Plot: 4/5
Spice: 4/5 (# of scene's, risky scenes, detailed descriptions)
Characters: 5/5
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Overall reco: I love a good cocky asshole. Beck from the Finley/James CU Hockey series comes to mind instantly, but pretty much every bad boy to bad boy is my favorite thing. I love watching that dynamic where the MC cracks past that attitude and peeks that soft center. (I also love warm half baked cookies BTW). Holden might be my favorite yet. He dripped with confidence, oozed it. I loved watching the game develop between the Phoenix and Holden, I was on the edge of my seat with anxiety about them but it was the best ride.
When I read the warning at the beginning of the book I was a bit nervous. I'd not actively avoided the cheating tag but it's just not come up much (yet) in the books sphere's I've been into. I figured I'd probably hate it, when I did run across it, but I was very much surprised by this book. Yes, it's a grey area in this book, and while not technically fully into it it does give the taboo feeling. CE Ricci actually worked this line really really well. I was upset for EVERYONE in this book, it would have been so easy to make someone a villain and then lean into that but really, I loved Kason, and Phoenix, and Holden. I get WHY she did that (Kason's book is next) but it made the story more real, more human.
I raced through this book in 2 days because I needed to know. I was gripped by the throat and it didn't even let me go once. I was grabbing pages between every little thing going on in my life the last 2 days. I can't wait to get into Kason's story!

additional random thought : I just, while writing this review found out Jacob Morgan is Phoenix in the audiobook version and I think I just died and maybe went to heaven