When We Fall (Take the Fall, #2)(65)
PHOTO: MATTHEW WINSLOW
MARQUITA VALENTINE is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of the Holland Springs and Boys of the South series.
Since first taking the plunge in July 2012 to self-publish, Marquita Valentine has sold more than a quarter of a million books around the world. Her books have appeared on the iBooks, Amazon, and Barnes & Noble top-selling eBook lists. She’s been called “one of the best new voices in romance” (Guilty Pleasures Book Reviews) and her books have been accused of being “a sexy, fun, and slightly addicting contemporary read” (Book Queen).
When she’s not writing about sexy heroes who adore their sassy heroines, she enjoys shopping, reading, and spending time with her family and friends. Married to her high school sweetheart, Marquita lives in a seriously small town in the South with her husband, two kids, and a dog.
Visit Marquita at the links below and subscribe to her newsletter through the contact link on her website.
marquitavalentine.com
Facebook.com/AuthorMarquitaValentine
@marquitaval
The Editor’s Corner
Happy Holidays from our hearth to yours! This month we’re sending you some hot Loveswept romances to keep the fire burning:
USA Today bestselling author Bronwen Evans’s new Disgraced Lords novel is about a marriage of convenience and its delightful pleasures—and mortal danger in A Whisper of Desire. K. J. Charles turns up the heat in her new Society of Gentlemen novel, A Seditious Affair, as two lovers face off in a sensual duel that challenges their deepest beliefs. Samantha Kane’s Birmingham Rebels series proves that three’s never a crowd…at least not for the hard-bodied football all-stars who give teamwork a sexy twist in Calling the Play. Welcome to Forever, new from author Annie Rains, introduces a small coastal town where America’s best and brightest risk everything for love. Jackie Ashenden ups the ante in the seductive Deacons of Bourbon Street series, co-written with Megan Crane, Rachael Johns, and Maisey Yates, with Hold Me Down, a story about what happens when the biker who broke Alice’s heart rides into town, and she must choose between passion and duty. Another story for MC fans is Violetta Rand’s irresistible novel about a sexy-as-sin biker who tempts a good girl to go bad, Persuasion.
In USA Today bestselling author Tina Wainscott’s gritty, emotional small-town romance Falling Hard, passions run high as a reformed bad boy reconnects with an old enemy…and gets her engine revving. In Laura Marie Altom’s tale of forbidden love, Stepping Over the Line, meet two tortured souls with an unbreakable bond. Then comes a tender military romance from Serena Bell, USA Today bestselling author of Hold on Tight, in which a war-shattered veteran gets a second chance at love with the one that got away in Can’t Hold Back.
Writing duo MJ Fields and Chelsea Camaron release another sizzling-hot Caldwell Brothers story—Morrison, which hits the Vegas strip as a bad-boy gambler from Detroit Rock City shows a single mom what it means to play for keeps. Then it’s off to Los Angeles where Hollywood’s hottest young actor hits the road to chase his big break—and discovers a leading lady where he least expects in Cassie Mae’s No Interest in Love.
I can’t believe 2016 is upon us, can you? Thank you for spending your reading time with Loveswept, and we hope to entertain you all over again in the new year.
Happy Romance!
Gina Wachtel
Associate Publisher
Read on for an excerpt from
After We Fall
by Marquita Valentine
Available from Loveswept
Chapter 1
Hunter
It’s been six months since I last spoke to her. One hundred and eighty days since I last saw her battered and bruised face. Four thousand, three hundred and twenty hours since I last touched her vulnerable body. Not that I’m counting. I shouldn’t count. I shouldn’t think of her at all.
Yet…
Over the years, I’ve escorted countless women to shelters, but none has affected me on the damn level as she did. Not a single one. I can’t get her out of my head. Can’t stop wondering if she’s safe, if she’s back with her sadistic husband, or if she’s lying dead on the side of the road.
It’s where she was found the first time. Shuffling down the beltline, no shoes, torn clothes. An extra from The Walking Dead looked better than she did. Had less blood on them too.
Exhaling thickly as I get out of my truck, I head inside the bar where I’m meeting my partner for drinks. We’ve had a hell of a shift today, and a beer or two is calling our names.
Why this woman? I don’t get it. I really don’t, and it’s not like I haven’t had the opportunity to get her out of my head, because I have. Believe me, I have. A lot of women dig the cop uniform. The cuffs, too.
Only for the past six months, I’ve said no. I guess you could call it a form of self-imposed celibacy. In any case, I’m not buying what they’re offering. On one hand, it sucks to not be into any other women, but I’m twenty-eight-years old—hardly some punk with a raging boner and a drive to stick it into anything willingly standing still.
“The FNG is here,” Rollins shouts and I inwardly groan. Why in the hell did Dwight have to invite him. I can’t stand that dude, or his nickname for me.