Title: Hate You (Not)
Author: Ella James
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Publication date: February 12th, 2020
Goodreads
I didn’t know I was that person. You know—the one who gets the kids. But that’s what the will said. June Lawler: Legal Guardian.
My niece and nephew are 6 and 9, and all they’ve ever known is San Francisco. I arrive the day after the wreck, pack up my sister’s mansion, and fly them back to Georgia.
The small-town farm where their mom and I grew up isn’t what it once was, but it’s home. That’s all they really need.
*
I was courting an investor when it happened. Tromped all up and down the Himalayas, and he didn’t even buy in. It was a week before I found out what I’d lost. My little brother meant the world to me. Now even his kids are gone.
Spirited away to Heat Springs, Georgia—population 298.
They’re living on a farm that’s half a breath from bank foreclosure with a 26-year-old who didn’t finish high school. Nowhereville is not the place for little Mastersons. But I’ll get them back. It’s the money she must want, and I’ve got lots of that.
“June Bug” Lawler is poorer than that red dirt she comes from. I can make her dreams come true—and do one last thing for my brother.
I hate him.
She makes me crazy.
He thinks he can buy me off! I’ve never met a man so arrogant.
There’s no woman anywhere more stubborn.
I wish I had never met him.
But that’s not the story.
Excerpt . . .
Yeah. So he is rich. I knew he was some kind of tech smartie, but I didn’t know just how successful my new archnemesis really is until I did some web browsing this morning. Apparently the villain Mr. Masterson has started and sold two startups already, and is working on a third one, financed mostly by him.
The tall, dark, slightly scruffy male-model knockoff occupying my mossy rock and wrestling with my charges is worth a screaming 120 million dollars.
So he’s ridiculously wealthy, enviably smart, and he’s clearly good with children. I was skeptical, based on his absence at the funeral and his absolute asshole act when he knocked on my door yesterday, but it seems crystal clear now that the kids adore him.
I chew the inside of my cheek—the cheek angled away from him.
He lifts his head, laughing at Margot’s tickles, and his gaze catches mine. He looks radiant. Like he’s waited his whole life for this one shining moment. Like Margot and Oliver are all he needs to live his best life. I lift a brow and try to smile when our eyes lock, but I’m 99 percent sure it comes off scowly.
When we rolled up a few minutes ago and the kids first ran to tackle hug him, he smiled at me as he wrapped them in his muscled arms. It was a gotcha smile, an I-took-over-your-lawn smile. A this-is-what-my-money-can-buy, and-it-can-buy-you-too smile. So yeah.
When he looks at me again a second or two later, still wrestling with the kids, I give him the full scowl he deserves. I can be civil when the kids are looking, but right now they’re climbing on him.
Burke winks at me.
The mothertrucker winks. As if he thinks I think he’s charming or attractive.
I arch a brow. Nope. I don’t.
He grins as he tickles Oliver, and it’s a wicked, evil grin. I know, it says. And I love it that you hate me. I’m a villain, so this is my version of fun.
Fuck villains, I say with my face. But not literally.
He heard my freaking thought. He smirks as if he means to tell me, yeah, I know you want it, and he winks again. That freak!
The tall, dark, slightly scruffy male-model knockoff occupying my mossy rock and wrestling with my charges is worth a screaming 120 million dollars.
So he’s ridiculously wealthy, enviably smart, and he’s clearly good with children. I was skeptical, based on his absence at the funeral and his absolute asshole act when he knocked on my door yesterday, but it seems crystal clear now that the kids adore him.
I chew the inside of my cheek—the cheek angled away from him.
He lifts his head, laughing at Margot’s tickles, and his gaze catches mine. He looks radiant. Like he’s waited his whole life for this one shining moment. Like Margot and Oliver are all he needs to live his best life. I lift a brow and try to smile when our eyes lock, but I’m 99 percent sure it comes off scowly.
When we rolled up a few minutes ago and the kids first ran to tackle hug him, he smiled at me as he wrapped them in his muscled arms. It was a gotcha smile, an I-took-over-your-lawn smile. A this-is-what-my-money-can-buy, and-it-can-buy-you-too smile. So yeah.
When he looks at me again a second or two later, still wrestling with the kids, I give him the full scowl he deserves. I can be civil when the kids are looking, but right now they’re climbing on him.
Burke winks at me.
The mothertrucker winks. As if he thinks I think he’s charming or attractive.
I arch a brow. Nope. I don’t.
He grins as he tickles Oliver, and it’s a wicked, evil grin. I know, it says. And I love it that you hate me. I’m a villain, so this is my version of fun.
Fuck villains, I say with my face. But not literally.
He heard my freaking thought. He smirks as if he means to tell me, yeah, I know you want it, and he winks again. That freak!
About the Author . . .
Ella James is the USA Today bestselling author of sixteen teen and adult love stories. She's an angst-a-holic who loves exploring difficult situations and the emotions of the people caught up in them. Also, smut. But always, always romance.
Ella's obsessions include vanilla cream soda, hiking, other weird, crunchy things like rock collecting, and the antics of her three little monsters.
To find out more about her projects, follow her on Facebook at www.facebook.com/ellajamesbooks, tweet her at author_ellaj or follow her on Instagram (authorellajames).
Interested in the foreign rights for one of Ella’s books? Contact her agent, Rebecca Friedman, at rebecca@rfliterary.com.
Website | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | Goodreads | Newsletter | Bookbub| Amazon
Ella's obsessions include vanilla cream soda, hiking, other weird, crunchy things like rock collecting, and the antics of her three little monsters.
To find out more about her projects, follow her on Facebook at www.facebook.com/ellajamesbooks, tweet her at author_ellaj or follow her on Instagram (authorellajames).
Interested in the foreign rights for one of Ella’s books? Contact her agent, Rebecca Friedman, at rebecca@rfliterary.com.
Website | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | Goodreads | Newsletter | Bookbub| Amazon
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