Series: The Edens #4
Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Steam: 🔥🔥🔥🔥
Release Date: January 31st, 2023
CW: cheating, toxic relationships, difficult parental relationships, gun violence, mentions of cancer
Until after one weekend in Las Vegas, she comes home married to a stranger.
Jasper must have put her under a spell with those soul-deep eyes because after a single night together, they woke up husband and wife. Her only hope is to keep this marriage a secret until it’s annulled. Then she’ll pretend it never happened.
Except Jasper begs her to stay married. To fake it for three months so she can accompany him to a wedding. Maybe she’s lost her mind to agree. But her brooding husband seems desperate. It’s only three months, right? Then she’ll say goodbye to Jasper Vale, and with any luck, hello to her new hotel.
Well, damn. Devney Perry gave Eloise an incredible story! I have loved the youngest sister of the Eden family and her drive to protect and keep the hotel that’s in her name. I always thought of her as the kindest, sweetest, most generous and hardest working person of the Eden family. Then again, they’re all pretty incredible. But we’ve seen how much Eloise has struggled and how she’s fought to come out on top, so to have her story be all kinds of beautiful made me happy. And don’t even get me started on the grump that is Jasper, oof *fans self*
Jasper Vale has:
✨ a shotgun wedding that turns into a marriage of convenience
✨ small town montana
✨ grumpy x sunshine (of a sort)
✨ strangers to lovers
✨ eden family dynamics
✨ forced proximity
✨ dirty talking hero
✨ “that’s my wife”
✨ wiiiiiide open doors
✨ faking it till they make it
I’m a sucker for a fake relationship or a marriage of convenience, so falling in love with Eloise and Jasper’s complicated story wasn’t that hard. One night in Vegas together turns their world upside down and despite deciding to get their shotgun wedding annulled, they hold onto the marriage for…reasons. I loved their relationship, though. It’s complicated and it’s a little messy, but it’s also VERY hot. Eloise and Jasper might not seem like the perfect match, but that’s kind of what makes them work so well together. I loved their banter, the chemistry and obviously the sexual tension. I admired both of them for thinking that they could stay away from each other when they clearly just want to bone all the time!
Having met Jasper in Garnet Flats and only seen him through Talia and Foster’s eyes, to see him so open in his own book was incredible. Jasper is a rough kind of guy, he’s got all these secrets that do come out eventually and he’s struggling to make sense of the world and his place in it, but he finds all of that in Quincy, Montana. I loved watching him go from being a scowly, grumpy man to loosening up a little because of Eloise. Speaking of…Eloise and her struggles with proving to her family that she’s responsible and worthy of this job and owning the hotel continues and my heart hurt for how desperately she wanted it and felt like she had to do so much more than necessary to get what she wanted. I wasn’t overly pleased with her parents through this book, but Eloise has my whole heart.
“It had happened last night, when I’d stood on the porch of the A-frame, watching my wife stand beneath the trees wearing only a towel, letting the rain soak her face. Eloise was my wife. There wasn’t a damn thing fake about this marriage. Not anymore.”
The steam in this book is next level off the charts hot. When you put two characters who are attracted to each other and fighting all other feelings in the same a-frame home, you’re bound to get explosive sex and chemistry. And Jasper and Eloise don’t hold back. I think, personally, this might be Devney’s best set of sex scenes yet? I loved every single one, I could feel the desire between these characters through each scene and might have (no shame) read some of them more than once.
Knowing who comes next and what the book is about has me champing at the bit for it. But then it also makes me aware there’s only one more Eden after that and I’m sad to say goodbye to this family!
Thanks to Valentine PR for generously providing me with an advance copy. I am voluntarily leaving an honest review.
anna reads here 