Copyright
Originally Published as
Sexy Little Surprises by J.C. Daniels
Copyright © 2012 by Shiloh Walker
Reissued in 2018
Cover by Shiloh Walker
This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.
All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
Sexy Little Secrets
After ten years in, Alexis Marshall thinks her marriage is over. Maybe it doesn’t matter that she still loves her husband, still dreams of him, still aches for him…maybe it doesn’t matter that her entire body longs for him…
But before she walks away, she’s going to try one more time to see if there is anything left. She’s pulling out all the stops. Sexy surprises, sweet seductions, provocative promises. Anything to remind him—and herself—of what they had together before an unexpected heartbreak tore them apart.
She’s not ready to let go of her marriage. And she’s out to seduce her husband and make him realize that some things are worth fighting for.
Chapter One
If anything sucked, it was spending an anniversary alone. Especially when you’d been stood up.
Alexis Marshall rested her elbows on the table, twirled her straw in her drink and stared at the seat across from her.
Empty.
He wasn’t there.
It was their tenth anniversary and Garrett wasn’t there. For the first ten minutes or so, she’d been patient…waiting. He was always late, after all. But after twenty minutes, she’d started to get upset.
Now it was running on thirty minutes and she’d moved past upset, thought briefly about crying…
But she was just too tired.
So damn tired.
“Ma’am…?”
Looking up, she met the impatient gaze of the waiter. “Can I get my check?” she asked quietly.
Get the check. Get out of here. Get the hell…where?
Did she want to go home?
No.
She couldn’t go home. He’d end up there eventually, once he unearthed himself from the mountain of work he always managed to bury himself under and she didn’t think she could handle seeing him.
If she could be angry, she’d go home.
But she suspected the tears would win out.
The tears…or worse.
Alexis was afraid she’d just feel like she did now. Numb. Tired. Empty.
And wouldn’t that just take the cake?
Her tenth anniversary. She had been stood up. And instead of being hurt and angry…she felt nothing.
* * * * *
“Did you call him?”
She hadn’t gone home. Instead of spending her tenth anniversary with her husband, she’d driven to a friend’s house and now she was staring into a fire and trying to figure out just what she was supposed think, how she was supposed to feel.
Looking up into Melissa’s eyes, Alexis shrugged. “No.” She twirled her almost empty wineglass and then tossed back the rest of the wine, reached for the bottle and filled it right back up. She’d bought the blackberry mead for Garrett. They both loved it and she’d been hoping— No. Screw what she’d been hoping for.
He hadn’t even had the courtesy to call. Her luck, he’d forgotten all about it.
“Why not?” Melissa demanded.
“Why would be the better question.”
“Wellll…” Melissa pursed her lips and leaned forward, gazing out the huge window at the fat, fluffy snowflakes that had started to fall over the past hour. It had started during the drive over and hadn’t let up since. Already there was more than a couple of inches of snow on the ground and the way this was going, there would be a lot more by the time it ended. “Maybe because when he gets home and you aren’t there, he’s going to worry? Hell, maybe he got held up. Maybe he was in a wreck. Maybe…”
Just then, her phone rang.
Staring at it with her heart lodged in her throat, Alexis froze.
“Are you going to answer?” Melissa asked quietly.
But Alexis just stared. It rolled over to voicemail and she went back to focusing on her wine.
From the corner of her eye, she was aware of her friend picking up her phone, checking the display.
“It was Garrett.”
She already knew that. She’d programmed the ringtone for the calls coming from their home number and his cell phone. She’d done it a year or so ago in a fit of nostalgia—True Companion. There had been a time when she’d thought that was the song for her and Garrett. But anymore…
The ache in her heart threatened to break free and she almost welcomed it. She’d rather hurt, damn it. Hurt instead of feel nothing. Anything was better than nothing But lately, that was all she felt—nothing. Just emptiness. She hated that more than anything else. She’d take pain, she’d take anger over the void inside her.
Carefully, she rose from her chair and made her way over to one of the seats closer to the fireplace. They were low slung, perfect for cuddling into, perfect for reading, or in her case…brooding.
“Why didn’t you call him from the restaurant?”
Swallowing around the knot in her throat, Alexis said quietly, “I think it’s over, Mel. I really, really do.”
There was a harsh intake of breath—the only response Melissa made for a long while.
As the seconds ticked away, Alexis nursed her wine, welcoming the warmth as it spread through her body.
Over.
Did she really need to consider that it was over?
She’d felt so empty, so apart from him for so long, and he never seemed to reach out to her, but she hadn’t realized it was this bad. Not until tonight.
He hadn’t even called.
There had been a time when he’d always called, or sent her an email, texted her—something to let her know he wouldn’t be home on time. And it had happened…often. Garrett was a cop and once he’d earned his detective’s shield, those hours had only become more insane.
Nobody understood how crazy the job was better than she did. Her dad had been a cop. Two of her brothers were. She understood the job, respected it. And he’d understood that she worried,
that she just wanted to know he was okay. So he kept in touch when he could while she tried not to worry. They made it work, damn it. Or at least they had…
But it wasn’t the job that was breaking them.
They were breaking them.
Yeah. As the tears started to burn her eyes, she whispered, “I think maybe it’s over.”
This time, Melissa spoke. “Honey…if that’s what you want…okay. But before you do anything, let me ask you something, and you need to think it through. Is that what you want?”
* * * * *
Bone-tired, sore and pissed, Garrett Marshall trudged up the sidewalk to the house, something nagging him in the back of his head, although he sure as hell couldn’t remember what it was.
The case he’d spent the past few months working on had finally come to a head. For the past three weeks, the task force working this one had been all but working around the clock as they got closer and closer to cracking it and then, today, finally, they tore it wide open. Now, thankfully, it was done.
That case had just about been the end of him. The brutal son of a bitch was locked up, and hopefully they could keep him that way. If they didn’t…
Hell. He passed
a hand over his face. He’d cross that bridge when he came to it. Although one thing was clear—he needed to get the hell out of the violent crimes unit. It was killing him inside, slowly. Piece by piece.
He’d already requested the transfer, too. Once he had all of this done, once he wrapped up his other cases…yeah. He was getting out. Violent crimes was just destroying him inside.
But he’d think about that later.
Right now, he just wanted to see Lexy.
Just see her.
They rarely spoke anymore, but on a day when he was as ragged as this, just seeing her made him feel better. Maybe he didn’t feel like he had the right to go to her and haul her into his arms, bury his face in her hair, the way he once had, but just seeing her made him better.
And right then, he needed to see her so bad, he hurt with it.
His hands were practically shaking as he unlocked the door. The alarm sounded and he scowled as he rounded the corner, resetting it. It was set for when nobody was here—motion alarms and all that shit.
“Lexy?”
Only silence responded.
He glanced down at the snow that covered him. Even the short walk from his car trunk to the front door had him covered in thick, wet flakes. It was almost nine and there was nearly four inches of snow on the ground. He’d listened absently to his scanner on the way home and already more than a dozen weather-related accidents had happened.
Maybe she’d gone to bed and just set it wrong. Although he knew that wasn’t it. He checked their bedroom.
Empty.
The garage…
Empty.
Worry curdled in his gut but he tamped it down. He’d call her. That first. But when he called her from the home phone, nobody answered.
Swearing, he pulled out his iPhone and groaned. The fucking battery had gone dead on him. He’d meant to charge it at the desk while he was doing the reports but he’d forgotten. He’d been too damn determined to get everything on the Bayside Rapist case tied up.
Exhaustion forgotten, he scrounged for the cord to his phone, plugged it in and went to his laptop. While it booted up, he started calling some of the people they used to hang around with. Sometimes, she went to the movies or shopping with Kara, so that was his first call.
Kara hadn’t seen or talked to her.
She was in the middle of asking him something, but he cut her off. “Okay, thanks. If you talk to her, let her know I’m looking for her?” Then he hung up.
Christy was one of her friends from the gym. Nope, hadn’t seen in her in a few days, hadn’t been to class, sorry!
Maybe she’d been held up at work. She worked in family law and sometimes that did keep her out late. The call to her private line at work rolled over to voicemail.
His worry started to ratchet up and still, at the back of his mind, he kept thinking there was something he was missing. He’d been running on too little sleep, too little food, and too much caffeine and nerves for the past few weeks and the last week, it had only gotten worse. Everything had come down to the line over the past forty-eight hours and he was existing on next to no sleep, very little food fueled by nothing but coffee and determination as he and his partner Adele got closer and closer to bringing down a man who’d tortured and raped more than a dozen women.
He was not in a good frame of mind to be trying to think right now. Where the hell was his wife? Absently, he rubbed his finger over his wedding ring as he logged into his email.
And there…
He saw what he’d forgotten
The Google calendar reminder—one he would have seen if he’d checked his phone at any time in the past few hours.
Feeling a little sick, he stumbled back a few steps until his back hit the refrigerator. “My anniversary.”
Closing his eyes, he shoved his hands through his hair, fisted them.
His fucking anniversary.
Damn it. Of all the fucking days for a case to come to a close.
“No.” He scrubbed his hands over his face, then lowered them, staring off into nothing. Yeah, he’d finally managed to close one nightmare of a case but there was no justifying this and he knew it.
Swallowing the bitter, nasty taste of guilt that was crawling up his throat, he moved back to the counter and checked his iPhone once more. It had charged enough to for him to use it, so he checked to make sure she hadn’t called.
No.
Of course, he wasn’t surprised.
That wasn’t her style. Lexy was too…proud.
She was either pissed off, or hurting, he figured.
Or maybe she wasn’t.
They never talked anymore. Yeah, she’d made plans for this, but that was what Lexy did. She made plans, she followed through. She was all smooth and polished and elegance and control. It would make sense for her to plan an anniversary dinner, but did she even care?
Rubbing his hand over the hollow ache in his chest, he muttered, “I do.”
Damn it. He’d fucked up badly this time.
And he still didn’t know where—
No, actually, now that he thought about it, he did know where she was.
As he scrolled through the contacts, he mentally rehearsed what he was going to say.
He just needed to talk to her. Tell her he was sorry.
He’d fucked up. He’d own up to it. He’d make it up to her.
He could do that…right?
Distantly, Alexis heard the phone ring.
It was Melissa’s landline, though, so she tuned it out and continued to stare at the fire.
Is that what you want?
Melissa’s question circled around and around through her head.
Did she want her marriage to end?
No. She wanted it go back to the way it had been. Back when they’d been happy. Back before…
“Sweetie?”
Rolling her head on the padded back of the chair, she met Melissa’s soft blue gaze. “Yeah?”
Melissa shifted from one foot to the other, holding the phone in her hand. She had the mouthpiece covered and she kept biting at her lower lip, a habitual nervous gesture she’d had all of her life. It was enough to tell Alexis what she needed to know.
Closing her eyes, she looked back at the fire. “I need a little while, Mel. Okay?”
“Sure thing, Lex.”
A moment later, she was alone.
Alone. Remembering. Remembering back when they’d been happy.
When had it been?
Not last year.
It had been strained. Stilted.
Not their eighth, either. Although then, at least, they’d been together…really together, not just two strangers sharing what was supposed to be a romantic meal.
She’d still been too weak and tired to go out.
But that hadn’t stopped Garrett from bringing the romance to her. A posh dinner from Vincenzo’s, a local upscale Italian place. Wine. He’d given her a necklace. Absently, she reached up to it. She still wore it. Almost every day. Felt naked without it.
That meant something. Right?
Their seventh, she decided.
That had been a good one.
They’d actually planned a vacation around it. Tired of the snow and the cold, they’d headed to Florida. Disney World. Sighing, she let her thoughts drift.
Pleasure Island.
She’d dragged him through Magic Kingdom and Animal Kingdom, watching him laugh as she flirted with Goofy.
Yes. That had been a good one.
And sadly, that was what had led to the beginning of the end, it seemed…
* * * * *
“You keep letting that floppy-eared dog flirt with you, I’m going to think you’ve got a hidden furry kink or something,” Garrett murmured as he came up behind her.
She stood at the window, staring outside, watching as the fireworks exploded over the castle.
Lovely, she decided. It was lovely. Maybe it even had a little bit of magic to it.
Then Garrett dipped h
is head and raked his teeth across her neck and she groaned. And that really did have some magic in it, the way he touched her.
“Do you?”
“Do I what?” she asked.
He stroked his hands up her torso until he could cup her breasts, plumping them together. “Do you have some hidden kink for furries or something?”
A started laugh bubbled out of her and she turned in his arms. “Oh, baby. You know it,” she purred, leaning against him. “Go buy a Goofy costume and make love to me.”
Garrett dipped his head and nipped her lip. “How about I just fuck you right here?”
As his hands pushed under the hem of her shirt, she leaned back against the window. “I think I could settle for that. Provided you do a good enough job.”
He snorted. A few seconds later, he’d made quick work of her bra and as he stripped away that, and her T-shirt, Alexis closed her eyes, sighing in pleasure at the feel of his hands.
Nobody had ever made her feel the way he had.
Nobody ever would…and she knew it. Knew it her bones, in her heart, in her soul. Straight to the very core of her.
“Look at me, Lexy.”
She opened her eyes, found herself lost in the dark midnight of his eyes. His hair tumbled into his eyes and she reached up, brushed it back, hooked her hand over the back of his neck. Drawing him in…
As he slanted his mouth over hers, she opened for him. He tasted so familiar, and still so wicked, so wild and hot. Like the wine they’d shared at dinner, like sunshine and rain…like Garrett.
Stroking her tongue over his, she arched against him and groaned at the feel of her breasts pressed against his chest. He still wore his T-shirt and the worn cotton was too abrasive against her sensitive nipples. Pulling back, she reached for the hem of his shirt. “Take this off,” she demanded.
“Yes, ma’am,” he muttered, stripping it away. Muscles flexed in his arms, his belly as he dropped it to the floor and reached for her once more. The dim light of the room cast the sculpted planes of his chest and belly into shadow.
She reached out and rested her hands against his chest, lightly tugging at the light dusting of copper-brown hair across his chest. A groan rumbled out of him as he reached for her. “Come here, Lexy…my pretty Lexy.”
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