It’s funny, really. I’ve only wanted two people in my entire life. The first time, it was his brother.
And now, it’s his wife.
Dean Sheridan.
The teenage boyfriend of Caleb’s younger brother.
The one that Caleb drove away.
He has hated Caleb ever since.
When his house burns down, he is forced to move in with the Goodes.
He decides to have revenge on Caleb by seducing his wife.
Whatever the world wants to throw at us, we can take it.
Toss us into the fires of hell if it wants to. For this love we share, it would still be worth it.
Caleb and Briar Goode.
Their relationship began with Briar cheating on her then boyfriend.
Caleb and Briar have been together since college.
They are happily married with a child.
Or are they?
They don’t communicate with each other.
Them trying for a baby but not succeeding has caused major stress on both.
Is there anything that can help them fix their relationship?
Honestly, this book was really slow to begin with and I was even a bit bored for the first 20 %. The story was similarly told in past and present tense with many chapters beginning with a flashback that revealed how Caleb and Briar’s relationship came to be. Honestly, I think I would have preferred the whole flashback portion in the beginning of the book and then some of the present could have been cut. However, I understand why the past was revealed little by little as the book progressed, even if I did not like it.
I want her.
I want to seduce her. I want to make her mine. I want to have Briar Goode at my mercy and in my bed.
Then I want to see the look on Caleb’s face when he finds out.
When Dean was a teenager and Caleb forbade him from seeing Isaac, Caleb’s teenage brother and Dean’s boyfriend, anymore, Dean always thought Caleb did it because he was homophobic and resented Isaac for who he was and Dean for what he was to Isaac. That is what causes his resentment towards Caleb and his desire to cause a bigger rift between Caleb and Briar by seducing her.
Caleb’s behavior was all over the place. At first, he was apprehensive about Dean living with them but mostly passive. All of a sudden, he is raging to Dean and being all possessive about Briar. Then, all of a sudden, he ends up messing around with Dean himself and does not care if Briar is involved with him. I did not really catch up to Caleb with his feelings before they changed again. Still, I kind of understood his reasoning behind his actions and feelings even though it was lacking. Also, I feel like he was, largely, overrun by Briar and he let it happen. In the end, he managed to grow some balls but damn did it take a long time for him.
I reminisce on the way it felt when we first met. When I thought Caleb was going to save me. When it felt as if he was my liberation, my safe space, my truth.
Briar was just someone I did not really like in general. I was not a fan of present Briar but when I realized how past Briar behaved, I think she did not deserve Caleb. In college, she was an insecure little b*tch imho and, if I am being honest, she should have been the one who was beaten up. Therefore, when Dean and Caleb ended up worshipping Briar, I was not a fan of it. I would have rather the dynamics of the relationship to be focused on Caleb or Dean.
My heart wants Dean, too. Sweet, dominant, compassionate Dean. But wanting and having are two different things, and if loving Caleb is my crime, then not having Dean is my punishment.
For me, it was more petty than hot from Briar when she sent the video of her and Dean having sex to Caleb at work and urged him to think about his reaction since it might be a dealbreaker in their relationship. Honestly, the guts of this woman? You go and have a revenge fuck with the boytoy that has been spicing up your and your husband’s sex life and then pretty much determine how he can react to it? That’s just fucked up. Or how she just moped in bed and drank every night at the end when Dean was MIA for a week? Bitch please, get a grip. You expect your household to run itself and your husband to go to work but wallow in self-pity yourself.
I want him. In a physical, torturous, heart-wrenching way, I want him. Dean is everything I crave out of my life. Independent and headstrong.
But I love my husband, and I love my family.
I don’t understand why I so desperately feel this need to be free from it.
Honestly, with Briar being described as sweet and good and a bit naive just does not sit well with me. I saw her more as petty, selfish and, especially in their college days, a wimp. I’ll know most people have loved Briar but, honestly, she was my least favorite of all three main characters. She wanted to have her cake and eat it too without budging an inch.
I don’t belong here. I don’t belong with a happily married couple, regardless of how comfortable I feel with them.
I’m the infiltrator, the third wheel, the home-wrecker.
It was actually ironic that Dean felt like the home-wrecker and how he was slightly presented as one as well. Especially considering that Caleb and Briar’s love story began by Briar cheating on her college boyfriend with Caleb and her being unable to decide between the two, even though it was pretty obvious to all involved that she was just a wimp who was afraid to dump her boyfriend for Caleb.
I hate this. I hate that my wife has to bear this and won’t even let me make it better for her.
But I can’t tell her I hate it.
It was kind of sweet how Dean and his expertise as an escort managed to fix pretty much all the problems, especially the lack of communication, in Caleb and Briar’s relationship just by engaging in threesomes with them and making them speak about their feelings afterward. Still, it seems a bit naive that all of a sudden the problems were solved that easily, especially because their sex life pre-Dean consisted of Caleb quickly coming in Briar during the right days and her wanting no reciprocation. Not to mention the lack of passion and romance. No wonder Briar was all hot for Dean immediately when he showed even minor interest towards her, even though the abhorrent state of her sex life with Caleb was largely due to her own fault.
Fun? Did she literally call that fun, as if we just finished playing a board game? I Eiffel Towered my wife with a twenty-six-year-old male prostitute, and she called it fun.
Sara Cate mentions that this was her spiciest book to date. I don’t know if I’ve been reading the same books that she has written before because I would definitely disagree with her. I’d say the first four books in SPC were a lot better as books. Also, they had more and better spice as well. Still, I have to admit the spice in this book was good, even though it did not quite reach the aforementioned level of spice but I’d say there was definitely less spice in this book than SPC. However, I have to hand it to Sara Cate: she really does know how to write a throuple!
”This is a very dirty little wife you have, Caleb.”
“Yes, I do. And she’s all ours.”
The next book will feature Caleb’s twin brother Lucas and Sadie, the girl who helps run Sage’s club. It seems pretty obvious there will be some student-professor vibes in it and I am crossing my fingers and hoping it would reach SPC level because, you guessed right, I will read it in any case.
• • • • •
Please, please, please let this book reach SPC-tier spice and blow me away. That is how badly I just need an amazing read that will blow my mind.