Entice - By Ella Frank Page 0,122

my head. I was building us a dream.”

He pulled her in close, and Shelly could feel the tears sliding down her cheeks.

All of this is just too good to be true.

The man, the house, the place she felt most at home, and yes, even the damn dog.

“I know you live in Chicago. I know our lives are there,” he told her as he kissed her nose. “But I want us to be able to come here whenever we want. Lay down on a blanket in the afternoon sun and make love. Unwind and dream together.”

Shelly looked up at the sweetest, sexiest man she had ever met and wondered how on earth she had ever let a day go by, let alone months and weeks, where he wasn’t close enough to touch.

Reaching up to wrap her arms around Josh’s neck, Shelly smiled into his warm eyes and asked, “But what do you dream for when you have everything you already want?”

She watched as his sexy smile widened across those delicious lips.

He conceded, “Good point.”

Standing up on tiptoes, Shelly kissed those lips softly and whispered in the best Southern accent she could dig up, “Oh, what a shame, sugah. Now, it just looks like you’ll have more time to unwind and make love to me in the afternoon sun.”

Clutching her in tight, Josh kissed her lips with a lot more force than she had. He whispered, “Oh now, that is a shame, Georgia. When do you think we can begin?”

Shelly answered on a soft sigh, “I’m thinking now, sugah. I’m thinking right now.”

With that, she found herself kissing her future husband under her dreaming tree and thinking of new dreams.

She wondered, just for a moment, if it would shock Josh at all to know that the dream now held a dog and a toddler running around under a large oak tree.

As Josh picked her up in his arms, carrying her closer to some shade and a blanket, he leaned down and nuzzled her ear.

“I love you, Shelly Monroe. I can’t wait to have a family with you.”

“I love you, too,” Shelly told him as she turned her head and kissed him back, smiling and thinking.

This tree really does make dreams come true.

The End

Read on for a glimpse of Rachel’s story, Edible

Due out Summer 2013

2008

“Let go!” Rachel demanded, trying to free herself from Ben’s punishing grip around her upper arm.

“I told you to stop,” he shouted as his fingers dug tighter into her tender flesh.

That’s going to leave a mark, Rachel thought with a grimace.

Spinning around to face him, Rachel glared up into her boyfriend’s irate eyes.

“And I told you not to touch me when you’re angry.”

Ben hauled her in close, and Rachel knew whatever was about to happen wasn’t going to be good.

Twenty minutes earlier, he’d come home in a foul mood. That usually equaled a painful evening in the bedroom for her, but not tonight. Tonight, she was done.

“I’ll touch you whenever I want to touch you. You got that?” he sneered down at her.

Rachel narrowed her eyes and yanked on her arm again. Instead of letting go, he reached up, gripped the other one, and pushed her back against the living room wall. She hit it so hard that the bookcase beside her shook, and she could have sworn her teeth clattered.

“You’re mine, remember? You do what I say.”

Staring up at him, Rachel knew she was risking his wrath, but she could no longer stay silent.

“Not anymore. You’re leaving. Pack your shit up, Ben, and get out of my place! I’m sick of being your punching bag.”

What happened after that became a bit of a blur, like it happened in slow motion.

Rachel saw him raise his hand, and before she could move her face, his large palm connected with her cheek, the brutal force of it resounding in a loud crack. Her face felt like someone had lit it up with a blowtorch.

As she reached up to grip her cheek, she heard the front door crash open. Rachel turned her head against the wall, squinting because of the sunlight shining in from behind the person now standing there, and not to mention, the throbbing ache that was ricocheting up into her skull.

“Take your hands off of her.”

Rachel recognized her father’s voice, but it was filled with a cold anger that she had never heard before. Ben took one step away from her, and her father was instantly on him.

As she crumpled to the floor with the wall supporting her back,