Review: Dirty Pleasures by Meghan March

★★★★ 4 stars

Here we go again! Sigh…

DIRTY PLEASURES immediately follows the final events of DIRTY BILLIONAIRE (read my review here!). Holly has just left her dirty-talking, billionaire husband, Creighton Karas. Normally I'd roll my eyes at dramatics over a single mistake, but in this instance I empathize with her. Creighton did not promise her love, but he did give his word that he will consider her career top priority, just as he does his own. Unfortunately, he forgot about Holly and that she had to make it to her scheduled tour—or else, her record label will drop her like a hot potato. Hurt and determined to succeed, she takes off on her own.

As the second book of this series, this was all about the growth of Creighton and Holly's relationship. They did things backwards if you recall in book 1: hookup first, a very public proposal driven by lust, and then a wedding very soon after. It's crazy. It's no wonder they are having trouble now.

There is one awesome thing here though: Creighton truly wants to make things work. I looooove it when the guys grovel. It's heart-melting, isn't it, when the heroes go out of their way to prove themselves to the heroine? Especially after a major screw-up? I was truly impressed with the lengths he had taken to make it up to Holly. He had to make major adjustments, from his lifestyle to the way he conducts business. However, since he is mostly on this mission throughout the book, his intensity was toned down by several notches. In book 1, he is an all-out tease king. He says such provocative things that had me blushing and looking over my shoulder. He's still like that in DIRTY PLEASURES, but... not so much anymore. Or I guess not the same intensity level. I can't quite put my finger on it, but something was just different.

I still like this second installment, but not as much as the first. Yes, I loved grovelling Creighton, but again I missed his intensity in book 1. The ending was another reason. SPOILER ALERT: Holly, yet again, leaves Creighton. If I was sympathetic the first time it happened, this time I'm just, "oh gosh, not again…" .

Tip? When you read this, make sure you also have the third book, DIRTY TOGETHER, because you'll want to just get on with what happens next. It is very obvious what the "next big fight" will be about, so I just wanted to know right away how the characters would handle it (crossing my fingers that no one will be running away yet again!).