Three First Kisses {Author Guest Post: Draven, Kaye, & Rice}

Three HQN Authors Talk About The Art of the First Kiss 

While Harlequin is known primarily for romance, they also offer hotter fare. Today, authors Stephanie Draven, Laura Kaye and Leia Rice are here to talk a little bit about kisses and duel for the hottest. You decide!

The Fever and The Fury…“You do want to go to bed with me, don’t you, Phaedra?”

“Yes.” It was just the one tremulous word, but it was all the permission he needed. He drew her palm to his mouth. Her hand was damp, her pulse leaping beneath his lips. She was so eager. So wanting. Still, she resisted him. “Luke, you know I can’t consent to it. I can’t give you pleasure.”

“Then stop me from taking it,” he said, dragging his teeth up the pale underside of her arm, kissing the soft spot inside her elbow. She seemed entirely undone by this tenderness: she succumbed to it with a helplessness he’d never seen in any woman. It was unfair, some part of him thought. He was taking advantage of her innocence and inexperience. Someone should stop him, because he couldn’t seem to stop himself.

“Luke,” she whispered in warning.

“Stop me,” he said, his lips working up her shoulder and fastening at the pulse just behind her ear, the silk of her dark hair tickling his nose.

When her mouth fell open to speak, his thumb traced her lips and he was rewarded with another moan. His muscles tightened, every part of him straining with the thrill of torturing her for a change and in such a delicious way. “Stop me from kissing you, Phaedra. If you can.”

Stop him, she thought. Stop him!

But as his mouth inched its way along her jawline and found her lips, his honeyed kiss filled her mouth with sweetness. If her existence depended on it—and it may have—she couldn’t have stopped him. Instead, her lips parted and she offered no resistance to the tongue that touched her own.

The intimacy of being kissed by Luke was a revelation. The unanticipated joy of it rocked her to the soles of her feet. How was it that mortals could experience this and ever want to do anything else? She didn’t return his kiss, but let him plunder her mouth. And she wished that he would go on doing it forever.

The Revolutionary Mistress…Pulling the sleeve of her dress down, Rene leaned over and gently kissed the slope of her shoulder.  He kissed the curve of her neck, the line of her jaw, and finally, his lips were on hers.  He parted Mariette’s mouth with his tongue, probing it inside and around her own.  Almost instantly, the kiss went from something soft and gentle, to something ravenous and hungry.

Mariette moaned inside of the kiss.  She moaned at the touch of his fingers over her corset, which he also pushed down so that her breast popped free of its confines, skin meeting with the chilly air.  Her nipple immediately tightened, hardening into a sensitive nub that Rene began to roll between his thick fingers.

“Now what do you want from me?” He asked after breaking the heated kiss. 

In the Service of the King…Shayla’s mind erupted into a cacophony of joyous confusion. She’d been specifically told there would be no kissing. The king did not kiss. But, holy hell! Did the king ever kiss.

His large frame bent down over her, surrounding her in his heat. His full lips sucked and pulled at hers and his tongue demanded entrance and exploration, which she freely granted. His hard muscles bunched and thrummed around her, setting her body on fire everywhere they touched. The scent of powerful masculinity filled her nose, and the exquisite flavor of his tongue in her mouth intoxicated her. And, oh God, every time she felt the passing hardness of his fangs as they kissed made her whimper and moan. Her body readied itself immediately for his, moistening, opening.

Having shielded herself from physical relationships, she was astounded to learn her body had the ability to produce this crazy, urgent euphoria. Her brain scrambled to process each new, maddening sensation. In that moment, she would’ve done anything to maintain the feeling. Was it always like this?

Kael growled low in his chest as his mouth came at her again and again, and Shayla felt the vibration of the feral sound against her breasts. She squeezed her thighs together, seeking friction to satisfy even a little of her now uncontrollable lust. Her mouth was so filled with his probing tongue it was difficult to get enough oxygen, but his kisses convinced her she could live without it as long as he continued to devour her so intensely.

Never had she imagined the expression of physical love could make her feel so wanted, so needed.

His obvious pleasure throbbed against her stomach and flooded her with unbelievable feelings of power, and just a little fear. Because they were off the grid now, outside the bounds of the rules and expectations she’d been taught during her training. And she was thrilled it might mean he was as affected by her as she was by him. Wherever the king was leading them, she was only too happy to follow. In truth, she felt powerless to do otherwise.

Sooooo, what say you? Which kiss was the hottest?

About the Authors…Stephanie Draven is a multi-published award-nominated author of myth-inspired paranormal romance. Writing for HQN Nocturne, Stephanie’s Mythica series asks the question: What if the monsters of ancient mythology still walked the earth…and what if you found out that you were one of them? Currently a denizen of Baltimore, that city of ravens and purple night skies, Stephanie lives there with her favorite nocturnal creatures–three scheming cats and a deliciously wicked husband. And when she is not busy with dark domestic rituals, she writes her books.

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Laura Kaye Voted Breakout Author of the Year in the 2011 GraveTells Readers’ Choice Awards, Laura is the bestselling and award-winning author of a half-dozen books. Hearts in Darkness is a finalist for the EPIC eBook Award for Best Novella, Forever Freed won the NJRW Golden Leaf Award for Best Paranormal of 2011, and North of Need, the first book in the Hearts of the Anemoi series, was named Grave Tells’ Best Book of 2011 and won their 5-STAR Gold Heart Award, and won Sizzling Hot Read of the Year at Sizzling Hot Books. Laura lives in Maryland with her husband, two daughters, and cute-but-bad dog, and appreciates her view of the Chesapeake Bay every day.

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Leia Rice is an avid lover of everything Parisian, Ancient Grecian and Ancient Roman. She wishes that women would still wear the pretty dresses and petticoats that they did back in the 18th century, but she’s well aware how much of a pain they must have been. Leia writes historical fiction, romance and erotica in these  areas, because she cannot get enough of each respective time period.

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