"Meet Me in the Waves" by Aria Brennan is another one of the many, many ARCs that I'm working my way through. This is the first book in Aria's latest duology: South Coast, and it debuts on July 1, 2024.
["No one expects to be abandoned the day before Christmas but that is exactly where I find myself when my mum cancels our summer holiday to be with her new husband. Not wanting to spend the break alone, I jump at my best friend’s offer to join him at his family’s beach house.
The only potential hiccup? Dane’s lazy, beach bum older brother, Nick, will also be there.
Except Nick is like nothing his younger brother has represented. He’s a welcome breath of fresh air, a man who lives life to the fullest and who calls to me in ways nobody else has ever done before. Oh, and did I mention how good he looks on the back of a surfboard?
As far as I know I’m totally straight and it’s easy to mistake attraction for admiration. But then the lightbulb suddenly flicks and I can no longer deny how much I want him.
I’m hooked and falling fast but we both have exes – my manipulative, slightly stalkerish high school sweetheart and his devastatingly beautiful supermodel ex who just so happens to be Nick’s best friend – who aren’t quite so thrilled about letting us have our happily ever after. Besides, this was only meant to be a summer fling. Right?"]
These two were such fully developed characters that they were jumping off the page after two chapters each. And I was fangirl-wiggling the entire time.
Ajay is an adorable hot mess. He's deep in the imposter syndrome, but he's cute, talented, sweet, a bi-disaster waiting to happen. Enter bi-awakening. Nick is hot and he knows it, but he's also kind and caring and wants nothing more than to "corrupt" the big innocent eyes that captured his attention the first moment they met.
Nick wavers between playboy mode and crushing mode (which, frankly, was really cute), but it doesn't take him long to fall hard. Ajay though? He went from cute and innocent to coy and indulging to corrupted and inspired. All the while finding himself and falling in love.
Quote of the Day (with a minor--but not really--spoiler alert) (Nick to Ajay): "You know, when I first saw you on the beach that day, you with your gorgeous brown curls and your pretty face and your big, innocent eyes, I wanted to take you and mess you up a little, maybe corrupt you. But instead, I fell in love with you and now I’m the one who’s completely at your mercy."
Followed up with (Ajay (the (cute) little shit) to Nick): "I fell in love with you too, Nicky. But let's not pretend you didn't also thoroughly corrupt me." ;)
Not to mention all of the times little mix Ajay came out to play and Nick was left speechless ("Where the hell did you come from?").
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