Blog Tour | Say It Louder by Heidi Joy Tretheway

Hey loves! Today I'll be sharing an excerpt from Say It Louder. I hope you all enjoy the excerpt. There is also a giveaway at the end of the post, so make sure to check it out and enter.

Title: Say It Louder

Author: Heidi Joy Tretheway

Series: Tattoo Thief #4

Age: New Adult

Genres: Contemporary Romance

Publication Date: September 29, 2016

Publisher: Jasper Ridge Press

Source: InkSlinger PR

Purchase: Amazon | B&N | Kobo | Play Store | iBooks 

Synopsis: 
Dave faces an ultimatum—dump his toxic girlfriend Kristina or break up his band Tattoo Thief. But Kristina won’t go quietly. She has enough dirt to ruin each member of the band, and enough on Dave to send him to jail.  
This stinking, bloody threat has haunted him for years. As Dave hangs in limbo, a new star emerges: Willa, dubbed “The Parking Lot Picasso” by the modern art world. When a magazine feature catapults her to sudden fame, Dave helps her cope with the spotlight when all she’s ever known is the shadows.  
Life as a runaway jaded Willa, and it leaves her deeply in doubt of her fifteen minutes of fame. Nothing good lasts forever. Especially not love. It seems like everyone wants a piece of Willa now. When their music and art worlds collide, Dave's the one person who isn’t trying to take something from Willa, and who might have something to give.  
As Dave’s secret is laid bare, a mystery unravels, pointing to his guilt and its dangerous intersection with Willa’s old life on the streets. Both must risk their success and the intense connection to each other to prevent their pasts from defining their future. SAY IT LOUDER is a stand-alone steamy romance—each book in this companion series is a love story about a different member of the band Tattoo Thief. This novel is about 300 pages/ 75,000 words. 


Excerpt
We jog west a few blocks, passing a noisy bar where a handful of patrons are smoking and chatting on the sidewalk outside. The thump of bass from the music reaches my chest, beating in time with my heart.
I stumble on a raised sidewalk edge and Willa’s suddenly not there beside me. I whip my head around, and I’m alone.
What the …?
A snap from the alley I just passed alerts me. I backtrack ten paces, and she’s there, hand on her hip, telegraphing annoyance. I broke the first rule: keep up.
I follow her down the alley to a quieter, narrow street lined with mostly apartments. A gray metal roll-up door is down and locked to cover a storefront. She digs into her messenger bag and pulls out a long, rolled sheet of cardboard and masking tape.
“Make yourself useful.” She hands me one edge of the cardboard. In the moonlight, I see shapes cut through it, and I follow her gestures to hold it against the door. She tapes it up. I’m not sure of the cutouts, but I think they form words.
Sounds from the sidewalk at the end of the side street make Willa’s body go rigid. I hear voices, and suddenly she grabs my shirt and spins us in front of the door, her back against the cardboard cutout to partially block it. Her arms go around my neck and she yanks my face toward hers.
The voices grow louder. Two men are walking down the sidewalk.
“Kiss me,” Willa hisses. “Now.”
Rule three: do what she says, ask questions later.
She doesn’t have to tell me twice.
I lower my mouth on hers, finally tasting cinnamon and clove. Her kiss is desperate, her fingertips digging into my shoulders as the men approach us. She hooks one leg around the back of my knee and suddenly my crotch is pressed right up against her. I feel myself harden.
Through her thin leggings, I’m sure she feels it too.
And what the hell else is she feeling right now, as her lips move hard against me and her hips tilt up to meet mine? I dart my tongue into her mouth, exploring, and she moans. The men’s conversation drops off, but they’re still walking toward us.
My hands round her hips and fill with two perfectly muscled ass cheeks. The electricity of our touch sparks brighter, shooting want and need and desperate urges into my kiss that quicken the tempo of my pulse.
It’s something I haven’t felt in years. Something so raw it cuts to the bone, to what lies beneath our flesh and blood and ink.
Only a few yards from us, the men slow their pace. Willa kisses me harder, panting tiny breaths, and I inhale her scent and breath and being. I kiss her back, eyes wide open as I strain to understand her expression.
By their footsteps, I know the men keep walking. As their sound recedes, I feel the tension melt from Willa’s body, feel her more pliant beneath my hands as the men amble down the street.
I draw her lower lip into my mouth and suck on it, wanting to taste the fullness of cinnamon. The fullness of Willa.
And that’s when her hands unwind from my neck, trailing down my shoulders to my elbows. As the men’s voices fade, she disentangles herself from me, panting.
She runs a hand through her spiky pink layers. “That was close.”
No, that was awesome. I stay silent.
“If they’d come down this street a few minutes later, they’d’ve smelled the paint. They’d know we weren’t just here to make out.”
“It’s a good enough reason,” I say, disappointment churning in my gut. Was that kiss real? Or was I just covering for her?
Because that kiss wasn’t just a pretend kiss. It wasn’t just a here-put-your-lips-on-me-for-a-while kind of deal.
That was thunder and lightning and the heavy, heady feel of air rich with ozone in late summer. The kind of night that makes you feel even more alive.

Giveaway

About Author
Heidi Joy Tretheway is a sucker for campfires, craft cocktails, and steamy romance in books and real life. She sings along with musicals (badly), craves French carbs, and buys plane tickets the way some women buy shoes.

  Her first career as a journalist took Heidi behind the scenes with politicians, rock stars, and chefs, all of whom inspire her stories. Heidi Joy is currently working on her tenth book from her home in southwestern Washington.

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