Today I'm sharing a sneak peek at The Governess Was Wicked which comes out in just one week on September 12! Here's a look at the back of book blurb:
Elizabeth Porter is quite happy with her position as the governess for two sneaky-yet-sweet girls when she notices that they have a penchant for falling ill and needing the doctor. As the visits from the dashing and handsome Doctor Edward Fellows become more frequent, Elizabeth quickly sees through the lovesick girls’ ruse. Yet even Elizabeth can’t help but notice Edward’s bewitching bedside manner even as she tries to convince herself that someone of her station would not make a suitable wife for a doctor. But one little kiss won’t hurt...
And here we go!
“Any woman would be lucky to call you her husband,” she said quietly.
“Miss Porter . . .”
She looked up to find a smolder in his eyes that contrasted with the tightness in his jaw, as though he was holding himself back from doing something he knew he shouldn’t.
“Yes?” she asked, wishing that he’d just once act without thinking and not let another one of these long, fraught, lingering moments go by.
“You hardly know me.”“I know that you’re a gentleman who has done nothing but treat me with respect.”
“Except that sometimes I don’t want to play the gentleman,” he said, his voice taking on a gruff quality she’d never heard before. “Sometimes I think about doing things I shouldn’t.”
His words hung in the air, warming her blood and quickening her breath. It was deliciously wrong. It didn’t help that it would take just a half step for him to tower over her, her unbound breasts brushing his chest through her nightclothes.
She was so tired of stuffing herself into a little box and closing the lid. Everyone thought they saw Elizabeth Porter, but all they saw was the careful mask she’d adopted to survive. Somehow Dr. Fellows and all of his noble intentions had weakened her defenses. She wanted to let him in, to connect with him. After nine solitary years, she suddenly couldn’t control the impulse any longer.
“You should turn around and walk out of this kitchen,” he said quietly. “Go back upstairs and forget all about this, Miss Porter. A lady like you shouldn’t be compromised.”
A lady? Perhaps once she’d thought of herself as such, but no longer. Ladies were like Mrs. Norton—delicate, finicky things who spent their time making and receiving calls and planning what to wear at the next in an endless string of balls and suppers. Elizabeth was the unfortunate daughter of a reckless army captain and a mother who died in childbirth. A woman forced into taking a position. She had no claim on the word. Not anymore.
“I’m not a lady, I’m a governess.”
“You’re more of a lady than anyone I know,” he said, fierceness lacing his words. “I admire you, Miss Porter. You’re intelligent and beautiful in a way I would never be able to put into words, and I fear you’ve bewitched me.”
They were just words—a collection of letters strung together to form the simplest sentences—but to Elizabeth they were everything. Before she knew what she was doing, her hands were in the doctor’s hair, and her lips were on his. He froze, but overcame his apparent shock quickly, for his mouth slid over hers, angling to drink in her kiss.
The Governess Was Wicked is still available as a 99c preorder from all major ebook retailers: