Sugared (Misfit Brides #4) Read online

  Kimmie squinted at the cupcakes again, and an unexpected laugh burst out of her. “You know what those remind me of?” she said to Josh.

  “Modern art?”

  “Our first kiss.”

  He looked at the cupcakes.

  Then back at Kimmie.

  And the smile he gave her was better than his old Josh Juan smiles, better than any cupcakes, and even better than discovering her courage and taking charge of her life.

  This man was her everything.

  And she hadn’t needed a superpower to snag him.

  She’d simply needed her cupcakes.

  The End.

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  The Misfit Brides Series:

  Blissed (CJ and Natalie)

  Matched (Will and Lindsey)

  Smittened (Mikey and Dahlia)

  Sugared (Josh and Kimmie)

  The Officers’ Ex-Wives Club Series:

  Southern Fried Blues (Jackson & Anna Grace)

  Moonshine & Magnolias (Zack & Shelby)

  * * *

  Like Southern gentlemen and military heroes? Meet Jackson Davis, hero of SOUTHERN FRIED BLUES (Officers’ Ex-Wives Club #1)…

  Anna braced herself, scooted into the car, and cranked the engine. Steam flowed out of the air vents. She tilted them away while the AC system caught up. After buckling in, she gave her rearview mirrors a quick check. The gearshift seared her palm, but she gritted her teeth and put the car in reverse anyway.

  Something tickled her finger. She absently scratched it and gave the car a little gas. Something else tickled the back of her hand.

  She frowned.

  Sweat didn’t usually tickle. Not like that.

  She moved to shift the car into drive and something dark scurried over her windshield. “What the—”

  A line of fire ants marched across her steering wheel.

  Anna shrieked. She threw the car into park and tumbled out of it. “Get off! Get off!” She raked her hands over her arms and hopped on her clogs to shake the little buggers off. The prickles moved to her back, up her neck, into her hair. She knew the ants couldn’t be up there, there’d only been one or two, but she scrubbed at her scalp anyway.

  “Ma’am? You okay?” A guy leaned out the side of a red car behind her. She was blocking one of the exits.

  “Oh, yeah, sure, you betcha.” She wiggled her itching toes. “Sorry. It’ll just take me a minute to get out of your way.”

  Her car’s engine whined. Heat radiated off the hood and wrinkled the air. The backs of her knees tingled as if a hundred ants had gathered there for an impromptu Riverdance.

  A car door shut behind her. “Need a hand?” he drawled in a local-boy kind of way.

  “Everything’s fine. Thanks.” Because she carried insect-killer in her car all the time in case her car came down with a case of the ants.

  It took some effort to not reach for her phone. This was the kind of thing Neil would’ve taken care of for her. And it pissed her off that she wanted to let the man approaching solve her problem.

  She was an independent woman, dammit. She’d fix this herself. She squared her shoulders, marched to the edge of her door, and hit her trunk release. She scooted around the car to survey the potential ant weapons in her trunk. She had to have something useful. Maybe she could club them one by one with her jumper cables. Shoot her emergency flares at them. Drop the box of Neil’s junk on them. Label them to death with the label maker.

  It’d worked on her marriage.

  And there was that stingy feeling behind her eyeballs again.

  Long runner’s legs ending in flip-flop–clad feet entered her blurred vision. “You got some friends there.”

  If Neil had to leave her, he should’ve done it somewhere else. Somewhere without fire ants, somewhere more hospitable to her Norwegian coloring, somewhere with halfway intelligent locals. She shot her audience a look she should’ve tried on the ants. “Where I come from, they’re called a nuisance.”

  Instead of shriveling up and dying, he flashed her a goofy grin. His dark-lashed eyes creased in the corners.

  Those lashes and the mass of just-long-enough-to-be-curly hair on his head were proof positive a man could have brains or looks, but not both.

  And that tingly sensation along her breastbone was proof positive she had no business being single. First she agreed to a date with Rodney, now she was getting hot over a redneck.

  She was supposed to be worrying about the ants. Class. Her life.

  He scratched his curly hair and surveyed her neatly organized trunk.

  As if he could wield her jumper cables better than she could against an army of fire ants.

  Instead, he swung her Windex out of the trunk like a gunslinger preparing for a showdown, then tucked her paper towels under his arm.

  “My car is very—” she started, but then it hit her.

  He wasn’t going to clean it.

  Carbon-based ants, meet ammonia.

  Forgetting simple chemistry principles was not a good omen for her degree.

  Wanting to watch her unexpected helper go to battle against the ants wasn’t a good omen for her sanity.

  Her skin flushed as if she were standing inside Hell’s boiler room. She reached for the Windex, but something stopped her before she could get close enough to grab it.

  Something that tasted suspiciously like fear.

  Not of him.

  Of herself.

  “I’ll do it,” she bit out. She flicked her fingers up, gesturing for him to hand over the Windex.

  “Ain’t no trouble.” His gaze wandered down her body, and she felt a whomp in her chest beneath the tingles spreading to her rib cage.

  “Be a shame to mess up them pretty clothes,” he said.

  “I can handle this,” she said firmly. She gestured to his car. “There’s another exit two rows down. I’ve taken enough of your time.”

  His eyes were big and blue as her wounded heart, but when he squinted at her like that, they went a shade darker to cobalt. “Now I’m sure it don’t matter none to you, but my momma’d have my hide if she heard I abandoned a lady with critters in her car.”

  Anna stifled a whimper of frustration. She swiped at her forehead. She’d probably drown in her own sweat before she managed to wrestle the Windex out of his hands.

  If she could get brave enough to get within touching distance of him. “I don’t know your momma, so you don’t have anything to worry about.”

  He scratched his hair again, and she felt an intense desire to claw out that part of her that wanted to know how it would feel between her fingers.

  Rebound, her brain yelled.

  Something more primitive was still clamoring about his hair.

  …Excerpt from SOUTHERN FRIED BLUES by Jamie Farrell ©2013

  Get Southern Fried Blues now!

  Click here to sign up for Jamie’s Newsletter to find out about the next books in the Misfit Brides and Officers’ Ex-Wives Club series!

  Kimmie’s S’mores Cupcakes

  S’mores Cupcakes

  As a special treat, Kimmie wanted to share her s’mores cupcake recipe with you! Want more Kimmie Cakes recipes? Sign up for Jamie’s newsletter, and she’ll send you your own electronic copy of a special Kimmie Cakes Cookbook!

  Cupcake base:

  1 cup graham cracker crumbs (15 squares)

  3 tablespoons sugar

  2 tablespoons butter, melted

  6 oz. bittersweet chocolate, finely chopped

  Preheat oven to 350. Line 24 cupcake cups with liners. Combine graham cracker crumbs, sugar, and butter, and distribute evenly amongst the cups – about 1 tablespoon each. Pack down, and sprinkle about 2 teaspoons of chocolate in each cup. Bake for five minutes or until crumbs are golden.

  Cupcakes:

  1 cup plus 2 tablespoons flour

  ½ cup plus 2 teaspoons cocoa

  1 te
aspoon baking powder

  1 teaspoon baking soda

  ½ teaspoon salt

  2 large eggs

  2/3 cup milk

  1/3 cup oil

  1 ½ teaspoon vanilla

  1 ½ cup sugar

  2/3 cup boiling water

  Combine sugar, flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda, and salt together in a large bowl. In a separate bowl, whisk eggs, milk, oil, and vanilla together. Add to dry ingredients and mix until combined. Add boiling water and mix. Fill each liner ¾ full, and sprinkle any remaining crumbs and chocolate on top. Bake at 350 for 18-20 minutes. Cool completely, then frost with marshmallow frosting.

  Marshmallow Frosting:

  ½ c. sugar

  2 tablespoons water

  2 egg whites

  1 jar marshmallow crème

  ½ teaspoon vanilla

  Whip egg whites, sugar, water in double boiler and beat until soft peaks form. Whip in marshmallow crème. Remove from heat and add vanilla. Pipe onto cupcakes, then toast with a kitchen torch, taking care to not burn the cupcake wrappers.

  The Complete Jamie Farrell Book List

  The Misfit Brides Series:

  Blissed (CJ and Natalie)

  Matched (Will and Lindsey)

  Smittened (Mikey and Dahlia)

  Sugared (Josh and Kimmie)

  The Officers’ Ex-Wives Club Series:

  Southern Fried Blues (Jackson & Anna Grace)

  Moonshine & Magnolias (Zack & Shelby)

  Standalone Books

  Mr. Good Enough (Trent & Maddie)

  Acknowledgments

  Writing is a solitary endeavor, but I never feel lonely with the amazing support of my writer friends. To Maria Geraci, Kelsey Browning, Sharla Lovelace, Selena Laurence, Shauna Allen, Taylor Reynolds, Angele McQuade, and my Washington Romance Writers and Tuesday Night Writes friends, thank you for all that you do. You are amazing!!

  A special thanks to Deb Nemeth and Pauline Nolet for your fantastic advice and eagle eyes on Sugared. Any mistakes that remain in this book are mine and mine alone.

  As always, thanks to my family for your unending support. Especially Buttercup and Squeaker for telling people Mommy writes “So we go to college,” and Munchkin for asking everyone he sees if they “read adult books.” (He gets that from his daddy.)

  A huge shout-out to my Feisty Belles Fan Club. Y’all are fabulous, and I love hanging with you on Facebook!

  And finally, a huge thanks to everyone who let me add a bit of themselves to Sugared. To Rachel Harris for letting Charlie Tucker (from You’re Still The One) come to Billy Brenton’s wedding, and to A.J. Pine for letting Josh hang in the Kingston Ale House (from The One That Got Away). To Sacha Coutu for helping me take Kimmie’s cats to the next level. To Amber Tinsley, Amanda Ray, and Kathy Donoho for inspiring the name of the Sweet Dreams Snack Cake company. To Kiley Hansen and Stacey Perrucci for use of their names. And to Stephanie Roberts, Rosemary Anne, and Tracy Faas for inspiring the names of some of Kimmie’s special cupcakes.

  About the Author

  Jamie Farrell is a bestselling author of feel-good contemporary romances. She believes love, laughter, and bacon are the most powerful forces in the universe. Her debut novel, Southern Fried Blues, was a finalist in the National Readers’ Choice Awards and the National Excellence in Romance Fiction Awards. Blissed, the first book in her Misfit Brides series, received a starred review in Publishers Weekly Magazine.

  A native Midwesterner, Jamie has lived in the South the majority of her adult life. When she’s not writing, she and her military hero husband are busy raising three hilariously unpredictable children.

  For news and updates on Jamie’s books, and for a glimpse into her sometimes zany personal life:

  Visit Jamie’s website at:

  www.JamieFarrellBooks.com

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  http://www.twitter.com/TheJamieFarrell

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  Copyright

  SUGARED

  Copyright © 2016 by Jamie Farrell

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  ISBN: 1-940517-11-7

  ISBN-13: 978-1-940517-11-7

  Cover Design by Sweet ‘n Spicy Designs

  Cover Photo © .shock via DepositPhotos.com

  http://www.JamieFarrellBooks.com