Hard to Hold (True Romance)
“What better way is there to prove romance really exists than to read these books?”
—
Carly Phillips
,
New York Times
bestselling author
“Memoir meets romance! In the twenty years I’ve been penning romances, this is one of the most novel and exciting ideas I’ve encountered in the genre. Take a Vow. It rocks!”
—Tara Janzen,
New York Times
bestselling
author of
Loose and Easy
“An irresistible combination of romantic fantasy and reality that begins where our beloved romance novels end: TRUE VOWS. What a scrumptious slice of life!”
—Suzanne Forster
,
New York Times
bestselling author
“The marriage of real-life stories with classic, fictional romance—an amazing concept.”
—Peggy Webb,
award-winning author
of sixty romance novels
Julie Leto
HARD
TO
HOLD
Contents
“
Y
OUR PROBLEM IS THAT YOU’RE TOO PICKY
.”
The blissful bubble built by Jeff Tweedy’s poignant lyrics and masterful acoustic guitar burst as if pricked with a pin. Anne Miller turned to her friend, Shane Sanders, and speared her with incredulous indignation. Just before the concert had started, Shane had been ruminating on all the reasons why Anne should not have been in Albany’s Egg theatre without a date. And now, a split second after the last bit of applause had died away, the discussion had popped up again like an earthworm.
“Drop it, Shane.”
Shane smiled, then rested her head on the shoulder of her latest boyfriend, James. Or was it Jamie? Jim? Anne wasn’t sure. Convinced she needed to expand her circle of friends, Anne usually tried harder to get to know new people. With Shane’s dates, however, she rarely had the chance to keep track.
Shane pursed her naturally pink lips and gave Anne a hard once-over. “You’re very attractive. Men notice you all the time. And you’re smart—probably smarter than you should be where guys are concerned. You’ve got a career, a great family, and wonderful taste in friends.”
“You should date me,” Anne quipped, before lowering her voice to add, “maybe then your relationships would last more than twenty-four hours.”
Shane sneered, but without any real malevolence. “You’re too messy. You’d drive me nuts. Seriously, sweetie, if you want a guy to share all your fabulosity with, you’re going to need to lower your standards.”
“My standards are just fine,” Anne said.
“Really? Then why is it that we sold that seat beside you rather than filling it with a guy you might get lucky with later on?”
“So you could spend the entire night trying to fix my love life, why else?”
Shane rolled her eyes at Anne’s sarcasm, but dropped the topic as they gathered their bags and coats. One of these days, Shane would come to the same realization as Anne that worrying about her social life—or worse, obsessing about it—was a lesson in futility.
If she was destined to meet someone, she would. Efforts on her part to make this happen sooner rather than later only resulted in frustration. A year ago, she’d bought an extra bedside table and had emptied drawers in her armoire in anticipation of meeting someone special. But the emotional
feng shui
had just left her with extra storage space—a fitting metaphor for her heart. And yet, for someone who rarely put things away, the act remained utterly useless.
“Don’t you feel the least bit anxious to meet someone interesting?”
“I meet interesting people every day,” Anne said. “And relationships happen when they happen. In the meantime, I’ll just leave the getting lucky part to you.”
The walk home to their State Street apartment building would be brisk, so Anne snuggled into her jacket with anticipation of the frigid November air. The crime desk had been especially brutal this week at the
Albany Daily Journal
and even the cold was preferable to air that had been recirculating inside a courthouse since the 1970s.
When Jamie suggested they stop for drinks on the way home, Anne agreed immediately. A couple of margaritas on a Monday night was a rare and wonderful treat.
Shane shuffled behind the line of music lovers moving toward the outer aisles. “What happened to you wanting to meet new people and broaden your horizons?”
Anne sighed. “And here I thought the promise of margaritas would deter you.”
“I just want you to be happy. You’ve been working like a maniac lately.”
“Crime doesn’t sleep, so neither do crime reporters.”
“Good thing, because if you’re any indication, crime reporters all sleep alone.”
Anne gave Shane a playful shove. “You’ve got a one-track mind. I love my job. I love exposing the dark underbelly of society and exploring the road to justice.”
“Too bad you don’t meet too many cute single guys on that road,” Shane said.
Anne winced. “My job is the last place I’d look for dates.”
Criminals notwithstanding, Anne did not want to date another reporter. For one, reporters on high-powered career tracks were fascinating, but they moved a lot—chasing down not only stories, but better jobs in bigger markets. She had her own aspirations in that arena and wasn’t quite certain she wanted to balance her professional goals against someone else’s. Not, at least, in the same industry.
The only other nonfelonious people she encountered in the workplace were overworked cops, underpaid prosecutors, bail bondsmen, and the downtrodden families of either victims or suspected criminals.
Not exactly a smorgasbord for potential mates.
Anne didn’t want to date just to get out of the house. She had friends for that, both male and female, and dabbling in casual dating had long ago lost her interest. She wasn’t exactly on a husband hunt, but she was done wasting her time on guys who had no intentions of settling down.
Okay, so maybe her standards were too high.
“If you’re not meeting guys at work and you won’t let me fix you up, then exactly how are you going to find the man of your dreams?”
“Dream men I have,” Anne said. “A little Jack Bauer, a little David Boreanaz, and my sleeping hours are covered.”
“That’s not how sleeping hours are supposed to be covered,” Shane replied, wiggling her eyebrows.
Maybe not, but Anne would rather fantasize about sexy men doing delicious, sexy things to her while she was asleep than waste any of her premium waking hours on a guy who didn’t float her boat.
Anne started to followed the people on her left toward the exit, but Shane grabbed her hand and tugged her to the right, following James. They filed into the open area that would lead them out of the auditorium. “Maybe over margaritas, I can convince you to go out with my cousin.”
“With tequila, you just might have a shot,” Anne said, though she doubted it. The last girl Shane’s cousin had dated had worked as a stripper. Somehow, she couldn’t imagine him finding her thick and naturally wavy dark hair, curvy figure, and cherry red–framed glasses appealing.
A break opened in the crowd. They were slipping through rather quickly when Shane stopped short, causing Anne to crash into her. She opened her mouth to apologize when Shane spun around, her light brown eyes bright with excitement. “Or, I could introduce you to Michael.”
Anne slapped her forehead. Keeping up with Shane’s unending list of single male relatives and cast-off guy friends, not to mention her train of thought, required more brain power than Anne possessed this late on a Monday night.
“Who’s Michael?”
Shane swung Anne around so that she bumped shoulders with a guy who’d been headed toward the same exit as they were.
A twinge of something warm reverberated through the lining of her jacket.
Something like attraction.
“I’m Michael,” said the guy she’d crashed into.
Anne stepped backward, nearly trampling over a couple of girls who looked way too young to be out on a weeknight. She mumbled her apologies while her gaze connected with the most intense blue eyes she’d ever seen.
The grin that reached into their turquoise depths wasn’t bad, either.
“This is Anne,” Shane said, practically bouncing on her toes with excitement. “She lives in my building. Isn’t she beautiful?”
There was a special place in hell for people who insisted on fixing up their friends—a place only slightly less horrifying than the dungeons reserved for those who sprang arresting-looking guys on their neighbors with no advance notice. Anne forced a laugh over her clumsiness. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to run you over.”
Michael dug his hands deeper into the pockets of his jacket, his grin lighting his eyes to a color that was almost hard to look at. “The experience wasn’t entirely unpleasant. How’d you like the concert? And yes,” he said to Shane. “Yes, she is.”
Not unpleasant
wasn’t the best compliment she’d ever gotten, but how he handled Shane’s audacious question put her on notice. That he’d agreed she was beautiful was special. That he’d done so with such smooth skill impressed her even more.
Since they’d stopped to talk, a bottleneck of people surged behind them, pressing them forward through the exit. Despite the chaos all around, Anne answered Michael’s question about the concert. By the time they spilled into the lobby of the Egg, they both agreed that Tweedy had been on form and worth the ticket price.