“Hot, heartwarming, and hilarious...This is a
knockout.” —Publishers Weekly, starred review
Award-winning, highly-acclaimed author Adriana Herrera
delivers the sexy, modern enemies-to-lovers romance you’ve been waiting for.
Starting over is more about who you’re with than where
you live…
Julia del Mar Ortiz is not
having the best year.
She moved to Dallas with
her boyfriend, who ended up ditching her and running back to New York after
only a few weeks. Left with a massive—by NYC standards, anyway—apartment and a
car lease in the scorching Texas heat, Julia is struggling…except that’s not
completely true. Running the charitable foundation of one of the most iconic
high fashion department stores in the world is serious #lifegoals.
It’s more than enough to
make her want to stick it out down South.
The only monkey wrench in
Julia’s plans is the blue-eyed, smart-mouthed consultant the store hired to
take them public. Fellow New Yorker Rocco Quinn’s first order of business?
Putting Julia’s job on the chopping block.
When Julia is tasked with
making sure Rocco sees how valuable the programs she runs are, she’s caught
between a rock and a very hard set of abs. Because Rocco Quinn is almost
impossible to hate—and even harder to resist.
Buy Here to Stay by Adriana Herrera
Julia
I stepped into the elevator and shoved my phone into the
pocket of my dress, took a moment to send a prayer to the employee discount
that let me buy bomb clothes on a nonprofit worker budget, and did some mental
math of what could be going on.
Was the program
really in trouble? Could we actually get shut down?
Nope, I would not go there. I would not think about what
it would be like to get on a plane back to New York dumped and unemployed. Not
happening.
A distraction. That’s what I needed. Just as the door to
the elevator was about to close, someone got in. The fact that I was eye level
with the base of his throat was a good clue as to who it was, but when he
opened his mouth and the now familiar knee-weakening baritone echoed off the
walls of the elevator, I got my confirmation.
“Morning, Ms. Ortiz.” That voice could be used for
interrogation tactics. Every muscle in my body loosened at the same time
whenever I heard it.
I squeaked out a “Morning” and took my time lifting my
head all the way up to look at the last person in the world I wanted
overhearing my conversation with my mother.
Him.
Rocco Fucking Quinn, otherwise known as the “Team Leader”
for the consulting firm looking to bag my job. The guy with the New York
City-est name on the planet. I hadn’t exactly gotten personal with Mr. Quinn,
but I picked up on that accent the first time we met.
“What’s good?” I really tried to sound polite, but my
Queens jumped out in situations like this. I did not gulp, because I could not
let this fucker see me sweat. I managed not to cut my eyes at him, but it was a
close call.
I took him in, ramrod straight, every hair in its place,
not a wrinkle in sight, and decided he could not be the proprietor of the
laugh-choke from before. The man seemed to be completely lacking a sense of
humor. I knew he must have teeth but I’d never
seen them.
Yeah, definitely not him. That fact rallied my spirits a
little bit as I stood close enough to pick up on how he smelled. Like the ocean
and something woodsy. That was not helpful information.
Without saying another word, I ran my eyes over him. It
struck me that he was not wearing something bespoke like pretty much everyone
here. Don’t get me wrong, he still looked good enough to eat, but he was
clearly on a budget. And at a place where everyone looked like they were
heading to a New York Fashion Week photo shoot, it was sort of jarring. Still,
the suit fit him well. And there was no question, this guy could wear the fuck
out of a suit. I held back a whimper when I envisioned him in a Brioni or a
Zegna. They’d have to put out a heat advisory for the building if that ever
happened.
“I thought I could detect a familiar accent when I was
coming down the hall.” His perfectly blue eyes twinkled at what I was certain
was an expression of utter mortification on my face. He sounded pleasant
enough, but he was also alluding to the fact that I was yapping on my phone.
This wasn’t the first time he tried to be cute. Rocco Quinn seemed to like
fucking with me. And it was only a matter of time before he stepped on my last
nerve and I reamed him out.
Thankfully, just as I was scrambling to respond to his
comment, the elevator got to my floor. I was planning to just leave him hanging
and run off, but he was hot on my heels.
Dammit.
“Sounds like your mom misses you.”
Oh, for fuck’s sake. Why did he have to act all fake
nice?
I nodded without looking at him. “She does. Listen, Mr.
Quinn—”
“You can call me Rocco.”
Nope, that was not happening. I was not letting this sexy
bastard talk me into getting all chummy with him. I was already on thin ice as
it was. He could keep his pheromones and his slick-as-fuck expressions to his
damn self. I came to a dead stop a few feet away from the conference room door
where my boss—and whatever shitty news she was about to give me—was waiting.
When I turned around, Rocco was looking down at me with
an expectant smile. God he was handsome, that jet-black hair so dark it almost
had a tinge of blue and those eyes, piercing. And I guess he had teeth after
all, and of course they were perfect. Asshole. I shook my head hard when my
traitorous brain started wondering what Pantone color his eyes would be.
Get your head in the game, Julia del Mar.
I straightened my back, determined to fight off the
debilitating effects of those gleaming teeth and perfectly pink lips. I had to
remember this niceness was probably his way of getting us to let our guard
down. He was here to find ways to cut jobs. I was not about to mouth off and
get myself fired, but I needed to get some things clear.
“Look.” I was proud of myself for not rolling my neck or
pointing at his face. “I know you’re trying to be nice, but you make me
nervous.” I pulled on the hem of my blue polka-dot dress and smoothed my yellow
cardigan, avoiding eye contact at all costs.
“Why do I make you nervous?”
Uh, maybe because
you’re here to close down as much of the foundation as you can.
I refrained from actually saying that because I had not been
raised by a Puerto Rican man and Dominican woman just so I could act like I had
no home training with the guy who could get me fired. But it was a close call.
“I’m sorry for saying that. You don’t make me nervous.”
Lies.
Rocco Quinn didn’t just make me nervous. He made me want
to run my hands all over that big-ass body and moon over his almost but not
quite curly hair and blue eyes, in spite of the fact that I knew he was out
here gunning for my entire program. And yet, I still wanted to kiss the hell out
of him while I climbed him like a sequoia.
Copyright © 2020 by
Adriana Herrera
Disclaimer: ARC copy was provided in exchange for an honest review.
I was pleasantly surprised by how much I liked this book. TLDR: it's a charming rom-com with down to Earth characters. The main characters are Julia del Mar Ortiz and Rocco Quinn are ex-New Yorkers and newish transplants in Texas. Julia moved to Dallas because of her boyfriend. Not long after, said boyfriend dumps Julia and moves on with a new girl on his arm. What a jerkface. But this doesn't stop our girl. Julia rolls with the punches and decides to make it on her own in Texas. She has a job managing the charity department of a department store. It's stressful, but it's a job she enjoys. Unfortunately, job security is up in the air after a consultant, Rocco Quinn (another New York transplant) is brought in to evaluate and cut down on department costs. Despite their immediate attraction to each other, with her job on the line, Julia has her guard up. As a character, Julia is passionate, generous, and authentic. The familial closeness between Julia and her family in New York is felt through the pages. Her passion for helping those less fortunate gives depth to her character. As for Rocco, the author did a good job making him charming, savvy, and likable. Despite how the plot makes him out to be a bad guy for having the power to potentially first Julia, he's actually an okay guy. He genuinely cares about his job and loves his little sister. There's a duality to Rocco that the author was able to express through scenes with Julia. At the beginning of their "courtship," their jobs serve as roadblocks to the lovebirds getting better acquainted. As time goes on, they begin to spend more time together and emotionally connect...and then physically connect, if you know what I mean. *wink wink, nudge nudge* I gotta say, the sex scenes were spicy! All in all, with loveable characters and a decent plot, this was a solid release.
4 STARS
About Adriana Herrera
Adriana was born and raised in the Caribbean,
but for the last fifteen years has let her job (and her spouse) take her all
over the world. She loves writing stories about people who look and sound like
her people, getting unapologetic happy endings.
When she’s not dreaming up love stories,
planning logistically complex vacations with her family or hunting for discount
Broadway tickets, she’s a trauma therapist in New York City, working with
survivors of domestic and sexual violence.
Her Dreamers series has received starred
reviews from Publishers Weekly and Booklist and has been
featured in The TODAY Show on NBC, Entertainment Weekly, NPR, Library
Journal and The Washington Post. Her debut, American
Dreamer, was selected as one of Booklist’s ‘Best Romance Debuts of
2019’, and one of the ‘Top 10 Romances of 2019’ by Entertainment Weekly. Her
third novel, American Love Story, was one of the winners in the
first annual Ripped Bodice Award for Excellence in Romantic Fiction. Adriana is an outspoken advocate for diversity in romance
and has written for Remezcla and Bustle about Own Voices in the genre. She’s
one of the co-creators of the Queer Romance PoC Collective. Represented
by Taylor Haggerty at Root Literary.
Connect with Adriana Herrera
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