About Win and Lose
by TC Blue
64 pages
/ 25000 words
ISBN: 978-1-60370-376-5, 1-60370-376-4
Available file types - html. lit, pdf, prc
When Luzien Bascombe finds himself lost in the middle of more snow than he’s ever seen in his life, he starts to expect things he’d rather not. Like death. What he doesn’t expect is to find someone like Win out there in the middle of nowhere, and he really doesn’t expect to find himself falling for Win so quickly.
Winston St. James doesn’t know what to make of the young man he finds on his doorstep; not even when Luz makes it clear that he wouldn’t mind a bit of fun in Win’s bed. He does know that Luz has a life to get back to, though, which becomes harder and harder to accept. The world is never perfect, so when Luz has to go, he tries to make the best of things. Will Luz and Win get past their old hurts and take a chance on each other, Win or Lose?
Review
Kalita Kasar, author of The Keeper, writes:
If I had to come up with two words to describe Win and Lose, they would be: 'Molten honey.' This story is incredibly hot, and beautifully sweet at the same time and I found myself alternately smiling and fanning myself.
It's the story of band member Luz (Luzien) who gets lost, and almost frozen to death in a storm and is rescued when he finds his way to and knocks at the door of Win (Winston's) tattoo shop.
The chemistry between Win and Luz is immediate and undeniable as they find themselves thrown together in what could be a life or death situation for Luz.
Win's main priority is to get Luz warm, which he does by getting the guy out of his sodden, icy clothes and into a hot and steamy shower.
I found the quickness with which their relationship developed into a sexual one believable, given the circumstances, but it wasn't long before the guys started to think that maybe there was something more between them than just a quick flash of lust and I was right there with them, willing them to move in that direction.
T.C Blue spins a fast paced, warm and humorous story that pulls the reader right into the world of the characters.
Little snippets of humor helped to move the pace along and kept me smiling, and in some cases chuckling aloud and all in a good way. The following is one example of these:
“Dryer takes forty-five minutes, baby. That might be long enough. So don’t move. I’ll, uh… fuck, Luz, I’ll be right back, okay?” Lord, he might just pull something important if he moved as fast as he wanted to, and that would be bad.
Then Luz was giving him another heated grin and a muttered “Yeah. I’ll be right here, Win,” and fuck it. He would run.
I loved this story. It was a quick and satisfying read that left me hungry for more from this very talented author.
Highly recommended.
Sample
“God damned mother fucking snow,” Luzien grumbled, kicking at yet another crusted lump of gray ice on the shoulder of the road.
His steps were slower than he would have liked, and more careful, but they had to be, he consoled himself. He couldn’t take a chance on slipping and breaking a leg, or even worse, an arm.
Hell, the record company was going to be pissed enough that he’d left the relative safety of the so-called tour bus, but he’d been damned bored. They should be able to understand that. Luz had never dealt well with boredom; they shouldn’t be surprised to hear that hadn’t changed in the six months he’d been on the road.
It wouldn’t have been so bad if he’d been traveling with the rest of the band, but he wasn’t. Hadn’t since nearly three months earlier, which was when his long-term and supposedly serious relationship with Thom had ended in a sharp, hard burst of fury.
It still made him growl when he thought about that night. He thought it probably always would.
Of course the rest of the band had come down on Thom’s side. Thom was the one who got them all the free drugs… the one who set them up with more groupies than they could handle.
Luz was the one who actually wanted them to practice. To work. To not embarrass themselves and him when they played. And so what if they were only doing the small club circuit right now? A few good tours of the smaller venues would lead to more exposure, then higher sales… and if they were lucky, one day soon they’d maybe be opening for one of the big headliners.
Of course, that wasn’t going to happen now. Hell, Luz would be surprised if they managed to finish this tour as a band, rather than five guys who just happened to play music together, which he kind of thought they might already be, anyway.
He had no idea where the other bus had ended up. It had been in front of his when they’d driven into that fucking storm that had put him off the road with a swiftly dying battery. When the thankfully brief buckets of snow stopped, the other bus hadn’t been in sight. Two hours later, it still hadn’t come back, and Marco hadn’t been able to raise them on the radio. Then the guy had decided to head out on foot, which only led to more boredom for Luz.
He’d stuck it out on the dark, partially remodeled old school bus for another hour before he’d decided that even stomping along the winding road they shouldn’t have been on in the first place was better than just sitting there waiting to die from lack of stimulation.
Okay, it was cold. Bitterly cold, even with the heavy parka he’d thrown on over his leather. The wind slammed into him at random intervals, driving small bits of icy snow against his cheeks.
Long, pale hands slipped from the pockets of the parka to cover his ears, blocking the frigid air from the silver rings in his lobes that felt like tiny icicles piercing his flesh.
“God damned mother fucking snow,” he groused again. “And what the fuck kind of place is this that there isn’t a damned thing anywhere but rocks, trees, ice and more fucking snow! I swear, I’m never doing a winter tour up here again!”
His hands shoved deep into his pockets again once he started to lose feeling in the tips of his fingers. He almost wanted to just turn around, but when he looked back, he couldn’t see the bus anywhere, which was strange because he didn’t think he’d walked that far.
Then the wind started up again and this time there were big, puffy flakes mixed in. It was actually pretty. Like some old movie or something, Luz thought. Or one of those paintings he was supposed to be too cutting-edge to like.
It took a few minutes of still more walking for him to realize that it wasn’t just the wind blowing old snow around. The drifting, shifting, floating flakes were new… and he really couldn’t see more than a foot in front of him now, so going back to the bus? Really not an option.
Fuck, if this shit didn’t let up soon, he’d need to find some sort of shelter. It was either that or they’d find him in the spring as a frozen Luz-cicle. That would be one hell of an end to a semi-promising career.
He ducked his head, glad he’d resisted the haircut the label had wanted him to have before the tour. Just because some of the bigger names in music were going short and scruffy, that didn’t mean everyone should. It was all about being original, supposedly. So why did they want him to follow the crowd so much?
Of course, right then Luz was wishing there were a crowd to follow. At least then he wouldn’t be so worried about getting lost in the damned blizzard he was walking in.