No one said finding love was easy, but when you invented the world’s bestselling vibrator, it’s near impossible. Yep, that’s right. That little toy hidden in your bedside table is my brain child. It’s aptly named Woman on Top. And you know what they say . . . it’s lonely at the top.
So I’m headed home to my Southern roots. It’s supposed to be an extended Summer vacation — nothing more. But Rorke Weston has other plans for me. Plans that not only involve me being on top, but also underneath him.
It’s been said you never forget your first. For me, that’s definitely true. No night has ever lived up to the one I spent with Rorke.
He’s turned into quite a man. Tan from the Southern sun, and stubborn as the day is long. And there’s nothing sweeter than the swipe of his tongue.
Rorke wants his chance. The one we never had. But that was a long time ago. When I still believed in Prince Charming and Happily Ever Afters. Even ten years later, I feel a pull. And it’s not simply Rorke yanking down my panties.
Do second chances really happen? Or is my heart simply toying with me?
Hammering the nail with one hard pound, I mutter, “Friends?”
That should be a cuss word, especially coming out of her full, pink lips. I toss the hammer aside, scanning the mostly-converted barn. Yep, I live in a barn. Well, not any barn. The barn where Sterling and I lost our virginity. I know just the spot. It’s the spot where my bed is now.
I didn’t plan it that way. In fact, I didn’t even really think about it until she showed up in town the other day. I came home, walked in, and realized I’ve designed this place around her. Crazy, but true. That woman has burned herself into the deepest parts of my soul. Deeper than even I realized. She was my first, a memory. I thought it was over. I thought we’d only ever get that one night. She had her life, and I had mine. I didn’t see this coming.
This old barn sits on the edge of my parents’ property. It sucks to be almost thirty and still living on my parents’ land. Technically, I’m not living at home, but sometimes it feels like it. Unfortunately, buying my own house on my teaching salary isn’t in the cards, so a few years ago, I started converting one of the old barns.
Every nail, every piece of wood in here has been touched by me. And it’s almost done. It’s wide open, designed that way mostly because it’s less work than putting up a bunch of walls. The only room with any privacy is the bathroom. I left the distressed rafters from the ceiling exposed and just refinished them. The original sliding barn doors have been replaced with new ones. Almost one whole wall houses my personal library. The only thing left to finish is the kitchen. The upper cabinets are in, but my only appliances are a refrigerator and microwave. So any real meals I eat come from the main house — my parents’ house. My plan is to use part of my summer vacation to finish it up.
I look over at the bed. My subconscious must have taken over with that decision. Sterling is etched into the fiber of this place. Maybe that’s the reason I haven’t ever brought a woman to see this place before? Who knows? The subconscious is a tricky bitch.
But the memories of that day and night are so vivid. It’s all flooding back now that she’s back.
I remember a buddy of mine had rushed me home my freshman year of college, making the two-and-a-half-hour drive from New Orleans in just under two. But I was too late. I wasn’t here when Levi took his last breath. Those few days are a blur. Everything is a blur until the moment I stood up at his funeral to speak; her green eyes were the only thing I saw, her whimpers the only ones I heard. I hadn’t expected her to be there. I hadn’t expected her to fly home from college to say goodbye to my brother, but she had. And I didn’t expect her to find me at my parents’ house after the funeral. I swear, there were hundreds of people there, and it was the loneliest day of my life. I had to get out of there and started walking. I’m not sure if it’s just me, but when I need to think, I tend to walk. That day, Sterling was by my side. We didn’t talk, roaming around the fields until we ended up at this old barn. It was the place that Levi and I escaped to. As little kids, we’d used it as a fort, a clubhouse. Later, it held our bikes and four wheelers.
I remember being embarrassed bringing Sterling inside. It was old and filled with our junk. The only place to even sit was an old, beat up sofa. We made good use of it, though.
I’ve never been as unprepared for something as I was that day. Unprepared to put my brother in the ground, unprepared to lose my virginity, unprepared to let her walk away.
I chuckle remembering exactly how unprepared I was when our naked bodies first touched. My brain thought “condom.” But I didn’t have one. My dick promised it’d pull out. But I had no idea the kind of willpower that would take. I swear to God, I had every intention of pulling out.
I thought for sure that she’d kill me, and quickly launched into the lamest apology in the history of the universe. Just thinking about it makes me cringe. I was never so thankful for anything in my whole life as when she kissed me to shut me up, whispering she was on the pill.
Some might think it’s a dick move to be banging a girl the day you bury your twin brother. But it wasn’t like that at all. It wasn’t cheap. I didn’t think of it as a one-night stand, even though technically it was. It’s impossible to explain. It was us clinging onto life, onto each other. Emily Brontë wrote, "Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.” And after that night, our souls have been forever linked.
Every single second of that night is burned into my mind, my heart, my skin.
After that night, we stayed in touch for a long time — email, phone calls. But we were thousands of miles apart. And our paths never crossed again. If I was at home on break, she wasn’t. It just seemed like it wasn’t meant to be. She is the one that got away. We never got our chance.
Now she’s back, and she thinks we can be friends? I spent my entire childhood and teenage years being “friends” with her.
She wants to be friends? That’s fine. I’ll be her friend. But I’ll be damned if that’s all I am.
4.5 Stars
This book! Toying with Her, is a sweet, sexy and fun read. Sterling and Rorke are perfectly matched. The southern charm of Rorke will have you melting. This small-town boy woos back his childhood crush and I couldn't love it anymore!
Sterling is a successful business woman who invented the bestselling...adult toy for women. She's millionaire many times over, but having all the money is a lonely place. She has fans all around the world, but also critics that shame her and her company. So what does a girl do to get it away from it all? Head back home for the summer for some relaxation and time with her parents.
But being back home isn't all that welcoming. The small southern town have a few close-minded folks, who shunned her profession, that in turn has effected her parents. And there is one boy, now man, that is willing to get a second chance.
This is the second book I've read from this author and now a big fan. Looking forward to read more books from her!
About the Author
Prescott Lane is the Amazon best-selling author of Stripped Raw. She's got seven other books under her belt including: First Position, Perfectly Broken, Quiet Angel, Wrapped in Lace, Layers of Her, The Reason for Me, and The Sex Bucket List. She is originally from Little Rock, Arkansas, and holds a degree in sociology and a MSW from Tulane University. She married her college sweetheart, and they currently live in New Orleans with their two children and two crazy dogs. Prescott started writing at the age of five, and sold her first story about a talking turtle to her father for a quarter. She later turned to writing romance novels because there aren't enough happily ever afters in real life.
Present day… I took in the mess of the large, circular room we were in and at first saw nothing but the mess—decaying furniture, a soot-covered stone fireplace, a kitchen that might have been put in in the forties but had not only not been touched the last nine years, it perhaps had not been touched the last nineteen (or more). Then I saw more. The extraordinarily carved railing to the sweeping wood staircase that ran the curved side of the house. The red brick walls. The plank wood floors. “Once upon a time, long ago,” the realtor was suddenly talking wistfully, “someone loved this place. Put that love into building it. Put that love into keeping it. Nine years and more when no one really gave a whit, and still you can see it once had a lot of love.” Oh yes. You could see that. “It’s got a basement, more like a big crawl space,” the agent declared, surprising me with his quick change in tone back to businesslike and informative. “The furnace is down there. You can get down there through a door in the floor. The furnace was put in a while back, and full disclosure, though an inspection will catch it, it probably needs to be replaced.” Through his words I stared at the fireplace, which scoured would be magnificent, and I noticed it didn’t have a chimney as such, but the smoke probably went out a vent in the wall. “This floor has a powder room under the stairs,” the realtor kept on. “You can look at it if you want, but if you wanna save yourself that, I’ll just tell you straight, it needs to be gutted.” I decided to take his word for it and told him that. He looked relieved when I did before he stated, “Place has a garage, two car. Not in good condition, but think you saw that. Still, it’s close to the house and there’s a covered walkway to that door over there.” He pointed at a door that was across from the door we’d walked in. “Means you might feel a chill but you won’t get wet, unless it’s raining sideways, which happens.” With a breeze that plastered my jacket to me on a sunny, early spring day, I did not doubt that. “Garage has a loft space above it, which could be renovated as a studio rental if you’ve a mind to do that sort of thing. As for the property itself, it also has a building where the generators are stowed,” the realtor carried on. “Hook up for a washer and dryer and good space in there. Lots of it for storage. Which is good because there’s not a lot of storage in here for tools and Christmas decorations and whatnot.” I glanced around seeing he was right. There wasn’t even enough cabinetry to house the things a decent cook would need in her kitchen. Though there was room for them. In fact, if you fought back the gloom, there was quite a bit of room. “And there’s a place outside, could call it a studio, could call it a mother-in-law house,” he shared. “Whatever, it’s got goodly space, two bedrooms, big kitchen. Could be renovated to be a guest house. Or like I said, a studio if you’re artsy. Or you could rent it out like a B and B. I’ll show you all of that after we have a look at the lighthouse.” “Thanks,” I replied. “Now, since I mentioned full disclosure, you have to know it all,” the realtor continued. Slowly, my eyes went to him. When they did, he launched in. “Like I said, it’s automated. And like I said, you won’t really have to concern yourself with the functionality of that unless the electricity goes out, but then the generators automatically kick in. There are two. But you’ll need to keep fuel on hand to keep them going in case a blackout lasts awhile. And just to say, this is coastal Maine. We get weather. Blackouts can last awhile.” When I nodded to share I took that in, he kept going. “And if you’re, say, away on vacation, you need to make sure someone is playing backup in such a case.” “Okay,” I replied when he stopped talking, thinking this probably wasn’t a good thing since I knew no one in Maine (or not anyone who wanted to know me) and thus couldn’t call on anyone to do something like that. I also didn’t hold high hopes I’d make friends and win people. I hadn’t had a lot of success in that in my life. And last, although Patrick believed it completely, I held no hope that the reason I was out there was going to come to fruition. That being me having a happy ending. That being what Patrick thought would be my happy ending. Which might mean I’d have someone, a certain someone, or actually two (at least), even though I knew I never would. 
About Kristen Ashley:
Kristen Ashley was born in Gary, Indiana, USA and nearly killed her mother and herself making it into the world, seeing as she had the umbilical cord wrapped around her neck (already attempting to accessorize and she hadn't taken her first breath!). Her mother said they took Kristen away, put her Mom back in her room, her mother looked out the window, and Gary was on fire (Dr. King had been assassinated four days before). Kristen's Mom remembered thinking it was the end of the world. Quite the dramatic beginning.
Nothing's changed.
Kristen grew up in Brownsburg, Indiana and has lived in Denver, Colorado and the West Country of England. Thus, she's blessed to have friends and family around the globe. Her family was (is) loopy (to say the least) but loopy is good when you want to write. They all lived together on a very small farm in a small farm town in the heartland. She grew up with Glenn Miller, The Everly Brothers, REO Speedwagon and Whitesnake (and the wardrobes that matched).
Needless to say, growing up in a house full of music, clothes and love was a good way to grow up.
And as she keeps growing, it keeps getting better.
