Season for Love (40 page)

“Faster.”

Grasping her hips, he gave her what she wanted until they came together in a moment of perfection so sweet it brought tears to her eyes.
 

She descended from the high to find him placing soft kisses on her face and lips.
 

“So beautiful,” he said reverently.

“Yes, it is.”

“I meant you.”

“I meant
us
.”

“That, too,” he said, smiling.
 

Syd wrapped her arms tight around her new husband, thrilled that she got to spend forever with him.
 

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Season for Love
! I hope you enjoyed it. If you did, please help other people find this book:
 
 

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Turn the page for a sneak peek at
Longing for Love
, coming soon!

Longing for Love

McCarthys of Gansett Island, Book 7
 

By: Marie Force

Tiffany Sturgil stood outside her new shop and watched two workmen secure the hand-carved sign over the display window. Drivers on Ocean Road slowed to take a look at what was going on, but there wasn’t much to see yet. Tiffany had kept paper over the store’s window in an effort to maintain the surprise until the last minute. But once the sign was in place, it would be time to unveil her beautiful new shop.

Her heart raced with excitement and anticipation and a tiny bit of dread. What if she failed? What if she’d poured every dime she had—and then some—into the store only to fall flat on her face? “I can’t let that happen,” she muttered, determined to believe in herself or no one else would. Still, she couldn’t help but wonder what her mother and sister would think about the shop, not to mention her soon-to-be ex-husband, who’d definitely have something to say about it. Not that she cared about his opinion. Not anymore.

“Ready?” one of the men called to her.

“Absolutely!” At those words, insane excitement immediately trumped the insecurity. This was it—the moment she’d waited for since that horrible night with Jim, her soon-to-be ex-husband, the night she’d landed in jail and then let the island’s insanely hot police chief get her off in the kitchen. A tingle of desire heated her core as she remembered that explosive moment. Tiffany shook off the memory, as she had every day since, to focus on the store.

“Here we go!”

The two men tore the paper cover off her sign and stared at it, dumbfounded.

“Seriously?” one of them said. “On Gansett Island?”

“What?” Tiffany asked.

“
Naughty & Nice?
” the younger of the two men said, snickering.
 

“It’s catchy,” Tiffany said.

“It’s
raunchy
,” the older one said to guffaws from the other.

Suddenly, she wanted them gone. No one was going to rain on her parade. Not today, not on the day when all her dreams were about to come true. “How much do I owe you?”

“Fifty bucks.”

“I’ll get you a check.” She stepped into the space that had occupied most of her waking moments for months. Working long hours seven days a week in between her mothering duties, she’d painted and buffed and polished until the place gleamed. Scented candles burned throughout the store, sending a hint of spicy cinnamon apple into the air. Racks of luscious, frothy lingerie in every style, shape and color, bins of panties, baskets of bras, lotions, potions and candles… Everything she’d imagined and then some. Through a beaded curtain, other treasures awaited, designed to bring ultimate pleasure.

“What do you need, boss?” asked Patty, the nervous young woman Tiffany had hired to help her out a few hours a week. Her mousy brown hair was cut into an unfortunate style that did nothing to enhance her other unexceptional features. Tiffany had makeover plans for her Plain Jane assistant as soon as things let up a little.

“A check for fifty dollars, please.” She handed Patty the business card the men had given her.

“Coming right up.”

Patty had been the only one to apply for the job. Tiffany hoped she’d eventually be able to leave the store in the other woman’s hands so she could take an occasional break to spend time with her daughter. Her mother and pseudo-stepfather Ned had been great about helping out with Ashleigh while Tiffany was getting the store ready to open and were willing to keep her whenever Tiffany needed help.
 

Once she got the store up and running, Tiffany also hoped to jumpstart her social life. If the explosive orgasm she’d experienced at the hands of Blaine Taylor had taught her anything, it was that she’d been missing out on far too much during her years with Jim. She was determined to do something about that as soon as she had some free time.

Tiffany leaned over to sign the check and tore it from the ledger. “Thanks, Patty.” On her way back outside to pay the men, she pulled the brown paper off the inside of the store window and went out to find the two idiots ogling the nearly naked mannequins dressed in racy lingerie. She’d gone with a red theme for her first window—lacy teddies and silk nightgowns, bra and panty sets, a large bottle of massage oil and lube that heated on contact.
 

“Holy smokes, lady,” the older one sputtered. “I don’t know what you think you’re doing here, but this ain’t that kind of island.”

Tiffany forced a smile when she really wanted to scream. “What kind of island is it?” she asked sweetly. “The kind where no one has sex?”

He stared at her as if he couldn’t believe she’d said that. Snatching the check from her hand, he tilted his head to tell his partner to get in the truck.

Tiffany happened to glance down to find the younger man’s cock at full mast. She smiled when his startled eyes met hers. “Come on back soon,” she said in her best baby-doll voice, “and buy something sexy for your lady—and yourself.”

Flustered, he bolted to the truck. They left rubber in their haste to get out of there.
 

Watching them go, Tiffany experienced a twinge of apprehension. What if everyone in the conservative island town reacted the same way?

The next morning, she got up early to shower. As she spent extra time on her hair and makeup, her heart pounded with excitement and anticipation. Opening day! She’d planned and prepared for this day for months, and everything was set. From ads in the paper beginning today, to balloons out front, to special events to tout her sensual offerings, Tiffany was ready to announce her arrival.

“Look out, world,” she whispered to her reflection. She’d chosen a sexy red silk blouse over a black skirt with stiletto heels for the opening. Applying lipstick in the same shade of racy red, Tiffany took one last measuring look in the mirror before she grabbed her purse and headed downstairs. Ashleigh had spent the night with Jim, so Tiffany was free and clear to focus on her store on opening day.
 

Her heels sounded like shotgun blasts inside the empty house. In one of the more acrimonious moves in their divorce proceedings, Jim had shown up one day with a moving truck and taken all the furniture, leaving her and Ashleigh with their beds and not much else. Until he’d done that, Tiffany had retained some hope that they might patch things up. Now she couldn’t wait to finally be free of him. Any day now, her lawyer, Dan Torrington, had assured her. Couldn’t happen soon enough for Tiffany.

With all her money tied up in the store, it would be some time before she’d be able to replace the furniture. What did it matter? They had what they needed, although she’d been astounded by how fast her savings had disappeared once she started buying inventory, shelving units, a computer, a cash register and everything else she needed to open the store.

“It’ll all be fine once the money starts rolling in,” she reminded herself in a sing-song voice.
 

For the millionth time since their encounter in the kitchen, Tiffany thought of Blaine and how much she wished she could share her excitement with him. Why him? Well, why not him? If he could make her come like a cannon with his fingers, imagine what he could do with his tongue or that thick shaft he’d pressed against her. The thought of it made her tremble with need.
 

And the way he’d looked at her with such yearning, as if he wanted something he couldn’t allow himself to have. Then there had been the encounter last fall at Luke and Syd’s house when he’d cornered her on a dark deck and told her to call him the second she was free of Jim. For a brief moment, she stopped to wonder if he was still waiting for her to call. Who was she kidding? A guy who looked like he did could have his pick of women. He’d probably moved on a long time ago when he got tired of waiting to hear from her.

She took a deep, shuddering breath and closed the front door. No time for negative thoughts today. Although, spending months surrounded by lacy negligee and thick dildos had left her twitchy with unfulfilled desire. “Someday soon,” she said as she approached her little red car with the new NAUGHTY vanity plate. If Blaine wasn’t interested in her anymore, she’d find someone else who was. Tiffany was sick and tired of feeling down about herself in the wake of the disaster her marriage had become. The store was only one step in a whole new life, and she was more than ready to get started.

Tiffany smiled, thrilled with the sun, the cloudless sky, the fragrant late spring breeze. She couldn’t have handpicked a day better suited to starting her fabulous new life and had to curb the urge to wave to everyone she passed on the road.

On the way to the shop (she loved saying that—
the shop
), she went through her to-do list before the noon opening. She’d chosen to open on a sunny Saturday in early May in the hope that people would be out, about and curious. It was also important to have all the bugs worked out before the Gansett Island Race Week festivities later in the month. The island would be overrun with people in town for the annual sailing regatta.

Driving through town, Tiffany thought about how much she loved Gansett Island and how happy she’d been when she and Jim returned home to the island after he finished law school—that was until everything went to crap between the two of them for reasons still unknown to Tiffany. Perhaps she would never know. Over time, she’d begun to make peace with that possibility.
 

The Gansett town center included the requisite New England white-steepled church, a large park next door to the redbrick town hall, and the combined police and fire station. Tiffany’s shop was located down the hill from the police station, which she passed daily, hoping to catch a fleeting glimpse of the sexy police chief. But she hadn’t laid eyes on him since the night on Luke and Syd’s deck last fall. His elusiveness had led her to wonder—more than once—if he was intentionally avoiding her because he’d changed his mind about being interested in her.

She could still remember the gravelly tenor of his voice when he’d grabbed her by the waistband of her jeans and pulled her in close to him on the dark deck. A shiver went through her when she thought about what he’d said.
“The minute you’re free of him, the very same second it’s final, you’re going to call me.”
Before that encounter, she never would’ve thought a dominant man would turn her on. Now she knew otherwise. But since he’d made himself scarce ever since, she was left to wonder if he still felt the same way.

She pushed that unpleasant thought to the back of her mind, and the last half-mile of the ride to work passed in a blur of plans and exhilaration and eagerness. As she pulled into the parking space she’d decided would belong to her as the owner and proprietor of Naughty & Nice, she hoped the women in town would be curious enough to come check out the latest thing.

Rounding the corner to unlock the front door, Tiffany came to a dead stop.

“Oh my God.
No
.” Multicolored paint, as if shot from a paintball gun, was splattered all over the white brick front wall of her store, on the window and splattering her beautiful new sign—the sign she’d paid a thousand dollars to have hand-carved. Viewing the damage, white-hot rage overwhelmed her. Who could’ve done such a thing?

A gasp from behind her had Tiffany spinning around to find Patty holding a dozen red balloons and covering her mouth with her hand. “Oh no.
No, no, no
!” Patty’s eyes were shiny with tears. “I’m so sorry, Tiffany.”

“So am I.” Tiffany gritted her teeth to keep from shrieking and jammed the key in the lock to open the door. Marching to the storage room in the back of the store, she found an unopened can of white paint and a new roller. She glanced down at her expensive silk blouse and skirt. Since she was unwilling to ruin her gorgeous new outfit, she rummaged around, looking for the gym bag she thought she’d left there the week before.