Page 55 of Fifty First Times (Sharing You 0.40)
On the drive home, I kept replaying our conversation. And his face . . . his beautiful, too perfect face. His hands, his mouth, his taste.
I let myself into the empty trailer. Mom and Chels were still at the Cave. I changed into comfy PJs and dropped down at my desk. I fired up my computer, pulling my long hair up into a messy knot as I waited for it to wake. It was four years old and took forever.
Finally ready, I started searching grants. In a little over an hour, I felt like I already had some promising leads.
My cell rang from across the room. I went to get it, assuming it was Chels checking in, seeing if I needed anything as she headed home. She probably thought I hadn’t eaten anything. Sometimes she grabbed a pizza for us to share. It depended how good her tips we
re.
It wasn’t my sister. Instead it was an unknown number.
I answered hesitantly, “Hello?”
“Hey.” The deep voice sent everything crashing awake and alive inside me. My blood quickened and my lips tingled like I could feel his kiss all over again. Like he was right here in front of me. “It’s tomorrow . . . I said I’d call.”
Want to know what happened between Hunter and Pepper?
Read Foreplay
(Book #1 of the Ivy Chronicles)
by Sophie Jordan
Available now!
About the Author
SOPHIE JORDAN grew up in the Texas hill country where she wove fantasies of dragons, warriors, and princesses. A former high school English teacher, she’s the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of Avon historical romances and young adult novels for Harper Teen. She now lives in Houston with her family. When she’s not writing, she spends her time overloading on caffeine (lattes preferred), talking plotlines with anyone who will listen (including her kids), and cramming her DVR with true-crime and reality TV shows. You can visit her at www.sophieojordan.net.
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Under the Seryn Moon
MELISSA LANDERS
Balzear Colony: 3017
LYRA DIDN’T KNOW which unnerved her more: the scents or the sounds.
From within the stone walls of her enemy’s formal dining hall, foreign chatter and boisterous laughter competed with the scrape of utensils, the clink of goblets, and the rhythmic percussion of celebratory war drums. Hounds wailed behind closed doors, eager for a discarded scrap of flesh from their masters—generals and commanders who lined the expansive wooden table congratulating one another on their recent victory. The clamor hung around Lyra’s head like a cloud of insects, pressing her temples in a headache.
She faced her supper. A tendril of malodorous steam wafted up from her stew, the metallic bowl teeming with graying chunks of meat and lumps of mash that had, perhaps, once been vegetables. Her stomach turned a somersault.
The scents unnerved her more. Definitely the scents.
She reached for her goblet and took a sip of melon wine, the only thing that made dinners bearable in her new “home.” Both sweet and tangy, the taste reminded her of shore-side summers at her family’s cottage, far from the lines of battle and the stretches of ruined landscape—of simpler times when her greatest dilemma had been which suitor to encourage to ensure the most favorable match.
She never imagined her father would promise her as spoils of war to a Seryn.
“A toast!” The viceroy lifted his goblet toward Lyra, his voice thick from too much wine. He spoke her native language when he shouted, “To my new daughter. May she bear me many grandchildren!”
All eyes in the dining hall shifted to her downturned face, causing it to blaze. Her hands grew clammy and she longed to climb beneath the table. But in her mind, she heard Mother’s voice chiding, You are a young lady of Bethel, descended from kings. Behave like one.
Summoning the wide, diplomatic smile she’d mastered early in her childhood, Lyra lifted her gaze and studied the regent who had claimed her as his daughter.
Like all men of his kind, the sides of his russet scalp were clean-shaven, highlighting a single coal-black braid that extended from the center of his forehead to the back of his skull. He wore the traditional Seryn tunic, cut in a low V to display the circular tattoo on his massive, battle-scarred chest.
How many of those gashes had her father inflicted over the years?
