Guest Post Excerpt and Giveaway: The Ship Mates Series by Gemma L. Perfect

LEARN TO LOVE AGAIN

(Ship Mates, book 1 of 4)

Available on all platforms, FREE

Genre: Contemporary romance

Blurb:

“Love love love!!! Captured me from the get go, totally invested in Ava’s story, now patiently waiting for other books in this series to come out.” Sara Fisher – amazon review

Mack never sleeps with women he works with. It’s his number one rule.

♥ But Ava makes him want to break all the rules. In the best possible way ♥

She’s the new girl on the cruise ship and the more they rehearse together, the steamier their dances become, and the harder he finds it to hide his desire.

Ava feels like she’s living a real-life Dirty Dancing fantasy, but should she follow her father’s orders of keeping her virginity until her wedding night, or should she follow her heart and her newfound passion and go to bed with Mack?

* All the books in the Ship Mates series are stand-alone books with Happy Ever Afters, zero cliffhangers, and recurring characters I know you’ll grow to love. They should be read in order to avoid spoilers *

Excerpt:

“So today we’re going to practice our eighties dance number – it’s the finale to the show, and it’s a great show. Some of the music from back then was so good and it’s a really energetic performance. Our song is from Dirty Dancing – classic eighties film – and a passenger favourite.”

Ava can’t help but smile to herself – maybe she is like Baby. Could Mack be her Johnny? Would she even want him to be?

“Oh, I love Dirty Dancing.”

“Good. So you’ll know the song.”

Again, he plays it on his phone because they don’t have the proper rehearsal until the others arrive in an hour.

Stepping into his arms feels easier today; she’s more relaxed in his company and a little less anxious about her own ability. She knows she can dance; she just hasn’t done it for a while. She’s bound to be rusty.

“When we do this on the night, we change the stage so I can jump off.”

“Amazing.”

“It works really well. Then of course I lift you. I think the dress you wear is like the one in the film too.”

“I didn’t notice.”

There were so many costumes, Ava didn’t take all the details in.

She’s in his arms again, he’s talking her through the moves, leading her through the dance, and all she’s aware of is the heat of his body next to hers, the hardness of his muscles, the tension in his arms, his breath and it’s like she’s in the film, and he’s her leading man, because the theatre falls away, the morning by the pool listening to Robyn’s wild stories, falls away, and her sadness and anger at what happened to her with Jason and Mia, falls away.

She’s breathless.

It’s just her and it’s just him. Two bodies. Heat. Muscles. The push of his hips against hers, and his hand against the small of her back.

Her eyes fly open. She can feel something else. Unmistakable. Every time he grinds his hips into her, she feels the solid press of his erection.

He steps away from her, looking a little bashful. She’s danced with men before and it’s an occupational hazard you might say – however professional and experienced they might be, their bodies are just feeling the heat and closeness of another body and reacting as bodies do.

She can’t help but steal a glance down at his shorts, before he turns away, clearing his throat.

“We won’t practice the lift – though I’ll get the stage set up for another morning and we’ll do a quick run through.”

She nods; he keeps breaking the magic by talking, but judging by the tent pole in his shorts, maybe that’s a good thing. She’s only glad that aside from a blush flushing her neck, there’s no way he can tell what’s she’s thinking or see how her body is reacting to him.

She knows he has to talk her through the dances as she learns and of course, he doesn’t know that she’s imagining that she’s really Baby and he’s really Johnny and they are really falling in love, but there’s something about the music and the moves and the way she’s making him hot and bothered that have her feeling weak.

“Shall we do it again? I think we have time to go right through?”

She nods and steps into his arms, the familiar first lines of the song playing quietly from his phone.

“Bravo!”

She hadn’t noticed anyone come into the theatre; she had been too wrapped up in their dance.

She steps away from him, blushing. It’s embarrassing how starved she is for attention since Jason and Mia betrayed and humiliated her. She’s only been on the ship five minutes and she’s already getting in a tizz over a little hard on. Well, not exactly little…

Ridiculous. She sits, arms crossed, watching them dance, a frown on her face.

“Are you okay?” Pip comes over to her when they stop for a quick break.

Ava sighs but nods. “Yeah, fine. Just not feeling it today.”

“Well, you and Mack looked like you were feeling it to me. I love your chemistry.”

“Not chemistry,” she says, the image of his shorts flashing into her mind. “He’s just a brilliant dancer and a brilliant teacher.”

Giveaway:

To enter please comment with your most anticipated upcoming romance! Winner will be chosen on Friday, October 22nd, and contacted by the author, Gemma L. Perfect, by email.