Rowena’s review of Stay with Me (Waiting for You #3) by J. Lynn.
At 21, Calla hasn’t done a lot of things. She’s never been kissed, never seen the ocean, never gone to an amusement park. But growing up, she witnessed some things no child ever should. She still carries the physical and emotional scars of living with a strung-out mother, Mona—secrets she keeps from everyone, including her close circle of college friends.
But the safe cocoon Calla has carefully built is shattered when she discovers her mom has stolen her college money and run up a huge credit card debt in her name. Now, Calla has to go back to the small town she thought she’d left behind and clean up her mom’s mess again. Of course, when she arrives at her mother’s bar, Mona is nowhere to be found. Instead, six feet of hotness named Jackson James is pouring drinks and keeping the place humming.
Sexy and intense, Jax is in Calla’s business from the moment they meet, giving her a job and helping her search for Mona. And the way he looks at her makes it clear he wants to get horizontal . . . and maybe something more. Before Calla can let him get close, though, she’s got to deal with the pain of the past—and some very bad guys out to mess her up if she doesn’t give them her mom.
Calla is a good friend to Teresa Hamilton from the last book in this series, Be with You. She’s got a huge crush on her friend, Brandon who is part of the Hot Guy Brigade. The HGB is what Calla calls the assortment of hot guys that she hangs out with. Cam is the President of the HGB and is with her friend Avery (Book 1) then there’s Jase who is with Teresa and some other guys and then, Brandon. Brandon, the guy who has become one of her closest friends.
The night she finds out that Brandon has a girlfriend, a serious girlfriend, Calla is bummed but she doesn’t have time to deal with her feelings about that since she finds out some pretty bad news. Her Mom has wiped out her savings, her tuition money and Calla has to go home to figure out what the heck is going on.
Going back to the place that she grew up isn’t something that Calla ever thought she’d do. There aren’t a lot of good memories for her there. Her mother was a pretty crappy Mom and Calla was affected because of her mother’s choices. Now, all these years later and Calla’s Mom is still being a crappy Mom but she’s messing with Calla’s life and Calla has nowhere else to go to figure out what she’s going to do. So back to Mona’s bar, Calla heads.
Her Mom’s bar isn’t the shit hole that Calla remembers from when she lived there and while she’s home for the summer, she learns a lot about what her Mom has been up to while Calla’s been studying at school. And she meets Jax. The guy that is running her Mom’s bar.
I’m really enjoying this series by J. Lynn. I don’t read any of her other books but I’m a huge contemporary NA fan so I’m all about reading these. Jax and Calla were great characters that weren’t perfect and while some of the time, it drove me up the wall, I still walked away from this book having enjoyed it.
Jax was super-hot and I really enjoyed getting to know him throughout the book but there were a few times when I wanted to smack him upside his head. Like when they get into that fight and he takes off? Umm, bone-head move considering everything that they’re going through right now. Then there was when he was explaining himself to Calla and her friends. How he knew all about her before she got to town because he drove her Mom out to see her a few times and even though they never approached her, he knew what she looked like since he mentioned a specific scene from the last book. He’s seen her before and yet when she comes into the bar, he hits on her. I got the impression that he didn’t know who she is since when her Uncle Clyde comes out and calls her name, he freezes. Like, it just dawned on him who she is and ummm, how does that make sense of the story you told Calla later on with her friends as witnesses? How can you not know that Calla was Calla? I mean, it’s pretty hard to mistake her for anyone else considering she’s got that huge scar on her face. So that didn’t make sense to me but I got over it because in the end, I enjoyed the story.
Calla was a great heroine, a heroine that I connected with because I understood why she thought the stuff that she thought, why she did and reacted to things as she did and though she wasn’t the most perfect protagonist, I still enjoyed her journey. I really enjoyed getting to know her and seeing the romance between her and Jax take off. They were just too cute together.
It was also nice to see the rest of the gang in the book though I would have liked it more had Brandon made an appearance in the book. They were mentioned as being good friends and yet, he never once made an appearance in the book other than the very first scene.
Overall, this was a great addition to the series and it’s got me pretty stoked for the next book. I was mighty curious about both Roxy and Reece so I’m looking forward to jumping right into their story.
Grade: 3.5 out of 5
Reading Order:
This book is available from William Morrow Paperbacks. You can purchase it here or here in e-format.
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