Zoe Jensen doesn’t know what she will do now that she has been evicted out of her apartment this close to the holidays. Her landlady didn’t mind the pets that she had until she spied the “rodent” aka hamster that her best friend Grant had given her to keep until they found a home for him. Zoe has always had a soft spot for animals, which made it hard growing up on a ranch, so Grant knew that she would take the animal. Since he was the one that caused the hamster incident and the eviction, he knew that he would help her to find a place to stay. Zoe wants to stay with Grant until she has time to look for an apartment that will take her pets, but Grant won’t let her do that. The small town that they live in will not look kindly on a kindergarten teacher living with a man, and Grant knows that living with her, he’ll never be able to resist her.

Grant Cortez’s family is one of the richest in the world, yet he likes to live in the small town in which he grew up. Four years ago when Zoe was nineteen, he realized that he felt something different for her, different than what he had felt for any other woman he had dated. Things went a little too far one day, and she went back to school and only returned when she was ready to begin teaching. Now Zoe is not nineteen anymore and is ready for what Grant can give her. Grant keeps telling her that friends don’t kiss, but Zoe has her own way of thinking. It should be very interesting to see who wins this game.

This book is one of my all time favorite Harlequin Presents books, so it’s one of my all time favorites from Lucy Monroe. The book is sweet, and I loved the fact that Grant is rich although he’s never acted like it. He is a rancher and he wore the clothes, drove the truck and acted like a rancher. I also liked the fact that the heroine in this book was just as much of an aggressor as the hero. This is a book where the hero and the heroine are going to be very happy living together because neither will let the other one get a lot over on the other Ms. Monroe always does a great job and as always has done so with The Rancher’s Rules.

Reviewed by: Missy