I’m good at hiding my feelings.
Having to pretend I’m not in love with my best friend?
Pfft. That’s child’s play.

Here’s how I do it: I avert my eyes when he walks out of his room, shirtless in all his toned glory. I squash the butterflies that fill my stomach every time he slowly unfurls a dimpled smile. And, most importantly, I keep an arsenal of “personal massagers” in my bedside drawer. Wink.

Not to brag, but Aiden Smith isn’t hard to resist if you’ve been doing it for as long as I have. In fact, we might have continued as best friends forever if not for the fact that I needed him to play the part of my fake boyfriend.

Date me like you mean it, I told him. Nudge nudge. C’mon, just go along with a little lie, help a girl out, and then we can all return to life as we know it.

Except he veered from the plan.

He crossed the line.

Flirting with me when no one else was around? Pinning me down and kissing me like that? Okay, how exactly is taking off my bra part of the ruse, Aiden?!
I’d ask him about it if I could, but well…things got ugly and we’re not best friends anymore.

In fact, we’re the exact opposite.

Now, I have to play nice even though I want to crush his heart in the palm of my hand.

Pretending not to love Aiden was the easy part.
Pretending not to hate him?
Well…I might need a little more practice.

Book Type:

Romantic Comedy

Review: Date Me Like You Mean It

With DATE ME LIKE YOU MEAN IT, author R.S. Grey delivers a charming, irresistible friends-to-lovers romp impossible not to devour.

We meet Maddie, who has become an expert in hiding her feelings from her best friend and roommate, Aiden—the man she’s fallen for. She’s sure he doesn’t feel the same, as is evidenced by the many women that come (and go) through their door. But when Maddie begs Aiden to be her pretend boyfriend, something changes between them. And just as things inexplicably heat up, the possibility of who they could be disappears with a phone call.

Their friendship fractures under the weight of hurt feelings, words unspoken, and miles between them. Maddie is ready to move on from Aiden altogether, but Aiden seems to be on to her and suspects the hate she spouts is frail armor for her heart.

What’s wonderful about R.S. Grey’s books is that they are so dependably a delight to read. They transport you into a world, a story, that seems to make the rest of the world vanish. It’s a single-sitting, gone-too-fast reverie that inevitably reminds me of why I love to read: to lose myself in a story that brings me joy.

With angst, humor and tenderness, this is the perfect, lighthearted weekend escape.

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