Refugee from Laundryland.

First a note for Miss Kate, who so politely inquired about the state of my plumbing: Got the biopsy results yesterday and the trouble is entirely benign, though still in need of a spot of surgery, thank you kindly for asking. :)

So it's been raining. Maybe you've noticed. And while we certainly aren't floating away like certain areas of the country, poor things, we are decidedly...damp. Moist, even. And not in the good way.

As a result, we're filming our own version of CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON. It's called FLOODED BASEMENT, BROKEN WASHER.

In other news, All Romance eBooks is offering a new Free Read program, and they've contracted the short novella I wrote for PBW's Ebook Challenge, "Dark of the Day." You can find it here -- a free download in PDF and HTML.

In still other news, the sequel to SEVEN YEAR ACHE (known alternately as "Brokeback on Crack") is proceeding nicely.

Here. Have an unedited excerpt from WILD HORSES, due out from Amber Allure/Amber Quill Press sometime in July:

* * *

“And this is our new hired hand, Kris Killborn.”

Kris stepped up, removing his hat and wiping his brow with the back of one grimy wrist. The blond guy moved first to shake his hand. Kris looked close, waiting to see if the big man would remember their earlier meeting in the diner.

“Hey, I’m Dex Egan.” Nothing. A practiced smile, a strong grip, and no recognition whatsoever.

The fat little fuck who called himself Troy Abrams shook Kris’s hand, too, without appearing to know him. But the tall, skinny one in the shirt with the letters embroidered over the left tit looked Kris square in the face. “Gaelen Ramsey, at your service.”

Yeah, this one remembered. His sneer said it all.

Kris let it slide. He couldn’t afford to make trouble no matter how bad his fingers itched to curl up into a fist.

Then the fourth member of the group stepped forward — the only one who hadn’t made an impression back at the diner — and all the prideful irritation simmering under Kris’s skin seeped away.

“Blake Talbot.” His voice was deep but smooth at the same time, with the edges worn down to nothing by a heavy drawl. The sun glinted off the silver ring on the third finger of the hand he offered Kris. “Good to meet you.”

He smiled, and it caught Kris by surprise. Like when he did the hung-over walk of shame out of some dude’s apartment on a Sunday morning and got smacked in the face by a sunrise right out of one of those paintings that sold for half a grand in a Missoula gallery. Not as pretty a Rafe — nah, nobody’s as pretty as Rafe — but there was something in how this Blake Talbot’s light brown hair fell in a wave over his forehead, and in the flicker of his lashes over his dark blue eyes. In the way his nose was a little too long and his mouth a touch too wide for his face. Something in the shape of his jaw and the curve of his smile that made Kris want to know how he’d look backed up against a wall and begging for it.

JT cleared his throat, and Kris jerked his hand away. While the others discussed plans for an afternoon trail ride, he stared out at the mountains and tried to pull his shit together. No matter what kind of signals he was picking up from this Talbot guy, the guests were off-limits — hadn’t Rafe said as much? And Kris needed this job. More than he needed to get laid, even.

Plus he was probably reading it wrong. What did some college boy from back east want with him?

But when he glanced back again, Talbot caught his eye and held it for a long count of five. Kris offered up a wink and a grin, and Talbot ducked his head and showed his dimples in a way that made something in Kris’s chest twist around and whine for mercy.

“Sandwiches in the kitchen, Killborn,” Rafe said, looking at him funny. “Go wash up. We’ve got another half-mile of fence to check before I need to start supper for the guests.”

Kris nodded, his eyes on the way Talbot’s ass filled out the dark denim of his too-new jeans as he walked away.

“Don’t even think about it,” Rafe whispered as he passed him.

Kris smirked and spit in the dust. No doubt Rafe’s advice was well meant, but it had come a wink and one slow, shy smile too late.

* * *

SelahMarch.com - Romance of Dubious Virtue