Sunday Smooch with Anna Campbell!

Welcome to another LoveCats DownUnder Sunday Smooch!

Today we have a smooch from  Anna Campbell, but first ...

the winner of last week's Sunday Smooch Giveaway is -- Kaelee!


Kaelee, can you please contact Barbara - barbnelliot (at) bigpond (dot) com com to receive your copy of Miracle At Bellaroo Creek


And now for today's Sunday Smooch from Anna Campbell's A Rake's Midnight Kiss

It Takes a Lady…

Brilliant scholar Genevieve Barrett knows how to keep a secret. Her identity as the author of her father's academic articles has always been her greatest deception-until a charming housebreaker tries to steal the mysterious Harmsworth Jewel from her. She doesn't reveal that she recognizes her father's devastatingly handsome new student as the thief himself. For Genevieve, this will be the most seductive secret of all...

..To Catch a Thief!

Sir Richard Harmsworth has been living a lie, maintaining a rakish facade to show society that he doesn't care about his status as a bastard. Yet long haunted by his unknown father's identity, Richard believes the Harmsworth Jewel will confirm his claim as the rightful heir. But when Richard sets out to seduce the bookworm who possesses the stone, he instead falls for its beautiful owner. But even as she steals Richard's heart, Genevieve will be in greater danger than her coveted treasure...

Scene set-up:

When innocent vicar's daughter Genevieve Barrett chances a midnight swim on the Duke of Sedgemoor's estate, she gets more than she bargained for when rakish Christopher Evans (aka Sir Richard Harmsworth) discovers her.

Kiss Scene:

Genevieve remained motionless as Mr. Evans’s mouth skimmed hers. The brief contact set her lips tingling. In the second between that kiss and the next, her head swam with a multitude of impressions. His height, his heat, the constrained power in his arms. The satiny texture of his lips. His clean, masculine scent.

He kissed her with a purpose and fervor that curled her toes against the grass and turned her knees to water. Lost, dazed, she hooked one hand around Mr. Evans’s shoulder to keep her balance. That first tentative kiss had provided little hint of what was to come. Her girlish imaginings even less. This was like a whirlwind.

Behind closed eyes, the darkness was blacker than a starless night. Hot darkness. Beckoning darkness. Her hand clenched in his shirt, over his frantic heartbeat. She whimpered with longing against his lips.

He gave another of those low growls that reverberated not just in her ears but in her bones and slid his tongue between her lips. She tensed with surprise and tried to withdraw.

“Open for me, Genevieve,” he whispered, brushing kisses across her nose and cheeks and forehead. It was the way one kissed a child, except that his determination mocked innocence.

“We’ve kissed now,” she stammered, hardly aware what she said. “You can let me go.”

“Devil take that for an idea.” He cradled her face between his strong palms. “That wasn’t a kiss.”

“It felt like a kiss.” She struggled to sound resolute, but only managed breathless and bedazzled. She could hardly blame Mr. Evans for responding with wry amusement.

“How would you know, my sweet little lamb?”

He kissed her again. This time his tongue’s invasion didn’t seem so alien. A thrill coursed through her, tightening her breasts and settling heavily between her legs. She shifted to relieve the building pressure.

The sensation wasn’t uncomfortable. It was just…odd.

A kiss was astonishingly intimate. Her mind might insist that Mr. Evans meant trouble, but close to his big, strong body, she felt safe. Safe, yet brave and verging on some marvelous discovery. It was like entering a hitherto forbidden section of the library.

She should be frightened, but she wasn’t. His touch was inexplicably familiar, as though he’d touched her before. As though she belonged in his arms. As though she’d waited all her life for this man to set his lips to hers.

By offering her mouth, she surrendered something of her soul. The experience was overwhelming, too complex to analyze. Instead she drifted into velvety pleasure where his lips lured her with what even a novice recognized as breathtaking expertise.

Tentatively she moved her tongue, copying him. This time Mr. Evans’s growl expressed satisfaction. What remarkable communication he achieved without words.

Encouraged, she slid her tongue over his, then more daringly, she slipped it between his lips, tasting him as he tasted her. At first the activity had seemed outlandish. No longer.



Anna's book was released in Australia and New Zealand and North America in August and can be purchased on these links:

•  Amazon
• Booktopia
•  The Book Depository
• Barnes & Noble

For a chance to win a copy of Anna's book:  

This kiss in the moonlight introduces Genevieve to a world of forbidden pleasure. I think we have our guilty little pleasures. What’s yours? Mine has to be Smith’s Barbecue Chips. Yum! Confess and you might win a signed copy of A RAKE’S MIDNIGHT KISS!

Come back next Sunday, when the winner of today's giveaway will be announced -- and a smooch from Patchwork Family in the Outback by Soraya Lane will be posted!



Smooch Graphic by WebWeaver