Title: Anchor Me
Series: Stark Trilogy #4
Author: J. Kenner
Genre: Erotic Romance
Release Date: April 11, 2017
Synopsis
Fourth novel in the fast-paced series including Release Me, Claim Me, and Complete Me. This sexy, emotionally charged romance continues the story of Damien Stark, the powerful multimillionaire who’s never had to take “no” for an answer, and his beloved wife Nikki Fairchild Stark, the Southern belle who only says “yes” on her own terms.
It’s a new chapter in the life of Nikki and Damien Stark ...
Though shadows still haunt us, and ghosts from our past continue to threaten our happiness, my life with Damien is nothing short of perfection. He is my heart and my soul. My past and my future. He is the man who holds me together, and his love fuels my days and enchants my nights.
But when tragedy and challenge from both inside and outside the sanctity of our marriage begins to chip away at our happiness, I am forced to realize that even a perfect life can begin to crack. And if Damien and I are going to win this new battle, it will take all of our strength and love ...
Excerpt
Anchor Me – Chapter One
I look out the window at the beautifully manicured yards that line the wide street down which I am traveling in the sumptuous luxury of a classic Rolls Royce Phantom. A car so sleek and magical that I can’t help but feel like a princess in a royal coach.
The road is shaded by parallel rows of massive oaks, their branches arcing over the street toward their counterparts to form a leafy canopy. Morning light fights its way between the leaves, creating golden beams in which dust sparkles and dances as if to a celebratory melody, adding to the illusion that we are moving through a fairy tale world.
All in all, it’s a picture-perfect moment. Except it’s not. Not really. Or at least not to me. Because as far as I’m concerned, this is no children’s story. This is Dallas. This is the neighborhood where I grew up. And that means that this isn’t a fairy tale. It’s a nightmare.
The branches aren’t stunning—they’re grasping. Reaching out to snare me. To hold me tight. To trap me.
The canopy doesn’t mark a royal corridor leading to a castle. It leads to a cell. And it’s not The Dance of the Sugarplum Fairies that fills the air. It is a requiem for the dead.
The world outside the car is lined with traps, and if I’m not careful, I’ll be sucked in. Destroyed by the darkness that hides behind the false facades of these stately houses.
Surrounded not by a bright children’s tale, but by a horror movie, lured in by the promise of beauty and then trapped forever and slowly destroyed, ripped to pieces by the monsters in the dark.
Breathe, I tell myself. You can do this. You just have to remember to breathe. “Nikki. Nikki.” Damien’s voice startles me back to reality, and I jerk upright, calling upon perfect posture to ward off the ghosts of my memories.
His tone is soft, profoundly gentle, but when I glance toward him, I see that his eyes have dipped to my lap. For a moment, I’m confused, then I realize that I’ve inched up my skirt, and my fingertip is slowly tracing the violent scar that mars my inner thigh.
A souvenir of the deep, ugly wound that I inflicted upon myself a decade ago when I was desperate to find a way to release all the pent-up anger and fear and pain that swirled inside me like a phalanx of demons.
I yank my hand away, then turn to look out the window, feeling oddly, stupidly ashamed. He says nothing, but the car moves to the curb and then rolls to a stop. A moment later, Damien’s fingers twine with mine.
I hold tight, drawing strength, and when I shift to look at him more directly, I see worry etched in the hard angles of that perfect face and reflected in those exceptional, dual-colored eyes.
Worry, yes. But it is the rest of what I see that takes my breath away. Understanding. Support. Respect. Most of all, I see a love so fierce it has the power to melt me, and I revel in its power to soothe.
He is the biggest miracle of my life, and there are moments when I still can’t believe that he is mine. Damien Stark. My husband, my lover, my best friend.
A man who commands an empire with a firm, controlling hand. Who takes orders from no one, and yet today is playing chauffeur so that he can stand beside me while I confront my past.
For a moment, I simply soak him in. His strength, apparent in both his commanding manner and the long, lean lines of his athletic body. His support, reflected in those eyes that see me so intimately. That have, over the years, learned all my secrets.
Damien knows every scar on my body, as well as the story behind each. He knows the depth of my pain, and he knows how far I have come. How far his love has helped me come.
Most of all, he knows what it has cost me to return to Texas. To drive these streets. To look out at this neighborhood so full of pain and dark memories. With a small shiver, I pull my hand free so that I can hug myself.
“Oh, baby.” The concern in his voice is so thick I can almost grab hold of it. “Nikki, you don’t have to do this.” “I do.” My words sound ragged, my throat too clogged with unshed tears to speak normally. “Sweetheart—”
I wait, expecting him to continue, but he’s gone silent. I see the tension on his face, as if he’s uncertain what to say or how to say it—but Damien Stark is never unsure. Not about business. Not about himself. Not about me.
And yet right now he’s hesitating. Treating me like I’m something fragile and breakable. “You think coming here is a mistake.” I snap the words at him, but it’s not Damien I’m irritated with, it’s me.
“No.” He doesn’t hesitate, and I take some comfort in the speed and certainty of his response. “But I do wonder if now is the right time. Maybe tomorrow would be better. After your meetings.”
We’ve come to Texas not so that I can torture myself by driving through my old neighborhood to visit my estranged mother, but because I’m vying to land a contract with one of the top web development companies in the country.
It’s looking to roll out a series of apps, both for internal use among its employees and externally for its clients.
I’d submitted a proposal and am now one of only five companies invited to come to Dallas to pitch, and my little company is by far the smallest and the newest.
I suspect, of course, that part of the reason I got the invitation is because I’m married to Damien Stark, and because my company has already licensed software to Stark International.
A year ago, that would have bothered me. Not anymore. I’m damn good at what I do, and if my last name gets me a foot in the door, then so be it. I don’t care how the opportunity comes because I know that my work is top-notch, and if I get the job, it will be on the merits of my proposal and my presentation.
It’s a huge opportunity, and one I don’t want to screw up. Especially since my goal for the next eighteen months is to build up my receivables, hire five employees, and take over the full floor of the building that houses my office condo.
I’d worked on my business plan for months, and was a complete nervous wreck the night I handed it to my master of the universe, brilliantly entrepreneurial husband for review. When he’d given it the Damien Stark seal of approval, I practically collapsed with relief.
My plan to grow my business doesn’t hinge on me getting this job—but landing it will mean I can bump all my target dates up by six months. More importantly, winning this contract will put my business firmly on the competitive map.
My shoulders sag a bit as I meet his eyes. “You’re afraid that seeing Mother is going to throw me off my game. That I’ll flub tomorrow’s meetings and hurt my chances of landing the contract.”“I want you at your best.”
“I know you do,” I say sincerely, because Damien has never been anything but supportive. “Don’t you get it? That’s why we’re here. It’s like a preemptive strike.”
His brow furrows, but before he can ask what I mean, I rush to explain. “Just being in Dallas messes with my head—we both know that. She haunts this town. And having you here with me now makes it so much better.
But you can’t always be with me, and before I make my pitch, I need to be certain that I can travel back and forth between LA and Dallas without being afraid I’ll see her around every corner.”
The pathetic truth is that lately I’ve been seeing my mother around all sorts of corners. I’ve imagined seeing her in Beverly Hills shopping centers. On Malibu beaches. In crowded streets. At charity events.
I have no idea why this woman I’ve worked so hard to block from my mind is suddenly at the forefront of my imagination, but she is. And I really don’t want her there.
I draw a breath, hoping he understands. “I need to lay all these demons to rest and just do my work. Please,” I add, my voice imploring. “Please tell me you understand.”
“I do,” he says, then takes my hand and gently kisses my fingertips. As he does, his phone rings. It’s sitting on the console, and I can see that the caller is his attorney, Charles Maynard.
“Don’t you need to take it?” I ask, as he scowls, then declines the call. “It can wait.” There’s a hard edge to his voice, and I wonder what he’s not telling me.
Not that Damien keeps me informed about every aspect of his business—considering he pretty much owns and operates the entire planet and a few distant solar systems, that would require far too many updates—but he does tend to keep me in the loop on things that are troubling him.
I frown. It’s clear that he’s not telling me because I already have plenty on my mind. And while I appreciate the sentiment, I don’t like that—once again—my mother has come between my husband and me.
You should call him back, I say. If he’s calling on a Sunday, it must be important . . . I let the words trail away, hoping to give him an opening, but all he does is shake his head. “Don’t worry about it,” he says, even as his phone signals an incoming text.
He snatches it up, but not before I see Charles’s name flash on the lock screen again, this time with a single word: Urgent.
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Teasers
The Series
For fans of Fifty Shades of Grey and Bared to You comes an erotic, emotionally charged romance between a powerful man who’s never heard “no” and a fiery woman who says “yes” on her own terms.
About Author
J.Kenner (aka Julie Kenner) is the New York Times, USA Today, Publishers Weekly, Wall Street Journal and #1 International bestselling author of over seventy novels, novellas and short stories in a variety of genres.
Though known primarily for her award-winning and international bestselling erotic romances (including the Stark and Most Wanted series) that have reached as high as #2 on the New York Times bestseller list, JK has been writing full time for over a decade in a variety of genres including paranormal and contemporary romance, “chicklit” suspense, urban fantasy, and paranormal mommy lit.
JK has been praised by Publishers Weekly as an author with a “flair for dialogue and eccentric characterizations” and by RT Bookclub for having “cornered the market on sinfully attractive, dominant antiheroes and the women who swoon for them.” A five time finalist for Romance Writers of America’s prestigious RITA award, JK took home the first RITA trophy awarded in the category of erotic romance in 2014 for her novel, Claim Me (book 2 of her Stark Trilogy).
Her Demon Hunting Soccer Mom series (as Julie Kenner) is currently in development with AwesomenessTV/Awestruck.
Her books have sold over three million copies and are published in over twenty languages.
In her previous career as an attorney, JK worked as a clerk on the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, and practiced primarily civil, entertainment and First Amendment litigation in Los Angeles and Irvine, California, as well as in Austin, Texas. She currently lives in Central Texas, with her husband, two daughters, and two rather spastic cats.
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