The story goes like this: while on pregnancy bed rest, Lauren Dane had plenty of down time, so her husband took her comments about ‘giving that writing thing a serious go’ to heart and brought home a secondhand laptop. She wrote her first book on it. Today, Lauren is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of more than 60 novels and novellas across several genres.
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The Ink & Chrome Series
Opening Up
Falling Under
Coming Back
COPYRIGHT
Published by Piatkus
978-0-3494-0983-2
All characters and events in this publication, other than those clearly in the public domain, are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
Copyright © 2015 by Lauren Dane
The moral right of the author has been asserted.
Excerpt from Falling Under copyright © 2015 by Lauren Dane
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the publisher.
The publisher is not responsible for websites (or their content) that are not owned by the publisher.
PIATKUS
Little, Brown Book Group
Carmelite House
50 Victoria Embankment
London, EC4Y 0DZ
www.littlebrown.co.uk
www.hachette.co.uk
This one is for the boy who is the
full moon shining on my Camaro’s hood.
Acknowledgments
Thank-yous go to so many people! 2014 was a year of challenges for me and my family. I’m incredibly grateful to those around me who went out of their way to make things easier for me at what were some of the most stressful times in my life.
Laura Bradford, my agent and friend – thank you so very much.
Leah Hultenschmidt – thank you for working with me so hard to give me as much time and space as you could while I was trying to recover (as well as the work editing me!).
My beta readers – Fatin (who is also my fantastic assistant) and Mary, who always have so much excellent advice and help.
Friends who have pitched in and helped me out – your kindnesses do matter. Thank you all.
Readers – thank you all for your patience and for continuing to read my books!!
Chapter One
“I don’t even know who that is, but I’d like to take several large bites.” PJ took in the ridiculously badass alpha male across the room from where she and her sister had just been handed drinks at the bar.
“Who?” Julie asked as she paid and they moved to the side. “Point him out. In a non-attention-seeking way!” she added, like PJ was a beast.
PJ blinked a few times before she spoke. “You’re a terrible human being.”
“I get it from Dad.”
PJ tilted her head to indicate the guy whose sheer charisma she felt from across the room. A brunette with a body straight out of a pinup calendar stared up into his face as she stroked a hand up and down his arm.
“She’s all right in a totally voluptuous, drop-dead-sex-bomb way. I mean, for those who like that sort of thing.” Julie’s dry delivery made PJ smile.
“Let’s saunter by that fantastic Camaro over there so I can get a closer look.” PJ started off.
“At the guy or the car?”
“Two birds. One stone,” PJ called lightly over her shoulder.
“Will this end up in some sort of terrible misunderstanding that will embarrass me for years to come? Or, better yet, am I going to have to explain what happened to the police?”
“That only happened once.”
Julie’s brow rose very slowly. Julie was the elegant one. The one who played the piano perfectly. She’d gone to the schools their parents had told her to. Wore tasteful, perfectly tailored clothes. Now had a corner office at their family’s tire company and was set to lead it into the future with their other siblings.
Whereas Penelope Jean Colman had been a “terrible disappointment” because she just never fit anywhere her parents tried to put her. And maybe because she’d gotten her big sister into some trouble once or twice.
“Okay, three times. But I had good reasons for two of them.”
“The other was you being innocent?”
“Heck no. Which isn’t to say how pleased it makes me that I got away with it.”
“He’s standing with Duke Bradshaw. The dark-haired one.”
Julie did a very nice job of looking natural as she shifted to stand next to PJ, giving her an unobstructed view.
“Duke owns Twisted Steel with someone else. Maybe that’s him,” Julie said.
There really was no other word for the man but dominant. Easily six foot three, he stood, feet apart, a beer in one hand as he spoke to Duke. This was a man you could dress in a tux and while he’d look fantastic, you’d know he could punch you in the face without losing a cufflink.
She wasn’t entirely sure why that made him so hot, it just did. There was a sort of barely restrained… something about him that made her take notice.
Dark hair, shaved close at the sides, longer on the top. He had it pulled back from his face, exposing masculine features.
“You have that goofy look.” Julie poked her in the side.
“Ow! What?” PJ asked without tearing her gaze from him.
“You get it at the sight of tacos, too.”
PJ nearly choked on her drink. Thank goodness he hadn’t noticed her almost dying.
Once she could breathe again, PJ glared at her sister through still-watering eyes. “You’re on a roll tonight. Did you take allergy medication before you started drinking?”
Her normally serene sister had a twinkle in her eye. “Someone has to keep me entertained at these things. You seem to like them. I, on the other hand, would rather be home catching up on my Housewives.”
“What a waste that would be. There are handsome single men here. A bar. Food that’s being served from a tray instead of a buffet a hundred people of questionable hygiene have pawed over. Me, of course. All of these things are better than being at home alone watching TV.”
“Says you.”
“Witty. That expensive Ivy League education was totally worth it.”
“I need to dumb it down for state college dropouts to understand.” Julie stuck out her tongue.
PJ turned back to look at him again. He was too far away for her to see the color of his eyes, but she figured they’d be brown or green maybe. She took note of the septum piercing and the tattoos on both arms visible from the elbows, where he had his shirtsleeves rolled up. It was necessary, for reasons of some sort, that she get a better look.
“Since he’s standing with Duke, I say you go on over and introduce yourself. This is an industry party. You’re here for Colman Enterprises. It’s your job to network. Give him your card.” Julie got a little closer, lowering her voice. “And it’s good for you to make some connections for your custom work.”