Celebrate Loving Day with me!

June 12 is National Loving Day, commemorating the day in 1967 when the US Supreme Court finally struck down laws across the country that had made interracial marriage illegal in many states.

As you can imagine, this is a decision that has personal relevance to me, because I am married to someone of another race! So to celebrate and continue the work of Mildred and Richard Loving and continue their humble fight for marriage equality under the law, I have donated a brand new contemporary romance novella to this anthology. All proceeds will benefit the charities who are continuing the fight begun by Richard and Mildred Loving to ensure that love in all its incarnations is protected.

BUY LOVING HEARTS HERE–> https://books2read.com/u/mYxD9w

Available at Amazon, Kobo, Apple, !ndigo, Smashwords, and more!

I’m including an exclusive excerpt of Worlds Apart here on the blog, and for all of you who have asked me to write the story about how my husband and I met and fell in love… this is not it. Sorry! But I will say that Sunny and Martin’s story is definitely informed by my husband’s and my journey in an international romance, and I think you will fall in love with them as much as I have. It’s definitely one of the most romantic stories I’ve ever written.

While this will be published as a stand-alone at some point, it won’t be for at least six months, so please support this great cause, grab the anthology, and discover the work of 16 other authors who may be new-to-you, writing about love of all kinds.

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From Worlds Apart…

Martin’s iPad was missing. Again.

“Dammit, Alice.” He regularly let the camp manager use the iPad when she needed to make a quick change to the schedule. Since they were all linked through his main account, it made the most sense.

The problem was, Alice wasn’t the best at putting things back where she found them.

Martin was in the large reception tent where the group visiting area, the fire pit, and the bar were all located. He walked behind the bar and looked through the shelves and drawers.

“Alice, where did you put it?”

They had guests coming and he wanted to be out of the way before the chaos of new people complicated the search. He couldn’t call her, she was already on her way to the airport to pick up her school friend.

“Hello?”

Martin popped his head over the bar and saw a dark-haired woman spinning in circles, taking it all in. “Hello.”

She turned toward him and raised her sunglasses. “Oh. Hi. Alice said there was a bar, I didn’t realize it was right here. She said I could wait here while they got my luggage sorted out, but I didn’t know anyone would be around.” She pushed her hand forward. “Sorry, I’m Sunny. I don’t travel much.”

Martin smiled and shook her hand. “I’m Martin. You must be—”

“Is it too early to get a gin and tonic?”

He put a hand on his chest. “Actually I don’t—”

“My mother said they’re medicinal.” She smiled and it transformed her face. “Pretty sure she’s just saying that though. She drinks a lot of them when she’s golfing.”

The smile struck Martin dumb for a moment. The way that a simple expression could transform a pleasant looking woman into someone… incandescent.

He reached for a glass. “Any preference on gin?”

“Oh no, I’m not picky.” Her eyes were wide and blue as the sky. Her neck had to be sore from the way she was swinging her head around, trying to take everything in.

Martin decided to tease her a little. “So do you come to this bar often?”

The woman burst into a nervous laugh. “I can’t believe I’m here. This is like… I don’t know, a movie or something. I didn’t know places like this really existed.”

“You mean the camp?” He worked hard to make sure his “safari camp” was nothing close to rugged. Coming from a high-end hotel background, he wanted guests to sleep in luxury while they explored the outdoors and experienced the Mara. “Or the countryside?”

“The camp, the country, everything.” She looked out the open side of the reception tent, which was a broad shade cover on a raised platform that overlooked the savannah. “I’m drinking at a bar and there are zebras grazing.” She pointed over her shoulder. “Like… right there.”

Martin smiled. “Welcome to the Mara.” He poured two fingers of gin, squeezed a lime over the ice, and filled the rest of the glass with tonic water. “Your gin and tonic, miss.”

“Thanks.” She gave him that smile again. “The trip from the air strip was the most beautiful drive I’ve ever taken in my life.”

Martin remembered the first time he came to this place, twelve years old and finally old enough to travel with his father for work. His father had never been content with the leased cooperative idea that the Maasai were developing. If John Karanja built a hotel, he wanted to own the land it sat on.

“I was twelve the first time I visited this place,” he said. “I still remember how awe-struck I was.”

“Where are you from?”

“Nairobi,” he said. “City boy. You?”

“Same. Well, city girl. I grew up in the Washington, DC area.”

“Is your father in government?”

“Oh no, thank God. He’s… He works in banking. Kind of boring.”

“Ah.” Martin leaned on the bar and watched her. “Do you work in banking as well? You’re Alice’s friend, correct?”

“I am. And yes, kind of. I don’t work for the same bank as my dad, but I’m an actuary and I work for an investment fund. I analyze data and numbers to quantify the risk potential for different businesses.”

“That sounds interesting.”

“It’s not.” Her smile turned nervous again. “I mean, it’s interesting to me, but usually when I describe what I do, I notice people’s eyes glazing over.” She sipped her gin and tonic. “Most people don’t like numbers that much.”

“Do you like them?”

She blinked. “I don’t think anyone has ever asked me that before.”

“If you like your job?”

“No, if I like numbers.” The smile began to creep out again. “I like my job as much as I like any job, but I really like numbers.”

“Why?”

She relaxed onto the stool and let out a thoughtful sigh. “They’re beautiful and elegant. They’re like this beautiful language that you don’t have to speak aloud.”

Her cheeks reddened a little bit and Martin felt a punch of satisfaction. He liked making this woman blush. He liked seeing her smile. He liked her laugh and he really wanted to see her long hair down. It was braided sensibly down her back, but wild feathers of it had pulled away from the braid, probably from the wind.

“And they’re easy to understand.” She was still talking about numbers. “People can be really…”

Attractive. Intriguing. Unexpected.

“Complicated?” He poured himself two fingers of scotch and mixed a little water in.

“Tiring.” There were the red cheeks again. “Not you. You’re a lifesaver. But sometimes I’ll be talking to someone—and I am terrible about remembering faces and names—so I’ll be talking with someone at one of my parents’ parties or something and I’ll think they’re one person but they’re really another person and then I’ll say something completely inappropriate and make a fool of myself.”

“I doubt that.”

“No, trust me. I can be really awkward.” She nodded and finished her drink. “My sister is brilliant with people. So…confident. And I don’t have any reason not to be confident, but I still struggle with it. I think it drives my mother crazy, but I don’t know how to turn that anxiety off.” She blinked. “I can’t believe I’m telling you all of this. I guess what they say about bartenders being therapists is true, huh? You probably hear the most private things from the guests here, don’t you?”

“Actually, I’m not usually—”

“Sunny?” Alice called from the pathway. “Oh, you met Martin already!” She jogged over and put her arm around her friend. “Sunny, this is my boss, Martin Karanja.”

Sunny’s eyes went wide. “Martin… Karanja? As in Karanja Safaris?”

“Of course! My boss. Martin, this is Sunny.” She frowned. “And what are you doing here? I thought you were working on payroll this afternoon.”

“I’m looking for my iPad.”

Sunny was blinking and her cheeks were red again, but this time there was no smile accompanying the flush.

“I left your iPad in the office,” Alice said. “Did you look under the payroll folder? I put both of them right on the top of your desk.”

Martin kept glancing at Sunny, whose expression was frozen. “I didn’t lift up the payroll folder, no. It was probably under there.”

Alice rolled her eyes. “Men are all the same. How you find your own shoes in the morning is a miracle.” She tugged on Sunny’s arm. “Bring your drink along! I want to show you your tent. We’re not booked up this week, so I gave you one of the Duma tents; it has the best view.”

“Oh, I’m…” Sunny quickly swallowed the last of her gin and tonic, then she set her glass down. “I’m done.” She sounded as if she had something in her mouth. “Sorry.” She carefully took the slice of lime out and put it in the empty glass. “Sorry.” There was a furtive glance at Martin, then she looked away. “Thank you so much for the drink.”

“Any time.” Martin watched them walk away, Alice’s arm firmly around her friend’s shoulders. He was hoping he might catch a whisper of their conversation, but the wind stole their words away.

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Copyright 2023 Elizabeth Hunter

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