Love Her Or Lose Her
(Hot and Hammered #2)
Tessa Bailey
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Release Date  January 7, 2020

New York Times bestselling author Tessa Bailey returns with a unique, sexy romantic comedy about a young married couple whose rocky relationship needs a serious renovation.

Rosie and Dominic Vega are the perfect couple: high school sweethearts, best friends, madly in love. Well, they used to be anyway. Now Rosie’s lucky to get a caveman grunt from the ex-soldier every time she walks in the door. Dom is faithful and a great provider, but the man she fell in love with ten years ago is nowhere to be found. When her girlfriends encourage Rosie to demand more out of life and pursue her dream of opening a restaurant, she decides to demand more out of love, too. Three words: marriage boot camp.

Never in a million years did Rosie believe her stoic, too-manly-to-emote husband would actually agree to relationship rehab with a weed-smoking hippy. Dom talking about feelings? Sitting on pillows? Communing with nature? Learning love languages? Nope. But to her surprise, he’s all in, and it forces her to admit her own role in their cracked foundation. As they complete one ridiculous—yet surprisingly helpful—assignment after another, their remodeled relationship gets stronger than ever. Except just as they’re getting back on track, Rosie discovers Dom has a secret... and it could demolish everything. 

I was interested in Rosie and Dominic after meeting them in Fix Her Up. They have been married for over ten years, but due to circumstances, their marriage has been slowly deteriorating. Rosie has recently developed some new friendships and has started to feel more empowered. She is tired of settling in her marriage, her dead-end job, and wants to finally go after her dreams of opening a catering business or restaurant. 

Years ago Dominic returned from his time in the military a changed man.   He now works construction. He has always been taught that the man's place was to provide and that will be enough to show how much he cares. He is the quiet, brooding type that feels deep but has trouble sharing. But he did not realize that intermittent bedroom connections and being the behind-the-scenes provider would not be enough for her. 

He gets his wake up call when she leaves. And now he is a man on a mission trying to figure out how to make things right. But Rosie does not know everything. And neither of them were really communicating effectively. They were not speaking each other's love languages, but can a last-ditch trip to an unorthodox therapist make them realize what brought them together in the first place?

I really enjoyed the first half of the book and it was interesting that the characters were already married and trying to figure out how to fix a broken relationship. That part was really relatable. I admit that as it went on I got more frustrated though, mostly with Dominic. He was keeping a big secret and it was driving me crazy that he did not just spill the beans. I could understand due to his background why he approached things the way he did and I was glad he was starting to learn alternatives, but it got a bit repetitive. I honestly felt like shaking sense into the man so he would tell her everything and quit feeling so unworthy.

And there was something about the way their chemistry was just so over-the-top full of sexual tension and so volatile that kind of felt a bit forced to me in a couple that was having trouble even speaking to each other. But overall I truly felt like they belonged together and was rooting for them to get it all together. And it had good messages about really trying to communicate and understand your partner and to figure out what you both need to be happy and content.

This brings back the quirky characters from Fix Her Up and sets up a new story for one of her friends, Bethany. It looks like she might have met her match.