Call Me Saffron (Greenpoint Pleasures)
Page 14
I carefully set the three of them on the brand-new mantel, one by one, then stepped back. It was overwhelming to see them. Here. In my home. Our home. And yet…they were from the past, and this was my present.
“There’s one more.” Dylan stepped forward and placed a final framed shot on the ledge.
It was of the two of us, standing in Brooklyn Bridge Park last summer, the lower Manhattan skyline behind us, our arms wrapped around each other. In it, we were looking at each other, grinning like buffoons. We didn’t look needy; we didn’t look lost. We looked like we belonged.
Jeanine had taken the shot, and afterward we’d all gone on a boat ride to picnic and ride bikes around Governor’s Island. A perfect late summer day.
Now, tonight, Dylan came up behind me and wrapped his arms around me. “What do you think?”
I turned to him. “I think it’s perfect.” And it was.
And then I kissed him. Because I wanted to. Because I could. Because he was mine.
Author Note
Thank you for reading Call Me Saffron. I hope you enjoyed Samantha and Dylan’s story.
You may be curious how this story came about. In particular, why a call girl?
Some years ago, I found an anonymous blog written by a graduate student moonlighting as a call girl to make money. She wrote a lot about her clients, mostly about her interactions with them and why they sought her out. It was clear that many of them saw her as a friend and confidante, filling an emotional need, not merely a sexual one.
Then last year, I read a piece in an online magazine by a woman who had been a sex worker and was now going to school to become a nurse. When she told her friends, they all nodded and said it made perfect sense. She’d always been drawn to the helping professions. Sex worker or nurse—in some unexpected ways, the two are not so far apart.
This is where the Greenpoint Pleasures series originated. I’m fascinated by the idea that sex can foster intimacy whether you intend it to or not. Because I write romance, not erotica or gritty literary tomes, I’m specifically drawn to that emotional, psychological puzzle. My heroines are not jaded, experienced sex workers (except for Jeanine). They’re exploring their own sexuality, the intimate connection to another human being, and everything this brings up.
~*~
Although Call Me Saffron is the first in a new series, it’s closely linked to the already-existing Greenpoint Artists series. Alanna and Georgette, who make appearances here, are part of a small artists’ collective: four women artists—all friends—who share a studio space in Greenpoint. Alanna’s story is told in Hold Me Tight, currently available. Georgette’s story, tentatively titled Dream of Me, will be coming out in Fall 2014. The free prequel novella, Draw Me In, is also available.
For those who have read Hold Me Tight: the scenes with Alanna in Call Me Saffron take place in early December, after Hold Me Tight’s climax but before the resolution.
~*~
Annie’s story will be the second book in the Greenpoint Pleasures series, and will include the world’s most awkward phone sex scene. The release date hasn’t yet been set.
~*~
Want to find out when I have a new release? Sign up for my newsletter. I’ll post news there first, as well as occasional related tidbits (largely, excerpts and descriptions of upcoming books).
And please consider leaving a review on Amazon and/or Goodreads. They help other readers find books, and help authors find their footing. I appreciate all reviews.
You can find more information about me and my books on my website.
~*~
Turn the page to read an excerpt from Hold Me Tight.
Hold Me Tight excerpt
Miles and Alanna were briefly lovers as teens. They both continue to be haunted by the profound connection they felt then, despite how badly it ended.
Alanna has just been hired as a graphic artist for the ad agency where Miles is de-facto creative director.
Working together, their old feelings return in a rush, driving them both insane with longing, but they can’t act on them. An ironclad company policy forbids fraternizing, and Miles is wary of trusting his heart to Alanna a second time.
When Hold Me Tight begins, Miles has a girlfriend, Sophie. By this point in the story, though, he’s broken up with her because of his feelings for Alanna.
Alanna doesn’t know this.
Sophie and Alanna are of a similar height and build, and both have blond hair.
As this excerpt begins, Alanna is heading into work late to drop off some artwork.
~*~
Alanna brushed an errant strand of hair back from her face and smoothed her skirt against her legs. Keep it professional. Keep a discreet distance from the man with the girlfriend.
She stepped out into the unseasonable, unreasonable heat and headed to the glass-and-steel skyscraper. To Miles. No, to the job. There was a difference. There was.
As she opened the door to his brightly lit inner office, Alanna heard his voice calling out from behind her. “Sophie! Wait, I’ll be right back.”
Alanna whirled around. The girlfriend was here? Was she going to have to deal with that sickening display of affection again?
But Sophie wasn’t there.
Miles was on the other side of the big main room, his hand still up in a half wave. Waving at her? He was already turning away, heading toward the break room.
As she entered Miles’s now familiar office, Alanna put her hand up to her hair. Coiffed, upswept. He’d seen her from the back and thought she was Sophie. Wow, this was going to be embarrassing.
She pulled the printed image out from between cardboard protectors and laid it carefully on Miles’s desk. Through the open door, she could see him approaching across the main room, passing rows of empty desks. There weren’t many people left in the office at this hour; all the assistants and day workers had gone home.
The fluorescent lights overhead flickered. Once. Twice.
And went out.
All the lights. Inside Miles’s office. In the main office. The buildings and streetlights outside. Everywhere. All dark, hushed, except for a faint echo of traffic cacophony far below.
The world consisted of shades of black and gray. A laptop computer sleep light pulsed in the main office, dimly lighting the space around it. She could hear exclamations, then footsteps as people raced toward the stairwell door, presumably to clatter down the long flights of stairs. Outside the window, the cityscape was dormant. Skyscrapers loomed like silent black behemoths. Alanna could see her hands on the desk more as shadows than as form. The room was blocks of shape, leached of color or definition.
Footsteps came toward the small office. One set. Male, judging from the weight and cadence. He stopped in the doorway, a dim silhouette. “Still here?”
Alanna opened her mouth to reply. Then she breathed out. He thought she was Sophie.
Everyone else was gone, and Miles was here with a woman he thought was his girlfriend.
Alanna murmured low in the back of her throat, a wordless assent.
“Oh. Like that.” His voice was soft. He took a step into the room. Another. Then he was there. Right next to her.
A powerful current jolted through her body. She could hear his harsh breaths as he got close. He was turned on too. At the thought. Like her.
She should tell him. Should stop this right now. She opened her mouth again, determined to say her name, to clear this up. To—
He touched her. Light, gentle, tracing the line of cheekbone and jaw. He brushed her lower lip with his fingertip. It felt like the most intimate touch of her life.
Oh hell.
She leaned forward, tilted her head up, and kissed him with everything she had in her, all the pent-up longing, heartache, frustration. Like it was her last time ever kissing anyone. Acutely aware of his sandpaper chin against her own, his soft, generous mouth against hers.
It was dark, and he thought she was Sophie, and it was the only chance she’d ever have.
So she kissed him.
~*~
This was pure sin, and he couldn’t get enough. Alanna was here in his arms, flicking the tip of her tongue against his lip. Sin. Miles groaned and pulled her closer, twining his tongue with hers as he tasted her cinnamon-and-coffee-flavored goodness.
He’d known the truth the moment he stepped into his dark office, when she’d murmured a soft response to his greeting. Her voice was indistinct, but her stance, outlined against the gray-blue skyline, gave her away. She stood with her legs braced—a warrior, not a lady. And she smelled like Alanna, musk and linseed oil and body warmth.
But why so quiet?
Then he remembered calling to Sophie a few minutes earlier when the lights were still on, and he’d caught a glimpse of upswept blond hair, thinking she’d come to drop off her keys to his apartment. But it wasn’t her. It was Alanna. And yet she hadn’t corrected him. Her blurred whisper, that was deliberate.
And he realized, right now, in the dark, he could touch her without consequence. He brushed her cheek, the edge of her jaw, with his fingertip. Heard her quick intake of breath.
Then she kissed him, and the delicious shock of it stunned him.
She wanted more than a touch. She wanted him to kiss her. To embrace her. To make love to her?
Rash impulse and insanity. How like Alanna. How unlike him.
He kissed her back because he could. Cloaked in night, concealed by mystery, unknowable, untraceable. For once in his adult life, he could do what he wanted with no painful backdraft. He could be with this woman. He drowned in the swirl of sensation: her scent, her body against him, the ragged tone of her breaths, and once he started, he couldn’t—or was that wouldn’t—didn’t want to, didn’t seem to know how to—stop.
His hands crept up under her shirt to check if her nipples were as tight and aroused as they felt against his chest. They were, and her breasts felt so good under his palms. She gasped and arched up toward him, an invitation. At the same time, though, she whispered, “Miles,” with a note of doubt. “Miles, wait, you should know—”
“Shhh.” He kissed her, erasing the words. If she spoke, if she revealed herself, she broke the spell. This was the perfect moment. The only one they could have.
To read more, buy Hold Me Tight, now available
(Link takes you to Amazon)
About the Author
Talia Quinn began her writing career as a screenwriter but switched to prose after she started writing an online journal for fun. This led to writing fiction, which led to writing romance.
She won the prestigious Romance Writers of America® Golden Heart Award in 2012 for Hold Me Tight and is a two-time finalist.
She now lives in New York City, her childhood hometown, with her husband and son.
Other Works by Talia Quinn
Available Now:
Draw Me In, a Greenpoint Artists prequel novella
Hold Me Tight, Book One in the Greenpoint Artists series
What’s Yours is Mine
Coming Soon:
Dream of Me, Book Two in the Greenpoint Artists series
Copyright © 2014
Tamar Bihari
All rights reserved.
ISBN-13: 978-0-9910933-7-3
ISBN-10: 0991093372
www.TaliaQuinn.com
talia@taliaquinn.com
All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for use of brief quotations in a book review.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.