Book Review: "Hard To Handle" by Jessica Lemmon

ONCE BURNED
Sadie Howard never dates a guy more than once-but Fate has other plans for her when it comes to Aiden Downey, the one that got away. Aiden loved her, left her, and broke her heart. Yet suddenly she's bumping into him at every turn, driven to distraction by his wicked grin and rock-hard body. Now she can't resist finishing what they started-as long as she doesn't let herself fall in love . . .

TWICE AS TEMPTING
Aiden Downey threw away the best thing he ever had when he let Sadie go, and now he's determined to win back the woman he's always wanted. Sadie agrees to let him into her life-and her bed-as long as there are no strings attached. But Aiden's not about to make the same mistake again. Can he convince her to take a second chance on a once-in-a-lifetime love?

Sadie's best friend, Crickitt, is marrying Aiden's cousin, Shane, and it's at their wedding where we start off in this book.  With Crickitt and Shane gone, off to their honeymoon, we find a plastered Sadie and a well buzzed Aiden staying overnight at the reception site.  It's here where Aiden takes Sadie off to her room and puts her to bed where we find out through their thoughts what happened to make Sadie despise Aiden.  They dated a year prior and Aiden, when his mother went to a holistic cancer center in Oregon, broke it off with Sadie and went to be with his mother, hoping she'd beat the cancer.

A couple of month's later, we find Sadie working her butt off as a sales rep for a motorcycle parts company and she's off to land her biggest potential client before the owner hires another Parts Manager.  To Sadie's shock and chagrin, the owner has hired Aiden for the job.  With Aiden feeling guilty and still in love with Sadie, he gives her the account which wins her a big bonus at work and the number one sales position.

Now she sees him daily at the shop as she changes over the inventory, the displays and sells off the older, lesser quality competition products.  At this point, just about anyone can guess where THAT'S going to go.

Aiden is a wonderful hero in this book.  He's changed a lot after his mother's death.  He has goals and purpose and he knows what he wants his future to be.  And he wants Sadie to be a part of that future.  For a big, badass biker dude, he's a sensitive guy.  And of course, he's a little bit stubborn too because, well, he's a man.  "Nuff said.

On the other hand, Sadie is whiny and kind of a bitch when it comes to how she treats Aiden.  I mean, if I got this right, Sadie and Aiden had THREE DATES.  Now maybe there's a lot more to their previous relationship in the novella that precedes this book but by all accounts, it was THREE DATES.  I got the impression that they both fell in love with each other, most likely at first sight the first time around, and maybe that's why Sadie STILL won't let it go.  But she's also completely not understanding at all as to why Aiden broke if off.  The man's mother was dying of cancer and he chose to go be with her.  So, from this point of view, Sadie really appears to be the self-absorbed one of the two.

I had no trouble reading the book, it was a page turner.  But I got all sorts of annoyed at the back and forth that led to nowhere.  But I liked the end and the epilogue.  It just felt like there was a middle missing. A missing piece. There's all the back and forth and then the ending and epilogue comes real fast.

One of the things in the book that nagged at me was Sadie's fear of riding on a motorcycle.  Her backstory obviously includes a family and friends who ride. She has extensive knowledge of cycles, riding and the parts she sells.  So there's this story that carries through the book of this fear because her dad had an accident and Aiden had an accident.  As far as I can tell, nobody she knows has died in a motorcycle accident.  It seems irrational.  At one point, I thought the turning point (the missing piece) would be Aiden has another accident and Sadie finally sees that she really cannot live without Aiden.  After finishing the book, I kept asking myself if Jessica Lemmon may have even written that in and for some reason, took it out.

Overall, it's a good book.  Readers of romance novels will enjoy it, especially if they enjoy reading romances that go "off formula."  That being said, I'm extremely interested to read the first book which is about Crickitt and Shane and the novella which gives us the whole backstory on Sadie and Aiden.

I received a copy of this book from NetGalley in return for an honest review.