River Road by Jayne Ann Krentz

Image linked from Goodreads

I quite enjoyed this return to the books I remember reading when I first started getting into romance. This story is proof that Krentz can step away from the Arcane novels to return to her contemporary novels (the ones without paranormal aspects) and still craft a really good story. At the same time this story felt fairly modern, I really felt the connection to Krentz's earlier works.
The book opens with Lucy Sheridan being taken away from a teenage party by a three-years-older Mason Fletcher. She has a crush on this enigmatic male but she's still pissed that he peremptorily pulled her out of a party that she was going to leave anyway.
But Mason has a good reason for pulling her away, one he doesn't want to tell her about. But the problem goes away when the teen at the heart of the issue vanishes.
Thirteen years later, Lucy, now a genealogical researcher, returns to Summer River to sell the property left to her by her aunt and deal with the shares in a family company left to her by her aunt's partner (Krentz isn't usually so coy about possible homosexual relationships but I prefer to believe because it's such a non-issue that she doesn't feel the need to spell it out.) Of course, Mason is also there, healing his psyche after a particularly bad outcome with his company.
Long time readers will be able to figure out pretty quickly what the twist at the end is going to be but I didn't feel like it took any enjoyment out of the story.
Why not five stars? I really wish that Lucy and Mason had kept using condoms until they were in a committed relationship.

Four stars

This book came out January 7th, 2014