Reviewed by Vicki
TITLE: Rough Road
SERIES: Lake Lovelace #2
AUTHOR: Vanessa North
PUBLISHER: Riptide Publishing
LENGTH: 185 pages
BLURB:
Eddie Russell is many things: A wealthy pillar of the community. An outrageous flirt. A doting best friend. A masochist with a kink for brawling with his bedmates. But he is definitely not a man who invites intimacy. His friends are close but few, his lovers rarer still.
When Eddie runs his Mercedes off the road on a hot July afternoon, Wish Carver comes to his aid—and leaves his number in Eddie’s phone. Wish, a road crew worker half Eddie’s age and sexy as sin, seems fascinated by Eddie’s different sides. Mutual attraction and compatible kinks ignite the sheets, but it’s their connection outside the bedroom that Eddie begins to crave.
When the two come down on opposite sides of a local issue, Eddie finds his growing feelings for Wish at odds with his business interests and his devotion to his best friend, local wakeboarding legend Ben Warren. Torn between old loyalties and his new love, Eddie is reluctant to make a choice. But he knows he can’t make Wish wait too long to make up his mind.
REVIEW:
What an enjoyable story! I picked this book up to review on a whim, realized it was the second in a series, and read them both in two days. I’ve seen Vanessa North here and there, may have read one of her stories in an anthology, but I’m really not familiar with her work. Both of the books in this series were great.
This series centers around a lake in Florida and its surounding town. The first book follows former wakeboarding star Ben, as he finds love with Dave. Ben’s best friend since school is Eddie, a very out and proud gay man. Eddie is the son of one of the founding families of the lake community, and is now a wealthy business owner. He is overly emotionally attached to Ben, having been friends with him for twenty years, and saving Ben from addiction after an accident ended his career. He owns the business Ben works for, they spend weekends together, and have been known to fuck on occasion. A relationship never worked between them, because Eddie is a total pain slut, and Ben can’t give him what he needs.
This second book follows Eddie as he finds a little love….
Eddie has a tire blowout and crashes his car, right in front of a group of road workers. One of the men pulls Eddie out of his car, calls him an ambulance, and programs his number in to Eddie’s phone, after a little connection is made between them. Eddie calls Wish, his new friend, to come keep him company at the hospital and the two end up fucking like naughty little bunnies.
Of course Eddie can’t have anything more with Wish, Eddie is twenty years older and in a different economic class. Not to mention he’s a pain in the ass, high maintenance, “cranky old queen”. But maybe….
While this very tentative relationship is happening, there is trouble brewing in town. Eddie’s arch-nemisis Rodney Romeo has a plan in works that will cost Eddie his business. Eddie’s family and Rodney’s family have been rivals for years, and Eddie refuses to let Rodney win. Rodney is the villain of this story, but his plan will also include a highway project that will keep Wish employed. Eddie, not realizing the issue with Wish and his job, starts to fight a political battle to keep Rodney from getting his way, but this creates some tension between Eddie and Wish, and further points out the differences between them.
So Eddie and Wish do really have some issues. Wish is very young, a bit rough, and prone to running off any time they get in a fight. Eddie is a drama queen, and clueless quite often. But you know where they work best? In bed. Holy crap do they work in bed.
Eddie is a masochist, but is not a submissive. He is very clear about that. He likes to be hurt, but not bossed around. Their sex scenes start as fights for dominance, and end with Eddie getting exactly what he wants. Bruises, welts, bites, and a sore ass. I loved it. They are soooo hot together! Eddie fully takes advantage of his young lover and his stamina.
Ben and Dave pop in and out of this story, I liked to see them again, and see how things have progressed in their relationship. They have a big thing that made me very happy. Plus we get to see Tina, their fellow wakeboarding friend, and her dog Elvis. Eddie’s mom was a great addition, as were Wish’s family members. I liked the community feeling of these books, they are all friends but more than that.
I know nothing about wakeboarding, but I got a really good feeling for the sport after reading both of these books. It definitely features more in the first book than this second one, but its still there. At first I was concerned I wouldn’t understand or get anything out of the sport talk, but I did actually like it and appreciate it’s inclusion as a focus for these books.
I loved Eddie as a side character in the first book, and I am happy he got his own story, man, and happy ending. I liked the differences between the two characters, and I loved the hot sex and physical connection between them. I liked the writing, the plot, and the details about a sport I wasn’t familiar with. All in all this was a great book! I hope we get some more books in this series, and I’ll go look for other books from this author to try!
RATING: 
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