Title: Stoned
Author: Mandi Beck
Series: Wrecked #1
Publisher: Self-Published
Release Date: July 13, 2016
Genre: Contemporary Romance, Erotic Romance, Rocker
More Info: Goodreads
Purchase: Amazon US
Purchase: Barnes & Noble
Purchase: Amazon UK
Purchase: iTunes
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“A rock star with no rhythm is a man with no soul.” – Stone Lockhart

As the lead singer of one of the hottest bands to hit the rock scene, fucks are free, drugs come easy, and music is life.

For as long as Stone can remember, Willow has been his music – the notes that weave his soul together. His rhythm.

Until he threw her away.

All he has left is a handful of pills and a few lines of powder to make him forget her.And he tries, over and over.

Clean and ready to make things right, he’s faced with the fact that Willow’s moved on. She’s not the same girl he cast aside. Willow’s a woman sure about her purpose in life. Sure about who she’s meant to love.

Stone may be lost without his rhythm, but Willow has found so much more.

Title: Stoned

Series: Wrecked #1

Author: Mandi Beck

Release Date: July 13, 2016

Genre: Erotic Rock Star Romance

Excerpt

Willow isn’t a performer. She’s too honest and pure for that. She plays and sings with her heart. If she’s mad, she sings angry shit. Happy, she smiles throughout the whole damn song making you smile too. But I know the moment I hear the chords of “Over,” this set she’s working on is all me. She can’t see me in the corner here, but she sings for me nonetheless, and I feel every fucking word. Every last note as she pours her heart out. This is a Willow that was always reserved for me. She never wanted to be in the spotlight. We begged her to be in the band and not just help write the music, but she said no, over and over. But when it was just her and I, this was the Birdie I got. We would play for each other for hours, late into the night, sometimes it would lead to us fucking, and other times it was because we had just finished, our bodies sated, but our souls still full of passion and adrenaline. A naked Wills wearing nothing but a guitar is the most beautiful fucking sight in the world and just thinking about it now makes me hard.

“Stone? Babe? Wake up, I can’t sleep.” I can hear her but can’t make my eyes open to see her. The bed shifts and then dips. Willow straddling my lap has my eyes opening slowly, blinking the sleep away. I suck in a breath when I can finally focus. My beautiful Birdie is sitting astride me, completely naked except for her brand new custom Martin. Her fingers lovingly stroking over the fret board. “I wrote you a new song,” she whispers excitedly. Peering up at her, I can see the excitement on her face, the love in her whiskey-colored eyes. As she starts playing I shift. My bottom lip clamped between my teeth I gently tug the sheet lower down my legs inconspicuously. She begins singing and I feel a lightness wash over me. Her words like a balm on my now overly heated skin. Every time she opens her mouth, beauty pours from it, and I have the urge to fill her. Fill her any way that I can so that I can touch that music. Be her music the way she’s mine. Entranced, I watch as Willow falls into her zone, eyes closed, face intense in its peacefulness. As she hits the bridge, her voice raising an octave, I slip inside her. Pussy wet, always so wet when she gets like this, I thrust. Her eyes don’t open, but she softens, all of her relaxing into me. When I begin rocking back and forth, slowly, rhythmically in sync with the chords she plays, she falters for a beat. Gradually her eyes open, landing on mine just long enough for me to see all the love from moments ago turned to lust and a deep, needy want. She’s close. Thank fuck.

Careful to not bump the guitar, I slide my thumb to her clit and play her, same as she plays her Martin. Silently we make music together as her song envelopes us, breathier than before. I join in on the chorus, my raspy voice melding with hers as I fuck her, pushing us both over the edge.

Blissed out and with hands on her thighs, I smile wickedly, “Sing it for me again, Wills.”

I’m brought from my thoughts when Law elbows me. “Where’d you go, bro? You okay?” he whispers just as the song finishes and she takes a moment to sip from her mug. I’d bet money it was tea. She always drank tea to soothe her throat when she was serious about a session or we had a lot to work out in the studio.

“Yeah, man. Just thinking about Wills.” Shrugging sheepishly, I glance over at him before letting my gaze settle back on Willow. “I haven’t had to share her like this in forever, not even with you guys really. Not like this.” My voice is pitched low so that it doesn’t travel. “It’s fucking with my head a little. There’s never been a time that she wasn’t mine and that music wasn’t ours. Ya know?”

My Review

This was my first book from the author, but after this experience I can saw without a shadow of a doubt I’ll be first in line for the next one! Writing better than some seasoned authors I’ve read, the words flowed from the page flawlessly and with apparent ease. I was drawn in with the cover and stuck around for more because of the promise of what was to come. And these characters? Well, it physically hurt me to read their story in the most delicious of ways. This was the second book I’d read this week about drug addiction, and if I was circling the barrel with the other story, this one truly brought me to rock bottom. I loved that we got to experience every step with Stone, from still being in the throes of his addiction, to rehab, and then recovery. It made the story more realistic and not just glossed over. I felt like the author didn’t hold any punches or try to pretty it up. She left it raw and real and it came across with a truth that you don’t often see. She stayed honest to the characters, and I truly believe in the end it paid off. What we were left with was a story that had my stomach in knots and brought me to my knees multiple times. But it was also a story I very much loved and one I won’t soon forget.

The more I read the story, the more I had an inkling as to what Willow was holding back from Stone. And even though I was right, to hear it come from her mouth was just about the most gut wrenching thing I’ve ever read. The emotions that were portrayed in that scene are permanently embedded in my mind like a scar. It was so raw, so guttural, so heart breaking. The whole book was like picking at a festering wound, peeling back the scabs a little at a time, over and over and over. Whether in anger, lust, or love, the words that Stone spoke throughout the story were some of the most beautiful ones I’ve ever read. This was a couple with over ten years of history, ten years of knowing each other inside and out, ten years of being the half to the other’s soul. There simply couldn’t be one without the other, and for them to be apart as long as they were surely made the world tilt and everything seem uneven. Quite a bit of their past was told in flashbacks, but the majority of the book was in the present. I love that they endlessly fought their way back to each other. Well, Birdie fought against Stone, and Stone fought for her. But then he was the one who needed to grovel. He was the one with something to prove. And she was the one with everything to lose, once again.

I loved every little nuance this book held for us. If I could I’d easily read another 300 pages because I just couldn’t get enough of them. They made my heart hurt, they made is soar, and they filled it so full I’m surprised it didn’t burst. My only complaint is for as much as they, mostly Stone, talked about his pierced member and their steamy love making, I’m disappointed we didn’t get to actually get to experience much of that in live time. The story would have been perfect with a few more scenes of that, because the very few we got were some of the hottest ones I’ve ever read. Cannot wait to get my hands on the next installment and couple!

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