Rating: 4 Stars

Publisher: Kerry Kilpatrick

Genre: Gay Romance

Tags: Contemporary, Daddy Kink (Age Play), Fake Relationship, Romance, Series

Length: 288 Pages

Reviewer: Cindi

Purchase At: Amazon

Blurb –

Love doesn’t happen on a schedule.

Gabriel Alves is well aware of his status as a daddy. Still, his all-consuming career as an architect leaves no time for relationships. That is until he needs a fake date for a New Year’s Eve bash.

Enter Rory Quinn, a sassy college lecturer with a knack for disastrous dating and a house on the brink of condemnation. Their chance meeting leads to a mutually beneficial proposition. Gabe will help Rory save his inherited home from crumbling around him. In return, Rory will pretend to be Gabe’s little for the night.

As the two double down on their charade, sparks fly, and the thin line between fact and fiction blurs. But when the clock strikes midnight, will their arrangement crumble under the weight of their commitments and an interfering ex? Or will they find a love worth celebrating beyond the confines of their fake relationship?

This MM low-angst romance comes with the bestest of friends, jumping in with both feet, and a guaranteed HEA.

The Just A Little series is part of an interconnected world, but all can be read as standalones. You can see more of the world in Almstead Newcomer’s Club.

JALL book has been reformatted and edited for clarity.

Review –

A few weeks ago, I was scrolling on Facebook and saw a sponsored ad for Just A Little Fling, book #3 in this series. Something had me checking out the comments. I wish I wouldn’t have, honestly. The amount of hate that I saw aimed at the author and the book made me sick. In a nutshell, it was a bunch of homophobic idiots who felt the need to say such horrific things about something they totally didn’t understand; in this case, Daddy and little relationships. One comment stood out, and it was actually a good one. Somebody pointed out that the reason the ad showed up on these homophobes’ timelines was because of their search history. You know how those pesky algorithms work. 🙂

Anyway, I reported the bad comments even knowing that Facebook won’t do anything. It also had me wanting to read the book in support of the author. With it being #3 in the series, and we know I hate reading books out of order, I went and downloaded the first book. It’s been a while since I’ve wanted to read a Daddy/little book, but I’m glad I picked this one up. It was too cute.

Rory has just inherited his late uncle Tobias’ old house. It’s a large historical house in a prime location. Developers want it, and they want it bad. Some have even gone so far as to try to have it condemned so Rory would be forced to sell. They don’t want the house, just the waterfront land. Rory is disorganized, something he inherited from Uncle Tobias. All the house paperwork is a mess, and Rory is kind of in over his head with trying to figure it all out. He’s at his favorite late-night diner when he says out loud that he needs an architect. And what do you know? A man sitting nearby, that would be Gabriel, just happens to be an architect. He overhears the conversation and offers his services – for a favor. Well, not quite a favor because money and services will change hands, but still.

Gabriel, a Daddy, has lied to his best friends about having a little. I ended the book unsure of why he lied, but anyway. There’s a New Year’s Eve event coming up at a kink club and Gabriel is expected to bring his boy. The friends are Reed, a Daddy, and Jakob, his boy/little. I loved them both, especially Jakob.

Gabriel offers to help Rory with his house issues – permits, contractors, etc. – if he would pretend to be his boy for the event. He also offers to pay Rory $10,000 for doing it. There are several problems with all that. One, Rory has never considered himself a little, though it’s so obvious to the reader. Two, their pretend thing turns sexual pretty fast. No, not just sexual. Gabriel goes into total Daddy mode, and Rory falls quickly into the little mind space. Gabriel gives Rory the nickname of Bunny for reasons mentioned in the book.

They both realize that what they’re feeling for each other stopped being pretend pretty much the first day, but neither is willing to share their feelings just yet. This not sharing backfires spectacularly on Gabriel’s part when he has to go to Europe for one of his work projects. This is when a ‘big misunderstanding’ happens. I didn’t blame Rory in the slightest for his reaction to this misunderstanding, though I did find the resolution to all that quite cheesy. Gabriel also had the tendency to say the wrong thing more often than not.

I mentioned Jakob and Reed. Jakob is a total sweetheart. I just wanted to hug him, and maybe color with him. 🙂 Reed was the ultimate Daddy. There’s also Anders, Rory’s best friend. Anders is in a bad relationship. He’s the perfect best friend. I look forward to him having his own story if he doesn’t already.

Overall, I enjoyed this. It wasn’t Daddy/little overkill. Rory and Gabriel were really good together from pretty much the first time they met. Things did happen super fast, and I was okay with that. I’m sure I’ll continue with the series. I do want to go back and read Reed and Jakob’s story. It was also a very strange coincidence that the book I decided to read during traveling hell just happens to be set in the Pacific Northwest. I’m actually in Tacoma, having driven across the country with my husband for his job. I didn’t plan to read anything until we were settled in our temporary apartment, but I’m glad I read this one along the way. I’m officially settled now, so maybe I can jump back in and read the others.