She is the perfect, dutiful daughter. Violet Fowler is the middle child and as such, works to smooth things out between everyone in her life. She is the go between for her very individual sisters, works hard to prove herself at her family's business, and keeps her head down in her relationship with her boyfriend, even though she knows he has a wandering eye. 
 Ryder McKay is a little rough around the edges. He hates Violet's boyfriend on principal, as they are working towards the same promotion. When the opportunity to get closer to Violet arises, he sees it as a way to potentially rise his career as well as the thrill of the chase. 
 I loved the development of both Violet and Ryder. Violet develops a backbone, learning to use it as the story progresses, both for her own gain and those around her. Ryder is a bad boy all covered up. Suits and ties, dresses and heels. Both characters hide behind their respective armor, but neither gets what they expect as the armor breaks down and the clothes come off. 
 This is by far the author's hottest work (as Monica Murphy, that is), and boy do things heat up quickly. For a while it seemed that all that was between Ryder and Violet was physical, but I loved watching the physical turn deeper at moments when each least expect it. 
 The games that Ryder started out playing initially bothered me. Hoping for an HEA for them, it's always messy when things don't start out honest. And this was no exception. Things got very messy, very quickly. While parts of the storyline are resolved nicely, and Ryder pays for his indiscretions, I wished there had been more fallout for the other characters involved in the games. 
 I felt like there were a couple storylines that were started or referenced but never picked up again, and I am hoping they come up again somehow in either Rose or Lily's stories, but at the same time can't figure how they'd fit in as they center around Violet. 
 While this was one of Monica's longer works, it didn't feel overly long. The story moved along at a nice pace with continual development of both characters and their relationship, with necessary bumps along the way to keep things moving. 
 This was an interesting start to a new series from Monica Murphy. I loved the introductions readers get to Rose and Lily, the sisters that will be the focus of the next two books, and can't wait to see more of them. I think there is more than meets the eye for both of these sisters, as there were several things that happened in this book that point to things maybe not being what they seem. 
 I was gifted a copy in exchange for an honest review.