With: A.S. Green

In this excerpt, Jax has arrived on Little Bear Island to
provide private security for a celebrity wedding. He’s been instructed to go to
the ferry office to pick up a local girl, who will show him the way to the
venue. Unbeknownst to him, the local girl is the “girl who got away” six years
earlier.
Jax
I flip up the sun visor as a stunning
redhead emerges from the doorway. She’s dressed in a Foo Fighters concert tee
and tons of silver bracelets. Her black miniskirt is stretched tight across her
tanned thighs. F**k. She used to be exactly my type. Back when I had one, that
is. Totally rock-and-roll. Like that redheaded ’80s chick from the Whitesnake
video.
The old man goes inside while she
crosses in front of my car. A gust of wind blows her long red curls across her
face, and she quickly piles the heavy mass onto the top of her head, securing
it with an elastic she pulls from her wrist.
I toss my paperwork onto the dash
before she jumps in. She opens the door and hops onto the seat, giving it a
little bounce and bringing with her a faintly floral scent.
“Good morning,” I say.
She turns toward me with a welcoming
smile. F**king great mouth. A smile like that once damn near stopped my h— Oh,
shit. Oh, f**k no. Impossible.
I knew Little Bear Island had sounded
familiar. I thought maybe I’d seen it featured on a travel show or something.
But no. Now I remember where I first heard the name. On the lips of Natalie Rip
Your Heart Out O’Brien. The one woman besides Gram who ever really mattered to
me.
Gone are the bright-blue hair and
Poindexter glasses she wore back when I thought she was mine. I can tell
there’s more meat on her bones, too, which—f**k me—only makes her look
more amazing.
I might not have recognized her so
quickly if she hadn’t smiled. Shit, that smile. She used that same
f**king smile on me mere seconds before she threw me away—us away.
Well, I’ll be damned if I’m going to
give her the satisfaction of seeing my pain. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool
me twice…
The smile has dropped off her face by
now—small mercy.
I don’t think about what that might
mean, because I’m too far into self-preservation mode. It might make me a
coward, it might make me a huge dick, but I reach out my hand and give
her the best blank look I can manage. Then I force my mouth to form the words I
hope will burn her as badly as she burned me.
“Jackson Sparke. Pleased to meet
you.”
About the Author:
I live in the cold, upper Midwest with my husband and three kids. I spend summers on Lake Superior, which is the muse for my contemporary romance, Summer Girl, and I’m a sucker for down-to-earth men who work with their hands (if they play guitar, that’s an added bonus). I love all things Irish—particularly music, dancing, and Jameson. When I’m not writing or reading romance, I’m traveling, camping, visiting book clubs, blogging for Writer Unboxed, and writing paranormal and contemporary young adult novels (under my real name).
About the Author:
I live in the cold, upper Midwest with my husband and three kids. I spend summers on Lake Superior, which is the muse for my contemporary romance, Summer Girl, and I’m a sucker for down-to-earth men who work with their hands (if they play guitar, that’s an added bonus). I love all things Irish—particularly music, dancing, and Jameson. When I’m not writing or reading romance, I’m traveling, camping, visiting book clubs, blogging for Writer Unboxed, and writing paranormal and contemporary young adult novels (under my real name).
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