Leigh's A Rogue's Rules for Seduction (NO SPOILERS HERE, BABY)

A Rogue’s Rules for Seduction (Last Chance Scoundrels, book 3)

Eva Leigh

SPOILER FREE REVIEW

Stars:  Excellent ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ (strong woman, but can you be too strong? tortured hero; um, is that an orgy on a remote Scottish island? good friends who stick together and make your life wonderful or hell—it depends! EMBROIDERY)

Heat rating:   🔥🔥🔥🔥(Eva Leigh never disappoints)

Cover rating:   A. The cover models are PERFECT. Probably the most accurate I’ve seen. The heat these two are giving off is unmistakable. She’s on top, which fits Willa. The pink gown (IYKYK).

Oh, Willa and Dom.

I have been waiting for you for so long (Amazon has informed me that I preordered this on July 29, 2022, so yeah, basically). And I wanted it to be fire 🔥.

And it was.

Let me set the scene for the AMAZING Last Chance Scoundrels series. I’ve reviewed the previous books, 1: A Good Girl’s Guide to Rakes and 2: How the Wallflower was Won in detail here on my blog. You definitely must read those before you tackle this book, A Rogue’s Rules for Seduction. But it’s no hardship. The previous in the series are two of the best books that I’ve ever read, and Rogue’s Rules doesn’t disappoint. Since you’ve read the first two (I warned you, don’t make me call the Squirrel!), you know that the entire series revolves around Dominic Kilburn legit leaving Willa Ransome at the altar, basically set in motion by Willa’s brothers (and Dom’s best friends). Well, Willa is devastated, and she’s no shrinking violet, so it’s a wonder that she didn’t hunt him down and cut off his . . . well, you get my point. But yeah, the families aren’t particularly pleased with this (Dom’s dad isn’t a bad sort, but the Ransome parents are the worst parents ever), and pin the blame directly on the three wild friends, brothers Kieran and Finn Ransome, and our man Dom, and they come up with an ultimatum. The three guys need to find and marry acceptable women within a year or they’re going to be cut off. Okay, so these three are pretty much Worldstar wild men, Kieran is a rake, Finn is a gambler, and Dom likes to drink and fight. They definitely need those inheritances!

The previous books give us Kieran and Finn’s HEAs. Kieran, surprisingly, has found true love with Dom’s sister Celeste. Finn, who everyone seemed to think was a blockhead, but who is actually brilliant, has found Tabitha, a bluestocking wallflower nerd girl (who I absolutely LOVE). So they’re 2/3 of the way to getting their inheritances.

So, as I said, the jilting of their sister was the brothers’ idea, because they could see that neither Dom nor Willa seemed really happy about the marriage. They fought CONSTANTLY. The boys really thought they were doing the right thing (sigh, dudes, really?). Anyway, the brothers are ecstatically in love, and now they think it’s time for Dom . . . and Willa to get back together. Okay, YOU broke them up! But that year has made Kieran and Finn into new men, love has brought them around, so they are going to try to help out their bestie and their sister. Easy peasy, right?

Yeah, no. Someone has got to tell the Ransome brothers that they absolutely suck when it comes to grand ideas and intelligent planning. But that won’t stop them. They have stranded Dom and Willa at a salacious house party on a remote Scottish island, hoping they will fall into each other’s arms. Alas, as you can tell by Willa’s first remark when she sees Dom (I will not spoil it, but I literally laughed out loud when I read it), it’s not going to be simple.

So Eva Leigh spins a tale that winds us up into Dom and Willa’s lives, their past relationship, how they’ve grown up while apart, and where their brains and hearts are now. Of course, we are sure they’ll get together in the end (it’s a happily ever after, of course), but it’s going to take dodging bullets of hurtful language and wading through emotional minefields to get the posh society lady and the guy from the stews together in a good way. But we recognize it’s going to be tough. She’s hurt and angry and he doesn’t feel like he is the best thing for her, so he smothers his heart. But fate, and interfering friends and family, have other plans.

Forced proximity is one of my favorite themes and Eva Leigh does this well. Her fresh take on that theme is wonderful—her spin is new and slightly different. Plus, I like the fact that her hero and heroine have to learn to communicate, even to just deal with being stuck together for (possibly) two weeks, but also because there needs to be some resolution. Her brother is married to his sister. Their families are close. They cannot hide from each other until the end of their days. And there’s the inheritance issue hanging over their heads . . . it’s going to be wild!

We’ve seen a lot of Dom and a little of Willa in the previous books, so it was delightful to get an entire novel devoted to them, plus you get to see some old favorites from her previous series (hey Maggie). Easy 5-star ending to a 5-star series.