Maisey Yates: Take Me

Sometimes to really understand an event you have to see it.

I had already finished work on the first 5th Avenue book, Avenge Me when I was approached about writing a possible prequel novella. I wasn’t sure what I would write, until one of the lovely editor suggested I take it back ten years, to where it all began.

That made Take Me different for me in a lot of ways. It was great to go back to the scene of the incident that ultimately kicks off the 5th Avenue books of decade later, and it was interesting to take on a pair of characters who were so young.

Travis and Sydney are in their early 20s, still in college, not yet out in the real world. But one night changes everything, when they are friend jumps to her death at an opulent Christmas party.

This is the first glimpse into the corruption that is at the core of this opulent world. The first bit of tarnish on an empire that will ultimately crumble as the series goes on.

But this is the beginning. And it isn’t only the beginning of the end for Jason Treffen’s kingdom, it’s the beginning of a change in Travis and Sydney’s relationship.

I'm a sucker for a friends to lovers romance. I can’t lie. So the idea of having a tragedy make two friends see each other in a different way was natural to me. Because it is a short story, Most of it takes place over one night, and the connection between Travis and Sydney is very intense.

There are a lot of emotions burning between them, and certainly for Travis, years of repressed desire now burning to the surface.

But when the night is over, and the sun rises, they both have to face what they’ve done. They have to face the loss of their friend, and the change in their friendship. And the fact that no matter how much they might want them to, things can never be the same again.

The question is, will they move forward without each other, or stronger than ever?

 And I have included, a short teaser for you:

There was one thing he wanted. One thing he’d always wanted. And taking it now would be...it would be the worst kind of betrayal. 
But he didn’t get up. He didn’t leave. Instead, he pulled her hard against him, wrapped his arms tightly around her body. 
She buried her face in his neck, her tears falling onto his neck. He’d never seen Sydney cry. She was too tough. Too guarded. But she was crying now, weeping like she was trying to cleanse herself of everything that had happened tonight. 
He wished he could do it too. But there were no tears for him. There was nothing but deep, yawning pain, and a need that he didn’t think could ever be entirely satisfied. 
She shifted against him, turned her face to the side, her lips brushing against his jaw. The soft, sweet contact shocked him, burned him. His heart sped up, blood pumping hard and fast through him, heating up the cold places inside of him. Reminding him that he was alive. 
She put her hand on his face, traced the line of his jaw with her finger. His breathing became labored, his heart raging so hard he thought he was having an attack. 
“Not a good idea, Syd,” he said, giving her a chance. One last chance, because if she took it any further he didn’t know what he might do. 
“No,” she said, “maybe not.” 
He gritted his teeth, his blood pumping hot through his veins, his shaft aching, getting hard. This was not the time for that. Not the place for that, and dammit, he’d made the decision years ago, she was not the woman for this. But he couldn’t stop himself from responding. “Definitely not.” “What if there was nothing else, Travis?” she whispered, a temptation he couldn’t ignore. “What if this was all there was? Tonight? This room? You and me. What if it started and ended here?” 
He closed his eyes, swallowed hard, his whole body on fire. “Then I know exactly what I would want to do. But the thing is, there’s more than this night, more than this room, and more than us. More than that...there’s a lot more to us than...this.” “There wasn’t more for Sarah,” she said, her words choked. “This was it, Trav. And I’m not going to...to jump off of a building, but what I saw tonight reminded me that...that we don’t necessarily have tomorrow. Unless we’re choosing to take tomorrow from ourselves, like she did, I think we all truly believe that tomorrow is going to be there, but we’re just making up stories.” 
He closed his eyes. “Is that all?” 
“Yes. Because until the sun rises we don’t really know if it will for us. It’s just...making fantasies for what we hope will happen when the only thing that’s actually real is...now.” “But tomorrow...”
“Screw tomorrow,” she said, her words fierce. “It’s not...I can’t...”
He angled his head and closed the distance between them, his lips pressing hard against hers. Cutting off her words, trying to cut off her thoughts, her pain, her desperation. And his own.  
And just like she’d said it would, everything burned away. There was only this moment, this room, this kiss.

Take Me is available FREE for preorder in most ebook stores.

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Grandma and the Prince - Part 5 (Barbara Bretton)

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4


Do you remember those old B-movie westerns? They were TV staples when I was a kid. The good guys wore white hats; the bad guys wore black. You cheered the heroes and hissed at the villains and you never for a second questioned who was right and who was wrong. You just knew.

Too bad life isn't like that. One of the things I've discovered as I dig back into my Grandma El's life is that there are shades of grey everywhere I look and nobody left to help shine some light in the dark corners.

According to the story my Grandma El told me, her father was a ladies man. "A divil of a man," she called him and I'm not sure whether or not it was a compliment. She claimed her mother gave as good as she got and for my great-grandmother Nell's sake, I hope she did.

Sometime around 1904 when my grandmother was 4 years old, her father Charley did something so dastardly, so unforgivable, that he had to take his family and leave England for New Zealand. (Let's face it: you couldn't get much farther away from home, could you?) Although he had been born into money, he'd apparently squandered his share and couldn't afford passage for his wife and three kids so he turned to the family at Sea View for help.

I've warned you that the Dimlers weren't exactly the Waltons, right? Well, great-grandpa Charley "sold" his eldest child, Edith, to relatives at Sea View for enough money to get him to New Zealand and set himself up with his own butcher shop.

I know. It boggles the mind. Poor Dede was only seven years old at the time, a tall gangly introspective blond in a family of short and boisterous redheads. Can you imagine how she felt when her parents and siblings sailed away? (Actually I know how she felt and will tell you next month.)

I've often wondered why my great-grandfather chose New Zealand. Out of all the places in the world, why such a far away (and beautiful) country? And why didn't I ever ask my grandmother that question?

They settled down in Auckland, in a small house on Ponsonby Road that my grandmother loved.
The photos are front and back of a "real photo" postcard my Charley sent to Dede from New Zealand. Unfortunately Grandma El glued the postcard into an album so much of the message on the back was lost.

The postcards lead me to believe that Dede had been left in her grandfather's care, something that makes my blood run cold. Her life must have been something out of a Gothic novel. Not so Grandma El's life. She loved every second of their ten years in New Zealand. Decades later, she glowed when she talked about the beauty and freedom of the place. (She claimed her best friends were neighboring Maori kids but I'm not sure that wasn't wishful thinking on her part.)

In 1914 Charley ran out of money and into trouble again and packed up the family for the return trip to England.

He didn't stay long. In 1916 the entire family, Dede included, was on its way to America.

Here are Grandma El's words, transcribed from a tape I made of her during the summer of 1976: "We came back to England when I was 14. They were broke and in disgrace. We stayed at Sea View for two years. Oh, Barbara, the things people thought! The Germans were the enemy and someone said my grandfather was signalling them with secret messages and people threw rocks at us and set fire to the house. We were hated by the town. You don't know what it was like . . . the bombs . . . the fires . . . the zeppelins overhead . . . terrible . . . terrible. Then he decided we were going to America. It was 1916. The War was still on but he had to go. We made the trip on an American ship. We stopped in the middle of the Atlantic with our engines off on account of the submarines everywhere. I remember that only the American flags on the ship saved us.

"I remember it was hot, so hot, when we reached New York. We didn't waste any time getting jobs. The second day our parents said, 'Find work," and we didn't know anything. I was brought up rich. I couldn't do anything. So I found a job as a nursemaid for a rich Jewish family on Central Park West. I took care of their little girl and the mother used to say to her, 'Now you should learn to speak like Elsie -- cahn't, tomahto' and I would feel so good to be appreciated.

"We used to go--I can see it now--to the swanky shops like B. Altman on Fifth Avenue. She had a chauffeur and a limousine and I would sit in the rear and I can still see him placing the fur robes over the madam and the girl. But not me. It wasn't done. I told them that I'd had servants too but who knows if they believed me. I was just a green kid.

"One day I left them. I don't know why. I just left. I didn't know any better. [silence] You don't know what it was like to come here . . . everything so big . . . so much . . . all the food and stores and people. I loved it from the first."

And then the unthinkable happened: Charley died of a heart attack at 47 years of age.

May 2, 1922
(from)
AVOCA
22 Ashfield Rd
Aigburt (?)
Liverpool

Mrs. Dimler, our united and heartfelt sympathy go out to all of you in your dreadfully sudden Bereavement. It was a bombshell to me and tears trickled down my face whilst reading the sad news to the rest of the family at the Breakfast table.

May God be with you in this your hour of trial.

Margaret is away at Chester - and we wrote her the sad tidings. She replied immediately - sending her love and sympathy.

Now as regards Charley's affairs under his late mother's will -- you may rest assured that your interested will be carefully guarded by the Enors. It is a pity Charley did not make a will - especially as he wrote me regarding in his very last letter. You may have possibly read my reply to it - stating that the balance eventually due to him after meeting his legal liabilities is somewhere around about 150 pounds - perhaps a little more, perhaps a little less.

I presume Charley was still a British subject at the time of his death - if so this money will be disbursed according to British law. If on the other hand he was a naturalized American (and I never heard anything) then I must have documentary evidence of this fact and a letter from a New York Notary Public direct - stating American law on this point. You quite understand, don't you, that if Charley was not an American then all this red tape business and expense will be unnecessary. So please write me by return so we may put things in order. Also please thank Cassy for his very feeling letter.

With kind regards to all of you we remain yours in sympathy,
The Ludeck Family

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To be continued.

PS: I'm Barbara Bretton and you can find me here and here and here. My next book, LACED WITH MAGIC, will be released in August. I hope you'll watch for it.