TBR Challenge: Emma Holly - Cooking Up a Storm

The Coates Inn restaurant in Cape Cod is about to go out of business, when its striking owner, Abby, jumps at a stranger's offer of help—both in her kitchen and her bedroom. Storm, a handsome chef, claims to have a secret weapon—an aphrodisiac menu that her patrons won't be able to resist. It certainly works on Abby, who gives in to the passions she has denied herself for years. But can this playboy chef really be Abby's hero if her body means more to him than her heart, and his initial plan was to steal the restaurant from under her nose? Storm soon turns the restaurant around, but Abby's insatiable desires have taken over her life. She's never known a guy into crazy sex like him before, and she wants to spend every spare moment getting as much intense erotic pleasure as she can. Meanwhile, her best friend Marissa becomes suspicious of the new wonder-boy in the kitchen. Before things get really out of control, someone has to assume responsibility. But can Abby tear herself away from the object of her lustful attention long enough to see what's really going on?

Comment: It's time for another challenge read. This month the theme is steamy reads and I went through my books to see which erotic books I might have and despite having read quite a few some years ago, I see that nowadays it's not what I look for to read. So I didn't have that much to choose from...I mean many books have enough sex to count as erotic but I wanted something more in the genre and I had to stick with Emma Holly. The author isn't new to me, as I've read several of her books in the past and enjoyed them, but taste changes and I picked this book with some suspicion and wondered if I would like it.

Anyway, this story is about Abby Coates. She has a business with her sisters but she's the one who works the most towards maintaining the restaurant their father left them. She's in trouble and needs clients fast. So she puts an ad in the paper wanting a chef.
Storm Dupré is in California, unhappy with his life and seeing the ad he decides it's the best thing that could happen to him. There he goes and by meeting Abby, something tells him she's would be special even though his aim is to buy her restaurant from her. However, while seducing Abby, he also learns to see in her someone he develops feelings for.

I wasn't very curious over this book. I'm not in an erotic stage right now and I don't usually look for these kind of books, although I have read them in the past with will.
I new this story would have enough sex to overcome the plot so in a way I can't say I'm disappointed, plus I knew what type of writing the author offers. But, there was still a part of me, the side that prefers romances, that looked at this and sighed over wasted possibilities.
It's not the contents of the story, or the fact there were several different sexual partners in there that made me wrinkle my nose..it was more the fact the main couple could have taken this opportunity to develop a better relationship and that didn't seemed to happen. Right at the end, for instance, even though it was obvious they had feelings for each other, although not spoken out loud yet, still Abby gave in to her impulses and had sex with another man. I thought she was done exploring. Well, Storm thought himself in love with her well before that and he had sex with someone else too,so...but I mean, if things were meant to be like this, I would be fine with it, this could be a free choice menage or whatever, but it's said at some point, they're jealous of each other, so why pushing the issue like this? I must be very naive....

Abby and Storm had personal things to solve. They had issues fro their pasts and I cared for that. But of course the way they went about to deal with them could have been done differently, specially in respect to both of their behaviors.
Storm had a bad experience in his life with his mother, so in a way, his treatment of women was justified enough I guess. 
Abby started as someone innocent and not very daring but ended up discovering her inner sex goddess which she explored quite well by having sex with almost all the characters n the story. But she did it with class so I can't say it was that bad...well, she did distributed the love often I'd say.
There are also secondary characters that provide amazingly deep characterization, considering the air time and the fact most of that time is spend having sex. But it's still a proof of the author's talent to bring such interest to the secondary characters.

In the end I liked some of the settings, some of the issues dealt in the book, but despite recognizing this as a good erotic story, I'm in a point where it doesn't step over interesting. Still, I intend to read the other books by the author I have.