Hi Guys and Dolls, it's time again to offer you a chance to get a free copy of my new contemporary BDSM release,
A Marriage of Inconvenience the first book in my The Attic Trilogy coming out September 30th.
Blurb:
Izzy
Thorton’s mother is dying.
Her best
friend, Sebastian Leery, made Izzy’s mother’s dying wish come true.
Now Izzy and
Sebastian are getting hitched in a quickie ceremony.
Among the
myriad of problems for Izzy including her new husband’s little black book, his
workaholic tendencies, and his hidden, although not so secret love of
BDSM—she’s actually in love with him. Caught with the task of proving to him
that his self-perceived sins hide a man only his secretly submissive best
friend could accept, can she convince Bash before he pushes her away for good?
Sebastian
Leery’s mother was murdered in front of him.
To spare his
best friend pain he’ll renounce his playboy ways.
Now he needs
to be a man he never thought he was capable of becoming—for his wife.
But his
difficulties have only begun when his demons rise to the surface and tap dance
all over his new marriage—with the potential to scare away the most important
woman in his life. When Izzy insists she’s in love with him, he yearns to rip
off the mask of normalcy, and bare it all so she knows the monster behind the
man. Torn between her vision of him and his reality, Sebastian must walk a thin
line. Can he convince Izzy that she’s in love with a mirage, without destroying
their relationship in the process?
Tied together
for life, will they choose to tighten the ropes, or break their bonds for good?
Excerpt:
When Izzy plowed through the door of
her apartment that night after working at the studio all day, she still wasn’t finished over
analyzing their kiss. But she had to stop thinking, for a moment. Mainly
because Bash was down on one knee on her cat pillow, with a ring box in his
hand that held a ring with a stone that looked very, very large.
“Really? Now?”
“I think you’re
the only woman on Earth that would complain about this, you know that?” Bash arched a brow and
cleared his throat. “Do
you want to hear me out or not?”
She pushed back a snide retort, threw
her gym bag on the ground, and prepared to be swept off her feet. God, she
hoped she could stay anchored in reality, at least, for a little while. No need
for her feelings to get out of hand when—
“Are you even listening, Izzy? This is a little pivotal.”
She shut her eyes and refocused,
swallowing past the pure fuel of fear and adrenaline that was keeping her on
her feet. “I’m sorry, please
continue.”
“Thank you.”
She watched his lips quiver at the
corners, but he didn’t
speak. With each passing moment, she shifted from foot to foot trying to
remember how to breathe.
“Okay, you’ll
have to forgive me, this is going to be a little rough. I’ve never done it
before, you know?”
Izobel laughed and nodded, not trusting
her voice to tell him to take his time.
“Do you remember in fifth grade when Mitchell Stevens
stole my banana and shoved it down my pants calling me wiener boy?”
“Okay, this is starting off really weird, Bash…”
“After Mitchell shoved me down making the mashed
fruit pop inside my shorts you jumped up, little fists curled for battle, and
called for the lunch monitor on duty like some goodie-goodie—”
She opened her mouth to protest, but he
put a finger to his lips and she indulged him.
“But when the lunch monitor wasn’t looking you stabbed
him in the eye with your finger, kicked him in the shin, and then pantsed him
in front of everyone. And you never got caught, Izzy. That little girl was my
partner in crime, even when I didn’t
want her help, even when I didn’t
want her to be there, she was there. Now it’s my turn to be there for you. Let me be your
partner. Let me help you be strong when no one else is looking, okay? I promise
to be as infinitely stubborn, as relentlessly fierce, and never let you face
down the world alone. Will you have me?”
“I…I…didn’t think you remembered
any of that.” She
swallowed past her unshed tears and stared down at the giant, glowing rock in
his hands.
“I don’t
forget much when it comes to you.”
“Real smooth.”
A nervous giggle pressed past her lips until she tightened her mouth,
unable to suppress her smile.
“So…what
do you think? Are you just going to leave me here?” His eyebrows raised as he lifted the ring higher
with a cock of his head.
“Oh, yes. Yes, of course!” Swept up in the moment, Izobel shoved out her ring
finger and waited with a sort of giddy anticipation as he slid the hunk of
glittering rock on her hand. “It’s really beautiful.
Thank you.”
“A highlight of this whole mess, right?”
She blinked. “So it’s
a pity diamond?”
Her whole body went tight and then
limp, completely draining the moment as she stared at the ring. Reality ripped
into her perfect bubble with a crash bang. None of it was real. The man getting
up from her carpet was marrying her, sure, but under false pretenses. When they
got an annulment she’d
probably wind up giving the ring back. What was the point of even savoring the
moment when there was no real moment to begin with, when it was all in her
head?
“Uh, no?”
Bash’s brow
furrowed as he got up and took a step back. “I got you the exact size I thought would make you
happy. I thought it was what you deserved…but I can take it back.” He snapped the velvet box closed and shoved it in
his pocket. “Just
because we’re
doing this a little non-traditionally doesn’t mean the whole thing has to be fake, Izobel. What
I just said, what those words meant…that
was real to me.”
She bit back the objection that nothing
on their personal timeline was real anymore. Unable and unwilling to get into a
fight when they were going to get married tomorrow, she pressed back her
objections. There was plenty of time to fight about it later. She barely
nodded, drained of all emotion. God, she’d been so stupid.
“We need champagne to celebrate, don’t you think?” she asked barely above
a whisper.
“So, we’re
okay? You’re okay?” Bash cleared his
throat. “There’s no way it was that
easy. You seemed really upset. You’re
still pale. What’s
going on? You don’t
believe me?”
“I just need a drink. This is all…a lot. You know? It’s really fast.” She couldn’t meet his eyes but
sensed his stare
“Yeah, I get it. Getting married wasn’t exactly this close on
my to-do list, either.”
He turned to go into her kitchen, and
she tried her best to compose herself taking a minute to breath and not reveal
the muddle of emotions making her head pulse with pain. His comment hurt, even
if she’d always
known he’d felt
that way.
“But if it had to be anyone, I’m kind of glad it’s you.”
Bash returned with two flutes of champagne handing her one of the
glasses before chugging half of his down.
“Oh yeah? You’ve
given it a lot of thought, huh?”
She took a tentative sip of her glass. “Not enough other candidates on the roster?”
“Okay, Izzy. What are you getting at? Are you trying
to start a fight? We’re
supposed to be happy, tonight, if we’re
playing this up in a typical fashion. If there’s another script, please let me know. I can’t work to make my
future wife happy if I don’t
know how.”
She downed the glass of champagne and
brushed past him to go into the kitchen to nab the whole bottle. This was a
whole bottle kind of conversation.
“This is taking some adjustment, okay? One minute you’re non-exclusive with
half the female population, and now you’re
expecting me to take you at your word that you’ll be a good husband, only to make my mother happy?
It makes a girl feel a little second rate.”
Bash made a noise of frustration. “After all that, after
how many years of friendship…you
don’t trust me?” He put down the
champagne flute on the table and crossed his arms, stare boring into her from
inches away.
Izobel winced unable to move from her spot
against the wall. She took another long drag of bubbly, wiping her mouth with
the back of her hand. Now that they were going down this path, there was no way
to divert the conversation. They were going to fight, so she might as well be
straight with him.
“Bash, what were you doing two months ago?”
“That’s
a little off topic—”
“Indulge me. What, or more specifically, who, were
you doing two months ago?”
He coughed and turned his
back his shoulders going rigid with tension. “Do we really have to go into all this right now? Why
can’t you just be
happy?”
“How can I be happy when this isn’t a normal marriage! I
didn’t want this,
and neither do you! Two months ago, you were having an affair with a married
woman while you saw a sorority sister and her best friend, all at the same
time, on rotation. You managed to juggle three women without blinking an eye
and that number’s
on the lower end of the totem pole for you. Who would want that for a husband?”
“That’s
all in the past, now. I know you, I can be good to you—”
“I know all of your secrets! A lot of things I wish I
didn’t know!”
“That’s
a good thing. It means I trust you more than anyone else, enough to throw
myself under the bus for you—”
Bash must have realized what he said as he was saying it because his expression
caught up to the horror flashing in his eyes a second too late. “Shit, Izzy…I didn’t mean…” He took two steps
forward, and she put her hand out, shaking her head.
“You did mean it. And that’s precisely why I didn’t want to go through with this bogus marriage in the
first place.”
They were silent. There was nothing
else to say that could possibly breach the gap between them. It would make for
one hell of a wedding day the next morning. Izobel drained the last of the
bottle and tossed it into the recycling with a clang that reverberated through
her bones. He flinched, cracked his neck, and took a deep breath.
“I…uh…I’m sorry…I didn’t mean…”
It was the first time she’d ever known him to be
lost for words.
“Go, Sebastian. I’ll see you tomorrow. I’ll be the one in white.”
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