Tessa Maxwell yearns to find the kind of love movies are made about. For four years, she's been struggling as a single mom, but she hasn't given up on the idea of giving her daughter the family she deserves. Or finding the one guy who can commit to them both.
Jason Montgomery can't commit to a side of the bed, let alone a woman. Trapped by burdens he wants no part of, the last thing he needs is the obligation of a built-in family. But his best friend's little sister is proving too hard to resist.
Jason's the very definition of trouble, but Tessa can't get him out of her mind…or her bed. And every day she spends by his side only serves to keep her from the one thing she wants more than anything: a happily ever after.
One-click Tessa Ever After now!
Sign up for Brighton’s newsletter and receive a free copy of The Neighbor! Being part of the newsletter also unlocks your access to exclusive content and giveaways! Click here or go to brightonwalsh.com/newsletter.
Join her Facebook group, Brighton’s Brigade, where shenanigans are had on the regular and you get sneak peeks at future books.
Reviews are very much appreciated as they help readers find new books. Spreading the word by telling friends is the best way to help an author. Please leave a review on your favorite book site!
Keep reading for an excerpt from Tessa Ever After!
Tessa Ever After Excerpt
tessa
The windows are dark as I walk up to the front door, and I slip in to the house, listening for signs of life. When I hear none, I take my shoes off and hook them on my fingers as I tiptoe down the hall toward Haley’s room. Carefully, I push open the door, and what I see inside stops my heart and makes the butterflies lying dormant in my stomach burst to life.
Jason and Haley are both asleep on her bed, my little girl curled under his arm, her body fitting perfectly into the nook of his side.
She’s in full-on princess gear, the tulle of her play-dress bunched up by her knees, her pretend high heels discarded below her small feet. The tiara I’m sure was once perched on her head now sits on Jason’s shoulder. And while seeing that would warm any mother’s heart, that’s not the part that’s making mine skip a beat. No, that achievement is because of the too-tall man whose legs are falling off the sides of Haley’s twin bed. He’s wearing one of Haley’s tea party hats with a bright pink feather boa wrapped around his neck, and I almost can’t breathe.
Seeing something like this isn’t anything new. I used to come home from working a late shift or a date or a night out with Paige to find Haley and Cade curled up the same way. And I remember thinking then what I wouldn’t give to find a guy who would do that with my daughter. Who would forget about being a manly man for an hour and play dress-up with a little girl who thinks he hangs the moon.
And all this time while I’ve been searching for him, I’ve been looking in all the wrong places. Trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. Because while Greg was safe and steady, someone who looked great on paper, I could never see him doing something like this.
The realization that this has been in front of me the whole time—that he has been in front of me the entire time—is jarring, and I stumble over some toys lying on the floor as I make my way out of the room, quietly shutting the door behind me.
I press my back against the wall outside Haley’s room, my eyes closing at my epiphany. I don’t have enough time to process it, though, before her bedroom door opens, and Jason comes out, now free of all dress-up gear. He shuts the door again, then leans against the wall opposite from me, arms folded across his chest and ankles crossed.
His pose is casual, just like how he was when I left him earlier, but his eyes are appraising, searching for something. They travel the entire length of me from my head all the way to my bare feet, darting up to see the shoes hanging between my fingers. And just like earlier, his eyes, the way they seem to almost caress me as his gaze travels over my body, light something inside me.
“How was your date?” His voice is low and raspy from sleep, and I don’t want to admit what the sound does to me, that it sparks something deep when touches from other men haven’t evoked even a quarter of the response.
I could lie. I could tell him it was wonderful, that Greg took me to a beautiful restaurant and I had a good time, but I don’t feel like pretending. Not tonight. “Not great.”
“Why not?”
I shrug. “We just didn’t click.”
He stares at me for a long moment before he says, “Why do you keep going out with guys like him, Tess?”
After a pause, the truth tumbles out of me. “Because he’s what I thought I needed.”
“And what about now?”
I look at him, take him in, from his carelessly mussed hair to his dark butterscotch eyes to the jaw sharp enough to cut glass, only marred with a slight shadow of stubble, and my knees go weak. “Now I’m not sure.”
He pushes off the wall and moves to stand right in front of me, so close I can feel his breath ghosting over my exposed collarbone. “Were you ever sure about him?”
His nearness has stolen my voice, and all I can do is shake my head.
With his voice dropping even lower he asks, “Did he ever make you feel good?”
And he could mean a dozen different things. He could mean intellectually or emotionally or physically, but it doesn’t matter which one he’s talking about because the answer is the same regardless.
“No.” It comes out raspy and breathless, and when did I become that girl? The one who loses all composure at the nearness of a guy. A hot guy, sure, but a guy nonetheless. Apparently allowing the tension to build up so much that it has no choice but to explode wasn’t my brightest idea.
He reaches out, his fingers tracing along my shoulders, and I shiver, a wave of goose bumps erupting all over my skin, my nipples tightening into hard points against the satin material of my dress.
“I could,” he says, his voice so quiet, I barely hear him. But I do. I do, and I want exactly what he’s suggesting. “I could make you feel so good, Tess.”
Of that I have no doubt. Jason’s competence in that area has never been in question, not since we were in high school.
“Do you want me to? Just say the word, and I will.”
He leans forward, his lips brushing against my neck, and my head hits the wall, my shoes forgotten and thudding on the carpet by my feet. I can’t seem to make my arms go around him, to press my fingers into his hair and pull him to me, so instead I flatten them against the wall behind me.
“Tell me, Tess.” His voice is low, gritty, and the desperation in his tone is what finally breaks me.
Want to read more? One-click Tessa Ever After now!
Other Titles By Brighton Walsh
Reluctant Hearts series
interconnected stand-alones
Caged in Winter
Tessa Ever After
Paige in Progress
Our Love Unhinged
Havenbrook series
interconnected stand-alones
Second Chance Charmer
Captive series
interconnected stand-alones
Captive
Exposed
Stand-alone titles
Dirty Little Secret
Plus One
Season of Second Chances
The Neighbor
Have you read London Hale?
Filthy, taboo, smart erotic romance is what you get when Brighton Walsh and Ellis Leigh/Kristin Harte team up. Ready to set your e-reader on fire?
may-december romances
Daddy’s Best Friend
The DILF
Nanny With Benefits
opposites attract romances
Sinner (formerly Sinful Temptation)
Cuffed (formerly Sinful Attraction)
Talk Dirty to Me (formerly Sinful Distraction)
friends to lovers romance
Reunion
one night stand to more romance
Tapping That Asset
teacher/student romance
Seducing His Student
stepbrother’s baby romance
Knocking Her Up
billionaire boss romance
Bedding the Billionaire
Never miss a release, giveaway, or sale. Sign up to receive the Temperance Falls Gazette, the only place to get all the gossip from London and Temperance Falls. www.londonhale.com/gazette
About the Author
Brighton Walsh spent nearly a decade as a professional photographer before deciding to take her storytelling in a different direction and reconnect with her first love: writing. When she’s not pounding away at the keyboard, she’s probably either reading or shopping—maybe even both at once. She lives in the Midwest with her husband and two children, and, yes, she considers forty degrees to be hoodie weather. Her home is the setting for frequent dance parties, Lego battles, and more laughter than she thought possible.
www.brightonwalsh.com
[email protected]
Copyright
Copyright © 2018 by Brighton Walsh, Second Edition
All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Cover Art © Brighton Walsh
Caged in Winter is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is coincidental.
[Reluctant Hearts 01.0] Caged in Winter Page 24
