Book Blurb:
I’ve taken pucks to the face…
But nothing hits harder than hearing her call me Dad.
I return to Cedar Hollow for my father’s funeral. Not for forgiveness. Not for Poppy. And definitely not for the daughter I never knew was mine.
Poppy rebuilt her life without me—and she has every reason not to trust the man who left her behind.
But the moment I meet my little girl, everything changes. Walking away isn’t an option anymore.
They can warn her about me all they want. This time, I’m not leaving.
I’ll burn this town to the ground before I lose them again.
Tropes:
*Netgalley ALC *2nd chance for romance *Sports romance (hockey) *single mom
*spice *grumpy x sunshine *secret pregnancy *found family *emotional baggage
Thoughts:
Storm (MMC) is a NHL player who is returning home in the off season to his small town for his father's funeral. He is broody x 1 million and left his small town with no hopes of returning ages ago due to all of the bad memories with his father who was abusive.
While back in town for what he thinks will be a short time thing he helps his brother fix up their childhood home and then he comes in contact with his teenage crush Poppy who he had a night to remember with... maybe since he's in town they can rekindle what they once had, but Poppy has a big secret.
Poppy (FMC) remembers their night together differently while she wanted to be with Storm he left town and she hasn't seen him since she tried to contact him multiple times after finding out she was pregnant, now she has been raising their child as a single mom and seeing him back in town brings up a lot of emotional baggage... if he leaves her again it could break her but she can't have him do that to her little girl.
Storm is upset that something so life changing was with held from him for so long especially since his brother and father both knew... but he has a lot of time to make up for he wants to spend time with Poppy and get to know his daughter in whatever increments of time Poppy will allow him to have.
Poppy is quickly falling for her daughter's father... but his job is in the off season right now, what happens when he returns to work and needs to travel, could they do long distance? What if he leaves her again or he gets traded?
Storm and his brother are both dealing with emotional baggage from growing up with a irresponsible dad and coming together to fix up their old home is bringing up a lot of feelings... and they don't do feelings.
Poppy has a great group of friends, Storm has fun team mates who come to town, Storm and Poppy's daughter is adorable. Insert small town nosy neighbors, and diabolical geese who love to attack people and steal ice cream and you got yourself the starts of a cute new hockey series.
The narrators Ivan Morea & Avery Caris did a great job with the story and they are probably how I ended up staying with this story.
I did like that Storm was working on mending his relationships with his brother, with Poppy and getting to know his daughter and that he 100% owned up to needing to be there for his daughter from the moment he knew she was his, his whole plan changed from leaving immediately to being the dad he never had and showing up.
Some negatives for me:
*Storm spends so much of his time angry and brooding that I had a harder time liking him, he's angry about everything too long!
*repetitive things like how much he loved her tiny red bikini... yes we get it what else do you like about her because it felt more like insta lust.
*There are so many characters coming into the story that I felt at times like I was dumped into the middle of a series but this is the first book in this series.
*The story wasn't necessarily bad it just didn't grab me like I hoped it would I didn't really feel a great connection with the lead characters, I was more interested in a budding relationship between Poppy's friend and Storm's Team mate.
So I guess I'd say if you enjoy a small town hockey romance (with not much hockey), reconnections and second chance for romance you might enjoy this one!
I do plan to check out more of this series as I liked the side characters
Have you read this one? What did you think?
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