Bax and Jason short

“Goddamn it, Mini! Are you trying to kill yourself?” Bax was about to boil over. Jason had been out there with an axe, trying to trim branches off their Christmas tree.

“No. If I was doin’ that, I’d be whacking at my legs and shit.” Jason’s eyes rolled, searching for him. “I didn’t hit an artery, did I?”

“No. No, but you were headin’ that way.” Bax took the axe, glad Mini didn’t make him wrestle for it.

“I was helping.” Oh, there was pouting involved now, full-on. Shit, marthy, that was cute as fuck.

Bax manfully fought the urge to kiss that lower lip where it stuck out. “How did you even find the axe, Mini?”

“It was in the toolshed.”

“So, what, you wandered around calling for it?"

“Nope. I wandered around feeling for it.” Jase just grinned like a monkey. “I moved the rakes.”

“Good to know. I ain’t blind, but I might just kill myself on them.”

“Don’t be pissy, Bax. This is the only way I’ll get to see the tree this year. Once the glass shit is on it, no one will want me touching it.”

Well, shit. He’d not thought of that. He had a bunch of stuff of his momma’s, and Brenda had sent a box for Jason...

“We could hang the glass stuff off the garland on the big wall. Do the tree up in stuff for you.”

Jason shrugged, cheeks pinking. “I don’t want to be no problem.”

“Why would it be a problem? This is our place, not your momma’s or mine.”

“It’d make things a little easier, to not have to worry about knocking into the tree.”

“Well, then, we’ll do that.” He forgot, sometimes, that Mini couldn’t see. Jase got around so much easier every day. It sucked, not to see the twinkly lights and pretty wrapping paper and all.

“Okay.” Jason sighed. “How ‘m I supposed to buy you a present, cowboy?”

“You think I need anything? Hell, tell Missy to take you to buy me new Wranglers.” He hooked an arm around Jason’s waist, hating that defeated fucking look, hating God and the job and the world with all his soul, for mucking up the man he loved. “You know my size. Intimately.”

“I know all about you.” That grin went all goofy and Andy knew he’d gone and done something good and that loosened up that acid in his heart. “Intimately.”

“There you go. All I want for Christmas I got.”

It wasn’t true. He wanted Jason’s sight back. Now, but both of them knew it, so neither of them said it.

Weren’t neither of them young enough to believe in Santa and shit. They just had to believe in each other.

That was enough.

What She Wants is Out!

Calleigh and Adrian have always had an open marriage. Adrian being on the road all the time has made it easy for them to have separate lives, but neither of them acted on their agreement to see other people until Adrian met fellow Aussie and force of nature, Packer Stevens.

Now Packer and Adrian are always together, and Calleigh is left at home, missing her man. When Calleigh decides she’s not going to let Adrian go without a fight, she comes up with what she thinks is the perfect plan. She hits the spa, and the gym, and sets out to find her inner buckle bunny, intent on getting her bullrider back, and maybe on impressing Packer a little, too. She heads out on the road, ready to fight for her husband.

What Calleigh doesn’t understand is that her plan will be wildly successful, and also the hardest thing she’s ever done in her life. Packer is more than willing to play, but he’s as complicated as Calleigh is emotional. As much as he loves Calleigh and Packer, and the sexy games they play, Adrian has to try  to set things right, but can he find a way to give Calleigh what she wants, and make everyone else happy at the same time?

http://www.torquerebooks.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=97&products_id=3758

Writing Contemporary Western Menage, or why it took my 3 years to write What She Wants...

Julia dared me, a few years ago now, to write a western contemporary menage that made sense to her. 

Now, I'm a fan of menage books -- in fact, I read them sort of voraciously. I love the werewolves, the were kitties, the contemporaries. I've got a huge collection and I enjoy them. 

Julia, though, the western contemporaries bothered her. 

"I want one that I buy, baby," she told me. "I want one where I can go, okay, yeah. Those two cowboys would share each other and some incredibly patient girl. I want you to write it for me."

I know a lot of cowboys. Rednecks? Rednecks play fast and loose with the rules, but cowboys are harder, cowboys have a code, rules. Y'all, I actually discussed this with my daddy and my brother. OMG, the awkward.

Finally, though, I did it and once the thought was out there? Let me tell you, Adrian and Packer were happy to oblige, and Calleigh? Well, this woman knows her own mind, that's for sure...

So, I got the concept pretty quick. What if there was this couple in an open relationship and the wife decided she was tired of waiting for her husband to come home to her? What if she wanted to play with him and his 'traveling partner', too.

Boom.

So I wrote.

And wrote.

And wrote.

And about 10K from the end, the file corrupted.

The backup corrupted. 

I ended up with the first, oh, 8,000 words recoverable?

So, Calleigh and the Aussies went in a box while I licked my writerly wounds. And lord, I did. God help you if you asked me where they were, how they were doing, because I'd just burst into tears.

Then one day I thought about them and didn't cry.

That's the day they went on the writing board.

What's the writing board, you ask? 

It's the whiteboard in the office where Julia and I pretend to keep track of things. (What She Wants isn't on this one because it was in editing already. For the record, (looks at the current board) it doesn't look like this anymore...the ink story is done, Julia's current square has stuff in it and my NEEDED square is, like, totally got 6 projects in it... O.o

It lingered for a few months, then I opened the file.

Cried.

Closed it, BUT I started talking about Adrian and Packer. Julia played along, encouraged me, then Calleigh started poking and, 70,000 words later, they're real.

:D

Also, Julia dubbed them incredibly hot, so yay. :D

Okay, so, that was the story of how Julia asked for a western contemporary menage and how it almost didn't happen.

Much love, y'all,

BA