The Happy Onion in print

My novel The Happy Onion is scheduled for release in PRINT this coming week from Samhain Publishing. Yay! Read on for the blurb and an excerpt :)

© Copyright 2009 Ally Blue

Liberal vegan meets corporate carnivore. What could possibly go wrong?

Thomas Stone has one sacred rule: Don’t Date The Boss. Ever. So when he finds out his new employer is the man he took to bed his first night in town, he’s less than happy. He doesn’t need any more complications in his life, and the way Phil makes him feel definitely qualifies as a complication. Especially since he can’t seem to keep his hands off the man.

Philip Sorrells is thrilled to discover that the new bartender his manager hired for his restaurant, The Happy Onion, is the aggressive little blond he slept with once and can’t forget. Thom is Phil’s wet dream come true, from his angelic face to his fiery temper. For the first time, Phil hears the siren song of monogamy, and he’s tempted to follow it.

When Thom leaves The Happy Onion for a job managing an upscale nightclub, it looks like a chance for him and Phil to be together without the whole boss/employee thing hanging over them. Instead, Thom’s new position brings out previously unsuspected differences in their world views. Differences with the power to destroy their fragile bond.

So how will this nature-loving tree-hugger and corporate-ladder climber navigate this political minefield in the name of love? Very carefully.

(Warning, this book contains bad language, good music, vegan personal care products and lots of hot, dirty mansex.)

As usual on a Friday night, Belial’s Basement was packed and busting at the seams with sexual energy. Philip Sorrells swiveled his stool around and leaned his back against the bar, sipping his second whiskey and watching the parade of horny men strutting past. Or maybe he should say struggling past, since the crowd was so tight any movement at all was an achievement.

Most of the faces were depressingly familiar. Belial’s was a fun, lively place, but there wasn’t much variety here. The regulars and staff all knew each other, in a Biblical way as often as not. For those nights when he wanted someone who already knew his tastes and who he could still be casual friends with later, it was great. Tonight, however, he had a craving for new blood. Or to be more exact, new cock.

“Well, helloooo there, handsome!”

Phil winced at the sound of the familiar singsong from his right. Of all the guys in his personal “wish I hadn’t” file, this was the one Phil always dreaded seeing the most. My own fault. If I’d been paying attention, he wouldn’t have sneaked up on me like that.

“Hi, Brad,” he said, forcing a smile. “How are you?”

“Much better now.” Brad leered, his eyes glowing with lust. Or maybe that was just the weirdly bright green contacts he wore. “So. Phil-licious. Wanna come back to my place and play Hide the Sausage?”

Phil clamped his mouth shut to prevent spewing out the mouthful of whiskey he’d just taken and ended up coughing most of it onto the floor anyway. “Good grief,” he wheezed when he could breathe again. “What are you, twelve?”

Brad tossed a lock of neon pink hair out of his eyes and grinned. “Why, you want me to be twelve?”

Phil set his whiskey glass on the bar before Brad could choke him to death with any other appalling comments. “Go away, Brad.”

Brad crossed his arms and pouted, lower lip sticking out. On a thirty-one-year-old, the effect was a little disturbing. “Well. Who pissed in your coffee this morning?”

Sighing, Phil rubbed his temple with two fingers. After a long day of laying tiles in his new bathroom, all he wanted was to get fucked good and hard by someone other than Brad, then sleep for about ten hours.

He opened his mouth to tell Brad in terms even he could understand to Go The Fuck Away, when across the room the door opened and in walked a vision. Forgetting all about Brad, Phil stood with his mouth hanging open and stared.

All he could see at first was a face, but what a face it was. Heart-shaped, milky pale, with a sweet rosebud mouth and gigantic eyes the color of a tropical lagoon. Gleaming platinum hair fell in straight shoulder-length layers to frame those angelic features.

As the man slipped catlike through the crowd to the bar, Phil caught glimpses of a slim, compact body clad head to toe in black leather. The open vest revealed well-toned arms and chest and a hard, flat belly. A line of fine golden hair bisected the man’s abdomen and disappeared into the snug pants hanging low on his slim hips.

Phil gulped. The urge to run over, fall to his knees and follow that treasure trail with his tongue was hard to resist.

“God, they don’t even bother to card people anymore, looks like.” Brad dug an elbow into Phil’s ribs. “You really are into the young stuff, aren’t you? Close your mouth, before you start catching flies.”

Phil’s eloquent and detailed reply, in which he listed all the reasons the beauty who’d just walked in had to be legal, got lost somewhere between his brain and his mouth. Not wanting to waste any more time on a guy he wasn’t ever going to bed with again in this lifetime, Phil pushed Brad aside and stalked toward the pretty little thing he’d decided he had to get between the sheets as soon as possible. Brad’s declaration that Phil was a sanctimonious bitch barely registered, except to make Phil wonder where a party slut like Brad had learned such a big word.

“Baileys on the rocks,” Blondie shouted to the bartender over the thumping music just as Phil sidled up to him.

“It’s on me,” Phil declared, counting out the right number of bills and laying them on the bar. “And give me a Maker’s Mark,” he added when he realized he’d left his whiskey on the other end of the bar.

Turning sideways, Blondie tilted that adorable face upward and gave Phil a heart-thumping smile. “Thanks.”

“My pleasure.” Phil smiled back, mentally working out the logistics of getting Blondie’s cock up his ass. The man was at least eight inches shorter than Phil’s six-foot-one-and-three-quarters, but Phil was determined. He had a thing for men who looked delicate and pretty yet were willing and able to fuck him through the mattress.

God, please let him be a top.

Blondie’s smile widened. “What’s your name?”

“I’m…uh, Drake.” It wasn’t a complete lie. Just because he only used his middle name for one-night stands didn’t mean it wasn’t on his birth certificate.

“I’m James. Nice to meet you.” Instead of offering a hand to shake, Blondie—James, rather—raked a sharp, appraising look up and down Phil’s body. “You think we’re gonna fuck, just because you bought me a drink?”

Like the answer to that question wasn’t glaringly obvious in the way “James”—not his real name, Phil would’ve bet, but who was he to complain?—eyed the crotch of Phil’s body-hugging jeans. Phil grinned. “Yep.”

James laughed, the sound full-throated and surprisingly childlike. “You’re right, as it happens.”

“Cool.” Leaning an elbow on the bar, Phil picked up his glass of Maker’s Mark and took a sip. “We should probably talk first.”

James’s pale eyebrows went up. “Yeah? Okay.” He lifted his own glass and took a long swallow, licking the creamy liquid off those gorgeous lips in a marvelously suggestive way. “I’m clean, I always use condoms until I know my partner’s clean too, and before you ask, yes, I really am legal. I’m twenty-six. I prefer to top, but I’ve learned to enjoy getting my ass pounded once in a while. When you look like this, it’s either that or go without a lot of times. What about you? Top, or bottom? And if you want to go bareback tonight, better find someone else.”

Phil gulped half his glass down in an effort to be cool. Crowing in triumph usually didn’t endear him to strangers.

“I can do either, but I’m mostly a bottom.” Setting his drink down again, Phil moved closer to James, catching a whiff of leather, shampoo and musky cologne. “That wasn’t really what I meant about talking, though.”

James gave him an inscrutable look. Draining his glass, he put it down and slipped a knee between Phil’s thighs. Phil could feel the man’s heat even through the leather. He clutched at the bar, fighting a dizzying wave of lust.

“So. Drake.” James stretched an arm up and around Phil’s neck, fingering the thick golden brown braid hanging down his back. “What’s your favorite color?”

“Blue,” Phil answered, staring down into James’s brilliant blue eyes. “Yours?”

“Black.” Leaning closer, James pinched Phil’s nipple through his threadbare Powerpuff Girls T-shirt. “My favorite movie’s Die Hard, what’s yours?”

Phil licked his lips. “Uh. The Terminator.” His growing lust guided his hands up under James’s leather vest. He pushed it aside and rubbed his thumbs across the little pink nipples, which hardened at his touch. “What’s your favorite TV show?”

“Mythbusters.” Rising on tiptoe, James ran the tip of his tongue up the underside of Phil’s chin, stirring the hairs of his close-cropped beard. “You?”

“Check the T-shirt.” Phil groaned as James’s mouth latched onto his neck and sucked hard. “Shit. Can we go fuck now?”

A chuckle vibrated through James’s chest and into Phil’s. “Your place or my hotel room?”

“Your room close by?” Phil pushed his hips forward so James could feel the erection trapped behind his zipper. “My house is too fucking far.”

“Best Western it is.” James unwound his arm from Phil’s neck and slid both hands down to squeeze his ass. “I already have lube, but I need to buy condoms. Is there a drugstore or something nearby?”

The feel of James’s fingers kneading his butt cheeks made it damn hard for Phil to keep talking, but he managed. “Um. They sell ’em one at a time in the bathroom vending machine, or by the box at the bar. Just ask the bartender.”

James laughed, his head dropping down to rest on Phil’s shoulder. “Wow, I don’t think I’ve ever been to a bar that sells whole boxes of rubbers before.”

Phil couldn’t answer. Having James’s sweet little body pressed against his was causing all sorts of pleasant havoc inside him. Following a sudden, overwhelming urge, he slid a hand into James’s hair, tugged his head back, bent and kissed him hard.

James responded with gleeful enthusiasm, mouth opening wide and lean hips rocking his erection against Phil’s thigh. Moaning, Phil held James’s head still and swept his tongue between those pretty lips. The creamy sweetness of the Baileys lingered in James’s mouth, almost as intoxicating as his leather-and-lust scent.

Something hard and rounded rubbed Phil’s soft palate as the kiss went deeper, and Phil realized with a jolt that James had a pierced tongue.

Sweet Jesus.

Phil’s knees turned rubbery. He clutched at the lithe body molded to his, hoping to God he wouldn’t embarrass himself by actually swooning.

James pulled back, those big eyes gleaming in the low light. “You like the tongue stud, huh?”

Phil nodded, wiping the sheen of sweat from his brow. “I bet that feels amazing when you go down on a guy.”

“That’s what I’m told.” James’s soft pink lips curved into a filthy smile. His hand snaked between Phil’s legs to cup his balls through his jeans. Phil squeaked, and James chuckled. He stood on tiptoe, pressing his cheek to Phil’s. “I bet you’re dying for me to suck you off, aren’t you? So you can see what that piece of metal feels like on your cock.”

“You better believe it.” Planting both hands on James’s leather-sheathed ass, Phil lifted him right off his feet and kissed him again. “I took a cab here. You got a car?”

“No. Just a bike, and it’s back at the hotel. I walked.” James bit Phil’s lip and wriggled out of his grip. “It’s only a couple of blocks. Let me get the condoms and we can go.”

Phil eyed James’s taut rear hungrily as he bent over the bar to summon the tender. God, the man had the cutest little butt. It was all Phil could do to keep from yanking down those sinfully tight pants to see what it looked like bare.

Patience. In a few minutes, you’ll get to look your fill. Maybe he’ll even let you have a taste.

The thought made Phil’s mouth and his prick both water. He pressed a hand to his crotch, not even bothering to be discreet. Every guy here was looking to get laid, and more than a few of them had paired off and were making out in the middle of the floor, so what was the point in trying to hide his excitement?

James stepped away from the bar, a box of extra-thin Trojans in his hand and a lustful gleam in his eyes. His gaze turned heavy when it zeroed in on Phil touching himself. “Shit. Let’s get out of here. I need to fuck you before I explode.”

Grinning, Phil let James clamp a hand around his wrist and pull him through the crowd to the door. He loved it when the short, cute ones took charge like that.