I finished Breaking Loose by Tara Janzen. Nice satisfying ending in some ways, in other ways of course she leaves you hanging, desperate for the next book - hurry, Tara!!! I need to know!

This week I started Riding on Instinct by Jaci Burton. This book is part of a series about the Wild Riders, an undercover biker group and the heroine of this story is working undercover as a stripper. Cool.

And if you'd like to read a powerful and moving poem, check out my critique partner Nara Malone's winning poem Blue Harbor, in the the September edition of Emuse.It won the Summer Madness competition.

I have news! Actually to me it's old news, I've just been waiting til all is official to announce it here, although I did already post some of my news at Romance Divas and on Twitter.

I got my contract today from Ellora's Cave for my second book with them: Irish Sex Fairy. So it's official! Finished edits on it over the weekend (barring any other changes my wonderful editor Suz wants me to make!). Check out my website for a blurby thing about it and I'll update release dates and cover when I know!

Also in today's email were my final books for Love Me More, out October 13 from Samhain. All ready to give away in some contests perhaps! I posted the beautiful cover here a couple of weeks ago. Also on my website.

AND THE BIGGEST MOST EXCITING NEWS:
I've signed with agent Laura Bradford!! I got the signed agency agreement a while ago but just thought I'd save up some news and put it all together here! She's already been pitching my book and I'm so thrilled to be working with her.

Jack brushed a kiss over her mouth, a chaste, friendly kiss that did nothing to satisfy the sharp, aching need inside her. In fact, it only served to ignite the low burning heat low in her belly into a red-hot blaze. He pulled back and she almost fell against him as he moved away.
“Good night, Ally.”
She stared at him, her body aching for him, unable to think clearly. Her nipples tingled and hardened beneath the tank top she wore. She pushed down the frustration and arousal and tried to get her wits together.
“Yeah. Um, good night.” Heat slid through her at how close she’d gotten to doing something really embarrassing. She pressed past him and, trying not to flee with shame, flashed her teeth at him in a forced smile, then turned her back and climbed the stairs, one step at a time, fighting the urge to run.
Once in her room, she let emotion take over and sank onto her bed, trembling. She covered her face with her hands. What on earth had she been thinking?
She hadn’t been thinking. She’d been feeling, with every nerve ending in her body, feeling more than she’d ever felt in her life.
Since Carter’s betrayal, she’d been a lifeless mannequin. She’d had no interest in dating, a huge cold emptiness inside her. She didn’t know what she’d done wrong that had led Carter to cheat on her with another woman, and had wondered if she would ever meet someone that would make her feel alive, someone she would satisfy.
But not Jack. He was a friend. He was not someone to satisfy her sexual yearnings with. God.

* * *

They could try to pretend the moment had never happened, but it was there, making things awkward and edgy. Ally’d appeared in kitchen while he was eating his cereal in the morning, dressed in a swirl-around-the-knees flowered skirt and a camisole top that showed off smooth shoulders and arms.
She’d flashed a too-bright smile and headed for the coffee pot, and he’d responded with a similar smile. Now they sat at the counter on stools, eating, drinking coffee, Jack looking at Ally’s morning newspaper, the silence dense and heavy.
Jack finished reading the paper and folded it up.
Ally glanced at her watch. “I’ll call Carter at his office,” she offered, reaching for the phone on the counter.
He listened to her talk to Carter’s secretary.
“Oh, he is,” she said, eyes meeting his. “When’s he due back? Wednesday. You expect him in the office Wednesday morning?” She paused, listening. “Oh. Okay then. Thanks, Bridget.”
She pressed the button to turn the phone off and set it down on the counter. “He’s in San Diego.”
“Oh.”
“I should have asked her for his cell phone number.” Jack shook his head. “Nah. Never mind. I’ll still be here Wednesday, I’ll call him then.”
“Okay.” She eyed him cautiously. She picked up a piece of toast, then set it down on her plate again. “I have to work today.”
“God, that’s fine Ally. I don’t want to get in your way of that. I’ll find something to do.”
“And tonight I’m going out.”
“Oh.” His body tensed. Was she going on a date?
“I’m going to a fashion show.”
A fashion show?
Ally got up and walked over to a closet. “Here’s an extra key, so you can come and go as you need.”
“Thanks.” Jack pocketed the key slowly.
She hesitated at the door of the kitchen, coffee mug in hand. “You can come with me tonight, if you want,” she offered tentatively. “It’s a different kind of fashion show.”
“Different how?”
“It’s a charity event to raise money for Freedom House.”
He raised a brow.
“Freedom House is a shelter, part of a big international charitable organization. They help women with drug addictions get clean and get their lives back.”
He nodded, noticed the flare in her eyes as she talked.
“The fashion show raises money, of course, but the models are all women who’ve been through the program. It helps boost their self esteem and also gives them some recognition for what they’ve accomplished.”
Jack had once visited a photographer buddy in Milan who shot fashion. He envisioned stick-thin models strutting the runways in outrageous couture clothing and shook his head. “Sure I’ll come,” he said, somewhat doubtfully.
Rather than hang around Ally’s house again all day - especially if she was there – he made his way to the beach. A few people wandered there and Jack strolled along, two cameras hanging around his neck.
That brush of a kiss last night had been a huge mistake. It had been so hard to resist taking more, her multi-colored eyes all big and sparkling, her lush mouth just begging to be kissed. It had almost seemed as if she wanted it as much as he did. How could that be? Could it be?
The Pacific Ocean sparkled in the eye-stabbing sunshine, the morning warmth hinting of heat to come later, the fresh breeze carrying the salty tang of the sea. This was so far away from what he’d left in Iraq it was almost surreal.
There was a certain relief in being away from the pain and tragedy that haunted daily life there. Maybe he hadn’t realized how much it had been affecting him until he was removed from it. It weighed on a person, made every day, every simple daily act, an effort, fear and a low-level anxiety always present, coloring and shadowing everything.
He took a deep breath of fresh sea air, letting the ocean breeze stroke through his shaggy hair.
And yet, despite its beauty, its picture-perfection, its blatant wealth and shininess, LA wasn’t perfect either. As he passed a building housing washrooms and showers for beachgoers, he spotted a scruffy-looking man dressed in threadbare clothes. He’d apparently just used the facilities to shower, and carried what looked like all his worldly possessions in a plastic shopping bag. He stopped at the overflowing trash can to peer in and dig though it.
Jack lifted his camera and framed the man, his thin face concentrated on his important task, rotated the focusing ring until the image was sharp, and clicked. His long lens let him take the shot without the man realizing and he rapidly fired off a few more shots. As Jack continued his walk, he encountered other homeless people who’d found shelter near the beach for the night. Their lives were probably filled with fear and anxiety, a struggle for them that was different than life in Iraq but no less difficult.
Not for the first time, a feeling of gratitude swept over Jack, a realization of how incredibly lucky he was.

Extreme Close Up Chapter 12

I finished Crazy Kisses by Tara Janzen and am now into Breaking Loose also by Tara. There are several little mysteries in this story that are pulling at me, have to find out what’s going on, but one of them (again so hard not to talk about these books without spoilers!) I can only say, yes!! He’s alive!! And I don’t think he’s actually Jesus Christ LOL.

“What?” Jack stared at her.
Ally bit her lip and peered up at him through her eyelashes. His hands clenched into fists at his side and his jaw tightened.
“Why would you think that?” he demanded. He squinted at her.
“You have a daughter together,” Ally whispered, twisting her fingers around each other. “You cared about her once.”
He gave a harsh laugh. “That was years ago. I was eighteen, for Chrissake.”
“But it’s possible...”
He shook his head, ran a hand through his hair. “No. It’s not possible, Ally. Believe me.”
“Okay. I just thought maybe you’d rather have me out of the way if you two...”
“Is that what you were thinking about earlier? When we left Brittany’s?”
“Yes.”
“God. I thought you were pissed off at me for dragging you into this mess.”
Her mouth fell open. “I’m not pissed off! I’m...upset about it. I feel bad for Brittany and how she’s raised a daughter all on her own. It can’t have been easy. And I’m sad about how she kept your daughter from you all these years...but I’m not mad at you. About that, anyway.”
Their eyes met and held. “So it’s okay if I stay longer?” He had no goddamn idea why he was doing this. He should get the hell out of here before he embarrassed himself.
“Yes.”
“Okay.”
They stood there in front of her home.
“Um...I’ll make dinner. I have some chicken...”
“That’d be good.”
“It’s actually nice to have someone to cook for again,” she said over her shoulder, heading into the condo. “When it’s just me, I don’t bother much. Lean Cuisines and soup.”
“Can I help?”
She turned and looked at him. “Have you learned how to cook in the last five years? Because you sure didn’t know how before.”
He grinned. “No.”
She tried to hold back her smile but couldn’t. “Then you’re not much help.”
“I can do something. I can fetch stuff for you. Set the table.”
Shaking her head, she opened the fridge door and bent over to stick her head inside. The shorts rode up and his hands ached to test the curvy flesh of her ass, to see if it was as firm and soft as he thought.
She backed out and stood up, holding a package of chicken breasts and some bags of produce. He dragged his gaze up. She didn’t seem to have noticed him checking out her ass.
She pulled out a cutting board, started slicing, chopping, mincing. “Can you get me a box of fettuccine from the cupboard over there?”
He helped her fix dinner and then they sat at the counter to eat the awesome pasta, chicken and vegetables in a garlicky-tomato sauce and warm, crusty rolls.
“You’re a good cook, Ally,” Jack said as he polished off the last of the chicken.
“Thanks. I like cooking.”
“I like eating, so we’re a perfect match.”
Once again their eyes met and awareness shimmered between them, and he knew she felt it too. Christ, he was in trouble.
An intense, aching want tightened his body, made him hard. With hands that trembled, he carefully set down his cutlery. Those watchful, see-inside-you, green, gold and brown eyes terrified him. He picked up his glass of water and drank deeply, dragging his eyes away from her. Why the hell hadn’t he gone to a hotel like he’d planned? The food he’d eaten churned in his gut.
He had to get a grip if he was going to stay there. Ally was off limits. It made his chest ache, though, to have come all this way, found her - alone! Not with Carter any more. To find he still wanted her, more than anything in the world. But he still couldn’t have her.

* * *

Ally sat back in her chair, poking at the last of the food on her plate with her fork, stomach tight, appetite gone. Something about the way Jack looked at her, the way his eyes grew hot and dark, the way his face tightened, made him look insanely sexy. It squeezed the breath out of her and made her shiver.
When he finally looked away she sucked in a deep breath. God, last night this had happened, too. What was going on? She pressed a hand to her tummy.
“I’ll do the dishes,” he said, pushing back his chair and standing up. “Since you cooked.”
“Oh, that’s okay.” But he was adamant.
“Just show me where stuff is, and I’ll do it. You go watch TV or whatever you’d usually do on a Sunday night.”
She wandered into the living room and sat on the couch, took a big breath in. And out. This was insane. She could not be having these kinds of thoughts about Jack. For one thing, he was a friend. That’s all. For another thing, he’d think she was nuts. Although she got the impression he felt something, too. But he had enough confusion in his life right now. And, he’d soon be leaving again to go back to some war-torn country to take powerful, gut-wrenching, award-winning photographs. She sighed.
When he came into the room a short time later, she still hadn’t turned the television on, sat staring into space in the evening dimness. He sat on the far end of the couch from her.
She turned to him. “Did you feel like a father? This afternoon, when you met Sarah?” Her fingers played with the cushion she held on her lap.
Jack put his hands behind his head and leaned back, looking up at the ceiling. The short sleeves of his T-shirt rode up and the paler underside of his biceps bulged. Ally’s mouth went dry.
“No,” he finally said. He was quiet again for a moment. “I don’t know what I felt. I thought maybe there’d be some instant connection, some paternal instinct would kick in. But I just felt like I was meeting Brittany’s daughter. Except I was more nervous.”
“You were nervous?”
“Hell, yeah. Like a first date, when you want to make a good impression. Only worse.”
“Oh, Jack.” Her heart squeezed. “She will love you. You two just need to get to know each other.”
He turned his head to look at her. “I guess.” He closed his eyes and pain etched grooves in his face on either side of his mouth. “What a fucking mess.”
“I don’t know if I’ll be here long enough to get to know her. And even if I am...I still have to leave.” Jack’s voice was raw with emotion. “How do I do that, Ally? How do I be a father to her?”
Ally bit her lip. “I don’t know,” she whispered. The ache in her chest intensified. She ached for Brittany, who’d chosen such a difficult path, for Sarah who’d never known her dad, for how she might feel when she did get to know him and he left, and for Jack...especially for Jack, sitting there agonizing over his life.
“So what happens tomorrow?” she asked. “Brittany is going to call you?”
He nodded. “Yup. I guess we’ll talk about how we’re going to handle this. When to tell Sarah.” He sat up and lowered his arms. “Sarah wants a tree house. If Brittany will let me, I might build one for her.”
Ally pictured Jack swinging a hammer. Shirtless, muscles flexing. Whoa. She swallowed, tried to talk. “You know how to build a tree house?” Her throat felt as if she’d swallowed cotton.
He laughed. “I have no clue. But I think I could figure it out.” He stretched his long legs out in front of him, the soft, worn denim outlining the big hard muscles in his thighs. She couldn’t help but notice the bulge behind his fly, and immediately looked away, appalled at herself.
She nodded. “Okay. Well, I’m going up to bed. Good night.” She stood and as she moved by him, he stood, too.
She couldn’t get past him with the couch on one side and the coffee table on the other. She looked up at him uncertainly. He reached a hand out and took hold of her hair, hanging over her shoulder, and dragged his fingers down the length of it. When his fingers got to the ends, he held on, gave a gentle tug that brought her closer. God, she loved having her hair touched. Did he know that?
“Thanks for letting me stay here,” he said softly. “And for your support.” His eyelids went heavy and his wrist rested just against the swell of her breast, still holding her hair. She tried not to breathe, but the urge to inhale deeply and push her breast against him was almost impossible to resist. This close, she could smell the warm, male scent of him. She stood still, paralyzed, hypnotized by his blue, blue eyes. Liquid warmth pooled inside her, low in her belly, and she longed for him to touch her hair again, longed to move forward that scant distance between them and press her body against his.
The light from the television brightened, then dimmed, the sound of the newscast a distant, wordless hum.
Fuzzy-minded, soft-bodied, her eyes went to Jack’s mouth, the allure of it so tempting. She felt her own eyes start to fall shut and she swayed a bit closer, her lips parting.

Extreme Close Up Chapter 11

Almost forgot it was Wednesday, because of the long weekend! Love those short weeks.

This week I read Smash Cut by Sandra Brown. Wow! She totally got me. Lately I can predict plot twists in stories I’m reading with ho hum regularity so I am lost in admiration that I did not figure this one out. Of course after the fact, I don’t know why I didn’t. Not to reveal any spoilers, but it was the one thing nagging at me about the story, so really I should have clued in. But when I got there and read it, it hit me right between the eyes and I laughed out lout because I was so surprised. Loved it! She is a great story teller.

And I started Crazy Kisses by Tara Janzen. Yes, I’m back to Tara. I want to read this one before I read her latest. It’s already downloaded on my reader!

Here's the cover for my next Samhain release coming October 13, 2009:

And the blurb:

This time, it’s all about his ultimate fantasy. If she has the nerve…
The sequel to Love Me.

In a bid for her boyfriend’s undivided attention, Melina indulged in a flirtation that led to an unexpected—and incredibly sexy—threesome.

Now, months later and on their way to the altar, she and Gavin don’t talk much about that night. Except his confession that in his threesome fantasies, the two women are focused entirely on his pleasure.

Melina is a little uncomfortable about that—and more uncomfortable about the wild and wicked bachelor party his buddies have planned for him. She’s no prude, but the idea of him being uh…attended to by unknown women is driving her crazy. Gavin agrees to a compromise, but it leaves her with a lingering feeling of guilt.

How to make it up to him? She has an idea…but does she have the nerve?

Warning: This story contains fighting, pouting, guilt, make-up sex, a threesome, and more make-up sex.

“Mom.” Sarah spoke softly, tugged at her mother’s sleeve. “I want to go outside.”
Brittany gazed down at her daughter, bit her lip. “Well...”
“What’s outside?” Jack asked.
“My swing set. I can do gymnastics...”
“No,” Brittany said sharply. She glanced at Jack, then smiled at Sarah. “No gymnastics today, honey.”
“Well, show me your swing set.” Jack stood and set his empty glass on the coffee table. “Even if you can’t do gymnastics today.” He grinned at Sarah and to his immense gratification, she actually smiled back at him.
“Okay.” She skipped out of the room and he trailed behind her, through the kitchen to the back door. A tidy patch of lawn and a few pots of colorful flowers made up Brittany’s yard. A large swing set with a yellow plastic slide dominated the small space.
Sarah plopped herself down on a seat and started to swing back and forth.
“I guess if I sat on that swing I’d probably break the whole thing.” Jack eyed the other seat doubtfully.
“Yeah. You’re pretty big. I mean...”
“You calling me fat?” He made his voice teasing and was glad to see her smile again.
“No! I didn’t mean you’re fat!”
“I know, I know, I’m kidding.”
“You’re just tall,” she added hastily, kicking her little feet. “And...um...big.”
He laughed. “Do your friends come over sometimes to play here?”
“Yeah, sometimes.” She moved back and forth. “Why’d you want to see my swing set? It’s not that great.”
“I guess it’s ‘cause I’ve been away for so long. I just wanted to see something nice and normal and American.”
She seemed to accept that. “I want a tree house.”
“Yeah. Tree houses are fun. I had one when I was a kid.”
“Really? Did your dad build it?”
` “Yeah, he did. I helped, but I probably caused him more work than I actually helped.” He laughed.
“I don’t have a dad,” Sarah said matter-of-factly. “Not here, anyway. Mom says I have a dad, but he lives too far away for me to see him.” She gave a gusty sigh. “I wish he was here so he could build a tree house. Right there.” She waved a hand at the live oak in the corner of the yard. Jack’s heart squeezed. Oh God. If he opened his mouth something was going to come out. He closed his eyes, tipped his head back while he got things under control.
He coughed. “Yeah, dads are good for some things.”
“All my friends have dads, except some of them don’t live with their dad anymore. They got a divorce. That really sucks.”
“Yeah, I guess it does. That happens sometimes.”
Sarah rolled her eyes. “A lot,” she said, and her young cynicism dug into his heart.
“Everything okay out here?” Brittany’s voice came from behind him and he could hear the note of anxiety. He turned and smiled reassuringly.
“Yeah. We were just talking about tree houses.”
“Oh. Sarah, are you on that again?” Brittany smiled. “You’re just not going to give up that idea, are you?”
“No.” Sarah pouted. “I want one.”
Jack glanced at Brittany and moved over to her to speak in a low voice. “Could she have one? ‘Cause if I’m here long enough, maybe I could...”
Brittany shushed him, apparently afraid Sarah would overhear. “We’ll talk later,” she whispered, frowning.
He nodded, and they all went back inside.
He felt Ally’s gaze on him as he walked back into the living room, her beautiful hazel eyes full of compassion and curiosity. He shot her a smile, sat back down again. “Brittany and I were getting caught up,” Ally said cheerily.
“Wanna see my room?” Sarah invited.
“Oh, Sarah...” Brittany began, but Jack stood again.
“Sure.”
“You can come too, Ally,” Sarah invited her. Ally followed them down the hall to Sarah’s small pink and white room.
After seeing her doll collection, and after she’d modeled the pouffy white tutu she’d worn in her ballet recital, Jack, Ally and Sarah returned to the living room once again.
“I guess we should go,” Jack said finally.
“Why don’t you call me tomorrow?” Brittany suggested quietly, as she showed them out. “We can talk more.”
“Sure.” He turned to call back into the house. “’Bye Sarah. Nice to meet you.”
He heard her small voice calling a goodbye over the television she’d already switched back on and he grinned.
In the car he wiped a hand across his forehead. “Whew.”
Ally studied him, a faint smile curving her lips. “You sound relieved.”
“Yeah. I had no idea what to expect. She seems like a good kid.”
“Yes, she does.”
Jack started the car and headed for the freeway again.
After several miles of silence, he asked, “What’s wrong?”
She looked at him, startled. “Nothing. Well...other than this whole situation.”
“You know you don’t have to do this. I can deal with all this on my own.”
“Is that what you want to do?”
Hell, no. He’d had bombs raining down around him, explosions ripping up the ground, seen people hurt and killed, watched his friend grieve the loss of his young family, and he’d done it on his own. But right now...he didn’t want to be alone.
“I can.” He kept his eyes on the road.
She fell silent again, and when he shot her a sideways glance, she was gazing out the side window. The silence in the car thickened, making his gut roll until they got to Ally’s home.
They climbed out of the car and stood there for a moment, looking at each other.
“Ally...”
“Jack...”
They both smiled slowly. He touched her hair.
“Ally. Do you want me to leave?”
“You don’t have to,” she said. “I’ll butt out of your business, if you want, but you can stay here.”
“Butt out?” He stared at her. “Ally, I asked you to come today.”
“I know, but I thought maybe you’d rather...” She appeared to struggle for words. “Do you think you and Brittany will get back together?”

Extreme Close Up Chapter 10

Is it really Wednesday? (Yawn). I'm so tired. In a fit of late night insomnia I stayed up and finished Laid Bare by Lauren Dane. Very hot book.

I also finished this week Megan Hart's Deeper. Yes, this is a book you have to think about after to know how you feel about it. I liked it. It made me think of a lot of things, which I can't even really talk about much her without giving a whole lot of spoilers. It made me think about how one even can change the shape of our whole life, how life takes unexpected twists and turns, and what would it be like to have a second chance? To find out how different things could have been? Except you can't really go back and time doesn't stand still and there isn't always a happy ending.

And oh, man, was I surprised!Our kids threw a surprise party for my husband and me, to celebrate a big wedding anniversary and milestone birthdays this year. They managed to pull it off without us having a clue!

Our friends J&L wanted to go out for dinner Friday night. This had been planned for a few weeks. Earlier in the week my daughter asked if it was okay if she had friends over Friday night. I said sure, but we won't be home, we're going out with J&L which was fine. She did a little house cleaning that day to get ready for her friends, which I thought was so nice. I picked up a few snacks for them and the makings for mojitos in case J&L maybe came back to our place after dinner. My son asked if he could go over to a friend's place that night, and again I said sure, as long as you have a ride home. He said his friends would drive him home. I didn't suspect a thing.

J&L picked us up, we had a really nice dinner and bottle of wine and when I suggested going back to our place for mojitos they said great! Still not a clue.

J was texting as we left the restaurant. Still no clue.

Our other friend B called my husband's cell phone as we were finishing dinner. Just to see where we were and what we were doing. He calls like that all the time. Still no idea.

We walked into a house full of people, with balloons and decorations and food, even a big birthday cake, and I almost died! I had NO idea. I stood there in shock for about ten minues and was in a complete daze for a good part of the evening!

It was so much fun, and I still can't believe they pulled it off without us knowing a thing.

This was crazy. He’d been fighting these feelings for years. He’d known it wasn’t going to be easy to see Ally again, but he’d really hoped after five years his crazy crush on her, or whatever it was, would have diminished. The fact she and Carter were together had put her firmly off limits. But that was no longer the case.
Now she and Carter had split, nothing stood in the way of pursuing her. Except, of course, friendship. His friendship with Ally. His friendship with Carter. Friendship was the only thing he had.
Despite Jack’s current annoyance with Carter, he was still a friend. A friend who had stood by him during one of the most difficult times of his life. He could not put the moves on his friend’s ex-girlfriend. That was one of those unwritten laws of friendship.
Blowing out a long breath, he stood up. “I’m going to turn in now.”
Ally nodded, looking confused and concerned. “Yeah. Sure. Me too.”
He carried his empty bottle into the kitchen and set it on the counter as she turned off the stereo and the lamps. Then he followed her upstairs.
It was almost like they were a married couple going to bed. He’d follow her into her room...
Stop. Stop with the horny thoughts. With a terse “good night” he marched into his own room and shut the door forcefully. Jesus.
He threw himself down on the bed. How was he going to stay here with her? She’d seen him looking at her mouth. Staying with her in her home, all cozy and intimate, was going to be beyond difficult.
Then a thought flashed into his head. Ally wasn’t with Carter, but what if she was with someone else? She hadn’t said anything, but then...he hadn’t asked. His gut cramped.
Tomorrow he’d go to a hotel if he still couldn’t get hold of Carter. It would be safer. Much safer.
By morning, he was still determined to do that. This time, he got up before Ally, so he started coffee and poked around in her cupboards for food. She’d bought some cereal – hey, Fruity Os! His favorite. He hadn’t had them in years. He poured himself a big bowl, added milk, and went into the living room to see if he could find some cartoons to watch.
What a trip. It was like being a kid again, eating Fruity Os in front of Sunday morning cartoons. He was still sitting there, bare feet on the coffee table, remote in hand, when Ally came down.
“You already ate?” she asked, yawning. “I’m sorry, I really slept in today.”
“That’s okay. I found the Fruity Os.”
“Well, I’m glad you enjoyed them.”
She wore a pair of snug black athletic shorts, and a tank top hugged her upper body. He had to drag his eyes away from her breasts, their perfect shape outlined by the white tech fabric.
“I’m going for a run,” she told him.
“You still run? That’s great.”
“I sit at a computer all day. I have to get some exercise somehow.”
“Listen,” he said, leaning forward on the couch. “I’m going to get a hotel room for tonight. I don’t need to put you out any longer. You probably have stuff to do and I don’t want to get in your way.”
She rolled her bottom lip under her top teeth and nibbled on it. “You’re not in my way.”
He hesitated. “Are you sure? I know you and Carter aren’t together now, but...I don’t want to get in the way if you’re seeing someone else...”
Her eyes widened. “Uh...no. There’s no one else.” She started to say more, but snapped her mouth closed.
“Are you sure I’m not in your way?” Why was he even asking? He should just go.
“I’m sure.” She looked like an athlete, auburn hair in a ponytail, her legs slim and muscled, her butt firm, abdomen flat. Funny, she’d never been athletic, although she’d always had a nice body. She obviously worked at staying in shape.
Seeing her dressed in the skimpy running outfit didn’t help his rising urge to grab her and put his hands all over her. He gulped and went for more coffee while she went for her run.
They spent the rest of the day apart, Ally working, Jack reading her book – loving her book, really; snooping through old photo albums for pictures of his friends – Carter, Brittany, Ally, even one of him that Carter’d taken after grabbing his camera away from him.
When Ally walked into the living room later that afternoon and stretched her hands way over her head, her snug white tank top lifted up and revealed her smooth, firm belly. Jack’s mouth went dry and his body clenched.
“Did you get a lot done?” he croaked.
The corners of her mouth tilted down. “Not as much as I’d like.” She blew out a frustrated burst of air. “So. I guess we should go.”
“I don’t have anything for Sarah.”
The idea had come to him while he’d been sitting there.
“I don’t think she’d expect anything. Remember, you’re just an old friend of her mom’s visiting her.”
“Yeah.” He swallowed. “Okay. I’m ready.”
He remembered how to get to Pasadena and between the two of them, they found Brittany’s house, a small bungalow in a nice, middle class neighborhood with a park at the end of the street. As they walked up to the door, Jack’s armpits prickled with sweat and he licked his dry lips. Ally glanced at him, and the warm support in her eyes made him straighten his spine. They rang the doorbell.
Brittany opened the door and greeted them enthusiastically, like they were all old friends - which they were – but an underlying tension belied their camaraderie. She showed them in to her living room where a small girl curled up on the couch watching television.
Jack stopped and stared at Sarah, trying to act naturally.
“This is my daughter, Sarah,” Brittany said. “Sarah, can you turn off the TV?”
Sarah reached for the remote and clicked it off, rolled to her feet off the couch. “These are my old friends from high school, Jack and Ally.”
“Pleased to meet you,” Sarah said with an ego-bruising lack of enthusiasm. Smaller than Jack expected, a pair of capri pants and a t-shirt hung on her thin frame. A baseball cap covered her hair and her big eyes dominated her small face. Blue eyes, like Brittany’s...and like his own, he supposed. He swallowed.
“Nice to meet you, Sarah.” He wanted to say so much more, but he had to act casually, as if he was indeed just an old friend visiting.
“I’ll go outside,” Sarah said.
“No, that’s okay, baby,” Brittany said quickly. “You can stay here with us while we visit. Come sit here with me.” She patted the sofa cushion beside her, and Jack and Ally took a seat in armchairs.
“I should offer you a drink...coffee? Iced tea?” “Iced tea would be great.” Jack needed a drink to wet his parched mouth and throat. He tried to drag his gaze away from his daughter to reply to Brittany.
“Me, too,” Ally said with a smile.
“I’ll be right back.”
Brittany disappeared into the kitchen and Jack returned his gaze to Sarah. He sucked air into his lungs. “So, Sarah,” he began. “How old are you? Nine?”
“Yes.” She gazed back at him solemnly. She hadn’t smiled since they’d walked in the door – was she always so serious?
“That means you’re in grade...four?”
“I’m going into grade five.”
“I see. Do you like school?” She shrugged, picked at the hem of her T-shirt. “It’s okay. I missed a lot this year because of...because I was sick. It was hard to catch up.”
“Oh. I didn’t know you’d been sick.”
Sarah glanced toward the kitchen where her mother was clinking glasses, but just nodded.
“So you must be happy it’s summer holidays.”
She nodded again, looked down at her fingers playing with the T-shirt. Jack glanced at Ally, licked his lips again. “Your mom says you’re a good student.”
She lifted those huge blue eyes to look at him, still no smile. “I guess.”
Jack started to feel very warm and a little desperate. Brittany returned with three glasses, handed one to Ally and one to Jack. “Do you want some tea, baby?”
Sarah nodded. “Yes, please.” Well, she was polite, anyway. Brittany handed the third glass to the girl, then disappeared again, and returned with a drink for herself.
“Well,” she said brightly. “This is so nice to see both of you again after all these years. Tell us abut your job, Jack. I’m sure it’s been very exciting.”
Exciting, yeah, but not appropriate for a nine year old to hear about. He talked generally about some of his travels and what he’d done, checking out Sarah’s response from time to time. She looked...bored. Great. He was a boring dad.
A fist grabbed all his insides and twisted. God, why couldn’t they just tell her who he was, so he could abandon the edgy pretence and just be himself?

Extreme Close Up Chapter 9

This week I finished Taste of Fear by Shannon McKenna. Three great stories in one book, the usual Shannon McKenna intense alpha heroes brought to their knees by a good woman. Sigh.

Just started Deeper by Megan Hart. I mentioned a couple of weeks ago when I read her Spice Brief that she is one of my absolute favourite authors! I love how she writes. Her stories are always intensely moving. This story has me totally intrigued and trying to figure out what happened and I suspect I’m going to be shedding some tears before it’s done…

Still working on those research books House of Mondavi and At Home in the Vineyard.

Jack gave her a slow, unnervingly sexy smile. “No, you’re not.” His white teeth gleamed in his tanned face, those crystal blue eyes knowing, and suddenly a wave of heat washed over her.
Her frown deepened.
“You can’t stay mad at anybody,” he continued softly. “You never could.”
“Well, maybe I’ve changed.” She folded her arms across her chest. She could stay mad. Sometimes. Okay, not often. But being mad at him was a lot safer than the warm tenderness growing inside her.
“We’ll get to the bottom of all that once we track down Carter.”
“I’ll call him at his office on Monday.”
The waiter appeared with their check and Jack reached for it, then slid a platinum credit card into the folder. “Thank you for dinner,” Ally said.
“My pleasure.” He grinned. “I think any other time we went out to eat was either for pizza or burgers.”
“Impecunious college students don’t have money for extravagant dinners.” She smiled back at him. “We’ve come a long way, baby.”
When they got home, she hesitated. It was too early to go to bed. “Would you like a drink?” she offered him. “I’m going to have a glass of wine.”
“A beer would be good, if you still have some.”
She nodded and went to get their drinks while he sat down in the living room. When she came back, she slid a CD of jazz music in her stereo.
“Hey, I like this,” Jack said. “It’s Jeff Greene, right?”
“Yes,” she said, surprised, sitting on the opposite end of the couch from him. She turned sideways and sat cross-legged, pulled a cushion onto her lap and clasped her glass of wine in two hands.
“I saw him play in a jazz club in Paris.”
“Oh. Wow.” She sipped her wine. “Tell me more about the good things you’ve seen.”
So he did. She listened to stories about Paris, London, Athens, the things he’d seen, the people he’d met.
She’d missed Jack so much. Sure, she’d been happy with Carter - for a while - but there had always been an empty hole in her life.
Their eyes met. Everything fell away, the dark corners of the room fading to nothing, the world narrowing to them, on the couch. Even the sultry tones of the saxophone music subsided into the background. Ally felt that feeling that had bothered her years ago, the entire last month before graduation - a yearning, a feeling of wanting something, needing something so badly, but not knowing what it was.
“Do you want to talk about what happened with Carter?”
She stared at him.
Jack lifted a shoulder, looked away. “You didn’t say much yesterday.” He looked like he wasn’t sure he really wanted to know the details.
“I don’t know. You and Carter are friends. I don’t want to talk about him in a way that makes you uncomfortable.”
He nodded. “Yeah. Carter stood by me through the whole pregnancy thing. You and Carter both,” he amended. “You guys showed me what true friends are. But I have to say, I’m a little pissed at him right now, too.”
“Carter is a guy who always needs something new to keep him entertained,” Ally said, rubbing a finger around the rim of her wine glass. “You saw that in high school – how he changed activities, changed courses, changed girlfriends.”
“Like the time he quit the yearbook on us halfway through the school year, to join the debate team.”
“Yeah. Although he was a really good debater.”
Jack grinned. “He just likes to argue. He’d say the sky is green just for the sake of an argument.” Ally returned the smile, although less enthusiastically. Carter’s love of debate had increased over the years, and while it may have served him well in his profession, she’d gotten damn tired of him disagreeing with everything she said.
“I never realized it went so deep,” she said. “I can only guess he got bored with me and needed something ...someone new and exciting.”
Jack snorted. “Dumbass.”
Ally smiled a bit. “It actually happened more than once. The first time, I never did anything.”
“Ally.” His eyes gleamed with understanding, despite the gentle censure in his voice. “I know you don’t like conflict, but come on. He was cheating on you.”
“I know.” She felt a twinge of embarrassment and shame at how she’d avoided the problem. “I was pretty sure he was fooling around, but I thought if I just pretended I didn’t know, it would all just go away. I know, I know, stupid plan.” She sighed. “After that, I was paranoid and suspicious all the time. Apparently with good reason. When I came home one day and found him in bed - our bed - with his...with another woman, that was it.”
“I hope you got a new bed.”
Ally stared at him, then burst out laughing.
“As a matter of fact, I did.”
“Friend or no friend, he’s an asshole to treat you like that,” Jack muttered darkly. “You don’t deserve that.” He shook his head, tipped the beer bottle to his lips.
Again Ally felt that warming, softening, yearning feeling, a need for a hug. Her mouth went dry and she swallowed with difficulty at the thought of pressing her body against Jack’s.
“I think Carter cheated on every girl he went out with,” Jack continued.
“Huh?”
“Yeah. I never really knew what the deal was with the girlfriend he left when he moved to Garden City, but for sure in college I caught him a few times with other girls.”
“Oh, yeah,” Ally said slowly. “I remember. He was going out with Shanna and you said you’d seen him with another girl. But you played that down, made it sound like nothing.” Her eyes narrowed. “In fact, I thought he was still going out with Shanna when he and I...got together. I asked him and he told me he’d just broken up with her. I bet he didn’t. Oh, God. What do you think Shanna thought of me?” She closed her eyes momentarily.
His eyes were soft as he looked back at her. “You always saw the good in people,” he said. “I didn’t want to ruin your image of Carter. There were other times I never even told you about.”
Ally could not believe her ears. She picked up the cushion on her lap and hurled it at Jack. Hard.
“Hey!” Jack tried to duck but the pillow hit him in the face. He knocked it to the floor. “What the hell was that for?”
“You could have told me!” she cried. “Jesus, you could have saved me from getting involved with him, if I’d known that stuff.”
Now it was Jack’s jaw that dropped. “I...never thought of that.”
“Damn it, Jack.” She rose up on her knees, furious. “You should have told me.”
He looked like he’d been turned upside down and shaken. “I...I’m sorry Ally.”
Her lips twitched at his apology - was it his hundredth? - and so did his. She sank back down to the couch. “No, I’m sorry,” she said, letting out a long breath. “I can’t really blame you for my mistakes. But seriously. I wish I’d known that.”
They sat there, both breathing heavily, staring at each other. Suddenly, Ally was looking at Jack’s mouth and to her intense shock, when she looked back to his eyes, he was looking at her mouth too. Their eyes met in mutual astonishment. Ally’s lips parted, her mouth went dry. At that moment, the only thing she could think was that she wanted to kiss Jack.

Extreme Close Up Chapter Eight

Finished Secret Ties by Opal Carew. The way it ended up kind of surprised me, in a good way.

I also read Breaking Midnight by Emma Holly. I’m not so much into vampires but it’s Emma Holly, and it was great! Super hot and several romance stories for the price of one.

And I started Tasting Fear by Shannon McKenna (great week for favourite writers, Emma Holly and Shannon McKenna are two of my top picks!) This is a big fat book (reading it in print) which includes three sisters’ stories. At the moment I’m a little annoyed with Liam, but I’ll probably forgive him (and so will Nancy, LOL).

Meanwhile I have several other non fiction books on the go:
Still reading The House of Mondavi by Julia Flynn Siler
Started: The Hit Charade: Lou Pearlman, Boy Bands and the Biggest Ponzi Scheme in US History (there’s a title for ya) by Tyler Gray
and
At Home in the Vineyard by Susan Sokol Blosser. Lovely.

Today I am a guest at Meankitty's blog - come see what I think about cats.

Jack nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, I actually am. Confused. Not sure whether to be pissed or happy or...” He rubbed a hand over his face. “Confused.”
Ally swallowed hard. It was surprisingly hard to think of Jack and Brittany as parents. A couple. A couple with something linking them together, forever. They’d been in love once. It wasn’t out of the question that they could care about each other again, especially since they had a daughter to bring them together. The idea caused an ache in her chest. She cleared her throat. “I’m sure Brittany is doing a great job of raising your daughter.”
Jack started the car. “How about we go out for dinner somewhere?” he offered. “My treat. To make up for all the bread I ate this morning.”
Ally laughed. “Oh yeah, that’s a fair deal. But, sure.”
“You decide where. I have no clue.”
She chose a restaurant closer to her home and again gave driving directions to get there. The funky, casual place usually had a long wait for a table, but it was early and they were shown right in.
“This is nice,” Jack said approvingly, checking the place out. Huge bronze and glass light fixtures hung from the high ceiling. Dark wood tables and chairs sat in the center of the room and upholstered booths lined the walls.
“You’re a world traveler now.” Ally wondered how this measured up to some of the places he’d been. He laughed.
“Yeah. But this is great.” Their eyes met and he blew out a long breath. “Wow. I’m sorry to drag you into this, Ally.”
She looked at him and tipped her head. “Isn’t that why you came? To drag me into this?”
His eyes widened and she smiled.
“I’m kidding. Sort of.” How could she not be involved? They were friends, despite her anger at him for ignoring her for the last five years.
“I didn’t really expect you to come and see Brittany with me,” he said slowly, his features relaxing. “Thank you.”
“I’ll do whatever I can to help.”
He nodded, played with the knife and fork in front of him. “Will you come with me tomorrow?”
Her heart expanded in her chest at his low, husky question, his head bent as he looked down at the fork. “Of course.”
He looked up and the emotions darkening his eyes and the lines bracketing his mouth made her throat tighten. “Thanks, Ally. I know this isn’t your mess to deal with, so...thanks.”
She nodded, not sure if her voice would come out if she spoke. There was silence for a moment, while she swallowed hard a couple of times.
“Tell me what you’ve done, Jack,” she finally said. “Tell me about your work.”

***
Over dinner they set aside the monumental problem of Jack’s fatherhood, and he talked about his work in Iraq.
“Things aren’t always like you expect,” he commented slowly. “I spent some time embedded with the Marines.” She nodded, but didn’t say she already knew that. “It was quite an experience. I had to train like I was one of them. Lifting weights, climbing ropes, trekking for miles in the desert. Man,” he shook his head. “Physically, that was tough.”
She eyed his broad chest and shoulders, his hard muscles.
“But it was almost more of a challenge mentally.”
“How so?” She watched his face as he talked, trying to interpret the various emotions passing across it.
“When you’re an embed you have to agree the military has control over the work you do that gets out. I started to almost feel like I was betraying my profession.” He shook his head. “You can lose your objectivity. You stop asking the hard questions, start accepting things. Every day we journalists tried to remind ourselves we weren’t one of them, but you hear the same messages over and over, and it gets to you. And you start to develop relationships, friendships...when you have those ties, you might not be so objective. I wanted to see more. I wanted to know the Iraqi people. I won’t go into detail, but there were stories I wanted to tell that...well, let’s just say not everyone wanted them told.” He lifted a broad shoulder. “So I went out on my own.”
“Oh.” Ally’s eyes widened. “That must have been even more dangerous.”
“Yeah. Without the protection of the military, I was taking some risks. I hooked up with a few other journalists. Another American, a Canadian, and an Irish guy. We traveled around together. We got into some trouble, some pretty tight situations. But we had a lot of laughs, too.” He smiled and she saw the fondness he’d had for these fellow journalists. “I took some time off and I traveled in Europe a bit. Got to see something more than just ‘shock and awe’.
“Then about two years ago I got to know a contact in the Mahdi Army, in Baghdad.”
She looked inquiringly at him.
“The Mahdi Army is a militant branch of the Shiite movement to resist American occupation.”
“Oh.”
“So Mohim and I worked together. He knew I was American and he was basically keeping an eye on me and what I was doing, but on the other hand, he let me get inside and see things that no one else could. You know, you get a whole different perspective on things when you make friends with people. I got incredible access to the workings of the Mahdi Army. There were times where Mohim stood up for me, vouched for the fact that I wasn’t an American spy. I owed him my life more than once. He was a young guy, same age as me, but married with a little baby.” The intense sadness in Jack’s eyes made her skin prickle in anticipation of what she was going to hear.
***
Jack looked down at the table as he talked, picked up a fork and turned it over. “One day I was at Mohim’s home, having tea. I never met his wife. She always stayed in the back room of his home when I was there. We heard the helicopters coming and then the explosions. Mohim and I ran out into the street. I grabbed my camera, of course. They were firing basically right at us. Mohim’s house was destroyed.” He looked up, and the pain and anguish in his eyes made Ally’s eyes sting. “His wife and baby were killed that day. After that, he was a different man. He was from a poor neighborhood in Baghdad. All he’d ever wanted was a life with dignity and freedom. He never had that under Saddam Hussein. And then he never had that with the foreign invasion. All he’d ever known was violence and struggle.”
“Oh, Jack.” Ally watched Jack as he talked, definitely older and wiser now, a little world-weary and cynical.
“But it puts things in perspective.” He fingered the stem of a water goblet.
“It does make you realize what’s important. And how trivial some of our problems seem.”
He nodded. Their eyes met in mutual understanding. She wanted to reach across the table and take hold of his hand to show him she understood, even though she had never experienced anything like he had. But she stopped herself. Memory of the last night she’d seen Jack before he’d left - the way he’d touched her as he adjusted her position for her graduation photograph - sent a shimmer of sensation through her.
They had finished their dinner. “Tell me more,” she invited. “I remember hearing about all the antiquities that were destroyed. That’s so tragic.”
“Well, we still don’t really know the whole truth about that,” Jack answered. “The Iraq National Museum was definitely looted, but there were some miscommunications ...” his mouth twisted wryly, “...or something, about how much was actually destroyed. Some thought looters had even accessed the museum’s underground vaults and destroyed priceless ceramics that had been packed away there. Ceramics that tell the story of civilizations over nine thousand years in Mesopotamia. But apparently museum staff hid a lot of the items in secret locations.”
“Wow,” Ally breathed. “That’s lucky.”
“Yeah. They had a plan in place from the Gulf War to hide things.”
Ally shook her head, amazed at Jack’s experiences, at what he’d learned. What a remarkable man. He put his own life on the line to make sure people around the world saw what was happening.
Typical of him, too, he hadn’t wanted to be bound by rules that kept him from following his own values, his honesty, his deep-seated desire to always do the right thing. As a photojournalist, he felt an obligation to tell the truth, no matter how difficult it was for him.
And now...he wasn’t running or hiding from his obligations. Something expanded and warmed in her chest. It might have been her heart, which had been frozen for a long time. It felt...scary.
She frowned, looked down at the table and said, “I’m still mad at you.”

Extreme Close Up Chapter 7

This week I read Instant Gratification by Jill Shalvis. Jill’s one of my favourite authors, but this book was one of the best I’ve read of hers in a while. I got a lump in my throat and teary-eyed reading it! The story between Emma and her father was very touching.

I also read Reason Enough by Megan Hart. It’s a Spice Brief, and I wouldn’t have read it if it wasn’t by Megan Hart, another one of my favourite authors. For me there’s not enough romance in a Spice Brief. The cool thing about this story, though, is that it’s about the same characters from Megan’s book Dirty. I do love checking in on characters after the story ends! They have a lot of hot married sex in this story. (Anyone else notice these characters also appear in Stranger?? :-) Along with another character from Dirty? I was waiting for them to all meet up in Stranger and for poop to hit the fan, but it didn’t happen.)

I started Secret Ties by Opal Carew. I don’t know why I keep reading her books. They are undeniably hot but a little too mechanical for me. But the domination and submission theme got me. We’ll see how it goes.

Also in progress: The House of Mondavi by Julia Flynn Siler.

I have this great idea for a story. Actually, it’s a series of stories. There are so many possible stories in this idea! It’s big. It’s the biggest thing I’ve ever thought of doing. I’ve done all kinds of research and made pages and pages of notes, and I’ve sketched out my first story, the characters, and even the subplots that will thread through all the stories.

But I’m not sure if I can do this. It’s daunting when I start one new book, to think of how many words and pages lie ahead of me. But when I’m thinking three or even five books? Aaack!

I guess I just need to take one step at a time. Write the first book. Write the first page. Write the first sentence. I know from experience that when I start a book feeling like I haven’t quite nailed down all the details, they do come together by the end. I don’t have to have all three or five stories completely planned out before I start the first one. Even if I end up with one story and never write the rest, that’s still something. Right?

The subject matter is intimidating too. It’s something I have no experience with and characters will travel to places in the world I’ve never been to. The jungles of South America. The coast of Africa. I don’t know if I can do it! But I won’t know unless I try.

We saw local musician Sierra Noble sing this live Friday night. She told us this was the first song she ever wrote and the first song she sang in public. She's an amazing musician. She recently opened for Sir Paul McCartney!

I love this song...