Do You Prefer Salty or Sweet?

Mar 15, 2023 11:01 pm

Hello Dear Readers!

It's spring break in my world! My oldest is home for the week and currently reading Pokemon books on the couch. We've got a plan to raid the library for Pig the Pug books this week, too. Fun times!

Other fun times are to be had in my Facebook group The Brazen Belles. Sadie Bosque has created a rating scale for heroes from the sweetest cinnamon rolls to the saltiest pretzels. 🤣 And this week, we're rating the heroes of my Debutante Dares series, so stop by and give your opinion. So far, none of them have made it past 2/3 out of 5 (1 being cinnamon roll and 5 being pretzel). Color me not surprised.

I've been researching "golden retriever" heroes, those cinnamon rolls who might not be the brightest but are all about loyalty and enthusiasm. I think I might have one in the works. :) But I love an intelligent hero, so I don't think I can short him in that area.

In more writing news, it's just less than two months until the next Cavendish book--Scandalizing the Scoundrel. Scoundrel is with my editor right now, but I thought I'd give you guys a sneak peek. Here's a bit of chapter 1 (unedited ... and I've already caught a lot of things just pasting it here 😂).

***

Freddy flung herself to the side as a man strode out of the building. Even without a moon high above, his hair glinted like golden threads. Too long and tied back in a short queue low on his neck, strands escaped to fall over his forehead and muddle with the perspiration there.

Mr. Grant Webster.

Knitting needles like knives, she wanted to lick that neck. More than she wanted her next breath. She felt intoxicated by the sight of it, tendrils of lust wrapping round her every vein and tightening. She'd never felt such pulsing need. Was it just him or that she was doing something for herself, something elicit that spoke to her every hidden and silence desire? If it was the latter, she’d better do something, then.

She rolled off the wall and launched herself at him, flung her arms about that very sweaty neck and pressed her lips to his.

He startled, pushed back, peered into the shadows of her hood. “A strange maiden approaches. What shall I do with her? Hm. Eager hands. Welcome lips. I think I should kiss her.”

She opened her mouth to say yes please but found the two tremulous words swept into the patient fury of his kiss, into the warm hollow of his mouth. She didn’t need those words after all.

The kiss unfurled like the thin, streaky clouds floating across the moon. They promised rain, but the kiss promised a thunderstorm.

He spun them and walked her backward until her back hit the wall. “Eager, love?” He placed a palm on either side of her head and leaned over her, his body casting her in further shadow.

She nodded, stroked her fingertips down his muscular back. He wore only a waistcoat and shirt sleeves as he did in every performance to better show off his musculature. To give him better ease of movement also on his horse she assumed. It also gave her greater access to him. No wool to hide his warmth and strength from her.

The kiss was slow, meandering, like sipping tea in a garden at morning when the dew still clings to each petal and leaf. Yet it promised to grow, too, and singe her as the rising sun eviscerates the dew.

In the surge of feeling, she remembered how to kiss, how she’d been kissed with passion by her husband before she’d been forgotten. So she outlined his bottom lip with the tip of her tongue, and he opened dutifully for her. They deepened the kiss at the same time, exploring, reveling. He didn’t touch her except with his lips, and the absence of his hands where she most wanted them—everywhere on her—seemed to heighten her pleasure, and as her pleasure increased, so too did her desire. She wanted more, needed it.

She fisted her hands in his cravat and broke away from the kiss. A momentary gathering of breath before diving back in. They were disparate heights, and as she turned her face up to him, her nose brushed the bottom of his cravat, and she spied the gold and diamond pin nestled in the folds, glinting in the moonlight. The bit of jewelry was like him—beautiful, sharp, and a bit unexpected. Paste or real? It did not matter. It shone exquisite all the same. Like him.

His hand appeared, a heavy, delicious weight on her cheek, and he stroked his fingers into her hair over her ear, taking the hood of her cloak with him.

Mesmerized by the winking gem in his cravat, by the earthy scent of the man she’d dreamed of for a year now, she barely noticed but to lean into the caress.

The moon caught her face.

“Damn me.” Mr. Webster jumped away from her. “Freddy?”

Freddy never cursed, but a damn might be appropriate. So many emotions laced his few words, chief among them shock. She straightened off the wall and smoothed her skirts. What to do with his shock? And was that … a touch of disgust in his voice? Surely not. Please God, not.

He paced away from her, raking his hands through his hair. When he returned to stand before her, he said, “It is you. I had hoped I imagined it.”

Hoped he’d imagined it. Well. Freddy pulled her cloak up over her head and tried to find her courage. She looked up to the heavens for help. The clouds had rolled away, and the stars winked hello, but their blinking seemed laughter. Freddy cut her gaze away, gripped her hands before her.

Mr. Webster wrung his hands. “Good God, Freddy, I’m so sorry. I am so very, very sorry. I do beg your pardon, a thousand times over. I thought you someone else.” He groaned, hunched his body to the left and dropped his face in his hands. “Max is going to kill me. The strong man going to snap every bone in my body with his bare hands.”

She held a hand out with a halting step toward him. “Do not worry, Mr. Webster. I will not tell my cousin.”

“Well, that makes it a bit better. Man’s a boxer and a viscount and married into the Cavendish family. If anyone can snap my bones, and my reputation, it’s him. And if there existed any reason for him to do so … it’s this.”

She shook her head but lost the words to contradict him.

“Are you here to see him?” Mr. Webster asked.

“No. No … ah, I’m … here to see you.”

***

So, that's Freddy and Grant, first met in Bring a Boxer to His Knees, and their story will release May ... 9 I think! I really love these two. Freddy is soft but strong at the same time and Grant is just passionately head over heels. And he literally can put his heels over his head because he's an equestrian trick rider. 🔥🔥🔥

Do you guys have any spring break plans?