IF I WERE YOU has a brand new cover
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**This is book 1 in the INSIDE OUT series,
previously published with a different cover. The INSIDE OUT series, is
currently in development for TV with Suzanne Todd (Alice in Wonderland, Must
Love Dogs, The Boiler Room, Austin Powers and more!). To read more about the
show and to get ready for a BIG update soon, please visit the series page**.
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If I Were
You (bk 1) Special Edition Paperback
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From New York Times Best Selling author
Lisa Renee Jones, a story with the heat of 50 Shades and the mystery of Pretty
Little Liars. Now in development for cable TV with acclaimed producer Suzanne
Todd (Alice in Wonderland w/Johnny Depp)
How It All Started...
One day I
was a high school teacher on summer break, leading a relatively uneventful but
happy life. Or so I told myself. Later, I'd question that, as I would question
pretty much everything I knew about me, my relationships, and my desires. It
all began when my neighbor thrust a key to a storage unit at me. She'd bought
it to make extra money after watching some storage auction show. Now she was on
her way to the airport to elope with a man she barely knew, and she needed me
to clear out the unit before the lease expired.
Soon, I
was standing inside a small room that held the intimate details of another
woman's life, feeling uncomfortable, as if I was invading her privacy. Why had
she let these items so neatly packed, possessions that she clearly cared about
deeply, be lost at an auction? Driven to find out by some unnamed force, I
began to dig, to discover this woman's life, and yes, read her journals--dark,
erotic journals that I had no business reading. Once I started, I couldn't
stop. I read on obsessively, living out fantasies through her words that I'd
never dare experience on my own, compelled by the three men in her life, none
of whom had names. I read onward until the last terrifying dark entry left me
certain that something had happened to this woman. I had to find her and be
sure she was okay.
Before
long, I was taking her job for the summer at the art gallery, living her life,
and she was nowhere to be found. I was becoming someone I didn't know. I was
becoming her.
The dark, passion it becomes...
Now, I am
working at a prestigious gallery, where I have always dreamed of being, and
I've been delivered to the doorstep of several men, all of which I envision as
one I've read about in the journal. But there is one man that will call to me,
that will awaken me in ways I never believed possible. That man is the ruggedly
sexy artist, Chris Merit, who wants to paint me. He is rich and famous, and
dark in ways I shouldn't find intriguing, but I do. I so do. I don't understand
why his
dark side
appeals to me, but the attraction between us is rich with velvety promises of
satisfaction. Chris is dark, and so are his desires, but I cannot turn away. He
is damaged beneath his confident good looks and need for control, and in some
way, I feel he needs me. I need him.
All I
know for certain is that he knows me like I don't even know me, and he says I
know him. Still, I keep asking myself -- do I know him? Did he know her, the
journal writer, and where is she? And why doesn't it seem to matter anymore?
There is just him and me, and the burn for more.
Full
Chapter
Chris
maneuvers the 911 into the drive of a fancy high-rise building not more than
four blocks from the gallery. Before I can question the fancy location being
home to a pizza joint, as he’d called it, a valet is already opening my door.
“I’ll
come around to get you,” Chris says with a touch on my arm. He doesn’t wait for
a reply, climbing out of the vehicle and disappearing from full view.
I am both
charmed and embarrassed at the prospect he believes the extra wine has made me
a helpless lush. Worse, it wouldn’t be an assumption completely without merit,
and this night is exactly why I never let myself lose control. It always
backfires.
I unsnap
the seat belt about the same moment Chris appears at my door. Holding my skirt
down, I slide my legs to the ground, all too aware of his scorching gaze on my
legs.
His hand
appears in front of me, and I hold my breath, preparing for the impact of his
touch, as I press my palm to his. He pulls me to my feet, onto the sidewalk
beneath an awning, his hand settling possessively on my hip. The rich sensation
of desire spreads through my limbs. I have never in my life reacted to a man
this intensely.
Behind
me, I hear the car door shut, and the engine rev, before the 911 pulls away.
“This doesn’t look like a place that serves pizza,” I comment, but I am not
looking at the building. It is Chris who has my full attention.
“Two
blocks down,” he explains. “We can walk there if you want, or we can go
upstairs to my apartment.”
Chris
lives here, at least when he’s in the States. The implications of our location
are clear.
His long
fingers curl around my neck, under my hair, and he lowers his mouth to my ear.
“Be warned, Sara. I’m no saint. If I take you upstairs, I’m going to strip you
naked and fuck you the way I’ve wanted to since the moment we first met.”
The
shockingly bold words ripple through me, and I am instantly aroused, squeezing
my thighs together. He has wanted to fuck me since we first met. I want him to
fuck me. I want to fuck him. Yes. Fuck. I want to give myself permission to
forget good, proper behavior and fuck and be fucked. Wild, hot, uncontrollable
passion, with no worries during and regrets in the aftermath. I’ve never let
myself feel those things. When in my life have I ever experienced such a thing?
When has any man ever made me think I could?
I press
against his chest and lean back, my eyes seeking his. “If you’re trying to
scare me off, it’s not working.”
“Not
yet,” he says, dark certainty to his tone, to the lines etched in his handsome
face. It is as if this is simply a seed already planted that cannot be stopped.
“Not at
all,” I counter.
He
doesn’t immediately respond, and his expression is a mask of hard lines, his
jaw set, tense. Slowly, his fingers slide from my neck to caress a path down my
arm until his fingers lace intimately with mine. “Never say never, Sara,” he
murmurs, and starts walking, pulling me with him.
Anticipation
sizzles through me as we walk toward the automatic doors to be greeted by a man
in a dark suit with an earpiece and buzz cut.
“Evening,
Mr. Merit,” he says, and glances at me. “Evening, miss.”
“Evening,
Jacob,” Chris replies. “Pizza coming our way. Don’t frisk the delivery guy.”
“Not
unless he’s a delivery woman, sir,” Jacob comments, and I get the sense these
two are familiar beyond the casual exchange.
I lift a
tentative hand at Jacob. “Hi.”
“Ma’am,”
he replies, and there is a slight shift in his gaze I’m certain he doesn’t
intend for me to notice, but I do. I read it as surprise at my presence, and I
can only assume I am far from Chris’s normal choice in women. It isn’t hard for
me to imagine Chris being a blond bombshell kind of man, and where I hadn’t
felt insecure moments before, I suddenly do now. I am angry at myself for
feeling such a thing when I’ve promised myself no more self-doubt. When I crave
the escape, the freedom, I was so close to experiencing only moments before.
The
elevator is right off the fancy lobby and past a security booth. Chris punches
the button, and the doors open immediately. I follow him inside and watch as he
keys in a code. The doors shut, and he pulls me hard against him.
My hands
settle on his hard chest, inside the line of his jacket, and warmth spreads
through me. “What just happened?” His hand brands my hip.
My
breasts are heavy, my nipples aching. “I don’t know what you mean,”
“Yes. You
do. Second thoughts, Sara?”
I scold
myself for being so transparent. “Do you want me to have second thoughts?”
“No. What
I want is to take you to my apartment and make you come and then do it all over
again.”
Oh . . .
yes, please. “Okay,” I whisper, “but I think you should feed me first.”
His lips
curve into a smile, his eyes dancing with gold specks of pure fire. “Then you
can feed me.”
The bell
dings, and the doors begin to open. Chris wastes no time pulling me to the edge
of the elevator, and I watch in surprise as a gorgeous living room appears
before me, rather than a hallway. Chris has a private elevator, and I am
entering his private world, a world very unlike my own.
Chris
releases my hand, our eyes lock, and I read the silent message in his. Enter by
choice, without pressure. On some level I sense that once I enter his
apartment, the decision to do so is going to change me. He is going to change
me in some profound way I cannot begin to comprehend fully. I think he might
know this, and I wonder why he would be so certain, what is etched with such
clarity to him beneath the surface.
He has
misplaced doubts of me in this moment, as he’d doubted me at the gallery. I can
see it in his eyes, sense it in the air. I refuse to allow his lack of
confidence in me, or anyone else’s for that matter, to dictate what I can or
cannot do ever again. I’ve been there, and I ended up on the sharp edge of a
cliff, about to crash and burn. I’d recovered, and I am beginning to see that
locking myself in a shell of an existence isn’t healing. It’s hiding.
Regardless of what happens at the gallery, I’m done hiding.
My chin
lifts, and I cut my gaze from Chris’s and exit the elevator.
My heels
touch the pale perfection of glossy hardwood floors, and I stop and stare at
the breathtaking sight before me. Beyond the expensive leather furniture
adorning a sunken living room with a massive fireplace in the left corner is a
spectacular sight. There is a floor-to-ceiling window, a live pictorial of our
city, spanning the entire length of the room.
Spellbound,
I walk forward, enchanted by the twinkling night lights and the haze
surrounding the distant Golden Gate Bridge. I barely remember going down the
few steps to the living area, or what the furniture I pass looks like. I drop
my purse on the coffee table and stop at the window, resting my hands on the
cool surface.
We are
above the city, untouchable, in a palace in the sky. How amazing it must be to
live here and wake up to this view every day. Lights twinkling, almost as if
they are talking to one another, laughing at me as they creep open a door to
the hollow place inside me I’ve rejected only moments before in the elevator.
I swallow
hard as the song “Broken” from the band Lifehouse fills the room, because Chris
doesn’t know how personality is to me. I’m falling apart. I’m barely breathing.
I’m barely holding on to you.
This
song, this place with the words, and I am raw and exposed, as if cut and
bleeding. Who was I kidding with the refusal to hide anymore? This is why I’ve
hidden. The past begins to pulse to life within me, and I am seconds from
remembering why I feel this way. I refuse to process the lyrics and shove them aside.
I don’t want to remember. I can’t go there. I squeeze my eyes shut, trying to
seal those old wounds, desperate to feel anything but their presence.
Suddenly,
Chris is behind me, caressing my jacket from my shoulders. His touch is a
welcome sensation, and when his arm slides around me, his body framing mine
from behind, I am desperate to feel anything but what this song, no doubt aided
by the wine, stirs inside me.
I lean
into him and hard muscle absorbs me. There is a strength to Chris, a silent
confidence I envy, and it calls to the woman in me.
His
fingers, those talented, famous fingers, brush my hair away from my nape, and
his lips press to the delicate area beneath, creating goose bumps on my skin.
And still, I barely block out the words to the song and their meaning to me.
As if he
senses my need for more—more something, anything, just more—he turns me around
to face him, and his fingers tangle almost roughly into my hair. The tight pull
is sweet, dragging me from other feelings, giving me a new focus.
“I am not
the guy you take home to Mom and Dad, Sara.” His mouth is next to mine, his
clean male scent all around me. “You need to know that right now. You need to
know that won’t change.”
But the
song does change, and this time to another track on what must be a Lifehouse
CD. “Nerve Damage” begins to play. I see through your clothes, your nerve
damage shows. Trying not to feel . . . anything that’s real.
I laugh
bitterly at the words, and Chris pulls back to study me. And I am not blind to
what I see in the depths of his green eyes, what I’ve missed until now but
sensed. He is as damaged as I am. We have too many of the wrong things in
common to be more than sex, and the realization is freedom to me.
I curve
my fingers on the light stubble of his jaw, the rasp on my skin welcome, and I
have no idea why I admit what I have never said out loud. “My mother is dead,
and I hate my father, so don’t worry. You’re safe from family day and so am I.
All I want is here and now, this piece of time. And please save the pillow talk
for someone who wants it. Contrary to what you seem to think, I’m no delicate
rose.”
A stunned
look flashes on his face an instant before I press my lips to his. The
answering moan I am rewarded with is white-hot fire in my blood that he answers
with a deep, sizzling stroke of his tongue. He slants his mouth over mine,
deepening the connection, kissing me with a fierceness no other man ever has,
but then, Chris is like no other man I’ve ever known.
His
tongue plays wickedly with mine, and I meet him stroke for stroke, arching into
him, telling him I am here and present and I’m going nowhere. In reply to my
silent declaration, his hand cups my ass and he pulls me solidly against his
erection. Arching into him, I welcome the intimate connection, burn for the
moment he will be inside me. My hand presses between us and I stroke the hard
line of his shaft.
Chris
tears his mouth from mine, pressing me hard against the window, and I know I’ve
threatened his control. Me. Little schoolteacher Sara McMillan. Our eyes lock,
hot flames dancing between us and some unidentifiable challenge.
Some part
of me realizes the window behind me is glass, and all things glass can break.
He knows this, too, it’s in the dark glint of his eyes, and he wants me to
worry about it. He’s pushing me, testing me, trying to get me to break. Because
I slid beneath his composure? Because he really believes I am out of my league?
And maybe I am, but not tonight. Tonight, as the song has said, I am broken,
and for the first time perhaps ever, I am not denying the truth of all of my
cracks. I am living them.
I lift my
chin and let him see my answering rebellion. His fingers curl at the top of my
silk blouse and in a sharp pull, material rips and the buttons all the way down
pop and clamor in all directions. I gasp, in unfamiliar territory, and burning
alive with the ache I have for this man.
He turns
me to the window, and my hands flatten on the glass. Wasting no time, Chris
unhooks my bra, and it and my blouse are off my shoulders in moments. He is
behind me again, his thick erection fit snugly to my backside.
“Hands
over your head,” he orders, pressing my palms to the glass above me, his body
shadowing mine. “Stay like that.”
My pulse
jumps wildly and adrenaline surges. I’ve been ordered around during sex, but in
a clinical, bend over and give me what I want kind of way I tried to convince
myself was hot. It wasn’t. I hated every second, every instance, and I’d
endured it. This is different though, erotic in a way I’ve never experienced,
enticingly full of promise. My body is sensitized, pulsing with arousal. I am
hot where Chris is touching me and cold where he isn’t.
When he
seems satisfied I’ll comply with his orders, Chris slowly caresses a path down
my arms, and then up and down my sides, brushing the curves of my breasts. He’s
in no hurry, but I am. I am literally quivering by the time his hands cover my
breasts, welcoming the way he squeezes them roughly, before tugging on my
nipples. I gasp with the pinching sensation he repeats over and over, creating
waves of pleasure verging on pain, and the music is fading away, and so is the
past. There is pleasure in pain. The words come back to me, and this time they
resonate.
His hands
are suddenly gone, and I pant in desperation, trying to pull them back.
Chris
captures my hands and forces them back to the glass above me, his breath warm
by my ear, his hard body framing mine. “Move them again and I’ll stop what I’m
doing, no matter how good it might feel.”
I quiver
inside at the erotic command, surprised again by how enticed I am by this game
we are playing. “Just remember,” I warn, still panting, still burning for his
touch. “Payback is hell.”
His teeth
scrape my shoulder. “Looking forward to it, baby,” he rasps. “More than you can
possibly know.”
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About Author Lisa Renee Jones
New York
Times and USA Today Bestselling author Lisa Renee Jones is the author of the
highly acclaimed INSIDE OUT SERIES, and is now in development by Suzanne Todd
(Alice in Wonderland) for cable TV. In addition, her Tall, Dark and Deadly
series and The Secret Life of Amy Bensen series, both spent several months on a
combination of the NY Times and USA Today lists.
Watch the
video on casting for the INSIDE TV Show HERE
Since beginning her publishing career in 2007, Lisa has
published more than 40 books translated around the world. Booklist says that
Jones suspense truly sizzles with an energy similar to FBI tales with a
paranormal twist by Julie Garwood or Suzanne Brockmann.
Prior to publishing, Lisa owned multi-state staffing
agency that was recognized many times by The Austin Business Journal and also
praised by Dallas Women Magazine. In 1998 LRJ was listed as the #7 growing
women owned business in Entrepreneur Magazine.
Lisa
loves to hear from her readers. You can reach her at on her website and she is
active on twitter and facebook daily.
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