Writing A Wrong (Write Stuff 2)

The palms of his hands skated along my ribs. His thumbs tickled the undersides of my breasts. That bastard. He knew that was one of my sweet spots. The softness of his lips trailed from my ear and across my cheek, barely nipping the corner of my mouth.

Any determination I had left was almost gone as my body sagged against his. I slammed my eyes closed, trying to think of anything else, but I couldn't help it. I wanted Alec bad. So I'd have to let him read my work in progress. It was better than walking around with the female equivalent of blue balls.

One of his hands left my side and began gently stroking my face. If his dirty tactics didn't feel so good, I would have called him out on it. "Open your eyes," he breathed against my lips.

I shook my head, burning all the willpower I had left. If I allowed myself to look into his deep dark brown eyes, the bet would be over. The husky smell of his trademark scent enticed me to lean in and inhale deeply from the hollow of his neck.

"Nicole." His voice was low and insistent. "Look at me. I need you to look at me."

The pleading tone in his voice was my undoing. I could not deny him. I was going to lose the bet and I no longer cared. My eyes fluttered open just as he brushed a thumb across my bottom lip. I sucked it into my mouth, making him groan in approval as I swirled my tongue around the tip. He slowly extracted his thumb from my mouth and began grinding against the lower part of my body. No longer able to take the sweet torture, I took a deep breath, ready to concede.

"Uncle," Alec whispered seconds before I could get the words out. He engulfed me with his arms as his lips crashed onto mine. Releasing the counter from my viselike death grip, I threw my arms around his neck, devouring his kiss.

"Uncle? You sure?" I asked, coming up momentarily for air.

The room tipped as he swept my feet out from under me and carried me from the kitchen. "Yep. You win. Your damsel-in-distress act worked."

My betting luck had finally changed. Who would have thought my clumsiness would work in my favor for once?

Chapter 3

"Have you talked to Jillian yet?"

"If you mean today, no. Why?" I usually spoke to my agent every week or two, but Olivia seemed to know something I didn't.

"Okay. Are you sitting down?" Olivia's excited voice leapt from the phone I had cradled between my shoulder and ear.

"Is that a trick question?"

I could practically hear her rolling her eyes on the other end of the line. "I'm serious. You might want to be sitting down for this."

I grinned. Olivia was known for her dramatic flair. "Fine, drama queen. I'm sitting down. What's up?"

She ignored my teasing. "Remi forwarded me your book event schedule. They've decided to do a big launch party and a twenty-city tour for the print release."

I groaned. I adored Remi, my editor extraordinaire from the publishing house I signed with, but traveling was near the top of my long list of phobias. "Twenty?" I'd done book events before, but twenty cities back to back seemed daunting. A cold knot of fear crept into my belly as another thought occurred to me. All the signings I'd done to this point were with other authors. Lots of authors. Authors who drew crowds. Now they wanted me to do a solo act? What if no one showed up? Or even worse, what if people who hated my book showed up and screamed at me and held up signs to tell the world I suck? The thought of it made me want to puke. "I'm not sure, Liv. I—"

"It'll be you and three other authors," she interrupted like she hadn't heard me. "All of you are releasing around the same time and your publisher thinks it would be good to cross-promote you. They're calling it A Little Romance on the Road. They're even leasing a tour bus for the entire trip. Like a rock band or something. Can you believe that shit?"

I weighed her words. A signing tour like that with other authors involved definitely had possibilities. Plus, the fact that I wouldn't have to fly for each leg of the journey made it seem more tolerable. I guess things weren't nearly as bad as I had initially thought. "That sounds doable."

"I'm not even done yet," she harped.

Nuts. Close, but no cigar. "Okay, what's the bad news?"

"I also heard from your publicist, and she has several other things she'd like to add to your schedule. A few of the bigger events and a—" She had to clear her throat from talking too fast. "And a couple interviews."

And there you had it.

The boom had been lowered. The dreaded word being interview. My king of all phobias. I could practically hear the little minions chiming in with the dun dun dunnn.

"Interviews? Why?" My voiced sounded squeaky, like a mouse.

Olivia sighed. "Uh, I don't know. Could it be that you're a kick-ass number-one New York Times bestselling author, not once but twice, and you scored a seven-figure book deal for your series? You're barely twenty-two and you're living the American dream. People want to hear your story."

"Lots of authors hit bestseller lists and never do interviews."

"What are you so worried about? You've been interviewed on TV before."