Hello, my fabulous Readers, and welcome to another First Kiss Friday. It’s always a pleasure to welcome back my friend Ruth A. Casie to my blog. Today Ruth has an excerpt from her latest release, The Lyon’s Shadow. I have to admit, I just love all these Lyon Den Connected World books and isn’t her cover just gorgeous? We hope you enjoy this first kiss scene. Happy reading and take it away Ruth!
Some loves are forged in the shadow, where choice matters more than light.
After weeks of restraint, Marcus and Lila reach the moment where truth leaves no room for retreat. What follows is not impulse, not comfort, but choice—clear, undeniable, and impossible to take back.
Excerpt:
“This is not kindness,” he said quietly. “This is truth.”
She stared at him, trying to hold her composure the way she always had. It slipped anyway, not into tears, but into something far more vulnerable.
Hope.
Marcus leaned forward, close enough that her breath mixed with his. Close enough that she could feel the decision in him before he spoke again.
“You told me I may choose to walk away,” he said.
“Yes.”
His mouth tightened as though the idea offended him.
“I will not.”
Marcus leaned in.
Not slowly.
Not carefully.
As if something in him had reached its limit.
His hand tightened at her jaw, thumb pressing beneath her ear as his mouth claimed hers, not tentative, not restrained, but certain, decisive, the kiss of a man who had already chosen and would not unchoose.
Lila gasped, not in surprise, but in recognition, and then she was kissing him back with everything she had been holding in check.
Her fingers fisted in his coat. She rose onto her toes without thinking, closing the distance, refusing the space his control might have left between them.
Marcus made a low sound in his throat, the first unguarded thing she had ever heard from him, and the kiss deepened, heat surging, intention unmistakable.
This was not comfort.
It was choice.
His hand slid into her hair, anchoring her, his mouth demanding, claiming, not ownership, but belonging.
Lila answered him with equal force, her palm flattening against his chest, feeling the powerful beat of his heart beneath her hand. She pressed there, as if to say I know you. I am not afraid.
For one breathless moment, the world narrowed to this, to him, to the truth they could no longer deny.
Marcus broke the kiss first.
He rested his forehead against hers, his breath unsteady now, control visibly reclaimed but altered, changed.
His thumb brushed her lower lip, lingering, as though memorizing.
“This,” he said hoarsely, “changes everything.”
“Yes,” she whispered, without hesitation.
The Lyon’s Shadow: Lyon’s Den Connected World
By Ruth A. Casie
Some loves are forged in the shadow, where choice matters more than light.
Marcus Wolfton, known only as Wolf, has lived his life in the shadows—controlled, precise, untouchable. A man shaped by duty and loss, he guards his world carefully… especially the quiet grief of a son who no longer plays the piano.
Until her.
Steady where he is guarded and warm where he has gone cold, she reaches for the broken places he has long kept hidden. And when silence begins to give way to something more, Wolf is faced with a truth he cannot outrun.
Some shadows are meant to protect.
Others… must be left behind.
Step into the story…
Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GX2VK74R
BookBub: https://www.bookbub.com/books/the-lyon-s-shadow-the-lyon-s-den-connected-world-by-ruth-a-casie
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/251051833-the-lyon-s-shadow
Author Bio
Ruth A. Casie is a USA Today bestselling author of historical romance filled with adventure, intrigue, and heartfelt emotion, where love is earned, and partnership is equal. Her stories feature strong heroines, honorable heroes, and richly layered worlds readers want to return to again and again.
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