The Fire in the Heart is the Hardest to Fight…

BURN FOR YOU
Outback Skies Book Two
Available Now

Harsh, rugged and unforgiving, the Australian Outback is the perfect place for Evan Alexander to hide. Up in the air, fighting fires from the cockpit of his helicopter, no one sees the scars that run clear down to his soul.

When a massive fire breaks out in a nearby national park, Wallaby Ridge becomes a media staging ground, and Evan’s daring piloting skills the center of attention. Evan finds it easy to dodge every reporter—except one. A woman from his past.

Jenna McGrath can’t believe the quiet, withdrawn man declared a hero is the same arrogant, cocky pilot she fell in love with six years ago. A cruel betrayal caused Jenna to remove herself from his world, but she’s never been able to erase him from her memories.

Their long-suppressed attraction reignites, but the walls Evan has built around himself are high. And while Jenna easily overlooks the scars on his body, she begins to wonder if molten desire is enough to melt the emotional scars binding his heart.

Warning: It’s not the flames devouring the landscape that will stir your soul…it’s the wounded, broken man fighting them from the air.

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“This isn’t a long read, but man is it a great one. There aren’t many authors that can grab your heart as hard in these few words as well as Lexxie has. I highly recommend this book and series!!! I can’t wait to see what else she has coming from these guys of Wallaby Ridge.” ~ KcLu, Guilty Pleasures EXCERPT

No way.

Jenna’s stride, normally utterly confident, purposeful and commanding, betrayed her. She stumbled, her four-inch Manolo Blahniks scraping over the gritty concrete, her mic slipping from her loosening grip.

Reflexes contracted her fingers around the microphone before it could fall to the ground. Her cameraman, Theo Theodopolis, snared her upper arm before she herself could tumble in that direction.

“Gotcha, boss,” he muttered, laughter in his voice.

She tried to shoot him a grateful smile over her shoulder, tried to show her appreciation for his quick action, but she couldn’t seem to drag her stare from the man in the baseball cap and battered bomber jacket standing near the helicopter.

There was no way it could be who she thought it was.

No way.

For starters, the Evan Alexander she knew five years ago would never hide under a baseball cap. Evan Alexander only ever stood tall and arrogant, smile smugly charming, oozing sexy-as-sin cockiness and surety.

That Evan, the one her best friend had married—correction, so-called best friend—had married would never wear his collar up hiding half his face.

Evan Alexander knew he was too good-looking to deny the world his countenance. Evan Alexander preened when the world looked at him. Evan Alexander would not, repeat, would not turn his back on a reporter making their way towards him like the man in the bomber jacket was doing now.

Which meant the man Wallaby Ridge was hailing a hero couldn’t be Evan Alexander, right?

Right?

So what’s with the punch-to-the-tummy sensation then, Jenna? The same punch-to-the-tummy sensation you always got every time your eyes connected with Evan’s back when you still hung out with him and Tracey?

Drawing in a slow breath, she straightened her spine and continued towards the man so very obviously ignoring her approach. There was no way it could be Evan. No way. It was a freaky trick of light, is all. A snatching glimpse of eyes similar to Evan’s. Hell, what with the way the man was wearing his baseball cap so low over his face, and with the cocked-up bomber jacket collar, she was lucky to have seen his eyes at all, especially in the darkness of the evening. Where were all the streetlights in the Outback? Surely the helipad should have some kind of illumination? How did they see anything out here at night with so little electric light? By the gazillion stars overhead?

“Miss.”

She flicked the tall man standing beside the one ignoring her a look. He smirked at her, an unreadable expression on his face.

Jenna swallowed, casting her gaze over him from eyes to boots and back to eyes again. Charlie Baynard, Wallaby Ridge’s Senior Constable. A ripple of apprehension shot up her back. She’d spoken to him only a few moments ago, trying to track down the hero of Wallaby Ridge. He’d been intimidating then, shielding a small group of firefighters just in from the massive blaze from a frenzied gaggle of print-media reporters desperate to get a story.

“Senior Constable.” She licked her lips, her belly tight. Why, she had no idea. There was no reason for it. The man with his back to her wasn’t Evan. She indicated towards that broad back with her head, gripping her mic tighter. “Is this who I’m after?”

Charlie Baynard nodded. The shoulders of the man refusing to look at her stiffened.

“It is,” Charlie said. “But I don’t think he’s in the mood for talking. And I wouldn’t call him a hero if I were you.”

Jenna frowned. “But he is. Everyone is talking about the helicopter pilot who risked his life to save the team on the north line of the fire. Even his own captain says they’d all be dead if he hadn’t…” Huffing into her fringe, she tore her focus from the smirking police officer and reached out to tap on the other man’s shoulder. What was she doing wasting time with Baynard? “Excuse me, I’m Jenna McGrath from Chanel Eight News. I’m wondering if you’d permit me a few moments to talk about what you did out there?”

The man half turned his head, enough to grant her a glimpse of what little profile the low baseball cap peak and high collar allowed. “I just did my job,” a deep voice, scratchy and husky from smoke, no doubt, declared. “There’s no story here.”

The tension in Jenna’s stomach fluttered. Her throat thickened.

In amongst all that scratchy timbre was a voice she recognized, one that had stayed with her long after she and Tracey had parted ways. One that visited her often in her dreams and when her hands took care of the yearning in her body.

She stared at the glimpse of a profile. At the downcast eyes refusing to look at her.

“Evan?”

His name slipped from her lips, doubt and confusion tripping over the syllables.

The broad shoulders encased in beaten leather stiffened. She saw his eyes squeeze shut. Saw his head dip a fraction, as if weighed down by a fatal sense of acceptance.

And then the man every member of the media here in Wallaby Ridge wanted to talk to turned and faced her fully. Fixed her with eyes as piercing as they’d ever been despite the dark shadow thrown over his face by the peak of his baseball cape, and Jenna forgot how to breathe.

“Hi, Jenna.”

A lump lodged itself in her throat. Got stuck there, fast and tight.

She caught sight of white twisted flesh beneath his left eye, over his cheek. Saw a hint of the same on what little of his jaw and the side of his neck was visible behind the cocked collar of the bomber jacket.

Are they…are they scars?
The shocked thought ran through her head at the very second she realized just how long she’d been staring.




























COMING JULY 2015 ~ PRE-ORDER NOWNot all cowboys ride horses.

Jeremy Craig is on the cusp of being named the deputy prime minister of Australia. Which means he’s got to play his cards right and stay deep in the closet. Australia is a lot of things, but there’s no way the country is ready for a gay prime minister. So far, it’s been an easy ruse to maintain. Until he meets Ryan Taylor. Then all bets are off.

Ryan is sick of the Brokeback Mountain jokes. For starters, he’s an Australian stockman, not an American cowboy. For another, he spends most of his working days alone in a helicopter, not on the back of a horse. As Wallaby Ridge’s only contract heli-musterer, he gets to escape any small-town scorn high in the sky. He’s happy up there. Lonely, but happy. Who needs passion and wild sexual pleasure in their life when they have the boundless skies of the Outback, right?

Then Jeremy Craig climbs into his chopper…

Warning: This book may change your opinion of politicians. It also contains scorching, no-holds-barred passion between two alpha men, one with a Ryan Gosling fetish and the other with a secret deeper than the ocean. Yes, it’s that complicated.

EXCERPT

“The PM sends you his best, Minister,” Jeremy Craig’s assistant offered into the phone, a soft crackling of the connection the only hint of the vast distance between them. “And tells you not to forget you have a breakfast meeting with him when you return Thursday.”

From his seat in the Cessna Citation, Jeremy studied the arid landscape below. This high in the sky, one could be forgiven for thinking the Australian Outback was just the product of a painter denied anything but a palette of ochers and reds. The red dirt stretched beyond the horizon, marred only by clumps of grass trees, yellow spinifex and tenacious eucalyptus trees.

It was a breathtaking sight to behold, one a city boy like Jeremy recognized as both culturally significant and strangely stirring.

He thought of attempting to describe the view to his fellow politicians when he returned from his visit—public servants who had never stepped foot outside of Australia’s capital cities for fear of exposure to substandard cappuccinos, or those who sniffed at the very notion there was existence beyond the country’s coastal borders.

Those politicians would find this trip to such an isolated area a hardship. They’d complain and moan and begrudge the forced time away from their metropolitan offices. They’d spend the three-and-a-half-hour flight working out how they could claim their upcoming overseas vacation as a tax expense rather than taking in the unique beauty of the Outback’s grandeur below.

A grandeur he was about to spend five days visiting, thanks to his position as the federal minister for the arts and culture.

When the PM had requested Jeremy officiate the opening of Wallaby Ridge’s first indigenous art gallery—a move the PM viewed as politically sound—Jeremy had jumped at the chance.

For one, it gave him a chance to get away from the backstabbing and power playing of Parliament House for a while.

For another, it would allow him a chance to absorb himself in something he genuinely loved—art and Australian culture

More than that, it allows you to escape the constant pressure of the persona you’ve chosen to wear, doesn’t it? You may not be able to completely relax out here but at least you don’t have to worry about the ever-present scrutiny of the media and your—

“Minister?”

Jeremy jerked himself from the reverie, bringing his attention back to his assistant on the other end of the telephone connection.

“Sorry, Linda.” He shifted his butt on the plush seat, noticing for the first time the hint of buildings away off in the far distance. “I was woolgathering.”

“Isn’t that the minister for agriculture and rural livestock’s job, sir?”

Jeremy laughed at the young woman’s joke even as he adjusted the glasses on his face. “It is, Linda. But he’s not the one about to land in Wallaby Ridge, is he?”

His assistant chuckled. “Enjoy your stay in the Outback, sir.”

Jeremy disconnected the call and returned his focus to the township the private plane was now approaching. Wallaby Ridge, a thriving Outback community of roughly seven hundred people and his home for the next five days.

Those five days were planned to the minute. There was the art gallery opening, along with various appearance and appointments acting as the prime minister’s representative. A visit to the Mutawintji National Park, where he would take in the ancient Aboriginal cave paintings, and a goodwill trip to the local Aboriginal community. The latter two would require transportation via helicopter and, according to the itinerary Linda had supplied him, his pilot was a man called Ryan Taylor.

Taylor was to meet him when he touched down. He would then fly Jeremy out to the deputy prime minister’s newly rebuilt Wallaby Ridge homestead—situated 242 kilometres away from the town proper—where Jeremy was setting up office for the week.

Jeremy let his thoughts linger on Australia’s deputy leader for a moment. There had been many backroom conversations and mutters about the man, most focusing on his dubious relationship with a multinational mining company. Rumour had it he was about to announce his exit from political life, a retirement touted as being forced by the PM.

According to Linda—who seemed to know the move of every politician in federal politics before they made them—Jeremy was but two party-room elections away from being named his replacement.

Was Jeremy ready to become Australia’s deputy prime minister?

He didn’t know. What he did know was he loved his country more than words could describe and would do anything required of him to make it an even better place to live.

Including denying that which would destroy his political career.

A soft tone filled the plane’s interior, followed a second later by the sole flight attendant’s arrival at his side.

“We’re landing in a few moments, Minister,” she said, leaning towards him. Her smile—and her eyes—suggested any invitation he extended would be accepted.

His political advisors would most likely encourage the dalliance. The last time Jeremy’s name was linked to a sexual scandal as such, his popularity with male voters had skyrocketed. Surprisingly, so had his popularity with female voters aged eighteen to twenty-five. Of course, that scandal had seen him pitted against a rock star for the affections of Natalie Thorton, the dean of the Sydney Conservatorium of Music. It was very likely the approval may have had something to do with the celebrity status of his so-called rival.

“Thank you—” he flicked her nametag, strategically pinned just above her breast, a quick look, “—Tabatha.”

She straightened, trailing her fingertips across the back of his shoulder as she turned and walked back to the cockpit.

He smiled, his gut clenching.

If only she knew…

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