Snippet Saturday: Friends

Snippet Saturday is the brainchild of author Lauren Dane, wherein a group of authors selects thematic excerpts from their work and shares them on Saturday mornings. This Saturday's snippet is friends. As such, I'm going to post an excerpt about friends FROM a friend of mine, Inez Kelly! That's like twice the friends. Inez is a romance writer, often writing very hot romance, and the excerpt today is from a best friends to lovers story called TURN IT UP.

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“Charlie, have you ever wondered what might have happened if I wasn’t married when we met?”

She loved his voice, so deep and rich, with just enough silk in it to make her quiver. It carried across the radio waves like water in a brook. Just a word or a phrase in his gilded tone and she wanted to melt like butter in July.

He was the poster child for the All-American classic male. One look told you his life story. Football hero, baseball captain, Young Republican’s Club and med school whiz. He’d married his college sorority-sweetheart and set out to live the picture-perfect life.

But nobody was perfect and dreams crumbled. Charlie had been there when his did and helped him hold it together. That was what a friend did. That and they never crossed that invisible boundary.

Had she wondered what might have happened if he’d been single? No, she’d always known.

“It’s pretty easy to figure out. We’d have become sizzling hot but temporary lovers and missed out on something really great. The chemistry’s always been there. But lovers are a dime a dozen. Friends that last are priceless.”

“Maybe we would’ve been different.”

Jazz. His voice was jazz, invoking images of steamy nights, moist skin and rolling hips. Had she fantasized about him? Hell, yeah. Long ago she’d trained herself to stop actively imagining his hands on her bare skin or his mouth pressed to hers. Snippets and flashes snuck in, of course, but she always shrugged them off. Being his lifelong friend meant more to her than getting naked and sweaty for a while.

Bastian wanted a woman forever. It was in his makeup, his genes. Charlie didn’t do forever where men were concerned.

She preferred hard, intense sex and lots of it. Sex had intrigued her from her first time with Bobby Mason in his father’s Ford. It lacked everything she’d thought it would be. So she set out to discover why. What she’d learned fascinated her, empowered her, awed her. Sex made the world go ‘round, and Charlie absorbed every facet. Sex was fun. It was exhilarating. It was temporary.

Her best friend was permanent.

“What might have been doesn’t matter now. You were married and off-limits so we became friends instead. Besides, you mean more to me than any sexual fling ever could. You’re my best friend, the best friend I’ve ever had. That’s harder to find than any piece of ass. I love you, Bastian.”

Lines crinkled around his eyes with his gentle smile. She’d never said these words aloud but knew he knew them. She knew she meant the same to him. They were rare and nothing could make her risk that. But still, a girl could fantasize. In color.

When he jerked his head, a silent invitation to join him, she leaped up and threw herself in his arms. Bastian gave the best hugs. Not wimpy and soft as if she’d break or hard and crushing like she was a grape to be squished. He never tried to cop a feel or worried if he brushed her breasts. He just hugged her. It was one of her favorite things about him.

His lips skimmed her brow, just enough to let her know he loved her back.

You can find TURN IT UP for sale at:

Carina Press
Amazon
Barnes&Noble
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Jody W.
www.jodywallace.com  * www.meankitty.com

MORE FRIENDLINESS:

Megan Hart -- Read in bed!
Eliza Gayle
Rhian Cahill
Anne Rainey
Lissa Matthews
Mari Carr
McKenna Jeffries
Myla Jackson
Taige Crenshaw
Alison Kent
Delilah Devlin
HelenKay Dimon
Leah Braemel
Shelli Stevens
Shiloh Walker
TJ Michaels
Zoë Archer
Lacey Savage