Welcome to my First Kiss Friday blog. In the coming weeks, you’ll be getting excerpts from the Bluestocking Belles novellas in our upcoming release Under the Harvest Moon. Up first is my dear friend Jude Knight with an excerpt from her story, Love In Its Season. We just know you’re going to love this set. Happy reading and enjoy my lovelies! Take it away, Jude!
This excerpt is from Love in Its Season, which is my story in the forthcoming collection Under the Harvest Moon. My hero and heroine, after a busy week with more hard work to come, take the afternoon off to go on a picnic. She doesn’t believe anyone thinks she is attractive. He is having trouble behaving like a gentleman.
Excerpt:
She sat on one side, her knees and ankles decorously together, her sensible half boots off the edge of the coat. “There’s room, Jack,” she said. “Come and share.”
Jack shook his head. “Not a good idea, Gwen. I cannot sit that close to you and keep my hands to myself.”
She looked puzzled. “Do you mean that you want to touch me? As if…? Jack, what do you mean?”
Perhaps he’d be off to hell in a hand basket, but he could not resist just once telling her how he felt. He would regret it if she sent him packing, as she should, but just once, he wanted her to know.
“I want to touch you.” It was a ravenous growl. “I want to kiss you until you don’t remember anything but my name. I want to devour you, Gwen, and if you have the least sense of self-preservation, you’ll let me sit over here while you sit over there.”
Was that a flare of interest in her eyes? Heaven help them both if it was, for her father was no sort of chaperone at all, sound asleep as he was.
Then she floored him. “You don’t have to pretend to desire me, Jack,” she said. “I know I am too tall, too old, and too manly. Believe me, Jack, I know what they think. The only man who has ever kissed me told me to my face that I was a fool to think he was truly interested.” She shrugged. “I don’t know why he pretended. And I am much older now.”
For a moment, Jack couldn’t think of a word to say, then he strode over to where she sat and lowered himself to sit beside her, so close that his thigh touched hers all the way to her bent knee. “Let me prove it to you,” he said. “May I kiss you, Gwen? Please?”
She stared at him, and her eyes gave him hope. Definitely interest. Curiosity, too, if he was not mistaken, and a touch of longing. She nodded.
His muscles quivered with the effort he made to restrain himself. “I cannot touch you without your permission. Words, Gwen. Yes or No?”
“Yes.” It was a whisper, and did not satisfy her, for she repeated it louder. “Yes, please, Jack.”
He started carefully, his hand cupping her face, his lips gently covering hers, moving to caress and stroke. She must have been kissed before, because she responded instantly, and opened her mouth to trace his lips with her tongue.
He deepened the kiss. She had not been kissed very well, or perhaps it had been a long time, for her every response was hesitant and then enthusiastic. She was proving to be a fast learner. As Jack’s hands found her luscious curves and her own hands stroked his back, he was in sore danger of losing all control.
He drew back, panting. “We have to stop, my love, before I cannot.”
Love In Its Season
By Jude Knight
The Battle of Waterloo lost Jack Wrath the use of one arm and ended his career in the cavalry. With nothing better to do and nowhere else to go, he sees his doctor home to Reabridge—and stays because of Gwen, the female farrier he rescues from a lustful lord. After all his years of wandering, Gwen’s cottage feels like home.
Gwen Hughes is taller and stronger than many men, and runs her own business. Perhaps she intimidates the men of the town, but that is fine with her. She doesn’t have time for courtship. She’d be a fool to refuse Jack’s offer to help her father, who is in his second childhood, and even more of a fool to read too much into his kindness.
Under the harvest moon, two people who believe romance has passed them by find it is their season for love.
Under the Harvest Moon: A Bluestocking Belles with Friends Collection
Release Date: October 10th
Preorder now for only $0.99!
Buy link:
https://books2read.com/UnderHarvestMoon
Meet Jude
Jude always wanted to be a novelist. She started in her teens, but life kept getting in the way. Years passed, and with them dozens of unfinished manuscripts. The fear grew. What if she tried, failed, and lost the dream forever? The years since 2014 have brought 17 novels, 16 novella, 6 volumes of short stories, a number of awards, and hundreds of positive reviews. The dream is alive.
Website and blog: http://judeknightauthor.com/
Subscribe to newsletter: http://judeknightauthor.com/newsletter/
Jude’s bookstore: https://judeknight.selz.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/JudeKnightAuthor/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/JudeKnightBooks