Exquisitely Yours: A Sin City Tale

by M. Jay Granberry

  “Don’t stop, don’t stop, don’t stop,” he pants, twisting his hands in my hair, pulling to the point of pain, and pumping into my mouth with stilted, jagged thrusts of his hips.

  Stop? Stopping isn’t an option. We’re too far gone, too lust-drunk and needy. There is no stopping. There is only us. His body taking what he wants from mine.

  It’s primal.

  Possessive.

  Abso-fucking-lute.

  I’m not stopping until his essence floods my mouth, until the memory of me sucking him deep and taking him to the edge of ecstasy is scorched on his retinas.

  “I’m almost there. Just a little . . .”

  I grip him in a tight fist working in tandem with my mouth. His eyes never leave mine as he shudders and releases deep in my throat.

  Seth pulls himself free with a groan and those pillow-soft lips immediately find mine. We kiss until our pulses slow and our breaths even out, until his lips on mine is little more than skin meeting skin . The quiet is somber. The ache of two breaking hearts replaces our shared passion with unspoken sadness.

  When he pulls back, his eyes are glassy with unshed tears as he studies me.

  “So, this is good-bye then?”

  “This is good-bye,” I parrot with hard finality that leaves little room for what-ifs or maybes.

  A couple of tears leak from the corners of his eyes, but he squeezes them shut, cutting off the flow.

  “Aw, baby,” I say. I swipe my thumb over the ridge of his cheekbone. You’re breaking my fucking heart. He leans forward again, kissing me one last time before he stands. His movements are slow and methodical. There is a slight tremor to his hands when he pulls up his shorts. I see him start to morph into the ideal bodyguard—the elite soldier. His eyes lose their innate softness, and his jaw sets in an unforgiving hard line. He pulls in all that emotion and stuffs it somewhere far away from the surface. A little part of me hurts that I’ve caused this.

  “Seth . . .” I say, guilt coating his name in my increasing misery.

  I can’t do this.

  I can’t let him go.

  “Don’t,” he says, rubbing the back of his neck. “No explanation necessary. I understand. I do. Let’s just . . . Let’s just take it for what it is . . . I mean, was.” He won’t look at me as he speaks. When I sit up, naturally leaning toward him, I attempt to rest my hand on the back of his knee. It is an automatic gesture. He skirts my touch, immediately backing away. The rejection, however slight, however deserved, guts me.

  “I gotta go. Sin gets in today. I have to get to the hotel and make sure everything is ready.” He continues to refuse my gaze as he steps into the house, slipping quietly through the door.

  I drop back on the chaise lounge with a thud. Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! Fuuuuuck! I punch my hands into the air and thump my head on the thick padding of the chaise. I’ve never been a romantic. That’s my best friend, Sin, not me. Dammit, just this once I wish I was. I wish I had it in me to give him an epic kind of love. The kind that fills the pages of a notebook and inspires hit songs.

  Fifteen minutes later, I catch a glimpse of Seth through the sliding glass doors. He’s dressed with a backpack slung over his broad shoulder, radio piece in his ear, and a gun clipped to his belt. Those gorgeous brown eyes are covered with dark sunglasses and those soft lips I kissed are pressed tight into a thin, stoic line. The sound of his boots beats a steady cadence on the wooden floor as he passes in the hallway.

  I stand just outside the open door, my hands pressed on either side of the metal frame.

  “Seth?” I whisper.

  His footsteps pause halfway to the front door, but he doesn’t turn around.

  “I’m . . .” Terrified that when you walk out that door, you’ll take a piece of me. A giant piece I’ll never get back.

  “I’m sorry,” I say instead. His shoulders rise and fall with one big heaving breath before he continues toward the door. He doesn’t look at me or acknowledge my unbefitting apology.

  I let my head hang heavy and the muscles between my shoulder blades pull tight. I can’t watch him walk out. Even though it’s the right thing—possibly the best thing—I can’t watch it. I won’t. My heart beats faster as his footsteps move away. I hold my breath when the door opens, and when it closes, I exhale a long-frustrated stream of moist air.

  So, this is what a real good-bye feels like? Like someone just placed my heart in a blender and pulverized it.

  Here is a super special sneak preview

  of my WIP Master of Fate

  It matters not how strait the gate,

  How charged with punishments the scroll,

  I am the master of my fate,

  I am the captain of my soul.

  —Invictus, William Earnest Henley

  Prologue

  Fear is an equalizer.

  Every person—man, woman, child—understands the metallic taste of panic at the back of your throat, the feel of a rapidly beating heart trying to pound out of your chest, and the unmistakable rush of adrenaline making your muscles twitch with an ancient fight or flight instinct.

  Fear is universal, a sensory reminder that above all things you are human. Extraordinarily created yet deeply flawed and fallible.

  Controlling fear, harnessing it as motivation, using it as the steel to sharpen the blade of ambition and determination is what differentiates the predator from the prey. Its why lesser men bow to kings. And why I bow to no one.

  It takes gorilla sized balls to come into my city and make moves. To treat me as a pawn to be maneuvered and sacrificed, to demand I take a knee, that I pay tribute. For that reason, the interlopers have a modicum of my respect.

  Men of action are risk takers and move makers, bosses and wanna be bosses. Unfortunately, this risk was a mistake. One that tipped the scales significantly in my favor.

  Defeat is coming. It’s evitable. Especially since I have her.

  The last eighteen years of my life have been a training ground of sorts culminating to this moment. Where the motherfucka that murdered my mother and sent me running shattered and alone across state lines at thirteen, to a new city and a family that didn’t quite fit, stands in judgement for every transgression.

  I will be the presiding judge, and hungry prosecutor. The unsympathetic jury, and ice-cold executioner. Get back is jungle level. An Old Testament, Code of Hammurabi, lex talionis— you take from me I destroy you— type of revenge.

  You want to play asshole?

  Game On.

  COMING SOON...

  AKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  It’s the end of the book and here’s the bizness. . .

  Soooo. . .COVID happened, and my world turned inside out. Getting back to writing has been harder than I thought it would be. It is real in these publishing streets y’all. I’ve made a crap ton of changes, that I’m honestly not sure will pan out. But we are in this ish together. If you stick with me, I swear I’ll stick with you, and we’ll ride this thing until the wheels fall off.

  Jessica and Dan’s story is maybe one of my favorites! It doesn’t have half of the angst, but their story is real, and sometimes uncomfortable, and the messy type of love we see and experience IRL. I love this couple for being messy and insecure, and for being themselves when it would have been easier to be anyone else.

  That said, I’m supposed to be thanking people, so let me get on to it...

  Tovah, you listen, you provide feedback, you genuinely care! You regularly talk me off the ledge, and down the hill when I’m spun out and crazy. THANK YOU!!! Of all the people that I have met on this journey, you lady, are the bonified truth!

  Najla and the whole design team you make sense out of my nonsense and sanity from my crazy and somehow come up with beautiful covers and interiors. You, my friends, are all the things! Thank you!

  And to you, the AWESOME reader
, who actually picked up this book and gave me a chance THANK YOU! I hope you felt something and were thoroughly entertained! BIG hugs!

  That’s it for me.

  Mjay out!

  xx

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  M. Jay Granberry is first and foremost an insatiable reader.

  Among her favorite things are classic fairy tales, smutty books where characters have heart, old lady sweaters (preferably chunky knit), gift baskets (giving not receiving), and charcuterie trays (green olives, smoked cheese, and Genoa salami).

  She’s a true Las Vegas native, the one in Nevada not New Mexico, and to answer the most frequently asked questions about growing up in Sin City…

  No, she doesn’t live in a hotel.

  No, she has never been a stripper although she does know some.

  Prostitution is absolutely illegal in Clark County (Las Vegas)!

  And what happens in Vegas does indeed stay in Vegas.

  M. Jay earned a degree in words and stories, and after fifteen plus years of doing everything other than writing, she penned her first novel. Giving a voice to characters, that are strong yet fragile, that are sometimes uncomfortably real, that express love in the dirtiest ways with the sweetest sentiments is honestly a dream come true.