Infusion Read online

  Table of Contents

  Legal Page

  Title Page

  Book Description

  Dedication

  Trademarks Acknowledgement

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  New Excerpt

  About the Author

  Publisher Page

  Infusion

  ISBN # 978-1-78686-408-6

  ©Copyright Liz Crowe 2018

  Cover Art by Posh Gosh ©Copyright August 2018

  Edited by Rebecca Baker

  Totally Bound Publishing

  This is a work of fiction. All characters, places and events are from the author’s imagination and should not be confused with fact. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, events or places is purely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any material form, whether by printing, photocopying, scanning or otherwise without the written permission of the publisher, Totally Bound Publishing.

  Applications should be addressed in the first instance, in writing, to Totally Bound Publishing. Unauthorized or restricted acts in relation to this publication may result in civil proceedings and/or criminal prosecution.

  The author and illustrator have asserted their respective rights under the Copyright Designs and Patents Acts 1988 (as amended) to be identified as the author of this book and illustrator of the artwork.

  Published in 2018 by Totally Bound Publishing, UK

  Totally Bound Publishing is a subsidiary of Totally Entwined Group Limited.

  Warning:

  This book contains sexually explicit content which is only suitable for mature readers. This story has a heat rating of Totally Burning and a Sexometer of 3.

  Brewing Passion

  INFUSION

  Liz Crowe

  Book five in the Brewing Passion series

  A wife and mother’s worst nightmare…a bittersweet return home…a fresh look at love.

  Gayle Connolly’s dream life on the West Coast is snatched from her in the blink of an eye, forcing her to face her own worst fear—because she didn’t truly appreciate what she had, a senseless tragedy was somehow her fault. Now, she wakes up every single morning in her childhood bedroom in Michigan and wonders how she can even breathe, much less live a life devoid of everyone she loved.

  Noah Stokes’ dream of taking over his family’s landscaping business is dashed when the company goes bankrupt, thanks to his father’s gambling debts. That hard reality sends him spiraling downward, where he discovers himself making money in ways he’s ashamed to admit. When he leaves it all behind and returns home to Michigan, he’s determined to regain some semblance of normalcy, not to mention his dignity.

  For a while, Gayle and Noah’s smoking hot connection provides them both with distraction and solace. Until lust turns into something more—something they both resist for as long as they possibly can.

  Dedication

  This book is dedicated to my friend, fellow Yogini, and personal inspiration, Lora Rosenbaum, owner of Pure Hot Yoga in Ann Arbor, Michigan.

  We stayed in the room.

  Trademarks Acknowledgement

  The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of the following wordmarks mentioned in this work of fiction:

  Abercrombie and Fitch: Abercrombie & Fitch

  Bluetooth: Bluetooth Special Interest Group

  Chopin vodka: Polmos Siedlce

  Colt 45: Pabst Brewing Company

  Cookie Dough Blizzard: Berkshire Hathaway Inc.

  Dairy Queen: Berkshire Hathaway Inc.

  Estée Lauder: The Estée Lauder Companies Inc.

  Netflix: Netflix, Inc.

  Pappy Van Winkle: Sazerac Company

  Patek Philippe: Patek Philippe SA

  Ray-Ban: Luxottica Group S.p.A.

  Chapter One

  “Forward motion. Don’t think about it. Move. Put one foot in front of the other…”

  Gayle’s hands hurt. She opened her eyes one at a time and saw why. She had her fingers wrapped around the thick leather-covered steering wheel so tight that when she released them with a wince, the expensive hand-stitching was embossed on her palm like a tattoo. She glanced out to see her fellow yogis unpacking their mats, towels and water bottles and heading toward the studio.

  This had been a bad idea. She’d not planned to practice hot yoga today. She had an interview. A job interview. A crucial, life-altering dream-job interview with a major company that had recruited her via a top-secret headhunter. And yet here she sat, already sweaty, heart pounding, staring out into the parking lot and wishing she were anywhere but here.

  But, of course, she needed this. Her hot yoga practice had been one of the few stable things in her life for the last year, two years—shit, almost three years now. It had been the only stable thing, if she were being completely honest. And one thing she prided herself on was total self-aware honesty.

  She re-fastened her wilting ponytail and turned off the motor. The radio continued to drone sonorous news voices she no longer heard for the requisite thirty seconds before shutting down. Without the AC running, the interior of the car heated up fast in the midsummer sun.

  But then again, she could be having some kind of shitty karmic early onset menopause, too. That would be exactly the thing, really. Even though she was only thirty-six going on thirty-seven. Her mother had gone through ‘the change’ at forty-five, after all. Tears burned behind her eyes, but she blinked them away.

  There was no crying in hot yoga.

  It was an iron-clad rule, at least for her.

  With a teenager-worthy sigh, she hauled her yoga mat, towel and water bottle into her arms and stepped out onto the hot pavement. She’d done the calculations over and over in her head the night before. If she did this nine-thirty class, it put her home at eleven-forty. She only needed fifty minutes to get from shower to interview-ready and the damn thing wasn’t until two o’clock. If she had an appetite, she could even eat some lunch in between since it was exactly twelve miles—which translated to about seventeen minutes travel—to the industrial park where she’d be meeting with the president of TriCities Distribution in hopes of convincing him that she wasn’t overqualified for the sales director’s job. She would give her eyeteeth to get the job. She’d even take less salary than he was offering—hell, she’d do it for ten dollars a day. She didn’t need the money. She needed the distraction and she was damn good at selling beer and wine. Always had been.

  She mentally reviewed the resume the headhunter had sent over to the company. The resume which had resulted in the company’s president and CEO calling her within about an hour asking why in the world she’d consider working for his company—not that he didn’t want her of course. It was just…

  Gayle squeezed her eyes shut and tried to shut out the incessant buzz of memory. Today was not a time for lollygagging around in unhappiness. Today was a day of forward motion. And she was ready for it.

  “Hey, girl,” a voice called from her behind her. Gayle turned, a smile fixed on her face. She’d made a few new friends thanks to this yoga thing, most of them wealthy moms-from-home who had the hou
rs between nine and two-thirty wide open for things like exercise, lunches, facials and whatnot. She’d been invited to some of the other activities but had demurred with random excuses for the past year or so. A period of time in which she had flopped around in sweats and no makeup for the first time in her adult life, wondering what to do next.

  “Hi, Pam.” She hoisted her mat and towel up under one arm so she could sip water from her yoga-studio-labeled stainless bottle. Her mouth was bone dry and she was already sweating—no wonder, since it was eighty-something degrees at nine-twenty a.m. She put the bottle to her lips and glanced over at the studio. A bank of windows in a long line of them, in a strip mall once abandoned by a large retailer then saved by another one plus a high-end grocery store.

  “What’s going on over there?” she asked, only half-interested.

  The other woman shielded her eyes with one hand. “Window washers maybe?”

  “Maybe,” Gayle agreed. “Well, the sweat box awaits.” She started across the hot tarmac, surprised when Pam grabbed her upper arm. “What?” They were not the sort of friends who touched each other. They were only fellow practitioner-sufferers. Pam was staring at what Gayle could now make out were two guys on top of a partially lifted platform. One of them was drilling something over his head. The other was sorting through a stack of the somethings piled on the platform.

  “Lord, those guys are…hot.” Pam’s voice was a loud whisper. “Look!”

  Gayle looked. She even made a show of taking off her Ray-Bans to see better, as if she cared. “Hmm…guess so. Well…” She glanced at the fingers still dug into her biceps. “Better get inside.”

  Pam’s face flushed when she let go of Gayle’s arm. Flustered, she recovered and treated Gayle to her bleached smile. Gayle began the trek across the pavement to the covered sidewalk, where the men were still working to a light refrain of bland, pop-country music. She got closer and snuck an actual look at them.

  The one with the drill was wearing safety glasses and focused upward on his task. His light gray T-shirt was lifted thanks to his overhead efforts and her eyes went straight to the perfect strip of exposed skin. He was tan and fit. The lower part of his abs she was ogling flexed as he continued drilling or whatever it was he was doing.

  Gayle let her gaze slide upward, slowing her walk. The man’s face was covered in a light beard, barely more than stubble. His jaw was square and set to his task. His shoulders were broad. His neck and face also nicely bronzed. His eyes…

  Gayle blinked and took a step back when she realized he’d stopped the drill and had lifted his safety glasses to stare back at her. The ill-timed step sent her left foot down off the sidewalk and her ankle rolling in seconds. The bolt of agony made her gasp. But it was nothing compared to the actuality of finding herself on her ass, half on, half off the sidewalk. The expensive water bottle rolled away from her, coming to a clanging rest under the work platform. The tarmac burned her left hand while her right kept a death grip on the mat and towel.

  Pam was at her side and pulling her up within a half-second, but the half-second she sat, sprawled like a turtle on its back and still eye-locked with the man—the young man, she self-corrected—on the platform was one of the longest of her life. Second only to the one she’d experienced on her way home from work, cruising along the Pacific Coast Highway, that had set her on this current, shitty path.

  “Jesus,” she muttered, staring down at her swelling ankle.

  The men had stopped work. The one with the drill climbed down and retrieved her errant water bottle, handing it to her with a wide, perfect smile. Pam jostled her arm to remind her to lift it and take the thing from him. The other guy leaned over the platform railing, grinning at the small crowd of women that had gathered, all holding the same version of Gayle’s bundle of supplies. She lifted her arm, trying not to meet the man’s eyes. But she did. And they were, indeed, the exact shade of light coppery-brown she’d seen before she’d done the super-klutz move.

  “Ma’am,” he said, giving his yellow construction worker’s hat a little dip. “You all right?”

  His voice was like the purest honey—smooth, rich and somehow soothing. She swayed when she leaned her weight on her injured ankle, but it wasn’t because of her foot. “Ma’am?” The man put a hand on her arm, but Pam and the others hustled her inside when the studio owner appeared at the door, concern in her eyes.

  “Gayle, here, sit down.” The woman’s soft voice worked its way past the unwelcome and unexpected rush of memory that had almost made her pass out on the sidewalk. She did as she was told and took the cool glass of water offered to her. She held it, staring down into it, doing her best, therapy-induced mental tricks to muscle past the voice, the touch, the laugh, all the sensations she’d associated with, and adored about, her husband.

  All the things she’d taken for granted.

  Finally, she sipped and nodded thanks to the efficient woman who’d shooed all the gawkers away to give her space to breathe. She drank the entire glass, then leaned back, pressing her head against the front window. “Thanks, Helen,” she said when the studio owner placed a small bag of ice on her aching ankle. “I don’t know if I can…”

  A sharp rap behind her made her yelp and flinch. Helen smiled and calmly replaced the ice bag where it had been. “Your fan club wants to know if you’re okay,” she said, giving someone behind Gayle a small wave.

  “My…what?” Gayle turned and saw the beautiful young man’s eyes, staring at her with concern. He lifted his thumb and treated her to his wide, gorgeous smile. Then turned it down and made a fake sad face, pointing to her. She sucked in a breath, allowing herself another second to appreciate his physical perfection—shoulders even broader than she’d thought tapering to a slim waist, long legs covered in workman’s denim, steel-toed boots. The works. He made an exaggerated shrug which tugged a smile to her lips in spite of her intention not to encourage him.

  God, he’s probably all of twenty years old. Stop staring, you sick cougar.

  From his place up on the platform, the other worker gazed down on all the incoming yogis with eagerness. Gayle sighed and did a halfway thumbs-up and pointed to the ice on her ankle.

  “Sorry,” the man’s lips said without sound. Gayle found herself fixated on their extreme fullness. When she realized she was staring and fantasizing about what they might feel like, her entire body flushed hot. She turned away from him, mortified at herself, pressed both hands to her face, squeezed her eyes shut and focused on greeting all the incoming students instead of the much-too-handsome-for-his-own-good young man behind her.

  Chapter Two

  “I’m gonna give it a try,” Gayle said after ten minutes of ice therapy. “I mean, I can’t just sit here.” She refused to succumb to the extreme temptation to turn around and ogle the man, who, she presumed from the sound, had picked up the drill again.

  Helen came around from behind the desk and studied her foot for a few seconds. “Tell you what, see how you get on during the warm-up, but if it feels weak during the balancing series, just sit those out.” Her gaze flickered to the men behind Gayle. “I should tell them to take a break. They can see right into the studio.”

  Gayle noted most of the women had set up their mats far from the wall separating the lobby from the hot room. The fact that anyone walking by could always peer into the room and see the sweaty, sometimes half-naked humans suffering through their practice was never far from Gayle’s consciousness. But today, it seemed even more alarming.

  “Yeah, but I guess they’re not working for you, right?”

  “No, they’re not. The landlord has done so many great things—new parking lot, new roofs, new facades. And now whatever it is they’re doing up there.”

  Gayle had to bite the inside of her cheek not to turn around and see what Helen was smiling at. Because she already knew. And she couldn’t allow herself to look at him again. Ever.

  She rose and put her weight on the less-swollen ankle. It held, so she
lifted her right foot to see how much it could take. “Ankles are incredibly flexible joints,” Helen said, holding out a hand just in case Gayle toppled over again. “And you’ve been coming every other day for a solid two years now, Gayle. It’s a testament.”

  “Yeah, it’s something,” she said. “It’s saved me in a lot of ways.” She smiled at the slight, dark-haired woman who was beaming at her. “You know that better than anyone.”

  Helen patted her arm, gave one last glance up at the men who were, if their noises were any indication, busy at their job again, then held open the hot room door so Gayle could make her way inside. The room was packed ‘ass to nose’, as one of her fellow yogis liked to say. There were a couple of tiny spaces she could take farther into the room. But one giant swath of real estate remained unclaimed, right in front of the glass doors. Without a thought, Gayle plopped her mat onto it, spread out her towel then eased off the light T-shirt she’d been wearing over her sports bra and spandex, letting it drop to the floor.

  She sat in the heat and silence for a few minutes, gathering her thoughts and concentrating on the ninety minutes ahead. The drilling sounds were muted, thanks to the half-wall and doors between her and the sound. But they were still out there, their platform and bodies blocking the sunlight that usually streamed through the glass doors into the studio at this hour.

  When Helen flipped on the lights and requested everyone stand and prepare for the breathing exercise, Gayle smiled at her friend, who gave her a quick thumbs-up on her way to the front of the room. The heat settled on her skin in its usual fashion, causing a light sheen of sweat to break out on her arms. She rolled her sore ankle, pleased it did seem to have bounced back, even if her embarrassment over it would likely never fade.