Since You've Been Gone (Welcome to Paradise) (17 page)

“A little birdie told me that Cooper Grady wants to rent out his cabin.” Austin’s lips quirked. “And since the two of us are currently homeless, I thought we might want to go and check out the place.”

“That’s a very practical idea,” Mari teased. “When should we do it?”

He arched a brow. “How about now?”

“Now?” She slanted her head, thinking it over. “No.”

His confidence faltered. “No?”

“No,” she repeated. The smile returned to her face, and then she moved closer and looped her arms around his neck. “Because we have something else scheduled at the moment.”

“We do?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Okay, I’ll bite. What’s on the agenda?”

She dropped her arms and planted them on her waist, then shot him an indignant glare.

“Make-up sex,” she informed him. “In which you do a whole lotta groveling and make me forget all about waking up this morning to find your side of the bed empty.” She paused. “And after said make-up sex, I expect another note. No, a
sonnet
. Written in calligraphy and filled with passionate, flowery words that pay tribute to my sheer awesomeness.”

Austin nodded earnestly. “Done.”

“Oh, and since I’m a teacher, I’ll be grading the sonnet.” She cast an impish grin. “And the sex.”

He burst out laughing. “I wouldn’t expect anything else.”

Mari grinned again, then stood on her tiptoes and brushed a quick kiss over his mouth. “Good, let’s get neckin’ then. We’ve got a busy day ahead of us, and no time to waste.”

“Whatever you say, Marigold.”

Still chuckling, Austin leaned in for another kiss, then took her hand and led her to the doorway. As they walked upstairs together, side by side and hand in hand, a warm sensation washed over him. A feeling of rightness. Completion. Belonging.

For the first time in a long time, he felt thoroughly and wonderfully at peace.

And more than that, he felt happy to be home.

About the Author

A RITA-award-nominated author, Elle Kennedy grew up in the suburbs of Toronto, Ontario, and holds a BA in English from York University. From an early age, she knew she wanted to be a writer and actively began pursuing that dream when she was a teenager. She loves strong heroines and sexy alpha heroes, and just enough heat and danger to keep things interesting!

Elle loves to hear from her readers. Visit her website
www.ellekennedy.com
or send her a note at
[email protected]
. You can also find her on
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Twitter
(@ElleKennedy).

Look for these titles by Elle Kennedy

Now Available:

Bad Moon Rising

Dance of Seduction

Midnight Encounters

Going for It

Red Hot Summer

Hot Summer Nights

Hidden Desires

Out of Uniform

Heat of the Moment

Heat of Passion

Heat of the Storm

Heat It Up

Heat of the Night

The Heat Is On

Hot and Bothered (print anthology)

Feeling Hot

Getting Hotter

Hot and Heavy (print anthology)

Hotter Than Ever

Welcome to Paradise

Welcome to Paradise

Take Me Home Tonight

Born to be Wild

Being bad never felt so good…

Born to Be Wild

© 2012 Elle Kennedy

Welcome to Paradise, Book 3

Bree Lockhart was always the good girl—on the surface. During her senior year of high school, however, her inner bad girl was lured out to play by reckless, carefree Jake Bishop. Her parents’ worst nightmare, and the man she she’s never forgotten.

Twelve years later, she’s home for a charity event and up for auction. The highest bidder? Jake. This time around, he wants more than a wild ride—he wants it all. But she’s not about to risk her heart on another fling that’ll just leave it in pieces.

Jake once reveled in showing Bree how good it is to be bad. But convincing her he can be good for her is going to take some very special tactics…

Warning: This book features a bad boy soldier determined to chip away at a good girl’s resistance with hot sex, hot sex, and…more hot sex.

Enjoy the following excerpt for
Born to Be Wild:

“Is that Bree?” Owen hissed, his head swiveling from the stage to his brother.

Since his entire mouth had turned into sawdust, Jake simply nodded. He couldn’t tear his eyes off the woman up on the stage. And not just any woman—
his
woman.

Shock spiraled through him. Fuck, even after twelve years, he still thought of Bree Lockhart as his.

What the hell was she doing up there? He hadn’t even known she was back in town.

“She looks fantastic,” Owen murmured.

Fantastic? Uh, try absolutely fucking incredible. The Bree he’d known in high school had been pretty, but this newer, older Bree was even more tantalizing. Tall and curvy, with an X-rated set of perky breasts and a taut ass that made his mouth water. Her straight black hair was shorter, dancing just above her shoulders and layered so that it framed her heart-shaped face. Her skin was as pale and smooth as ivory, her eyes were bluer than he remembered, and her mouth…man, she still had those pouty, fuck-me lips.

The memory of those lips wrapped around his cock flashed into his mind, and just like that, his dick strained against the zipper of his trousers like a bull frantic to burst out of a chute.

“I know you’re all familiar with Bree Lockhart,” Mayor Price announced. “Now, I’ll admit, the Price and Lockhart families haven’t always seen eye to eye, but we can both claim the honor of being this town’s founding families.”

Owen laughed under his breath. “And the honor of being this town’s biggest snobs,” he muttered.

“Bree works as a junior partner at Lockhart and Associates, a prestigious law firm in Denver,” Price continued. “She’s an avid skier, volunteers at a local soup kitchen, and prefers quiet evenings at home to crowded restaurants. But she’s willing to make an exception—the lucky man who wins a date with Bree will join her in the private dining room of Carlotta’s tonight. A romantic dinner for two!”

Looking uncomfortable, Bree stopped at the end of the runway and did a feeble little half-turn.

Jake frowned, wondering how she’d gotten roped into this. She seemed totally ill at ease up there. The way she walked, how she nervously tucked a strand of hair behind her ear as she turned back to the podium. Jake saw something very vulnerable in her smoky blue eyes, something fresh and appealing, something that made him want to march up on the stage and kiss that pink lip gloss off her luscious mouth.

He’d never been able to resist the prim good-girl thing she’d had going on. Especially when he’d discovered she was oh so bad beneath the surface.

“Didn’t you two used to…” Owen tactfully trailed off.

Jake met his brother’s curious gray eyes. “Yep,” he confirmed in a hoarse voice.

He and Bree used to do a lot of things.
A lot
of things. Even now, he couldn’t figure out what had spurred her to seduce him that night after the big game against Huntsville. A wide receiver for the Paradise Panthers, Jake had been coming down from the victory high after the team crushed their neighboring town in a rivalry game for the ages. Bree was on the cheerleading squad, but their paths had never crossed until that night.

The night she demanded he deflower her in the back of his pickup truck.

Which he’d done without a single protest.

“So c’mon, fellows, let’s show Bree just how much you like her!” Mayor Price said into his mic.

Right off the bat, a tall, brown-haired man in the front of the crowd bid two hundred dollars.

Jake frowned. Cheap bastard.

“Three hundred,” someone else piped up.

“Four.”

“Four-fifty.”

The higher the bids climbed, the more annoyed he got. Up on the stage, Bree had started fidgeting with her hands. Her visible discomfort triggered something dark and protective inside him. Bree might have a secret wild streak running through her, but she’d always been shy, and Jake could only imagine the thoughts swirling through her pretty head right now. She was no doubt contemplating how to run off the stage without causing a scene.

“Five hundred and fifty,” a deep voice called out.

Jake glanced over, his shoulders stiffening when he noticed the bid had come from Dan Bradford, a guy he’d gone to high school with. Bradford had played linebacker for the team, and he was still as huge as ever—broad shoulders, barrel chest. The beer belly was new, though…

The flicker of unease in Bree’s blue eyes told Jake that she wasn’t thrilled with the newest addition to the bidding war.

In fact, if he recalled correctly, back then Bradford had constantly harassed Bree to hook up with him, even after she’d turned him down a hundred times.

Jake’s jaw tensed and it took a few seconds before he could pry it open. When he finally got his mouth to work, the words that flew out of it stunned both his twin and himself. “One thousand dollars,” he yelled.

Dead silence crashed over the room. His bid was the highest by far, but he didn’t regret it one damn bit. Screw it. One look at Bree’s silky black hair and big blue eyes, one glimpse at that body-hugging dress, and he knew that the only man she’d be having dinner with tonight was him.

He was her best friend…until he became her fantasy.

More Than Friends

© 2013 Jess Dee

Lucy Lawson’s got it bad. Bad as in stunned speechless by the situation she’s in, by the feelings sitting on her chest, ready to explode. She’s in love…with her best friend.

Problem is, telling Sebastian Blackford could destroy the best thing in her life, but the longer she keeps her feelings under wraps, the stronger the need to spill her secret.

The last thing Seb suspects is that his best mate is madly, wildly in love with him, or that he’s the star of her seriously dirty fantasies. Worse, he’s just started seeing someone he’d like to see again—and Lucy knows it.

So why does her confession hit him like a runaway train? And why can’t he get her explicit description of her fantasies out of his mind? They’ve never been more than friends, but now that he knows how Lucy feels, everything is out of whack.

Seb figures it’s up to him to get their relationship back on track. He’ll do it too, just as soon as he establishes which track is the right one.

Warning:
After reading this, you may just be tempted to jump your best friend. It’s recommended you keep your partner on speed dial or a toy with fresh batteries on standby.

Enjoy the following excerpt for
More Than Friends:

“Okay, if you space out on me one more time, I’m going to start thinking it’s personal.”

Lucy blinked and brought her attention back to the man sitting opposite her. Not that she’d ever lost her focus. Nope, her attention had been on him the whole time. Maybe just not on what he’d been saying.

“Loo, that’s about the tenth time you’ve zoned out. You haven’t heard a word I’ve said in the last five minutes. You gonna tell me what’s going on?” He set his tea down on the table.

She shook her head as she looked at his cup. “You realize you are the only man in Sydney, maybe in the world, who drinks Earl Grey?” The cup seemed small and dainty beside his strong, tanned hand.

He shrugged. “I like it, as you well know. Now forget about the tea and tell me what’s bothering you.”

Her gaze drifted from his teacup to his chest, and she admired the way his T-shirt sat snugly across his shoulders. How was it possible she’d never appreciated the broadness of those shoulders? Had his hair been so long it had hidden their extraordinary proportions?

She sighed. “You wouldn’t believe me if I did tell you.”

Seb shot her a strange look. “When have I ever not believed something you’ve said?” He took a chip from their shared plate, dipped it into tomato sauce and popped it in his mouth. Then he repeated the process, only this time he popped the chip in Lucy’s mouth.

It was all she could do not to close her lips around his fingers and trap them there. But then trapping fingers, a chip and a dollop of tomato sauce in her mouth was hardly sexy, now was it?

She chewed thoughtfully and swallowed, desperate to open up with the truth and admit her feelings, yet paralyzed by the prospect. For the first time ever, she had trouble voicing her thoughts to Seb.

“You know, I’m a pretty good listener.”

She smiled, trying to keep the mood light while her insides were so heavy. “Then why do you always complain that I never stop talking?”