Every Little Piece of Me is a sexy, standalone second-chance romance in the all-new Orchid Valley series.
It’s not every day you’re invited to your wife’s wedding . . . as a guest.
The first time I saw Brinley Knox, she was crying, draped in a ridiculous pink tulle dress for her sweet sixteen, and cursing the boy who’d broken her heart.
I was the hired help, a teenage charity case.
She was the daughter of the wealthiest family in Orchid Valley.
I knew a girl like Brinley was off-limits. That didn’t stop me from kissing her. Or from promising that if she were ever mine, I’d never let her go.
The last time I saw Brinley, she was sleeping, tangled in the sheets of my Vegas penthouse, my diamond glittering on her finger.
I returned three hours later to an empty bed, the ring on the dresser, and a goodbye note.
We haven’t spoken in the six months since, but I’m not the kind of guy who’d file for a divorce he doesn’t want.
Until I got this damn invitation, it never occurred to me that Brinley didn’t remember our impulsive Vegas nuptials.
It’s time to return to Orchid Valley and remind the bride-to-be that I’m a man who keeps his promises.
Every Little Piece of Me is a sexy, standalone second-chance romance in Lexi Ryan’s all-new Orchid Valley series.
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Excerpt
Every Little Piece of Me, excerpt © 2020 by Lexi Ryan
I run the water cold and brace myself on the sink.
Everything is okay. This is just one moment. Inhale and exhale, and move your way through it.
Once my breathing evens out, I splash cold water on my face and blot it dry with a paper towel. I’m definitely overreacting. There are a thousand reasons he could be in town and want to talk to me alone. Thousands of reasons that don’t begin with the words “You’re the love of my life. Please don’t marry anyone else.”
Because I’m almost positive I don’t want to hear those words. Mostly.
When I step out of the bathroom, Marston is waiting there, leaning against the wall across from the ladies’ room, arms folded, jaw twitching with aggravation. The picture of tall, dark, and pissed off.
When Marston sets his mind to something, he gets it, and tonight, apparently that something is talking to me alone.
“Sorry.” I smooth down my pencil skirt. “That vodka didn’t sit right.” I turn toward the main room.
He catches me around the waist and spins me so fast that I’m trapped between the wall and him before I can blink. “Give me one minute.” He braces his hands above my head and leans forward.
I swallow hard. Not because I’m scared. Marston’s never scared me. But looking up at him when he’s this close is stirring up all kinds of memories. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to look at him without part of me wishing for the future I longed for at sixteen. I place a firm hand on his chest. “I don’t think this is a good idea.”
“Was Vegas a joke to you?”
Of all the questions I expected him to ask, that wasn’t anywhere on the list. “What? Of course not. Vegas was . . .” Hot. Impulsive. Crazy. Amazing. Wild . . . everything.
He dips his head until his lips hover right above mine. “Don’t you dare call it a mistake,” he growls, his warm breath tickling my skin.
I ache to close the distance between our mouths, ache to feel his kiss again. I’d never call Vegas a mistake. Maybe I should, but I can’t.
“Fuck, you smell so good. I couldn’t get the smell of you out of my mind for weeks after you left me that damn note. Do you know how crazy that made me?”
My hand is still against his chest. If I pushed, he’d back off. He’d give me the space to clear my head. But when he shifts his mouth from above mine to my ear, I don’t want to push him away. I want to pull him back. “Marston—”
“Is this why you sent me that invitation? Did you want me to come here and remind you what it’s like between us? How it feels when we’re close?” In a breath, he has me pinned against the wall again, and his mouth crushes against mine.
Fireworks explode in my stomach. All at once, the floor is falling out from under me and I’m floating.
The kiss doesn’t last long—I don’t let it. I tear my mouth away before it can swallow me whole.
I shove him back, my lips tingling. “You can’t do that.” The kiss was everything I remembered, everything that’s missing when I kiss Julian. Everything I’ve been trying to convince myself I don’t need.
Meet Lexi
Lexi Ryan is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of emotional romance that sizzles. A former academic and English professor, Lexi considers herself the luckiest girl around to make a living through storytelling. She loves spending time with her crazy kids, weightlifting, ice cream, swoony heroes, and vodka martinis.
Lexi lives in Indiana with her husband, two children, and a spoiled dog. You can find her at her website: www.lexiryan.com
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So I finished Every Little Promise and I was so emotionally invested in the story of Brinley and Marston. I immediately had to dive into Every Little Piece. I needed to know what happened in Vegas and how Marston was going to get Brinley to call off her wedding.
There was also the ten year old secret that was between them that I had so many questions about. Having this book told in present tense with chapters flashing back to their past had me feeling the depth of their connection as much as the chemistry. But having it told in dual point of view made this story perfect.
If not for the dual point of view I probably wouldn't have liked Brinley very much. Because the decisions she made all through the book and in both times would seem selfish and cold if not for knowing exactly what was propelling her to make those decisions.
I call dibs on Marston. Every single thing he did was so transparent and was done with nothing but love for Brinley. And even when she made choices and decisions that broke his heart he still went above and beyond to do the right thing for Brinley. He was just beautiful and I couldn't get enough of him.
I would have loved to get more of them together once all of their issues were resolved. Especially with their friends and family all on the same page. But knowing that we are getting Stella's story next hopefully we will get a whole lot more of all these guys. I loved the story and couldn't put it down from the first page. Which is what I knew to expect from a Lexi Ryan book.
New Adult Romance
Cover Design: Juliana Cabrera, Jersey Girl Designs
Release Date: June 12, 2020
My last name was royalty in New Orleans, at least, I guess to those who mattered. But to me…my last name was a curse.
High society. Expectations. Old money. Politics. Everything I despised.
If only they could see what happened behind those high-society closed doors. The same doors my daddy paid a lot of money to keep closed.
Deceit. Destruction. Bribery. You name it, my family was guilty of it.
My father’s throne was built on lies. Our family was the epitome of faux royalty.
Then, I fell in love and oh what a fool I was. I was just a pawn in my father’s game. And to use the man who claimed to love me...
Five years ago, I walked away, and left my father to his riches.
And that man who left me in broken, jagged pieces?
Well, what goes around, comes around.
Grey
Four years in a prison cell changes a man.
I spent those five years fighting to survive.
When I emerged, I was nothing like the man who had walked through those cell doors all those years ago.
I overcame things that I never imagined I’d be faced with..
The one person who promised to never leave, did.
The life I thought I knew, gone.
The future I once thought I had, up in smoke.
Like so many things in my life, my story and my future were stolen from me.
Sure, it’s made up of the usual parts…a beginning and an end. But just like every story, there’s a hero, there’s the villain…and then there’s me.
And this is the beginning of the end.
Something I knew better than most.
The worst types of pain, I knew them intimately.
But pain is subjective, we all feel it differently.
Pain takes a body and leaves it hollow, a mere shell of the living, breathing human that it used to be.
Sometimes I wonder how one person can feel so much pain yet never die?
But, here I still stand. Living proof that no matter how much pain you’ve endured, the worst part was living through the memories of it.
Eight years ago I was thrown inside a concrete prison, a four-by-four cell where I would grow up.
I would be taught all the fundamentals of life, my mentors and instructors the lowest of criminals. They would take me, shape me, make me. Leaving me nothing of the man whom I once was.
I learned the hardest lessons in life, alone.
The worst lesson I learned?
Love was foolish, but it wasn’t what made me a fool.
What made me a fool is that even though love put me in prison, I still sought that love out in my dreams. Like a siren, she sang to me.
I would’ve followed her wherever she called.
That was before.
Before I sold my soul to the devil in exchange for her freedom. She doesn’t have to know the truth. The truth won’t set her free.
It’ll shackle me to the walls of this concrete prison and I’ll gladly take my sentence for love. It’s what put me in here anyway.
Connect with her via Facebook, Instagram (@RHolmesAuthor) and twitter!
Melanie A. Smith
(Life Lessons, #2)
Publication date: May 19th 2020
Genres: Adult, Contemporary, Romance
From best-selling author Melanie A. Smith comes the second book in a new series of steamy contemporary medical romance standalone novels about life lessons that break all the rules.Even when you know better, sometimes it’s simply too tempting…
Hospital work isn’t for the faint of heart. Becca Dillon knows that firsthand, having worked as a medical assistant in the cardiac unit at Rutherford Hospital for longer than she cares to think about. What she does care to think about is having fun, gossip, and … guys. Her favorite of the three. And why stick to one, when you can sample them all?
That’s exactly her plan when a workplace crush on a mysterious bad-boy orderly unexpectedly takes a very steamy turn. But Vincent DeMarco turns out to be nothing like she expected, and before she knows it, she’s falling hard and fast. She wants him in ways she’s never wanted anyone before, but there’s something he’s keeping from her. Something that’s holding him back. And Becca is going to find out what.
Even though she knows that bad boys don’t make good boyfriends, he seems like he might be so much more. Will her quest unlock the truth behind who he really is? Or will it end their relationship for good? Either way, ready or not, Becca’s world is about to change.
Excerpt
“You mean there are things you don’t want me to know about you.”
He shakes his head. “Same difference.”
“No, there’s a big difference,” I disagree.
“It doesn’t matter. Let’s just go back to your place,” he insists, stepping closer and looking down into my eyes with an intense gaze that, despite myself, sends heat ripping through me.
“Oh, now you want to fuck me?”
“Isn’t that what you wanted?” he asks, confused.
“Yes. But I don’t just want to fuck you, you dumbass,” I grind out. “Don’t ask me why, but for some insane reason I want more than that. Wanted more than that. Starting with the story on you and the cops. But now? You’re being all weird again, and I’m starting to lose my patience with this bullshit.”
“I’ve been pretty up front with you, Becca,” he replies calmly. “I’m not looking for a girlfriend. But I like you. And I’m sick of trying not to fuck you.”
“Well, that’s romantic,” I reply sarcastically.
He laughs. “If you want romance, you’re really barking up the wrong tree,” he says. His eyes still glittering with laughter, he looks down at me again. “But if you’re looking for someone to worship every inch of your gorgeous fucking body, I can definitely help you with that.”
My breath catches in my throat. Goddamn him. He drives me fucking crazy. But that’s just it. I’m into this guy on so much more than a physical level. Don’t get me wrong: I’m not the girl who thinks she can change a man. But damn do I want to understand him.
And he’s wrong about the romance. Dancing with me like our bodies were made to fit together? Sitting with me in a dark alley so I’m not alone? Fixing my back after a stressful week? Giving me orgasms with no expectation of getting them back? He’s not acting like a guy who isn’t thinking about what would make me happy. Even if he keeps saying he’s not. He’s a pile of contradictions.
But he’s also unfortunately done things to my body I’ll never forget. Twice. Is that why I’m so into this guy?
I have to admit that the answer to that is, Maybe. Or maybe it’s my ego; maybe I just want to conquer him. Either way, I for sure don’t want him for just a good fuck, though at this point he’s proven he would be. I’m just as stupid and stubborn as he is. We’re either perfect for each other or we’re sexual napalm, about to explode all over downtown San Diego.
Melanie A. Smith is the best-selling author of The Safeguarded Heart Series and other contemporary romance fiction. Originally from upstate New York, she spent most of her childhood in the San Francisco Bay Area before moving to Los Angeles for college. After that, she spent almost fifteen years in the Seattle Area, and now lives in the Dallas-Fort Worth area of Texas with her family.A voracious reader and lifelong writer, Melanie’s writing began at a young age with short stories and poetry. Having completed a bachelor of science in electrical engineering at the University of California, Los Angeles, and a master’s in business administration at the University of Washington, her writing abilities were mainly utilized for technical documents as a lead engineer for the Boeing Company, where she worked for ten years.
After shifting careers to domestic engineering and property management in 2015, she eventually found a balance where she was able to return to writing fiction.
Melanie is also a Mensan and enjoys spending time with her family, cooking, and driving with the windows down and the stereo cranked up loud.
