Mixing Temptation
Second Shot #3
By: Sara Jane Stone
Releasing September
13, 2016
Avon Impulse
Avon Impulse
Blurb
In the third installment in Sara Jane Stone's dazzling Second Shot series, a beautiful but broken woman must decide if true love is worth risking everything...including her freedom
In the third installment in Sara Jane Stone's dazzling Second Shot series, a beautiful but broken woman must decide if true love is worth risking everything...including her freedom
After a year spent living in hiding—with no
end in sight—Caroline Andrews wants to reclaim her life. But the lingering
trauma from her days serving with the marines leaves her afraid to trust the
tempting logger who delivers friendship and the promise of something more.
Following an accident that nearly robbed him
of his hopes for the future, Josh Summers believes life has given him a second
chance. He wants to settle down with the woman who stole his attention and his
heart. And he’s willing to wait until she’s ready to be more than “just
friends.” When fear of discovery leaves Caroline pretending to be his date,
Josh tempts her to try the real thing—a relationship built on trust, not lies.
But then the past threatens and Caroline
must risk everything—including her freedom—to bury her demons before she can
take a chance on happy-ever-after.
Ok, I would strongly recommend reading the Independence Falls and the previous Second Shot books, because they give the backstory behind Josh and Caroline. In the Independence Falls you see Josh at his most vulnerable time. He struggles. Granted he's a secondary character, but he has come so far in the books. In the Second Shot books we see Caroline change from scary GI Jane wood nymph to someone trying to take back her life. This romance has been building in series. So read the previous books before taking on Mixing Temptation, that is my advise you can take or leave. Moving on.
JOSH & CAROLINE's story oh happy day. It's been a long time coming, but Caroline was emotional damage, this couldn't be rushed. I can't stress the importance of reading the previous books in Second Shot series, because we see Josh bringing Caroline a pie all the time. He slowly gained her trust through pies. She didn't trust no man. Who would blame her? However, she learned to trust Josh.
Anyway, Sara did an amazing job with this story, because it was pretty awesome. We finally have Josh and Caroline finally officially coming together. However, something happens that forces Caroline to face her past. By the way is not the easiest thing, but she knows she needs to face it in order to move on in her life. I liked how Sara used another situation to help Caroline to draw this conclusion. Now I'm hoping that there will be a story for Ryan.
Overall, a great ending for the Josh and Caroline. I'm going to say, I'm glad Josh never ended up in a relationship with his nurse. However, he was a super hero Caroline needed at the time.
Copy provided by Avon via Edelweiss.
Excerpt
“May I lick the
whipped cream off your face?”
Josh lowered his
fork to the pie dish and waited for the Big Buck’s dishwasher to catch up with
the conversation. Pie—not flowers—had offered him the perfect way to transition
from the guy who found her in the woods to her friend. And he couldn’t resist
the temptation to switch from small talk to damn near close to begging for a
kiss.
And a date, he thought. I’m going to ask her out today.
Caroline raised one
perfect, dark eyebrow. One hand clasped a spoon and the other rested on the
stainless steel work surface that on busy nights held stacks of dirty pint
glasses waiting for her attention. Right now, it was just the two of them and
the pie. The bar wouldn’t open to Forever’s local logging population and the
university students who outnumbered the men and woman born and bred in this
section of the Willamette Valley for another hour.
“No,” she said. Her
tongue darted out from between her pink lips that always looked as if she was
wearing a kiss-me-now lipstick. Or course, he knew the woman whose ideas of
accessorizing involved a concealed weapon tucked into the waistband of her
pants did not bother with makeup. She licked the whipped cream teasing the edge
of her mouth. “I’ve got it under control.”
He nodded, refilled
his fork and lifted another bite of key lime pie to his mouth. He always
asked—for a touch, a taste, a kiss—but he never pushed. Caroline would shift
the parameters of their dessert-based friendship in her own time. Or she
wouldn’t and he’d be forced to come to terms with the fact that the future he
daydreamed about—settling down with Caroline, buying his own home, maybe a
dog—would replace sleeping with Megan Fox on the top of his Never Going to
Happen list.
“You’re going to
Noah’s wedding on Saturday night?” he asked, sliding back into friendly
chitchat. He’d waited a year to kiss Caroline the first time. And he’d sit
tight for another if it meant more sugarcoated kisses. To hell with his
siblings’ opinions.
“Just because I can
take the dishwasher apart and fix it every time it tries to quit on us”—she
nodded to the restaurant-grade appliance behind her—“doesn’t mean Noah wouldn’t
fire me for missing his wedding. Plus, he’s closing the bar for the night.
Everyone else is going.”
“Everyone else is
in the wedding,” Josh pointed out. Big Buck’s owner and manager was marrying
Forever’s former bad girl, who’d burst into his life over a year ago, demanded
a job, and quickly worked her way up to assistant manager. And the only other
bartender on the payroll right now was the groom’s best friend and the bride’s
big brother.
“True. But I owe
Noah. I can’t miss his wedding.”
Fair enough, he thought.
“A couple of months
ago, you asked me out on a date,” Josh pointed out.
“I was feeling
brave at the time.”
“Are you
canceling?” he challenged. If she said yes, he’d kiss her again. Maybe not
today, but one day soon. And he’d reminder her why she’d summoned the courage
to ask in the first place. He’d caught her looking, her eyes roaming over his
biceps with a flicker of something more than friendship in their green depths.
And if given the chance, he would let her run her fingers over his T-shirt,
mapping the muscles beneath . . .
“No, I’m not
canceling,” she said thoughtfully. “I’m still working out the details.”
“Be my date to the
wedding.”
Her eyes widened,
staring back at him as if he’d dropped to one knee and suggested they follow
her boss down the aisle.
“No,” she said
firmly. “Josh, I . . . Just no.”
Caroline refused to
look away. She’d spent months learning to read Josh’s facial expressions,
forcing herself to look past the red-gold stubble that screamed ‘I’m too sexy
for this bar.’
Or his shirt.
Or her . . .
Right now, the
corners of his mouth threatened to fall into a frown. Disappointment. But he
never let his smile falter for long. He always took a moment. Looked away and
then returned his gaze to her as if she hadn’t turned him down twice in ten
minutes.
But he knows I’m a long way from whipped
cream kisses in the bar’s back room.
And dates.
Yes, she’d asked
him out once. But then reality had come crashing down on her. Her life
consisted of washing pint glasses and staying out of sight. She couldn’t hope
for more—not even a single night out at one of the restaurants near the
university—with a federal warrant hanging over her head.
Of course, the
police weren’t actively looking for her. As far as she knew. But if the local
cops, or even a state trooper passing through town, found out who she was . . .
If they learned why she kept to the shadows, she would be under arrest and
turned over to the military. She would have to pay the price for her
unauthorized absence. For refusing to deploy alongside the men who’d turned a
blind eye when their commanding officer ordered her into his bed. The men who’d
laughed with Dustin when he’d said he would force open her mouth and make her
take him between her lips . . .
And then there was
the elephant in the bar’s back room that would also tag along on their date.
She hadn’t had sex—oral or otherwise—because she wanted to since before she joined the marines. Josh had never
treated her like a victim, but there was a first time for everything.
“I’m sorry,” she
added. “But I can’t go to the wedding as your date. There will be too many
people. And everyone knows you. If they see me with you . . . they’ll ask
questions. And I can’t give them answers. I need to stay in the background,
hiding behind a plant or something. And then leave as soon as they cut the
cake.”
“A wedding probably
isn’t the best place for a first date.” He pointed his fork at her. “Maybe once
I get my own place, you can help me christen the kitchen.”
She raised an
eyebrow. “That assumes a lot for a first date.”
He laughed. And the
familiar sound threatened to lead her into his version of the future. One where
they would kiss in the kitchen and then—
“I was talking
about baking a pie together,” he said. “I’d invite you over to the farmhouse,
but I didn’t think you’d take kindly to receiving the third degree from my
siblings and their significant others.”
“Probably not a
good idea,” she murmured. She’d spent the past year trying to avoid his two
older brothers and his sister. It wasn’t hard seeing as his family lived in
Independence Falls, a solid hour’s drive from Big Buck’s Bar. Chad Summers, the
middle brother, had tried to befriend her, stopping by the bar’s back room with
his girlfriend, a drop-dead gorgeous woman who’d served in the army. But
Caroline had shut down their attempts.
Josh Summers
remained the one and only person she’d let in since she’d showed up on Noah’s
doorstep. There was something about the way he accepted the word ‘no’ that
broke down her defenses. He never tossed the word aside, questioning whether it
was a knee-jerk response. He never pushed—not once—under the pretense that he
knew what was best for her. Not since that first night when he’d found her in
the woods. Even Noah, who’d had her back when they were deployed together,
pushed. Her fellow soldier turned boss tried over and over to talk her into
visiting the local gun club with him. She said no and he asked again and again.
But Josh always
listened.
“Have you started
looking for a new apartment?” she asked, steering the conversation away from
dates that might lead to compromising situations.
“I’m looking, but
not for an apartment. I’m still sitting on my split from when we sold the
family trucking company. I want to use the cash to buy a piece of land.
Someplace with a nice view of the mountains, maybe space to put those
viticulture classes I’ve been taking to use and grow some grapes. Not a lot.
I’ve learned enough to know that is one tough business. I’d rather keep my day
job with Moore Timber and put my blood, sweat, and tears into building my own
home.”
“You can do that?”
The question slipped out before she could mask the surprise in her voice.
“I’ll need help,
but I know what I want. Four bedrooms. Maybe five. Plenty of space to spread
out. Timber frame. A second story that is open to a great room below. And one
helluva kitchen with all the modern appliances. I’ll hire an architect, and a
builder. But I can swing a hammer with the best of them.”
Four bedrooms. Plenty of space . . .
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