Good Guy by Kate Meader

After leaving the Special Forces, Levi Hunt is again playing hockey. But he's shocked when he's moved up to the pros after a series of injuries on the Chicago Rebels team. The press is ecstatic for the story but only one person has history with Levi, Jordan Cooke.

Jordan's husband was Levi's best friend. The night he was buried, Levi and Jordan kissed and Levi still feels a massive amount of guilt. Jordan is a little more balanced.
She knows that it was a strange time for them both and that grief can cause people to do things they wouldn't normally. But she's not back in his life to pursue romance; she has the chance to land time on a network if she can get a big scoop. But she's not exactly sure that she wants to be the one to do that to Levi. Sometimes the past is best left covered. Forced proximity and a simmering heat may not lead Jordan to the story of her career, but it may lead her to love.
This was a very frustrating story to read and the end was especially so. It relies on the trope of grown-ass people not just TALKING to each other and assuming that they know what is going on and what is going to be best for the other person. Plus, there is a pretty big bomb and it's sort of resolved but I wish there had been more.

Three stars
This book comes out July 30th
ARC kindly provided by publisher and NetGalley
Opinions are my own

Then Came You by Kate Meader

If you've read other books in this series, you know Aubrey and Grant. Once married, they've been divorced for about a year but the air still sizzles when they're together. At the end of "Illegally Yours," Aubrey showed up to a wedding with her arm in a cast refusing to explain what had happened to her. Grant is understandably worried about how she's going to get back to her parents for Thanksgiving. She can't drive, she doesn't like to fly, and the aging cat Aubrey refuses to leave behind won't be allowed on the train. So he does what any sane person would do, he offers to drive her over to Boston himself and then pretend to still be married for her nearly ninety-year-old grandmother's benefit. It works... a little too well.

This book would have benefitted a LOT from more growth on Grant's part. Dude was unbending and uncompromising the entire book. Everything that happened was Aubrey's fault and they couldn't get back together until she was "healed." He was the white knight there to rescue her rather than helping her figure it out on her own and he wasn't really able to step back enough to allow her to figure it out her way, it all had to be his.

I really like Meader's books in general but this one was just okay. Only the writing saved it from being a two star book for me.

Three stars

This book comes out May 7

ARC kindly provided by publisher and NetGalley

Opinions are my own

Illegally Yours by Kate Meader

Lucas Wright loves being a fancy-free divorce lawyer. Yeah, some of his clients aren't the best but he really, really likes his life. Well, most of it.
Trinity Jones likes her work. She's like a sommelier but for whiskey. And she is good at her job. Her personal life is... more complicated. Especially when she meets Lucas and sparks immediately fly. But he's the man who is representing her sister's soon-to-be-ex-husband. And that relationship is already complicated. So how is this going to play out.
I liked Lucas. He was generally an adult and was trying to do the right thing. Mostly. Trinity was a bit of an enabler and I had a harder time connecting with her because it was frustrating to see what she was doing. Overall, an okay book -- didn't love the middle-endish but the ending felt like they might have a chance at HEA.

Three stars
This book comes out January 22
ARC kindly provided by publisher and NetGalley

Undone By You by Kate Meader

Dante Moretti is an out gay man. That is generally hard enough but he's the GM of a a pro hockey team, specifically, the Chicago Rebels. So he's not about to make his life any harder by going after any of his players. Especially not Cade "Alamo" Burnett, a young player who's not even out. But then he sees Cade at a gay bar. And then Cade makes the moves on him. Soon, they're in a steamy relationship. But Dante just can't believe that love might be part of the equation. Maybe Cade can.

This is supposedly the third book in the series but, at just over a hundred pages, I thought this was a novella, not a whole book. And that was part of my problem with it. I was really hoping that the "#3" meant that Dante and Cade were going to have a fuller story. This was fine but not what I was hoping for.

Three and a half stars
This book comes out March 5th
ARC kindly provided by NetGalley

So Over You by Kate Meader

Isobel Chase was raised to be a winner. While her father ignored her older sister and hid her younger sister, he groomed her to be a hockey player. The Best hockey player. Which is why he chased off Vadim Petrov when he dared to de-virgin-ize Isobel when both were teens.
Now the two have been thrown together again. Vadim has just been drafted to the team Isobel inherited, with her sisters, from her father. And, because he's injured, Isobel is working with him to get him back up to speed. It will result in a player for the team and a new chance for Isobel (her professional career ended after about 20 minutes with a skate to the helmet).
There are a number of stumbling blocks -- she's technically his boss, sleeping with him might look like she's using him to help further her coaching career, their first time together was less than stellar for her... but the chemistry between them is enough to overcome them all.
This wasn't my favorite Meader book. There was a lot of Vad being just SO Russian and it was a little hard to take. I didn't read the first book and didn't feel like I needed to and I am very much looking forward to Dante's love story.

This book comes out December 6
Three stars
ARC kindly provided by NetGalley