Overall: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Readability: 📖📖📖📖
Feels: 🦋🦋🦋🦋
Emotional Depth: 💔💔💔💔
Sexual Tension: ⚡⚡⚡⚡
Romance: 💞💞💞💞
Sensuality: 💋💋💋💋
Sex Scene Length: 🍑🍑🍑
Steam Scale (Number of Sex Scenes): 🔥🔥
Humor: Yes, plenty of banter
Perspective: Third person from both the hero and heroine
More character focused or plot focused? maybe a bit more character, but overall a good mix of both
How did the speed of the story feel? medium to me
When mains are first on page together: Almost immediately
Cliffhanger: No, this ends with a happily ever after
Epilogue: Yes, two years later
Format: voluntarily read an advanced reader copy through NetGalley

Should I read in order?
It would be enjoyable to do so but not totally necessary. There is page time with the two prior heroines and you’ll have a whole new understanding of the beach tent where this couple rendezvous a few times from the prior book (One Duke Down) but overall it’s pretty minimal and not affecting the story other than knowing the 3 heroines are friends. (Series starts with Girls Before Earls)

Basic plot:
Leo returns to Bellehaven Bay after 4 years away – just in time for Kitty to show him up in the architecture contest the town is hosting.

Give this a try if you want:
- Regency (my assumption)
- English beach side small town setting (Bellehaven Bay)
- architect mains
- childhood frenemies to lovers
- unrequited love (from the hero)
- heroine has dimples!
- prodigal hero returns after 4 years away
- rake lessons
- opposites attract – Kitty is a bit emotional and whimsical and Leo is more rigid and by the book
- bet/bargain between the mains
- lower steam – there are 2 full scenes (and some kisses) but one is at the end

Ages:
- I don’t recall seeing them mentioned? But would think about mid twenties?

First line:
Forty-eight months and seventeen days away from Bellehaven Bay should have cured Leo of his infatuation with Miss Kitty Beckett – the beautiful, talented heiress who considered him her nemesis.

My thoughts:
I loved a lot about this book – the beginning was just perfection to me. I enjoy Bennett’s writing. But I got a bit frustrated in the latter half with Kitty.

The town is hosting an architecture contest that will give the winner 100 hundred pounds and put their building to construction. This gives our mains lots of opportunity for close proximity as they both work in Leo’s grandfathers former business (he’s since retired). Kitty also relies on Leo for calculations with math.

While the steam was a bit lower than what I wanted, I very much appreciated the tension and longing woven throughout the story that made it feel so much more satisfying when they come together. Also I love time spent on a first kiss!

I enjoyed the twists in this one and the bit of unexpected events for me – many of them turning the hero/heroine stereotypes on their head. I have read many heroes that protect their heart the way Kitty does, but not many heroines and it was fun to see the hero have to work so hard to earn her trust. Kitty is so strong and independent but deep down has such a longing for family – Leo needs to prove himself endlessly to Kitty.

And this was also my qualm with the story here was the that I think Kitty took it too far. My heart broke a bit when all was bared towards the end and it wasn’t enough after Leo had been nothing but amazing and steadfast. And it’s not just one time she acts like this but repeatedly. It made me doubt that she’d ever be happy with him, when he’s been nothing but pretty amazing to her.

There was a lot of refreshing communication in this one, and so much sweetness. I love Bennett’s writing and found myself highlighting so many passages. Despite my frustration with Kitty towards the end, this was such an enjoyable read and Bennett is becoming an author I want to read more of!

Quotes/spoiler-y thoughts: Any mistakes/typos are my own

More confident, more worldly, more jaded. The truth was that he was still, one hundred percent, smitten with Miss Kitty Beckett.
And she was quite oblivious to the fact.
---
But no. Leo Lockland didn’t possess shoulders that broad. He certainly didn’t have those muscular thighs or that chiseled jaw.
---
Leo took a moment to digest the compliment – if it could accurately be classified as such. Then he said, “Let me see if I have this correct.” He held up a hand, preparing to tick off her list on his fingers. “You think I need a woman who’s meek, desperate, and not hideous.”
---
“Deal,” she confirmed. She didn’t release his hand right away, but instead searched his face – as if she longed to know his secrets.
He didn’t let go, either. When it came to Kitty, he would never be the first to let go.
---
“What about you, Kitty?” Leo asked, his voice deeper than it had been a moment before. “Can I tempt you?”
The image of him in the tailor’s shop, his fawn-brown eyes gleaming, flashed in her head, unbidden. She reminded herself that he was referring to tarts.
---
For the space of several heartbeats, he said nothing, and she did her best to focus on the sounds and sensations around her. Seagulls cawing overhead. The low roar of the ocean in the distance. The salty sea air licking at her ankles. Leo’s warm breath puffing close to her neck. The erratic thumping of her own heart.
---
I love how much she can wreck him

“I never claimed that cricket was my area of expertise,” she quipped, but her gaze followed the ball as it sailed straight up, dropped down, and smacked the center of his palm. “But that...that’s good.”
“What, this?” He followed the track of the ball as it momentarily hovered above his head – there was nothing special about it.
“The tossing,” she clarified. “It makes you look athletic. Quite masculine.”
Jesus. The ball bounced off his chest and plopped sadly onto the sand.
---
She narrowed her eyes, signalying that she knew exactly what he was about. “I suppose that they are doing what they do best, Leo. Pleasing women. Alas, I cannot teach you everything. Right now we are simply attempting to master the basics.”
Holy hell. He wanted to say that if he were ever given the chance to please her that he wouldn’t devote his entire life to it. That he’d make it his personal mission to see that she was drunk on pleasure for the rest of her days. That he’d worship every wanton desire till she was a puddle of sated bliss.
---
“Yes. At the end of the summer,” she added. As if he couldn’t be expected to recall exactly when her brithday was.
It was August twenty-second.
---
“I can’t resist you,” he rasped. “I’ve tried. But tonight...tonight you’re mine.”

Content warnings: These should be taken as a minimum of what to expect. It’s very possible I have missed some.

- parental death
- elements of infidelity (not with the mains) – the hero’s father was a bigamist
- Kitty is an orphan and has some trust and abandonment trauma
- scenes of drowning peril where the hero saves a child
- scene of domestic violence – remembrance of the hero’s father slapping him in a confrontation but immediately being horrified and apologetic

Locations of kisses/intimate scenes:

Safe sex: 

Hero blows it in his hand the first scene. The second scene I believe is inside her but it’s the end of the book and they are together 

Hows the consent? 

Very good – the hero lets the heroine lead most of the interactions 

35% - kiss
45% - kisses and breast play in the cave
60% - 🔥 oral for her, missionary

He swept his thumb over her skin, making a series of small circles. “What if I said I wanted to kiss you here?”

“I would say...you can kiss me anywhere you like.”

62% - the next day starts with blow job for him (complete) – it’s pretty short and right after the prior scene so I’m combining.
69% - kiss
94% - 🔥 spooning sex

Bringing her to the brink. Daring her to come.
“Don’t,” he whispered. “Not yet.”