The right words can save your life.
For fans of Nicholas Sparks and Jodi Picoult… A soldier falls in love with his battle buddy’s sister through their letters and returns home from Afghanistan with a secret that could destroy their fragile relationship. Don’t miss THE LAST LETTER by Rebecca Yarros! Grab your copy today!
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Synopsis
Beckett,
If you’re reading this, well, you know the “last-letter” drill. You made it. I didn’t. Get off the guilt train, because I know if there were any chance you could have saved me, you would have.
I need one thing from you: Get out of the army and get to Telluride.
My little sister Ella’s raising the twins alone. She’s too independent and won’t accept help easily, but she has lost our grandmother, our parents, and now me. It’s too much for anyone to endure. It’s not fair.
And here’s the kicker: there’s something else you don’t know that’s tearing her family apart. She’s going to need help.
So if I’m gone, that means I can’t be there for Ella. I can’t help them through this. But you can. So I’m begging you, as my best friend, go take care of my sister, my family.
Please don’t make her go through it alone.
Ryan
Excerpt
“Ella.” It was a plea to speak, to not speak.Hell, I didn’t know anymore.
“You don’t see me like that. I totally get it.”She reached for the TV remote.
“How exactly do I see you? Please,enlighten me.” I leaned forward, stealing the remote. She’d opened this box and had better well dishit.
She huffed in annoyance. “You see me as amom. As Colt and Maisie’s mom. And of course you do, because that’s what I am. A mom with twokids.”
“Well, yeah,” I said. Her motherhood—thatselfless devotion she had to her kids—was one of her most attractive attributes.
She rolled her eyes with a little sigh, andthe metaphorical light bulb went off in my head.
“You don’t think I want you.”
She shot me a look that confirmed myguess and blushed the same crimson of her couch. “You know, you’re right. It’s late.” She faked a yawn.“Suuuuuuper late.”
“I want you.” Damn, it felt so good to saythe words.
“Yeah, okay.” She gave me a goofy look anda thumbs-up. “Please don’t make me feel any more idiotic than I do right now.”
Yeah, enough of thisbullshit.
I pounced in one smooth motion, taking herback to the couch, sliding over her as I gathered her wrists in one hand above her head and settledbetween her open thighs.
Home.
“Holy shit, you move fast.” There was nofear or rejection in her eyes, just surprise.
“Not in every arena,” Ipromised.
Her lips parted.
“Ella. I want you.”
“Beckett…you don’t have to.”
Yeah, that soft little sigh she did was goingto be my undoing.
I let go of her wrists, letting my fingers traildown her arm until I had one hand weaving my fingers into the hair at the base of her scalp and theother at the curve in her waist.
“Feel this?” Then I slid forward, letting mydick stroke along the seam in her pajama pants hard enough for her to gasp at the contact. I couldn’tremember ever wanting to shred a piece of fabric so much in my life. “I’ve never wanted a woman asmuch as I want you.”
I moved again, and her eyes slid shut as shelet loose the sweetest moan.
My dick throbbed, knowing everything I’dfantasized about for the better part of the last eight months was one decision away.
“Beckett.” Her hands found my biceps, hernails digging in.
“Don’t ever think that I don’t want you,because if things were different, I would have already been inside you. I would know exactly how youfeel, and what you sound like, look like, when you come. I’ve thought about it at least a hundreddifferent ways, and believe me, I’ve got a great imagination.”
She rocked her hips against me, and Ilocked my jaw to keep from giving her exactly what her body was asking for. “Ella, you have tostop.”
“Why?” she asked, her lips dangerouslyclose to mine. “What do you mean if things were different?” Her eyes flew wide. “Is this because I havekids?”
“What? No. Of course not. It’s becauseyou’re Ryan’s little sister.” Before I could do any more damage, I got the hell off her and sat back on myside of the couch.
“Because…I’m Ryan’s little sister,” sherepeated, scooting so she sat upright, facing me. “And you think he’d, what? Haunt you?”
Three things: The letter. The cancer. The lie.
I repeated those in my head until I was certain I could look ather and not drag her back under me.
“Beckett?”
“When I was growing up, if I wanted something, I took it.Immediately. I had sex at fourteen with a girl in my foster home of the moment. I opened Christmaspresents early if I was lucky enough to get one, and it was usually from my social worker or somecharity.”
“I don’t understand.” She wrapped her arms around her kneesagain.
“I took it immediately because I knew if I didn’t, chances were Iwouldn’t get it. It was a now-or-never kind of thing—there weren’t second chances.”
“Okay.”
“I can’t touch you, can’t talk about it, because I’m afraid I’ll acton it.”
“And why does that matter if I want you to?”
“Because I won’t get a second chance. And I’m crap withpeople, with relationships. I’ve never had one that lasted more than a month. Never loved a woman I’veslept with. And chances are I’d do something to screw this up, because it’s not just my dick that wantsyou, Ella.”
That O popped right back onto her face, and I closed myeyes to keep from lunging across the distance and kissing her. Knowing she’d let me—that she wantedit—sent my need from a bullet to a nuclear missile.
“And when I’d screw it up, because it would happen, trust me,it would hurt Colt and Maisie, too. You’d be on your own again, because there’s no chance you’d let mehang around and help you out like Ryan asked.”
“And there it is.”
“There it is. You’re Ryan’s little sister.”
“There were only five years between us. Not so little, youknow.” She reached for the remote.
“I’m well aware.”
“So if Ryan were still alive…” She shot one last look atme.
I let everything slip for a millisecond, letting her see it all in myeyes, how badly I wanted her, and not just for her body. “Everything would be different.”
“Everything?”
“Everything but the way I feel about you, which he probablywould have killed me for. Where does that leave us?”
“You mean besides me being a dried-up spinster and you beinghonor-bound to a ghost?”
“Something like that.”
She rolled her head along the back of the couch, mutteringsomething that sounded like a curse word under her breath. Then she sat up straight and powered onthe TV with a click of her thumb. “That leaves us choosing a movie on demand. Because I’m not lettingyou walk out that door right now.”
“You’re not?”
“Nope. You walk out now, you might get all weird about thisand not come back. Honor is a fabulous thing, but sometimes pride can be a lot stronger, especiallywhen you convince yourself it’s for the good of the other person.”
Damn, the woman knew me.
“So movie it is,” I agreed. “Just…stay on your side of thecouch.”
“I wasn’t the one who crossed the center line,” she teased witha smile that got me hard all over again.
Movie chosen, we sat and watched, both of us stealingsideways glances. There was that saying…the horse out of the barn. Yeah, the horse was out of the barn,and it wasn’t going back in. Not no way. Not no how.
That horse was running amok and screwing with my carefullyconstructed control.
But I didn’t complain when she moved over. Or when shepressed against my side. Nope. I lifted my arm and savored the feel of her curves, her trust. Still didn’tcomplain when she lay down in my arms. Hell no, I held on and memorized every second.
About Rebecca Yarros
Rebecca Yarros is a hopeless romantic and a lover of all things coffee, chocolate, and Paleo. She is the author of the Flight & Glory series, including Full Measures, the award-winning Eyes Turned Skyward, Beyond What is Given, and Hallowed Ground. She loves military heroes, and has been blissfully married to hers for sixteen years.
When she’s not writing, she’s tying hockey skates for her four sons, sneaking in some guitar time, or watching brat-pack movies with her two daughters. She lives in Colorado with the hottest Apache pilot ever, their rambunctious gaggle of kids, an English bulldog who is more stubborn than sweet, and a bunny named General Fluffy Pants who torments the aforementioned bulldog. Having adopted their youngest daughter from the foster system, and Rebecca is passionate about helping others do the same.
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