Starting the week off right with some sexy scenes from scintillating romantic suspense novels on Molten Monday.
Taking a peek inside Reckless Endangerment today...
Coming home again isn't always easy. Colonel Michael Cedars
and reporter Hope Shane fell in love in a warzone, but then the world blew up
and splintered their lives in two.
Sometimes heroes fall and take the ones they love down with
them. A Marine accustomed to giving orders, Michael struggles to find his role
in civilian life. Wounded, he faces new battles as he learns to walk again,
struggles with wartime ghosts, and questions his abilities as a husband.
But theirs is a love worth fighting for—and Hope Shane
doesn't surrender. An investigative reporter, she's hot on the trail of a human
trafficking ring. Danger intensifies as she gets closer to the truth, but the
human traffickers know her weakness.
Will Michael become her Achilles Heel? Will her reckless
disregard for rules shatter the fragile bonds of their marriage once and for
all? Is he still the hero she married or has he become a liability that could
get them both killed?
An excerpt...
“None
of us are who we were. Do you think I’m
the same person I was before seeing my best friend killed? Before stepping over Marishka’s body and the
bodies of her murdered children? Before
seeing you face down in the dirt? Do you
think I don’t see corpses in my sleep?
Do you think that hasn’t changed me?” she asked.
“You
look the same.” His gaze flicked over
her before sliding toward the window.
“Maybe I’m still walking on both of my feet,
but that doesn’t mean other parts of me aren’t paralyzed.” She scrubbed her
fists against the tears and hated herself for being weak. “I’m pissed at you for denying me access to
you in Frankfurt. You have no
idea—none—how much I needed to be with you when you were hurt and you made me
out to be a liar. I’m your wife, for
God’s sake.”
“Stop
saying that word.”
“You’re
a selfish bastard.” She shoved her hands
through her hair and counted silently to twenty. “Say what you want, I don’t care because I’d
rather fight with you than mourn you. I’d rather you hate me than feel
nothing.”
“I
do hate you.”
Blowing
a strand of hair from her face, she grabbed the ouzo bottle, opened it and
slammed cabinet doors looking for a glass.
“I
know you’re lying,” she said.
“Get
the hell out of here,” he yelled.
“Where
are your goddamn glasses?” she asked between clenched teeth.
“How
would I know? I’ve been here less than
six hours.”
“Who
needs a glass, right?” She took a long
swig of the liquor. The alcohol burned her throat but felt damn good. She took
another swig before meeting his gaze.
“Is
that how you’re dealing with your guilt?
Drinking it away?”
She
held the bottle out toward him. “Want a
taste?”
He
looked at her through narrowed eyes, muscle working overtime in his jaw.
“C’mon,
babe, look at it this way…maybe a taste will kill you,” she said.
For
the first time since entering the room, a flicker of humor shot through his
eyes. With a shrug, he grabbed the
bottle and drank without breaking eye contact.
“I’m
still alive,” he said.
“Sorry
to disappoint you…again.” Needing to
touch him, she reached for the scar that zigzagged across his forehead.
He
flinched away from her touch.
“You
need to leave. You don’t owe me anything,” he said without looking at her face.
She
caught her lower lip between her teeth and studied his bent head before
answering. “This isn’t about owing you
anything.”
He
met her gaze then, annoyance flashing in the brown depths. But there was something else there,
too...pain so intense she took a step back.
“What
is wrong with you?” he asked. “Just because I’m in this chair doesn’t mean that
you can bully me.”
“Am
I bullying you?” She grinned at the idea of bullying him. He’d always been the badass Marine with more
arrogance than necessary. Her
independence clashed with his attitude more often than not, but that had been a
good thing. Maybe...just maybe...he’d
missed it. “I brought you fast food and
alcohol. We even had a fight. I think you like that I’m here. I’m livening things up. You looked pretty bored when I walked in.”
He
grabbed her hand before she could snag another fry. He squeezed her fingers so hard she thought
her bones would snap. “Look at me. I’m not the man you married. I’m not even a Marine anymore. Look at me.”
She
only saw the man she loved who stared back with desperation in his eyes. She
saw his hair thicker and longer than she’d ever seen it before and liked it.
She saw his teeth sink into his lower lip and wanted them sinking into her
skin. She only saw Michael.
“You’re
still the sexiest man on the planet,” she said.
“You’re
delusional.” He dropped her hand as if
the mere touch of her skin sickened him.
“Maybe
I am.”
“What
are you getting out of this?”
“A
headache.”
“I
can’t…I’m changed. We’ll never be able
to be like we were.” He looked at his
legs. “Not like how you remember me
anyway. I’m different now.”
“So
am I. We’re all different.”
“It’s
more than that and you know it. You and
me...sex...there will be...expectations.”
“I
see, so I should pretend you don’t exist because you feel awkward about sex?
You must not think much of me, Colonel.”
She bit out his rank between clenched teeth.
“When
I see you that’s what I want, are you satisfied now? Right now I would like to throw you up
against that counter, rip those jeans from you and fuck you. I remember how we were together. That’s what I want. I can’t do that. Do you hear me? I can’t have what I want and seeing you is
torture for me. I can’t have you.”
Silence
quaked in the room.
She
put both of her hands on his knees, conscious that he couldn’t feel her touch.
“You keep talking about what you’ve lost, but you haven’t lost me. Don’t you see that? You may not be a Marine anymore and you may
not be able to walk anymore, but you have me.
I love you. I need you. Can’t that be enough? And you have your son.
What about him? He needs you, too. You
haven’t lost him.”
“I
wish you hadn’t come here.”
“Too
bad, I’m here. Deal with it.” She moved
onto his lap and moved her hands over his shoulders. “What’s the problem?”
“Stop
this,” he whispered.
“You
want me to kiss you. You want to kiss me back.”
She could see it in his eyes, the need, the desire, the question. “Is that what you want, Michael?”
“What
would that prove?”
“Does
it have to prove something? Can’t a kiss
be a kiss?”
“No.”
“Typical
man.” She leaned within a fraction of
his lips. “Don’t you remember high school? Don’t you remember when a kiss meant
everything?”
In
a sudden move, he grabbed the back of her head and ground his mouth against
hers. She knew the intensity was meant
to shock her so she matched it with her own.
She sat on his lap and plunged her tongue into the recesses of his mouth
until he moaned. His free hand squeezed
her breast through the thin material of her blouse but, instead of hurting, it
ignited her blood.
The
Michael she knew still lived inside this man.
She felt him in the warmth of his mouth, the strength of his hands on
her body, the restrained power of his touch.
She couldn’t stop
touching him, hands moved through his hair, over his face, along his
shoulders. Alive. Here.
She fought back a Hallelujah.
