Tangled Thing Called Love: Life and Love on the Lam (A Loveswept Contemporary Romance)

by Juliet Rosetti

“Wait here, okay?” he said. “I’ll run in and get our key.”

  Mazie waited, feeling a fluttering in her chest that slowly spread through her entire body. Every cell seemed to be vibrating with excitement, joy, and anticipation. And now the man she loved was walking toward her, the breeze ruffling his hair, his dark eyes seeking hers. He was holding a key. “It’s a couple minutes’ walk,” he said, pointing toward the woods. He grabbed Mazie’s suitcase—hoisting it as though it weighed nothing; no wonky wheel problems for him—and led Mazie along a path that paralleled the river.

  Mazie had thought there’d be another building back here, but when they came out into a wide clearing, she gasped in surprise. There, perched in a gargantuan willow tree that looked as ancient as the Ice Age, was a tree house. It was made of honey-colored wood, with large windows, a railed deck, and a curving stairway leading up to it. It overlooked the wooded hillside, the river below, and the valley beyond. Above sandstone bluffs, swallows scythed across the sky like blue-black scissors.

  Only one word did it justice: spectacular.

  “I can’t believe you did this,” Mazie whispered. “It’s so—”

  “Uncharacteristic?” Ben laughed. “Okay, I’ll fess up. Scully and I were talking yesterday and he happened to mention how women like it when their guys surprise them with umm … romantic places.”

  “You’re taking advice from Scully? The guy who once serenaded a girl beneath her window and got tuna casserole dumped on his head? Cats were coming from miles around to rub up against him.”

  Ben grinned. “He didn’t mention that.” He looked at her. “Do you like it?”

  “It’s beautiful. Very, very romantic.” Standing on tiptoe, Mazie kissed his cheek.

  The house wasn’t really built into the tree, she saw as they climbed the stairs. It was built solidly on beams driven deep into the earth, but positioned so that it seemed to be resting in the grip of the tree’s giant limbs. Inside, it was even prettier than outside, much larger than she’d expected, with warm pine walls, comfortable furniture, and a four-poster bed with a soft, quilted, leaf green coverlet. There was a kitchenette and a bathroom, though they must have had to use elf-magic to install plumbing up here.

  “And just like your tree house,” Ben said, “it has a hole in the roof.”

  Mazie tilted her head, smiling. There was a skylight. You could lie in the bed and look straight up at the stars or the shivering leaves or falling snow or swooping swallows.

  “No grandmothers, notice?” Ben said.

  “No twins.”

  “No beauty queens falling off boats.”

  “No werewolves.”

  “Cell phones off.”

  They looked into each other’s eyes, and Mazie saw her own eagerness mirrored in Ben.

  “Just one more thing,” Ben said.

  “There’s more?”

  “I promised to take you dancing.”

  Ben reached into his pocket and retrieved his iPod. He placed it on the docking station on the nightstand table. He scrolled until he found what he was looking for: “Let’s Get It On” by Marvin Gaye.

  Mazie giggled. He was such a guy. Her guy.

  Ben closed the distance between them in two long strides. He grabbed Mazie’s left hand, drew her in, and placed his other hand on the small of her back. God, he smelled good. A mixture of Old Spice and male pheromones.

  They began to sway in time to the music. He kissed the top of her head. Her nose. Her fingers. He let go of her hand and slowly dragged his fingers down the length of her arm, down her side, and along the bare skin just above the waistband of her jeans.

  “I love you, Mazie,” he said softly.

  It took a moment for the words to sink in. Mazie raised her face to his. His eyes held hers. He meant it, she saw. Ben Labeck had said, “I love you”!

  Which tangled her feet and made her stumble. Ben caught her, drew her tight against him, took her face in his hands, and kissed her. She kissed him back. They kissed their way over to the bed. Hot, demanding, take-no-prisoners kisses.

  Mazie pulled his shirt out of his pants.

  He pulled her T-shirt over her head. Had her bra off in seconds.

  His shirt, his jeans, Mazie’s jeans, underpants. Tossed aside. And then there was nothing between her and the man she adored, just the lovely sensation of his skin on hers.

  His hands were magic; they knew exactly where to touch, how to drive her insane with desire. Her body was clenched and eager and urgent, and Ben was strung like a bow; she sensed that it was taking all his self-control to hold back, to wait for her to get there.

  But she got there. They both got there; they took the human cannonball route and got there in a convulsive explosion that made Mazie scream and nearly blow out Ben’s eardrums.

  Afterward, panting and sweaty, they lay atop the comforter. They’d never gotten around to getting under the sheets.

  “You were awfully noisy,” Ben said, smiling smugly.

  “You weren’t exactly mute yourself.” She smiled back. “I hope we don’t have neighbors.”

  “Nope. This is the one and only treetop motel room for miles around. We’ve got dinner reservations for later, too.”

  “No end of surprises with you today.”

  “The place has a band. We can dance some more. I want you to experience my moves.”

  “I’ve experienced your moves. I like them. A lot.”

  He nuzzled her neck. “Ready for more?”

  “You’re joking.”

  He turned her toward him, propping himself up on one elbow and looking down at her. “I am not joking.” His deep, sexy baritone set every cell in her body aquiver. “I have six weeks’ worth of celibacy to make up for.”

  “You … umm … said you didn’t—in L.A. Did you mean it?” It was a sore topic, and she didn’t want to talk about it, but knew they had to.

  “No. I didn’t sleep with anyone. I went out a couple of times, like I told you. I was lonely for female company and you weren’t answering my messages.”

  “You never said why you came back.”

  He picked a damp strand of hair off her neck. “Isn’t it obvious? Because I missed you. Missed you insanely.”

  “I missed you too. It was like I was dead inside. Muffin was all that kept me going.”

  “I don’t want us to be separated again, Mazie.”

  Mazie took a deep breath and did an all-over body wriggle, feeling she couldn’t contain all her happiness. She was with the man she loved, the man who’d just told her he loved her. In the heat of the moment, she realized, she hadn’t said “I love you” back—but her body had done the talking for her, hadn’t it? And they were going to spend the night together, in the same bed! It would take more than a night with Ben Labeck, though, because there was still a lot she wanted to know about this wonderful, brave, complicated—and frequently infuriating—man.

  But she’d learned a few surprising new things about him this week.

  He liked kids.

  He wasn’t afraid to make a complete fool of himself over a baby.

  He had a hoop skirt fetish, and anytime she wanted to drive him wild, she just had to channel her inner Scarlett O’Hara.

  Ben gathered her into his arms. “I like your family,” he murmured.

  “Even the twins?”

  Ben wigwagged his hand. “When we have kids,” he said, “let’s have girls.”

  “Deal.”

  To the Oshkosh Area Writers Club

  Thank you for all your support.

  Acknowledgments

  I’d like to thank my wonderful agent Andrea Somberg for her help in finding the right home for my stories at Random House. Also my editor, Sue Grimshaw, who manages to keep a myriad of balls in the air at the same time, possibly using supernatural powers. Finally, thank you, Tom Cherwin and Crystal Velasquez, for your superb copyediting. I stand in awe of your skills.

  BY JULIET ROSETTI

  The Escape Diaries

&nb
sp; Crazy for You

  Tangled Thing Called Love

  The Sexiest Man Alive*

  *Coming soon

  Photo: Dee Madden

  A native of Wisconsin, JULIET ROSETTI grew up on a dairy farm, where she neglected her weed-pulling and cow-milking duties in favor of reading every book she could get her hands on. At various times in her life, Rosetti has worked in an aluminum factory, coached cricket, competed in a beauty pageant, and sold encyclopedias door-to-door. Writing romances is her favorite job so far because it almost never involves wearing bathing suits or shin pads—although she sometimes dons her lucky tiara. She lives in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, with her husband and son and is currently working on a new Escape Diaries novel.

  Julietrosetti.net

  The Editor’s Corner

  May marks the halfway point between the first day of spring and the summer solstice—I don’t know about you, but I’m definitely ready for the warmth of spring and the heat of Loveswept romances! And you can always count on Loveswept to have the perfect gift for you and your mom this Mother’s Day.

  Let’s see what’s on sale this month:

  Small-town romance is first on the list with Laugh—Mary Ann Rivers continues her Burnside family series as two people try to share their hearts without losing their cool. Outlaws and daredevils are up next when the Justiss Alliance returns in Tina Wainscott’s Wild Ways, and the search for a missing woman forces two brave souls to tap into their wild sides. And in her Loveswept debut Against the Cage, Sidney Halston turns up the heat as a sexy cage fighter shows a former bookworm how delicious a few rounds between the sheets can be.

  Moms everywhere will certainly enjoy Loveswept’s Classics, beginning with Bonnie Pega’s back-to-back releases: Wild Thing, Then Comes Marriage, The Rebel and His Bride, Only You, and Animal Magnetism. Then Jean Stone weaves together an emotionally charged story of friendship and betrayal, forgiveness and love, in Places by the Sea. And, in #1 New York Times bestselling author Iris Johansen’s electrifying Blue Skies and Shining Promises, two hearts are thrown together by fate and united by irresistible desire—don’t miss it!

  ~Happy Romance!

  Gina Wachtel

  Associate Publisher

  Read on for an excerpt from

  Crazy for You

  by Juliet Rosetti

  Available from Loveswept

  Chapter One

  You know the job market is tough when you daydream about going back to prison.

  —Maguire’s Maxims

  Rhonda Cromwell was the kind of woman that gives cougars a bad name.

  She broke up marriages, seduced door-to-door missionaries, and sunbathed nude in her front yard, causing neighborhood guys to run their lawn mowers up trees, neighborhood mothers to lock their teenaged sons in their rooms, and the local camping-goods store to stock more binoculars. Botoxed, liposuctioned, and siliconed to whatever bodily perfection is possible at age forty-five, she trolled campuses for fraternity boys, hung out at singles bars, and hooked up with hot, young hunks she met on Internet dating sites.

  She carried on her predations at the office, too, slinking around in bustiers under blazers, screw-me heels, and miniskirts so mini that when she put her feet up on her desk, you could read the brand label on her thong. Young, male employees were afraid to bend over the water fountain. Female employees fantasized about strangling Rhonda with her own Spanx fanny-lifting leggings.

  Rhonda was smart, hardworking, and ambitious.

  She was also vain, greedy, and malicious.

  She was my boss.

  She was the owner and CEO of Cromwell Research Services, which sounds like the kind of business that crunches numbers, runs rats through mazes, or test-markets new brands of cheese spread. But its name is misleading. CRS is a spying operation. It sends mystery shoppers out into America’s malls and mini-marts to rat out rude employees, crummy food, and toilet paper stacked in towering piles ready to fall on your head when you squeeze the Charmin.

  I’m one of those spies. My name is Mazie Maguire. I’m still pretty much the same insecure twelve-year-old who worried about kissing, except now my acne has cleared up, I’ve achieved a B-cup bra size, and I’ve kissed quite a few males. My real name is Margarita, a legacy from my Italian grandmother, who also handed down her dark-brown hair and ability to sing on key. My blue eyes, freckles, and small frame are from the Maguires, an Irish clan rumored to be descended from leprechauns.

  I spent the last four years of my life in prison, convicted of murdering my husband.

  I didn’t do it.

  Of course, all felons claim they’re innocent, but in my case it’s true. When a tornado tossed me over the prison fence, I ran for my life, pursued by a federal marshal, a couple of nasty hit men, and squads of gun-toting citizens salivating over the reward on my head. Along the way I managed to solve my husband’s murder, expose a dirty senator, and royally piss off my loony-tunes ex-mother-in-law. A judge looked at the new evidence, declared me not guilty, and ordered me set free.

  But people believe what they want to believe, and in their eyes I’ll always be the woman who got away with murder. When I tried to return to my old job teaching high school music, the school board refused to hire me back. Nobody wanted an ex-convict teaching their kids. Guilty or innocent, it made no difference. I still wore an invisible barbed-wire tattoo.

  It’s now been seven weeks since I walked out of prison, and there are days I want to go back. In the can, you don’t have to worry about making your rent, filling your gas tank, or buying groceries. I’d been released at the exact moment the American economy was tanking. I was fighting for burger-flipping jobs with PhDs in physics.

  So I was grateful to have found the job with CRS. True, I despised my boss, the salary was laughable, and I had to taste-test tons of greasy, calorie-laden fast food—but at least I was earning a paycheck. If Rhonda ever got around to paying me, that is.

  I live in Milwaukee, a terrific city with not-so-terrific weather. Our unofficial motto is “Yeah, but have you ever felt a witch’s tit?” I rent a two-room flat at the rear of Magenta’s, a boutique that caters to drag queens. It’s the first time I’ve been on my own in years, and the freedom is dizzying. I can take a shower without Mona the Monobrow sidling over and offering to lather up my back. I can read in bed without someone yelling at me to turn off the damn lights. I can eat Pop-Tarts for breakfast and popcorn for supper. After you’ve lived cheek by jowl with twelve hundred people for four years, solitude is the sweetest thing in the world.

  Except when it isn’t. Except when you’re missing someone so much it’s an actual physical ache and you want to clamp a giant band-aid over your heart.

  Tough it out, my horrible brothers would have said.

  Plenty of fish in the sea, my dad would have said.

  Stop moping and get on with things, my mom would have said.

  Getting on with things on this Friday morning meant heaving myself out of bed and going to work. I had mystery-shopping to do, restaurants to rate, salons to scrutinize. The consumers of the greater Milwaukee area were depending on me.

  I skipped breakfast. Sack time wins out over cereal every time. I snapped a leash on Muffin, my shih tzu, and took him out for a walk, both of us exhaling frosty puffs of breath like speech balloons. It was sunny and chilly, typical mid-November weather for Wisconsin. The trees were bare, the ground was frozen, and Thanksgiving decorations were fighting a losing battle against the oncoming steamroller of Christmas.

  I dropped Muffin off at doggie day care and hiked the five blocks to where I’d parked my car. I live on Milwaukee’s east side, close to the megalithic University of Wisconsin campus, which means that every day I have to compete with thirty thousand students for about sixteen available parking spaces.

  My car is a twelve-year-old Ford Escort in an end-of-season clearance-sale color—sort of kidney bean red. It has a jones for oil, its tires are bald enough to require a comb-over, its glove compartment harbors a fam
ily of mice, and its engine makes odd grunting noises, as though a pig is curled around the carburetor. Still, it was as much car as I could expect for what I’d paid.

  I’d sold my wedding ring for this car. I’d been wearing the ring the day I was processed into prison and was forced to turn it over to the prison staff, who locked it away in the property safe. Since I’d been sentenced to life, I’d never expected to see the ring again.

  But what the penal system taketh, the penal system sometimes giveth back. When it spat me out, it handed back my ring. The man who’d set this ring on my finger had cheated on me, announced he wanted a divorce by sticking the papers on our refrigerator with a Scooby-Doo magnet, and tried to kick me out of my own home. As a symbol of faithfulness, this ring ranked with purple plastic secret-decoder rings that came free inside boxes of Cap’n Crunch.

  When I slid the wedding ring back on my finger, I waited to see if it would set off sentimental vibes. Nope. Not a single vibe. The thing was just a shiny chunk of metal.

  A shiny chunk of metal worth a goodly chunk of change, as it turned out when I took it to a jewelry dealer. I walked out of the shop with naked fingers, but with enough cash to pay my first month’s rent and buy the Escort.

  I scraped the glacier off the windshield and got in. Crossing my fingers, I turned the ignition and the engine grumbled sullenly to life. I aimed the pig out into traffic and we sputtered and oinked our way toward downtown. My first secret-shopper call of the day was to a brand-new business rumored to be way too over-the-top for Milwaukee’s conservative sensibilities. A talk show host had called it smutty, risqué, and indecent. A church group was picketing it. Nearby high schools were forbidding their students to enter the premises.

  I could hardly wait to review it.

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