The second book in Lainey Davis’ Playing series and Playing for Payback brings together Pittsburg Fury star the openly bisexual Alder Stag and team trauma dentist Lena Sinclair when the arena kiss cam zooms in on their respective partners passionately locking lips in the stands. With nowhere else to go Lena ends up as Alder’s new roomie where they plot their revenge on their cheating ex’s getting more creative as their anger grows. Both Alder and Lena were wracked by confidence issues in this close proximity romance. Alder’s boyfriend had treated him as his dirty secret with Alder being the only one working at their relationship while Lena’s boyfriend treated her a cash cow while playing on her insecurities about her shape, telling her no one else would want someone her size even after they’d broken up, and it was something her mother underlined every chance she got, till Lena believed it. As heroes go Alder didn’t always think before he spoke which brought some drama to the story when he found himself under fire from the LGBTQ community when his ex targeted him in a revenge attack, and his relationship with Lena only added fuel to that particular fire. He also didn’t consider the consequences of his actions on other people, such as how a relationship between him and Lena would affect her job with the Fury but the more he got to know her the more he wanted to be with her and thought he needed to prove his love in a dramatic fashion. With likeable characters in Alder and Lena, the overall story was engaging, easy to read and relatively lighthearted but with a sprinkling of angst as both characters had to realise that they were enough just as they were, and with the support of the Stag family they soon saw this.