COVER REVEAL: The Rule Series by Monica Murphy
Cover Designer: Sarah Hansen, Okay Creations
FAIR GAME (The Rules Series, Book 1) May 12, 2015
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“What are you doing?” she asks, sounding the tiniest bit breathless.
“Making sure you’re not injured,” I answer, proud of how under control I sound. Inside, I’m chaos. My heart is thumping hard against my chest and my breathing’s accelerated. I grip her knee, and realize my hand is fucking shaking.
“I think you’re trying to get your hand up my skirt.” Leave it to Bitch Face to call me out. I can’t help but find her straightforwardness attractive. No girl is ever straightforward with me. They’re always coy. Playing games and flirting and never asking for what they really want. They always defer to me.
After awhile, that gets pretty damn boring.
“Maybe I am,” I say, moving my hand to rest on top of her knee.
Her lips curve into the smallest smile and seeing it feels like a victory. As if I’ve just won an extra difficult battle and that tiny curve of her lush lips is my prize. “You’re pretty determined, aren’t you?”
She’s not pushing me away. I need to take this moment. Seize this fucking moment and make it mine. Make her mine. At least for tonight. Her scent is making my head spin and just touching her knee has got me sporting wood. “I’m always determined.”
“Determined to piss me off?”
I chuckle and her smile grows. “Am I doing a good job?”
“You’re an expert at making me mad.”
“I think we’re having a moment,” I tell her. “A bonding moment.”
She looks the slightest bit horrified. “No. Way. That is the last thing I want to do.”
I raise my eyebrows, let my hand slide up a bare inch more. Then another. I’m so close to getting under that skirt, it’s not even funny. “You don’t like me very much, do you?”
“You don’t like me either. You call me Bitch Face.”
“You introduced yourself to me as Bitch Face.”
She tilts her head, all that wavy red hair tumbling over her shoulder. My fingers itch to touch it. “I did, didn’t I?”
“Yeah. I thought it was an unusual name…” I let my voice drift and she smiles once more.
“Says the man with an unusual name.”
“I told you it’s an old family name.”
“As a last name, not as a first.” She makes a little face. “It’s not very sexy.”
“You don’t think?” Interesting.
“I can’t imagine shouting out your name in the throes of passion.” Her cheeks go the faintest pink. That she’s even thinking like this gives me a secret thrill.
Forbidden. Unknown. This is the last girl I should consider getting naked with.
“Throes of passion?” I ask. “Someone’s been reading too many romance novels.”
“You know what I mean.” She waves a hand, dismissing her words.
“I don’t.” I pull the innocent act, which she isn’t falling for but it’s still fun. “What are you talking about exactly?”
“You’re not going to make me explain, are you?”
“I would love for you to explain. Or maybe I should help you.” I crawl my fingers up her thigh, playing with the frayed hem of her denim skirt. “Are you talking about…having sex?”
She nods, her cheeks blazing up. Hmm, she’s extra pretty when she blushes.
“And that moment…when we’re fucking…and you’re so damn close.” I lean in and inhale deep, my eyes almost falling shut as I absorb her scent, her warmth and that flush in her cheeks, the way her breathing quickens. “So fucking close as I push deep inside you. You don’t think it would be sexy to yell out my name just as I make you come?”
“N-no.” She shakes her head, that single word coming out as a squeak.
“Really.” I give in and settle my cheek next to hers, nuzzle her ear with my nose before I whisper, “Because by the time I have you coming, I’m fairly certain you’ll be crying out my name and begging me please.”
“You’re a real arrogant prick, aren’t you?”
I pull back from her the slightest bit, a little shocked. The girl doesn’t mince words. “Merely confident in my abilities.” I cup the back of her head, thread my fingers in the silky soft waves of her hair. I’d love to wrap her hair around my fist and tug her head back right before I kiss her…
“Proud of your manwhore status?”
“I can’t help it if the ladies flock to me.”
She rests her hand on my chest and gives me a gentle shove. “I’m not flocking to you.”
“Even after all that talk about coming and with my hand up your skirt?”
Jade looks down with a sharp gasp, dropping her hand to mine and shoving it out from beneath her skirt. “What are you doing?”
“I thought it was obvious.” When she says nothing, only glares at me, I continue. “I was going to kiss you and hopefully get you off with my fingers.”
Her mouth drops open. Instead of looking aroused, she looks…pissed. Vaguely horrified. “You’re disgusting.”
I lean back. Move way, way back though I’m not getting off the bed. Not yet. I still have a chance.
Or then again, maybe I don’t.
IN THE DARK (Book 2) August 25, 2015
SLOW PLAY (Book 3) November 3, 2015
New York Times, USA Today and international bestselling author Monica Murphy is a native Californian who lives in the foothills below Yosemite with her husband and three children. She’s a workaholic who loves her job. When she’s not busy writing, she also loves to read and travel with her family. She writes new adult and contemporary romance and is published with Bantam and Avon. She also writes romance as USA Today bestselling author Karen Erickson.
