Who We Used to Be is the first book I’ve read by Dara Nelson. Friends-to-lovers and second chance stories are among my favorite romance tropes be they M/M or M/F. Based on the blurb I was pretty sure I was going to like this book and I did.

The blurb is great so give it a read. Who We Used to Be has a lot of drama going on. To me drama is a bit different than angst. Drama pretty much always contains angst but angst doesn’t have to contain drama. What I mean is that all of the emotions that were being expressed in this story were, to me, overly dramatic with the feelings being a bit exaggerated. I love a good cry but there was a whole lot more crying going on in this story than what seemed plausible.

With all of that being said, I still enjoyed it. Ten years is a long time to pine for someone you thought was lost to you forever but Zeke just didn’t seem to be able to get over his feelings for Digger. How they eventually work through all of their problems with Digger’s family kept me interested in the story. I love a good epilogue and the one for Digger and Zeke was much appreciated.

There were some great secondary characters in this book and the excerpt for the next one in the series whetted my appetite for more; I’m looking forward to reading it.

Reviews for Dara Nelson

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Zeke stared at the amber colored liquid in his glass while trying to figure out what he was feeling. That was just the thing. He wasn’t feeling anything.He was numb.

If he really allowed himself to think about it, he’d been numb for a decade. Since the day he’d opened his front door and had seen that invitation sticking out from under his doormat. That was the last day he’d felt anything at all. And what he’d felt then was total, utter devastation as he collapsed onto the porch swing as those words penetrated his brain. Such a profound sense of not only sadness, but the devastating knowledge that life as he knew it was over.

Everything he thought he knew was shattered.

How could he do this?

Everything he thought he could have was gone.

Did he know her? Had he been cheating the whole time?

And anger – god there was so much anger.

The cowardly fucker didn’t even have the balls to look him in the eye when he destroyed him.

He swore he could feel his heart shattering into a million pieces. It was also the day that he lost all hope of finding his happily ever after.

It was the day he was forced to come to terms with the fact that he and Digger were not meant to be.

Shit. Every time one of Zeke’s crappy relationships ended, he always thought of Digger.

Digger Brandt. The first boy he’d kissed. The first boy he’d touched. The first…and only…. boy he’d ever loved.

Digger Brandt. The man who had destroyed Zeke Malloy. Ruined him for all others.

“Fuck,” he mumbled as he scrubbed a hand over his face. He really needed to stop doing this.

He had to find a way to get over Digger Brandt once and for all.

But how?

As he brought his glass up until it touched his lips, he felt a presence behind him, the heat of someone close, someone big, someone strong, someone that Zeke might be able to get lost in.

“I don’t bottom,” he said, getting that shit outta the way right quick.

A deep chuckle rumbled out of the man’s chest. It was so sexy it made Zeke’s balls tingle.

“The man I knew never had a problem with it.”

Zeke’s eyes squeezed shut.

He knew that voice.

He’d felt that voice.

He’d swallowed that voice into his body when the man came, dozens of times.

He still heard that voice every time he jacked off, despite trying to fight it with everything he had.

If he allowed himself to, he could easily get lost in that voice again.

He shook his head.

No. Not again. Never again.

“The boy you knew doesn’t exist anymore,” he growled and then he tipped back his glass, welcoming the burn as the liquid slid down his throat.

He felt the change in the man behind him, knew without looking that he’d gone from self-assured, cocky even, to unsteady, remorseful…..guilty.

Good.

“Zeke, I….”

“Don’t, Digger. Just fucking don’t. Go back to your perfect house, your white picket fence, your beautiful wife, your two point five kids. Go back to whatever fake little happy life you built and leave me the fuck alone.”

God. Ten fucking years of trying to forget him erased in sixty seconds.

He signaled to Joe, the bartender, for another and tried to ignore the fact that he could still feel Digger behind him.

When Digger slid onto the empty stool next to Zeke, he wanted to turn and walk out.

But he couldn’t.

He felt like he was anchored to his spot with a one-ton boulder.

To be honest, he was anchored, but not by a boulder; by a six-foot-one heart-breaking asshole named Douglas Digger Brandt.

Zeke refused to turn and look at the man.

Truth be told, he was afraid to look.

Afraid that he just might drop to his knees and beg the man to love him, to really love him, the way Zeke thought he had all those years ago, the way Zeke had loved him, the way a still fucking loved him.

Hell, he’d probably even offer to be his dirty little secret if Digger asked him to.

Just anything to get the man to touch him one more time.

Nobody had ever touched Zeke the way that Digger had, like he was trying to fuse them together, like he was pulling whatever it was that made Zeke, Zeke, into himself. He didn’t even have to touch Zeke’s dick, although that was amazing too. Just the tips of his fingers on Zeke’s skin or the brush of his lips on his neck made Zeke feel like he was the only thing in the world that mattered.

Everything that was Digger slid effortlessly together with Zeke like the pieces of a perfect puzzle.

A puzzle whose pieces Digger had scattered to the wind the moment he had walked away.

Maybe nobody had ever touched Zeke like that since because he’d never allowed it, because he’d never let someone get that close.

Never again.

A heartbreak like that was something you never forgot – it changed you.