Cafe in the Park (Siren Publishing Classic)

Café in the Park

When Emily McKenzie joins a dating agency, she never expects to meet someone like Chris Donato. Everything she ever hoped for in a man, he’s special in more ways than one, independently rich, a singer and guitar player in a rock band, and he's totally gorgeous. Their intense attraction to each other, is fuelled by their shared loneliness, and they soon fall into a highly sensual relationship.

Emily's previously lonely life is suddenly filled with delicious sexual encounters, and love is on the horizon.

Chris sets out to capture Emily's love. He asks her to his gigs and brings her back to his huge house in the hills.

Things are looking good, when someone from his past comes back to haunt him.

Will Emily find out his shocking secret?

How can love blossom when someone is trying to tear them apart?

Genre:
Contemporary, Shape-shifter

Length:
39,306 words

Elodie Parkes

EROTIC ROMANCE

Siren Publishing, Inc.

www.SirenPublishing.com

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IMPRINT: Erotic Romance

CAFÉ IN THE PARK

Copyright © 2014 by Elodie Parkes

E-book ISBN:
978-1-63258-297-3

First E-book Publication: September 2014

Cover design by Elodie Parkes

All art and logo copyright © 2014 by Siren Publishing, Inc.

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED:
This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part, without express written permission.

All characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.

PUBLISHER

Siren Publishing, Inc.

www.SirenPublishing.com

Letter to Readers

Dear Readers,

If you have purchased this copy of
Café in the Park
by Elodie Parkes from BookStrand.com or its official distributors, thank you. Also, thank you for not sharing your copy of this book.

Regarding E-book Piracy

This book is copyrighted intellectual property. No other individual or group has resale rights, auction rights, membership rights, sharing rights, or any kind of rights to sell or to give away a copy of this book.

The author and the publisher work very hard to bring our paying readers high-quality reading entertainment.

This is Elodie Parkes’s livelihood. It’s fair and simple. Please respect Elodie Parkes’s right to earn a living from her work.

Amanda Hilton, Publisher

www.SirenPublishing.com

www.BookStrand.com

ELODIE PARKES

Copyright © 2014

Chapter One

Emily sat with a cool drink and a book in her roof garden after a hectic day at work. She turned a page of the romance novel with a sigh. Emily craved love, romantic love that would sweep her off her feet and last forever. The warm, midsummer evening accentuated her need as she read about delicious kisses. Emily pushed the novel away across the table considering how long it was since she’d had sex or even kisses. She sipped her drink and watched a bee amble in the pot of flowers nearby. The hot summer made her longing for love worse. She wanted the feel of a man’s body next to her, her arm around his bare waist as they walked on a beach somewhere.

A work colleague, discussing the lack of available men, told Emily she’d been without sex for three years, and the longer she went without sex, the easier it became to cope with the deprivation. Emily hadn’t found that. She missed sex all the time. The need hadn’t dwindled for her in the last year she’d been without it. If anything, it was worse. She craved sex so badly sometimes it worried her. She would secretly look at men and mentally undress them. She felt close to desperation sometimes wanting to touch a man’s body. Just touch him. He needn’t return the favor, although that would be great.

The bee left the flowers and flew close to her face. Emily gently batted it away and shook off her growing depression. She’d seen an advertisement on TV the previous night for an online date matching service. She’d considered it all day and now she was going to join. At lunchtime, buying a magazine at the newsstand, she’d flipped through a dating magazine where people posted advertisements in the “personal” columns. The rest of the thin publication was devoted to how to get a partner and keep them. There were articles on sexual technique, lingerie, and adult toys for sale. Emily memorized the magazine’s website address, intending to check that out, too.

She put down her glass of lemonade and went indoors to her study.

Emily booted her computer and launched the browser.
I hope this isn’t a stupid thing to do.
With a deep breath, telling herself nothing ventured, nothing gained, she found the magazine website and clicked on the form for an “ad” in the personal column. She read the instructions about making the pitch appealing, succinct, and yet individually tailored to what you really hoped to find in a partner. She got through the basic questions and then couldn’t think how to phrase what she really wanted.

I want a man who honestly wants to love and be loved…someone who can show emotion…romantic, someone who can cry.

She reread her words.
Will that net a man who’ll throw his heart and soul into a relationship?

She took the chance and typed it in. At the mailbox facility assigned for replies, she chose how frequently notifications of its contents were sent to her, paid, and then signed out.

The online date matching service was no easier. Emily answered the questions, but didn’t upload a photo. In the requirements box, she used the same sentence as the personal ad. When her initial matches built on the next page, she was disappointed. The ten guys offered to contact didn’t appeal. She browsed through the list of events offered in her geographic area by the company and saw a speed dating evening that was going to happen at the end of the week. Emily stared at the booking form for a full minute, considering the prospect. Then she booked a place and paid for the whole deal, the matching service, and the event, with her credit card.

That night, Emily looked through her clothes, considering what to wear to the speed dating Friday evening, finally deciding to stay with the business suit she’d be wearing. The event started early and she’d have to go straight from work anyway. That night as she lay sleepless in bed, she wished she hadn’t gone ahead with any of it, not the personal “ad,” nor the matching service. She told herself that only desperate people used it. If the range of men already offered to her were anything to go by, it would be a waste of time. Then, as she drifted to sleep, she acknowledged she was desperate.

The next day after work, she kicked off her high-heeled shoes at the front door and padded along to her study to check the date matching mailbox on the website. There was one reply.

“Meet me for coffee Thursday lunchtime. I’ll wait at the front of Café in the Park at one o’clock. I’m tall, dark haired, and will be wearing black.”

Emily took off the jacket of her business suit and read the message again. Café in the Park
was easy to get to from her workplace. She hadn’t too much time to worry over the meeting, since today was Wednesday. She only had to cut down an adjacent street to meet the large square of the city park. There was a pond and a big bistro café there. Lots of workers went to eat their lunch at the café or sit on the benches that lined the path through the park…so a safe enough assignation.

As she ate her evening meal, she daydreamed about the meeting, hoping the man would be attractive, intelligent, kind, and sexy.

The next day, even though she’d promised herself she wouldn’t fuss, she put on her shortest work skirt and highest heels, and instead of the tan stockings she ordinarily wore, she chose black. As she drove to work, a flutter of anticipation grew in her stomach.

The morning dragged. She began to get cold feet, but then, ten minutes before one o’clock, she put her computer to sleep, picked up her jacket from the back of her desk chair, and left her office. Emily told the receptionist she was going out for a sandwich. As she strode down the street and detoured to the park, nervousness took over. Her heart beat a little faster. By the time she approached the café, she was shaking.

There was no one outside it that matched the description in the message. Two young men in white shirts and tan chinos passed her and went into the café. Three women all in business dress talking and laughing together, waited for a fourth to join them, and then went into the café. Emily took a deep breath to steady her nerves and walked right up to the café entrance. She stood around for a few moments trying not to feel self-conscious, but it got the better of her. She retreated to a bench seat on the path a little way off from the door to the café.