Stay with Me by Mila Gray

My Friday reading tips this week is the gorgeously cute and romantic Stay with Me by Mila Gray. From the first moment, this beautiful love story held me captivated.

Stay with Me is an emotionally, beautiful story about Didi, the bosses daughter who does her intern at a military hospital, and the wounded marine Walker. Didi is a sucker for romance, looking for the true, epic love to sweep her off her feet. Walker is bitter, broken and cynical without hope for the future. He was one of the youngest Lieutenants in the Marine Core. But the majority of his team died while he was left blind with a knee injury.

This is the second book in the Come Back to Me-series, but can be read as a standalone. In Come Back to Me, we met Jessa but in Stay with Me all focus is on her best friend Didi. Didi has her whole life planned out. She’s about to finish her degree in psychology and she's dating movie star Zac, a guy most girls would kill to be with. Her plan certainly does not include falling for one of her patients, especially not someone like Walker.

I really enjoyed the romance between Didi and Walker, it's such a slow build up as they become friends and slowly start to open up to each other. It was a great take with the POV switching from Didi to Walker, which made you see their hopes and doubts much clearer. And the sexual tension and angst was so addictive, it just kept me longing to read the pages as fast as possible…

I loved the characters, Walker and Didi of course, but also the other wounded soldiers, like the good-hearted and brave Sanchez, and troublesome Dodds. Mila Gray really shows the challenges soldiers face after coming home with severe injuries and how they all have different coping mechanisms. This story definitely wasn’t just a light and happy romance, there was so much more pain and suffering the ugliness of war that really added more depth to it.

My only complaint about this book is the ending. It sort of wrapped up too quickly after all the slow build up. I think the book would have benefited by having an epilogue. But maybe that will be in the third book in this series? Even though it’s another stand-alone, there might be some Didi-Walker appearances too I hope!

Overall, I really loved this amazing and emotional love story and recommend it with all my heart!

Find out more about the book and the author here: Mila Gray