Real Men Last All Night: Four Steamy Novellas

Real Men Last All Night: Four Steamy Novellas

Real Men Last All Night: Four Steamy Novellas

Real Men Last All Night: Four Steamy Novellas

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Overview

Today's top erotic romance writers come together for a steamy read of four sexy stories about women who discover that real men last all night...



Luring Lucy by Lori Foster

All Lucy was looking for when she went to her vacation home was in innocent fling to quell the yearning she had felt since her husband died four years ago. She never expected her longtime friend Bram to lure her into a love affair so hot.

Cooper's Fall by Lora Leigh

Former ranger turned bar owner Ethan Cooper never expected to get an eyeful of prim Miss Sarah Fox from his attic window one hot summer afternoon. But now his blood is on fire for the delicious little minx.

The Edge of Sin by Cheyenne McCray

Zane Steele lives a life of extraordinary danger as a government agent and has never let anyone get too close. Then he sees the one woman who changes his life forever.

Wanted: A Real Man by Heidi Betts
Claire left her high school sweetheart Linc, in search of a better life. Ten years later she needs his help as a U.S. Marshal to find her missing daughter…Linc's daughter. Reeling with the knowledge of a daughter he's never known, Linc sets out to claim what's his.


Product Details

ISBN-13: 9781429984874
Publisher: St. Martin's Publishing Group
Publication date: 06/23/2009
Sold by: Macmillan
Format: eBook
Pages: 368
Sales rank: 139,730
File size: 450 KB

About the Author

Lori Foster is the New York Times bestselling author of romance novels including her Men Who Walk the Edge of Honor series and Too Much Temptation. In 2001 she received the Romantic Times Career Achievement Award for Series Romantic Fantasy.

Lora Leigh is the author of Live Wire, Forbidden Pleasure, and Enigma, among many others. Writing is her passion, her peace, and her lifeline, and she can often be found daydreaming and plotting and planning with the varied characters that fill her imagination. When she isn't writing, she tends her flower gardens, watches horses romp outside her home, or spends time with the family and pets she fills her life with. She lives in the rolling hills of Kentucky.

New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Cheyenne McCray writes the Night Tracker novels and the Armed and Dangerous series, among others. She grew up on a ranch in southeastern Arizona. She has been writing ever since she can remember, back to her kindergarten days when she penned her first poem. She always knew one day she would write novels—she wanted to create worlds that readers would get lost in, just as she had always gotten lost in her favorite books. "Growing up I read, read, and read," she says, "and grew up to write, write, write." She has three sons and two dogs. A true Arizona native, she loves the desert and all of the sunshine and beautiful sunsets that go along with it.

Heidi Betts is the bestselling author of Knock Me for a Loop. She lives in the beautiful hills of Central Pennsylvania.


Lora Leigh is a #1 New York Times bestselling author of multiple series and sensual romances. A rebel at heart, a romantic by nature, and optimist by design.
New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Cheyenne McCray writes the Night Tracker novels and the Armed and Dangerous series, among others. She grew up on a ranch in southeastern Arizona. She has been writing ever since she can remember, back to her kindergarten days when she penned her first poem. She always knew one day she would write novels—she wanted to create worlds that readers would get lost in, just as she had always gotten lost in her favorite books. “Growing up I read, read, and read,” she says, “and grew up to write, write, write.” She has three sons and two dogs. A true Arizona native, she loves the desert and all of the sunshine and beautiful sunsets that go along with it.
Soon after joining Romance Writers of America, national bestselling author Heidi Betts’s writing began to garner attention, including placing in the esteemed Golden Heart competition three years in a row. The recipient of numerous awards and stellar reviews, Heidi’s books combine believable characters with compelling plotlines, and are consistently described as “delightful,” “sizzling,” and “wonderfully witty.” Her books include Loves Me, Loves Me Knot, Tangled Up in Love, and Knock Me for a Loop.

Read an Excerpt

Real Men Last All Night

Four Novellas of Super-Hot Romance


By Lora Leigh, Lori Foster, Cheyenne McCray, Heidi Betts

St. Martin's Press

Copyright © 2009 Lora Leigh
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4299-8487-4



CHAPTER 1

Ethan Cooper stared out the window, his expression bland. He knew it was bland. He could feel it pulling into lines of complete blank shock.

Fascination.

Lust.

He should move. He told himself to move as he clenched his fists and pressed them into the wall beside the small attic window.

He was going to move.

In just a minute.

Just as soon as he came in his jeans from the sight that met his bemused eyes.

It wasn't his fault.

He was excusing himself and he damned well knew it. He was just too ... shell-shocked. Yeah, that was the word. Too shell-shocked to move a single muscle and drag himself away from the little window with a bird's-eye view into the neighbors' secluded backyard.

Pervert! he railed at himself.

That didn't stop him. He was transfixed. His cock was in hell. He was practically drooling on his dusty attic floor as he watched shy little priss, Miss Sarah Fox, naked as God created her.

Glistening beneath the sun, slender hands moving.

He closed his eyes. Swallowed tightly. She thought she was in the privacy of her own home. She thought that sheltering fence she'd paid a fucking fortune to have built around her pool was tall enough to protect her. That no one could see her. That she was safe.

He opened his eyes.

He felt sweat bead on his forehead and roll down his temple as she smoothed her hands over her breasts. Cupped them. Rolled her nipples.

"Christ," he wheezed. There was a flash of gold.

Holy hell.

He felt his cock get impossibly thicker. Felt his balls tighten. His balls? Damn. He could barely breathe.

Prissy Miss Fox had nipple rings. Fucking nipple rings. Beneath those staid blouses and too-long damned skirts she wore, she was wearing fucking nipple rings?

His fists tightened as he pressed them into the window frame. He blinked back sweat, and he couldn't drag his eyes away from her.

Long nut-brown, riotously curly hair fanned around her. A hell of a lot longer than he had imagined it was. And she was curved. Curved where a woman should be curved.

And her fingers.

He tried to swallow. Her fingers were pulling at the little gold piercings in her nipples, and her expression was filled with pleasure.

Her entire body was sheened with oil. He forced his eyes from her nipples. Down.

"God have mercy." He was breathing fast, hard.

Fine. He was a fucking pervert. He unzipped his jeans, dragged free his dick, and curled his fingers around the shaft, palming it, stroking it.

Because, she was moving again. The fingers of one hand were trailing down her stomach, to her bare, waxed, glistening ...

He leaned his forehead against the little circular window, stared, fought to breathe. There was gold there, too. Just a flash. Just enough to assure his very trained eye that Sarah Fox had a piercing at the hood of her clitoris.

And she was playing with it. Pulling at it. Stroking her clit with glistening fingers.

She didn't writhe. She wasn't arching or giving him a show. She was a woman, lost in her own fantasy, her own touch. Her teeth clenched her lower lip, perspiration beaded her skin. Oil shimmered on it. And she was stroking herself. Slowly. Enjoying it. A woman who liked to be teased. Who liked the buildup. A slow hand.

He timed the strokes on his cock with the slender fingers moving between her thighs. Fine, he was fucking hard-core into watching the coolest little piece of flesh in town touching herself.

Damn. It was good. Who knew?

He stroked his cock, feeling her fingers on his flesh, slick, oil slick. He palmed the thick crown, feeling the steel that pierced the head of his cock, stroked down the shaft, and felt his chest tightening with the release building inside his balls.

And still she played.

His gaze narrowed on her. Her expression was almost distressed. Her fingers were moving faster now, stroking. His fingers stroked. His thumb raked over the curved steel beneath the head of his cock as he imagined the piercing in her clit.

Ah hell. Damn. He couldn't handle it. He watched. Her fingers, her face, the sweat that ran into her hair and then he blew. He felt the ragged growl that tore from his throat, the blistering curse as his come exploded from his balls, splattering against his fingers as Sarah's hips arched and her expression twisted.

In disappointment.

Her hand slapped the cement beside her. She sat up, pushed her fingers through her hair, then jerked to her feet and stalked back into her little house as Cooper stared at her in shock.

His come was cooling on his fingers and Sarah had been left disappointed?

He blinked down at the pool area as he absently grabbed an old T-shirt and wiped his fingers clean of his release, then his still-hard cock.

Fixing his jeans he stared out the window, narrowing his eyes. Most of the houses in the area were single story, with privacy fences built around them. It just so happened Cooper's was just a little bit taller than most to allow for a taller attic. Just tall enough, the window positioned just right to look down into her pool area.

For some unknown reason, there were few of the houses built on the same line in the little Southern Texas town. Just so happened, his was built just right.

He grinned at his luck. Then he frowned as he readjusted his jeans and moved to the door of the long attic and down the spiral, metal stairs that led down to the kitchen. Damn if Miss Fox hadn't just given him the release of the year or something.

The thought of her — disappointed. Wet. Pierced.

Fuck. Pierced. Sarah Fox. The woman he assumed was a staid little virgin. At least, that was the rumor. Virgin? With those piercings? Not likely.

Satisfied was another thing entirely, and as much as he would have liked to, helping Miss Sarah find her release wasn't going to become his aim in life.

Ethan Cooper was the bad boy, and he knew it. He owned the local bar, a sometimes biker hangout and generally ill-reputed establishment. And he liked it that way.

He was ill-reputable. The local troublemaker turned bar owner after returning from the Army where he'd served more than eight years. A bullet to his knee had put him out of the Rangers, but it hadn't put him out of life. A few scars and heavy pins in a reconstructed knee weren't enough to kill that untamed, sometimes dark core inside his soul.

The Army had honed it. The Rangers had sharpened it. Life itself may have darkened it further. But it was still there. He was still dangerous. He was still dark. He was still footloose and fancy-free. And he intended to stay that way.


Sarah threw the towel on her bed, pouted, and stomped to the shower. She washed the tanning oil from her body beneath the spray and sighed in exasperation at the need that still throbbed between her thighs.

Twenty-four years old. She was twenty-four years old and still a virgin. And as though everyone in this little town she had moved to knew it, she was still known as Miss Sarah. And she was tired of it.

She washed quickly, dried her hair vigorously before combing through the tangles and leaving the long, loose ringlets hanging to the middle of her back before moving back to the bedroom and breathing out roughly.

She'd tried everything to make herself fit in here, in this little Texas town.

Well, everything but walking into a bar and just picking up a man and she just couldn't bring herself to do that. Just as she hadn't been able to bring herself to let one of the drunken frat boys from college heave and moan over her.

She grimaced at the thought of the parties her sorority sisters had dragged her to while in college. There had been a few boys who hadn't been drunk. Who had flirted with her, seemed interested. In a quick little screw.

She sat down on her bed and glared at her bedroom wall. She should have moved to a larger town. She made a damn good living as a Web designer and computer programmer. She worked for an excellent company. She had good benefits. She'd been damn lucky. She didn't have to do the nine-to-five rush and could relax. She could afford to move to Houston or Dallas. The thought had her breath trapping in her throat. So many strangers. So much noise and fear. It was quieter here in Simsburg. A little, almost unknown, town outside of Corpus Christi. She could relax here.

Hide away.

Shaking her head, she rose from the bed and headed to the closet. She pulled one of the sleeveless dresses from the closet and slipped it over her head before buttoning it nearly to her neck.

She went back to the bathroom and stood in front of the mirror. She unbuttoned the dress, spread it back from her chest and stared.

The faint white lines were still there. She should stay out of the sun, she told herself as she let her fingers trace over the thin white scars. Tanning made them worse, she reminded herself. Made them easier to see. Harder to hide.

She let her fingers trace over them. There were half a dozen, long, narrow, very thin. But they were there. They had been there since she was sixteen years old. Sixteen and stupid.

She rebuttoned her dress before moving back to the bedroom and pulling on the bronze lace panties she took from her dresser. She slid her feet into sandals, twisted up her hair and secured it in a smooth twist at the back of her head before heading to the kitchen for her purse.

She locked the house quickly but securely as she stepped out on the front porch a few moments later. Even here, in the quaint little town, amid the little houses and friendly citizens, she didn't take chances. She kept her doors locked. Her windows locked. She kept her car locked.

Head down, she dug her keys out of her purse, raising her head just in time to see her neighbor driving into the driveway right beside hers.

The powerful steel-gray four-by-four rumbled with power as he drove into the driveway. Parking, he moved from the vehicle, then stopped and stared.

God, he was a poster boy for big, bad, and dangerous. Six four. Jeans and boots. A T-shirt that did nothing to hide the snake tattoo wrapping around his bicep.

And he was staring at her. He stopped by his pickup, folded his arms on the top of it, and just stared. Hooded dark eyes, thick lashes. Black hair, dark flesh.

She stared back, feeling her chest tighten as it did every time she saw him. She could feel her breasts suddenly swelling, her nipples pressing against the thin material of her dress. She could feel heat skimming over her body, as she felt pinned in place, held by his gaze.

His lips quirked. The lower lip was a little fuller than the upper. It was sexy, sexual. It was a wicked smile that promised he knew her secret fantasies. And knew he starred in them.

Sarah felt held. Caught. Her fingers gripped her keys, and as a breeze whispered around her, she was sure she felt his gaze like a caress. Licking over her bare legs. Up her dress.

Her breath caught.

"Miss Sarah, how are you doing today?" His voice rumbled and stroked her senses with wicked fingers of desire.

God, he was incredible.

"Just fine, Mr. Cooper. And your knee appears to be doing quite well."

He had returned from the military wounded. Sarah had done the neighborly thing for a year. Fixed soup and cookies, and a few times made certain to pick up fresh vegetables or light snacks from the store for him to eat.

He was appreciative. He always thanked her nicely. But damn if he had ever invited her to share a meal. She had done everything to make certain he was in fit, healthy shape, and he still called her Miss Sarah.

"The knee is as good as it's gonna get." He flashed her that bad-boy smile and her heart raced as though he had actually touched her.

"I'm glad you're doing better."

He made her feel jittery. He made her feel flushed and hot.

"I'm doing just fine." He tilted his head, lifted a hand, and touched two fingers to his forehead in a gesture of farewell before striding to the front door of his house, unlocking it and moving out of sight.

Damn.

She drew in oxygen with a ragged breath, clenched her keys, and forced herself to the car. Hitting the auto door lock, she got into the sweltering confines of the car and started the engine with a hard turn of the key.

He couldn't know her fantasies. She kept all her fantasies safely locked away, along with her nightmares.

He would never know that when she touched herself, she thought of him. That when she thought of being bad, being naughty, she always thought of being naughty with him. He would never know that she had come here because of him. Because of his actions on a dark, shadowed Dallas street and her fascination for the man who her uncle had saved.

Ethan Cooper had been one of the first people she met when the realty agent showed her the little house. He had been outside, cutting the grass in his front yard, pausing to watch as she drove into the driveway with the Realtor.

He had smiled and lifted his hand in greeting before going back to his yard work. Shirtless. In jeans and boots. Dark flesh gleaming. Sweat running in narrow rivulets down his back and shoulders. Black hair laying damp along his nape.

Then he had turned his head back quickly, and grinned and winked at her while the Realtor wasn't looking, which made her respond as though he had actually touched her.

She had gotten wet instantly. Hot and wet. And she had practically been panting as she walked up the drive to the little house. As though it had been a sign, that the dreams and fantasies she had woven around him could have a chance.

He was big, tall, broad, and dangerous-looking. The Realtor said Mr. Cooper was in the military. He had disappeared several weeks later and his house had sat empty, except for the occasional motorcycle-riding thug-looking type who came, checked over things, and then left.

A year later, Ethan Cooper had returned limping. She'd heard he'd been wounded in action. She'd watched as he worked out in the enclosed acre he owned behind his house. Weights, push-ups, sit-ups, stretches. God, he had made her crazy that year. She'd nearly killed herself trying to ease the cramp of arousal in her stomach.

During those months, she'd had a chance to get to know him. When she took him cookies or soup, he always chatted, always laughed with her. And she always came home, desperate to be touched.

She was tired of masturbating. She was tired of being alone. And she was tired of aching for that tall, broad bar owner with the sexy grin.


Perhaps it was time to do something about this, she told herself. After all, covert looks and wishing weren't going to get her anywhere. It was time to do something about it. If she was going to get Ethan Cooper to fall into her bed, then she was going to have to take the initiative.

CHAPTER 2

He couldn't get it out of his mind. Sarah Fox, spread out on the cement by her pool, long heavy ringlets fanned around her head, her curvy body slick and hot and oh so aroused.

He jacked off to it after he got back in the house. Hell, as if he could help it. The more he thought about it, the harder he got. He hadn't been so damned hot for a woman in years. Not since his first woman, in fact.

Who would have thought it? Timid little Miss Sarah.

He shook his head again before grabbing a beer and heading to his back deck. Sarah's privacy fence was over seven feet tall and extended around the full half acre of land behind her house. His white wooden fence connected with hers at a corner and extended almost double her area.

He didn't have a pool, though. He narrowed his eyes at the backyard and considered it before grinning and lifting the beer to his lips. He'd just end up in trouble. He'd never be able to keep his buddies out of it. It was hard enough keeping them out of his house.

He grinned, wondering if Miss Sarah would let him use her pool. Maybe while she was tanning herself beneath the hot Texas sun. All ripe and wet.

He grimaced at the thought of that. Piercings aside, luscious sweet little body aside, Miss Sarah Fox wasn't for the likes of him.

He finished his beer before heading into the bathroom to shower and change. Owning one of the roughest bars in the area could get dicey at times. He liked to be there before too late in the evening.

He was leaving the house, locking the door behind him when Sarah's compact, boring-looking little sedan pulled into her driveway.

He felt the hot lick of her gaze for just a second before the car shut off and she was moving from the vehicle. She kept her head down.

Cooper couldn't help but watch as she rounded the back of the car and opened the trunk. She pulled out a canvas bag — groceries, he assumed — and strode quickly up the drive to the house.

Ignoring him.

"Hello, Miss Sarah," he called out as she stepped up on her porch and came to a hard stop.

Her head lifted, eyes widened. "H-hello." A small smile, not hardly a smile, tipped her lips. Pouty lips. He liked pouty lips.

Cooper stepped across the drive. There wasn't much distance that separated their particular houses. The two homes had been built by two sisters, close together. The property extended out behind and beside one side of the houses, bunching them close while other neighbors were kept at a distance.

Cooper couldn't even explain why he was pushing this, except he'd already jacked off twice today because of her. He gave her one of his

trademark slow smiles and watched the little flush that filled her cheeks.

She watched him carefully, making no move to unlock the door, holding her keys carefully with one hand, the canvas bag with the other, as though she hadn't known him for two years. Wary, pausing to be careful. Miss Sarah wasn't a casual person by any means.

His eyes almost narrowed. She was in a carefully disguised protective stance. Keys to slash out with, bag to hit out with. Her body was balanced, ready to flee at a moment's notice. Now, why the hell would something that tiny, that damned shy, be on guard against a neighbor?

"Can I help you, Mr. Cooper?" she asked carefully as he leaned against the side of her house.


(Continues...)

Excerpted from Real Men Last All Night by Lora Leigh, Lori Foster, Cheyenne McCray, Heidi Betts. Copyright © 2009 Lora Leigh. Excerpted by permission of St. Martin's Press.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

Table of Contents

Contents

COOPER'S FALL by Lora Leigh,
LURING LUCY by Lori Foster,
THE EDGE OF SIN by Cheyenne McCray,
WANTED: A REAL MAN by Heidi Betts,

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