Briar Prescott takes a short break from her Until series to bring us Just a Taste – a sexy, heartfelt and well-written love story laced with tenderness and plenty of the author’s trademark humour and banter. I’ve seen it described as a ‘wet cat/golden retriever’ romance, and that kind of sums it up perfectly; we’ve got Lake, who would rather scratch and hiss than accept help or kindness, and handsome, talented Ryker, who would be easy to dislike were it not for the fact that he’s just so bloody nice!

Lake Bates and Ryker James have known each other since they were kids, and although they’re technically step-brothers, they didn’t grow up together. After Lake’s parents split up (for reasons we discover later on), Lake’s mother would occasionally drop him on John Bates’ doorstep in a misguided effort to restore the father-son bond. Bates had, by this time, married Ryker’s mother, and made no secret of the fact that he didn’t want Lake around – and it was Ryker who would sit with Lake and talk to him and take him outside to play while Lake did his best to be as sullen as possible and not to be grateful for any of it.

More than a decade later, Lake and Ryker are in their final year of college and Lake was planning to go to medical school the following year. But since his mother remarried, he no longer qualifies for financial aid, (even though she’s not helping him out financially), and although his part time job at a crappy diner means he can just about support himself to the end of the academic year, he won’t be able to afford to put himself through medical school. Then, out of the blue, Ryker proposes the craziest thing Lake has ever heard. He can provide the money for Lake’s tuition and for medical school, but it’s tied up in a trust fund he can’t access for a few more years – unless he gets married. Ryker figures they can help each other out; he could do with some extra cash, and he’ll give Lake the money he needs (Lake’s hackles immediately rise and he insists on a loan) – and as the fewer people know about their deal the better, he figures he and Lake should just marry each other. Completely stunned, Lake looks for the flaw in the plan – but he does need the money, and given Ryker is proposing (!) they continue as before and go their own ways after they’re married, he can’t really find one.

It’s a good plan, Ryker thinks, but he hasn’t really given much thought to the ceremony itself, certainly not to the ‘you may kiss your husband’ bit and definitely hadn’t expected Lake to kiss him quite so thoroughly. He also hadn’t expected to find himself kissing Lake back. Or for that kiss to have him looking at people differently, and questioning everything he thought he knew about his sexuality for weeks afterward.

To be honest, this is one of those times I had to hand-wave the somewhat convoluted set-up and just accept it as the instigator for these two getting together, because neither the step-brothers thing nor the marriage-of-convenience thing have a lot of bearing on the rest of the story. That said, the characters, their personal growth, and the way their relationship develops are so well done that it’s not difficult to overlook the flimsy set up and just go with the flow.

I admit to having something of a soft spot for prickly, acerbic, smart-mouths who use sarcasm and humour to deflect from their deficiencies and deter anyone from getting close to them, and Ms. Prescott writes that character-type incredibly well. Lake’s abandonment issues go very deep; he’s been left by so many of the people who should have been there for him that he finds it hard to believe that Ryker won’t do the same, thinks that at some point, he’ll realise he can do better than Lake and will walk away. Certain that’s on the cards, Lake builds walls and barriers, telling himself that as long as they don’t muck up whatever is happening between them by catching feelings, they’ll be fine.

But Ryker, for all his sunny nature, is no pushover, is determined to prove to Lake that not everyone leaves and that although what might have begun as a way for him to figure some things out, has gone way beyond casual and turned into something very real. He’s been drawn to Lake since the first time they met and no matter how many times Lake has tried to push him away, Ryker has always been there for him. Like Lake, he’s worked hard to get where he is – a star college hockey player destined for the NHL – yet there’s no denying things have come more easily to him. But Ryker likes that Lake isn’t impressed by him, that he doesn’t give a shit that he – Ryker – is already being lauded as a generational talent. It’s refreshing and besides, he’s never been one to back down from a challenge. He sees through Lake’s bullshit, sees him in a way nobody ever has – and Ryker knows that just as he sees the real Lake, so Lake sees the real him:

I can be myself with him. One hundred percent. Because I can’t impress him. Even if I tried, he wouldn’t care. Most likely, he’d just laugh at me for being an idiot. I don’t know, it’s just strangely liberating being your most authentic self because that’s the only thing the other person wants from you.

Even though I’m not normally one for new adult/college age characters, I really enjoyed Just a Taste, which is mercifully devoid of the manufactured angst and over the top drama that puts me off reading NA romances. There are definitely some angsty moments here, but they’re necessary to the story, and it’s easy to understand why Lake, after spending years building walls to protect himself would find it hard to let them down, even for someone who has been on his side all his life. His prickliness and Ryker’s good natured dry humour balance each other out nicely and the chemistry between them crackles right from the start. [As an aside, there are more sex scenes in this book than in any other book I’ve read by this author. Just in case you were wondering!]

I had one other main issue with the story, which is that Ryker’s sexual/bi-awakening feels a bit rushed. And Ryker himself is not as well-defined a character as Lake; we do get chapters from his PoV, but we don’t know a lot about his backstory and honestly, don’t know much about him other than that he’s great at hockey and maths (sorry, I can’t call it ‘math’ – it’s ‘mathematics’ with an S!), and that he wants to take care of Lake.

Despite that though, I raced through Just a Taste in a couple of sittings and was eager to return to it when I had to set it aside, so I obviously had a good time reading it! The ending is a very firm HFN and the words “for now” after “The End” have me hoping for a second book – perhaps following Lake to medical school and Ryker to the NHL – that shows us how they navigate their newly established relationship. Just a Taste doesn’t quite hit DIK levels for me, but it’s a great read and earns a strong recommendation.