Yours to Savor
| Yours to Savor | |
| Edwards, Scarlett | |
| (2013) | |
| Rating: | ★★★★★ |
| Tags: | Contemporary Adult Romance |
AN INNOCENT WOMAN...
Twenty-five year old Sandra Hawthorne once had a life that many would envy. Smart, beautiful, and engaged to an accomplished young professional, she seemed to have anything she desired at her fingertips.
Nobody suspects the emotional turmoil she lives with under the surface. Stalked by demons from her past, Sandra abandons everything on the cusp of her wedding and seeks refuge in a small town far away. But no matter where she hides, she cannot escape from the nightmares that torment her existence.
...AND A DANGEROUS MAN...
Having made his fortune supplying high-end drugs to the most affluent clientele, thirty-three year old Brandon Galliani now seeks to reform himself and reestablish ties with his long-estranged family. But when one final business trip beckons him to a small Washington seacoast community, the last thing he expects to find is a secretive, enigmatic woman who captures his heart, enraptures his soul, and changes his life forever.
...BROUGHT TOGETHER BY FATE.
For two years, Sandra has kept to herself while desperately hunting for relief from her nightmares. Everything changes when she crosses paths with a mysterious, dazzling stranger one crisp spring morning. Sandra knows she cannot afford to let down her guard around him. Yet the man quickly becomes hell-bent on breaking through the walls of her self-imposed prison. Sandra resists, but soon discovers that what her mind thinks it wants and what her heart knows it needs are two very different things.
Your to Savor is the riveting, erotic tale of two opposites colliding in a fiery clash of passion, lust, and love. Each holds secrets from the other. The truth will strain all the flawed underpinnings of their relationship. In the end, will Sandra and Brandon’s budding love be enough to overcome the most despairing odds?
Table of Contents
Yours to Savor
By Scarlett Edwards
Copyright © 2013, Scarlett Edwards
eBook Version 1.1
Publication Date: February 20, 2013
Cover design by: Scarlett Edwards
Interior images by: Amarie Veanne, Manamedia | Vecteezy.com
http://www.ScarlettEdwards.com
Book Description:
AN INNOCENT WOMAN...
Twenty-five year old Sandra Hawthorne once had a life that many would envy. Smart, beautiful, and engaged to an accomplished young professional, she seemed to have anything she desired at her fingertips.
Nobody suspects the emotional turmoil she lives with under the surface. Stalked by demons from her past, Sandra abandons everything on the cusp of her wedding and seeks refuge in a small town far away. But no matter where she hides, she cannot escape from the nightmares that torment her existence.
.
..AND A DANGEROUS MAN...
Having made his fortune supplying high-end drugs to the most affluent clientele, thirty-three year old Brandon Galliani now seeks to reform himself and reestablish ties with his long-estranged family. But when one final business trip beckons him to a small Washington seacoast community, the last thing he expects to find is a secretive, enigmatic woman who captures his heart, enraptures his soul, and changes his life forever.
...BROUGHT TOGETHER BY FATE.
For two years, Sandra has kept to herself while desperately hunting for relief from her nightmares. Everything changes when she crosses paths with a mysterious, dazzling stranger one crisp spring morning. Sandra knows she cannot afford to let down her guard around him. Yet the man quickly becomes hell-bent on breaking through the walls of her self-imposed prison. Sandra resists, but soon discovers that what her mind
thinks
it wants and what her heart
knows
it needs are two very different things.
Your to Savor
is the riveting, erotic tale of two opposites colliding in a fiery clash of passion, lust, and love. Each holds secrets from the other. The truth will strain all the flawed underpinnings of their relationship. In the end, will Sandra and Brandon’s budding love be enough to overcome the most despairing odds?
Prologue
The sounds were overwhelming. Music, loud and aggressive, blaring over everything. Voices, hostile and sharp, expanding the din.
Sandra stood alone. Dark bodies swirled all around her. She had never seen so many people in one place before. Somebody bumped into her, and she was knocked aside, colliding hard against one wall. She winced, rubbing her arm. Nobody paid her any mind.
There were so many people. So many frightening bodies clustered together. The air was stale—hot and damp and sticky despite the cool night outside. It wrapped her in a suffocating blanket of heat, making her feel like she’d been stuffed headfirst into a sweltering furnace.
It was too much. Too much for a nine-year-old to handle.
Sandra glanced over her shoulder, longing for the exit. The doors were still open, and every once in a while she’d catch a glorious breeze of fresh night air. But she couldn’t leave. Not yet.
She had to find her older sister, first.
Sandra had followed Chloe here after she had noticed her sneaking out their bedroom window after curfew. Sandra had followed her sister to get Chloe to return before their parents found out. She knew how mad Mommy and Daddy would be if they discovered their eldest daughter missing.
Sandra turned back to face the crowd. Poisonous scents assaulted her nose. The most prevalent was like the whiff she sometimes got when Daddy opened his liquor cabinet—but cruder, and so much stronger. It stung the inside of her throat and made her feel sick.
Sandra could not see through the mass of dangerous shadows in the middle of the room. They churned and swelled like the insides of some vile beast, scaring her. And that music! It was so loud, so domineering. It would not let up.
Why would Chloe have come here?
Everybody was way older than Sandra. Everybody was so frightening, so boisterous. There was too much noise, too many bodies, too many foreign smells.
Sandra hated it here. But she had to get her sister home.
She pressed small hands over her ears to block out the sounds and strained her eyes hard to see through the dark. Her gaze couldn’t pierce the pack of bodies. She knew Chloe was in there somewhere—she’d seen her come inside the house.
Sandra dove in. But the crowd was too tight for her to squeeze through. In seconds, she was pushed back out against the wall.
Desperate, she dropped to her hands and knees. That made seeing things easier. A path opened to her, and she started to crawl deeper inside.
The sticky floor clung to her hands. It smelled bad, like vomit and week-old garbage left to rot in the sun. She braved it all as she pushed her small body forward. Her eyes searched through the tangle of legs for a glimpse of her sister.
She looked, and…
there!
A flash of yellow heels disappearing into a doorway. Sandra couldn’t have mistaken those stilettoes anywhere. They were the ones Chloe had poached from their mother’s closet earlier that night.
Determination replaced fear as Sandra scuttled to her destination. She reached the doorway, stood up. She tried the doorknob. It didn’t budge.
The door was locked.
Summoning all her courage, Sandra started to bang on the door with tiny fists, knowing she risked attracting everyone’s attention. “Chloe! Chloe!”
There was no answer. She glanced back around, but—thank God—nobody had noticed her yet. She took a deep breath to make her voice as strong as possible. “Chloe! Chloe! It’s Sandra!” She had to be
louder
, she knew, to be heard over the booming noise. “Chloe, what are you doing? Chloe,
COME OUT
!”