Blurb
The smoldering intensity of first love ~ the forbidden fantasy of temptation ~ the cold hard
facts of real life.
When one man’s hopes are dashed apart in a split second after years spent chasing a dream, he
returns home to Kentucky furious at the world and everyone around him.
Kieran Francesco is the middle son of the volatile, tight-knit Halloran-Love family. His role as peacemaker and the one true athlete is well established. He now faces life devoid of the sport he
adores after a horrific, career-ending accident, which places him in a new and entirely uncomfortable position—that of the brother with no future.
Over the course of a few tumultuous months Kieran is plunged back into life at the center of
the Love family, where he must cope with one self-destructive brother, one ill-timed reconnection to an old flame and a series of bad choices that land him in more trouble than he’d ever known existed.
COACH LOVE, book 2 of The Love Brothers, a family saga of sibling loyalty that runs as deep and
wide as the Ohio River—at least until Sunday, when Antony, Kieran, Dominic and
Aiden work out their frustrations at the weekly Love brother pick-up basketball game.
Coach
Love EXCERPT:
As he drove the twenty or so miles from his parents’ house into town Kieran’s head
began to clear. The windows were down and the tunes cranked. The sun shone.
Signs of summer--one of his favorite seasons--were all around him. Parks packed
with families, all the basketball courts and swimming pools overflowing. The
sight of a gaggle of boys on bikes riding alongside him for a while, singing
along with whatever random, crappy rap song currently polluted the airwaves
made him smile.
“Hey, it’s Kieran Love!” one of the punks shouted after a few blocks. “Can you come
over and shoot a few with us?”
He waved and drove on, gratified but sad, the sound of their cheerful unhappiness
at his refusal filling his ears, taking the stretch of four lane road at
seventy miles an hour, pressing the gas pedal to the floor, the throaty,
powerful roar of the car’s engine revving him from head to toe.
It would be all right because he and Melinda loved each other. They had from the
moment they’d met. He passed some grandpa in a Toyota, as the deep green fields
surrounded by picturesque white fences and dotted with horses filled both sides
of his vision.
He’d been home and recuperating from radical knee surgery with the best prognosis he
could hope for after such a nasty break--to walk normally, much less play the
occasional pick up game. His depression had been deep, wide, and terrifying. He
woke every day at his parents’ house, unwilling even to get out of bed, not
that he could without help for the first few weeks.
Antony had tossed a laptop computer at him one day when he’d been sulking, unshaven,
and eating an entire bag of potato chips, something he’d not done since the age
of ten when his fate--bound for basketball fame and fortune--had been
determined.
“Here, find a job, find a date, find something,” he’d said before yanking the empty
chip bag away and smacking Kieran’s head hard enough to make his ears ring.
“Ow. Leave me alone, asshole. I’m grievously injured,” he’d said, not caring about
the swear-free zone he inhabited.
“That’s three dollars young man,” his mother had called out from the kitchen.
“You live with this, jerk, and see how you feel about finding ‘a date.’“ He’d hooked
his fingers around the words, heart in his throat at how badly he’d wanted to
call Cara right then.
But by the next weekend he was caning and limping his way toward the door to some
faux-fancy Italian restaurant in Lexington, rubbing his freshly shaved face and
trying not to sweat through his dress shirt. The woman from the internet site
sat at the bar, twirling an olive-laden swizzle stick in her martini glass,
long, slim, bare legs crossed, feet encased in sky-high patent leather heels.
He’d exhaled, beyond relived that he’d not been cat-fished by some troll, or
worse, a dude.
He’d hesitated then, something in him telling him to turn around and leave, fast.
But at that moment, she’d flashed him the whitest, most perfect smile he’d ever
seen and he’d been hooked. He still didn’t know how. They’d gone out for three
weeks before she let him kiss her. It’d been another three weeks before he got
anywhere near her tits. It had been a solid four months before he scored but
that encounter had been, in a word, epic.
Melinda liked to talk dirty, wear heels and a garter belt while he fucked her. Loved
doing it with all the lights on and in semi-public places. She gave head like a
pro at first, before he’d given her an engagement ring.
Her bitchiness had come across as extreme decisiveness, sort of hot in way, he’d
admit, since he tended toward the spontaneous and unplanned--”wishy washy” as
he now understood it thanks to Melinda’s re-categorization of his personality.
Her tight grip on her emotions and her surroundings, the OCD way she ordered
her life did grate on him at times but he figured she tolerated his innate
sloppiness and willingness to wake on a Sunday without a plan in place for the
rest of the day. When he realized he sat across from her at some overpriced,
hipster restaurant near her office after going out with her for eight months,
ready to present her with a ring he could barely afford, it had shocked him
without seeming to even faze her.
“Well, of course I’ll marry you, but you’ve got to find a better job,” she’d drawled
as she sipped her champagne.
“A new job?” He’d gotten the teaching gig at his old high school and couldn’t
imagine any job he’d want or like better. She made six figures for Christ’s
sake, at least he thought she did.
Elated, drunk with lust and achievement, he’d tried to get his long legs adjusted under
the small table jammed between all the others and covered with small plates of
“tapas” which, best he could tell were “appetizers” only twice the price and
half the helpings.
“I’ll do anything you want, Melinda. You saved me, honest to God you did.”
She’d fluttered her inky black lashes and gazed at him with an expression that
convinced him he’d made the drastic move for the right reasons. The following
year had been a combination of frustration, anger and high school level blue
balls. The double drama Antony and Aiden had foisted on the Love family during
that time hadn’t helped but it had distracted him. He’d taught his classes,
helped out with the basketball team pro bono without telling Melinda and had
been happier than he’d ever been as a pro athlete.
The fact that she maintained her uber-bitch persona around his family killed him.
But he was hooked.
