So I’ve been tweeting/FBing about my current project, a new romantic series for St. Martins. Those of who keep emailing and asking…I loved the Ash books, are you doing anything else like it?

Well…kinda sorta.  🙂

The Secrets & Shadows series is another romantic suspense series, set in a small town.  Not quite so fictional, though, although I completely tear up the town.  I based in a Madison, Indiana, an area just about an hour or so from my neck of the woods.

There are three novellas that will be released in ebook, and then after that, three books.  The novellas, Burn For Me, Break For Me, and Long for Me revolve around the Bell siblings. They’ll start releasing in the spring of next year.

The books are Deeper than Need, Sweeter than Sin and Darker than Desire.  The first one will release next summer.

I’ll have covers for the novellas soon and I’ve gotten a look at the first book’s blurb…so more info is forthcoming.

Here’s a look at the first novella.

Burn for Me

Blackness wrapped around them, a sheltering embrace as his body moved over hers.

His hunger had an edge tonight.

He’d come to her late, appearing in the darkened doorway of her room and she’d barely had a chance to catch her breath before he was there, strong hands slowly pulling away the covers and then the mattress gave way under his weight.

Now, as his cock swelled inside her, as one palm cupped her hip and angled her up to meet each driving thrust, he buried his face against her neck as he muttered her name.

She gasped out his and had to bite back the words she knew he wouldn’t want to hear.

Tangling her hands in his hair, she arched and whimpered as heat blistered and pleasure consumed her.

“Tate!”

He surged against her, harder. Faster.

She climaxed around him, muffling her sob against his shoulder.

His mouth covered hers, swallowing down that ragged, breathless sound.

Then he stiffened, coming inside her.

 

* * * * *

 

She wanted that purse.

Ali Holmes didn’t covet a lot of things, but as she told stood behind the counter of The Madison Pizza Company, she decided she was going to let herself covet that purse.

It was a safe obsession. Vivid, murder red, butter soft-leather. It cost almost as much as she made in a week—it would have to.  It was a Coach purse.  She had an eye for those things, mostly because she obsessed over them.  Drooled. Coveted.

Sometimes when she went shopping in Louisville or Lexington, she’d even let herself pet them.

But she wouldn’t ever buy one. How in the hell could she buy a purse like that when she could barely afford to put food on the table?

It was a safe enough obsession, because she knew she wouldn’t ever go and waste money she couldn’t afford to waste on something like a purse, not when her two boys needed shoes, not when she needed to figure out how to fix the roof, and not when she was still scrambling to pay the bills over the appendectomy she had to have last winter.

The owner of that gorgeous red purse stood in the doorway, blinking as her eyes adjusted to the dim light after being out in the bright sunny afternoon.

Ali gave herself another second to lust as she gathered up a couple of menus and tried to not to notice the way somebody was grinning at her.

“If you keep staring at the purse, she’s going to think you plan on mugging her.”

Just the sound of that voice was enough to make her heart skip, and maybe it made her knees a little weak, although she managed not to let it show as she turned her head and looked into the dark brown eyes of one Tate Bell, her other obsession.

He wasn’t so safe.

Lately, she was starting to think she might have to give him up.

He was like too much chocolate, too much wine.  She wanted to gorge on him, but he was oh, so very bad for her.  If she could keep herself to just lusting after him, it wouldn’t be an issue.  Lust was nice. Lust was healthy.  But she’d let herself get lost in him.  Lost herself to him.

Maybe that wouldn’t be so bad, if he could do the same.

But Tate had…commitment issues.

Hell, screw that. Tate had emotional issues.

With a lazy shrug, she said, “Nothing wrong with looking, sugar, right?”

A smile curved his lips.

That smile…damn it, that smile was what started it.  That was why she’d given into him in the first place, and all he had to do was flash her that smile at any given time and it made her want to forget herself all over again.

Forget the promises she’d made herself late last night, as she lay in her bed, with the scent of him still on her skin, while her heart split just a little more.

He might share her bed, but he wanted no part of her heart and she knew that.

She knew she needed to pull away from him.

What she didn’t know was if she could.