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Excerpt #2
“THAT WAS REALLY nice what you did. For
Kyle,” Ozzy said when they were back outside and headed to the diner to pick up
lunch. Walking with her, being with her, felt so...natural. As if it was where
he was meant to be. He wasn’t, however, under any illusions that Jo felt the
same. He’d seen her look at the pictures in the sheriff’s station. The fact she
hadn’t asked him about them said either she hadn’t made the connection or she
didn’t care. Personally, he was hoping it was the former.
Experience suggested otherwise.
“I didn’t do it for Kyle. I did it for
me. He’s a good employee.” How the sunlight caught her hair made it seem to
glow like gold. “A good crew member. I can’t have too many of them if I’m going
to meet my deadlines.
But moving Kyle to administrative
assistant is only half the plan.”
“And what plan is that?”
She arched a brow and looked him straight
in the eye. “I’m sure you’ll understand I’d like to keep a few secrets to
myself.”
The bubble of hope that she hadn’t
connected him to the image in those photographs burst. But there was something
else along with the teasing glint in her eye that had his gaze shifting across
her pink cheeks and full lips.
He couldn’t help it. He had the strangest
urge to kiss that smile from her lips. The very idea was so bold, so utterly
contrary to Ozzy that he found himself both grateful and nervous at the
prospect. And oddly determined.
With all the dates he’d been on, all the
women he’d met in the last year, women who offered everything he should want,
rarely had the impulse to kiss one of them ever hit him with the force it did
now.
Friends, he reminded himself. She’d made
it clear she was interested in being friends. There was a reason for that, one
he could only hope she’d share down the line. Her immediately shutting him down
when he’d asked about her baby’s father told him she’d been burned and that the
wound was still raw. Now was not the time to push. So, friends it would be.
Friends was a good place to start. Beginning now.
“Secrets, huh?” Ozzy said, his usual
expression of good will back in place.
“I won’t promise not to try to wheedle it
out of you over lunch. You and the kidlet must be starving.”
“Beyond. Leah told me you used to be a
deputy.” She seemed to notice he wanted her to set the pace downhill to Monarch
Lane. “Seems like a good place to work. What made you change to being a
firefighter?”
“Writing speeding tickets and answering
lost pet calls got tedious after a few years.” Ozzy shoved his hands in his
pockets.
“Ozzy.” It was the way she said it, part
disbelief, part daring that had him admitting what he’d only recently been able
to see for himself.
“I guess I wanted to be in a position to
help, rather than dealing with the aftermath.” It sounded sappy when he said
it. “Firefighters and deputies, we see people on their difficult days. If I can
make that day easier for them to deal with, then that’s what I want to do.”
She touched his arm. “I think that’s very
noble of you.”
Noble. Ozzy’s
lips twitched. Not a word he’d ever associated with himself before.
“The opportunity to switch over presented
itself. There were new openings at the station house and we had more than
enough deputies. Too many, actually. Matt and Fletcher belong there.”
“From what I could see, you do, too.”
“The job works well for them and I didn’t
want to get in the way of that. Besides—” now he finally grinned “—being a
firefighter means every day is a different adventure. We never know what’s
going to come across as a call.”
“Butterfly Harbor isn’t a
hub of criminal activity, then? Good to know.”
USA Today and national bestselling author Anna J Stewart writes sweet to sexy romances for Harlequin and ARC Manor’s Caezik Romance. Her sweet Heartwarming books include the Butterfly Harbor series as well as the ongoing Blackwell saga. She also writes the Honor Bound series for Harlequin Romantic Suspense and contributes to the bestselling Coltons. A former Golden Heart, Daphne, and National Reader’s Choice finalist, Anna loves writing big community stories where family found is always the theme. Since her first published novella with Harlequin in 2014, Anna has released more than forty novels and novellas and hopes to branch out even more thanks to Caezik Romance. Anna lives in Northern California where (at the best times) she loves going to the movies, attending fan conventions, and heading to Disneyland, her favorite place on earth. When she’s not writing, she is usually binge-watching her newest TV addiction, re-watching her all-time favorite show, Supernatural, and wrangling two monstrous cats named Rosie and Sherlock. You can read more about Anna at her website, www.AuthorAnnaStewart.com.
2 comments:
Thanks so much for the spotlight! <3
Thanks so much for the spotlight!
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