Robin Kaye’s second installment in The Bad Boys of Redhook series has a lot of elements that make it a book I wished I could enjoy and recommend. Unfortunately I didn’t and I can’t.

Skye Maxwell comes from a family of very successful restauranteurs. Her older brothers were all awarded their own restaurants when they reached the age of thirty, and since she’s a brilliant cook she fully expects the same. But, for her thirtieth birthday, she is advised by her family that she’ll be managing a restaurant instead. Fed up with her family’s tendency to underestimate her, Skye decides to make it on her own. She essentially runs away from home and finds herself in Redhook, New York. She’s trying to decide where to start on her new life path when a help wanted sign in a restaurant window catches her eye.

Logan Blaise needs a cook right away. He’s managing the family restaurant, The Crows Nest, while his brother is away on his honeymoon and his father is recuperating from a heart attack and surgery. It is important that Logan doesn’t fail at this endeavor and his chef has just taken an extended leave of absence to deal with family issues of his own. Skye’s arrival to interview for the position is a godsend, regardless of the fact that there are a lot of blanks on her application and she’s obviously hiding her identity.

Although grateful to find a job quickly, Skye is uneasy because she knows Logan’s fiance from home. They are a power couple in her circle – wealthy, beautiful and socially active. Logan manages the vineyard that his fiance’s family owns, and he’s made a name for himself in that capacity. And although she tries at first to hold herself aloof, Skye is steadily drawn into closeness with Logan’s family and her coworkers. The attraction that instantly springs up between Logan and Skye further complicates matters.

When he travels to Redhook for his foster brother’s wedding and to manage the restaurant while his brother is away, Logan has a clear plan. He’ll stay in Redhook long enough to take care of the business and then hoof it right back home to take up the reins of his real life. Like Skye, he’s been living somewhat incognito. His fiance has no idea that Logan is from Redhook or that he was a street kid who was fostered with Pop, the owner of The Crow’s Nest. But being at home has changed things for Logan. Foremost in his concern is the young girl who was dropped off on Pop’s doorstep on the pretext that one of Pop’s three foster sons was her father. Logan feels a real connection to the child and is almost certain she must be his. Furthermore, Logan misses his old town, doesn’t want to leave his aging father, and is enjoying managing the restaurant. He feels torn, and his attraction to Skye only makes matters more difficult.

See? This has the bones for a really nice book. What could be more perfect than a woman finding a new, loving family when her own has let her down, a man finding his roots when he’s been denying them for years, and even better, a sweet, abandoned child looking for a forever home? But for some reason the chemistry just did not work. The writing was choppy at first and I found the first few chapters really hard going. That eventually smoothed out, but by then there were other things to dislike. I didn’t like the dialogue, internal or otherwise. That bothered me even before the Big Mis which basically ruined the last third of the book.

There’s enough here that I certainly wouldn’t mind finding out about the little girl’s parentage, but I probably won’t read the next installment just for that. Maybe I’ll get lucky and somene else will read it and tell me what happens.