January (Calendar Girl #1) Anthology Anthology (40 page)
Read January (Calendar Girl #1) Anthology Anthology Online
Authors: Audrey Carlan
A
CKNOWLEDGEMENTS
To my critique partner,
Sarah Saunders
, you’re like that old song, “If I can’t have you, I don’t want nobody baby.” You remember the one? Any way, you always make me work hard and keep me on track. The characters, the story, the end result is always better because of you. Thank you.
To my editor
Ekatarina Sayanova
with
Red Quill Editing, LLC
, for knocking this out in record time, I owe you one, or two, okay possibly even three. I’m so happy I found you. My writing is getting better, even my beta readers have noticed a huge difference based on how little errors they find. You’re wonderful. Red Quill Editing, LLC is presently accepting new clients. (www.redquillediting.net)
Any author knows they aren’t worth their weight unless their story is backed by badass betas. I have the best!
Jeananna Goodall
- When I send my chapters to you completely raw, filled with errors, you continue to see through those errors to the story, the characters, and the emotion behind it. I get excited every time I finish a chapter because I know I get to send it to you! Thank you for being my biggest fan.
Ginelle Blanch
- It must be tiring to be such a bad ass. Really. No matter how small the error you find it. Blows me away every time. Even after it’s been critiqued, edited, and reviewed you still find the wonky errors in my writing. Almost as if you have a second sense. Like you know what I’m going to screw up and prevent me from sharing that side with the masses. Thank you honey.
Anita Shofner
- Every time I review your finds during the beta process I think, how the heck did I miss that! And then I look at the next error and think the same thing. Finally after the tenth one I just chalk it up to the fact that I have awesome women like you with incredible work ethic that are just talented and go with it. My stories are better because of it and I thank you.
Carol Ray
- Thank you for being a lovely pre-reader and cheering me all the way through each chapter. Love you lady!
Thank you to the ladies at
Give Me Books
and
Kylie McDermott
for spreading this book far and wide into the virtual social world! They do amazing release day blitz and are very affordable. Look them up on Facebook.
To the Audrey Carlan Street Team of wicked hot Angels, together we change the world. One book at a time. BESOS-4-LIFE lovely ladies.
A
BOUT
A
UDREY
C
ARLAN
Audrey Carlan is a multiple times Amazon bestselling author. She lives in the sunny California Valley two hours away from the city, the beach, the mountains and the precious…the vineyards. She has been married to the love of her life for over a decade and has two young children that live up to their title of “Monster Madness” on daily basis. When she’s not writing wickedly hot romances, doing yoga, or sipping wine with her “soul sisters”, she can be found with her nose stuck in book or her Kindle. A hot, smutty, romantic book to be exact!
Any and all feedback is greatly appreciated and feeds the soul. You can contact Audrey below:
Email:
[email protected]
Facebook:
www.facebook.com/AuthorAudreyCarlan
Website:
www.audreycarlan.com
Twitter: @AudreyCarlan
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/7831156.Audrey_Carlan
Table of Contents
Excerpt from April: Calendar Girl (Book 4)
Books and Coming Soon by Audrey Carlan
April: Calendar Girl
Book 4
By Audrey Carlan
Text copyright © 2015 Audrey Carlan
ISBN Electronic
ISBN-10:
0-9909143-9-9
ISBN-13:
978-0-9909143-9-6
All Rights Reserved
No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned or distributed in any printed or electronic format without expressed permission by the author.
Editing:
Red Quill Editing, LLC
Senior Editor - Ekaterina Sayanova
Editor - Rebecca Cartee
www.redquillingediting.net
Cover Design:
Tibbs Design
Graphics Designer - Valerie Tibbs
www.tibbsdesign.com
Dedication
Anita Scott Shofner
Mia’s journey in Boston is for you my sweet.
Like Mia, you recently started over.
I’m proud of you…for choosing you.
I think every person in this world needs
to choose themselves once and awhile.
I cannot begin to thank you,
Not only for being an incredible beta, which you are,
But also for being a lovely and supportive friend.
Namaste my friend.
Chapter 1
“Well, hey there, sweet
thang
,” were the first words out of his sexy assed mouth. Too bad the words, along with the way his eyes traced over me sent my temperature rising…and not in a good way. Mason Murphy leaned against a limo. He had aviator sunglasses, coppery brown hair, and a smirk that probably melted panties of all his baseball fans. Fortunately for me, I’d been around several hotter than hot men the last few months and wasn’t impressed.
I held out my hand. He pursed his lips, pushed his glasses on top of his head, gracing me with stunning green eyes. They were as dark as emeralds and just as pretty.
“What, no kiss?”
I narrowed my brows, cocked a hip, and crossed my arms over one another. “Seriously? You’re going with that?”
His head shot back and he pulled his glasses off his head than proceeded to dangle the end of one side in his mouth. Again, he looked me up and down. “Feisty. I like a girl that’s a bit of a challenge.”
I closed my eyes blinked several times to see if I was still asleep from the Benadryl I’d taken on the plane. Flying always made me jittery. Nothing like what I was feeling right now though. “You’re a real piece of work aren’t you?”
His eyes opened wide and a huge grin slipped across his distractingly well-sculpted face. High cheekbones, a little dent at the chin and those sparkling eyes looked wicked.
He moved close to me, hung an arm around my neck, and kissed the side of my temple. It took everything I had not to turn and plant one on him…a punch to the face, that is.
“You’re going to remove your arm from me and back away. Have you no manners?”
Mason planted his feet in front of me and leaned close as if to whisper. “I know what you are and I’m totally okay with it. Very,
very
okay with it. We’re going to have some fun together.”
I pushed his chest enough to get him out of my face. “Look, Mr. Murphy…”
“Mr. Murphy,” he said, mockingly. “Ooh, I like that.”
Sucking in a breath, I clenched down on my teeth. If I bit my tongue, I might have bitten it straight in half with how much this guy irritated me.
“What I was trying to say before you interrupted me was that you’ve got the wrong idea about me. I’m an escort. Meaning, I escort you to things. Provide you with companionship in a friendly manner.”
Again he got close, grabbed my hips, and slammed them against his. “I can’t wait to get more
friendly
with you,” he rubbed his pelvis against mine. I could just barely feel the outline of something coming to life.
I sighed. Letting it go, I pushed him away again. “Just take my bags.”
He whistled at the driver. Yes, whistled at him. Like a fucking dog. He may as well have said, “Come here boy, good driver.” I cringed and removed myself from his grasp.
“Don’t worry, baby, you’ll get into the swing of things,” he mock swung a baseball bat. I, on the other hand, rolled my eyes and opened the limo door crawling in. He maneuvered his long body into the spacious vehicle and clapped his hands. “Want a drink?”
I’m pretty sure I looked at him as if he’d grown a tail. “It’s not even noon.”
He shrugged. “It is somewhere in the world,” he said with a saucy wink. Mason pulled out a bottle of champagne. His tongue came out and wet his full bottom lip. The space between my legs took notice instantly, twinging delightfully. I shook my head and crossed my legs. He was a bastard, yet I couldn’t help but notice that he was a good-looking one. Mason Murphy was tall, probably six feet or so, had a body that could grace magazines and did, often. The muscles in his biceps bulged delectably and his quads flexed as he shoved the bottle between his legs and twisted the top off with a plop. No foam. Pretty good, I’d give him that.
“Now sweetness, let’s get a couple things straight.”
I opened my eyes wide, my eyebrows going straight into my hairline. He handed me a glass of champagne. Even though it was barely ten in the morning, I took the glass figuring I’d need something to take the edge off my annoyance.
“You were sent here to be my girlfriend. That means, in order to have my fans, prospective sponsors, and the media at large believe it, you and I are going to have to get
friendly
, very quickly. And looking at you…” he licked his lips again as his eyes traced my form from my booted feet up my jean clad legs and stopped directly at my bosom. Pig. “I’m going to enjoy every fucking second of it.”
This guy was going to be challenging. He was smug, sexy as hell, irritating, sexy as hell, downright crass, sexy as hell, and immature. Did I forget anything? Oh yeah, sexy as hell.
He leaned back, displaying his body for me against the opposite seat. He smirked and downed the champagne in one go. I wasn’t about to let this schmuck best me so I lifted the glass to my lips and swallowed the entire lot back. His eyebrows lifted and his eyes sparkled in appreciation.
“Woman after my own heart,” he clutched at his chest in mock chivalry.
I leaned over, grabbed the bottle, and filled my glass then gestured with a chin lift for his. He presented it and I filled it too.
“Okay, look we need to firm up a few things.”
His face made a gesture that indicated that he was about to crack a joke, but I cut his words with a pair of green daggers in his direction. He leaned back and lifted his chin.
I smiled knowing I won that round. “I may have been hired to be your girlfriend for the month, but I’m not your whore.” His eyebrows drew together. “Having sex with a client is optional on my part and not part of my contract. You should have read the fine print, buddy because you’re about to find out what a month of celibacy looks like.”
His mouth dropped open, shock the prevailing response. “You’re fucking kidding?” he smirked.
I shook my head. “’Fraid not. So you might want to get used to that there hand because you’re going to be using a lot of it. If the press sees you outside, trolling along with any harlot you can get to give you a second glance, they’ll know this,” I pointed a finger between the two of us, “is a sham and the effort and the hundred thousand you’ve paid me will be wasted.” Mason ruffled a hand through his hair. “It also wouldn’t look so good to your prospective sponsors that you can’t even hold onto your pretty new girlfriend for longer than a day. Remember, my fee is non-refundable.”
