Release Day Blitz! Excerpt & Giveaway: All Played Out by Cora Carmack
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I'm thrilled to be taking part in the release day blitz for Cora Carmack's All Played Out, the latest novel in the Rusk University series! I've been so excited for this NA contemporary romance novel, and I can't wait to read all about Nell and Torres falling in love with each other. I've built up the anticipation so much in my mind that I already think All Played Out may just be my favourite book in the series!
Release Date: May 12, 2015
Publisher: William Morrow Paperbacks
Summary (from HarperCollins):
First person in her family to go to college? CHECK.Straight A's? CHECK.
On track to graduate early? CHECK.
Social life? . . . Yeah, about that . . .
With just a few weeks until graduation, Antonella DeLuca's beginning to worry that maybe she hasn't had the full college experience. (Scratch that. She knows she hasn't had the full college experience).
So Nell does what she does best. She makes a "to do list" of normal college activities.
Item #1? Hook up with a jock.
Rusk University wide receiver Mateo Torres wrote the playbook for normal college living. When he's not on the field, he excels at partying, girls, and partying. As long as he keeps things light and easy, it's impossible to get hurt . . . again. But something about Nell gets under his skin, and when he learns about her list, he makes it his mission to help her complete it.
Torres is the definition of confident (And sexy. And wild), and he opens up a side of Nell that she's never known. But as they begin to check off each crazy, exciting, normal item, Nell finds that her list leads to something more serious than she bargained for. And while Torres is used to taking risks on the field, he has to decide if he's willing to take the chance when it's more than just a game.
And don't miss the first two books in the Rusk University series...
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Cora Carmack is a twenty-something New York Times bestselling author who likes to write about twenty-something characters. She's done a multitude of things in her life-- boring jobs (like working retail), Fun jobs (like working in a theatre), stressful jobs (like teaching), and dream jobs (like writing). She now splits her time between Austin, TX and New York City and spends her days writing, traveling, and spending way too much time on the internet. In her books, you can expect to find humor, heart, and a whole lot of awkward. Because let’s face it . . . awkward people need love, too.
Excerpt
Dallas and Dylan toss the disk back and forth a
few times, and I groan when Carson and Silas make no effort to intercept or
knock down the pass. I’m pretty sure it’s a distraction, so I stick tight to
Brookes, and I notice Ryan edging closer to me, too. He must have the same
idea.
Next thing I know, Dallas has sent the disk
soaring over our heads, and when I look, Nell is standing alone, completely
unguarded in the end zone.
She’s holding her hands out and staring at the
disk like it’s a missile instead of a piece of plastic. I take off toward her
in case she misses it. I want to grab the disk and get it back into play as
soon as I can.
As I sprint, the disk slips right through her
grasping fingers and nails her in the chest. She gasps; no doubt the air was
knocked out of her. The disk ricochets, and if I dive I might can manage to
catch it, but I can’t quite drag my eyes away from her chest. Her tits are
practically spilling out of the top of the tiny tank she’s wearing. I’d had a
front-row seat earlier with my arm around her. Now she’s clutching at herself
in pain, but all I can see are her smooth, delicate arms pressed against the
curve of her breasts, pushing them even higher.
I should look away before something very
unfortunate occurs in my baggy gym shorts, but now I’m picturing that shy girl
loosening up beneath me. It’s too easy to take those wide eyes she gave me when
I draped my arm around her and imagine them in the low light of my room, her
head on my pillow and her legs spread wide.
She makes a soft whimpering noise, and now the
rest of my senses join the fantasy, and I think of how she would feel, taste,
sound. I wonder just how low I could get her inhibitions. Enough to say my
name? To scream it?
“Damn,” I groan, and try to clear my head. “You
all right?”
She looks up at me, still clutching at her
chest, and pink spreads over her cheeks. She doesn’t say anything.
“Okay,” I say. “There is honestly no way to ask
this without sounding like a pig, so I’m not even gonna try. And really, in
these situations, I find you might as well go balls to the wall and throw it
all out there. So … at the risk of getting slapped, how are your tits?” I think
about offering to check them out for her, but I figure that’s probably taking
it a step too far.
Her mouth presses into a firm straight line.
“It wasn’t my ...” She trails off.
“Tits,” I finish for her. “You have them. You
can say the word.”
“It hit me in the collarbone, not the breasts.”
Breasts. I raise an eyebrow, and she rolls her eyes.
I take a step forward and say, “Let me see.”
“Absolutely not.”
I take another step, until my shadow falls over
her, and take hold of one wrist. “As you pointed out, you weren’t hit in the breasts. Just let me have a look. With
the right strength and good wind, a disk can go as fast as twenty miles per
hour. I’ve seen them break fingers and noses.”
“Dude, Torres!” Silas shouts behind me. “What
are you waiting for? Grab the disk and let’s go!”
Hesitating, I ask, “You wanna take a break?
Catch your breath and let me see it?”
She shakes her head stubbornly. “I don’t want
the game to stop because of me.”
I turn around and shout back to Silas, “Nell
and I are taking a break. You guys keep playing with eight.”
Taking her elbow, I pull her off the field
toward the picnic tables. She protests, but only mildly, and she still has one
hand pressed just above her cleavage. And looking down at her, I can see
moisture clinging to long lashes at the corner of her eye.
I sit her down so that her back is to the
field, and go down on one knee in front of her. She’s so small that it puts us
eye level, and I say softly, “Move your hand.”
“It’s fine,” she says. “Just give me a couple
seconds, and I’ll be fine.”
You don’t grow up with five sisters without
learning that sometimes with women, words are pointless. I reach out and move
her hand myself, pulling it away from her chest. The skin just below her
collarbone is an angry red, and the disk scraped through a couple layers of
skin. Not enough to bleed, but I bet it hurts. “Tell me how it feels. Still a
sharp pain? Or more of an ache?”
Her eyebrows slant over her pretty brown eyes.
“The pain was sharp and steady for approximately thirty seconds, but now it
kind of stings.”
“Like a slap,” I say.
She gives a short laugh, her shoulders bouncing
once before she stills in what I’m guessing is pain. “I can’t say I know what
that feels like. Though I’m not surprised it’s a sensation you’re familiar
with.”
I shrug. “I don’t believe in censoring my
thoughts. Some people just aren’t as fond of freedom of speech as I am.”
She shakes her head, and I think she’s trying
not to smile.
I reach up my left hand and as lightly as
possible run my thumb over the red mark. She sucks in a breath and I ask,
“Hurts to the touch?”
“Um.” She swallows and blinks a few times.
“Does it hurt a lot?”
I brush my thumb over her skin again, even
lighter this time, wondering if the Frisbee could have hit hard enough to crack
something. There’s already a purpling around the center that tells me it’s
going to bruise pretty good.
She swallows, and my eyes are drawn to the
graceful slope of her neck, up to a small chin and full lips. And it hits me
then … why this girl caught my eye from the moment she walked toward our group,
why I can’t drag my eyes or my hand away from her now.
She reminds me of Lina.
And the memory of the only girl I’ve ever loved
packs a punch so hard that it’s my turn to raise a hand to my chest to soothe
an all-too-familiar ache.
Giveaway!
To celebrate the release of All Played Out, Cora Carmack is giving away a $25 Amazon or Barnes & Noble gift card! Just fill out the Rafflecopter form below and you'll be entered into the contest.
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