Exposed
Ethan Frost # 3
Ethan Frost # 3
By: Tracy Wolff
Releasing May 5th, 2015
Loveswept
Blurb
Ethan Frost, the irresistible leading man
from the New York Times bestsellers Ruined and Addicted, returns once again in
Exposed—a novel that’s perfect for fans of J. Kenner and Sylvia Day.
Will Ethan Frost go too far for the woman he loves?
The moment Chloe Girard walked into my life, she exposed secrets and emotions I always thought were best kept buried.
She wants to move on, to ignore the past. But I can’t do that. Not when she still suffers. And not when the man who hurt her remains unscathed. So when I discover the perfect opportunity to make him pay for what he did to Chloe, I can’t walk away, no matter the consequences.
But there’s a fine line between justice and obsession. As I turn up old crimes and new lies, I know that I’m playing with fire—and risking the very foundations of our relationship.
My love for Chloe is absolute. I just hope it’s enough to save us both.
Will Ethan Frost go too far for the woman he loves?
The moment Chloe Girard walked into my life, she exposed secrets and emotions I always thought were best kept buried.
She wants to move on, to ignore the past. But I can’t do that. Not when she still suffers. And not when the man who hurt her remains unscathed. So when I discover the perfect opportunity to make him pay for what he did to Chloe, I can’t walk away, no matter the consequences.
But there’s a fine line between justice and obsession. As I turn up old crimes and new lies, I know that I’m playing with fire—and risking the very foundations of our relationship.
My love for Chloe is absolute. I just hope it’s enough to save us both.
***********************
Excerpt
My plane touches down in Vegas at eleven a.m. and within minutes I’ve got us in a limousine bound for the Atlantis. It’s the hottest casino on The Strip right now and it’s owned by my college roommate and close friend Sebastian Caine.
Chloe is curled up next to me on the seat, her head resting on my shoulder and her fingers entwined with mine while her best friend, Tori, is seated across from us, chattering nonstop about all the things that she and Chloe need to do before the wedding. The list is growing by the second, getting more and more complicated. Chloe doesn’t seem upset by it, though. Instead, she’s nodding along with everything Tori says, even laughing every once in a while at a particularly outrageous suggestion.
She sounds happy. She is happy, and I’m so, so grateful. There’s nothing I want more in the world than to make this woman as happy as she makes me.
And I am happy. Ecstatic, really. How could I be anything less when the woman I love more than my own life has agreed to be my wife? We’re getting married. Today. And then she’ll be mine, forever.
And still, I can’t relax. Can’t let myself enjoy this moment when something just doesn’t feel right. I try to tell myself it’s only the agony of the last week I spent without her—and the pain of the weeks before that as we struggled to come to grips with the mess that is our tangled pasts. And while that’s true, it’s not the only thing that feels off.
Maybe it’s that there’s still so much to work out. Not so much between Chloe and me—she’s mine and I’m never letting her go again. That’s nonnegotiable. But everything else is so fucked up. My brother, her brother. My mother, her parents.
She doesn’t talk about her family much—not that I blame her after everything they did. I’m not absolving Brandon and my mother, or myself, of guilt in what happened to Chloe. But I blame her family almost as much as I blame mine. They sold her out, sold her innocence and her trust, in exchange for capital for their business. That’s not something I’ll ever be able to forget . . . or forgive.
Just one more knot in the dark tangle of the life we want to build together. The life we are building together.
I try not to let all the shit we’ve got to deal with bother me right now, but it’s harder than it should be considering the fact that we’re here to celebrate. My unease must be noticeable, though, because when Tori stops talking long enough to take a sip from the glass of wine she’s holding, Chloe leans up and presses a kiss to my cheek.
“I’m sorry,” she whispers. “She’s just really excited. She’ll calm down soon. I promise.”
“She’s not bothering me at all,” I answer truthfully. “I’m glad she’s here with you.” I turn my head, catch her next kiss on my mouth instead of my cheek.
I mean it to be just a quick brush of lips against lips, but she gasps at the first touch of my mouth to hers. Her lips open like a flower and then I’m sinking into the softness, into the sweetness, that is Chloe Girard-soon-to-be-Frost. Nothing has ever felt better.
She tastes like dark honey.
Like sweet wine.
Like a home I never had a clue I was missing before I met her.
The thought steadies me even as it turns me on. Bringing my hand to her hair, I tangle my fingers in her wild strawberry curls. She gasps again at the soft tug, then opens to me fully, her lips and tongue and mouth mine for the taking.
I delve inside, falling deeper into her with every breath, every stroke, every sigh. My tongue circles hers, slides against the side of her cheek, the roof of her mouth. And finally, finally, I feel myself relax. Because this is real. Chloe’s real. What we are together right now is real. And what we’ll build in the future is just as real.
That’s what matters. That’s all that matters. Everything else is just background noise.
Goodreads series link
Author
Info
Tracy Wolff collects books, English degrees
and lipsticks and has been known to forget where—and sometimes who—she is when
immersed in a great novel. At six she wrote her first short story—something
with a rainbow and a prince—and at seven she forayed into the wonderful world
of girls lit with her first Judy Blume novel. By ten she’d read everything in
the young adult and classics sections of her local bookstore, so in desperation
her mom started her on romance novels. And from the first page of the first
book, Tracy knew she’d found her life-long love. Now an English professor at
her local community college, she writes romances that run the gamut from
contemporary to paranormal to erotic suspense.
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GIVEAWAY
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Loveswept will be hosting a Month Long Giveaway Including:
(1) Loveswept Mug
(1) Flirt Mug
Ebook of RUINED by Tracy Wolff
Ebook of CLAIMED by Stacey Kennedy
Ebook of ONCE PERFECT by Cecy Robson
Ebook of SURRENDER by Violetta Rand
Ebook of LAST OF THE RED-HOT COWBOYS by Tina Leonard
Ebook of RAVEN by Ashley Suzanne
Ebook of UNTIL YOU FIND ME by Amber Hart
Ebook of RUSH by Gina Gordon
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Link to Follow Tour
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My review:
4 out of 5 stars
Exposed by Tracy Wolff is part of the ‘Ethan Wolfe’ series
but is also connected to the world explored in the ‘Play Me’ series. Ethan has finally worked through some of his
issues enough to convince Chloe that, despite all of their complicated history,
they do indeed belong together for the rest of their lives. Their searingly incandescent and carnal
connection is destined to continue to weather significant challenges, but if
they can convince one another to trust that what they have is real, and to give
each other unconditional support, they can get past whatever the world throws
at them…or can they?
by Tracy Wolff is part of the ‘Ethan Wolfe’ series
but is also connected to the world explored in the ‘Play Me’ series. Ethan has finally worked through some of his
issues enough to convince Chloe that, despite all of their complicated history,
they do indeed belong together for the rest of their lives. Their searingly incandescent and carnal
connection is destined to continue to weather significant challenges, but if
they can convince one another to trust that what they have is real, and to give
each other unconditional support, they can get past whatever the world throws
at them…or can they?
This wickedly sensual contemporary romance novella is part
of a series that I have not read, yet I had no trouble making a connection with
the characters and getting a feel for the challenges they have had to overcome
to reach this point. I was shocked and
appalled to read about Chloe’s history and the role Ethan and his family have
played in damaging her psyche and a little concerned about the degree of
recovery she has achieved and whether her self-image is sufficiently bolstered,
but I liked that she continued to progress throughout the story and even began
challenging the very dominant and forceful Ethan. There are certain aspects of this story that
are uncomfortable to me, as one of my personal issues is the dichotomy between
the infliction of a multiplicity of bruises as “marks of ownership” and the
willingness to accept them as a compliment…although I have been informed that
there are definitely people who savor this condition.
This story contains a significant amount of angst and
emotionalism, not to mention frequent and intense intimate encounters, but
overall there is a nice progression aided by delightful interludes with Chloe’s
best friend, Tori. The unexpected twists
add to the intense and atmospheric relationship and make this a mesmerizing and
exciting story that will make one breathless for multiple reasons, and I will
be curious to see how matters continue to unfold, especially since Tori also
deserves to get her own time in the spotlight.
A copy of this title was provided to me for review purposes
Thank you for hosting EXPOSED!
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