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Email: Susan@stokerAces.com
Protecting Melody Excerpt
Melody wasn’t sure what to say. She hadn’t thought about it, but now that he put the imagines in her head, they wouldn’t leave. “You’re the least vulnerable man I’ve ever met.” She put every ounce of conviction into her voice as she could.
“You don’t have to—”
Melody interrupted him. “I’m not.” She felt movement under her cheek and lifted her head to see he was laughing.
“You don’t even know what I was going to say.”
“Don’t care. Whatever it was, was going to be crap. You could probably break someone in half if they broke in here. You could hop to the door and down the hall and outrun any fire that dared to try to burn you. If someone knocked, you could have your leg strapped on before they got any words out. In fact . . .” Melody pushed herself up even more and peered down at Tex in the dark room. “I bet you’ve practiced getting your leg on as fast as you can . . . haven’t you?”
When he grinned sheepishly up at her, Melody smiled back and brought her hands up to tickle his sides. “How long? What’s your fastest time?”
She let out a girly shriek when he flipped her over and trapped her hands in one of his above her head.
“There I was, getting all touchy feely with you and you had to go and ruin it.” His words were said with a smile and a twinkle in his eye, but Melody still immediately felt bad.
“Seriously, Tex, I’m sorry you feel that way, but If I had my pick between all your friends and you, as to who would be with me in this hotel room right now, I’d still pick you. You make me feel safe. Two legs, one arm, no legs, no arms. I’d still pick you.”
Without a word, Tex leaned down and kissed Melody deeply and with all the emotion he couldn’t figure out how to put into words. Her trust meant the world to him. Since his surgery, he’d always felt somehow less than his other SEAL friends. Two sentences was all it took to bring back his self-esteem.
Not letting the kiss morph into anything more, it still seemed too soon, Tex turned again until they’d resumed their earlier positions.
When they’d settled down, and just as Melody was slipping back into sleep, once again she heard Tex whisper, “Twenty-nine seconds.”
Melody merely smiled, turned her head and kissed his chest, and laid her cheek back down without a word. She’d known in her gut he’d practiced putting his prosthetic on.
Protecting Melody, SEAL of Protection, Book 7
Pre-ORDER LINKS-Out Sept 8th
Author Bio
New York Times, USA Today, and Wall Street Journal Bestselling Author, Susan Stoker has a heart as big as the state of Texas where she lives, but this all-American girl has also spent the last fourteen years living in Missouri, California, Colorado, and Indiana. She's married to a retired Army man who now gets to follow her around the country.
She debuted her first series in 2014 and quickly followed that up with the SEAL of Protection Series, which solidified her love of writing and creating stories readers can get lost in
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