It's a #NAChristmas
Thanks for joining us as we celebrate the holidays with thirteen New Adult authors. Check out every stop leading up to December 24 to get excerpts, exclusive content, and hopefully a cutie under the mistletoe! Be sure to enter the rafflecopter to win a grand prize pack of an ebook from every author!
Wild Ones Blurb and Buy Links:
Bri Martin likes her skirts too short, her heels too high, and trouble close at hand. So when big, brooding underground boxer Luke Turner comes into the bar where she works and starts a fight before she brings his first drink, she can't help being intrigued. Luke is everything she never wanted and everything she can't resist.
Soon, Luke is showing up everywhere Bri is, and she can't break free of his hold on her, nor does she want to. When her best friend turns on her, it's Luke who is there. When Luke's opponent comes after her to send Luke a message, it's he who comes to her rescue.
Before Bri knows it, she's caught in the midst of a rivalry between her boyfriend and her boss, both of whom are not content to settle their scores inside the ring. She swore she'd never live this life, so like the one she once ran from. But only by confronting her past can she decide where her future lies…and whether Luke can be a part of it.
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BONUS WILD ONES CHRISTMAS SCENE:
"You've
got to be kidding me," I muttered, running a hand through my hair, slick
with sweat from the gym. Before me sat the saddest sight I'd ever laid eyes on.
Considering I'd grown up with a mom who could barely take care of herself in
the worst parts of town, that was saying something.
"Who's
kidding who about what?" Bri's voice floated down the hall from our
bedroom. She'd be back there getting ready for work, squeezing into shorts a
little too short and a skin-tight tank despite the frigid temperatures outside.
I'd grumble a little under my breath as she left and she'd shoot me a look over
her shoulder. One that said the others could look, but only I got to touch. I
might grumble only to see it. I liked the reminder.
"What
the hell is this?" I gestured
toward the leaning, nearly-bare, fire hazard in front of me, as though she
could see. I didn't have to see her to feel her frown.
"You
better not be talking about my tree."
"This
is not a tree. This is probably against the effing lease, is what it is."
"Hey!"
There it was. That fire in her voice that ignited the fire in me. "I got
that special!"
"On
special? Tell the truth. You got it for free, didn't you?"
"Damn
it, Luke!" I glanced toward the hallway where she stood like an angel of
death, of destruction, like my every dream that ended in wet sheets. She tossed
her hair back and planted her hands on her hips. Hips that were bare, save for
those hands. I wanted to replace them with mine.
Focus,
Turner. She was angry.
"What?"
"That
was supposed to be a surprise! And
you're standing there with your judgy little eyes, making fun of it."
I
gave the tree in front of me a suspicious look. "The hell else am I
supposed to do? Other than get it out of here before the building manager comes
by and sees I'm inviting a fire. Is that the surprise? We're gonna burn down
the complex?"
"The
surprise -" Her voice kicked up a notch, shrill and dangerous. We were
treading into troubled waters and she was the siren waiting in the waves to
finish me off. "Is I got us a tree.
Our first tree for our first Christmas together. But that doesn't even matter
because you're an ass."
I
shouldn't have been turned. I shouldn't have looked at her in all her righteous
anger, standing there in her bra and tiny shorts, vibrating with her rage. That
rage was always my downfall. Had been since the beginning.
I
felt myself growing hard.
She
stomped past me, shrugging her shirt on. All long legs, fiery eyes, and radiating
fury. I reached for her arm and she all but snarled.
"Don't.
Touch. Me." Each word was a bite. A threat and a dare. Under normal
circumstances, I'd have nudged the fire burning in her. Just a little. Because
that's what we liked. We liked the clash then the crash. But I held back. There
was something else there, something in the set of her mouth and the way her
chin quivered.
Bri
was hurt. There was few things that cut me straight to the bone and her pain
was at the top of that short list.
I
reached for her again, despite her warning, and she jerked away as though
scalded. She shook her head, hair whipping, and she was gone, all but sprinting
to the door and into the dark that lay beyond. I didn't chase. Not even when I
heard her car start up and back out like the hounds of hell were after her.
I
crossed the two steps over to the couch and dropped on to it, letting my head
fall, sweaty hair falling into my eyes. I needed a shower. I needed to change
out of my gym shorts and unravel the tape still on my hands. I needed to make
this right.
Never
was sure how to do that.
"Our
first Christmas together," she'd said. But below that, I heard what she
wasn't saying. I haven't had a Christmas
before.
I
was on my feet before I realized what I was doing, pulling back on my coat and
grabbing my keys.
There
was a hardware store down the street, a mom and pop operation that managed,
somehow, to stay open despite the big box stores in the town over. Maybe
because assholes like me had to use it last minute. The fluorescents were too
harsh, the Christmas music coming from overhead too cheery as I snatched up a
cart just inside the door. I filled it without pausing to think or consider.
Lights, ropes of flimsy, shiny stuff the packaging claimed was something called
garland. Bulbs, ornaments, and stockings. If my eyes landed on it, in it went,
until it looked like Christmas puked inside of the cart.
I
paused at the small display of fake trees, some already lit, some as dark as
Bri's eyes. The biggest. She deserved the biggest. A Rockefeller monstrosity of
a tree that came with lights and I'd fill it up with more lights until it was a
beacon and our living room on fire with its glow. But she'd chosen the Charlie
Brown number and Bri got what she wanted. I made sure of that.
The
cashier eyed the tape on my hands curiously as I piled the belt up in front of
her. "You hurt yourself?" she asked, between humming Jingle Bells in
time with the store's speakers. I grunted in response, fighting to keep from
tapping my foot as she ran each item up at a maddeningly slow pace. Finally, I
shoved a wad of bills at her when she was through.
"Keep
the change." I didn't stick around to hear any protests.
Bri
would be at work for a few more hours, which was good. I'd need all that time
to get things together. Unlike her, this wasn't my first Christmas, but it
might as well have been. It was the first one I'd ever had as an adult. Ever
had a reason to celebrate.
Her
eyes were wary when she finally came in, until she caught sight of the
spectacle before her. She let out a small gasp, softer than anything I thought
Bri capable of.
"You
like it?" The cheesy Santa hat, so effing ridiculous, itched my forehead.
Her lips quirked, before she let out a bark of laughter.
"You
in that hat or the rest of it?"
"All
of it."
"You
kept my tree," she said instead of answering.
"It's
still an ugly son of a bitch."
She
grinned at me, impossibly large and brighter than a thousand decorated trees.
"It
is. Looks a little better under all those decorations, though."
"It
barely held them. It's weak and scrawny. I almost bought a different one."
"So
why didn't you?" She wasn't looking at me. Instead, she was staring at the
tree, at the rest of the lights I'd strung around the room, the stockings I'd
hung on the wall since we didn't have a fireplace.
"Because
this one is special."
She
turned, her eyes either warmer than I'd ever seen them or a trick of the light.
She launched herself at me, tiny fingers clutching at my shoulders, around my
neck, grabbing my hair as I heaved her up against my chest and her legs locked
around my hips. She was kissing me, only she wasn't, because her lips were
against mine but they were repeating, "I love you I love you I love
you" and I'd fill up our apartment with every sad, ugly tree if it meant
this. Her happiness and her wrapped around me, emotion she normally didn't show
spilling from her.
She
nipped at my bottom lip and I smiled.
"I
didn't forget anything, did I?" I asked. "I'll go back."
Because
if I'm addicted to your fire, I'm an effing goner for this, I didn't add. I
think she heard it anyway.
"One
thing," she whispered against my throat. "You forgot one thing."
"What's
that?" It came out husky and my hands tightened on her thighs. She somehow
managed to wiggle closer, until she was molded against me.
"Mistletoe."
"Mistletoe?"
"Mistletoe."
She
slid down my body, igniting every nerve-ending on the way, then grabbed my
hand.
"But
we don't need it."
And
with a look, the look I didn't get before she left for work, she dragged me
toward the bedroom.
"We
don't have to go back there," I offered, my eyes firmly on those little
hips wiggling in front of me. She glanced over her shoulder, eyes dark with her
fire and her desire.
"No?"
"First
Christmas," I said. "Let's stay right in here."
"Make
our own holy night?"
"Exactly."
I pulled her against me. "But it won't be silent, Sugar."
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About the author:
A poet at heart, Kristine is author of New Adult Contemporary Romance that bites like a junkyard dog. She's got a thing for words, twangy music, Elvis, Diet Mountain Dew in a can, and geeky shows. She's never met a smartphone she couldn't destroy, a pizza she didn't fall in love with, or a pair of pants she didn't resent having to wear.
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