Trophy Husband
Authors: Lauren Blakely
Tags: #romance, #romantic comedy, #contemporary romance, #sexy romance, #new adult
Trophy Husband
by Lauren Blakely
Smashwords Edition
Copyright (c) 2013 by Lauren Blakely
Cover Design by (c) Sarah Hansen, Okay Creations
PHOTO COPYRIGHT (c)
Gabi Moisa
All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights
under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be
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transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical,
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permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of
this book.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places,
brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author’s
imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the
trademarked status and trademark owners of various products
referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without
permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not
authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.
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Table of Contents
Sneak Peek of Playing With My Heart
(Caught Up In Us #3)
Sneak Peek of Impact of You by
Kendall Ryan and Unbreak Me by Lexi Ryan
Also by Lauren
Blakely
Caught Up In Us
Available at all fine e-tailers
Pretending He’s Mine
Available at all fine e-tailers
Sometimes you can't help falling in love,
even when you try to do the opposite...Successful fashion blogger
McKenna Bell has spent far too long protecting herself after the
way her ex-fiancé left her at the altar for a college chick he met
the night of his bachelor party. Loving again, trusting again,
well, that's just not in the cards. Especially now that her ex is
back in town with his new woman, demanding custody of McKenna's
favorite creature in the whole world--her dog. No effing way.
McKenna's had enough of him, and she decides to even the score by
finding her own hot young thing -- a Trophy Husband. Sure, she's
only twenty-seven, but doesn't that make it even more fun -- and
infuriating to her ex -- to pursue a younger man? When she declares
her intentions on her daily blog, her quest quickly skyrockets in
popularity, and that's when Chris enters the picture, and he’s got
all the assets. He's handsome, successful, and turns her inside out
with a kiss to end all kisses, the kind that makes you feel like a
shooting star. But loving again could mean losing again, and it's
so much easier to focus on getting even, isn't it? Unless, you just
can't help falling in love. Which means McKenna will have to come
face to face with what she really wants in life -- protecting her
heart from hurt, or letting go of her fears of a new beginning.
This book is dedicated to my family.
Because they put up with me, and I love them
madly.
Present Day
The stars twinkle and the night air is warm
as we leave the Tiki Bar and walk slowly up Fillmore. At the top of
the hill, I see my friend’s maroon Prius that I’m tasked with
driving home tonight. I point to it.
“These are my wheels.” I click on the key to
unlock the car. Then I reach for the door handle. But it doesn’t
open. I try again. Same thing happens. “Damn. What is up with these
hybrids?”
“They have to calibrate to your heart
rate.”
“Then how the heck am I supposed to drive it
home?”
“I know a trick,” Chris says.
“You do?”
“Want to give me the keys and I’ll show
you?” he asks, holding open his palm for me.
But before I can pull away, he closes his
fingers over mine, gripping my hand in his. That’s all it takes.
Within seconds I am in his arms, and we are wrapped up in each
other. His lips are sweeping mine, and I press my hands against his
chest, and oh my. He does have the most fantastic outlines in his
body. He is toned everywhere, strong everywhere, and I am dying to
get my hands up his shirt, and feel his bare chest and his belly.
But if I did, I might just jump him right here because I am one
year and running without this. Without kissing, without touching,
without feeling this kind of heat.
He twines his fingers through my hair, and
the way he holds me, both tender and full of want at the same time,
makes me start to believe in possibilities. Start to believe that
you can try again, and it’ll be worth it. His lips are so soft, so
unbearably soft, and I can’t stop kissing him. He has the faintest
taste of Diet Coke on his lips, and it’s crazy to say this, but it
almost makes me feel closer to him. Or maybe I feel closer because
he’s leaning into me, his body is aligned with mine, and there’s no
space between us, and I don’t want any space between us. I want to
feel him against me, his long, strong body tangled up in mine, even
though we’re fully clothed, making out on the street.
He breaks the kiss. “I wanted to kiss you
all night.”
“You did?”
“Yeah, that key thing was just an excuse.
Sometimes you just have to hit the button a few times to get the
car to open.”
I laugh. “So you said that to kiss me?”
He nods. “Totally.”
“I’m glad you tricked me,” I whisper, as he
bends his head and kisses my neck, blazing a trail of sweet and
sexy kisses down to my throat, and it’s almost sensory overload the
way he ignites me. Forget tingles, forget goosebumps. That’s kid
stuff compared to this. My body is a comet with Chris. I am a
shooting star with the way he kisses me. I don’t even know if I
have bones in my body anymore. I don’t know how I’m standing. I
could melt under the sweet heat of his lips that are now tracing a
line down my chest to the very top of my breasts as he tugs gently
at my shirt, giving himself room to leave one more brush of his
lips. Before he stops.
He looks at me and the expression on his
face is one of pride and lust. He knows he’s turned me inside out
and all the way on.
“That was so unfair of me,” he says with a
wicked grin. “Getting a headstart like that on all the other
candidates.”
How can there be any other guys after a kiss
like that? It’s a kiss to end all kisses, it’s a sip of lemonade in
a hammock on a warm summer day. It’s a slow dance on hardwood
floors while a fan goes round overhead, curtains blowing gently in
the open window.
If he feels half as much for me as I do for
him, then I want to sail away with him in the moonlight, and that
scares the hell out of me. I have to extract myself before I let
this go any further. I don’t mean the contact. I mean the way my
aching, broken heart is reaching for Chris.
Four weeks ago…
I used to have sucky parking karma, the kind
where every single time I needed a spot, and especially if I was
racing to a lunch meeting, the only one I could locate would be in
the next county, and in some cases, the next time zone.
Then one year ago, a miracle occurred. No,
my ex-boyfriend didn’t fall back in love with me and announce it
was all a joke when he eloped with some chick in Vegas at his
bachelor party the night before our wedding. But another miracle
transpired. Since then I have never failed to land a parking spot
on the same block as my destination. I am quite sure this is the
universe’s way of making up for precisely how he said sayonara –
via voicemail mere hours before I was about to walk down the
aisle.
And because of this awesome, amazing,
powerful parking karma I no longer worry that I’ll drive around
scouting out a spot in the city of San Francisco, even though time
in this city can truly be measured by the quest for a parking
spot.
One less thing to stress about is a good
thing in my book, so I give my gorgeous dog, Ms. Pac-Man, a kiss on
the snout as I grab my purse from the entryway table. She wags her
flag-sized, blond fluffy tail and places a big paw on my leg, her
way of saying goodbye. She’s a good dog, she’s well-trained, and
she’s also particularly well-mannered when I leave her home alone
in the Victorian she and I share just a few blocks from San
Francisco Bay. She spends the entire time I’m gone snoozing on her
Pac-Man decorated dog bed. I know this because I once set up my
phone camera to verify what I suspected – that she was indeed a
perfect canine.
“I’d tell you to be good, but I know you
will,” I say, as I scratch her ears. She leans her soft head into
my hand, and I smile as I pet her. Sometimes, I think this dog is
the only reason I’ve smiled at all in the last year. Not much has
made me happy, but yet here she is, ably filling that role as only
a dog can.
Then I’m off to another solo Sunday
breakfast, heading down the stairs, to the garage, into the car,
and onto the street, driving past a local grocery store where bag
boys fill canvas sacks with organic chickens, locally-grown
asparagus and all-natural, wheat-free cereals, then a
membership-only nail salon that I don’t go to. Because I do my own
nails, in alternating colors, and today I am wearing mint green and
purple.