Bound Branded & Brazen Excerpt!

Bound Branded & Brazen releases next week!!!! (March 2nd. That’s Tuesday. Y’all won’t forget, right?)

Since this book covers three different stories about each of the 3 McMasters sisters, I’d thought I’d put some exerpts up this week about each of the sisters to give you a little taste of each of them. Hope you enjoy. 🙂

This one’s Valerie, the oldest sister.

Excerpt:

“I used to know you better than you knew yourself. You’re not fine. There are dark circles under your eyes. When was the last time you slept?”

Years ago. “Don’t worry about me.”

His lips quirked. “Old habits die hard.”

He moved in, his fingertips brushing hers. The contact was electric, surprising.

What they had was in the past. It should be dead, buried, along with any feeling she’d had for him. But the whoa of chemistry was still there, undeniably roaring to the forefront with the simple touch of fingers.

It wasn’t fair that this was happening.

His gaze shot to hers and she was lost in the darkness of his eyes. Memories swirled around her. Their first touch, first kiss, and so many moments after that, mingling together like a movie in fast forward. Despite the self-preserving need to run, her feet stayed rooted to the floor, curiosity and need swirling like a tornado inside her, around her.

“Leave me alone, Mason.” She finally found the strength to take a step back.

“Is that what you really want?”

She’d taken his heart and stomped all over it. Why didn’t he hate her? Hadn’t he moved on? Why did he look at her with the same kind of heat he used to, the all-consuming kind that threatened to drop her to her knees?

She knew she shouldn’t have come, that she wouldn’t be able to handle this. Handle him.

Shuddering an inhale, she backed up another few steps, breaking the spell. “It’s exactly what I want.”

The smile never left his face. “I don’t believe you.”

She skirted around him, unable to meet his knowing look. He’d always known her better than anyone. “Start believing it.”

But as she walked away on shaky legs, needing to grip the railing as she made her way up the stairs, even she didn’t believe it.

The evidence was in her pounding heart, her trembling legs, her hard nipples. One look, one touch, and she was turned on, wanting him, needing him just as much now as she always had.

She might have divorced him and walked away, but she’d never really left him.

She could talk a good game, but when faced with the man she’d loved and left, she was toast.

She couldn’t even convince herself she didn’t want him anymore. How was she going to convince Mason?

Mason tossed his gloves on the worn table in the main room of his small place just down the road from the main house. Only a few rooms and one bedroom, it suited him just fine. It gave him privacy, away from the hands after a long day.

He left the lights off, needing the cool afternoon darkness of the house to quell the heat raging inside him. He grabbed a beer from the fridge and settled in on one of the old comfortable chairs in front of the fireplace, stretching out his legs so he could just breathe for a few minutes.

How could touching Valerie spark such an inferno inside him? He’d have to get a handle on this and quick.
Then again, he’d seen the fire light up in her eyes, the desire flame instant and hot just like it had been for him. It hadn’t been one-sided.

He’d teased her last night in the barn, wanted to irritate her—anything to get some kind of reaction from her other than her usual polite, say-nothing conversation that drove him crazy. And earlier in her room . . . God, he hadn’t expected that wildcat, the woman she used to be. But she’d only given him a glimpse, and then as usual, she’d pulled back, locked herself up tight and wouldn’t let him in.

So he’d done what he normally did when she drew back from him—he’d pissed her off. She’d always had spirit, but she banked it. He’d seen plenty of that spirit, that lust for life, when they were together, when things had been hot and heavy and good between them.

He hadn’t been the one to give up, to run. That had been all her doing. And maybe he should man up and walk away, just let this thing between them die once and for all. But he was also old enough and smart enough to read a cry for help, and Val was screaming loud inside.

He knew Valerie better than anyone ever had. He knew her pain, knew her fear. What he’d told her today was true—he knew her better than she knew herself.

Maybe he’d let go too easily before. Maybe he hadn’t given her what she’d been really been asking for two years ago.

Maybe it was time he did.