Thank you for taking this journey with me. I typed the words “the end” of Breathless 5: Loving Jacob, but I’m going to take a page out of my label mate, Falon Gold’s book and add “for now.” You never know when the Breathless characters will strike again with more love, passion and drama for your Kindles!
I hope you enjoyed reading Jacob’s redemption as much as I enjoyed writing it. Now, Destiny can finally move on loving Jacob the way he deserves, Clara and John are in love again, Montie is happy, and even Tasha found a boo.
Do me a favor, and post a note on my Facebook page to let me know if you think Tasha should get her own love story with her new boss.
Until the next time,
Stay blessed with good books,
Shani
***BRAND NEW STANDALONE***
Dangerous Bonds is available now on preorder!
DANGEROUS BONDS Synopsis:
Kemara wants nothing more than a quiet, simple life. In her experience, relationships are anything but simple. However, when she meets the Channing, her convenience store hero, she can’t help but long for a life that’s a bit more…complicated.
From the moment Channing lays eyes on Kemara, he knows he has to have her no matter what it takes. Given his affiliations with a white supremacy group, getting with a black woman is going to take quite a lot. But what could he say? She’s the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen and the heart has no biases.
Excerpt from DANGEROUS BONDS
Chapter One
Kemara
The universe was conspiring against me. That was the only way to explain the morning I was having, and when I got to work, all I wanted was a lukewarm cup of the cheap coffee in the breakroom, in hopes that the strong blend of mojo would perk me up. However, just as I was about to enjoy that coffee, an intern rushed into the room and bumped right into me. So instead of drinking the hot, life-changing fluid, I was wearing it. Perfect. I spent the next twenty minutes in the ladies' room trying to rinse the stubborn brown stains out of my chemise, but it was no use. No matter how hard I scrubbed the shirt wasn’t coming clean. I didn’t have an extra change of clothes and too much work piling up to leave, so I ended up wearing my blazer with nothing underneath. As I stuck one last safety pin in the top of my blazer to make it look presentable, I took a look in the mirror and sighed. I’m still going to make this a good day, some way, some how.
Walking out of the bathroom, the itchy material against my skin looked better than it felt. I was immediately struck by an endless barrage of issues upon entering my office and sitting behind my cluttered desk. I dealt with so many clients that I was already five minutes into my lunch hour before I looked at the time on my computer. Dann, it’s lunchtime already? Usually, time wouldn't matter, but I promised to meet Sharon for lunch, and I was going to be late.
As I drove twenty miles away to Moss Tavern in Lafayette, Alabama, work was still on my mind. I had to follow up with two cust
omers about their insurance claims, as well as investigate at least ten more before I got around to my regular daily duties. Mulling over the details of what needed to be done, I absentmindedly took a wrong turn, which was going to push me even further behind with meeting Sharon. I hoped my friend would understood that, for some reason, shit was happening that was beyond my control.
I reached over and took my phone out of my purse to call and let her know that I was on my way, when I noticed the screen was black except for the image of a red blinking battery. Damn, damn, damn. I threw the phone down and cursed the universe that helped to land me in this position of wearing a blazer with no shirt underneath, taking a wrong turn and now having a dead cell phone with no charger.
I laid my foot onto the pedal and flew down 431. As I drove, I looked for a place that I might be able to buy a charger. Up ahead, I saw this dinky old gas station—the kind in 80s horror movies that anyone with an ounce of sense knew to stay away from. But much like the characters in those movies, I was desperate. So I pulled up to the place and got out of the car. Not two steps later, I felt a squish under my heel. I closed my eyes and took long, deep breaths to keep me from screaming and tearing my hair out and someone dragging me away for my dramatics. I spent another five minutes scraping gum off my shoe before I finally headed into the shop. An old man behind the counter tipped his hat at me.
"Howdy ma'am."
I gave him a small nod and asked, "Do you have any iPhone chargers?"
"They're in the back aisle on the top shelf, ma'am."
I headed to the back of the shop and there was a group of white men huddled up in a little rancid lounge area. Some were standing to the side, chewing tobacco and some were sitting around an ancient fat back TV watching Fox News, at least they were until they noticed me. At that point, they all stopped what they were doing and just stared with their faces twisted in displeasure. Now, I was never the type of person to assume someone was a racist, but the way they looked at me suggested I needed to haul my black ass out of there, pronto.
I turned on my sticky heels and didn't even make it a step forward before I slammed into a broad chest covered by a dirty white tee. My eyes trailed up to his face and my breath caught. He was positively yummy. His hazel eyes had specks of green. And he had a slight grin that would make a girl want to stand on tip-toe and lick his lips. And I would have to stand on tip-toe because even in my heels I had to look up at him. He had such a presence. Even though he was only standing in front of me, it felt like he was all around me, and his body was warm. I could feel the heat rippling off his muscles. It took a moment for me to come to my senses and look away.
But even with my face turned, I could feel his eyes still on me. It felt like he was memorizing every curve of my face. Part of me wanted to turn and look at him again, but another part was far too intimidated. I wasn't sure if he wanted to kill me or devour me, but given the grimaces on the faces of his friends I figured it would be best not to stick around and find out.
I stepped to the side. "Excuse me," I said trying to get past.
He pulled something off a shelf and spoke. I wasn't expecting him to say anything and I was so dazed that I didn't even get what he said.
"I'm sorry?"
"An iPhone charger. That's what you were looking for, right?" His gruff voice rattled through me as he waved the package in front of me.