Title: Part-Time Husband
Series: Trophy Husbands #1
Series: Trophy Husbands #1
Author: Noelle Adams
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Release Date: May 29, 2018
Blurb
On a Wednesday afternoon, I ask Trevor Bentley to marry me. He might be the most arrogant, obnoxious man I know, but I need him to be my husband for a year.
There are reasons.
He's not going to be a real husband. Just part-time. Yes, I have to live with him. And, okay, I also have to share his bed. And, sure, he's the sexiest and most exciting thing to ever happen to my controlled, organized life.
But still... It's only a part-time marriage. I'm not going to give him my heart. I know what I'm doing, and I'm too smart to fall for my husband.
I hope.
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Excerpt
I’m feeling warm and relaxed when I finally get out of the bathtub. I usually don’t walk around the apartment unless I’m covered up, but since Trevor isn’t here I just wrap a towel around me. My hair is piled up messily on my head, and I’m carrying my bath salts and soap.I open the bathroom door and nearly run smack into Trevor.
I give a little squeal and immediately look to make sure my towel is in place. “I didn’t know you were home.”
“I just got back.”
“I was in the bath.”
“I know that.” He’s looking very sexy in that end-of-the-day way he has. Five-o’clock shadow. Slightly loosened tie and collar. Half-lowered eyelids.
God, the man is hot.
“I could smell you as soon as I walked in the door,” he adds, the slightly rough words doing nothing for my flustered state of mind.
“You smelled me?” I’m thinking all kinds of things at the moment, and none of them are suitable to share with the man in front of me.
He reaches over, and I swallow over a quick intake of breath. I think he’s going to touch me. I want him to touch me.
He touches my bath salts instead. “This stuff you put in your bath. I smelled it as soon as I walked in, so I knew you were in the bath.”
“Oh.”
It’s perfectly logical. And kind of a disappointment.
His hand moves from the bath salts, and his fingertips slowly trail up my towel to the bare skin at my collarbone. It’s barely a touch, but it makes my skin flush and a pulsing begin between my legs.
“What did you think?” he asks, his voice a little thicker than normal.
“What did I think about what?” I have no idea what he’s talking about. My brain isn’t exactly functioning at the moment.
“What did you think I smelled?”
“I… I didn’t know.”
“I see.”
It feels like he sees.
It feels like he sees all of me.
I’m staring at his plum-colored tie because it’s safer than meeting his eyes right now. I don’t want him to know how I’m feeling, how his touch, his presence is affecting me.
“Melissa?”
“What?”
“Are you planning to move out of the doorway? I need to use the bathroom.”
And that’s like a load of bricks on my breathlessness. I’m able to meet his gaze now with a cool expression as I step out of the doorway.
I’m on my way out of the room when he says, “We can return to this particular conversation a little later in bed if you want.”
Damn it.
The asshole knows exactly what I was feeling just now.
Fortunately I’m not feeling it anymore.
“I don’t think so.”
“You sure?”
I turn my head and see him smirking at me, as if he thinks he’s already won.
He hasn’t won.
“Yes, I’m sure. The problem is that any kind of conversation with you involves your infuriating personality, and that just doesn’t work for me.”
“I think it does.”
“You think wrong. And I thought you had to go to the bathroom.”
“I do. We’ll resume this conversation at a later date.”
When the man you hate turns out to be the only man you could ever love...
Melissa is stuck in a tough position. She doesn't want to be forced to find a new job, but her overbearing grandfather has just made his position clear. Either she gets married or loses her position in the family's company. And while Melissa knows she could probably convince most any man to wed her for a year, there is one man who is perfect for the job. The guy who her grandfather considers to be his arch nemesis.
Persuading Trevor to marry her is the easy part. Remembering that their relationship isn't supposed to be a real one is actually much harder. Melissa can't seem to keep her heart out of the arrangement and it doesn't seem that Trevor is trying very hard to keep his distance either. But giving into their physical attraction may just be the first step to falling headfirst into love. When the year ends, will the couple decide to make their marriage arrangement a permanent one?
I can easily recommend this book to anyone who likes a good enemies-to-lovers tale. I sure do and it's one theme I don't get to read often enough. But the fact that I enjoyed this book so much is really a credit to the author's storytelling skills. I much prefer to read books that are written in dual point-of-view and this one wasn't. There is usually just something missing when we only get to see one side of the story and I tend to have trouble connecting with both characters if one of their voices is omitted.
However, this is one of the few times where I fell right into the story and straight in love with the hero, despite never getting a chapter in his head. The book was written in a way that I didn't need to. His expressions were so well described that I felt I was actually watching him in person. And Melissa's character was intelligent enough to usually pick up on the signs that were nonverbal anyway. I felt like I knew Trevor just as well as I did, Melissa. Really, kudos to the author for that. It isn't easily done and I've read several books where it wasn't done well enough, leaving me unable to fully connect with both characters.
As for the plot, it's just plain great. We get right into the fake marriage action and there is no lull anywhere in this book. Even when the characters are getting into a domestic routine, the pacing never slowed or bored me. And the romance? Oh, honey. That stuff was hot with a capital 'H'. I am glad I read this book after everyone went to bed because those scenes left me fanning myself and craving more. Thankfully, we get plenty and every one of them was fantastic.
In closing...
I am a little worried for the sister who is about to reconnect with an ex-con. However, I'll keep an open mind because I have learned to trust that this author will provide an amazing story. I look forward to it. Five suns!
Author Bio
Noelle handwrote her first romance novel in a spiral-bound notebook when she was twelve, and she hasn’t stopped writing since. She has lived in eight different states and currently resides in Virginia, where she reads any book she can get her hands on and offers tribute to a very spoiled cocker spaniel.
She loves travel, art, history, and ice cream. After spending far too many years of her life in graduate school, she has decided to reorient her priorities and focus on writing contemporary romances.
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