I Have Lived And I Have Loved
A Charity Romance Collection
Willow Winters
KA Linde
J.D. Hollyfield
Jenna Hartley
Carrie Ann Ryan
Nikki Ash
Marni Mann
Aleatha Romig
Tia Louise
Nana Malone
Livia Grant
Harloe Rae
Melanie Harlow
Corinne Michaels
Skye Warren
Jennifer Bene
Amelia Wilde
Dylan Allen
Contents
About Live A Thousand Lives
Flirting with a Good Night
1. Sharon
2. Cade
3. Sharon
Sneak Peek at Knocking Boots
Prologue
Also by Willow Winters
About Willow Winters
Christmas at the White House
1. I: The Rose Garden
2. II: Birds of a Feather
3. III: The Oval Office
4. IV: We Own That Desk
5. V: Christmas Presents
Inked Fantasy
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Also by Carrie Ann Ryan
About the Author
The Inevitable
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Epilogue
About the Author
The Scene
About the Author
Also by Marni Mann
Baby It’s Cold Outside
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
About the Authors
Also by the Authors
Books by Corinne Michaels
Books by Melanie Harlow
You Walked In
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
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The Devil’s Chessboard
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Bridge of Love
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
First Dance
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Shaken
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
About the Author
Also by Livia Grant
Inevitable
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Afterword
White Ribbon
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Once Upon a Snowstorm
1. Brinnah
2. Flint
3. Brinnah
4. Flint
5. Brinnah
6. Flint
7. Brinnah
About the Author
Also By Jennifer Bene
Books Released As Cassandra Faye
Delicious
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Three Months Later
I’m Calling Dibs
I’m Calling Dibs
1. Rayne
2. Rayne
3. Seth
4. Seth
5. Seth
6. Rayne
Afterword
Also by Harloe Rae
About the Author
Ctrl+Alt+Bang
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
About the Author
Acknowledgments
Want more from J.D. Hollyfield?
About Live A Thousand Lives
About Live A Thousand Lives
Thank you so, so much for purchasing a copy of I Have Lived and I Have Loved!
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100% of the profits from this anthology will be given to the Live A Thousand Lives charity.
This charity donates audio players - equipped with hundreds of hours of classic stories - to low-to-no mobility patients in nursing facilities and hospitals.
The Live A Thousand Lives Project has been fueled by prolific Romance writers and unabashed book lovers who appreciate that audiobooks boost mental health, improve memory and stimulate the brain in ways that mirror reading printed text.
* * *
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WAYS TO HELP:
You can find out more and donate by clicking here!
Or you can purchase an audio device for yourself - a Brilliant Blue Classic or a Red Hot Romance Audio Player (with over $200 worth of audio books from bestselling authors) by clicking here!
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* * *
Flirting with a Good Night
By Willow Winters
In our small town, all of my friends have found their soulmates and here I am, moving from one crush to the next but never actually settling down. The reason why is standing only a few feet from me now. He’s joking with my best friend’s husband, as I sit on their sofa trying not to stare. With his sleeves rolled up, the tattoos he got while he was away in the marines are on display, curved around his toned muscle that flex with his rough chuckle.
* * *
Cade was years older and left right after high school. I never told him how I felt, we were so young and there was no way he’d ever go for a sophomore like me. Times have changed and now he’s back… and I can’t stop staring and pining over the man I’ve been longing for.
* * *
And when he looks my way, with that handsome smirk, rough stubble and gorgeous baby blue gaze…
Sharon
“Just smell it.”
Magnolia’s command is murmured with aww, even if it does crack me up. Both of us take a deep inhale that has my back pushing against the cream sectional sofa. Her eyes are closed, her nose just a centimeter above the practically bald little one’s head. He has just a small smatter of dark brown hair at the very top of his noggin and with the little jostle, he coos, putting a wide-eyed Autumn on edge.
“There’s nothing like it in the whole world.” Magnolia’s statement is met with both another coo from Cameron, the two-week old little one fast asleep in her arms, and a lo
ng exhale of relief from his mother. Autumn’s arms are still up as if she was getting ready to snatch her newborn and quickly rock him back to sleep if he woke from the two of us taking a nice long whiff of that baby smell.
I bite back my smile, unable to not see the humor in the room with Magnolia completely missing Autumn’s stress.
“Seriously,” Mags presses, “There’s something about the way they smell…” I finally let out a laugh when Mags closes her eyes and lays back with the little boy.
“If you keep creeping me out, I’m taking my baby back,” Autumn’s response is given with a broad smile. You’d never know she just went through almost thirty hours of labor earlier this week.
There really is something about that sweet baby powder like scent, though. I have to agree with Mags, pulling my legs up on the sofa and then resting my pointer against Cameron’s little cheek. “He is freaking adorable Autumn,” I murmur and feel my heart swell with happiness for her and Trent and their other two boys.
“I want another baby.” Mags cradles the baby closer and Autumn’s eyes go wide.
“If you wake him, you keep him,” she comments while dragging the basket of clothes across the kitchen island to be closer to her. She’s all the way at the end of it, now perched on a stool, while the two of us, strike that, two and a little a bundle, are huddled at the end of her sofa where the living room meets the kitchen.
Our Wine-down Wednesdays have certainly changed recently. Mags with her … shall I say love life dilemma, and Autumn with her ever-growing family.
“I’m not going to wake him up,” Mags admonishes Autumn then makes an ‘oops’ expression as Cameron wiggles in her arms.
The little man has only been on this earth for less than 2 weeks but he knows how to make the whole world stop as he nestles in tighter.
“I would steal him away from you,” I start and then we all hear the front door open and the sound of several boot steps filter in through the house. “But I have to get going,” I finish as the sight of two men interrupts the conversation.
With a charming smile, the first man pauses to cup the little one’s head. Giving me the perfect comparison of father and son.
Cameron looks just like Trent, Autumn’s husband. His little nose and those large brown eyes. They are all Trent.
With a pout from Mags, and her pulling the baby into her arms playfully, as if to say ‘he’s mine, off,’ Trent chuckles and makes his way to Autumn, planting a kiss on her cheek before setting down a number of plastic bags on the counter next to his wife.
What is it with men and carrying every single bag from the grocery store in at once?
“Thanks for giving him a ride while his car is in the shop,” Autumn’s gratitude is met with a little nod from the second man.
The one who has my heart stuttering from my place on the sofa.
“No problem,” his deep voice echoes and I take the chance to drink him in.
In our small town, all of my friends have found their soulmates and here I am, moving from one crush to the next but never actually settling down. The reason why is standing only a few feet from me now. He’s joking with my best friend’s husband, as I sit on their sofa trying not to stare. With his sleeves rolled up, the tattoos he got while he was away in the marines are on display, curved around his toned muscle that flex with his rough chuckle.
He was years older and left right after high school. I never told him how I felt, we were so young and there was no way he’d ever go for a sophomore like me. Times have changed and now he’s back… and I can’t stop staring and pining over the man I’ve been longing for.
And when he looks my way, with that handsome smirk, rough stubble and gorgeous baby blue gaze… Lord, have mercy.
“Cade Jameson,” Magnolia calls out as she gently sets the infant down for the first time since she snatched him from me. The little bundle lays effortlessly into the rocker at our feet.
With a gentle touch, I rock the little one, still bundled in a ‘choo choo’, blue plaid, train swaddle and look anywhere but at the man who’s become the center of conversation.
In my periphery, I gauge the friendly hug between them. It’s nothing more than polite. Well maybe a touch comical considering how short she is and how he has to bend down to hug her in return. She’s a bit petite and Cade is a wall of muscle, taller than most.
“It’s good to have you back. You staying long?
“I am,” he answers proudly and I only notice that I’m staring, waiting with baited breath for his answer, when his gaze lifts past Mags to where I am.
I’m quick to look away although I continue to eavesdrop about how he’ll be home through the holidays and how he’s stationed here now, hopefully permanently.
My little heart pitter patters at the thought of him being back home for good.
“You staying for dinner?” Autumn questions and it takes me far too long to look up and realize she’s asking me.
“Oh, no. I have to head out and I already ate.” I answer her but then realize once the words were spoken that she already knew that. I told her the moment I got here and stole Cameron from her before Magnolia could.
“You’re walking home?” she questions further, the room of eyes on both of us. I ignore the heat that comes with Cade’s prying gaze.
“That’s how I got here,” I cock a sarcastic brow Autumn’s way and wonder why she added concern to her tone. I always walk to her house, she knows that. It’s one of the reasons I love this neighborhood so much. As I stand, I stretch out my back slightly, focusing on the cream throw I’m folding rather than the man whose gaze is falling down my body.
Years ago I thought the tension between us was imagined. Or at least one sided. But this is the third time I’ve seen him since he’s been back and I swear it only gets more and more obvious that I can’t keep my eyes off of him and I know he does the same. Stealing glances each time we’ve had a run in together.
“Why doesn’t Cade take you home?” Autumn offers, folding a tee-shirt in her lap and then adding it to a pile on the counter.
Oh, the betrayal. She doesn’t have the decency to look me in the eyes. Instead she focuses solely on Cade as my heart completely halts in my chest. “You can take her home on your way, can’t you Cade?”
Alone with this man? In his truck? Late at night with my ovaries still doing flip flops at the sight of a newborn?
Oh, no, no, no.
“Of course I can,” he answers easily, a touch of southern hitting his last word as he slips his hands, which I already know are rough from years of manual labor, into his jean pockets. His asymmetric smile greets me, “Ready when you are, Shar.”
Shar. It takes great effort not to swoon just from the way he says my nickname.
Cade
There’s nothing like the autumn leaves, hues of gold and red, being carried down the gravel road of this old town. Or the smell of the apples and the laughter of kids playing at the edge of the orchard that lines this half of the neighborhood I grew up in.
Nothing like the soft sigh that comes from Shar’s plump lips either or the way the wind blows her brunette locks as I help her into my truck.
It’s all a part of home to me. A home I missed dearly for years.
Her hand is small in mine and the blush that rises up her chest and into her cheeks is certainly from my hand on the small of her back rather than the chill in the air. I’ve always had an effect on her, one that forces a hint of a chuckle from me and she peeks up through her lashes and then finds her place in the passenger side.
“Thank you,” she whispers shyly, letting me shut her door after giving her a small nod and a “no problem.”
Shar has no idea how much I thought about her while I was overseas. How the stories Trent would tell me, keeping me up to date on this town, always seemed to come back to her.