Lanie Wagner has it all—from her great
apartment in the heart of Los Angeles, to her amazing career as the city’s most
sought after wedding planner. Yes, ladies and gents, Lanie is riding high on
life.
But there's just one problem. When her
cousin called her and asked Lanie to plan her wedding, she knew it was going to
be a disaster. She hasn’t been back home in over five years, and her family is
out of control crazy. All of them.
With her cousin's wedding looming, Lanie
has to make a pivotal decision. She needs to find a date; a boyfriend to be
exact. She needs to find some poor bastard willing to pretend to be madly in
love with her for an entire week.
The only downside is Lanie is convinced
that no one is pathetic enough to take her up on her offer.
Lucas Sparks, aka Sparky, is the epitome
of every woman's wet dream. And he knows it. Born into a family of wealth and
privilege, Lucas has never wanted for anything. Well, that was until he was
given the opportunity to share an apartment with Lanie, the one woman that has
never fallen at his feet and begged for all that he could give her.
The same woman that acts like he doesn't
exist.
Even all the money in the world wouldn't
be enough to make his humble roommate fall in love with him. When he is given
the chance to spend a weekend away in the country with a woman he fantasizes
about on a daily basis, he’s determined to do whatever is necessary to go along
for the ride, even if it means pretending to be her man.
But playing pretend can be a dangerous
game, and considering the circumstances, Lanie and Lucas just might have signed
up for more than they bargained for.
In the grand scheme of romance novels, I think that the
“hire a boyfriend” storyline may be a bit overused. To be original, you have to have good
characters that set the story apart.
While I didn’t think that this book really distinguished itself from
others with this same theme, I did enjoy reading it, and found the characters
engaging and fun to read about.
This is the story of Lanie.
She is hitting it big as a wedding planner in L.A. when her cousin
enlists her to plan her wedding. From
the get-go, Lanie knows this will be a catastrophe. She dreads going back home and facing her
family, so she recruits the help of her friend and roommate Lucas (aka Sparky)
to be her pretend boyfriend who is supposed to be madly in love with her. The one hitch in the plan is that Lucas is
basically in love with Lanie already, so he’s hoping to parlay this opportunity
into a real relationship with her.
Nothing could go wrong from there, right? Riiiiiiight.
I really liked the characters in this book. Lucas is a total man-ho, but he has redeeming
qualities that make you take his side and hope that he wins Lanie’s heart and
attention. And Lanie’s family is
hi-larious. I had a few laugh out loud
moments for sure during the course of reading this.
My criticism of this book isn’t how it’s written, because I
find the author’s style engaging, but the fact that because this story is just
over 100 pages, it seems a lot of stuff is packed into a small package, and it
moves very fast. I would have liked the
characters and the story to be drawn out a bit more, to go a bit deeper and
give a little more satisfaction to the reader in the whole experience. From what I understand, there will be a book
2 and I will definitely be reading that one as well! 3.5 stars!
Before my hand landed on the doorknob, I was pulled back by Lucas’
grip on my arm. The song had changed, and my breath hitched when he pulled me
towards him, close to his bare chest. The song was deep and penetrating. I
closed my eyes and let the beat of the music drill into every pore in my body.
The singer’s voice was low and lust ridden, singing about being closer and how
the woman he loved took his heart and his soul. That and the way Lucas held
onto me sent a jolt of undeniable electricity zinging down my spine.
Lucas held me tighter to him and we moved slowly and deliberately
around the narrow hallway. I could feel his breath on my neck as he dipped his
head even further to rest it in the crook near my ear.
As the song continued, it felt as something shifted between us. I
tried to shake the idea from my mind and just allow myself to feel and move. I
felt Lucas’ hands slide down my back until they reached my hips. A visceral
shudder racked through my body, and I wanted to feel more. More of this.
We moved, swaying from side to side, and for a moment I let myself
forget about my problems and who I was actually with. I just let my body feel.
“Lanie.”
“Don’t,” I whispered. “Don’t say anything, please.”
With that Lucas pulled me completely flush against his bare chest
and I could feel his heart racing a mile a minute. It wasn’t as though I had
never thought about him as more than a friend, my best friend, but I knew it
would never work.
Every ounce of stress lifted from my body. I knew that I was
probably giving out the wrong signals, but I didn’t care. All of it felt so
damn good. He felt so damn good. And for once the man holding onto me didn’t
care about how my body looked or where I came from. He just held on.
My hands had been resting on Lucas’ shoulders and when he pulled
my hips into him, my fingers slithered around his neck until they reached the
little hairs at the nape of his neck. He dragged in a ragged breath. A throaty
growl bubbled up in his chest and I instantly felt a tightening deep in my belly.
I felt the warmth of his breath on my neck as he whispered,
“Lanie”, moving impossibly closer to me. “I...”
I didn’t respond. I just kept moving to the beat of the music. I
wanted to feel. I sucked in a breath when Lucas pressed himself against my
belly. And that’s when I felt it. He was hard.
Something in the pit of my belly stirred, and when I opened my
eyes and looked up at his face, Lucas’ brows were furrowed, almost as if he was
scowling, parting his lips slightly. His eyes were wild, searching my face. I
quickly pulled my hands away and bolted through my bedroom door, pressing my
back up against the wood.
Why did everything seem even more fucked up? All we did was
dance. Why the hell would he get a woody just by dancing with me? It’s not like
I’m one of those beautiful blonde, big boobed women he dates. Hell, those women
don’t even have an ounce of fat on them! What the hell, Sparky? Maybe he
needed to get laid. That had to be it. My vagina, his penis, so, so close. Oh,
God!
I
changed into my running gear. It was high time for that run.
Flora Roberts is an adult romance author with an affinity for writing
about characters that are utterly insane and wonderfully sexy.
Living on a ranch with her three kids in sunny California, Flora
thrives on the peace and quiet of her surroundings.
The first time the writing bug bit her in the butt was when she
discovered the world of fanfiction. From then on pulling her away from her
laptop was like pulling teeth out of an elephant.
Flora’s online stories have been read from around the world and have
been reviewed as laugh-out-loud funny.
If she isn’t on her laptop writing about swoon worthy characters that
make you spit your coffee out and laugh your ass off, you can more than likely
find Flora spending time with her kids, reading books by her favorite authors,
or sitting outside in the dark for no apparent reason.
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