by Peyton Banks
Rosemary gave her a knowing nod. “That’s my girl. Sounds like you two are going to do just fine.”
“I hope so.” Noah turned to shield her from a sudden wind that blew down the street. Rosemary’s bus rumbled into view. “There’s just one more thing to ask you before your bus arrives.”
Rosemary looked between them with a curious curve to her eyebrow. “What’s that, young man?”
“Would you like to come to our house for dinner sometime?”
Sage stood by and watched as Noah added Rosemary’s phone number into his phone. He was the perfect gentleman and helped Rosemary to her feet when the bus arrived.
They waved as the bus moved off down the street, and when it was out of sight, Sage turned and wrapped her arms around his neck. “You know what?”
He enveloped her in his arms as well. “What?”
“With all of the worries I had, and all the thoughts that were spinning around and around in my head, it all came down to one thing.”
She saw him hesitate for just a moment.
“What’s that?”
Sage leaned her head back for a moment, looking up at the vast canopy of autumn colors above their heads before she met his warm gaze with her own. “That everything I was worried about didn’t mean a thing when it came right down to it.”
“Really now?” Noah’s face was the most beautiful thing she’d ever seen. “Then what did?”
Standing there in the circle of his arms she didn’t feel the chill of the autumn air, she felt warm from the inside out.
“All that mattered was that with you, the easiest thing in the world was to fall in love.”
About the Author
As an author and reader, I’m all over the place Sweet to Heat, Contemporary to Historical, Paranormal to… well, normal! Books were my fantasy, my salvation, a vacation on paper. In books I could travel the world, discover different times, and live a thousand lives and more… I want to share that same joy with others and hope that my books find their way onto keeper shelves and readers hearts.
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Give Me Your Heart
THERESA HODGE
BLURB
Ex NBA Pro Basketball Star, Joshua Perry, is retiring after suffering an injury. He’s going home again and is on a mission— a mission to claim his one true love and fix a mistake from the past.
Jada has only loved one boy during her teenage years. That same boy broke her heart, and she swore to never forgive him.
Many years later, Joshua returns as a man in pursuit of a woman who still holds his heart. Will it be too late for Joshua to claim his woman?
Will Jada allow her one true love to put back the pieces of her heart, and give love between them a second chance?
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Give Me Your Heart is a second chance romance with no cheating and a HEA.
To all the believers of forgiveness and second chances.
Prologue
Jada
When I left Long Cane Middle School, I was devastated. I had just lost my mom a year before to breast cancer, and my dad was having a hard time staying in a city that had so many memories of my mom. Losing her hit us hard.
Jeremy, my little brother, was only six and I had just turned twelve nine months after my mom passed away. My mom always made our birthdays and holidays special. She allowed me to have sleep overs, but all those fun things came to a halt after her death. Months before moving to Atlanta from Lagrange, my friends and I became distant. My life as I knew it a year before, had come crashing down around my eleven year old world.
I wouldn’t come to know later how hard my dad tried to hold it together for his children. I wasn’t emotionally mature enough to understand how much losing a forever partner could destroy a man. My pain was too great to understand why my dad wanted to leave a place that I grew up and all the people we knew would be left behind.
My parents said that they had met in college and fell in love almost instantly. They often spoke about how Jeremy and I were the best things to happen to them. They said that Jeremy and I were the physical evidence of their love. Especially since my mom thought she couldn’t have any more children after me. It took almost seven years after I was born for her to get pregnant again.
Four years after Jeremy was born, mom discovered she had breast cancer in her left breast. After that, the cancer progressed quickly. Almost a year later, she died from a pulmonary embolism from the side effects of her therapy.
After we arrived in Atlanta Georgia and dad was transferred to a new company, I became more withdrawn. Jeremy was younger and adapting so much better than me. My dad’s much older sister, Aunt Janel, lived near us in Atlanta. My Aunt was a retired nurse and she helped my dad look after us whenever he needed her to. She had lost her husband years ago and she was all too willing to lend a helping hand.
It took me three years to finally feel like I was home. It began my ninth grade year at Northview High school. The same year I met Joshua Perry, and my entire world changed forever.
Senior Year 
“Happy eighteenth birthday,” Joshua said against my ear.
A shiver ran down my spine, as I thanked him and stared into his dark-brown, piercing eyes. Joshua Perry was the most handsome guy I knew. He stood over six feet, three inches tall, broad shoulders, trimmed waistline, and he had six pack abs you could bounce a quarter off of. Joshua also had melanin rich skin of dark espresso. He complemented my coffee with a splash of cream skin tone.
I always thought of Joshua as my new beginning—because that’s when I could finally breathe again. I could finally think of my mom without tears—tears had been replaced by the fond memories and the love that I had for her, and the love that she had for her family. Memories that I would keep alive with me always.
“Are you nervous?” Joshua asked me, cutting into my thoughts.
“Yes,” I admitted truthfully. I was a virgin, but I wanted Joshua to be my first, before we went our separate ways to college. I would be going here to Clarke University but Joshua had been signed to the Kentucky Wildcats. Joshua had been Northview’s number one lottery pick in the state of Georgia.
I always knew that he was destined for greatness, and I was awed that he chose me to be his girlfriend. Sure, I was smart, and mostly made A’s in all my classes but I wasn’t a cheerleader, or anything like that. My extracurricular activities were the National Honor Society, Academic Club, and the Student Government.
So, if my dad knew I was here at the Whitley Hotel getting ready to have sex with Joshua and not saving myself for marriage, he would be so disappointed. I was the good girl who he expected to do the right things and never veer off course. But my love for Joshua won out with my heart. How could sharing my body with the only boy I had ever loved and who loved me be wrong? Joshua was not only my boyfriend, he was also my best friend, besides Asia.
“I’ll go slow and I’ll stop any time you tell me to stop,” Joshua promised.
“Okay,” I nodded and allowed him to remove my clothes.
Joshua gave me a charismatic grin and I felt a shiver slither down my spine.
Joshua disrobed, while I waited on the big, queen-sized bed. My heart battered nervously against my chest. I felt a strange pulsing throb in my center, as I watched his bare-chest being revealed, as he pulled off his tee shirt, and low riding jeans. He nudged his feet from his Air Jordan’s.
My God, he was beautiful! I gulped when my eyes trailed down to take in his hardness. We did a lot of kissing and even some petting but we never had gone this far. I had never seen Joshua naked or expected him to be so huge.
“Don’t look so scared. I promise I won’t hurt you,” Joshua said.
I scooted over on the bed, to make room for Joshua to join me. In that moment, I didn’t care that I was afraid, I wanted—needed him to make me a woman.
Joshua’s brown eyes gleamed, as he slid on a condom and came
to hover over me. Our lips met and I sighed, allowing his tongue to slide into my mouth. A raging heat built inside of me, when our tongues met and tangled. I felt safe with Joshua. And when he laid me down and entered me for the first time, tears seeped from the corner of my eyes. Not because it hurt, which it did... I cried tears of joy from the completeness I felt in my heart, body, and soul.
Slowly, ever so slowly, he rocked back and forth into my heat. I mimicked the motion of Joshua’s hips. Soft moans slipped past my lips, as he pushed deeper and deeper into my wetness.
“Cum for me sweetheart,” Joshua grunted, as sweat gleamed from his toned muscles.
Tiny spasms zinged through my core and built into a core clenching orgasm. “Joshua!” I screamed just as he plunged to the hilt and grunted. Even with the condom, I felt the hotness of his seed exploding within the latex.
Joshua turned my shuddering body into his side, as his arms came around me to hold me close. “Please tell me I didn’t hurt you,” Joshua said.
“Only a little bit,” I replied, closing my eyes and burying my face against his chest. “It felt so much better than I expected.”
Letting out a long breath, Joshua rolled to his back, pulling me on top of him after he disposed of the used condom. I laid my head on his broad chest and listened to the pounding of his heartbeat.
It felt even better to feel his semi hard erection against my mound. I squirmed on top of him, feeling another tingling in my core.
“I love you so much, Jada. Never forget that,” Joshua said and proceeded to kiss me thoroughly.
“I love you too,” I murmured against his lips, becoming lost in his love once again.
The last two months leading up to graduation, Joshua had invited me to his team’s victory party but I came down sick with a cold. He wanted to stay with me to keep me company but I made him go anyway.
Joshua promised that he would just make an appearance since he was the star player for our school’s basketball team. I was so drugged from the cold medicine that I drifted off to sleep and slept for the rest of the night. The next morning, I woke up and checked my cell phone. I was surprised I didn’t have a text from Joshua.
After I jumped in the shower, I felt so much better than the day before. I dressed and went back in my bedroom, to send Joshua a quick text on my cell phone.
Me: Hey, I miss you. I hope you had a great time last night.
I held my phone for a couple of minutes, waiting for Joshua to text back. After a while, I decided to call him, but it went straight to voicemail.
My dad walked into the room, just as I was frowning down at my phone.
“Good morning, honey. Are you feeling any better?”
“I feel so much better,” I said, placing my cell phone on the bedside table.
My dad walked over to place his hand against my forehead.
“Good. Doesn’t feel like you have a fever. Come on down for breakfast, before your brother eats up all the pancakes.”
I nodded and stood to my feet to follow my dad out of the room. I pushed my lingering thoughts of Joshua out of my head.
Saturday passed and I was just getting ready for bed when my cell phone beeped with an incoming message from my friend Asia.
Asia: Call me first thing in the morning. I have something important to tell you.
Me: Tell me now.
Asia: Nope it can wait.
Me: Okay. ☹
I was turning back my bed covers, when another beep came in from my cell. I smiled knowing that whatever Asia had to tell me couldn’t keep. I picked up my phone to check the screen. It was Joshua instead of Asia.
“Hey, I’m outside. Can you let me in or can you come out?”
“I can come out,” I texted back. I knew my dad was in his bedroom and so was my brother. I didn’t want to get in trouble by letting Joshua inside this late at night.
I put on my sneakers and quietly made my way out of the house. Joshua was waiting on the front, dimly lit stoop. His hands were deep in the pockets of his sweatpants, and he had a matching hoodie pulled low over his head.
I smiled and bit my bottom lip, looking up into his handsome face. My smile slipped when I saw the grave look in his eyes.
“Hey babe,” he said. “I’m sorry I missed your texts and call earlier. I’m also sorry I didn’t call you last night, as promised.”
“Why didn’t you? Is something wrong?”
Joshua leaned down to peer into my eyes. “You love me, right?”
“I do,” I answered promptly.
“You know that there will never be anyone else for me, right?”
“I feel the same,” I replied, wondering where Joshua was going with all of this.
He stepped back and reached into his pocket. He pulled out a black velvet box… Joshua flipped it open and on the lighted porch. I could see a two strip platinum ring, with studded diamonds, interweaved into an infinity pattern. I gasped looking at the dazzling halo of diamonds in the center.
“Wha—what is this?” I asked, not believing the ring Joshua held out in his outstretched hand before me.
Joshua grabbed my hand and slipped the ring on my ring finger. “I was going to wait and give you this when I left for college but I wanted to give it to you now. This is a promise ring and I want it to be just you and me. Even when we go to different Universities, I don’t want you dating anyone else. I want you to belong to me and me alone.”
“Oh Joshua! Do you mean it?” I replied.
“Yes. I mean every word,” he replied and I threw my arms around him.
Our lips met and Joshua’s thick lips brushed mine softly, delicately, and sensually. I breathed in his scent of citrus and fresh mint. The kiss deepened and lingered before he slowly pulled away.
For the rest of the weekend, Joshua and I were in our own world. Asia called me but her calls went unanswered. I would talk to her in school on Monday. I knew she would understand, once I showed her my promise ring. She would be as happy as I am. Asia had always been our biggest supporter.
Monday
* * *
“Hey Asia!” I said, as she walked up to me at the lockers. “I’m sorry that I didn’t get to call you back yesterday. Look what Joshua gave me,” I flashed my promise ring in front of her face.
“Oh, Jada!” Asia said. The smile I expected to see on her face was turned into a frown instead. “I need to talk to you. But not here. We have time to go to the restroom before class.”
“Sadie, did you hear about the head cheerleader Destiny Edwards and Joshua Perry hooking up at the party on Friday night?” a voice said, on the other side of my open locker.
My eyes collided with Asia’s. Her mouth flew open but no words came out, as she looked at me with concern.
I slammed my locker, forgetting about collecting my books and stared at the girl whose words broke my heart in a thousand pieces.
“What did you say?” I asked, with tears sprouting my eyes.
“Jada! I didn’t know you were there. Sorry,” the girl that I remembered being in my English class said.
“Come on,” my friend Asia didn’t wait for me to reply, as she drug me off to the restroom.
“Did you know?” I turned and asked her as soon as we were alone.
Asia couldn’t look me in the eyes, as she glanced down at the beige and brown tiled floor. “That’s what I wanted to talk to you about yesterday but you never returned my calls or texts. I tried,” she said, before looking into my tear filled eyes.
“He lied to me!” I shouted, not caring who walked in to hear me. My hands covered my face, as my frame shuddered with tears. “I hate him.”
“No you don’t. Give him time to explain. Maybe—”
“Jada, baby!” Joshua came running into the girls restroom. “I can explain.”
“Explain what?” I shouted. “Did you have sex with Destiny Edwards or not?”
“Asia give me time to talk to my girl alone.”
“No. Asia stays!”
“I’m going to go and watch the door and make sure no one comes in. I’ll be right out front. Scream if you need me and I will be right back in here to kick ass or whatever you need me to do,” Asia said, giving Joshua an angry glance.
Joshua and I just stared at one another until Asia was out of sight. “I promised you I would never lie to you Jada, and I won’t. I was drunk out of my mind on Friday night. I don’t remember having sex with Destiny. We woke up together but that’s all I remember.”
“Were the two of you naked?”
Joshua looked down at his sneaker clad feet.
“I don’t want you to call me, speak to me, or see you ever again!” I twisted the ring off my finger and threw it at his chest. It bounced off his shirt and hit the floor.
“Please don’t do this. I made one fucking mistake that I don’t even remember doing. I love you! Those other bitches mean fucking nothing to me. You got to—”
Slap! My hand stung after it made connection with his left cheek.
My heart was broken and in that moment I felt like it would never feel the same again. Losing Joshua was like experiencing death all over again. The next two months until my graduation, I avoided Joshua as best I could. I turned the other way whenever we were in the same vicinity.
I promised myself to never let anyone hurt me in that way again. I may have been young and in love but that love was as real as it got.
1
Twelve Years Later
Jada