Futures and Frosting (Chocolate Lovers #2)

Futures and Frosting (Chocolate Lovers #2)

Tara Sivec





Acknowledgements


There are so many amazing people I need to thank that I could probably fill up an entire book with just their names.

First and foremost – my amazing editor Max. You are the wind beneath my skirt and I love you! Thank you for all of your help and support. I will hump your leg for days when we’re in the same room together.

Colleen Hoover. I can never thank you enough for the support you have given me. You never hesitate to answer my gazillion questions and you give me hope that someday I will be as awesome as you! I’m so happy for you and all of your success!

Sarah Hansen – you are the twin I never knew I had. Thank you for always supporting me, making me laugh and putting up with my husband’s Facebook posts. Jason Voorhies is still a *.

Mollie Harper – I adore you! And not just for the Floppy Vag song or the amazing “Pay it Forward” movement. Okay, those might be the main reasons, I’m not gonna lie. You are amazing and sweet and you put a smile on my face constantly.

To my Slappers – You were my first supporters and fans in this crazy endeavor and I will be forever grateful that I met all of you. I love you from the bottom of my heart.

To all the hookers at Bookaholics Anonymous and Book Broads – I love you. Each and every one of you. I’m so glad I “met” you. You are amazing and your support is never-ending. Thank you so much for all of the “Pay-it-Forwards”, pimping and just general awesomeness.

To all of the other Indie authors out there – I am proud and humbled to be in the same circle as you. I hope everyone realizes just how hard you work on a daily basis to make your dreams come true.

And last but not least, thank you SO much to the following blogs who reviewed/featured my book(s) on their pages. If I skipped someone, I’m so sorry. It’s all Google’s fault.

Aestas Book Blog, Anna’s Attic, Ashley’s Book Nook, Book Liaison, Book-Snobs, Coffee, Books and Lipgloss, Confessions of Novel Junkies, Cursed Pyramids, Fiction Vixen, Globug & Hootie Need a Book, Hot Coffee Books and Chocobar, Lisa’s Book Review, Lisa’s Reads, Love Affair With An E-Reader, Madison says, Mama Laughlin, Maryse’s Book Blog, Momma’s Books, Natasha is a Book Junkie, Romance Book Reviews Blog, Romantic Book Affairs, Romantic Reading Escapes, Scandalicious Book Reviews, Selena-Lost-in-Thought, She Can’t Shut Up, Sim-Sational-Books, Talk Supe, Tara’s Reads, Teahoney’s Book Café, The Autumn Review, The Book List Reviews, The Indie Bookshelf, The Romance Reviews, Totally Booked, Tough Critic Book Reviews, Under the Covers, Unraveling Aira, Up all Night Reviews, What to Read After Fifty (50) Shades of Grey Facebook page.





Futures and Frosting





Tara Sivec





1. Green Jell-O and Snapping Turtles

I have a dream.

And in this dream I’m under the covers in bed, just a few scant inches away from Carter’s body. I stare at his prone form lying next to me, the greenish-blue glow from the alarm clock on the bedside table providing just enough illumination for me to see the shallow rise and fall of his chest. The sheet is draped low over his hips as he sleeps peacefully with one arm flung over his eyes and the other resting on his taut, naked stomach. I slide my body ever so slowly across the bed, careful not to disturb him, until I’m so close I can feel the heat from his skin warming me from head to toe. I pull my arms out from under the sheet and my hands reach out towards him. I connect with his smooth, muscular chest, slide my fingers up his body, and...choke the ever living shit out of him.

Okay, that’s not really a dream. It’s more of a wish if you will, something I fantasize about when business is slow at the shop, when I’m waiting in line at the grocery store, or pretty much every waking moment of every single day when I find myself yawning and cranky from lack of sleep. But it’s not like I would ever follow through with this fantasy. I love Carter. I really do. Sometimes it’s just a toss-up on whether or not I love sleep more.

A few months ago, I hadn't even known Carter existed. Okay, I knew he existed; somewhere out there, over the rainbow, in a land far, far away living his own life. I never believed in a million years that he would ever stop and give me, his one-night-stand from college, a second thought. Turns out I was wrong on both counts. A land far, far away had turned out to be a few miles from where I lived and that second thought I figured he had never given? Well, much to my dismay, and using a Harlequin Romance novel cliché, he had spent years pining for me and searching the world for 'the one that got away'.

That's me by the way, in case you haven’t been paying attention.

Here I am, a twenty-four-year-old single mother to Gavin (the wonderful parting gift I received in appreciation of my mad virginity-giving-up skillz, ‘yo) when suddenly, the guy I spontaneously gave said virginity to after a rousing game of beer pong at a frat party shows up in my home town to whisk me off my feet and claim the son he never knew he had. This doesn’t happen in real life. Something this perfect only happens in books or John Hughes movies.

Alright, so Carter has never stood outside my window holding a radio above his head and he's never run down the street to sweep me up into his arms for a toe-curling kiss and hand me a pair of diamond earrings he gave to some other skank just moments before. Our story isn't necessarily a textbook eighties movie. There have been anxiety attacks, freak-outs, drunken ramblings, inappropriate cursing, misunderstandings, arguments, two-finger eye-threats, and chocolate covered sex in a public place that only by the hair of a gnat’s testicle avoided being publicly televised. Through it all though, Carter and I have managed to work through our problems with the speed an accuracy of a thirty-minute sitcom on prime time television. It’s no “Some Kind of Wonderful,” but it’s damn near close. I’m still waiting for my street kiss and diamond earrings, though.