Heartbreaker's Bet by Donna Cummings
Published by Selfpublished on 8 December 2015
Genres: Adult, Contemporary, Romance
Pages: 78
Format: Kindle
Source: Kindle Purchase


Reading Challenges: 2015 New Release Challenge

I need someone to help me become a heartbreaker. And I've picked you.

Bettina Knox's dating life was a disaster. What she needed was some expert instruction on becoming the love-'em-and-leave-'em type. Luckily she found the perfect man for the job - a professional-grade flirter, adored by every woman he encountered. It was all fun and games, until she started falling for her way-too-sexy teacher.

So you want me to give you all my secrets for breaking hearts. Even though I'm not convinced I've ever broken any.

Troy Callahan thought he'd heard it all in his years of owning a popular sports pub. Then this sweet, sassy woman waltzed up insisting he was going to teach her how to break hearts. He'd been a wingman forever, so why not help her unleash her inner bad girl? There was just one problem: turning Bet into a heartbreaking assassin had somehow put his own heart at risk.

Heartbreaker’s Bet is set in the same universe as Back on Track, and it is a light, sweet, humorous and sassy romance!

My Heartbreaker’s Bet review:

While Heartbreaker’s Bet is short story, Cummings still managed to have enough character development to reel me in, and the humor had me laugh out loud in several places. Both Troy and Bet just wanted something more… something they hadn’t been able to find in their lives before, and while their relationship started out with Bet picking him to help her become a heartbreaker, their chemistry rocked right off the charts from the beginning! Add in a little rivalry between Troy’s bar and another bar, plus some sassy dialogues, and you have the ingredients for a great story!

Between the flirting and getting to know each other better, Troy and Bet changed in subtle ways, and I enjoyed being taken along for the ride. I’m also happy to have a great drink recipe to use in my Thursday feature soon, as Troy’s bartending skills are definitely up to par.

Written in third person point of view, past tense, the omniscient narrator knew exactly what to share about the characters to make Heartbreaker’s Bet a fabulous story. If you’re looking for something with a good pace, and that you can read in an afternoon (or in a morning, or an evening) you should definitely pick this one up!

Some of my favorite Heartbreaker’s Bet quotes:

Bettina picked up her purse, ready to leave the bar. Another date, with another seemingly great guy, but with the same predictable ending. There was never a second date once they found out she was a kindergarten teacher. For Pete’s sake, it wasn’t like she had given birth to twenty kids. There wasn’t a busload of boisterous five-year-olds outside, eager to join her for a restaurant “field trip”.

Troy glanced at his watch once more, although he wasn’t sure why. He was early. At least five minutes early, although when he’d checked his watch five minutes ago, he was ten minutes early.

When he’d had this bright idea of hiring Bet, she had been a sweetly sassy school-teacher who needed some remedial help with her flirting skills. Now she was a sweetly sexy woman who needed to jump into his arms and get his heart restarted with some long-term mouth-to-mouth action.