Tuesday, June 28, 2016

His Heart's Revenge (49th Floor Series) by Jenny Holiday - Blog Tour & Excerpt





Twenty years ago, I was too smart and too poor to be cool. Now I’m laughing my way to the bank—the bank I’m CEO of. Nothing can touch me.

Except maybe him.

We met at summer camp. We made out under the stars. Then he stabbed me in the back.

They say revenge is a dish best served cold. But I’m gonna go with hot.

Alexander Evangelista is a millionaire with all the trappings: houses all over the world and hot guys lined up whenever he’s in need of some no-strings-attached company. He's on his way to world domination.

A CEO in his own right, Cary Bell is competing for a major client with his boyhood crush. He’s never forgiven himself for betraying Alex. But with his professional reputation on the line, he’s going to have to find his inner cutthroat if he wants his new company to succeed.

Alex isn’t about to let his nemesis steal a client out from under him. It’s time to break Cary’s company—and his heart.




 

Ready to make his thoughts on the matter known, Alexander swung open the door.

And was blindsided by Cary Bell, leaning against the wall in the small vestibule between Alexander’s elevator and his front door in jeans and a black leather jacket, looking like fucking James Dean paying a house call.

They stared at each other for several seconds, before Cary pushed off the wall and came to stand at his full height, which put him exactly eye to eye with Alexander. After another few moments of silence, Alexander’s dick stirred, which made him angry as hell.

They both spoke at the same time, Alexander saying, “How did you get up here?” and Cary saying, “I came to apologize.”

The simultaneous attempt at speaking sent them both back into silence. But it wasn’t truly silence. Alexander could hear his blood pounding and Cary’s rapid breathing. Apologize? That was the last thing in the world Alexander had expected, and it had him reeling. A glance at the other man’s chest confirmed that he was as unsettled as Alexander. He lifted his eyes to Cary’s face, only to find that his midnight visitor was checking him out, and not very subtly. Alexander, who was wearing only his underwear, straightened his spine. He might have been scrawnier than Cary the athlete back at camp, but he’d bet next quarter’s returns that with his disciplined jujitsu and lifting routine of the past two decades, he’d caught up.

He watched Cary’s eyes slide over his boxers. There was no mistaking what was going on there because the partial erection he’d been battling since he’d left Cary at Liu’s house had escalated to the full meal deal. He was tempted to say that Cary had woken him up, but he bit his tongue. He didn’t need an excuse. He was a allowed to have a boner in his own house, for fuck’s sake.

Slowly, so slowly, his gaze feeling so much like a physical caress that the skin on Alexander’s chest started to prickle, Cary raised his eyes to meet Alexander’s. Alexander had been expecting one of his nemesis’s trademark smirks, raised eyebrows that suggested bemusement, since that seemed to be Cary’s attitude toward everything. He expected him to somehow twist the apology into a prank. But no. All he saw in those eyes was heat. Those blue-gray irises were usually the epitome of cool. But not now. No, right now they were nearly subsumed by dilated pupils the color of night.

Alexander tried to think what came next, but his brain was full of tar, even as his limbs were on high alert and his senses heightened.

Cary shook his head, as if to clear it. It had the effect of wiping that dazed expression off his face. Alexander could swear he saw the heat leaving Cary’s expression. One corner of his visitor’s mouth turned up. No. He didn’t want that fucking holier-than-thou, punk-ass smirk. Not here. Not while he was standing in the doorway of his condo in his underwear, harder than steel.

Cary unzipped his leather jacket, revealing a worn white T-shirt. Alexander had forgotten how well Cary did casual. Then Cary shoved his hands in his jean pockets, perfecting his Rebel Without a Cause look. Alexander lifted his gaze back up to Cary’s face. The proto-smirk was a little more advanced, as if it were emerging in slow motion. Again, the thought that filled his head was, simply, no.

He grabbed the jacket, the slide of the old, soft leather over his fingers torture for his over-tuned senses. He wasn’t sure if relief lay in feeling less or feeling more. But he didn’t care, because his only mission was to stop that fucking smirk in its tracks.

So he yanked, hard, crashing his mouth down on Cary’s and swallowing his visitor’s gasp of shock.



Jenny Holiday started writing at age nine when her fourth grade teacher gave her a notebook and told her to start writing stories. That first batch featured mass murderers on the loose, alien invasions, and hauntings. From then on, she was always writing, often in her diary, where she liked to decorate declarations of existential angst with nail polish teardrops. Later, she channeled her penchant for scribbling into a more useful format, picking up a PhD in geography and then working in PR. Eventually, she figured out that happy endings were more fun than alien invasions. You can follow her on twitter at @jennyholi or visit her on the web at jennyholiday.com.



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