Leave the Lights On (27 page)

Her eyes fluttered open. “Oh my God. I’d forgotten how much I love oysters. These are fantastic.”

“Fresh as they can get.” His voice rasped. He tipped a shell into his mouth, letting the flavor distract him. “Man, these are good. Lemon on the next one?”

“Sure.” She sipped at her beer, and he realized the soup was about to boil over. He leapt up and caught it before it overflowed out of the pot.
She’s got me so distracted I can’t even heat up soup.

He ladled the rich red broth into two wide, ceramic bowls and carried them back to Kay. She’d worked her way through another two oysters.

“That sauce is out of this world.”

“You like it? It’s a classic mignonette sauce—white wine and shallots, but I added some sautéed spinach to give it an oysters Rockefeller taste.”

“Whatever you did, write it down. That’s a keeper.”

The combination of her complimenting his food and the smile on her face was definitely the highlight of his day.

She stirred her soup in wide circles before blowing on a spoonful. He waited while she took her first sip. “Oh.” She sighed. “I haven’t had this in years. You totally nailed it.”

He grinned so broadly it made his cheeks ache. “Good. I wouldn’t want to let Maria down.”

“She’d be very proud.”

They talked and laughed and drank more beer. James had practically forgotten that this was a catch-up session and not an actual date. Every time he looked at her he imagined what it would be like to kiss her.
Don’t rush things. She’s here for a funeral. Slow down.

She is the one dream that never had a chance to come true…until now

Exhale

© 2013 Dakota Harrison

Takeshi is finishing up a brutal double shift in the ER when a familiar—and bloody—face erases all thought of heading home. The broken body of the woman fighting for her life belongs to Gabby, his best friend’s mother. A woman he has rarely seen since he turned nineteen and foolishly declared his love for her.

She’s not dying today. Not on his watch. And not with a promise left unfulfilled.

Gabby has never forgotten the taste of the kiss Taka gave her under the mistletoe all those years ago. Or the silly promise that surely by now he’s forgotten. She’s wrong. Taka remembers. And she melts as he uses every trick in his highly trained surgeon’s hands to heal her—and rekindle the heat between them.

But there’s a secret lurking in Gabby’s past. And when it follows her all the way to Seattle, it threatens to drag the one man she loves into the nightmare she thought she’d left behind.

Warning: Contains a reluctant cougar heroine with a planeload of emotional baggage, a hot Asian surgeon who knows how to kiss it and make it better, and smoking hot love scenes that’ll give you a new appreciation for the tenacity of younger men.

Enjoy the following excerpt for
Exhale:

Gabby threw her keys down on the hall stand.

Lights blazed, welcoming her home. There was nothing worse than coming home to a dark house—it was so mournful. She kicked off her boots and padded through to the kitchen. Her jeans swished faintly on the timber flooring as she walked, the soft sound oddly reassuring. They were always a little too long when she bought them.

She flicked on the kettle and waited for it to boil.

The movie had been great. A nice little romantic comedy, the type that she could never seem to get Matt to agree to see.

She’d checked on them all only minutes ago. They hadn’t noticed her stick her head through the door and look around. Some had been dancing, some were already asleep in their sleeping bags, but most were still bouncing around having fun. So, she had decided to come up to the house and settle down in bed with a good book.

Untwisting her hair from the ponytail she’d forced it into, she dropped the heavy mass and rotated her head a few times to try and loosen up the kinks in her neck. She always came out of that cinema with a stiff neck. The seats were so old they must have been around with the dinosaurs.

The faint click of the kitchen door caught her attention. The smooth, firm line of Taka’s back muscles played under his tight-fitting tee shirt as he closed it. He looked at her and smiled.

“Past your bedtime?” She glanced at the clock. It was only two a.m.

He grinned nervously at her, a strange expression shadowing past his eyes. Gabby looked closer. What on earth had him nervous?

“Nope. I just wanted to catch you before you went to bed. You have a sore neck?” He motioned at her hand where she was rubbing at the base of her head.

Gabby pulled a face. “Mmm, yeah. Those seats at the Palace are a little on the old side.”

“Here. Let me.”

He walked over and turned her around by the shoulders. His long fingers shifted her hair and draped it over one shoulder, then gently cupped her head to tilt it forward. “Hold still.”

Taka leaned her body back into his, kneading the tense muscles of her neck. She sagged bonelessly back into him as he worked his fingers up her neck into her hair.

“Mmm… Oh, that’s real good,” she mumbled, chills running the length of her spine.

His hands worked their way up and down her neck to her shoulders and back again. A soft moan of pleasure wound its way from her throat. She heard Taka’s sharp intake of breath and his hands stilled.

“Please don’t stop.”

Goose bumps erupted down her back and legs as his hands went below her shoulders. She could feel his warm breath on the back of her neck, his forehead pressing against her hair. His hands massaged down to the flare of her hips, then one hand reached around her waist to stroke up to her ribs.

It felt so good that Gabby couldn’t think straight. His other hand reached up the side of her neck under her hair and started to massage her head above her ear.

She tilted her head into the sensation, the exquisite chills from his touch on her skin causing her to shiver. She vaguely felt his head move, then the touch of his warm lips pressed against the tender skin of her neck.

His mouth skimmed over her skin up to her exposed ear. The sensation of his lips, barely touching her, tore a whimper from her throat. An answering sound worked its way out of Taka, sending shockwaves spiraling down her legs, leaching the strength from her knees.

Gabby reached up and worked her fingers into his hair as his mouth made full contact with her neck. His hand slipped beneath her shirt and up under her breast as he started kissing her neck and jaw openmouthed.

“Taka, what are you doing?” Her voice was a coarse whisper in the silent room. She felt his smile curve against her neck.

“I thought that would be obvious,
Marishaten
.”

Taka’s hand moved higher to cup her breast. His fingers massaged her through her lacey bra as he drew his thumb over her taut nipple.

Her back arched into the sensation his hand was creating. Her head fell back against his shoulder, pushing her breast harder into his hand. Her moan of pleasure sounded loud, even to her. She couldn’t control her reaction to him. She fought hard to think through the molasses that had drowned her brain. His touch was so damned nice, and she hadn’t been touched in so long.

Something tried to screech at her through the fog in her head.

This shouldn’t be happening.

“Takeshi, no. We can’t.”

His teeth nipped at the underside of her jaw then back toward her ear. She couldn’t remember for the life of her what she was trying to say.

“Why not? Don’t you like it?” he whispered, his hot breath scorching her skin where it trailed behind his kisses.

Gabby pushed her hand up under his jaw to push his delicious mouth away from her so she could think. She turned to face him and stepped back, her breath heaving, as she tried to gain some perspective. Being so close made it too hard.

She stared into his eyes
. So beautiful
. His desire for her was written all over his face. That kiss at Christmas hadn’t been a fluke after all.

Taka lifted his hand to her face. Her eyes closed as he rubbed his thumb over her cheek.

“Oh, Takeshi. I’d have to be dead not to like it. But—”

His thumb pressed against her lips, stopping her mid-sentence.

“No buts.” He moved closer, his lips a whisper above hers. “I want you. So much.”

He ran his hand up into her hair, his long fingers kneading her scalp. Her head fell back, exposing her neck to his mouth. The heat from his lips burnt her very soul as they grazed her skin again.

“You’re too young. We can’t do this. It’s not right.” She could barely speak through the exquisite reaction her traitorous body was having to him.

“We’re both consenting adults. What’s not right?” His muffled words rumbled against her hot skin. He tore his mouth from her neck, his black gaze burning through her. “Do you want me?”

She opened her eyes and blinked, confused. “What?”

Taka stepped back. Just enough that the heat from his body felt too far away.

“Do you want me? If you don’t, I’ll go. I’m not going to force myself on you. But if you do, please tell me.”

The touch of his mouth and hands had unleashed all the yearning for closeness that she had tried so hard to ignore for the last two years. Her body’s response to him since his kiss under the mistletoe had kept her awake more nights than she cared to admit. It had ignited responses in her she’d desperately tried to extinguish.

Responses she’d never thought she could feel.

Gabby closed her eyes briefly. “God help me.” She lifted her gaze to his. “Yes, I want you.”

Leave the Lights On

Karen Stivali

When love throws you a curve, swing for the fences.

Parker Wood’s dreams of becoming a professional baseball player are shattered when he’s injured in a devastating car crash. After two years in hospitals and physical rehab facilities, he’s ready to move back to his childhood home and take over the family landscaping company. The house and business are his, now that his father has passed.

Sophie Vaughn has suffered through a hellishly public divorce from a husband who couldn’t manage to stay faithful for two months of marriage. Determined not to let her personal drama impact her successful wedding and party planning business, she buys her parents’ old house, hoping the comfort of familiar surroundings will help her heal.
 

When Parker and Sophie discover they’re neighbors once again, it’s as if time has stood still. Their friendship is quickly rekindled, along with the decade-long crush neither of them ever admitted having. Then the heat between them exposes a long-held secret that threatens to tear them apart…unless they can detach from their painful pasts and move forward—together.

Warning: Contains sultry summer nights, steamy pool-side encounters, and you’ll never look at a jar of peanut butter the same way again.

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This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.

Samhain Publishing, Ltd.

11821 Mason Montgomery Road Suite 4B

Cincinnati OH 45249

Leave the Lights On

Copyright © 2013 by Karen Stivali

ISBN: 978-1-61921-558-0

Edited by Lisa Dunick

Cover by Angela Waters

All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

First
Samhain Publishing, Ltd.
electronic publication: November 2013

www.samhainpublishing.com