“Get your buddy and get out of my bar.”
“He started it.”
“Yeah, but his name’s over the door, so get out and don’t bother coming back.”
Once they were gone, Scott batted at Jamie’s hand again. “You can let go now. And you didn’t have to do that.”
She released her grip on his hair. “I wouldn’t have had to do that if you’d listened to me.”
“This isn’t the station.”
“No, it’s not,” Lydia broke in, pointing the bat at him. “It’s our bar and if you pull this stupid shit again, you can find another place to hang out. Now go put some ice on that eye for a few minutes and then clean up that beer.”
“That’s mine,” Jamie said. “Just tell me where the mop is.”
“He can do it.”
Lydia walked away, and Jamie might have smiled at the exasperated look Scott sent after his older sister, but she was too annoyed with him. And with the way Danny was watching them.
“Show me where the mop is,” she said. “I’ll clean this up while you put ice on that eye.”
“You okay for a few minutes, Danny?” he asked.
“I’m good.”
Jamie followed him, her eyes on the back of his head. Because he’d gotten sweaty in the tussle with the douche bag, she could still see the ruffled area where her fingers had been buried in his hair.
It was tempting to reach out and smooth the strands so she wouldn’t be distracted, but she curled her hands into fists instead. No more touching Scott Kincaid.
Don’t miss
FULLY IGNITED by Shannon Stacey,
Available March 2016
In digital and print
www.CarinaPress.com
Copyright © 2016 by Shannon Stacey
Acknowledgments
Thank you to Angela James and everybody at Carina Press for your support, encouragement and enthusiasm.
The Kowalski Series from Shannon Stacey
Suggested reading order
Exclusively Yours
Undeniably Yours
Yours to Keep
All He Ever Needed
All He Ever Desired
All He Ever Dreamed
Love a Little Sideways
Taken with You
Falling for Max
Also available from Shannon Stacey
and Carina Press
Holiday Sparks
Mistletoe & Margaritas
Slow Summer Kisses
Snowbound with the CEO
Heat Exchange
Controlled Burn
Fully Ignited
Also available from Shannon Stacey
and Harlequin
Alone with You
Heart of the Storm
About the Author
New York Times and USA TODAY bestselling author Shannon Stacey lives with her husband and two sons in New England, where her two favorite activities are writing stories of happily-ever-after and driving her UTV through the mud. You can contact Shannon through her website, shannonstacey.com, where she maintains an almost daily blog, or visit her on Twitter at Twitter.com/shannonstacey, her Facebook page, Facebook.com/shannonstacey.authorpage, or email her at [email protected].
To find out about other books by Shannon Stacey or to be alerted to new releases, sign up for her monthly newsletter here or at bit.ly/shannonstaceynewsletter.
The Kowalskis series by New York Times bestselling author Shannon Stacey
EXCLUSIVELY YOURS
The Kowalskis, book one
UNDENIABLY YOURS
The Kowalskis, book two
YOURS TO KEEP
The Kowalskis, book three
ALL HE EVER NEEDED
The Kowalskis, book four
ALL HE EVER DESIRED
The Kowalskis, book five
ALL HE EVER DREAMED
The Kowalskis, book six
LOVE A LITTLE SIDEWAYS
The Kowalskis, book seven
TAKEN WITH YOU
The Kowalskis, book eight
FALLING FOR MAX
The Kowalskis, book nine
Fall in love with the New York Times bestselling series from Shannon Stacey, available now at CarinaPress.com and wherever ebooks are sold.
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Tough. Dedicated.
Meet the men of
“This is the perfect blend of sweet and sexy for those who love a bit of firefighter action!”
—Heroes and Heartbreakers
HEAT EXCHANGE, Boston Fire, book one
CONTROLLED BURN, Boston Fire, book two
FULLY IGNITED, Boston Fire, book three
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Pick up a new sport this season! Scoring a happy-ever-after is always guaranteed.
KNOCK OUT by Michele Mannon
Worth the Fight, book one
“With her gifted writing, Mannon allows readers to laugh out loud, swoon and bite their fingernails at all the appropriate times.”—RT Book Reviews, Top Pick!
A former ballerina turned ring girl meets her match in a brooding, sexy MMA fighter.
KNOWING THE SCORE by Kat Latham
London Legends, book one
“I love Kat Latham’s London Legends series—the rugby players are hot, the emotion is hard-hitting and the sex is sizzling!”—Molly O’Keefe, RITA-award-winning and bestselling author
A rugby player with a scandalous past gives up his vow of celibacy to help a virgin overcome her fear of intimacy.
PAIRING OFF by Elizabeth Harmon
Red Hot Russians, book one
“While I found the end to be a bit cheesy, it was the good kind of cheese!”
—The Book Pushers
A scandal-plagued American figure skater’s last chance at gold means pairing up with Russia’s sexiest male skater...who happens to be the first man she ever loved.
THE WINNING SEASON by Alison Packard
Feeling the Heat, book two
“This was a triefecta for me—a great heroine, a realistic courtship, and the added benefit of a well-integrated backdrop. It’s one of of my favorite books of the year.”—Dear Author
After hitting rock bottom, bad-boy catcher Matt Scanlon is traded to the team he’s loathed since boyhood, and he must confront a painful incident in his past before he can rebuild his life and his career.
RUSH ME by Allison Parr
“Parr delivers sharp, witty dialogue and sarcastic one-liners that I found hilarious. And, you get football.”
—USA TODAY
When post-grad Racheal Hamilton accidentally gatecrashes a pro-athlete party, she finds herself alone with quarterback Ryan Carter, darling of the professional football league. She thinks he’s a dumb jock with a sexist attitude, and he thinks she’s an uptight, elitist snob. But when Rachel reluctantly agrees to cohost dinners at Ryan’s apartment, the two opposites find they have more in common than they imagined.
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We think you have a good book in you!
Do you write in the below genres? Harlequin’s Carina Press wants to see your manuscript.
• Contemporary Romance
• Romantic Suspense
• Historical Romance
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Submit today! All manuscripts receive a thorough evaluation by a Carina Press editor and a decision within 12–16 weeks. What do you have to lose?
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ISBN-13: 9781459290150
A Fighting Chance
Copyright © 2016 by Shannon Stacey
All rights reserved. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario, Canada M3B 3K9.
All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.
This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
® and ™ are trademarks of the publisher. Trademarks indicated with ® are registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the Canadian Intellectual Property Office and in other countries.
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A Fighting Chance Page 14