This book was a reset for me after a string of awful or aggressively mediocre books. I enjoyed the first in this series, Sweet Talkin' Lover, but Like Lovers Do was even better.
Nic is a career-driven orthopedic surgeon finishing up her residency and about to move for a fellowship, when an entitled white intern decides to (try to) ruin her career because she reprimanded him for sending a patient home without actually seeing him. Nic's boss tells her to take the last two weeks of her residency as vacation, which lines up perfectly with her landlord and good friend Ben's need for a fake girlfriend for a Cape Cod friends trip.
Fake dating plus friends-to-lovers with a smitten man and a relationship-avoidant woman. All the catnip! Livesay's books are sexy, with lots of tension and, in this case, an accidental sexting conversation that both of them keep flashing back to. Nic is sexually confident and it's a joy to read the way their relationship changes--not that much!--as they get to know each other in a sexual and romantic way.
I read this on audio and while it was great, I think I prefer dual narration if we have two POVs. This narrator's voices were a little too similar for me to be able to easily tell who was talking.
As is typical when I sit down to write a review of a book I really enjoyed, I've run out of words to describe my love sufficiently. The central conflict was believable and not drawn out unnecessarily. The group of friends in the series title continue to be supportive and funny. (I am jealous.) And these two genuinely good people are so good to and for each other... I loved watching them ride off into the sunset together.
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Content Warnings: racism, parental abandonment, strained parent relationship, secondary character is misusing alcohol, mentions of surgery and medical malpractice (a Black man is turned away without proper care)
I borrowed this audiobook from my library.
