Sunday Smooch - Second Chance with the Single Dad by Kandy Shepherd

Welcome to another LoveCats DownUnder Sunday Smooch!


Today we have a smooch from Kandy Shepherd's new release SECOND CHANCE WITH THE SINGLE DAD but first


... the winner of last week's Sunday Smooch Giveaway is Laurie!


Can you please contact  annie@annie-west.com to receive your copy of The Greek's Forbidden Innocent.


And now for today's Sunday Smooch from Kandy Shepherd. 

From long-lost friends...

To newfound family?

Georgia and Wil were best friends until he married and disappeared from her life. Now he’s back, asking Georgia to forget the past and help him secure his future—the daughter he never knew he had! Georgia’s heart goes out to new dad Wil, but there’s an uncharted chemistry fizzing between them and she must protect her heart. Can they confront their unspoken attraction and finally become a family?

Scene set-up

Girl-next-door schoolteacher Georgia Lang and handsome self-made millionaire Wil Hudson go way back as “just friends.” They know each other so well they claim to read each other’s thoughts. But not everyone wishes the platonic friends well and the friendship ends abruptly and painfully. There was always an attraction, something deeper, but for fear of unleashing emotions they couldn’t handle, of losing the friendship, they never acted on it. Then Wil becomes a single dad to adorable baby Nina and Georgia agrees to help, staying with him for the school vacation at his beautiful house. But his visiting parents misunderstand the situation and think Wil and Georgia are engaged. The seriousness of his mother’s illness make Wil want to maintain the charade just for a few days. Georgia reluctantly agrees. But it’s still just platonic—right?

Smooch  - 

‘I’m in. I’m your fiancée until Wednesday,’ she said.

Wil stepped closer. Took both her hands in his. She looked down to their joined hands and back up to him, alarmed

‘It’s only pretend, remember,’ he said. ‘But we need to be convincing. As you reminded me, I’ve never kissed you. Engaged people should probably have some knowledge of what it’s like to kiss each other.’

Georgia looked up at him, her eyes wide and wary, but still with a trace of smile lingering at the corners of her lips. Her mouth was slicked with cherry-red gloss and it looked eminently kissable. He’d always found that slight unevenness of her top lip very appealing—now he wanted to know how it felt under his lips, how she tasted, how she felt in his arms.

‘Okay, so we kiss,’ she said.

‘Right,’ he said, taken aback by her practical approach.

‘Shall I be the first?’

‘What do you mea—?’

Before he could finish his question, Georgia had tugged on their linked hands to pull him close and pressed her mouth against his, soft and warm and, to his surprise, hesitant. For all her show of bravado, she was nervous.

Wil wasn’t the slightest bit nervous. More like exultant that he had her so close. Kissing Georgia at last.He took command of the kiss, being careful to keep his lips on hers tender and undemanding.

A shiver of surrender ran through her as she relaxed into the kiss. He tightened his grip on her hands. She parted her lips to welcome his tongue with a little murmur of what he couldn’t be sure was pleasure or trepidation. He vowed, with a fierce surge of protectiveness, he would make sure she felt only pleasure from his touch.

Her curves were soft and yielding against his chest. He slid his hands around to grasp her waist and pull her even closer. The wrap skirt of her dress had swung open to the top of her taut, toned thighs and her legs were bare against his. When her tongue met his, tentative at first and then meeting his in a sensual tangle, he was stunned by the sudden and intense shock waves of pleasure that rippled through his body—and his heart.

Her first kiss with Wil. It was so much more than Georgia could ever have imagined. She was almost overwhelmed by excitement. This isn’t real, she tried to remind herself, but she couldn’t think logically when she was so overwhelmed by sensation. This was Wil, familiar, yet, oh, so unfamiliar. His mouth, tasting of coffee and his favourite chocolate cookie. His scent, citrus shower gel with a heady touch of fresh, manly sweat. His hard, perfect male body in such intimate contact with hers.

What had started as a harmless practice kiss had flamed into something else altogether and escalated to a passionate exchange that surprised the heck out of her. Her heart hammered, her body pulsed with want. They’d always had a connection, mental, spiritual, now it was physical. The difference between friend and potential lover. 

Her heart gave a huge jolt. She broke away from the kiss to catch her breath, to find her balance. If she didn’t pull away from him, she’d be dragging him behind the house and pushing him up against the wall.

She came up for air, panting, holding on to her heart. Wil was the same, his eyes dazed and unfocused. He seemed as knocked out as she was by what they had unleashed.

‘What happened there?’ she gasped.

Wil was drawing in great gulps of air in an effort to steady his voice. ‘Eight years of wanting to kiss you? What’s your guess?’

‘Same,’ she managed to choke out. The thought struck her. ‘Or was it an act? On your part, I mean. You know, to look authentic.’

‘I sure as hell wasn’t acting. What about you?’

She shook her head. ‘No. It...it was real.’

Georgia looked up at him and, as had happened so many times before, their eyes connected and they laughed. She felt exhilarated, high almost. Her buddy Wil. The best kisser she’d ever kissed.

He planted a firm, hard kiss on her mouth. ‘Who knew?’ 

I'm a believer in platonic friendships but others think that there is often an underlying attraction - perhaps only on one side - even if it might never be acted on. What are your thoughts?

 Leave a comment here and go into the draw to win a copy of SECOND CHANCE WITH THE SINGLE DAD. 

Come back next Sunday, when the winner of today's giveaway will be announced and a smooch from Andi Bolter will be posted!

Smooch Graphic by WebWeaver

The empty nest

I  found myself moping around the place the other day wondering why I felt just a little down. Then my husband and I realised why we were both feeling a little bit that way—we’d been struck by the “empty nest syndrome”. 

Towards the end of last year our daughter, our only child, finally left home. She’d studied for years so had been living with us until age twenty-five (in Sydney, it’s the exception rather than the rule for uni students to live away from home). She’d been away on academic placements for weeks on end, but always came home. Even after she moved out (to a very happy living arrangement) for a while she worked nearby for a few days a week and sometimes it didn’t feel like she’d gone at all. 

But now, though we talk and text often nearly every day, she’s not often here, and when she is she’s a visitor. Her bedroom is now a fully functioning guest room but of course it’s still referred to as her room. The cats go in there, sit in the middle of the room and cry sometimes because they miss her. I’m still buying too much food at the supermarket.

According to Pyschology Today, empty nest syndrome is not a clinical diagnosis, but "refers to feelings of depression, sadness, and, or grief experienced by parents and caregivers after children come of age and leave their childhood homes." So it really is a thing!

We are delighted our daughter is enjoying an independent, happy life. That’s the outcome we want for her. We love being a guest in her new home. But having her gone is a kind of grief, not just for the loss of her company but also the end of an era where our lives revolved around family. We were older parents so daughter leaving home also coincides with facing retirement and down-sizing and other big life changes. (Not that I have any intention of retiring from writing romance!) You prepare for other stages of life, but we certainly hadn’t consciously prepared for the empty nest.

Last night I cooked one of my daughter’s favourite meals for dinner—a yummy cheese and caramelised onion quiche—and remarked to my husband how odd it was that for the first time we would get to eat the entire quiche ourselves, with leftovers for lunch the next day. 

Then there was a knock on the door and there she was, wanting a fix of home. I don’t know what empty nest syndrome is called for the one who left and sometimes misses home but I guess she’d felt it. There was much hugging. The cats came running up the hallway at the sound of her voice. And quiche was served. When her partner came to pick her up, he was also served quiche. There was no quiche left for lunch today but I didn’t mind at all.

Our little family on a visit to London last year

Have you suffered from empty nest syndrome—from either side? Any coping strategies to share? I’d love to read your comments.

(My next book Second Chance with the Single Dadis out now in Australia and next month in the US and UK. Adorable baby girl Nina is an important character in the book and brought back many happy memories of my daughter as I was writing it.)