by Lynn Red
Dora just stared at her, and Eve diverted her eyes.
“I don’t know if Rake’s the one for you, I really don’t,” Dora said. “But I do know that you’ve got a big, burly bear out there in Morales who is showing exemplary decency by not jumping your bones.”
“We’re just friends,” Eve said, weakly. “He knows about Rake.”
“Yeah! He does! And he knows you’re never gonna move on until you face that lion. Also, while we’re at it, that lion? He showed up here, twenty-goddamn-years after the last time he saw you, and I can tell you right now, he’s still in love.”
“How?” Eve asked. “You haven’t seen him.”
“Uh, honey?” Dora balled up her fists and planted them in her hips instead of on Eve’s shoulders. “How many times has that phone buzzed?”
Eve shrugged. “That’s not love, that’s stalking.”
“He. Is. A. Lion,” Dora said. “That’s what he does. I admit it’s a little heavy handed, but what the hell, you can’t stop yourself from getting pissed off at Tootsie Roll jokes, and you turn your head around too much and it makes people uncomfortable. But you can’t stop being an owl, can you?”
“No,” Eve said, “I guess not. I just don’t—”
“And you won’t,” Dora said sternly. “You won’t know, you can’t know until you find out for sure. And I’ll tell you this, I’ve never seen you this twisted up about something before. That right there should give you a moment’s pause, shouldn’t it?”
Eve closed her eyes tight, and pinched the bridge of her nose.
“When that phone rings again,” Dora said, “and you know damn will it’s gonna ring again. What are you going to do?”
Eve just kept pinching her nose, although she added dramatic sighing to her performance. “Come on, Dora,” she said. “Just—”
“What are you going to do?”
On cue the phone started up buzzing once again. Dora arched her eyebrow as Eve looked down at the big screen with the jumbo-sized numbers. “God damn son of a bitch,” Eve said glumly. “I’m gonna answer it.”
“Good girl,” Dora curtsied slightly. “I don’t know why I did that.”
“I don’t either,” Eve said. She hit the green slider on her phone and paused with the phone halfway to her mouth, before she said ‘hello’. “Dora?” she asked as her friend was turning to leave.
“Yes’m?”
“Thank you,” Eve said softly. “I think...” she sighed. “I think I’ve always known this was the right thing to do. And no one else on Earth cared enough to ride me until I broke.”
“Uh, actually you might want to save the whole riding until you break thing for someone else. Remember, you promised to tell me all the dirty details of whatever sexual exploits you find yourself in, remember?” Dora turned around to face the door again, but paused. “And I want a real good one.”
“Hello? Rake?” Eve asked. “I’m...”
Dora paused with one foot out the door just long enough to hear the next few words, which were a few moments in coming.
“I’m glad you called,” Eve said. “I think.”
Dora smiled, wiped away a tear, hid a sniffle, and marched straight back into the bar. On the TV sets, Blake was badly singing a Bon Jovi ballad to Lexie. It was so horrible that it was hard to make out, but being a life-long Jovi-holic, Dora knew it by heart.
“Always,” she whispered. “Yeah, sounds about right.”
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Special Previews and Excerpts
Keep reading for a bunch of great excerpts from more steamy, sexy, hilarious Lynn Red romances!
The Fox and Her Bear
Mating Call Dating Agency
When fox-shifting Angie Holton goes to work, she’s all business. Being all work, all the time, is starting to wear her down. Angie is lonely, though she’d never admit it. She goes from one thing to the next, more surviving than living, and has more or less given up on the whole love thing – who has time for all that anyway?
That is, until she meets Dawson Lex – a piano playing, hamburger cooking, sexy-as-hell werebear.
Dawson’s not just a pretty face and... really, really muscular arms. This bear has a dark, violent past and a present that barely keeps him from exploding again. But once he lays eyes on Angie, he knows he won’t—can’t—let this one go.
These two will have to scratch, bite, and hold on as tight as they can. Even if they have to survive gunshots, claw fights, and some REALLY obnoxious 911 calls, they’re never going to give up on this weird, beautiful love.
***The Mating Call Dating Agency is a series of standalone paranormal romances that can be enjoyed in any order. Each pair finds their own HEA – these books are perfect for a quick getaway in the middle of a hectic day!***
Hare Today, Bear Tomorrow
Mating Call Dating Agency
When you’re a shifter who don’t have the first clue where to find the love you need, WHO YOU GONNA CALL? Mating Call Dating Agency!
Fate is nice and all, but in the busy worlds of journalism and professional wrestling, sometimes a rabbit needs a hand, and a bear needs a place to grab.
Garnet Pendleton is a freelance journalist, and moonlighting as a librarian gets the bills paid, but barely. It’s a busy life, but it’s hers. Lately though, she’s felt like something was...lacking. With her life absorbed in pounding pavement and wrestling with the Dewey decimal system, Garnet hasn’t had time for something she’s starting to get REALLY edgy over – finding a mate.
Stacy Graves’s entire life has been lived in a ring. He’s big, muscled up, and can bodyslam and headlock with the best of ‘em. But he’s also not getting any younger. Stacy’s mind is starting to drift in the middle of matches. Instead of being worried about pinning his opponent, he can’t stop thinking about settling down and finding himself a mate.
Will Garnet’s journalistic drive for truth and Stacy’s life on the road be too much of an obstacle for them to overcome in the name of love? With mating experts Yvette and Dora on the case, Garnet and Stacy just might stand a chance.
Can’t Bear to Run
The Kendal Creek Bears
Raine Matthews used to be quirky, fun and slightly goofy. She’s not allowed to be any of those things while she is firmly under her husband’s thumb. Her only reprieve comes from distant memories of a man she saw only once six years ago. In that instant, Raine knew there was something special about him. The memory of that twinkle in his eyes, of his careless smile, gives her a shot of hope at her darkest moments.
She knows the only way to survive is getting away from her husband, no matter what. And in the back of her mind, she can’t shake the feeling that somewhere, somehow, she’s going to see that mysterious stranger again.
Daxon Mark is the frustrated, irritated, sexy-as-hell alpha bear of the Kendal clan. Trapped between shuffling truces with other bear clans, and the meddling of an overbearing shifter council, he can’t shake the feeling that the woman he saw six years before is what he needs to stay sane. He's teetering on the edge and when a bear as big as Dax goes nuts? THAT ain’t something anybody wants.
With Raine on the lam and Dax trying to escape the confines of small town politics, the two of them finally meet again – in the most romantic of places – in the toilet line at a concert.
With a glance, he steals her heart, and with a word she sets a fire in his soul. But with trouble brewing back in Kendal Creek and Raine constantly looking over her shoulder, will these two fated mates find their peace? Or will fear, loss, and murder rip the pair apart before love is allowed to bloom?
Lion in Wait
Alpha Lion Romance
Cassiopeia is lanky, quick-witted, and spent most of her life running from one thing or another. She escaped an overbearing family, and a series of dangerous misadventures, but then landed square
in the midst of a traveling carnival. In the gritty, grimy dirt circus, love is the furthest thing from Cass’s mind – she’s much more occupied with avoiding her boss Lyle’s slimy fingers.
Just about the only things Cass has left are her mind, a few books, and impossibly vivid dreams of a man she’s never met, but who she knows – somehow – is going to find her. And when he does? Well, who knows? But it’s gotta be better than the circus.
Oh, and then there’s the lion who sleeps in her trailer.
At first, Lex was impossible to control. He clawed, he snapped, he roared and raged like any lion would, but somehow never hurt anyone, like there was something more to him than caged animal ferocity. He lashed out at everyone except for a certain woman with curly brown hair and a thing for khaki cargo pants.
No one knew that the REAL Lex – the same man Cass dreamed of for so very long – was hiding beneath the fur and claws. When the lion-shifter lays eyes on the woman he knows he can’t live without, this king of the jungle can’t rest until he’s taken his queen. And when he first reveals the tall, dark and handsome underneath the tail and teeth? Cass isn’t too surprised that the man IN her dreams turned out to be the man OF her dreams.
Bearly Hanging On
A Jamesburg Shifters novel
Jamie Ampton is a sharp-tongued, pointy-toothed, vampy shifter with a penchant for neatly done-up hair buns and a habit of attracting EXACTLY the wrong sort of guy. Guys with a dash of arrogance, a pinch of cocky swagger turn her head... but when her last one turned out to be more “self-important jackass” and less “gruff and strong and takes what he wants,” it left her cold.
So to speak.
Ryan Drake has a dark past and a mysterious present. When he shows up demanding the town alpha do his part to care for Jamesburg’s aging shifters, the first thing Jamie notices is that her heart starts beating a little quicker. The second is a knot in the pit of her stomach. And then, before she can catch her breath, he stares straight into her eyes.
She’s never been one for the big, loud, muscled-up types, but in the space of two breaths, the elegantly detached Jamie finds herself falling for a bear.
Little does Jamie know that before he stomped into that courtroom, Ryan decided that nothing was gonna stop him from getting what he wanted. But, once he saw Jamie? Suddenly there were two things that this massive blue-eyed alpha bear were going to have, no matter what it took: help for his friends... and Jamie.
And Ryan? Ryan is one bear who ALWAYS takes what he wants.
To Catch a Wolf
A Jamesburg Shifters novel
AVAILABLE FOR FREE!
Sometimes a wolf’s gotta fight and bark and bite.
But other times, a wolf just needs a mate.
Erik Danniken is the alpha of Jamesburg, a small town, hidden from the world, and full of all kinds of shifters, and secrets. But underneath it all, he’s just a big, rough, bad-boy of a werewolf with a tattoo that goes all the way up his chest. Oh, and don’t forget his massive, building-shaking motorcycle.
He’s done his fighting, he’s done his carousing. Now he’s the mayor of Jamesburg, and he’s done looking for a mate... because he found her.
Sometimes a girl needs romance and wine and sweet kisses.
Other times, she just needs a job.
Isabel Taylor was more than a little frustrated when she answered a very vague job ad and moved across the country. Curvy, tough and with more than a little bit of a naughty streak, Izzy couldn’t believe her eyes when she saw that first Jamesburg hedgehog stand up, turn into a man and order a drink.
She’s found her place, found a life she thought she’d never have, and found the love she’d given up on... the problem is, she and Erik have to keep it a secret from everyone else in town.
Erik wants to claim her forever, mark Izzy as his honest-to-goodness mate. Izzy wants him to quit being such a coward and just come out and do it, but will a good old-fashioned small town scandal make them keep their love a secret, and in the process, kill it before it can grow?
Two Bears are Better than One
A Broken Pine Bears Novel
From USA TODAY and NEW YORK TIMES best-selling author Lynn Red comes a steamy, sexy, hilarious alpha werebear romance... with two times the bears!
Jill Appleton is a witty, slightly-lanky, tall-enough-to-make-most-guys-nervous biologist with a thing for bears.
Whoa, whoa, not like that - she's got a thing for SAVING bears.
When she hears stories of a secretive group of Kodiaks in the Appalachian Mountains, she knows she's got to check them out. First of all, they're not supposed to be there, and second – bears that live in a pack? That's about as rare as biologists who love big crowds. Or, when it comes to Jill, it’s as rare as one of her dates not turning into a train wreck. She's all but given up on finding that one guy who the universe decided was right for her.
Good thing she's about to meet two.
Rogue and King, joint alphas of the Broken Pine werebear clan, could not be more different. King is quiet, stalwart, and strong. He holds clan traditions and history sacred, and refuses to wear anything but a loincloth – the way the elders did. Rogue would rather get a face full of werewolf teeth than bother with all that. He’s feral, wild, loyal to a fault, and loves to guzzle craft beer straight from a keg. And also – a loincloth? Jeans all the way for this bear, thank you very much.
With the outside world coming closer to Broken Pine territory all the time, and the werewolf packs getting more riled up than ever, something is wrong. But, when the two alphas - who according to clan law, both mate one woman, and mate for life - see Jill making her way to camp?
The two alphas feel their hearts beat together, and know in that second that no matter what, no matter how, they will have her, they will possess her. They’ll make her theirs at any cost.
Thank you so much for taking the time to check out my new book! Click here to subscribe to my mailing list to keep up to date on all my new releases, giveaways, and free books!
Did you love Bear Arms? Then you should read Bear the Heat by Lynn Red!
What do you call a six-and-a-half-foot tall, muscled up, bear-shifting fire fighter? What about one with a long record of selflessly saving cubs from burning buildings? How about “yes please!”
Breaker Hart is all those things. He’s every ounce the panty-melting, bad boy, calendar hunk bear you’d think. There’s only one problem: there’s a hole in his soul, and he knows he needs a mate to fill it, but he’ll be damned if he can find the one.
Mink-shifting Lorelei Roberts is a damn good forensic scientist. But in between breaking cases, she’s starting to get... nervous. No matter what she does, her brain’s in a million places at once and her nerves are pretty much a frayed bundle of electrical wires.
One day, while she’s swirling some chemicals in a vial, it hits her square in the face – she needs a man. Or at least a really, really good lay. Damn. It couldn’t be that she needed a new car, or a bigger house – nope, of course not. It had to be the one thing in the world she’s the worst at. Dating.
The second Rory and Breaker lay eyes on each other – assisted by the legendary Eve and Dora of the Mating Call Dating Agency – something clicks. Rory knows she’s finally found someone who likes her for who she really is, and Breaker can’t get her out of his head. But, will an explosive investigation burn them both up before they can ever have a chance to find out what love REALLY is?
***The Mating Call Dating Agency is a series of stand-alone stories, each with its own HEA. They can be read in any order!***
Read more at Lynn Red’s site.
Also by Lynn Red
Jamesburg Shifter Romance
Bear Me Away
Kendal Creek Bears
Can't Bear To Run
Can't Bear to Hide
Mating Call Dating Agency
Hare Today Bear Tomorrow
The Fox and her Bear
Bear t
he Heat
Bear Arms
The Broken Pine Bears
Two Bears are Better Than One
Between a Bear and a Hard Place
The Jamesburg Shifters
Bearing It All
Bear With Me
Bearly Breathing
Bearly Hanging On
Bear Your Teeth
The Jamesburg Shifters Volume 2
The Jamesburg Shifters Volume 1
To Catch a Wolf
Standalone
Lion In Wait
Werewolf Wedding
Horns for the Harem Girl
Watch for more at Lynn Red’s site.
About the Author
Lynn loves reading romances -- especially ones with a full moon, alpha werewolves, and a whole bunch of wild action... but only if they have strong, engaging women and heroes that melt her heart.
Read more at Lynn Red’s site.
