Today I’d like to introduce you to India Jackson.
She’s a newly (finally!) divorced office drone who dreams of being a fashion designer…dreams she gave up when she married Nolan Roberts, but she’s chasing them now. And though she’s not looking for love, it comes in the form of rising soccer star Matt Bettony.
There’s just one problem: he’s 17 years her junior, an issue that throws up road blocks from the very beginning…
“Oh, okay. Thank you. So, um, Matt, how old are you?” She fiddled with the ties to the shorts.
He came around the end of the bed. “I’m twenty-six. I’ll be twenty-seven in September. Why?”
“Why?” Again, she sounded on the brink of hysteria. “Because I just turned forty in January, and I kissed you, and if you give me the chance, I’ll kiss you again, when I shouldn’t be kissing you at all.” I need to get out of here. What have I done? She brushed past him on her way to who knew where.
“Whoa. Wait.” He caught her arm. “Why can’t you kiss me? You’re divorced, right? Because I don’t condone cheating.”
“Yes, I’m divorced, but did you miss the part where I said I was forty?
“You’re forty. So what?”
“I’m…” She tried to do mental math, but her brain wouldn’t cooperate. “I could be your mother.”
“Really?” He sounded amused. “You’d have been thirteen.”
“Well, I could have been your mother. Regardless, I’m old enough to be an aunt or big sister.”
“So? I don’t care how old you are.”
“But—” He doesn’t care. She crossed her arms. “You really don’t care how old I am?”
He sighed, looked away, then looked back. “I’ll be totally honest, you are older than I thought because you don’t look a day over thirty-five, but really, what difference does it make? I want you.”
“You want me?” She couldn’t keep the disbelief out of her voice. No one had ever been so blunt with her in her entire life.
“I do.” A small smile turned his lips upward. “I thought about accidentally-on purpose forgetting to turn the dryer on so you’d have to stay longer, and that would give enough time to figure out some way to talk you into my bed.”
He wants me. And I’m an adult. He’s an adult.
But Penalty Kicks is about more than her romance with Matt. It’s about India finding her footing post divorce and stepping into the career of a lifetime with help from pop-star Maida who commissions a gown from India.
Of course, this is this is just the beginning. Matt and India’s story continues in the second half of the series Game of Two Halves (Get it?) with Own Goals, coming this September from Changeling books.
You can buy Penalty Kicks here from Changeling Press and pre-order from Amazon, Kobo, Apple Books, and Barnes and Noble for release on August 6.
D. S. Dehel 