Curveball: Away We Go, #1

By Charlotte Stein

When Judy Myers is offered a relaxing vacation to get away from her latest heartbreak, she can’t say no. A cruise on her brother’s yacht sounds like heaven...until she realizes her brother’s best friend has been invited along for the ride.

Steven Stark is big, he’s loud, and he’s obviously not interested in the plump, plain little sister he used to tease unmercifully. In fact, he’s still quite happy to tease her – until she turns the tables on him. Now, Steven can’t seem to keep his thoughts, or his hands, to himself. And worse, Judy’s not sure she can resist the attraction she’s kept buried for so many years.

Being trapped on a boat isn’t the best place to be, when you’re suddenly thrown a hunky curveball.

Note: This title has been previously published, but has undergone extensive editing prior to re-release.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Charlotte Stein
• Release date: Aug 18, 2015
• ISBN: 9781513084589

Charlotte Stein

Charlotte Stein has written over thirty short stories, novellas and novels. Her collection of short stories was named one of the best erotic romances of 2009 by Michelle Buonfiglio, and her first novel, Control, was recently called “…a non-stop crazy hot sex book”. When not writing non-stop crazy hot sex books, she can be found eating jelly turtles, watching terrible sitcoms and occasionally lusting after hunks. She lives in West Yorkshire with her husband and their imaginary dog.

Book preview

Chapter One

The trouble with this holiday is the heat. I just didn’t think about the heat. It’s unrelenting and raw, turning everything a blinding white while it roasts me to an embarrassing shade of red. I step out in it for two seconds, and my shoulders lose a layer of skin. I can’t lie on the slippery surface of my brother’s yacht because the heat tries to eat me. But I can’t go below deck, either, because down there it’s a suffocating, stifling cave.

Even at night, I have the urge to lie on top of the covers, stark naked. Only I can’t, I can’t, because of the other trouble with this terrible holiday—Steven bloody Stark, and the fact that his door is three feet from my bed. He could open it at any time and find me like a great, unclothed wedge of flesh, sprawled out on top of my duvet. He wouldn’t even have to go through another door to stumble across me, seeing as how my room doesn’t have one.

I don’t actually have a room, at all. I just have this open space between the kitchenette and my brother’s boudoir, and when I’m done sleeping, my bed turns into a table. My wardrobe is more typically known as a suitcase, and every night I doze off to the scent of whatever we cooked three hours prior, for dinner.

I really don’t need to be told that this was the worst idea in the history of the world.

Though in my defense, it’d sounded nice when my brother and his wife had invited me. They didn’t even turn it into one of Jason’s patronizing so you won’t be alone sorts of sermons. He’d made it sound, instead, like something that would take my mind off things—help me get over yet another failed relationship.

And in all fairness, it has achieved this. I’m no longer thinking about Frank, at all. I can barely remember his face, in fact. Though I’ll admit, that probably has more to do with the Mediterranean heat and its ability to melt my brain than anything else.

Not to mention the effect of Steven Stark, and his ability to be absolutely everywhere, all at once. I turn around, and he’s right there, like the Incredible Hulk. Only bigger. Oh God, he’s so big that his presence is practically a law of physics. He has to be in ten places at once just to cram in his massive pecs.

Because honestly, I’ve never seen pecs like his in all my days. I almost asked my brother about it, once—after we’d had that pool party and Steven had turned up wearing a t-shirt so tight it almost qualified as a secondary layer of skin. But of course, I’d chickened out at the last minute. What sort of person asks her brother about his best friend’s manboobs? Not a normal person, that’s for sure.

And besides...what did I really think he was going to say? Ah, well, he developed those rock hard bosoms with a strict regimen of daily squeezings? That’s just me, hoping for something daft. When really it’s something awesome and sweaty and sexy, like seventeen thousand push-ups using just one hand.

He probably does them half-naked. He probably does them half-naked, while covered in baby oil. And when he’s done, he goes out to a nightclub and laughs at girls like me, for being so fat and awful and useless—because that’s the other problem with being in close proximity to Steven Stark. It’s not just his size, or his fast-talking-always-moving mouth. It’s not just his face, which tends to haunt my dreams a bit.

It’s his ability to make me feel like nothing. Like less than nothing.

He just does it so effortlessly, too. I’m there, busy minding my own business, book in hand. I’m not even paying attention to the conversation going on next to me, in all honesty. I’m still mad at my brother for springing a surprise Steven on me, for reasons I really don’t want Jason to go into.

So, I’m doing my best to keep to myself. I’ve reduced my presence down to almost nothing, in fact. If it weren’t for the half-eaten slice of pizza on my plate and the two-thirds of a bottle of wine that’s now missing, you’d barely know I was there. I’m slightly woozy and nicely relaxed, when Steven blunders in with his size fifty-sevens.

So I picked up this cute little fat chick, he says.

And suddenly every inch of skin on my body is prickling and bristling. My armpits feel like an alarm has gone off inside them, and the already unbearable heat intensifies. If it gets any hotter, my face is going to melt right off the bone beneath—and all because he said that one magical word.

Fat, I think, then, of course, I’m picturing myself beneath it in Steven Stark’s dictionary. I’d definitely qualify as that very thing—it can’t be denied. Anything over a size two would likely make the grade, in his eyes, and I passed that stage around twelve levels ago. You could times his ideal size by seven and still not get where I’m at.

So, of course, this story is going to apply to me. I can feel how much it’s going to apply to me. It might even be aimed in my direction—you know, like one of those helpful passive-aggressive tossers who talks loudly about Weight Watchers around you in the hopes you’ll get the hint.

Though I don’t know I’m right until he gets to this part, "And I mean, she was a big girl. I could hardly get my arms around her waist."

That’s definitely me. Even though he could wrap one of his massive arms around my waist twice and still have room for half a rugby team.

And her ass...man, her ass was the size of a small planet.

He’s practically reading my bio!

But the best part was these thighs she had...these big, billowing thighs.

Oh, God...my thighs billow? I didn’t think they were that bad. They’re actually quite smooth and cellulite-free, in truth. And up until this point, I’d almost dared to wear a swimsuit a couple of times. My legs are quite short, but I definitely didn’t think they were this horrible.

Until right now.

Until Steven Stark and his almighty gob of horrendous awfulness. He just keeps going on and on about this poor girl who’s probably really me, every word punctuated by a snigger as though he’s the most hilarious person in the world. And what’s worse—my brother agrees with this assessment. So does his wife, Kimberley. They’re laughing away at Steven’s nightmarish tale of soul-crushing cruelty while I quietly die inside.

Seriously. I want to die. I don’t know why no one will let me. This wasn’t just the worst idea in the world—it was the worst idea for several solar systems. Aliens are busy wondering what the fuck I was thinking, agreeing to this holiday. Hell, aliens are busy wondering why I haven’t killed my brother for allowing this to happen.

And I can’t find a flaw in their logic.

My brother is currently guffawing, over this—It was like an avalanche of flesh, on top of me. At one point, I was genuinely afraid for my life—one false move, and I could have been crushed.—while something like mild anger brews in my belly. Of course, once I’ve let the mild anger take root, it starts mutating