Excerpt.......from chapter 1
Written on Saturday, March 29, 2008 by haleigh
From chapter one - when Cole wakes up from the blast that killed his partner, and first meets Shae.
He had to escape – that much was for certain. He tried to sit up but gentle hands pushed him back down.
“Shhh,” a voice said.
He instantly relaxed. It was an angel’s voice. Smooth and soft and husky. So he was dying . The angel made more comforting noises and brushed cool fingers across his forehead. An icy cloth followed, making him groan aloud with relief.
Death was okay then, if she was how he got there. He slit open one eye to get a look at what god had provided for his last wretched moments on earth.
His angel of mercy didn’t look so hot. In fact, she looked kind of sick. Dark stringy hair was piled on top of her head, her skin was clammy, her eyes were sunken, and on top of it she smelled bad.
But maybe all was not lost. He let his eyes travel down past her neck and shoulders toward the lush body he was sure god granted him in his mercy.
He groaned aloud at what his eyes encountered. “I at least deserve boobs.” From the look that crossed her face, she caught his creaky, barely intelligible words.
“Excuse me?”
“Water.”
She held a bottle of water to his lips, though her look was still wary. He closed his eyes a second, and waited until the room stopped spinning before looking at her again.
His angel had fewer curves than a twelve-year-old Korean boy. She was skinny, with no boobs, no hips, and no…well, he couldn’t see her ass from here. Maybe there was hope for redemption yet. “Do you have an ass at least?”
She flung the washcloth she was holding directly onto his face, so that it covered his eyes. “You’re a pig, Mr. Cole. And I’m going back to bed.”
He managed to get the washcloth off his face in time to see her walking away. Yep. Great ass. “Oh come back,” he said. “I’m bleeding. You can’t leave a bleeding man to his death, can you?”
She turned back to him, her slow movements exaggerated in what he had to assume was a killer hangover from the way she smelled. Her eyes were flashing, making her look a little less hideous than she had a moment ago. “I’m pretty sure I’ll be able to live with my conscience.”
He tilted his lips in a crooked smile that had women all over the world swooning at his feet. “Come back, baby. Be my Florence Nightingale.”
This woman was not impressed. She backed up with a hand over her heart. “Well, that’s just about the nicest thing anybody’s ever said to me.”
She turned back to the door. “Okay, okay,” he said, trying not to laugh. “I'm sorry. My mother should be ashamed of herself for raising such a reprehensible, chauvinistic monster. That doesn’t change the fact that I’m actually bleeding.”
He could see her wavering. She may not be an attractive woman, but he couldn’t help baiting her. It was kind of fun. More importantly, it distracted him from the images that just kept coming: the rubble of the ice cream store, the crater where Caleb’s car had been....
He focused back on her ass. He could only guess at the exact shape under the baggy men’s boxer shorts she was wearing, but from this angle, he’d have to rate it at least at a seven.
She turned back to him. “Are you staring at my ass?”
“Of course not.” Busted. “What kind of man would stare at your ass after that heartfelt of an apology?”
“You, apparently,” she said.
So this is where my internal editor shows up and starts bitching. "It's not original," she says. "It's a cliche. And Cole sounds like a jerk. What kind of man focuses on boobs after watching a little girl get blown to bits?"
I tell her to go away. I'm trying to write fast here. I can't worry about pesky little things like characterizations. And besides, Cole's been in Iraq for six months. The poor guy hasn't been laid in quite a while - of course he's focusing on the boobs! "But that makes him sound superficial." At that point, I just punched her.
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