Colters' Lady: Colters’ Legacy, Book 2 (33 page)

She shivered in reaction, a chill racing straight up her arm.

“Lust? Oh yeah,” he said as he lowered her hand. “But it’s more than that.” Her hand fell to the couch, but she wanted to press it back to his mouth. The urgency between her thighs had her shifting to alleviate the discomfort.

“If you’re asking me if we’re in love with you,” he began, “well, I can’t speak for my brothers, but I don’t think it’s that simple. As you said, we don’t really know you. But we recognize you. Does that make sense?”

She shook her head.

“Put it this way. I recognize you as the woman I
will
fall in love with. Maybe I’ve already started down the path. I won’t know until we’ve had more time to explore each other.” He flashed a wicked grin at her. “And explore, I plan to do.”

For some reason, his simple honesty comforted her more than declarations of undying love and devotion. She’d gotten those from Mason, and they certainly hadn’t done her any good.

“What do
you
want?” he asked softly.

“I want never to have gotten married,” she blurted, allowing her regret to pour out of her soul. Tears stung her eyelids and she looked away.

“Ahh, doll.”

He scooted forward and pulled her against his chest. He tilted her chin up until she looked him in the eye.

“You don’t have to stay married to the bastard.”

Sadness swelled in her chest. “I don’t think he’ll let me go. I know…I know too much.” He arched his brow.

“What do you know?”

She closed her eyes. She needed to release the heavy burden she’d been carrying for the last two weeks.

“I saw him kill someone,” she whispered. “On our wedding day.” Ethan’s grip tightened around her. “Hell.”

She pushed away from him, gritting her teeth to keep the tears at bay. “You see, that’s why I can’t stay here. He’ll find me. He’ll kill you. It’s nothing to him.”

Ethan released his breath then looked over her shoulder. “You hear everything?” She swiveled around to see Ryan leaning against the wall behind her.

Ryan nodded, his eyes glittering dangerously. “Did you email Cal?” She looked back at Ethan in confusion.

Ethan nodded. “Yeah.”

“Who’s Cal?” she asked.

“He’s a lawyer,” Ryan said.

Her eyes widened. She looked between the brothers, checking their expressions for something, some clue as to their intentions.

“He’s a good friend of ours. He practices law in Denver. I emailed him about your situation. Asked him how best to proceed with terminating your marriage.” She stood up in agitation, shrugging off Ethan’s hand.

“You can’t tell him where I am!”

“No one’s going to tell him where you are, doll.”

“Don’t you want to be rid of the bastard who hurt you?” Ryan asked.

She looked up to see him studying her, probing her as if measuring her reaction. Her eyes narrowed.

Did he think she wanted to stay married to Mason?

“After what you heard, how can you doubt that?” she asked, staring back at him just as intently.

They squared off, neither backing down as they burned holes through each other with their eyes.

He relaxed his stance then crooked his finger at her. “Come here.” It pissed her off that she found herself crossing the room to stand in front of him.

He pulled her roughly into his arms and melded his lips to hers.

She moaned low in her throat. God, he felt so good. She threaded her arms around his neck, and in that moment, she didn’t give a damn what he thought about her. She wanted to rip his clothes off.

He sucked her bottom lip between his teeth and nipped erotically. He wasn’t gentle. His touch was demanding. He slid his hands underneath her shirt, upward until he cupped her breasts in his palms.

She flinched when his thumbs flicked her nipples. She arched closer to him, wanting more.

Her breath came in ragged spurts as his mouth left hers. He burned a trail down her neck then sank his teeth in the curve of her shoulder.

She cried out, her legs collapsing beneath her.

Something caught her. Not something. Someone. She found herself rocked against two hard chests.

One in front. One in back.

Gentle kisses rained where before Ryan’s teeth had seared her skin. She leaned back, wanting more of Ethan’s touch.

Ryan shoved her shirt upward, baring her breasts. He bent and sucked one nipple into his mouth. God, he was hot. No preamble with him. No teasing. He went for it. Hard and fast.

“Do you want it?” Ryan murmured.

Did she want it? If she didn’t get it, she was going to kill someone.

“If you don’t want this, now is the time to say so,” Ethan said as he rocked her ass against his rock-hard erection.

“No, don’t stop. Please.”

“Never let it be said I could refuse a lady,” Ethan said, his voice thick with desire.

Ryan pulled the shirt the rest of the way from her body and tossed it on the floor. He hooked his finger in the waistband of her jeans and pulled her hard against him.

He devoured her mouth with his as he fumbled with the zipper. In a few seconds, he was impatiently shoving her pants down her hips.

“You’ve got too many clothes on,” she protested.

Ryan’s eyes flashed. “In the bedroom. Now.”

The voice of an angel, a husband who loved her—she had it all…until a tragedy took it away.

Songbird

© 2009 Maya Banks

A
Linger
Story

They called her their Songbird, but she was never theirs. Not in the way she wanted.

The Donovan brothers meant everything to Emily, but rejected by Greer and Taggert, she turned to Sean, the youngest. He married her for love, and she loved him, but she also loved his older brothers.

Her singing launched her to stardom. She had it all. The voice of an angel, a husband who loved her, and the adoration of millions. Until a tragedy took it all away.

Taggert and Greer grieve for their younger brother, but they’re also grieving the loss of Emmy, their songbird. They take her back to Montana, determined to help her heal and show her once and for all they want her. They’re also on a mission to help her find her voice again. Under the protective shield of their love, she begins to blossom…until an old threat resurfaces.

Now the Donovans face a fight for what they once threw away. Only by winning it—and her love—

will their songbird fly again.

Warning: Explicit sex, ménage a trois, multiple partners, a committed polyamorous relationship,
adult language, and sweet loving.

Enjoy the following excerpt for
Songbird:

The gentle strains of a guitar woke Emily from her sleep. She blinked fuzzily, wondering if it was just part of a dream. It was still dark outside, but a quick glance at the clock told her dawn wasn’t far off.

A haunting melody, so simple and beautiful, floated over her ears. Her chin trembled. It was the first song she’d recorded—a song she’d written long ago when she and the Donovan brothers had spent a spring afternoon in the rain.
Mountain Rain
.

She closed her eyes and let the chords take her back to the nights spent round a campfire, Sean playing the guitar while she sang. Taggert and Greer sat by the fire, their long legs stretched out, their brims pulled low over their foreheads and their worn boots reflecting the flicker of the flames.

Drawn to the music, she eased out of bed and walked into the hallway to stand at the top of the stairs.

Clad in only her flannel PJs, she followed the sound of the guitar down to the living room and realized it was coming from the front porch.

Her legs shook, and she had to steady herself by reaching down to grasp the arm of the couch. Who was playing? And moreover, her song?

The words to the song floated through her mind, and she was reminded of earlier, happier days.

Carefree.

She opened the front door and stepped into the chilly morning air. The music stopped, and she found herself staring at Taggert, his hand frozen over the strings as he stared back at her.

“I didn’t mean to wake you,” Taggert said.

“I didn’t know you played.”

He glanced down at the guitar, and it was then she realized it was Sean’s.

“I don’t play well. Been fiddling with it for the last year.”

“It sounded beautiful,” she said in a low voice.

He looked back up at her, his gaze roving over her face until she could feel it caressing her cheek.

“Will you sing if I play?”

Her hand flew to her throat and she shook her head forcefully. “No. I c-can’t.”

“Why can’t you?” he persisted. “Emmy, it’s been a year. Yours is the most beautiful voice I’ve ever heard in my life. You have a talent that astounds me, and you’re wasting it.” She shook her head again, unable to voice her terror, to admit her guilt, that it was because of the voice he loved so much that Sean was dead. She hated it. She couldn’t even think about singing without her throat closing in on her.

She sank down onto one of the rockers. “Play for me,” she begged.

His fingers stuttered over the strings for a moment, clumsy at first, and then he strummed the first chords of
Montana Memories
, a song she’d written specifically for the Donovan brothers. Did he know?

Had he guessed?

She wrapped herself in the beauty of the music, allowing it to give her comfort when nothing else had.

When the last note died and the skies began to lighten in preparation for sunrise, she sought his gaze and asked the question burning a hole in her mind.

“Why?”

His brow furrowed. “Why what?”

“Why did you come after me? Why did you bring me back here? Why…do you and Greer act as though I mean something to you…more than being your brother’s widow?” He sucked in his breath and carefully laid the guitar aside. His hands wiped along the tops of his legs and then gripped the area just above his knees. He looked…nervous. That puzzled her. Taggert was brash, temperamental, outspoken, opinionated, but she’d never seen him nervous.

“We made a mistake,” he said in a raw voice. “One that’s cost us a lot. One we’ll regret making the rest of our lives.”

“We?”

“Greer and I, but he’s not here, so I can only speak for me.
I
made a mistake, Emmy. I pushed you away. I was surprised, even a little appalled that you claimed to love all of us, that you wanted to be with us. I was angry—jealous—and so I sent you away.”

She stared at him in shock. Had he changed his mind?
Now?
After four years?

“Don’t you see, Emmy? If I hadn’t sent you away, you could have been with us. You would have never turned to Sean the way you did and the two of you wouldn’t have left here. You would have been happy and wouldn’t have spent so much time avoiding us. You and Sean would have stayed here and not in a hotel in town, and you damn sure wouldn’t have been walking back to the hotel from the café the night Sean was killed.”

Oh God, it hurt. She couldn’t breathe. She wanted to deny that he was at fault, but she couldn’t find the words. Her mind screamed
no, no, no
in a never-ending litany, but instead of saying it, she got up and walked back into the house, leaving Taggert calling after her.

She walked past the living room, through the kitchen to the back door with no destination in mind.

She let herself out, shivering when her bare feet made contact with the cold ground.

She went in the opposite direction of the stables, through the gate and down the worn pathway to the pond. The water looked dark and forbidding in the faint light, and she hurried on until she topped the slight rise beyond.

She came to a stumbling halt by the large oak tree that sheltered the headstones beneath. Some of them old, dating back a hundred years, and one much newer.

It wasn’t necessary for the sun to shed its light over the engraving. She knew it by heart.
Sean
Donovan, beloved brother and husband
.

Pain. Unrelenting pain. A tiny crack formed in the thick ice protecting her. Spreading rapidly, splintering in all directions. Unstoppable.

Panic swelled in her chest. A garbled noise caught in her throat. She couldn’t breathe and oh God, it
hurt
. She needed help. She was going to explode. Something was terribly wrong. She was losing control and felt her insides straining against unbearable pressure.

She tried to take a breath and then another. Her eyes flooded with tears and sobs piled up deep inside her chest. The agony was unbearable. She was going to break. Maybe she was having a heart attack. How could it hurt so much?

A horrible noise echoed across the hillside, startling her, and then shockingly, she realized the sound came from
her
, from the very bowels of hell.

Another followed, and she fell to her knees as finally, she shattered.

In this game of love, winning is not an option.

All Or Nothing

© 2010 Dee Tenorio

The Lonnigans, Book 2

Lucas Lonnigan thinks he’s finally gotten the best of his twin brother, until he discovers his half of a date-swap is none other than metal artist Belinda Riggs. A leather-dipped Goth queen who considers him a cross between a pin cushion and a science project—and the woman he’s loved forever.

Belinda isn’t exactly overjoyed to see him, either. In her opinion, love means becoming a punching bag, and she won’t be anyone’s doormat. Lucas is too dangerously tempting to allow within striking distance of her heart, but that doesn’t stop her from wanting.

After one blazing night of passion, Lucas finds himself locked out of Belle’s life with seemingly no chance to get back in. With nothing left to lose, Lucas makes a final play and appeals to the one thing Belle can’t say no to—a dare. Winner take all.

Lucas may think this crazy game will decide their relationship, but she sees it as her chance to finally set him free—and maybe indulge in the sexiest goodbye of her life…

Warning: Story may sizzle your undies off. Includes pigheaded hero with a cranky heart of gold,
bitchy heroine with a flamethrower, massively inappropriate behavior, make-up / break-up sex of the sinful
kind…and a puppy!