Lost and Found

Bea Marshall, a hairstylist, has just lost her best friend, Merritt. Merritt leaves her a last gift, and it forces Bea to decide what kind of life she wants. She chooses to try for motherhood on her own.

That choice leads her to share a house with Silas Byrd, the town firefighter. He has loved her quietly for years, and he is still recovering from a serious accident.

Under one roof, the feelings both of them have kept buried become difficult to hold back. The chapters move between the present and flashbacks to key moments in their friendship, so the reader sees how long the wanting has been there.

The book is a contemporary romance in a small town, with a friends to lovers arc and forced proximity. Grief, infertility and burn recovery run through it, and the tone is emotionally heavy rather than light. Heat is moderate at first and turns explicit in the second half.

Book three of the Spunes series follows Savor It and Left of Forever, and it reads on its own. Ellis, Wren and Fisher return, which adds warmth for anyone who knows the earlier books. The question is whether Bea and Silas can risk the friendship they both depend on.