“Wait. Where are you going?” she asked. “That Hamilton ticket has my name all over it. You can’t take back the offer now.”
“What?” Tim stuttered.
“Bye-bye, loser,” Penny said as she wiggled her fingers gracefully. She was manicured and badass.
“You’re not really going with her, are you?” he asked, his screwed-up face showing his distaste.
“I know this is totally random,” she said joining me at the bottom of the steps. “But I’ve been trying to get a ticket for weeks.”
“It is a bit random,” I agreed. “But I don’t like regrets, Penny, and I think I’d go home wishing I’d gone to see Hamilton with…a complete stranger.”
She laughed and linked her arm in mine, and I found myself smiling because, for a few hours, I could be taken away by laughter, mouth the lyrics to “Satisfied” like I could identify with every word and reenact it with feeling and after, I could eat away my frustration with noodles and gyoza. Yes, I didn’t know anything about this woman. We had a flimsy link at best. I hoped she wasn’t a serial killer or a weird stalker but decided anyway that I needed a distraction before re-joining the abyss of the dating game and wondering where the fudge I would start.
“That ticket is like gold dust. How much do I owe you?” Penny asked.
“Buy dinner and we’ll call it even.”
“Hold on a sec,” she said. “Tim?” He looked completely confused by us, his girlfriend and mistress, arm in arm and on their way to see the hottest show in town. “I forgot something.”
“What is it?” he asked, perching his hands on his hips.
“Hold on, let me look for it.” Penny rooted around in her pocket, looking for something. She tipped her head in frustration, sticking out her tongue in concentration, until she pulled out her hand dramatically, held it up, and proceeded to give him the middle finger. “Ah…there it is.”
It was at this point I realised Penny could absolutely be a serial killer or weird stalker, her behaviour indicated that she could be slightly un-hinged too, but she also seemed…pretty bloody cool.
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Also by Lynsey M. Stewart
The Music and Letters Series
When the decisions of her past affect the choices of the future, will Elle be able to find her happy ending?
Let Me Be Your First
One regrettable lie drove them down very different paths. One rash decision forced them apart.
Let Me Be Your Hope
When opposites attract, there’s bound to be fire.
Let Me Be Your Truth
Suspicion can drive you mad. But it can also prove you right.
Let Me Be Your Last
* * *
Stripped Bare
I couldn’t deny that seeing my ex-boyfriend jiggling his junk in the face of an ecstatic bride-to-be was a complete mind hump.
I didn’t normally get giddy over strippers, but this wasn’t any ordinary stripper. Ethan was my childhood friend, my teenage crush, the boy that featured in all of my firsts.
We had made a childhood pact. If we didn’t find the right person to lose our virginity to by the time we reached eighteen we would be each other’s first.
First kiss, first love…
First heartbreak.
We had been apart for three years.
I had forgotten how glorious he was. I watched him grind his hips to the music, creating a dance with the woman in front of him. But after the rip of Velcro, his thong thrown in my direction, his eyes finally focused…on me.
Who knew being whiplashed by a sequinned thong would lead to a moment of clarity? It was time to start questioning everything that happened between us until I was left feeling bare.
Stripped bare.
* * *
Sliding Home
I was flying high with the Florida Falcons until an injury completely changed my life. Playing baseball had been my dream since I was a kid and America couldn’t get enough of the Brit who’d made it to the big leagues. The game was my world, but suddenly I couldn't do it anymore. I was bored. I was frustrated. So I filled the void.
Sex was an easy answer for a pro ball player with an English accent, and soon my misdemeanours were splashed across the tabloids. Now I was a bad joke, a sleazy internet meme, a washed-up third-baseman who enjoyed playing with women more than playing the game.
I was given an ultimatum: go home to England and turn things around, or face being dropped. My reputation had been knocked out of the park for the final time. I needed a lifeline.
And then she showed up. An obstacle in my path struggling with a suitcase.
Jess tempted me before I’d even left the States. But there was something more. She intrigued me. Could the actress with the knockout smile help turn my life around?
I offered her a business arrangement she couldn’t refuse. No complications. No distractions. What could possibly go wrong?
* * *
A Novel Christmas
Go to an island, my publisher said. Reclaim your writing mojo, he added. Be inspired, he suggested. Oh, sexy shenanigans, was I inspired. Drew Carolla would do that to a woman. Reclusive and brooding, an ex-pilot-come-sexy-woodcutter-come-luxury-wedding-venue-owner-come…here.
Writing romance doesn’t come easy when you don’t have a muse, and I was on a deadline. Four weeks to write my next bestseller or face being dropped by my publisher. Thankfully, watching Drew chop wood, sweaty and shirtless, soon had the words flowing like water through Cornish coastline rock pools.
But Drew had his own stories to tell. Why did his luxury wedding venue no longer host weddings? Why did he scoff at the idea of romance? And why, despite that, did he look at me like he wanted to wake up on Christmas morning and find me naked in his bed?
Conundrums. Drew was full of them. Too bad I wasn’t writing psychological thrillers.
Would Drew Carolla, a man who didn’t believe in romance, inspire my greatest love story or leave me with unfinished chapters?
* * *
Lament
Dear Grief Fairy,
I’ve met a man who encompasses grief.
Alexander Blayren, the brooding cellist.
The man I crave.
He’s rude, bold and brash, but I see what’s underneath.
A man crying out.
Surviving for the sake of his daughter. Just.
Alexander didn’t believe you could survive grief. Loss had painted his life black, dimming the lights and quietening the music.
But I didn’t agree.
When I lost my family, dance was my therapy. Movement, my recovery.
Could music be his?
Would his notes be a reprieve; the strings, his lifeline?
Or could his journey to survival begin with me?
Through the body he studies as I dance, my cries of pleasure under his fingertips, or his arousal at my willing restraint?
Grief Fairy, you understand me better than anyone. Can I relieve Alexander’s lament?
Yours,
Nat
One Night Only
What if you met the right man at the wrong time?
Stacey
He’s a male escort.