EXCERPT- HER HEART'S DESIRE

Samantha Logan parked her car in front of her family’s dilapidated summer cabin and let out a demoralized sigh. The morning newspapers would expose the entire disaster, complete with the glaring caption—“Runaway Bride.” What they wouldn’t say that after she caught the bastard with another woman he’d damned near killed her. Her hands shook as she pulled the keys from the ignition.  Next time she looked for a lover she would be the one in control.  At least no one would think of looking for her here.

With that thought in mind she climbed out of her almost paid off clunker and walked up the rutted path to her hideout.  If she was in luck the key would be in the old hiding place on the ledge above the door.  Reaching up on tiptoe she smiled when her fingertips encountered cold metal.  Great, things were finally going her way. 

Now all she had to do was hole up, lick her wounds in private, and figure out what to do with the rest of her life.  Grayson, the rat, had been her only true foray into sex and it had gone horribly wrong,  Steadying her shaking hands, she stuck the key in the lock, and tired her damndest to turn it.  Frozen solid.  Just her rotten luck.  Good and mad now she rattled the rusty lock trying to force it, to no avail.  Fuck.

Then suddenly the door tore open taking her headlong with it as she stumbled over the threshold and into the dark cabin.  What the fuck...was all she could think before she crashed to the saggy floor  and some ox jumped on her.  Desperately trying to suck in air she futilely struggled with the seeming ninja as he flung her limp, slightly pudgy around like a rag doll and pressed her to the ground pinning her.

A mingling of sandalwood cologne and testosterone washed over her somewhat reminiscent and crazily relaxing her as she was pinned under his muscular, very male body if the heavy bulge pressed against her sex was anything to go by.   

Fight damn it, she told herself.  He was too big to be her ex-fiancé, but could Grayson have dispatched some thug to retrieve her? Or even worse, had she stumbled across a squatter, a criminal hiding out in the woods? Panicked, she took a wild swing into the darkness. Her fist crunched into hard flesh and bone as she struck a glancing blow off his jaw.

It had no effect on the hulk on top of her. The solid wall of muscle shook off her blow with a muffled grunt and flattened her even more with his weight. She tried to hit him again. He blocked her move, capturing both her wrists in a steely grip.  One of his large hands began running over her trembling body. As it skimmed over her breasts, she let out a bloodcurdling shriek.

He froze, his hand still cupping her breast. “Stop that god damned caterwauling.”