On the second day of Smutmas, Santa brought to me . . . a fake dating scheme with an evolved alpha billionaire (with just a dollop of Dom) - a review of Lauren Blakely's My Favorite Holidate

Lauren Blakely’s another one of my go-tos when I want just the right combination of naughty and nice (list - in keeping with the Smutmas theme, after all). This is the fifth installment of her How to Date Series, which features my favorite of her leading men - the number of which must be near triple digits, Axel Huxley in the first, My So-Called Sex Life. I loved the first installment, was smitten with the second (Plays Well With Others), enjoyed the third (The Almost Romantic), and was left . . . unsatisfied with the fourth (The Accidental Dating Experiment). I wanted Wilder’s story after reading being introduced to him as alpha-billionaire-literal-but-also-metaphorical daddy when he’s introduced in Plays Well With Others because . . . see hyphen happy description . . . but Blakely made us wait for him. And good things come to those who wait in both literature, as Wilder Blaine indeed gets the girl, designer Fable Calloway, he’s pined (can’t stop, won’t stop with these Christmas puns) for since we met him three books ago. 

Reader, I love him.

Not that it’s too hard to do so since Wilder (a name I want to hate but just won’t. So there. Also, his aunt calls him wild child so that’s freaking adorable) tiptoes the line of alpha dominance without making me feel like I need to burn my feminist (that’s the one with the extra padding that boosts the girls just so) bra over his brash boorishness. He’s just a simple billionaire who’s successfully co-parenting a spunky tween with his ex, of whom he’s never spoken a negative word, made himself out of the nothing he’s inherited from his gambling addict father, is navigating seemingly happy singledom under the watchful eyes of well-meaning aunt who needs to see him coupled up, and likes curling up in a private library that would make Belle dump the Beast in a hot minute with a dog-eared mystery. You know, totally relatable and not just book boyfriend fodder that Blakely loves to serve up.

This time with a healthy heaping of Christmas.

The fake dating trope isn’t one of my favorites, since I like the sizzle of a good barb slung in the midst of one of the requisite arguments for those mismatched couples of enemies-to-lovers (the heart wants what it wants), but I was along for the ride with Wilder and Fable (another one of those names I’d normal eschew but damn if I didn’t end up liking since it fit her character so well) the minute she hit him in the face with an explosion of red and green glitter dicks. Long story short, we’ve got all the necessary elements of fake dating - showing up cheating douche canoe exes (I’ll never be able to look at eggnog the same way after Blakely introduces Fable’s bro-friend being sucked dry by the thirsty caterer), avoiding set-ups from kind but meddling relatives (Bibi wins the award for feisty family member for her dedication to Christmas accessories alone), shared childhood trauma that makes both fake daters gun-shy on the real thing (aforementioned gambling addict dad and the classic philandering father in Fable’s case), and, of course, a mutual attraction that’s latent for one (Fable) and played close to the vest by the other (Wilder). 

And Christmas.

Community Christmas games, which I feel cheated out of, especially having come of age in snowy, scenic, small-town New England, feature prominently, ostensibly to allow the fake couple to crush the cheating ex, who, of course, is a member of the shotgun Christmas wedding where our romantic leads are, wait for it . . . Best Man and Maid of Honor (to absolutely no reader’s surprise). They’re fun, however, and toe the line between providing holiday hijinx and foreplay for . . . well, literal foreplay that gives way to some sex scenes that will warm you up on a cold winter’s night and make you take a second look at that spool of wrapping ribbon (or make you wonder, would you get burned if you wrapped your naked body in twinkling Christmas lights). They also allow for real love to blossom between our fakers (which we know has to happen and are, of course, here for) before the final dark moments, calamities, real breakups, fake breakups, and sexy sex-filled make-ups where no one is faking anything.

The love for family is strong in both our romantic leads and, to Blakely’s credit, reads as real, with tertiary characters who are fleshed out enough to make us believe that these two are more than capable of having big feelings for someone else since they clearly already do. Thus, the perfect mountain-top Christmas Eve wedding doesn’t make me gag as it has in other saccharine finales (looking at you, Hallmark movies starring Candace Cameron Beurre before she left you for an even more conservative Christian cable network). Of course I rolled my eyes - hard - at the epilogue in which Fable gets two Christmas presents a year in the future. One is sparkly - less eye rolling since we’d be up in arms if our jewelry designer didn’t get her own bling. The other is definitely the source of a pinched nerve in my left eyeball  . . . I’ll leave it up to you to decide if Blakely was just a bit too extra here.

In any case, read, enjoy, and imagine your own sexy billionaire who these books keep promising me will totally pop up in real life.     

Rating: 4.5 / 5 Candy Cane Thongs