I love to write books that surround a group of friends or extended family. It makes me happy and IMO, you can understand a lot about a person through their friends.

So how about a scene between Gillian and Jules from TART?

USA Today bestselling author Lauren Dane serves up a sweet, sensual, and hot-to-the-touch novel in which one woman’s most intimate desires are stirred by two very special ingredients

Juliet Lamprey is having the time of her life running her successful bakery, TART, when Gideon Carter comes back into her life. Returning home to help his grandfather run the family on the farm, Gideon is back for good. When they meet again, the spark between them is immediate, and it isn’t long before the former childhood friends play catch up in bed.

That’s not good news for local lawyer Cal Whaley. Though the sexually open but strictly monogamous Cal has loved Jules for a long time, he’s hardly ever taken it further than friendship. When he sees her start to fall for Gideon, he knows he has to make his move or risk losing her forever.

Who would have anticipated that all three of them would connect on such an intimate level? The trio’s scalding liaisons take them places they’ve never dreamed. But such an intensely passionate and unusual relationship comes with equally as complicated emotions, and when Jules must suddenly leave town, she wonders if she’ll have a choice to make when she returns

Delicious: TART by LAUREN DANE
Copyright 2012, Lauren Dane
All Rights Reserved, The Berkley Publishing Group

Once she got home and settled in, Jules grabbed the phone and dialed Gillian’s number.

“Hello there, Juliet, how may I assist you?” Jules’s godson and Gillian’s fourteen-year-old son Miles answered, making her laugh.

“Hey, kiddo. How’s it goin’?”

“Pretty cool. Oh! Dad said I could play with his band at the wedding. How cool is that?”

Jules smiled at the idea. She knew how much Miles loved music, and that his father, a notable musician, had given him such a big thumbs-up was lovely. She liked Adrian Brown even more at that point.

“That’s totally cool. I can’t wait to hear you.” Though Jules bet Gillian had told Miles that if any more Ds came home he wouldn’t be doing any such thing.

“Thanks. He also said he’d be cool if our band played. It’d be cool if Dad came up to play a song or two with us. Mum said he would and that I should ask him. But he’s all—well, you know, he’s Adrian Brown.”

She heard Gillian’s voice in the background. “Sure he is. And you’re his son and he loves your music. Silly. I’d wager the wedding will be filled with musician types so I bet you could do one of those cool jams they have at the end of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame events. That would be epic.”

He gasped, which only made Jules smile bigger. “Dude. That would be . . . oh my god. Hey, Mum, Jules is on the phone. I have to think about this more. Jules, you’re brilliant.”

And with that he was gone.

Gillian’s voice still held a laugh when she took over. “Are you bringing me cake tonight?”

Gillian was damned good at that stuff. Must be the mother thing. “How did you know?” She’d spent some time early that afternoon putting together cake samples for Gillian and Adrian. They’d asked her to make the cake for their upcoming July wedding. Jules had been touched beyond measure that they’d trust her with something so important and she’d insisted to Gillian and Adrian both that it was far over her head and she’d never made a big wedding cake before.

Gillian had waved it away, told her no one was better suited to make the cake for their big day and to suck it up and do it.

So Jules did. She’d spent the time since they’d asked working on different recipes. Perfecting until she’d decided on several she felt fit them both well and tasted really awesome. Gillian was her best friend and if she did say so herself, her cake repertoire had really come a long way.

“I didn’t know! That was all hope and bluster. But yay, cake! Come over now. Adrian is on his way back from Seattle and he says he’s bringing takeout. I’ll call him to say you’re coming for dinner. He’ll hurry if he knows cake is involved.”

“You only want me for my cake, Gillian. This makes me sad.”

“It’s really good cake. Come over.”

“All right, I’ll be there in a few minutes. Need anything else?”

“Just your pretty face. And the cake.”

Gillian’s house, well, the one she lived in temporarily until the renovations were finished on the new house anyway, was a place Jules always gravitated to. The front windows were ablaze with light and as she moved up the walk she caught sight of Miles, a cat in his arms, walking through the room.

Gillian would close the curtains soon, Jules knew. Now that it was common knowledge that Adrian Brown was Miles’s father and that he and Gillian were getting married, photographers made their way out to Bainbridge Island from time to time to try to grab pictures. One had even set himself up in a tree across the road. Of course he fell from his perch and broke his ankle in the fall.

Gillian was a far nicer person than Jules because she called an ambulance. Jules would have turned the hose on him and made him crawl his worthless butt away.

Still smiling and feeling a little vicious, she knocked on the door. The year before she’d have sailed right in. But those days were long past, also the product of the higher profile she had now that Gillian was going to marry someone famous. The doors were always locked up tight now.

Gillian opened and pulled her into a hug. “Come in. Adrian just got home.”

Jules put her bags down in the kitchen, out of the way of traffic and above normal cat inspection.

Still, Claypool came out and meowed at her in his scratchy old-guy voice so she knelt and gave him a scritch under the chin where he liked it best. “Hey, old man, looking good today.”

The cat purred at her, turned, rubbed his side along her knees and sauntered away.

“Story of my life. Get some lovin’ and you all leave afterward.” Jules stood and washed her hands.

Adrian Brown, ridiculously gorgeous and equally ridiculously in love with Gillian, strolled into the kitchen, pausing to plant a kiss on Jules’s cheek. “I got extra pad thai for you.”

“You come in handy. Thanks.”

“Do we have to wait until after dinner to eat the cake?” Miles poured juice into the glasses before he sat.

“Yes.” Gillian sent her son a look and he blushed.

Jules winked at him. “I brought extra just for you.”

He grinned, looking very much like his father.

They talked about the renovations. Adrian’s recording studio was finished, which was a lucky thing as he’d started working on his next record with some hot-stuff producer. The rest of the house was continuing apace and should be done by the beginning of June.

The food was good, the company even better. She was so glad Gillian and Adrian were settling out on Bainbridge instead of in Seattle. Jules never would have said it out loud, but it would have been really hard to not see Gillian as often as she did. And Miles, who she loved as fiercely as she did his mother.

Jules hated the ferry. Hated all boats for that matter, big or small. Which was sort of a problem when you lived on an island and all. Thankfully the trip was just over half an hour and there was a bridge too if she had to go that way. Bainbridge had just about everything and everyone she needed anyway.

Finally, after they’d finished dinner, Adrian and Miles cleared away the dishes and brought new ones out along with some freshly brewed tea.

“All right.” Jules placed five boxes on the table.

“Wow! That’s all cake? Score.” Miles sent a look to his dad, who also grinned.

“I told you I brought extra for you.”

“Which is your favorite?” Gillian sipped her tea as Jules placed the slices out on little plates on the table so everyone could see and take a taste.

“I’m not telling. Given what I know about you and what you like and the things Adrian told me, I’ve come up with several different ideas. But I don’t want to influence you in any way.”

Be Sure to Visit Today’s Other Snippeters!

Rhian Cahill
Jody Wallace
Leah Braemel
Mari Carr
Shiloh Walker
McKenna Jeffries
Taige Crenshaw
Shelli Stevens
HelenKay Dimon
Lauren Dane
TJ Michaels