ONE BREATH AT A TIME – Gwen Masters
La Grande Mort
Black Lace Books
ISBN: 978-0-352-34163-1
March 2008
Erotic Contemporary Romance

Tennessee – Present Day

Kelley is checking up on her friend Ronnie’s house because he is away for a few days. This is the perfect excuse for her to get away after her break-up with her boyfriend Michael. She thought their relationship was too good to be true because he seemed like the perfect man, very attentive and amazing in bed. But that all ended when she found Michael having rough sex with another woman on his workout bench. Kelley is trying to nurse her broken heart, but she thinks about Michael all the time and can’t figure out where she went wrong and why he would go to another woman.

But, Kelley is not alone in the house. She comes upon a man with a gun! He is actually the next-door neighbor returning one of the guns he borrowed from Ronnie. He introduces himself as Tom. Because Kelley doesn’t want to be alone and Tom has a nice smile, she invites him to lunch. Tom lends his ear as Kelley tells all. Soon one thing leads to another and they have some hot sex out in the open on the patio. Even though Tom knows that Kelley still isn’t over her ex, he wants to start a relationship with her and hopefully will help heal her broken heart.

Tom does things to Kelley that she would never allow another man to do, such as bondage and some light S&M that includes sex toys. She is also falling in love with Tom, and he with her, but Michael is always in the back of her mind. And even though they are hot and heavy, Kelly just can’t let go of the past, which begins to hurt Tom. Tom also has quite a past, from one-night stands to multiple partners. He also has two children he hardly ever sees, one being his son who can hardly stand him. But these two try their best to make things work between them. But as Kelley allows Tom into her heart, she must make a hard decision. She has to decide how much she wants Tom and whether to have a future with him, or allow her continuing thoughts of Michael to destroy everything. Kelley then does something that almost ruins Tom’s love for her, and she now has to make him see that Michael no longer matters, and she will do anything to cement their love, even if it means doing something so taboo in bed.

When I saw that ONE BREATH AT A TIME was a Black Lace novel, I seriously thought it would be all about sex and nothing else, but I soon realized I was mistaken. Gwen Masters has written an emotional and sometimes dark romance. Kelley is like any woman who questions herself when the man she thinks she loves cheats on her with another woman. Of course I wouldn’t recommend jumping into the arms and bed of a total stranger a few hours after you meet him, but her form of therapy has some merit. From the moment Kelley meets Tom, I believed they were perfect for each other. They are very honest from the beginning and, even though Tom knows that Kelley still has her own issues to deal with, he is there for her and will do his best to help her let go of her past relationship. Tom is a wonderful character. He is charming, sexy and so understanding even when Kelley does something so wrong that may finally push him away. He has all the right emotions, and the only way to punish Gwen is to have her open herself up even more during sex, which becomes more of a reward for them both in the end.

Kelley does have some interactions with Michael, who is not written as a bad guy, but just a man who made a certain decision that he felt was right for him. At one point I did want to smack Kelley because what she had with Tom was one-hundred times better than what she had with Michael. And since this is an erotic romance, you can bet that the sex is everything you would hope for! Kelley and Tom connect on such a level, especially when they are intimate. From sensual lovemaking to harsh dirty foreplay, Gwen Masters has written this all very well, and I wasn’t uncomfortable at any point at what Tom would make Kelley do.

ONE BREATH AT A TIME is how an erotic romance should be written and very much deserves a Perfect 10.

Kate Garrabrant