Just a Little Bet: A friends-to-lovers road trip romance where two exes get a second chance at love

JUST A LITTLE BET is the second instalment in Tawna Fenske’s contemporary, adult WHERE THERE’S SMOKE romance series (formerly known as Smokejumper). This is smokejumper / firefighter Tony Warren, and thirty-one year old, photographer Kayla Gladney’s story line. JUST A LITTLE BET can be read as a stand alone without any difficulty. Any important information from the previous story line is revealed where necessary. Told from third person perspective JUST A LITTLE BET follows former lovers now friends smokejumper / firefighter Tony Warren, and photographer Kayla Gladney as they embark on a cross country journey to face down a number of Tony’s ex-girlfriends in an effort to understand why all of his relationships fail. Meanwhile, Kayla has been contracted to do a coffee table book of photography focusing on the burned-out remains of several forest fires so their journey together forces Tony to remember a painful past that is about to come full circle. What ensues is the rebuilding romance between Tony and Kayla, and the potential fall-out as Tony believes he is incapable of love or ever being loved, in return. Tony and Kayla dated in the past. For whatever reason their romantic relationship fizzled and died but the embers remained hot and the palpable sexual energy continued to burn. But Tony’s dark past is about to rear its’ proverbial ugly head, and in the aftermath Tony struggles with his relationship to the woman with whom he had fallen in love. As Tony faced down the women from his past, Kayla offered support, sometimes pretending to be Tony’s new girlfriend. As their journey continues Kayla begins to examine all of her own failed relationships and comes to the conclusion that she and Tony were meant to be. The relationship between Tony and Kayla is a former lovers to best friends to lovers, once again, relationship wherein our couple agree to a ‘friends with benefits’ relationship while on the road but the heart wants something more when Tony professes his love then everything begins to spiral out of control. Late night dinner dates and sunrise photography sessions pull our couple closer together but the past is about to intrude once again, forcing Tony to push Kayla away. The $ex scenes are intimate and passionate without the use of over the top, sexually graphic language and text. We are reintroduced to Willa and Grady (The Two-Date Rule #1), Kayla’s friend Aislin, as well as Tony’s best friend Leo , nurse Nyla, Tony’s mother Connie, and Kayla’s mom Patty, Tony’s brother Joel, and a string of Tony’s ex’s who let him know exactly how they feel. JUST A LITTLE BET is a story of second chances, revelations, expectations and moving forward. The premise is heart warming and emotional; the romance is seductive; the characters are little bit broken, colorful and energetic.

After Two-Date Rule, I thought I had an idea of the people that Tony and Kayla are but meeting them in that book barely even scratched the surface. Their story is way more angsty and heavy than I was expecting but it was balanced by how perfect these two are for each other. There’s some pretty deep topics explored in this book but Tony and Kayla’s amazing sense of humor brought out the lighter side. This series is fun and I want even more smokejumpers!!

This story has all the heat and all the heart! A little road trip, a little self-help book, and a little Fireball add up to make this a deeply emotional, sexy, heart-pounding love story. It's both a second-chance and a friends-to-lovers story, as Kayla and Tony have kept their friendship despite their break-up a year ago. Now, Kayla needs to tour old wildfire sites for her upcoming photography book and since the fire season has ended, Tony is the perfect tour guide. Because it's set in the off-season this book doesn't deal with the smoke jumpers on the job, but it still has plenty going on. In an effort to figure out why he hasn't been able to maintain a lasting relationship, Tony agrees to include interviews with a few of his exes on this road trip. Between those insightful (and sometimes hilarious) scenes and the thought-provoking excerpts from the self-help book Kayla's sister recommended, these two find that laying their souls bare to each other is the most intimate thing either has ever done. The emotions are sometimes gut-wrenching but necessarily so, while the physical attraction between them is not ignored either. These two go through an entire lifetime of experiences together in just a couple weeks and my heart was captivated every step along the way. Their HEA is hard-won and absolutely perfect for them. I loved every bit of their story, and highly recommend it. I voluntarily reviewed an ARC of this book.