Hi guys, we have Allison Cassatta stopping by today with her upcoming re-release Three Little Words, we have a brilliant guest post from Allison, a great excerpt and a fantastic giveaway so check out the post and enjoy! <3 ~Pixie~

Three Little Words

Allison Cassatta

Is it better to keep some secrets locked away?

Matt thought his life was perfect, but he learns there’s no such thing when the man he planned to marry breaks his heart and leaves him holding the pieces. Needing to escape and lick his wounds, Matt heads to New England to spend time on his brother’s lobster boat. A one-night-stand proves to him that empty sex does nothing to mend old hurt, and neither does running away.

So when Matt’s best friend, Luke, a firefighter, is seriously injured, Matt steps up, even if it means facing bigotry and ignorance. Luke has been hiding his feelings from Matt all their lives, and revealing them after so many years won’t make life easier for either of them. But nothing worth having ever comes easily….

Love, Lust, and Heartbreak

Allison Cassatta

Most of you probably don’t know this, but Three Little Words is actually a re-release. Yes, it’s true. Version one-point-oh came out a long time ago with the now defunct Amber Quill Press. The history lesson is a segue into the reason behind this article. A few people who read the original release didn’t understand the one night stand with Aric. Some even asked how a man who was so in love and so heartbroken could possibly have sex with a complete stranger, and I wanted to address that here.

The heart and mind are both tricky creatures. One always knows what best for us. The other doesn’t really care what’s best. It wants what it wants. The roles can easily reverse given the time of day, the speed of wind flow, or the brightness outside. At least they can for some of us. More evenly tempered human beings might not understand this phenomenon.

So in this story, Matt–a construction worker from Memphis, Tennessee–has been away helping victims of Hurricane Katrina repair their homes. He specializes in storm damage and travels quite a bit. The man who supposedly loves him can’t handle his being away so much and bails on their relationship, leaving nothing but a Dear John letter and Matt’s broken heart. Without giving too much away, Matt gets the hell out of Memphis and away from the mess that is his life. Along the way, a beautiful man crosses Matt’s path and though there was no love at first sight moment, there’s interest on at least one side. Things may or may not have led to sex…

Have you ever listened to someone who was truly, truly broken hearted talk about their lost loves, or even better, avoid talking about their lost loves? Have you ever watched someone go into destruct mode after their lives get turned upside down completely? Essentially, that’s what Matt did. He didn’t want to fall in love. He had two men he loved–one platonically, then Brandon who totally destroyed his heart. He didn’t need love. He needed something to make him forget about that incredibly devastating emotion and he needed it right then. Some might have turned to booze or drugs or binge eating. Matt turned to dick. It happens. When love becomes too painful, lust can be a pretty decent substitute.

Some reviewers didn’t understand/didn’t like Matt sleeping with someone he didn’t love, but hey… that’s real life for some people. This story was about self-destructing and rebuilding. It was about crashing and burning, then picking yourself up again. Every character in the book had to go through something, probably something every reader can relate to. I think it’s totally plausible for someone to throw up their middle finger to love after being heartbroken and go out screw the first interesting person they see. Society as whole would probably frown on it, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen. Matt chose sex as his coping mechanism. The point of writing this is I ask you to go into this story with an open-mind about Matt and his interaction with Aric.

“Some people aren’t meant to be in our lives forever. Some people are just passing through to teach us a lesson.” – Unknown

I chose this passage from the book because it’s one small–and extremely trivial–example of the lessons people teach each other…

Excerpt

He grabbed his pants from where they’d been piled in the floor, and his phone started ringing again. Whoever it was could wait until he’d had his coffee. He wasn’t exactly in any sort of mood to pleasantly speak with anyone, but the phone didn’t stop and wouldn’t stop until he either answered it or turned it off.

The moment he lifted the stupid noisemaker from his pants pocket, he saw his brother’s name on the screen. “Shit.” His brother was probably freaking out right now. Matt never said anything about staying away all night, and he’d borrowed Mark’s truck for this little adventure.

“Hello?” he said into the phone, voice still gravelly from just waking up.

“Where the hell are you? I’ve been calling you all damn morning!” Mark growled.

“Calm down. Calm down. I had a little too much wine last night and decided to crash at Aric’s house.”

“Jesus Christ, Matt! I’ve been freaking out for hours.” He heard his brother sigh.

Matt cradled the phone between his ear and shoulder, hopping around on one foot as he struggled to get the wrinkled khakis he’d worn last night up his leg. “I’m fine, bro. I just didn’t want to risk driving home.”

“I wish you would’ve called me.”

“Yeah, I would’ve, but I passed out on the floor.”

“Sounds like you had more than a little wine.”

Yeah, sure did, didn’t it? He wasn’t about to tell his older brother he’d passed out from exhaustion after a night of mind-blowing sex with a perfect stranger. Wouldn’t that just make the situation a whole lot better?

“So,” Mark said, “you heading home soon?”

“Soon. Yeah. Aric made breakfast. I probably need to hang around and eat since he went through the trouble.”

“Damn, you already got the dude making you breakfast. Must’ve rocked his world,” Mark teased. Matt slapped his palm against his forehead. He so wasn’t going to have that conversation with his big brother. “I’m messing with you, man. Just get home when you can. It doesn’t look like the storm is going to be as bad as they thought, and I want to get the season started. I could use the money, you know?”

“Yeah, I know. I’ll be home soon, I swear.”

“Cool.”

“Later.”

“Later.”

Matt hung up the phone and set it down on the end table so he could fasten his pants, and when he swung around, Aric was standing behind him with a cup of coffee in one hand and a plate full of food in the other.

“Everything okay?” Aric asked.

“Yeah. It was my brother. He was concerned when he woke up and found I hadn’t been home. He worries about me.”

“Understandable.” Aric handed over the cup of coffee and the plate of food he’d made. He said, “We can eat by the fire or at the kitchen table. I wasn’t sure which you preferred.”

“The table’s good for me.”

Aric nodded, then turned and headed for the kitchen. Matt followed. He took a seat at the table, and Aric joined him, handing over a fork as he sat down beside Matt.

They quietly ate their food—a warm helping of fluffy golden eggs and a few slivers of bacon, some fresh bread, and a tall a cup of some of the best coffee Matt had ever tasted. Matt polished off everything but the bacon. Pork was another no-no in their house. Brandon traded the pig he’d once loved so much for turkey, and it just wasn’t the same.

“You don’t eat bacon?” Aric asked.

“No. My ex took it out of my diet. Haven’t had any in close to five years.”

“God, I couldn’t imagine. I love bacon. It’s one of the best things about breakfast.”

“Oh, I love it too, but—”

“So why don’t you have some. It’s not like he can tell you no anymore, right?”

“True.” Matt shrugged, eyeing the brownish-red slivers of fried meat.

He could feel his mouth starting to water. Aric had a point. Brandon was no longer around to tell him no and to ostracize him for the choices he made in regards to the quality of food he ingested. He picked up one of the crispy slivers and stared at it for a moment, remembering how his mother had raised him and his brother on the greasy goodness, and they’d both turned out okay. Matt stuck the piece of meat in his mouth, and the moment it hit his tongue, he moaned.

He chewed and swallowed, took another bite, chewed and swallowed again. Aric watched him with a grin curling his delicious lips. “I can’t believe I let Brandon take this away from me,” he said after devouring one whole sliver. He went after the next piece with a new ferociousness.

“You look like you’ve only discovered bacon for the first time.” Aric laughed.

“If you knew the orgasm my taste buds are having, you would understand.”

Aric only laughed harder. “The look on your face is precious. It’s like a small child tasting chocolate for the first time.”

About Allison

It all started with a dream that made her heart wrench and a set of mesmerizing eyes that begged to be seen, and Allison Cassatta the writer was born. A techie by trade, the day-dreamer in her wanted to sail away from the mundane, while the hopeless romantic in her searched for the perfect love story. Many poems and short stories were written before her first attempt at a novel and once that piece of her soul spilled onto paper, there was no stopping it.

She has an eye for the visually stunning and a mind that screams to bring that beauty to life. She gives her readers something they can feel in the depth of their heart, creates worlds they can touch and characters that become your best friend or worst enemy.

Born and raised in Memphis, Tennessee, big-city life was a rat-race that kept her busy in her career. It took moving with her new husband to a sleepy Mississippi town to make her realize that dreams can come true, and did they ever. She found herself a published author. She found her perfect romance.

Website | Facebook | Twitter | Pinterest | Google+ | Tumblr | Blog

Giveaway!

Win a previously released DSP title!

Allison Cassatta Rafflecopter giveaway!