Love on the High Seas. Yasmin Sullivan Y.
Voyage into love
Unlucky at love, Professor Angelina Lewis is resigned that she is more of an intellectual than a romantic. She is in the habit of satisfying the yearnings in her heart with academic pursuits. This all changes when her sister talks her into taking her place on a singles’ cruise. On the high seas, red-hot desire ignites when she meets Jeremy Bell. Frolicking in the Caribbean with the sensual doctor is making Angelina believe in the power of passion. But what happens once they sail into port? Will her shipboard romance get hit with a reality check?
Jeremy doesn’t want the passionate music he and Angelina make to ever stop. From the exotic island of Puerto Rico to the sun-kissed beaches of Miami, he’s pursuing the woman of his dreams. But Jeremy will lose Angelina unless he can prove to her that they share something special—a rare love they’ll never find again on land or sea….
Angelina woke up wrapped in Jeremy’s arms, weak from the pleasures of the previous night. She looked at her watch and closed her eyes again. They only had two more full days together—today and tomorrow. What would happen then?
She tried to move from within his arms without disturbing him, but as she shifted away from him, he shifted closer, holding her tighter. She tried again, and the same thing happened. On the third try, low grumbling laughter came from deep in his chest.
“Are you trying to get away?” he asked.
“Yes, I am. And you’re wide-awake.”
“It’s early, and I like holding you.”
“Well I have a day planned.”
He opened his eyes, “Are you going ashore?”
“We could later, but I have a spa appointment this morning.”
“I see. And you were trying to sneak away.”
He chuckled, grabbing her firmly by the hips and pulling her against the length of his body.
YASMIN SULLIVAN
grew up in upstate New York and St. Thomas, Virgin Islands, from which her family hails. She moved to Washington, D.C., to attend college and has earned degrees from Howard University and Yale University. As an academic writer, she has published works on by Frederick Douglass, Harriet Jacobs, James Baldwin, Maya Angelou and Ed Bullins, as well as the writing of the Negritude Movement and historical fiction treating emancipation in the Danish West Indies/United States Virgin Islands. She currently lives in Washington, D.C., where she teaches with a focus on African-American and Caribbean literatures. When she isn’t teaching, she does creative writing and works on mosaics.
Love
On the
High Seas
Yasmin
Sullivan
Dear Reader,
A poet once said that there’s nothing better than having someone with whom to dream. Our dreams then seem more possible, more viable, more workable, more real. Sharing a good romance novel does the same thing. It allows us to dream together, making us kindred spirits, so that love becomes more possible, more viable, more real in our own lives.
I hope that this novel connects us across such a dream. It is the story of Angelina Lewis and Jeremy Bell, whose story is about learning to embrace the possibility of love and accepting the thrill of the sensual side that lives in each of us.
I am already at work on my next romance project, and I would love to hear your thoughts on this book. Please write me at [email protected].
Warm wishes,
Yasmin
For my mother, father, brother and grandmother,
who have given me the richness of the human heart;
for Jennie and Tanya, who have been my sister-friends;
for Madeline, Freddie and William, who have shaped my vision of love;
and for Vionette and Lois, who have inspired the romantic in me.
Contents
Chapter 1
Angelina Lewis fidgeted on the gangway, stuck in line with the horde of other passengers boarding the Palace of the Seas, one of the largest cruise ships on the Atlantic. It was an hour before departure, when the throng had arrived, but the line was moving along quickly.
She might even have found a way to enjoy the short wait if she wasn’t sure that at least one more person would measure her against the passport she carried. Instead, the suspense of potential exposure was unnerving her. She couldn’t believe that she’d let her sister talk her into this.
Safire had shown up with a suitcase, a ticket and her usual chipper mood, and before Angelina knew what was what, they were in her room packing.
Safire’s calm, elliptical eyes followed Angelina as she flew back and forth across the room. Her sister still wore her usual blazer and matching miniskirt—her work attire. She tugged down the skirt as she adjusted herself on the bed, letting her long curls fall across the pillow. Safire’s plump cheeks puckered from her smile—one caused by mere amusement or by some thought that was more salacious. Angelina couldn’t tell.
“I