Happy VALENTINE’S DAY everyone!

And it’s thirty-nine days to go before the launch of BREATH OF AFRICA!

Please delve further into the cradle of my wonderful publishers, the Crooked Cats. They have created a loving newsletter, and even included a steamy scene from the Highlands of Kenya!

Crooked Cat Valentine’s Newsletter

It was his lunch break, and they were on the hill again. Her deep brown eyes were troubled, but her languorous body made him catch his breath. She seemed different, somehow, so much more attractive, if that were possible. Dark clouds were rolling up the valley behind them.

“Bother – it’s going to rain.”

They watched the purple curtain blot out the view below, and rush up the hill. The pattering of heavy drops on dry leaves clattered closer, deafening their ears. The deluge overwhelmed them. It stung their bare arms and they dived for the sparse cover of the scrub. They were wet through in seconds, and cakes of mud clung to their clothes.

Minutes later, the sun was out, and the earth steamed with wisps of vapour. Teresa’s black hair was slicked in tiny coils against her profile; her flimsy blouse clung to the line of her bra. She wrinkled her nose and sniffed the air.

“I love the smell of rain on the parched earth,” she said. “That earthy, humus scent makes me think of rotting leaves and wriggly brown worms working away in the undergrowth. And then little green shoots will start peeping out.”

But Charles was gazing at her, conscious of a tightening in his trousers. He moved away, and tried to discuss his going, but she changed the subject.

“I don’t want to think about it,” she said. “Can’t we just enjoy each other while we can?”