Romancing His Rival

Elena Mason is perfectly happy working alongside her friends Kingsley and Arden in Cape Harmony. Although she truly enjoys her job, she can’t put her broken engagement behind her. So her friends send her to a remote cabin to “help” her relax and try to move past Scott. Elena doesn’t expect company to arrive in the form of her biggest enemy...Lucas Albright.

Looking to get his creative juices flowing, Lucas treks to his sister’s cabin. Upon arriving, he’s accosted by a pillow to the face and his “mortal” enemy...Elena. Elena believes Lucas to be responsible for her broken engagement. As her ex’s best friend and best man, Lucas never really saw them as a serious couple. Ultimately, he wasn’t responsible for the broken engagement but that’s how Elena sees it. A snow storm has them trapped in the cabin for the evening, breaking down a few “walls”. When Elena takes off the next day, she accidentally leaves behind a sketch. A sketch that could ultimately lead to more...

I enjoyed Lucas and Elena’s slow burn. From enemies to friends to more. Although I truly enjoyed the story, I wanted to knock Elena upside the head! She was soooo mean to Lucas, blaming him for her broken engagement. If my fiancé broke it off with me, I would hope I could step back long enough to look at the “why” and not blame others. Her ex was truly a slime ball, but she was blind to his MANY flaws! Lucas liked Elena for WHO she was, not who he WANTED her to be. He accepted the fact that she loved Cape Harmony and her job. He was also supportive of her artwork/sketches, not for what it could do for “them”. Don’t get me wrong, he would benefit from the use of her sketches but he urged her to get out of her comfort zone in a supportive way. Great enemies to more love story! I read a gifted copy and all opinions stated are my own.

It starts off with the two of them trapped in a snowstorm around Christmas. It’s his sister’s condo. It’s also the condo of her friend’s grateful client. They get to know each other and eat expired Graham crackers, which sounds extremely gross to me. I didn’t feel like that scene was endearing, just disgusting.

Then they go back to their real lives, and the hero needs the heroine’s artwork for a big project that’ll make him a partner. It gets him there, and his grand gesture is to give it all up for her because it was really her work that made the project succeed. He’s also close friends with her recent ex-fiance, and the hero convinced the former fiance to dump the heroine. He told the heroine that she wasn’t good enough because she wasn’t college educated, which is awful.

It just isn’t a good story.

The blurb drew me in and enemies to lovers is one of my favorite tropes.

I liked the overall storyline and Lucas. Lucas was hands down my favorite character in this whole story. He's a decent guy and a great friend. Elena, I just couldn't seem to like her. Her obsession with life timeline just seemed ridiculous. She seemed so immature and I just couldn't get over it.

*This is my voluntary review of an advanced reader copy*