ARC Review: "The Au Pair Affair" by Tessa Bailey (Big Shots #2) ★★★★★

ARC Review: The Au Pair Affair by Tessa Bailey

The best way to describe this book is “Holy shit biscuits” (if you know, you know)! If you like all things Tessa Bailey, you’re in luck – it’s got a little bit of everything! This is brimmed with age gap romance, insta love but slow burn, he falls first, opposites attract, grumpy meets sunshine, boss/employee and forced proximity with a touch of sports. There are also deeper aspects like finding oneself and inner healing. Perfect for the summer – but could be considered even more ideal in wintertime because of Tallulah and Burgess’ love of the cold!

Happiness didn’t just appear out of thin air, a man had to search for it, cultivate it, and guard it with their life. Someone like Tallulah wouldn’t come along again. Ever. He’d found someone who slowed down time and made him feel immortal. Someone who believed in him. Someone *he* believed in, too…suddenly there was determination in his chest to take her places, show her things… Be alive with her. Love her.

[Contains some spoilers]

PLOT SUMMARY
26-year-old Tallulah Aydin is a marine biologist, striving to get her Master’s degree in Boston. She made a deal a year ago with divorced single father Burgess Abraham, 37-year-old captain of the Boston Bearcats ice hockey team – also known as “Sir Savage” for his brutality on the rink. This deal? To be an au pair (babysitter) for his 12-year-old daughter, Lissa.

With initial reluctance, due to his rough and cold reputation as well as her own trust issues from previous relationships, Burgess shows Tallulah that he only wants to keep her safe. After a little while they form an unmistakable attachment. After all, unbeknownst to Tallulah, he has been in love with her since they first met.

Various obstacles are preventing them from being together:
• Their age gap of 11 years is the most notable
• Tallulah is spontaneous, Burgess is more guarded and wants everything to be just so
• Burgess has a child and would expect Tallulah to settle down; she wants to spread her wings and party. Girlfriend, sure, but not wife and stepmother all at once.
• Lissa has hopes that, despite Burgess’ ex-wife Ashleigh having a fiancé, her parents will reconcile. This leaves Tallulah in the most awkward predicament.

When an injury threatens to end his ice hockey career, and their affair comes out, things come to a head (and get heavily messy). But will they put aside their differences to be the best man and maid of honour at their best friend’s Wells and Josephine’s wedding in Costa Rica?

“You could be wasting your time on me.”
“Time with you could never be a waste. Only a privilege.”

OVERALL OPINIONS
I may have said previously that Fangirl Down is Tessa's best story yet. I retract my statement: this one is it. It has got everything, which I listed above. This has so much humour and heart that this had such an impact on me. I would argue it is even better than Fangirl Down, though I loved of course that we got to see dear Wells and Josephine again – and that they are getting married. He should be named Wells the wingman after this ordeal.

Tessa took all her works from before (really, all the elements that made them good), combined them and made something stupendous here! The single parent element is something she has not covered often so again this is a fresh approach. Slowburns for Tessa is exceptionally rare to see and I really adore when she does it! This was nicely done, made the wait worth it. And goodness, the steam was so good ahh! Her books are either hit or miss depending, but this was definitely a hit for me.

There was so, so much depth to Burgess and Tallulah which was so great to see! I loved both their similarities and differences. It was cute that they both like and feel comfortable in the cold (Tallulah spent her time in the quiet Arctic studying wildlife, and Burgess does his ice hockey). The amount of green flags Burgess has, I think his team should have been this colour instead of blue! He instils so much confidence into Tallulah, and is so protective of her, never wants to take advantage of her, that it is so heartwarming to see. One of my favourite moments showing this was when he uses his own experiences to relate to Tallulah struggling to reject a guy:

“How do you feel about telling this clown that he’s making you uncomfortable and he needs to back the fuck off?”
She hissed a breath. “Oh, I don’t know. I’d rather just get through it.”
“Is getting through it working?” When she only blinked at him, he searched for a different tactic. “When someone encroaches on my territory on the ice, I let them know it’s not okay. And I guess it’s…I never thought about it, because it’s just my job, but I guess it’s empowering. To demand somebody backs off. You have that right, too.”

At the same time, I especially liked that they both become quite flawed characters and that both hurt each other: Burgess really ruins their relationship by pushing her away in the coldest arguably cruellest way possible, and Tallulah later on feels that she can have sex with him to get him out of her system. Tessa usually has a fallout where both parties feel guilty/bad about what happened and here is no exception – but this was the book where I felt like both of them really did some messed up stuff, whereas in other books it felt more one-sided than others. What an emotional roller coaster.

<< Positives >>
🠚 The re-iteration of an all too realistic issue for most women: being scared of what men might do to us if we reject them. This is such a big deal, and I am glad Tessa decided to use this for plot and covered it exceptionally well.

She shouldn’t have to lie or make an excuse not to be interested. She was allowed to simply not be interested and didn’t owe him an explanation about it. Her fear stemmed from how he would react is she turned him down.

🠚 Big shoutout to Chloe for being a girls-girl at the club and checking Tallulah was okay talking to that guy, we love that and we love Chloe!
🠚 The way both Burgess and Tallulah comes to the other’s defence.
🠚 Raising awareness of emotional abuse. Again, Tessa did this very well. As someone who has had this, I really felt the issues in my soul. In a world full of Bretts please be a Burgess!
🠚 Showing an amicably divorced couple. This was a healthy thing to see. I like that Ashleigh does not become a stereotypical jealous ex-wife who wants him back (which was how I feared this would go). Again, different and refreshing to see. She even tries to diffuse the situation when Lissa is mad at Tallulah and apologises for being initially jealous and giving the wrong idea.
🠚 Portrayal of a healthy stepmother and daughter relationship. Lissa understandably sees Tallulah as someone who has come between her parents getting back together but also sees the error in her ways. I love that she also gets a good character arc through Tallulah, going from being bullied in school to Tallulah helping her style her hair and land the main role of Juliet at school.
🠚 Healthy funny friendships, which as always Tessa is so good at portraying. Wells and Burgess were as wholesome as ever. And it is so lovely that everyone on the ice hockey team help Burgess to get better!

<< Negatives >>
🠚 Like Fangirl Down, there is not much of the actual sport occurring, but I would argue there is enough.
🠚 We did not get a chapter of the wedding to Wells and Josephine itself, I was so excited for this. I wonder if she will cover it in a book about Sig and Chloe. It certainly looks like that’s what Tessa is gearing up for.
🠚 Not a negative for me in this particular book especially because he *is* one, but if you hate someone calling their boyfriend “Daddy” you might want to skip this.
🠚 Never call a dick a “rigid pike” again, Tessa! I am begging. Please tell me I am not the only one who thought this??

CHARACTERS
-ˋˏ ꒰ Tallulah꒱ ˎˊ-
↳ I see a lot of myself in Tallulah. I love that she touches every aspect of Burgess’ life and changes it for the better. Reminds me of Piper from It Happened One Summer, but a much much better and more relatable version of her.
🠚 Her journey and her growth as a character in terms of confidence was so lovely to see! I like that she finally throws the postcards away and does things for herself and her happiness. She is super strong at the hospital, I would have cried instantly.

-ˋˏ ꒰ Burgess꒱ ˎˊ-
↳ Best Bailey Boy! Loved him from the start. When I read “A man who recognized his own faults. A man who wanted to be better.” I have never waved a green flag so fast in my life! Also, the “Name the dead man who hurt you” made me melt! Also I like that his eyes are blue, probably ice blue which is very fitting considering he likes ice.
🠚 Massive kudos to Tessa making this man (mostly) think with his heart and not his dick. Very rare phenomenon, but please keep this up.
🠚 He is the Big Boy that SZA was singing about hehe (that has got to be his song, right there)! I love that he has loved her since day one, and how big and protective he is. There are so many things he does that are so cute I need to list them properly:
• secretly offering to cover Tallulah’s rent and buying her pepper spray so she can stay somewhere safe
• making the effort to try and learn French braids for his daughter
• the way he listens to Tallulah when she talks about her difficult time and why she distrusts men. “He was exhibiting patience and understand, addressing her worries without her having to ask – and he wasn’t doing it in a patronizing way. That…counted for something.”
• “Give me a chance to show that you’re safe with me” – pleaseeee marry him!
• got them into an Aquarium for free
• even when they separated, he made sure she was okay via news from Chloe.
🠚 It can be seen why some people would dislike him after what he said in the hospital, and I get it. However, I have been in a situation like that, and in order to get you to be quiet men particularly like to say something that will get to you so you will stop or leave them alone. It sucks but it was so accurate I was like yes, this is exactly what would happen. And I would have done the exact same as Tallulah in that situation and left.

FAV QUOTES
• she hadn’t purposely searched for shirtless interviews, thank you very much. They’d come up as a *suggested* Google search. She couldn’t simply ignore that kind of search engine divine providence. It would be irresponsible.
• This was the person he remembered from lunch. Direct and clever. A little self-deprecating. Wildly unique.
• One hurdle at a time, though – and tonight was a big one. Six-foot-three to be exact.
• “That’s just a human being a human. Sometimes we break a little.”
• “What do you mean by that, buddy?” Burgess asked, his tone dripping with malice. Only, the way he said “buddy” sounded more like “future corpse”.
• Burgess liked playing protector. Yet he still wanted to help Tallulah stand on her own two feet again. That said a lot about his character.
• She ran, jumped and was enfolded in the warmest, safest hug of all time.
• she was brighter than any star in the sky. More brilliant than the nighttime lights illuminating the field. She put the Citgo sign to shame. She fucking glowed. • He usually defended other people, but…she’d come to his defense? That meant a lot.
• It no longer felt like an injury signaling the end of his career, it was a minor worry – and he had a major one that needed his attention. Tallulah was endgame.
• “It’s raining.”…“Is it?” His eyes ran a lap around her face “The sun is shining in here.”
• “you’re all mine.” “Ah gorgeous. I’ve been yours since California.”
• “The day we met, you could have asked me to bring you the moon on a platter and I’d have done it…Ask me for galaxies now.”
• Love and Tallulah were interconnected. There couldn’t be one without the other. Love was her. She was love.
• He looked at his daughter that meant so much more to him than hickey.
• She’d had her heart shattered for her efforts, but look. Look. She was still walking, talking and breathing.
• “I might have thrown away my chance, but I’m not going to throw away the lesson you tried to teach me. If it’s the only piece of you I’m allowed, I’m keeping it.”
• “Maybe I will cry again. Maybe we’ll shout and get angry or push each other’s buttons. But our love is going to be bigger than the bad moments.”
• “I’m going to take you on adventures…but hear me when I tell you, there will never be an adventure that lives up to you.” He looked her in the eye. “I want to stay on it forever.”

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I received an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review and I’d like to thank Tessa Bailey, Avon, and NetGalley for the opportunity. This has not affected my opinion in any way.

“The Au Pair Affair” is out July 16th