Cassie is the oldest of her siblings. When their mom died 10years ago, she did her best to step into her shoes. Their dad is a rock to the family and they have frequent family get togethers where she cooks. She started a catering business and one of her clients is Adam who is CEO of a huge corporation. She has catered many of their events. At the beginning of the novel they are having a meeting to finalize an event that is less than 2 weeks away and he is trying to make last minute changes to her menu. She tells him no. No one tells Adam no. When he realizes he cannot get another caterer this close to the date, he vows to never use her again. How dare she tell him no!They meet at her dad's house when he accompanies his mom for a special dinner. It turns out their parents are getting married and they are both surprised and angry. When Adam learns that Cassie has serious and painful female issues, he is torn between caring for her and wanting to fire her. He gets her to his beach house and she helps him put together a business meeting with wives attending and she works out menus and shopping and spa times for the women so they are not bored. Adam has another agenda as well - seduce Cassie. He succedes and the weekend meetings surpass his expectations.Their parents plan a small wedding, but Cassie convinces them to have it at Adam's place on the beach. Adam mishears her end of a phone conversation and believes she is pregnant. Now what is he supposed to do about getting rid of her personally and professionally. A couple of chapters into this story, I had every intention of giving it three stars ("liked it"), as the storyline was clever and the characters likeable enough. I had already deducted stars for the grammar/spelling errors which made me want to break out my editing pen and do a mark-up (yes, I'm a nerd), which I may not have noticed if the storytelling had been captivating enough. As it was, I was re-reading paragraphs because I spent the first time editing it in my head. The second star-reduction was due to the switching POV's. As I've read more and more romance books, I've come to some conclusions as to why I enjoy some books and not others - one of those being the POV's. In order for me to feel a strong connection with the characters (preferrably only two), I need to be in their heads. If the POV switches between characters back and forth - not to mention when secondary characters' POVs jump in - the story to me feels disconnected and I'm not getting to know the character, thus I don't feel for them, thus I don't care what happens to them. But then, about halfway through, I had to drop yet another star. The characters, to me, felt very unclear in their motivations and feelings. I could give examples, but this is already going on too long. I actually skimmed the last section of the book because I was so frustrated with the hero's churlishness and didn't see any character growth in him. The ending was abrupt and I had to go back a page to check that it was actually the end. Sadly, yet another book in a bundle that I won't be revisiting...
What do You think about Catering To The CEO (2000)?
i wish that the ending didnt end like that!! i wanted more!!!
—Lauren
