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Modern Heat

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as

Claimed By The Billionaire Bad Boy

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"Claimed By The Rogue Billionaire"

Revenge is a dish best served red-hot, passionate and delicious!

Heiress Ashling Fitzgerald has come home, determined to prove that she’s changed. Secretly she wants to make amends – with the tall, dark housekeeper’s son she left behind. But he’s not the boy she once knew – Gabriel Burke is now an infamous billionaire playboy!

Gabe thinks Ashling is spoilt and selfish – but still oh-so-sexy. He doesn’t want her apologies. Instead he wants her in his bed; he wants revenge…

But, once he gets it, Gabe can’t believe he is still so hungry for more…

For more books like this visit my Modern Heat page

Sighing deeply in resignation, she glanced in his general direction – not at all surprised to find him staring back at her,  

“Problem?”

He tapped the shorter plank he’d found off a palm as he walked towards her, his mouth quirking when she automatically took a step back, “No.”

Ash nodded at the plank, “Could we put down the weapon before approaching the enemy do you think?”

With a shake of his head he tossed it over onto the pile, “How can you look that pleased with this dump?”

“Maybe because I don’t see it as a dump?”

“Newsflash: It is a dump,” He rocked forwards onto the balls of his feet and dropped his chin to look at her with a sparkle of amusement in his eyes.

Ash took yet another deep breath – nope – she wasn’t going to get into another argument any more than was she going to pay any attention to the slither of anticipation shivering up her spine when he kept walking towards her. She was going to prove she could behave like more of an adult than he could and that she was in total control of her own damn body,

“Well when you and your guys have done the work I’m sure it’ll be something amazing.”

“I had no idea you had such faith in my abilities.”

“I have faith in Alex’s abilities – all you’ve gotta do is hit a nail in straight,” She counted to ten and tried again, “I have every faith that you can bring Alex’s visions to life if you hit enough of them.”

There, that was better.

Gabe circled before standing in front of her, studying her with hooded eyes until she honestly thought she’d strangle him if he didn’t say something to take her focus off his breathing or the hint of his scent or the way a lock of dark hair was falling into his eyes,

“Trying to be nice to me is the latest plan is it?”

She swallowed hard, folding her arms when the deep rumbling of his voice did things to her breasts, as if her overly-sensitive nipples could feel the very vibration of it in the air. Then she lifted her chin to study him while she counted to ten yet again,

“And what would you do if I was nice Gabe? Wouldn’t leave you much room for being nasty in return without seeming childish would it?”

He lifted a large hand and ruffled his mop of dark hair, leaning his head towards one wide shoulder and then the other as he continued studying her, “Well I guess it would depend on just how nice you were planning on being.”

The words were out before she could stop them, “Gimme your definition of ‘nice’.”

He closed the gap, towering over her so she had to lean her head back to look up at him, which gave her disobedient gaze an excuse to linger on his mouth before she caught herself on and looked into his eyes.

She couldn’t help a burst of almost nervous laughter from escaping when she read the meaning there, “O-oh I don’t think so.”

Which was a tad at odds to every pore in her body yelling ‘yes, yes, yes’ wasn’t it?

“Didn’t you ever hear the expression ‘kiss and make up’ Ash?”

“And that’s all it would take is it?” She mulled that one over for a moment, ‘cos – you know – if it helped… But then look where kissing him had got her last time, and that was before he’d become this, this apparently intense, compelling, almost hypnotic –

Damn him.

“It might take a little more than that.”

“Like what for instance?” She really didn’t know when to quit, did she?

“I’ve been known to appreciate a woman with a little imagination and a spirit of adventure. The world knows you have the latter in spades so maybe we should just see how you do with the first one?”

Oh he had no idea what her imagination could do. If for a single insane second she considered describing to him some of her nocturnal imaginations ways of ‘making up with him’ what would he do she wondered. Ask for all the hot and sweaty details? Challenge her to a demonstration?

No, she knew what he’d do. He’d gloat that she’d had them and she’d have to live with him knowing.

She smiled sweetly, “Go to hell Gabe.”

He smirked, leaned back and took a breath, “You know what your biggest problem is gonna be here?”

“Apart from you, you mean?”

He leaned back down, voice lowering, “You don’t know what to do about me, that’s your problem. ‘Cos you’re stuck with my company for the next while and you can’t pretend to be someone you’re not while I’m around.”

“You don’t know who I am, you just think you do,” She smiled the kind of smile she hoped sincerely looked equally as dangerous as the one he’d worn earlier, “And that’s your biggest problem here.”

And then she watched dense dark lashes brush tanned skin when he blinked, she watched as he searched each of her eyes in turn, and she had to purse her lips tightly together to stop herself from saying something to make things even worse.

After all, they were at the opening end of weeks of forced proximity and they couldn’t spend the whole time arguing, could they? She lifted her brows.

And Gabe’s mouth quirked at the edges in response, “There’s more I take it?”

Placing her hands on her hips, she stood as tall as her heels would allow her, “What you need to do is pretend you’ve never met me.”

“Do I now?”

“Yes,” She nodded firmly, as if to disprove the fact that the idea hadn’t just that second occurred to her, “And I’ll do the same with you.”

“Really.”

“Alright then, you come up with a better suggestion for working together this next while.”

“How about…” He turned his profile to her while he thought, then back, leaning his face closer to hers, warm breath washing over the end of her nose “…you stay away ‘til the work is finished?”

“Not happening.”

“There’s always the ‘be nice to me’ option…”

“Not happening either.”

“Scared you might enjoy being nice to me?” He smiled an even more dangerous smile, “Until your friends interrupted us I seem to remember you enjoying being nice to me well enough. I remember the noises you were making, the way you clung to me, the fact that it wouldn’t have taken much for me to move my hand higher…”

Ash hated that she had to swallow hard and take a breath before she could speak, “We might need to just remind ourselves who it was kissed who that one time, don’t you think?”

“Only if we remember who goaded who into doing the kissing.” His darkening eyes lowered to study her mouth the way they had in the hallway that last day, as if just talking about kissing made it something highly likely in the next few minutes.

Ash stared up at him with wide eyes, her pulse skipping erratically in her veins as she ran her tongue over her dry lips, “If we do that then we’d need to look at what we were doing before the whole kissing idea was brought up.”

His gaze swept to a point above her head, his brow creasing into a frown beneath what were now several thick waves of dark hair, “Hmm, you might be right…” And then his gaze locked with hers again, his voice a husky grumble that vibrated the heavy air between them, “… now what was it we were doing? Refresh my memory…”

Ash’s heart thudded up painfully against her chest as the answer hit the front of her brain. Well hell – arguing - that’s what had started the chain reaction last time, wasn’t it?

Gabe nodded, “Yeah, I thought that’s what we were doing. Not like we can seem to avoid that is it? Maybe it’s only a matter of time then.”

Back to books

Claimed By The Billionaire Bad Boy features my most internationally famous hero to date. Why you may ask...? Well, if you're a regular visitor at my Blog then you'll know this chap led me quite the merry dance during the writing of this book...

From the moment I posted pictures of how I thought Gabriel Burke looked he pretty much took on a life of his own. To my Blog friends he's simply Gabe and he was such a very large part of my life for a while that every time I talked to friends and family on the phone or over coffee there would be the inevitable 'How's Gabe?' question. Usually answered with the kind of language I can't post on here! And I'll forever remember, after all the angst, the hugs I got from fellow writers in London when they gingerly asked 'What about Gabe?' and I was finally able to answer - HE SOLD!!!

Gabe is quite simply Gabe. There will never be another hero like him for me. He's stubborn, pig headed, irritating, single minded... I could go on and on and on...

 But oh-my-is-he-sexy!!!

The irony is; the story was supposed to be Ash's! Ashling Fitzgerald is the younger sister of Alex from His Mistress: His Terms - in fact the book starts during the party scene at Alex and Ash's 17th Century childhood home that features two thirds of the way through His Mistress: His Terms. Same scene - same bits of dialogue - same four characters - each book showing the scene through a different set of characters eyes. Clever huh? I have my moments. Unfortunately during the first draft of this book they proved to be few and far between. Which led to a re-write the likes of which I haven't seen since my second book.

I blame Gabe entirely.

Not that the second draft version of Ash was any easier! In Alex's book we learn that the Fitzgerald family is the equivalent of Irish Royalty; Alex as the only son and therefore the heir, wears the mantle well and if anything the fact that he seems to be so *perfect* is what holds Merrow back from him. Ash on the other hand, was the family rebel and having shamed the family name was forced to flee the country. This gal is street savvy in that she's had her share of rough times and found her way out the other end on her wee own-some but she's also defensive because, well, she had her reasons for rebelling in the first place. But a gal with a past like hers - not so easy to write - 'cos you kinda want the reader to like her, you know?

Especially when Gabe despises her so much at the start of the book...

What it all added up to in the end was one hell of a battle of wills between two people who have known each other since Ash was born - Ash, the uber-rich Fitzgerald and Gabe, the housekeeper's son - who therefore know exactly where to *hit* to cause the most pain mid-argument. It's not a friends to lovers story because believe you me, they are NOT friends when the story begins and that wasn't easy to write either... How DO you get two people who can't stand in the same room without arguing to end up in love by the end of the story, hmmm??? I guess you'll just have to read it to see...

But I promise you if you like a modern day alpha hero just dripping with sex appeal and as stubborn and pig-headed as you can get then you're gonna love Gabe as much as I did by the final draft. He's my kinda guy (just don't go telling him - okay?)

REMEMBER FOLKS for the prequel to this book and a glimpse of Gabe before Ash is around to bring out his *dark side* you'll find Alex and Merrow's story in His Mistress: His Terms...

Locations in this book:

This book although thin on the ground with a great deal of description due to the space required for arguing and fighting sexual tension, does in fact have several locations and bits and pieces that add to the story.

As I mentioned it starts at a party held at the 17th Century Mansion where Ash, her brother Alex and Gabe as their housekeepers son, all grew up together. (You may remember this picture from the His Mistress: His Terms page...) And we get tasters of this house with it's high vaulted ceilings, and the expansive gardens that Ash's dog Moggie goes mental in when they arrive back from Paris, a few times during the story...

I also thought you might like a look at the dress I envisaged Ash wearing at that party when Gabe first sees her after eight years away. Kinda can't blame the guy for noticing her with a figure like that in a dress like that, can you? Not that he's the least little bit happy about noticing either one you understand. And then we have a picture of the childhood swing that played such an important part in an early *flashback* scene where you can see a little of where their troubles began... A scene that incidentally was in the first draft, out of the second and back in the third at the suggestion of my lovely editor! Which I was glad about 'cos I kinda loved that swing scene...

For every book I do these days I have a collage - a set of pictures put together on a Word Doc on my laptop that I can open and gaze at when I hit a tough stage in the book and it's these pics that I'm showing you. So I had the pic of Ash's childhood home, the dress, the swing, this one of the paparazzi to show how she was followed around during her wild-child days, the one of her finished Gallery - even though through most of the book it's at the construction stage... And it's amazing how clear everything can become in my mind when I play around with some of these pics.

Take Gabe's house for instance. In my first draft of the book I had pictured him living in a worker's cottage type thing next to the canal in Dublin. But when I did the re-write of the book it just wasn't working for me. I wanted a place that Ash could fall in love with almost before she fell in love with Gabe. The theory in my mind being that Ash may have grown up in riches but she'd never really been happy with that, you know? She'd never felt like she had a home. Whereas Gabe, who in theory hadn't had as good a start as her in life had made a home - you with me? So when I found this picture I just loved the house straight away and could see Gabe and Ash there in a happily ever after kinda way. Turned out in real life the house was just outside Dublin in an area known as Killiney Bay - which after a little research proved to be perfect! I mean - look at that view!!! How could Ash not fall in love with the house? And it became that very setting where the real changes in their relationship began...

So really, for me, you add that house, that view and then a Gabe and well... I'd cope with that kind of happily ever after too, wouldn't you?

So there you go, all snippets that are in the book, all just for you my dear website visitor to see. Glad you popped by now aren't you?

Soundtrack playing: 

This book actually went through a couple of *soundtracks* while Gabe was refusing to communicate with me...

And this time my Blog visitors know that, in the end, Gabe himself decided to tell me the crux of the matter with a track from the Embrace album, This New Day. The track was 'Nature's Law' - the chorus summing it up from Gabe's point of view...

"You should never fight your feelings, when your very bones believe them, you should never fight your feelings, you have to follow nature's law…"

You can order a copy of the album here

*All Photographs are used to give a visible representation of the Authors 'view' and are in no way representative of the people or places in real life beyond the realms of the Authors imagination.

"Claimed By The Rogue Billionaire (4.5) by Trish Wylie: Growing up together on the Fitzgerald estate, Ashling Fitzgerald and housekeeper's son Gabriel Burke were quite close until she was 17 and he was in his early 20s. Then a hurtful and humiliating incident sent Ashling running away to France. Eight years later, she's home in Ireland, and once more her life is entwined with her now-nemesis, Gabriel. Although their constant bickering and sparring says one thing, their intense attraction says something else entirely. Can they finally open their hearts to each other? This is a terrific story about letting go of the past and embracing the future. The emotionally rich journey is saturated with passion and sensuality." Sandra Garcia-Myers - Romantic Times

"Wow! This book raced me along and I wanted to keep reading all night! A strong, appealing heroine, a sexy as hell hero, and strong internal conflict made this story one that I found hard to put down. This was published in the UK as a Modern Heat- the sensuality level is a little higher than Presents/Modern. Here, the passion simmered all the way through, and when they consummated their relationship- ooh boy! Hot, but not too hot, like a good curry that's spiced just right."                                   Mulberry - An EHarlequin Book Challenge Reader

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