A review by haletostilinski1
The King's Delight by Sarah Honey

4.0

This was enjoyable.

I really liked Felix and Leo, they had good chemistry together.

Felix is around 23, and for the past 6 years he's been away learning how to groom horses and take care of horses. While away, he's gained some experience sexually and has learned he likes to get spanked/whipped and has had his fair share of dalliances. But now, he's feeling the need for something a little more permanent with someone.

He's sowed his wild oats and is now feeling the need to just find one special person.

But when the king, Leopold, 32, sneaks into the stables of the palace at night, to get away from his responsibilities as king for awhile and ride his horse, he and Felix run into each other.

Felix is now the royal groomer, and he's in the stables that night, and he hasn't seen the king in the flesh since he was 12 years old.

So safe to say, he doesn't recognize him, especially when Leo is covered in different clothes that are a little less royal so he could escape detection.

They immediately have an attraction, and they immediately start something sexual together. When Leo calls his horse by her name in the middle of things, to get her to leave them be to their exploits, Felix realizes that he's about to have sex with the king.

With the cat out of the bag, they agree to a sexual relationship. Felix has wanted more with someone, but he just wants Leo too much to say no, and what's one more casual relationship before he finds that special someone, right?

Of course, fairly quickly, these two form a deeper connection, and it doesn't take long for these two to go from casual, to more, even thought they try to deny it.

I do think this was a little rushed between them. There were times I wish the author had spent more time on these two as a couple and really took her time to establish their connection. It was pretty much about sex right away and any connection they made was in between the sex, so I just wanted more of those moments.

Which, the sex was great, and the chemistry in those scenes was great, it just took me awhile to buy the connection of more between them. It did come eventually, for sure, but it just took longer than I would have liked.

Also, near the end, I felt the problem of Leo potentially having to marry a woman to provide an heir was solved too easily. It did wrap things up nicely and these two did get their deserved HEA, but it just felt too easy, the solution that came about. I would have liked to see it be a little more complicated.

But also, for the scope of this story, an easy solution was kind of needed, to wrap this story up in a timely manner, so I didn't dock too many points for it.

It was a little disappointing, but overall it didn't bother me too much. So that, and their relationship being a little too rushed at first, had me giving this one star off.

But, the rest was enjoyable and these two did have chemistry and a certain charm to them. I enjoyed this, overall, so I definitely recommend this.

It just had a few areas that could have used improvement. It was good, though. Two thumbs up from me!