EXCERPT: I-Team Male Bonding — Gabe meets Marc, then Julian

I posted this excerpt to my Yahoo group, but I thought I would post it here as well. My last post was so serious, and I know how hot men cheer you all up.

These scenes take place in the first half of the story. The first scene shows when Gabe meets Marc. The second is their second meeting, but this time Julian is along for the ride. Since there are those of you who never, ever seem to get enough Julian and others who can't get enough Marc Hunter, I thought you might enjoy these little snippets.

When Gabe meets Marc...


“Kat!” Gabe was on his feet, blocking her path, drawing her into his arms,
relieved when she seemed to come willingly. He ran a finger over the curve
of her cheek. “It wouldn’t have been like that, not with you. If we’d had
sex—”

The doorbell rang, stopping him from saying God only knew what.

“That must be Marc.” She drew away and hurried off to get her things.

Gabe opened the door and found a man about his own age. With shoulder-length brown hair and wearing a faded denim jacket, the man stood tall enough to look Gabe straight in the eye, and Gabe was certain he’d seen him somewhere before.

“I’m guessing you’re here for Kat.” Gabe moved aside to let him in.

The man stomped the snow off his boots and stepped inside, sizing Gabe up like a big brother who’d found a stranger sniffing around his little sister. It made Gabe wonder whether Kat had mentioned their little make-out session when she’d spoken with her friend. And why did the bastard look so familiar?

The man held out his hand. “Marc Hunter, Denver PD.”

And then it clicked. This was the son of a bitch Gabe had spent three weeks chasing through the mountains in the dead of winter, the son of a bitch whose face had spent the better part of a month hanging on Gabe’s office wall — on a wanted poster.

“Gabe Rossiter, Boulder Mountain Parks.” Gabe shook Hunter’s hand, giving back as good as he got. “I busted my ass trying to bring you in.”

“It’s lucky for both of us that you didn’t find me.” Hunter glanced about, obviously looking for Kat, his gaze falling on a climbing harness that Gabe had overlooked on the hallway floor. “You’re a rock jock, huh? I bet that helps you out when it comes to scrambling up the east face of the Third Flatiron and shit.”

Third Flatiron above Boulder

<----East Face/West Face--->

“No, not the east face of the Third.” You prick. “But it did come in handy when a couple of guys got stuck in a freak blizzard climbing the Diamond on Longs Peak not too long ago.”

The Diamond

Hunter’s eyebrows rose a notch, and he nodded. “Thanks, by the way, for saving Kat’s life this past summer and for stopping that son of a bitch who pulled her hair. I’d like to kick his ass.”

“That makes two of us.”

And later in the story.....

You saved her life, man.

The thought struck Gabe right between the eyes, seeped through him, leaving him with a bone-deep sense of… satisfaction. He was used to saving lives, but not like this. To know that Kat was alive tonight because of something he’d done…

Maybe you don’t suck after all, Rossiter.

He turned the water in the shower and stepped under the warm spray, washing dirt, sweat, and blood from his skin, letting the water loosen his tense muscles. Then he got out, dried off, and dressed his wound, the sting of antiseptic making him cuss a blue streak. He’d just covered it with a large bandage when his doorbell rang.

He skipped the underwear and slipped into a pair of jeans. Taking no chances, he picked up his HK .40-cal semi-auto—he’d seen the last of the Glock, which belonged to Mountain Parks — and walked quietly to the door. He looked through the peephole — and felt his heart knock against his breastbone.

Kat.

She stood on his doorstep flanked by Hunter and someone else — a man in a black leather jacket whose face he couldn’t see. He tucked the firearm into the waistband of his jeans, unlocked the door and opened it. And for a moment all he could do was stand there, staring into her eyes. She looked exhausted, overwhelmed, beautiful.

Had she been crying?

“Good to see you in one piece, rock jock. I see you took a hit.”

Gabe tore his gaze from hers, gave Hunter a nod, rubbed his fingers over the bandage. “It’s just a graze. Hey, Darcangelo, how’s it going? You hang with this guy? That’s ironic.”

Julian Darcangelo, the best damn detective Gabe had ever met, shrugged then reached out and shook Gabe’s hand, a grin spreading over his face. “What can I say? Every superhero needs a sidekick. Plus, it’s a good way to keep an eye on him, keep him out of trouble.”

Hunter glared at Darcangelo, muttering something that sounded suspiciously like “fuck you.” Then he frowned, pointing back and forth between the two of them. “So, you two know each other?”

“Of course we know each other. We met chasing your sorry ass through the snow. Rossiter here is pure hell on a pair of skis.” Darcangelo shifted his gaze back to Gabe. “Is Kat going to be safe here with you tonight?”

Gabe met Kat’s gaze again. “Yeah, she will. Do you boys want to come in?”

Hunter’s gaze dropped to Kat, as if trying to gauge his response from her. “I think we’ll head home and let you two get some rest.” Then his gaze shifted to Gabe. He drew out a business card and held it out “Give me a call. Let us know what we can do.”

“Will do.” Gabe pocketed the card, watching as Kat thanked her friends and said her good-byes. Then he took her hand and drew her inside, the two men’s voices drifting back as they headed down his front walk.

“You didn’t tell me Kat’s rock jock was Gabe Rossiter. He’s not a rock jock, Hunter, he’s a rock god.”

“How the hell was I supposed to know you knew him?”

Gabe closed the door and locked out the night, while Kat hung her coat on the coat rack and slipped off her boots. They turned and faced one another, and for a moment neither of them moved or spoke, Gabe drinking in the sight of her, from the dirt smudge on her cheek to the shadows in her eyes. Then he did the only thing he could do. He drew her into his arms, and held her, just held her, his face pressed against her silky hair, the honey scent and soft feel of her a balm for all the rough edges inside him.

Naked Edge wallpaper/Excerpt

I just had to share this right now. Jennifer Johnson made it for me this evening, and it will soon be up on my Web site as downloadable wallpaper beside the other fun wallpaper she's made for the I-Team series.

It won't be up online for a while, so if you just can't wait, email me and I'll send it to you.

Thanks, Jennifer!

I'm in the middle of a massive Web site update. There are many new foreign covers, as well as an excerpt from Naked Edge and the novel-length author's note. OK, it's not quite that long. It's only eight pages, but for an author's note, that's looooong. My editor read it and said, "It's a lot more than I expected but then you never do anything half way."

Work at the paper is ratcheting up for the holidays, and things are busy with this book even though I'm done writing it. I'm almost done proofing the second round of copy edits to make sure no one added mistakes to the book. In some places, the accents on the Navajo words were changed, which if you know anything about Navajo, is a big deal. So I'll get those fixed. And then the book will head off to the presses. Before long there will be Advanced Review Copies (ARCs), and I'll be holding contests here and on my Yahoo group to give some copies away.

For now, though, just wallpaper. And this excerpt...

Haha! Yes, it's torture time again!

From Naked Edge:


Geee-zus!

Gabe sucked in a breath, shocked by the blistering impact of Kat’s unexpected kiss, heat shearing through his gut at the first clumsy press of her lips against his. Even as his body responded, some part of his brain knew this shouldn’t be happening. “Kat, you’re upset and tipsy and—”

She kissed him again, tilting her head to better slant her mouth over his.

Christ!

He turned his face away, felt her lips brush his jaw. “Honey, you don’t really want this. You’ve just lost—”

She made a little sound of protest, her arms sliding behind his head, drawing his lips closer to hers, as if to show him that she did really want it.

Good. So did he.

Ignoring the pathetic warnings of his conscience, he took control of the kiss, drawing her tight against him, capturing her mouth with his.

God, she tasted sweet! She smelled sweet, too — like honey and woman. She gave a little whimper, melting against him in a way that was utterly feminine, every inch of her soft body molding to his, her breasts pressing against his ribs, her lips parting to give him access. He swirled his tongue over hers, felt her body tense. And through a pheromone fog, he realized she wasn’t just a virgin between her legs.

Kissing — real kissing — was new to her, too.

Not just virgin, buddy — extra virgin.

He reined himself in, gentled the kiss, slowed it down, brushing her lips lightly with his, teasing their outline with the tip of his tongue, nipping their fullness, his lust for her at war with some strange urge to protect her from himself. In his world, any night that started with kissing ended soon after with fucking. His cock had already risen to the occasion and strained painfully against his fly, looking for the surest route out of denim and into her. But that couldn’t happen — not tonight, not when she was vulnerable and afraid and hurting, probably not ever. She wanted happily ever after, and all he could give her was sex. Still, he could keep kissing her…

Hell, yeah.

He claimed her mouth in a no-holds-barred kiss, penetrating deep, taking her tongue with his, sucking it into his mouth, biting down. She whimpered, kissed him back, meeting the strokes of his tongue with her own, her fingers curled in his hair, her body almost undulating against his, communicating in a primal language of its own, one Gabe’s body understood only too well.

Katherine James might want to save her virginity, but her body had other plans.

With a groan, he drew her beneath him, testosterone shorting out his brain, his body taking over, his blood running hot and fast. He found her throat and pressed his lips against the rapid beating of her pulse, kissing a path over soft, sweet skin, tasting her, nibbling her earlobe. And he wasn’t finished — not by a long shot.

Kat heard herself whimper and turned her head to the side, surrendering her throat to Gabe, the heat of his lips raising goose bumps on her skin, his male scent filling her head, the hard press of his body on top hers making her belly flutter.

She’d never felt anything like this, never even imagined it — the heat, the intensity, the overwhelming physical force of it. Her body trembled, and her heart raced, her breathing uneven as if she’d been running. And she was running — from her grief, from her fear, from everything that hurt. Some part of her knew this, but that only made her run faster.


The rules don’t apply tonight.

She didn’t stop him when he slid a callused hand beneath her sweater to trace tiny circles up her ribcage. She didn’t object when his clever fingers found the clasp of her bra between her breasts and unhooked it. And when he cupped her left breast, when his thumb flicked her nipple...

She gasped, stunned, the sensation too astonishing, too arousing, too wonderful to be real. Jagged shafts of heat seemed to shoot straight from her breast to her belly, turning to liquid between her thighs.

“You like that, don’t you?”

At the husky sound of his voice, her eyes flew open. She found him looking down at her, his breathing as rough as hers, his blue eyes burning, a smile on his wet lips. She forced herself to hold his gaze, shocked by the intimacy of watching him as he watched her, as he watched the effect his touch had on her, his hand still cupping and shaping her breast, his thumb tracing lazy circles over its aching crest.

And the heat in her belly became a wildfire.

Then he pushed her sweater up, baring her breasts, his gaze raking hungrily over her. “God, Kat, honey, you’ve got beautiful breasts. They’re so… Mmm.”

Whatever he’d been about to say became a moan as he ducked down and drew one of her nipples into the scorching heat of his mouth.

“Gabe.” Kat’s body jerked at the initial shock of it, the pleasure staggering as he suckled first one nipple and then the other, tugging at her with his lips, teasing her with velvet strokes of his tongue, tormenting her with nips of his teeth. It was sweet, so sweet, and terrible, too, the fire between her thighs now a throbbing ache. She heard herself calling his name, felt her hips lifting toward him, wanting, wanting…

Wanting him.

He groaned, settled his weight between her thighs, and answered her need, grinding what could only be the thick ridge of his erection against her… there. Slowly, so slowly he moved against her, taking the edge off the ache, only to make it so much worse. She was wet, the emptiness inside her burning, her inner muscles clenching around nothing. And she knew.

If he kept going, if he pressed her, she wouldn’t be able to stop him. She wouldn’t want to.

Gabe’s body was strung so tightly he thought it might snap. He’d been a damned idiot to take it this far. He’d wanted to give her the comfort she so obviously needed, and one thing had let to another. Or that’s what he’d told himself. In truth, he’d wanted to kiss her and hold her — and so he had.

He needed to stop. But how could he when Kat was coming apart in his arms, her response burning him up? Her little mewls and whimpers were driving him out of his mind, her wine-dark nipples drawn into tight buds that begged for his mouth, her hips moving in a way that was both feminine and undeniably erotic. He didn’t want to stop — oh, hell, no! He wanted to fuck her long and hard. He wanted to make her come again and again. He wanted to forget himself inside her.

And then what, buddy? You’ll pluck her sweet cherry and show her the door? She deserves better than that, and you damned well know it.

Gabe dragged his lips from hers, forced his hips to hold still, sexual need grinding in his gut, blood pounding through his veins. “Kat.”

She looked up at him, so beautiful it made his chest ache, confusion and longing in those hazel green eyes, tear stains on her cheeks, her lips red and swollen, her delicious breasts rising and falling with each rapid breath — no makeup, no silicon, nothing but sweet, soft, sexually aroused woman.

He fought the urge, so elemental, to kiss her again and settled for running his knuckles over her cheek. Somehow, he managed to string a few words together. “If I don’t stop now, honey, we’re going to be at this all night.”
(c) 2009 Pamela Clare
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Kat is the first contemporary heroine I've written as a virgin — and for reasons that become apparent in the story. It was an interesting experience. But more on that in another post. I have pages to copy edit!

Naked Edge update with excerpt

I just had to pop in quickly to say that my agent read Naked Edge this weekend and just called to tell me that I am ridiculous and have no sense of the quality of my own writing. This is very good news because I told her I thought Naked Edge was the worst thing I'd written so far.

She said she sobbed at the end and that she found the climax of the story every bit as nail-biting as was the climax of Unlawful Contact.

I have to give a shout out to some FOPs (that's an acronym for Friends of Pamela — you ken who you are) who have actually read the manuscript. The whole time I was writing it, I was thinking, "This sucks! This sucks! This sucks!" But these sweet FOPs kept saying, "No, it doesn't! Keep writing!" If not for them, I'd be out looking for my lost sanity.

I still want to do some minor revisions before I turn it in. This ghost-writing project is delaying that till the end of the month or early September.

How about an excerpt to celebrate the non-suckiness of the story (according to my agent and FOPs)?

Here's one I posted in my notes on Facebook. If you saw it there, sorry! And remember, Kat is a virgin — my only contemporary virgin thus far. And there are cultural reasons for this. But you'll see on March 2.

From Chapter 25 of Naked Edge

Kat willed herself not to break eye contact with Gabe, her heart pounding. He stared down at her, his pupils wide, the astonishment on his face turning to something darker, his brows bent in a frown.

He ran the pad of his thumb over her lower lip. “Are you sure?”

She couldn’t say when she’d reached this decision. Maybe it had been this morning when she’d prayed for him, looking for some way to help him regain the part of himself Jill had stolen. Maybe it had been that terrible afternoon when he’d saved her from being shot, proving his courage. Or perhaps it had been the moment she’d realized that the wind knew him, that he belonged to this land as much as she did.

Regardless, her heart had decided.

She had finally found a man who was worth it, a man she loved so much that going without him felt unthinkable.

“Yes, I’m sure.” She caught his hand where it cupped her chin and kissed his palm. “I love y—”

“Shhh!” He pressed his fingers to her lips. “Don’t say it. ‘Yes’ is enough.”

He ducked down as if to kiss her, then abruptly stopped, glancing around them. “No. Not like this.”

“Gabe?”

He stepped back. “Why don’t you go soak in a hot bath and pamper yourself a bit? The sun only set about an hour ago, so the water ought to still be fairly warm. There’s a camping lantern on the counter.”

Take a bath? Did she smell bad?

Something of her feelings must have shown on her face, because he leaned down to rest his forehead against hers. “Hey, trust me, okay? If I can’t be man enough to keep my hands off you like I should, then at least let me be man enough to do this right. I’ll tell you when you can come out.”

Confused, Kat walked into the bathroom, turned on the camping lantern, and shut the door behind her. She found herself staring at her own bemused reflection in the lantern’s half-light. This certainly wasn’t the response she’d expected from him.

If I can’t be man enough to keep my hands off you like I should, then at least let me be man enough to do this right.

What did he mean by that?

And then her pulse began to race again as she realized what was about to happen.

Gabe was going to make love to her. Tonight.

Suddenly, she was grateful for the extra time. What she’d said a few moments ago had been entirely spontaneous. She hadn’t stopped to think that it had been a couple of days since she’d shaved her legs or that she needed to brush her teeth or that she might want to take a bath first.

Quickly, she set her razor and a washcloth near the tub, then turned on the water, relieved to feel it was still quite warm. While the tub filled, she flossed and brushed her teeth and tied her hair up in a knot. Then she undressed and stepped into the soothing heat, noises coming from the other side of the door—the clanging of dishes, the opening and closing of doors and drawers, the creaking of floorboards, the front door opening again and again.

She might have tried to figure out what he was doing if she weren’t so nervous. Instead, it was all she could do to focus on shaving her legs, questions chasing one after another through her mind. How much would it hurt? Would she be able to have an orgasm with him inside her? Would he compare her to Jill and be disappointed? Would he push her away afterward as he had so many women?

Stop doubting, girl. Trust yourself. Trust Gabe. Trust that you’ve come to this place and time for a reason.

Her belly full of butterflies, she reached for her soap, inhaled its sweet honey scent and remembered how much he seemed to like it. Then she lathered her skin, trying not to worry about things she couldn’t control. She’d just pulled the plug from the bathtub drain and begun to dry herself, when he knocked on the door.

“Kat? Whenever you’re ready…”

Her heart gave a hard knock. Was she ready? After all these years was she ready for what was about to happen? She wrapped herself in a soft towel, drew a deep, calming breath. Then, without glancing at the mirror, she opened the bathroom door—and stared in amazement. “Oh, Gabe!”

The cabin had been transformed. The dirty dishes had been cleared from the table, and the kerosene lamps had all been stored away. Dozens of small emergency candles sat here and there on saucers and in bowls, the room warm with their radiance. Pine boughs had been wrapped around the bed’s four posters and its headboard, their scent fresh and enticing. The air was warm, a strong fire burning in the woodstove.



His gaze fixed on her, Gabe stood in the middle of the room, wearing only his jeans, the candlelight giving his skin a tawny glow, seeming to accentuate the ridges and valleys of his muscles. And Kat felt that familiar flutter in her belly.

Oh, yes, she was ready—for him.

He crossed the space between them in two lazy strides, slid his fingers into her hair, and undid the knot, spilling it down her back and around her shoulders. Then he brushed his knuckles over her cheek. “I can’t make any promises about tomorrow, Kat, but for tonight at least, I’ll do my damned best to be worth it.”

Then he reached down, tugged off her towel, and let it fall to the floor.



-----

The rest of that scene will be available on March 2. (Is my sadistic side showing?)