Introduction To Romance (10 Books). Кэрол Мортимер
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Genna gave him an are you kidding look. “If you don’t want to see yourself that way, that’s fine. I mean, who wants a guy who thinks he’s so awesome he should be declared a hero?”
“Say what?” Looking confused, Brody shook his head as if trying to clear his ears. “I thought you thought...”
“That I thought you were a hero?” she finished when his words trailed away. At his sheepish nod, she pulled both hands out of his to frame his face. Staring into his eyes, she smiled. “I don’t think you’re a hero. I know you are. You’re my hero. Whatever else you do, whether it’s saving the world or pouring whiskey, you’ll be my hero. Because you saved me. From myself, from my fears, from wasting my life.”
He started to shake his head, so she hurried on before he could interrupt.
“You helped me realize that I have to stand up for myself. And that even if it isn’t welcome, that sometimes we have to stand up for others.”
She waited to see if he understood that she didn’t blame him for trying to protect her. Again. When he tilted his chin, she knew he did.
“I’m strong enough to build my own life, Brody. To make it with you, while you’re by my side. Or while you’re away, serving our country. I’m even strong enough to survive without you.” She had to stop and swallow the tears that threatened to choke her words. “You’re my hero. And I’m strong enough to be yours.”
For a brief moment, Brody looked so vulnerable. His gaze was soft and his smile sweet. He leaned down, resting his forehead on hers, and closed his eyes. A heartbeat later, he brushed a gentle kiss over her lips.
“I love you,” he whispered. “Forever. I think I’ve loved you forever.”
Too happy even for tears, Genna offered an ecstatic smile. She brushed her fingers over his cheeks, then sighed.
“I love you, too. Just as much, and for just as long. You really are my hero, Brody. You always will be.”
“Lane.”
Brody held Genna’s gaze for a long, heart-melting second longer. Then, transforming before her eyes, he came to attention, did an about-face and saluted.
“Sir.”
“Report for duty Monday morning at oh-six-hundred.”
Genna pressed her fingers to her lips, trying not to cry. She’d never thought she’d be so happy to hear that the man she loved was committing to spend a huge amount of time away from her. But she’d never thought she’d love someone like Brody, either.
“Yes, sir.”
His face blank, Blake returned the salute. Then he flashed Genna a quick smile and a wink before rejoining his grinning wife.
Brody waited until they were out of earshot before turning back to take Genna’s hands.
“So. I have to go back to work,” he said quietly. He brought one hand, then the other, to his lips to brush each with a soft kiss. “For the next month, at least, I’ll be based in Coronado. I can put in a request for military housing instead of the barracks. Or I can come back here and visit on weekends for a while. Until you decide what you want to do.”
“What do you want me to do?”
“Whatever makes you happy.”
“You,” she said simply. “You make me happy.”
And there it was.
Genna was smart enough to recognize happy ever after when she was staring right at it. And wise enough to know that while it wasn’t always going to be easy, her life with Brody was going to be amazing.
Her lips met his, their kiss as sweet as their declarations.
They were going to live happily ever after.
* * * * *
Keep reading for an excerpt from TEXAS OUTLAWS: BILLY by Kimberly Raye.
1
PRO BULL RIDER William Bonney Chisholm had a hard-on the size of Texas.
He stood smack-dab in the middle of the kickoff dance for the Lost Gun Fair and Rodeo, a three-week-long event taking place at the fairgrounds on the outskirts of town. The band had started up. Couples two-stepped across the dance floor. The pungent scent of beer and livestock teased his nostrils. Cigarette smoke cluttered the air.
Easy, bud. Easy.
He shifted and damned himself for being such a sucker for the opposite sex. Blondes, in particular.
He’d fallen hard and fast years back the first moment he’d set eyes on Tami Elder’s Malibu Barbie. Tami had taken riding lessons at the ranch where Billy and his two older brothers had grown up. They’d been taken in by rodeo star Pete Gunner after their crook of a father had died in a house fire. Since Billy’s mother had passed years before that and the Gunner spread was an all-male domain—home to the infamous Lost Boys, a crackerjack group of young riders trained and honed by pro bull rider Pete Gunner himself—the only female Billy had ever kept company with had been a paint horse by the name of Lula Bell.
Until Tami had started coming out to the ranch every Sunday. He’d done his best, like any ten-year-old boy when faced with a cootie-carrying girl, to make her life a living hell. He’d shot spit wads while she’d rubbed down her horse and fired his water gun at her while she’d trotted around the corral.
He’d hated her, and she’d hated him, and all had been right with his male-dominated world. Then one hot summer afternoon, everything had changed. That had been the summer he’d turned eleven and spied his oldest brother, Jesse, kissing Susie Alexander, the local rodeo queen.
Kissing, of all things.
Billy had been hurt, then he’d been mad, and then he’d glimpsed an actual tongue and he’d been damned interested. For a little while. Then he’d been mad again and he’d raced off to gather some chinaberries for his slingshot. To see how many shots it took to get his brother away from Miss Travis County.
He’d been up in a nearby tree counting his berries when Tami had finished her riding lesson. She’d slid off the horse and wandered over to the tree, her doll case in hand, to play until her dad finished talking to the riding instructor. He’d meant to shoot off a few practice shots at her, but then her dad had called her over. He’d climbed down and had been about to stomp the daylights out of her Barbie when he’d realized that it wasn’t just any old Barbie.
It was a naked one.
Just like that, his belief system had done a complete one-eighty. One glance at all those interesting curves and that long blond hair and those deep blue eyes, and he’d started to wonder at the possibilities when it came to the real thing.
Yep, he loved blondes.
The trouble was, the pretty little thing standing near the bar was a brunette.
His gaze swept from her long, wavy brown hair pulled back in a loose ponytail to the shiny tips of her black stilettos, and back up again. She looked nothing like the other buckle bunnies crowding the dance floor. No itty-bitty tank tops or scandalous Daisy Duke shorts. Instead, she wore a black skirt that accented her tiny waist and a sleeveless black blouse that fell softly against a modest pair of breasts. There was nothing voluptuous about her. Nothing outright sexy.
Ah, but there was something about the way she stood there, her back so stiff and straight, her lips parted slightly as she sipped from a red plastic cup, that made his adrenaline pump that much faster.
She was a yuppie through and through. Out of her element, given the three-inch heels and what he would be willing to bet was wine in her glass. Probably a big-city reporter who’d gotten stuck covering the local rodeo.
He would have figured her for one of the big-time reporters who’d been in attendance to cover the “Where Are They Now?”