A Cold Dark Promise (Cold Justice #8.5)(44)



“Let’s get that sucker cut before anything else can happen,” Alex urged.

“What about the dogs?”

“We’ll save them a piece.” Alex then showed her his cell phone. A text from Frazer apologizing for letting the dogs out and telling him to be on the lookout for the mutts.

“Frazer can trudge through the fields after the dogs. You and I are going to cut the cake, and then we’re going to dance with your parents and each other for as long as you want. And, when you’re done, or you need a break from all these people, I’m going to carry you up to our room and make love to you for hours.”

“Carry me?” she said dubiously. She was no lightweight.

“Carry you,” Alex insisted. He stepped closer. “And you’re going to let me because I love you and I promised, in front of all these people, to worship you with my body. I hope to get started on that sooner rather than later.”

Her heart went all fluttery. “Okay.”

“Okay?” He gave her a stern look.

She just smiled at him. People said your wedding day was supposed to be the best day of your life, but she suspected there would be many, many more days to choose from and she intended to enjoy every one of them.

“I love you, Alex,” she said tenderly.

“I love you, too, Mrs. Parker.”





Dear Reader





Thank you for reading A Cold Dark Promise. I hope you enjoyed Alex and Mallory’s wedding story. Please note, this is not the last book in the Cold Justice Series. Expect more next year.

1. If you have time, please help other readers find this book by writing a review. Thank you!

2. Sign up for my Newsletter to hear about new releases, special offers, and receive a FREE EBOOK!

3. Check out my website for exclusive short stories and extra content.

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5. Interested in a writer’s life? Come chat on Facebook, follow me on Twitter, or check out some of my visual inspiration on Pinterest.

Look out for book #10 in 2018!








A Cold Dark Place (Book #1) Cold Pursuit (Book #2) Cold Light of Day (Book #3) Cold Fear (Book #4)

Cold In The Shadows (Book #5) Cold Hearted (Book #6) Cold Secrets (Book #7) Cold Malice (Book #8) A Cold Dark Promise (Book #9~A Wedding Novella) Watch out for Book #10 in 2018!

The Cold Justice Series books are also available as audiobooks narrated by Eric Dove.

Check out all Toni’s books on her website (www.toniandersonauthor.com/books)





Acknowledgments


In August this year, I attended a writing retreat in the lovely town of Shawano, Wisconsin (not far from where I set Cold Pursuit) with four of the most talented and wonderful people I know (Kathy Altman, Jenn Stark, Carolyn Crane and Rachel Grant). It was a time of furious plotting and artistic rejuvenation. Before I went to Wisconsin I’d realized there was something missing from this novella and they helped me figure out what that something was. Needless to say, this was a lot of story to try and fit into a forty-thousand-word format, but I hope you enjoy the results of my labors. I wanted Alex and Mallory to have the best wedding possible, considering all the pain their journey has involved. But there was no way I could write more than a chapter or two about an actual wedding. I’d always intended to reveal more of Jane Sanders’s tragic past and this was the perfect opportunity. Despite what some reviewers will undoubtedly say, this is not the last Cold Justice Series book, although I am contemplating a possible spin-off at some point.

Thanks, as always, to Kathy Altman for being my critique partner. She breaks down my stories and seems to understand my brain (no mean feat). And thanks to Rachel Grant for the beta read despite her busy schedule.

Thanks to my editors, Alicia Dean, and Joan Turner at JRT Editing, for the polish (commas are my kryptonite). My cover artist, Syd Gill, who, as always, did a great job capturing the essence of the story in pictorial form. And Paul Salvette (BB eBooks) who formats my ebooks with such care, and the guys at Createspace who take care of the print book interiors.

I’m pretty sure I’ve forgotten someone, maybe Martha Stewart for her “Weddings” magazine or Pinterest for feeding me everything else I needed to visualize the wedding, plot and characters.

As always, I want to thank my husband for being awesome, and my kids for being the best people in the world (and, yes, I’m biased!).





About the Author



New York Times and USA Today international bestselling author, Toni Anderson, writes dark, gritty Romantic Suspense novels that have hit #1 in Barnes & Noble’s Nook store, Top 10 in the Amazon, iBooks, and Kobo stores. Her novels have won many awards, and she’s been nominated for the prestigious Romance Writers of America? RITA? Award.

A former Marine Biologist from Britain, she inexplicably ended up in the geographical center of North America, about as far from the ocean as it is possible to get. She now lives in the Canadian prairies with her Irish husband and two children and spends most of her time complaining about the weather.

Toni has no explanation for her oft-times dark imagination, and only hopes the romance makes up for it. She’s addicted to reading, dogs, tea, and chocolate.

If you want to know when Toni’s next book will be out, visit her website (www.toniandersonauthor.com) and sign up for her newsletter. If you want to read other fascinating stories about life in a city that during winter is sometimes colder than Mars, friend her on Facebook: (facebook.com/toniannanderson).

Toni Anderson's Books