âYou want inside the house, right? Maybe we can make a deal.â Darioâs voice was husky.
Cassidy couldnât hide her desperation to search for the jewels. âYeah.â
âAnd my dad wants you to drop your claim on the place.â
âTrue,â she said, wondering where he was headed with all this.
âSex.â
She blinked. âSex?â
He nodded. âYou can stay in the house all week and search to your heartâs content, but only on the condition that youâll be my love slave.â
Her heart was beating a fast tattoo, and it had very little to do with the fact that the worldâs best-looking man was standing a mere foot away. âAre you serious?â
âThereâs one more thing.â
His gorgeous dark eyes had settled on the bed. The hotel room seemed dimmer now, but only because night had fallen. Moonlight was streaming through the windows.
âWhatâs that?â she asked in a whisper.
âThe sex starts now.â
JULE McBRIDE
is a native West Virginian. Her dream to write romances came true in the nineties with the publication of her debut novel Wild Card Wedding. It received the RomanticTimesBOOKreviews Reviewerâs Choice Award for Best First Series Romance. Since then, the author has been nominated for multiple awards, including two lifetime achievement awards. She has written for several series, and currently makes her happy home at Blaze®. A prolific writer, she has more than thirty titles to her credit.
Dear Reader,
I admit to being a fan of stories about cold cases. The older the mystery and colder the trail, the more intrigued I get. A second thing I love is reading about sexy cops, so it was only natural that Iâd eventually put these two things together for Blaze®.
Oh, and before I forget â a third thing I love is a super-hot romance! So, quite simply, the idea for Cold Case, Hot Bodies came to me when I put all my favourites into one steamy love story. When an old case involving a haunted property is reopened, a descendant of the harmed party finds herself wrapped in the strong arms of the law. And what could be better than that?
Enjoy!
And thank you so much for reading! Itâs what keeps me writing.
Very best wishes,
Jule McBride
December 1890
GEM OâSHEA GLIDED her hands beneath her loverâs shirt, feeling his nipples contract. It was exactly the kind of well-made shirt sheâd sewn in sweatshops when sheâd first come from Ireland, and her lips curved into a smile against the linen. âDo you remember when you firstâ¦bought me, Nathaniel?â
He grinned, his eyes catching light through the carriage window, from one of the gas lamps lining the dark river road. âI donât believe I do.â
But he couldnât have forgotten the night sheâd presented herself at Angelâs Cloud, in New Yorkâs notorious Five Points neighborhood, determined to sell herself to the highest bidder. âShould I remind you?â
âOf every detail.â He urged her closer, between his legs, and the satin dress sheâd worn to the wedding bunched between them, an unwanted barrier. She brought her mouth to his, and the taste of wedding cake invaded her senses.
âI had too much champagne,â she whispered.
âYou wonât hear me complaining.â
Heat surged through her limbs despite the cold. Everything but passion vanished as Nathaniel deepened the kissâthe pounding hooves on the cobbled road, the rushing of the East Riverâs wild currents, the crack of the driverâs whip. Hungrily, her fingers opened the studs of his shirt. Just as quickly, his tongue swept inside her mouth. Heat exploded as she stroked his chest hair, and she felt it catch on the backs of her ringsâbeautiful rings that were gifts from him, just a few of the countless jewels heâd given her over the years.
As desire took her, Gem thought of another kiss, the one theyâd just witnessed at the altar between her and Nathanielâs son, Mark, and his young bride, Lily Jordan. With the memory, her arms swept around Nathanielâs neck, and she wished with all her heart she could marry him. How many nights had she lain awake, knowing her heartâs deepest desire would remain an impossible dream?
She dropped down, moaning against his chest, her tongue searing a nipple, his answer a sound of need as he grasped her hand, urging it into the folds of his trousers. Soon theyâd be at Angelâs Cloud, where countless warm beds waitedâeither in the hidden rooms, or in the bawdy house, or in the rear building where sheâd livedâbut she wanted Nathaniel now. Her body was burning all over, just as it had the night they met.
Sheâd been desperate then, still speaking with a brogue so thick that most American natives couldnât understand her. Sheâd rarely even kissed a man, but sheâd heard other, less reputable girls talk at the sweatshop, claiming men paid them for sexual favors, and because sheâd been determined to earn her mumâs passage from Ireland, sheâd soon found herself standing on the shell-strewn floor of a Five Points bawdy house.