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Friday, December 26, 2014

Review: The Lycan Hunter by Kelsey Jordan



So right before bed last nite I stumbled upon a Facebook promo for a book. What captured my attention was the tagline "Sherrilyn Kenyon fans will want to check out The Lycan Hunter by Kelsey Jordan." My curiosity got the best of me because I love Sherri, so I bought this book. I started it around 9:30 p.m and by the time I was done with the book, the clock said 4:30 a.m. I will admit, I have never heard of this author until now. I couldn't believe I was so into this book and loved it so much that I stayed up all night reading. And I had to be at the office at 7:30, which means I slept 1.5 hours because I got up at 6:15 a.m to get ready for work.

You're probably thinking, WTF is she talking about. Well, for the price of admission ( which by the way is #FREE ), it's nothing like the world Sherrilyn built for her Dark Hunters or League series, but some of the names are similar to Dark Hunters series. However, I was impressed with the consistency and the details of the premise. I'm a military romance girl at heart, but I will read a good recommendation of PNR if the story tied in very well together even with a few WTH moments, Lol.

As this is a new author and this is a first book of a new series, she did so well building up this world and the development of characters. I will add her to my Fave Authors list and I can't wait to read more of this series. I hope it will be soon.

  

Sunday, December 21, 2014

Release: REVENANT by Larissa Ione + Giveaway






HELL HATH NO FURY . . . For five thousand years, Revenant believed he was alone in the world, a fallen angel beyond any redemption. Now he finds he has a twin brother who had all the light and love Revenant was denied. Caught in a tug of war between Heaven and Hell, he must weigh his thirst for revenge against his desire for a mysterious female named Blaspheme-a female whose very origins could deliver him into salvation . . . or destruction.

LIKE AN ANGEL SCORNED
Blaspheme has a deadly secret: she's the forbidden offspring of an angel and a fallen angel. Hunted by both heavenly and satanic forces, she has survived only by laying low and trusting no one. When Revenant claims he can save them both, how can she possibly believe him? But the powerful angel is persistence incarnate and for Blaspheme, there's no place she can hide in Heaven or Hell where he won't find her . . .

Buy Links:


About the author:
A former meteorologist and EMT, Air Force veteran Larissa Ione now gets her daily dose of excitement from vampires, werewolves, demons, and the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. She lives in wintery Wisconsin with her U.S. Coast Guard husband, her teenage son, a rescue cat, and her hellhound, a King Shepherd named Hexe.

Social Media Links:
Goodreads



Excerpt:

Since the moment Revenant bumped into Blaspheme at the hospital a few weeks ago, he’d been obsessed, and now, as her long legs ate up the asphalt as she walked toward him, he imagined them wrapped around his waist as he pounded into her. The closer she came, the harder his body got.
“Blaspheme.” He stepped out from between two black ambulances, blocking her path.
She jumped, a startled gasp escaping full crimson lips made to propel a male to ecstasy. “Revenant.” Her gaze darted to the hospital doors, and he got the impression she was plotting her escape route. How cute that she thought she could get away from him. “What are you doing lurking in the parking lot?”
Lurking? Well, some might call it that, he supposed. “I was on my way to see you.”
She smiled sweetly. “Well, you’ve seen me. Buh-bye.” Pivoting, her blond ponytail bouncing, she headed in the opposite direction.
 “Come home with me.”
“Wow.” She turned and crossed her arms over her chest, which only drew his attention to her rack. Niiice. “You get right to the point.”
He shrugged. “Saves time.”
“Were you planning to wine and dine me at least?  You know, before the sex.”
“No. Just sex.” Lots and lots of sex.
He could already imagine her husky voice deepening in the throes of passion.
“Oh,” she said, her voice dripping with sarcasm. “You’re charming, aren’t you?”
Not once in his five thousand years had anyone ever called him charming. But even uttered with sarcasm, it was the nicest thing anyone had ever said to him.
“Don’t do that,” he growled.
“Do what?” She stared at him like he was a loon.
“Never mind.” Dying to touch her, he held out his hand. “You’ll love my play room.”
She wheeled away like he was offering her the plague instead of his hand. “Go to hell, asshole. I don’t date fallen angels.”
“Good news, then, because it’s not a date.” And he wasn’t a fallen angel.
“Right. Well, I don’t fuck fallen angels either.” She made a shooing motion with her hand. “Go away.”
She was rejecting him? No one rejected him. No one.
She started to take off again, and he blinked, confused. This wasn’t right. He had his sights set on her, and she was supposed to surrender. This was something new. Something…titillating.
He moved in slowly, matching her step for step as she backed up.
“What are you doing?” She swallowed as she bumped up against a massive support beam.
“I’m going to show you why you need to come home with me.” He planted both palms on the beam on either side of her head and leaned in until his lips brushed the tender skin of her ear. “You won’t regret it.”
“I already told you. I don’t fuck fallen angels.”
“So you said,” he murmured. “Do you kiss them?”
“Ah…no, I—“
He didn’t give her the chance to finish her sentence. Strawberry gloss coated his lips as he kissed her, and he swore he’d never liked fruit as much as he did right now.
Her hands came up to grip his biceps, tugging him closer as she deepened the kiss. “You’re good,” she whispered against his mouth.
“I know,” he whispered back.



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Thursday, December 18, 2014

Release: DECADENT by Adrianne Lee + Giveaway















About DECADENT:

"Adrianne Lee always delivers!" ---Susan Wiggs
Contractor Wade Reynolds is having a tough year. His cherry farm went bust, and his construction clients threaten to unhinge what's left of his sanity. But Wade's passion for life heats up when he's hired to remodel a new storefront next to Big Sky Pie -and he falls for the red-hot, bad girl who's setting up her catering shop there. Fresh off her own divorce, Roxy isn't looking for another relationship, just a spontaneous fling or three. Her contractor Wade looks as delicious as her specialty confections, but he's way too buttoned-up for a casual affair. Yet there's an ultra-sexy strength about him Roxy can't resist. What that man clearly needs is something decadent-like her

About Adrianne Lee:

Adrianne Lee lives with her husband of many, many years on the beautiful Olympic Peninsula in Washington State in a pole barn building her husband transformed into an upstairs apartment with a shop below for his hot rods. Adrianne creates her stories on her laptop, in her recliner with her adopted cat, Spooky, curled between her calves, snoozing.  Over thirty years of summer vacationing in the Flat Head Lake area near Kalispell and Glacier Park has given her a love for all things Montana.

Adrianne’s SM:

Buy links:

Barnes and Noble: http://bit.ly/1wpfeyy 
Books-A-Million: http://bit.ly/1wkqa1z 
IndieBound: http://bit.ly/1skV4XZ 


Excerpt:

She closed the gap between them, a smoldering light ablaze in her pale eyes.  “You really are gorgeous cowboy, and there’s no denying that some kind of electric storm is raging between us.  You feel it.  I feel it too.  And there is nothing I’d like more than to encourage you to act on how we’re both feeling.”  She’d backed him against the closet door frame.  “But you’re not ready to let go of the past.
“But if you were, I’d stand really close to you like this, and shove my hands into your hair like this, and pull your head toward me, and kiss you like this.”  She kissed his mouth, hard, not sweet or gentle as he was used to being kissed, but with a pressure that ignited a fuse in him.  Then her tongue was pushing inside his mouth, shocking him, the sensation at once foreign, yet damned pleasurable.
She pulled away, leaving him breathless, panting for more.  She was also breathing fast.  “If you were ready, I’d unbutton your shirt like this, run my hands up your back like this, and I’d tell you that just touching you makes me weak in the knees and crazed with desire.  And you’d push your hands under my sweater like this, up under my bra, to torture my tingling breasts.”  She shoved his hands beneath her sweater as she spoke, slowing, torturously bringing them to the rigid beads, the breasts were full in his palms, and an earthy groan slipped from between his lips.  She threw her head back and moaned, “Oh, my. . .”
“And if you were ready, I’d unbutton your shirt and pull it loose from your jeans, then slip my fingers through your chest hair—God I love a man with chest hair—and you’d put your hands on my bottom, like this.”  She placed his hands on her butt and pulled herself hard against his erection, their hips meeting, grinding, the need a pulsing, living entity.
She was kissing him again, working the buttons of his jeans.  He’d lost his mind completely, all he wanted was to be inside this woman with her legs wrapped around him, as he drove deeper and deeper.  But she was pushing back again.  Pulling his hands from her, pushing away from him, trying to catch her breath.  “It would be so nice, but you can see that it’s impossible, right?”
“No.”  He grabbed her by the waist, urging her closer.  “Why is it impossible?”
“On the surface, we’d be a perfect ‘friends-with-benefits’ couple, since I’m never falling in love again, never getting married again, and you’re still in love with your wife.  We’re both looking for someone who will satisfy that itch five or six times a month without expecting anything more than a romp in the hay.  I admit that it would be nice if that someone was a person I also had amazing chemistry with.  The kind we’re feeling right now.  But you’re not the kind of guy who has casual affairs.  If you were, you’d have removed your wedding ring long ago.”
His silence seemed to confirm it for her.
“Yeah, I thought so,” she said, looking sorry to be right.  “I hope your wife knew how lucky she was to have you.”
Lucky?  Wade almost laughed at the absurdity.  The only thing keeping his ring on his finger was guilt, and giving into his baser instincts with Roxy would only make the guilt worse.  But at that moment, he wanted to grab her and kiss her so damned bad, it was killing him.  Instead, he let her step back, watched her righting her bra and her sweater, her lips puffy and sexy as hell.
“I don’t know about you, cowboy, but make-out sessions always give me one hell of an appetite,” she said, a bit breathlessly.  “Let’s go get that steak Quint offered.”
            Wade watched her sashay to the ladder and don her outdoor gear.  His considerable discomfort wasn’t allowing him to move just yet.  He had a hell of an appetite, all right.  But not for steak.




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Wednesday, December 17, 2014

Release: BOLD TRICKS by Karina Halle + Giveaway















About BOLD TRICKS:

The Faster They Live, the Harder They Fall . . .

Raised by con artists, Ellie Watt has a lot of crazy childhood memories-but none crazier than being scarred with acid by the demented crime boss Travis Raines. Now Ellie is a full-grown woman who lives for revenge, and Travis is a full-blown drug lord who kills for pleasure. The sadistic bastard has kidnapped her good friend Gus as well as her mother, whom he's been holding as prized possessions in his heavily guarded lair. And Ellie has only one chance in hell of getting them out alive-using two dangerous men who love her to death . . . One is Camden McQueen, a talented tattoo artist who's made a permanent mark on Ellie's heart. The other is Javier Bernal, her fiery ex-lover who's busted more than a few heads in his time. From the crime-ridden streets of Mexico City to the predatory jungles of Honduras, this unlikely trio forms an uneasy alliance in the deadliest game of all-a gun-blazing battle to the finish that will pit enemy against enemy and lover against lover. And Ellie must choose the right man to trust . . . or die.



About Karina Halle:

Karina Halle is a former travel writer and music journalist and the USA Today Bestselling author of Love, in English, The Artists Trilogy, and other wild and romantic reads. She lives in a 1920s farmhouse on an island off the coast of British Columbia with her husband and her rescue pup, where she drinks a lot of wine, hikes a lot of trails and devours a lot of books.

Karina’s SM:



Buy links:
Barnes and Noble: http://bit.ly/1BsL9zC 
Books-A-Million: http://bit.ly/1zKqcB0 
IndieBound: http://bit.ly/1wInERo 



Excerpt:

The motel room was a lot nicer than the one we stayed at before. Sort of a Best Western, middle-ground quality of place. No roaches on the floors, no geckos on the wall. Shit mattresses, I discovered as I pounded my fist on the bed, but I didn’t care.
Camden had just put the final box on my bed,Violetta sprawled out on hers in a state of drug-induced euphoria, when I noticed Javier lingering at the doorway.
“I’m going to be meeting Dom in about twenty minutes,” Javier said to me. “Is that enough time for you to get ready?”
I frowned and he quickly added, “You know he’ll want you there, if this is going to get anywhere. I figured you might want to shower and look nice.”
He rapped his fingers along the doorframe, his mouth opening as if to say something else, then he turned and walked off.
Camden eyed me. “I’m going with you.”
“You might be kind of drunk, Camden,” I told him, though the determination in his voice warmed me like the finest cognac.
“I’ve never felt better,” he said, enunciating each word. His eyes, my god they were still such a clear fucking blue, even in the pallid light of the hotel room. They bore into me with such startling clarity, sending shivers down my back like trailing fingertips. He would be coming with me.
I wished he’d be coming in me. A vision of us in this hotel room, alone, him nailing me to the bed, the headboard banging, slammed into my head.
“Are you okay with that?” he asked.
I suppressed the thought, the flare of heat between my legs, and smiled quickly. “Yes, of course.”
Meanwhile Violetta’s head flopped to the side, her arm still bound to her stiffly in the sling, and started snoring lightly. I motioned to her. “Do you think it’s safe to leave her here?”
He watched her for a few moments, blinking a few times, before saying, “I think she needs to sleep it off.” He went and sat down on my bed. “I’ll be here when you get out.”
I grabbed my bag of clothes I had brought out of the car and brought it into the bathroom. I had a quick shower, trying to rub off all the grim – both real and imagined – with the flimsy hotel soap, then picked through my clothes. Everything that had been in my trunk was musty and wrinkled, some even dirty. I had a packet of unopened (and decidedly unsexy) Hanes underwear, a bra, another pair of jeans, a pair of gladiator sandals that I thought were dressy enough, a pair of Timberland hiking boots, a plain white tee shirt, a couple of wife-beaters, a coral-colored blouse, a plaid shirt, and a light blue tank dress that went to the ground. I wasn’t exactly known for my fashion sense and even with the cherry blossoms covering the scars on my leg, bringing me beauty that I didn’t have before, I didn’t see myself branching out anytime soon. Dressing up in my old clothes for Javier hadn’t exactly helped either.
I slipped on the tank dress, opting to go commando for the evening, and put on the sandals. I looked at myself in the mirror. Once again, I felt like a different person was staring back at me. This me, this Ellie, was tired and hardened. I rubbed the residue mascara away from under my eyes and applied a new coat. My skin was brown from the sun now and I didn’t need much else.
When I came out of the bathroom, Camden straightened up on the bed. I felt strangely shy in front of him, especially as his eyes trailed up and down the length of me.
“Do I look okay?” I asked him, feeling the need to say something. “I mean, if you can see me, that is.”
He bit his lip and stared, a multitude of emotions flashing through his eyes, too fast for me to pick up on each individual one. I thought I saw lust in there – maybe that’s what I wanted to see.
When he still didn’t say anything, I walked over to the dresser where I had my clutch purse left over from the other night at Travis’s and rifled through it for my lip stuff. His silence at my back was a heavy weight, laden with too many uncertainties between us. It was eating at me, burning through me, rendering me with a lead heart. There were so many things I had to focus on, to worry about, fucking impossible things, and yet I needed him to tell me I looked beautiful. I needed him to tell me I was something to him.
I heard him get off the bed and walk toward me, that heaviness, that warmth that he brought with his bones, teased at my back. He stopped, close enough to touch me, and I was about to turn around, perhaps to do something foolish, when he crouched down.
“How is my art?”
His hands found my leg, one of them lifting the hem of my dress, the other slowly moving over the cherry blossom tattoo. I sucked in my breath, holding completely still, trying to contain my nerves that were firing wildly as his fingers ran along the ridges of the ink. He touched me gently over every vine, leaf and petal, until I had to supress a shaky moan that that tried to escape from my lips.
“It feels fine,” I said softly when I found my voice.
“It looks beautiful,” he said.
“I had a beautiful artist,” I told him. I turned at the waist and look down at him, my blue dress glowing in his tanned hand, his other one placed firmly around my calf, his strong fingers imparting heat that sunk deep. He was looking up at me, lips parted slightly.
I couldn’t take a second more of this.
I turned and dropped to the ground, my knees rubbing against his.
I grabbed his face, his rough stubble pressing into my palms, and kissed him.
Hard.
There was surprise for a second, a hesitation, a pulse that refused to beat on. Then Camden kissed me back, his soft lips enveloping mine, his mouth opening to give me life. He put his hand behind my head, holding it there with power and control.
My heart was an elevator car, the cable suddenly snapped, and I was freefalling and falling and falling as his lips and tongue and hot, wet mouth took away every inch of my resolve. The more he kissed me, the deeper and longer we found each other, the thirstier I got for him. I felt like if we stopped, I would die, empty on the inside and forever longing.




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Tuesday, December 16, 2014

Release: THE LAST COWBOY IN TEXAS by Katie Lane + Giveaway
















About The Last Cowboy in Texas, book 7 in Katie Lane’s Deep in the Heart of Texas series
Country music princess Starlet Brubaker has a sweet tooth for moon pies and cowboys: both are yummy-and you can never have just one. Now Beckett Cates may not be a cowboy, but he certainly has the heart, soul-and body-to whet her appetite. He's a sexy ex-Marine with a touch hotter than the scorching Texas sun and arms strong enough to catch her when she lands into trouble.

Playing bodyguard to America's sweetheart isn't easy for Beckett. But falling for her sure is. Unfortunately, Starlet has a reputation for keeping a guy or two wrapped around her finger and Beckett refuses to be anybody's backup. So now it's up to Starlet to prove that she's put her cowboy-crazy days behind her. Otherwise, she'll be singing solo instead of living in harmony with the man who's loved her even before her fame and fortune.

Buy Links: 


About Katie Lane
Katie Lane is the USA Today bestselling author of the Deep in the Heart of Texas and Hunk for the Holiday series.  Katie lives in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and when she isn't writing, enjoys reading, going to the gym, golfing, traveling, or just snuggling next to her high school sweetheart and cairn terrier Roo.

Learn more about Katie Lane at:
www.katielanebooks.com
Facebook.com/katielaneauthor
Twitter: @ktlane3




Excerpt:

With her head tucked under his chin, Beckett could feel Starlet take an uneven breath and release it before lifting her head and smiling brightly for the cameras.
“I’m glad y’all are so concerned,” she said.  “But as you can see, I’m just fine and dandy.  Thanks to the heroics of this Marine.”
That prompted a flood of questions and pictures, but it was Kari Jennings who raised her voice loud enough to be heard over the din.
“Why don’t you give your hero a thank you kiss, Star?”
The photographers catcalled their agreement.  Before Beckett could dissuade her from the notion, Starlet’s arms tightened around his neck, and he was pulled toward a pair of lips with a tiny mole at the corner that he remembered all too well.  The soft, full lips had barely brushed his when her eyes flashed open, and he found himself staring into a startled pair of green contacts.
The one word that slipped out of her mouth was the one word that Beckett had hoped he would never hear again. 
“Becky?”


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Monday, December 15, 2014

Release: Double Trouble: Charmed and Dangerous/Mission:Irresistible by Lori Wilde + Giveaway




DOUBLE TROUBLE
Two Lori Wilde romances together for the first time in print!

CHARMED AND DANGEROUS

When her thrill-seeking twin sister goes missing, Maddie Cooper must come to her rescue-which means teaming up with irritating, arrogant, and altogether way too sexy FBI agent David Marshall. David isn't one to get easily distracted but his new self-proclaimed partner has him completely sidetracked with her delectable curves and knockout smile. His first priority: follow the leads in the case. Then he can go about the all-too-enjoyable task of following his heart . . 

MISSION: IRRESISTIBLE

PR specialist Cassie Cooper loves the adrenaline rush of a well-planned party. And a masquerade ball at the museum is her best yet. But when a legendary amulet is stolen practically from under her nose, she needs the help of her nemesis, archaeologist Harrison Standish. No-nonsense Harrison has all the intensity of Indiana Jones. Though just when he needs his full attention on their mission, he's having the damnedest time keeping his mind-and his hands-off Cassie . . .


About Lori Wilde
New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Lori Wilde has written sixty novels. She holds a bachelor's degree in nursing from Texas Christian University and a certificate in forensics. She volunteers as a sexual assault first responder for Freedom House, a shelter for battered women. Lori is a past RITA finalist and has been nominated four times for theRomantic Times Reviewers' Choice Award. She's won the Colorado Award of Excellence, the Wisconsin Write Touch Award, the Lories, the More Than Maggie, the Golden Quill, the Laurel Wreath, and the Best Books of 2006 Book Award. Her books have been translated into twenty-five languages and featured inCosmopolitanRedbookComplete WomanAll You,TIME, and Quick and Simple magazines. She lives in Texas with her husband, Bill. 


Excerpts:


Charmed and Dangerous

The air in the room seemed miserably hot even though he’d twisted up the controls on the air conditioner whenhe’d walked in. Or maybe it was the heat of his bloodrushing through his veins.

“Nobody likes being intimidated.”

“Don’t be so sure of that. Ever heard of a submissive?”

“I’m not a submissive,” she denied. “Far from it.”

“You sure? You entered a man’s room while he wasgetting undressed.”

“That doesn’t make me submissive. If anything, I’d sayI was dominant.”

“You dominating me?” The notion was so foreign, soutterly ridiculous that David burst out laughing.

His derision incensed her. She stabbed an index fingerin his direction. “Maybe you’re the one who’s longing tobe submissive.”

“Oh yeah?” Swiftly he covered the remaining distancebetween them.

She backpedaled until she ran smack dab into the wall.David grabbed both her wrists, pinned her hands aboveher head and swiftly shoved one knee between her legs,completely hemming her in with no way out.

“This look like submissive to you, darlin’?” hegrowled.

They were both breathing hard, their lips almosttouching.

“For your information I’m a third degree black belt inkarate,” she said.

“Bring it on. I’m fifth degree.”

“You don’t threaten me.” She gulped, belying her ownbravado.

He saw the column of her throat muscles pump hardand he knew he’d succeeded in intimidating her, but stillshe held her ground. She might be scared, but she was too damned proud to run away.


Mission: Irresistible

“Harry?”

“Uhhuh?” He hesitated.

“Take this with you.”

“Wha—”

But that was as far as he got because Cassie unsnappedher seat belt, leaned across the console, and planted a kisson his scarred cheek.

He was so startled that he jerked his head toward her,and her mouth slipped from his cheek to his lips.
The next thing he knew he was kissing her.

Full on.

It was hot and wet and moving.

For one endless second Harrison forgot about the FordFocus parked behind him. He forgot about the Minoanhieroglyphics. He forgot about Solen and Kiya. He forgotabout the amulet. He even forgot about Adam.

Whereas before there was danger, now there was nothingbut pleasure. His full attention was focused on onething and one thing alone.

Cassie Cooper’s mouth.

Lush and full and ripe and sweet. She tasted of summer.Throbbing and heated and humid. Filled with lifeand intensity and drama.

He remembered swimming pools and lounging on thebeach, smelled chlorine and suntan lotion. He thought ofthe Fourth of July, heard bottle rockets scream and BlackCats explode. He saw fireflies flickering through pecantrees, and he spied charcoal embers glowing white-hotinthe bottom of a barbecue grill.

It all added up to a glorious wow.




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Friday, December 12, 2014

2014 Holidays: Twelve Days of Christmas - Day 5 + Giveaway



RAFFLECOPTER GIVEAWAY:

http://is.gd/gKb2bC

***Note: BBL giveaway is a variety swag bags with books and goodies. Please click the giveaway link http://is.gd/gKb2bC and participate in the 12 Days of Christmas for lots and lots of goodies***

Thursday, December 4, 2014

Release: UNWANTED VOWS by Beth Rhodes + Giveaway


Unwanted Vows
By: Beth Rhodes
Releasing August 25th, 2014
Self-Published

Enter to Win
$10.00 Amazon eGift Card & 
Ebook Copy of UNWANTED VOWS



To safely raise her daughter, Samantha Hollister must join wounded U.S. Army veteran Morgan Lawrence in rediscovering an old love that never truly disappeared.

WOUNDED

Samantha Hollister is done relying on other people to take care of—or abuse—her. Her ex-husband is out of the picture now…like her family home, the haven she intended to seek. Her father just sold it to her high-school sweetheart, the man who abandoned her many years ago for the army. The man who still makes her heart flutter. But Samantha has vowed to never be led astray again. She has a daughter.

WANTING

Despite being injured in action, Morgan Lawrence lives life to the fullest. Each day is a gift, and after five years he is finally one step away from opening a resort for wounded veterans like himself. Unfortunately, a woman stands in his way. And while she has changed, Samantha remains everything he’s ever wanted. Now it’s a matter of helping her see which promises are meant to be broken, and that being strong doesn’t mean one has to fight alone.


Amazon | B&N | Kobo | ARe | Smashwords




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Her little car bumped down the drive, almost got stuck in a muddy bog, and skidded to a halt behind Morgan’s oversized Chevy truck. Getting out of her car, she stepped onto the little bit of grass left in the front yard and called out, “Morgan Lawrence.”

He couldn’t be far. His engine was still clicking.

When he didn’t appear, she slipped off her ridiculous high-heeled shoes and headed for the back porch. “Morgan!”

The silence was deafening and the farther she went, the more agitated she became.

She was sick and tired of making excuses. For her father when he was on a drinking binge, and for herself with her controlling husband, who had wanted everything just so—to the point of sociopathic OCD.

She would not start her new life by apologizing and rationalizing her actions. She pounded on the back door then opened it onto the porch without an invitation.
They’d been friends once, and he’d been her first love. Maybe she’d left him hanging when she ran off and got married. But she’d been so young and stupid… and scared.

“May I help you?” Morgan asked, coming through the door from the kitchen. There was an edge to his voice that hadn’t been there the last time they’d stood in this very spot.

It sent a shiver down her spine. “I won’t apologize.”

“Well, good for you.”

“You said I would regret it.” Now that she was standing in front of him, she could feel her emotions taking over her attempt to remain calm, and she worked to control her reaction. “Don’t count on it.”

A fire blazed in his eyes. “You came all the way out here to challenge me?”

He drew close to her, the masculine scent of him overwhelming her. She might have backed up if she wasn’t already at the door, but she was…and she didn’t like encountering the mouse she’d become. Drawing up to her full height, she blazed back, “I just want a chance to make things right for my daughter. I will not have my entire life ripped out from under me. For once, I am not giving up something I love without a fight.”

Angry tears pricked at the back of her eyes, and she stood up to him, poking him in the chest. “I will fight for what is mine.”

“You’re fighting the wrong person. I do not have what is yours.”

“You have my home!”

Morgan grabbed her shoulders, firm yet decidedly gentle. Her insides quaked, remembering a different time, a different hold. His gaze dropped to her mouth.
He wanted to kiss her. She remembered his eyes. The look that shot desire straight to her core. She hated the pounding in her chest, the anticipation that flowed through her arteries with oxygen-rich blood. Oh, lord, have I ever really gotten over this man? “Please, I need—”

Morgan cut her off, staking her mouth with bruising pressure. She met his punishing embrace, tasted his lips, and tasted his frustration. His hands went into her hair and held her.

Lord, have mercy. Her hands went loose and the shoes she’d been clutching fell to the hollow floor with a thud. Her mind shut down.

He slowed his assault on her senses, scraping his teeth along her bottom lip as he backed off.

She licked at the trails of heated abrasion and sucked her lip into her mouth. How had she forgotten his touch? Lips like honey and—

“Need anything else?” Animosity rolled from him in waves.

“I—” I can’t think. She cleared her throat, bringing a hand to her mouth where she attempted to rub the memory away. “I—”

She was at a loss for words.

“Honey, if you’ve got nothing else to say, maybe it’s best you leave.”

His slow twanging comment pushed her back to reality. His sandy colored hair was messy, like it got when he ran his hands through it. His hazel eyes—more green than gold—watched her with guarded wariness and disappointment. He stood at the ready, ready to move, ready to react. On the balls of his feet—foot.

He’d lost, too. Yet while he’d been able to move on and live, she was still struggling to survive. There was life beyond survival. How did she get to it? “I just need to find out how to get back what is mine.”

Morgan lifted a hand.

She jerked back but knew in an instant he’d merely been gesturing.

Shit. Where had that come from? It had been months since she’d reacted at her most basic level. She controlled her exhale, reminding herself of where she was and who she was and how she was the strong one. But she didn’t feel strong.


Morgan frowned, stuffing his hand into his pocket. “Some things you can never get back.”



Beth Rhodes is a woman, imperfect yet trying—a wife, mother, friend, and lover.  She lives with her army husband and their six children at the base of the mountains in Colorado. She loves the cold, coffee, camping, and sunshine. Her stories are full of life, family, and love. You can find her reading just about any genre of romance, but her favorite books are fast-paced suspense, where life is on the line and love is the only saving grace. She wants a story that makes her heart pound and her pulse race.