Excerpt from "Secret Ties" by Opal Carew

“Summer, do you have a man back home.” Max sat on the couch across from her.

She stared at her lap as she dragged her finger along her knee. “Actually, there are two…”

He smiled as his eyebrow arched upward. “Really?”

“No… I mean, I’m not involved with both of them… neither of them actually… I just…”

“Would like to be?”

She glanced at him and nodded.

He picked up his glass and swirled it around.

“Then why aren’t you?”

“It’s complicated. They’re best friends and… I’m friends with both of them. If I go out with one…” She shrugged.

“You’re afraid you’ll break up their friendship?” He took a sip of his drink.

She nodded. “And I wouldn’t know how to choose between them anyway.”

“Why not go out with both?”

“Both?”

He leaned forward. “So we’re clear, I mean have a threesome. Then you don’t have to choose.”

Her cheeks flushed. “Oh, no. I couldn’t do that.”

He smiled. “Really? I think there are a great many things you might do that you don’t think you could… in the right circumstances.”

His dark gaze bored into her until she found herself squirming in her seat. He placed his drink on the glass table.

“Summer, come sit over here.”

He didn’t say it in his authoritative voice, but she obeyed anyway, standing up and moving to the couch, then sitting beside him.

She gazed at him and felt overwhelmed by the intense scrutiny of his dark eyes. She felt as though, at this moment, she was the entire focus of his world. As if he could see everything about her… knew everything there was to know about her. Even things she didn’t know about herself.

He stroked his finger along her cheek and exciting tingles danced through her body like fireflies on a summer’s night. His fingers glided through her long, auburn hair and he drew her forward. When his mouth met hers in a soft brush of lips, then moved with a delicate pressure, she drew in a breath and melted against him.

His tongue moved inside her mouth in long, sexy strokes… exploring… caressing. He wrapped his arms around her and drew her close to his hard, rigid body. Her nipples blossomed into tight nubs, pressing into his muscular chest.

His lips brushed against her ear.

“You are a sexy, beautiful woman, Summer. I want to make love to you. To release the passion within you.”

She gazed at him, a prisoner to his sinfully sexy charcoal eyes. Her lips longed for his again.

“I know you don’t really know me,” he said, “but if you’ll give in to your desires and trust me, I’ll take you on a journey you’ll never forget.”