Adrianne Byrd: Sinful Chocolate

Her long brown hair fell in loose curls across her shoulders while her deep sable eyes twinkled with excitement and two raisin-sized dimples grooved into her apple cheeks. Entranced by her angelic face, it took Charlie longer than normal to take notice of her statuesque curves.

He smacked his lips, but it had nothing to do with the lingering taste of chocolate in his mouth and everything to do with a sudden longing to taste her strawberry-colored lips. Absently, Charlie pulled at his collar and wondered who in the hell had turned up the heat.

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This book, as always, is dedicated to my loyal

Byrdwatchers Group. I couldn’t have asked

for a better group of women to cheer me on.

Best of love,

Adrianne

Dear Reader,

I hope that you enjoy Sinful Chocolate. Charlie and Gisella were fun characters to create. This is the second book in the ALPHA PSI ALPHA series. I hope you checked out the first book, Two Grooms and a Wedding. The fun never stops with these fine brothers.

Charlie Masters was actually the first character to come to me a few years ago, but I couldn’t quite figure out how not to make this story about two people instead of about him and the legions of broken hearts he’d left in his wake. Hopefully I’ve succeeded.

Gisella is definitely my fantasy self. I’d love to create sinfully delicious chocolate treats and drive men wild with an exotic accent. Maybe next lifetime. Meanwhile, I hope you enjoy Sinful Chocolate and then visit my Web site at www.adriannebyrd.com to drop me a line.

Adrianne Byrd

is a national bestselling author who has always preferred to live within the realms of her imagination, where all the men are gorgeous and the women are worth whatever trouble they manage to get into. As an army brat, she traveled throughout Europe and learned to appreciate and value different cultures. Now she calls Georgia home. Looking back, Adrianne believes her passion for writing began at the ripe old age of thirteen. It was also the age that she was introduced to romance novels by a most unlikely source: her fifteen-year-old brother. The book was probably given to her to keep her out of her brother’s hair, but it was a gift that changed her life. In books, Adrianne found a way out of her awkward teenage years and into a world of fictional friends that would stay with her for a lifetime. It wasn’t long before her imagination took flight and she was writing her own love stories. Within a year, she completed her first book, which she vowed would never see the light of day. Writing remained a hobby until 1994, when a co-worker approached her with an article on Romance Writers of America. Who knew there was an organization of women just like her? By 1996 she had sold her first novel, Defenseless, to Kensington Publishing. Her first release received rave reviews from Romantic Times BOOKreviews and fans. Her other novels were consistently selected as the magazine’s top picks. In 2001, Say You Love Me, was nominated for Best Romance at Romance Slam Jam. Her 2003 release Comfort of a Man won the Romantic Times BOOKreviews Best Multicultural Romance Award; Romance in Color’s Readers’ Choice awards for Favorite Book, Favorite Hero and Favorite Heroine; a Shades of Romance award; Slam Jam’s Emma Award for Favorite Traditional Romance; and Romance in Color’s Reviewers’ Choice Award for Author of the Year, Book of the Year and Best BET/Arabesque Book. Lastly, Comfort of a Man was a 2003 Georgia Romance Writers Maggie finalist for best Contemporary. In 2004, Adrianne released her first romantic-suspense novel, If You Dare, with HarperCollins. In 2006, her novel Measure of a Man was nominated for Best Multicultural Romance while her Harper Torch novel Deadly Double was nominated for an Emma Award. In 2007, she won an eHarlequin.com Joey Award.

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Epilogue

“Surprise!”

Charlie Masters clutched a hand over his heart and jumped back from his front door. Before his mind could register what was happening, the large crowd of people crammed into his Buckhead high-rise broke out in song.

“Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday to you!”

At last a smile broke wide across his full lips as he finally crossed the threshold into his apartment where black-and-gold balloons showered down on his head. “You guys shouldn’t have,” he said in the middle of their song.

His smiling and jubilant friends parted like the Red Sea to allow a magnificent four-tier, circular chocolate cake to be rolled out to the center of the living room.

Charlie moved forward, taken aback by the decorative dessert. Each layer showcased multiple ribbons of dark and white chocolate. On top, the ribbons looked more like a gigantic Christmas bow with the number thirty-four sparkling in the center.

Impressed and touched by the gesture, Charlie blushed like a prepubescent teenager until his friends finally ended their song and erupted into a thunderous applause.

“Thank you, guys. Thanks. You’re the best.”

“Are you just going to stare at it all night, or are you going to make a wish and blow out the candles?”

Charlie turned to his right and beamed a smile toward his best friend and fraternity brother Derrick Knight and his wife Isabella. “Hold your horses, man. Can’t a brother just enjoy the moment?”

The guests laughed heartily.

Derrick rolled his eyes, but his smile remained as wide as Charlie’s.

To his left, his other three Kappa Psi Kappa brothers cut in, “C’mon man. Make a wish.”

“Yeah. You’re holding up the music,” Taariq added.

Make a wish. Wouldn’t it be great if he could fix his mounting problems by simply making a wish? Feeling the weight of everyone’s stare, Charlie played the good sport by closing his eyes, leaning forward and finally blowing out the candles.

Another round of thunderous applause ensued and a second later, Rick Ross poured out of his surround-sound speakers, and most of the crowd paired off to get their grooves on. The rest of them crowded around Charlie and pounded his back in congratulations. It felt like most of the guys were trying to break his spine in half.

Before Charlie could ask his Kappa brothers how they’d managed to plan this whole thing without him catching wind of it, Hylan moved up behind him and jammed him into a headlock and razed the top of his head with his knuckles.

“Hey, old man. What did ya wish for?”