by Daria Wright
As the sun got higher, the brigade picked up their pace and Annie began to recognize the scenery around them from growing up just minutes down the street. It wouldn’t be too much longer until they made the turn onto her parents’ farm road and she would be back home, ready to get rid of McShaw once and for all. Annie was a little nervous despite the brave face she wore. Thoughts of what could go wrong played over and over again in her mind and she started to get a little jumpy. She looked over at Brighton and realized he had been watching her this whole time, ultimately confused by the nerves she was now letting loose on her face. She shook her head and smiled to let him know that she was okay.
Annie’s horse snorted, and she looked up at the turn-off coming up ahead; it was the road to Annie’s freedom, the path to the farm. Annie and Brighton looked at each other with excitement and brought their horses to a faster stride. The large group behind them noticed and caught on to the pace.
Meanwhile, standing in front of the Potter farmhouse were McShaw, the Sheriff, and the Mayor. They had come to remove Annie’s family from the farm, and they had no intention of hearing out Richard, who was trying to stall them for the time. McShaw had already declared the deal off and had ordered the Potters out of the home immediately. Richard stood beside his wife in front of their home in defiance, hoping they would see the brigade before it was too late. McShaw reached forward and grabbed Annie’s mother by the arm, ready to move her from her firm stance on the porch. Richard reached forward and began to push McShaw away, when from the corner of his eye he could see the dust billowing from the ground in the distance.
McShaw, noticing Richard and the Sheriff were occupied with events behind him, turned around and squinted into the distance. As the two horses grew larger in sight, they realized it was Annie and Brighton riding high and fast towards the farm. A grin broke across McShaw’s face, and he snorted loudly.
“Well, looks like she has changed her mind,” he said hastily. “But no matter, the deal is off. Maybe if she is lucky, I’ll let her clean my floors when I knock down this piece of trash you call a home and….”
The Sheriff grabbed McShaw’s arm and twisted him back towards the horizon. The smirk slowly slid off of his face as line after line of horses emerged from over the hill, charging towards the farm at full speed. Annie’s parents stepped back onto the porch, and Richard shielded his wife from the dust blowing up into their eyes. Clouds of dust billowed around them as the horses did circles around McShaw, the Sheriff, and the Mayor, who had their faces tucked into their shirts for protection. As the dust cleared, the three men looked up at the two people ahead of the pack who pulled bandanas down from around their noses and scowled down at them. It was Annie and Brighton, and once Annie noticed McShaw’s hand on her mother as they were driving towards the house, anger shot through her like a flood.
“What’s the meaning of this?” McShaw shouted as he puffed out his round belly in defense.
“You have been taking our land, charging us for what we have built with our hands, and bullying our daughters, and we are here to say enough is enough,” Annie said as she moved her horse closer to McShaw.
“Oh yeah?” McShaw scoffed. “And who exactly is going to stop me? Some little girl and group of unruly townsfolk from another town?”
“I am,” a deep voice stated from the back. A large white horse moved to the front and the Sheriff of Brighton’s town, Sheriff Troy, emerged, one hand on his gun and a large cigar clenched in his teeth.
“Now, hold on,” Annie’s Mayor said as he stepped forward. “You have no authority here, and I believe it would be in your best interest to move on.”
Sheriff Troy’s face began to grow red, and his brow became furrowed as he tossed the reins of his horse to Brighton and dismounted. He was a large man, muscular, and about two feet taller than the Mayor. He sauntered with no fear in him whatsoever, toward the Mayor until he was so close the Mayor was staring directly at his chest.
“Is that a threat?” Troy questioned.
“Uh,” the Mayor began to speak with a trembling voice and backed up slightly until he realized there were horses all around him. “No, sir. Maybe we have been acting a bit hastily with these folks. How about we just get rid of this contract, and we can all be on our way?” The Mayor went to turn toward Richard and Jane Potter, but Troy's hand on his shoulder stopped him in his tracks.
“I think,” Sheriff Troy began, “that we should take a little ride over to my town. You, me, your Sheriff, and Mr. McShaw have some treasonous business to talk about. In fact, it’s not a request; it is a demand.”
Sheriff Troy motioned to the back, and four riders pulled forward and dismounted their horses, armed with guns and chains. The Mayor and the Sheriff had looks of horror in their eyes and immediately dropped their high stance and allowed themselves to be handcuffed to the horses. McShaw, however, was a different story; his pride began to glow, and Annie could quickly tell that he wasn’t going down without a fight. As the crowd's eyes were focused on the men being shackled, Annie watched as McShaw slowly began to raise his hand towards the breast of his vest, where his gun holster sat. Before Annie could put much thought into it, she reached over and grabbed the gun from the side of Brighton’s horse and pointed it at McShaw.
“Don’t move, McShaw,” Annie yelled out. “Take your hand away from that gun and put your hands up. I promise you I am not just some little girl, and I will shoot your knee clear off your leg.”
Sheriff Troy quickly pulled his gun and moved back from McShaw, who chuckled in defeat and raised his hands over his head. Troy moved quickly to disarm him and then chained his hands behind his back. McShaw kept his stare placed on Annie as firm as her gun was pointed at his head. Brighton looked over at Annie and slowly lifted his hand to hers and gave her a comforting look as he took the weapon from her hands. By this point, Annie was shaking, but she had held her ground and become the face of the resistance. Sheriff Troy and Brighton exchanged looks, and the large group began to move away from the front of the house, the three men jogging to keep up with the horses they were tied to.
Annie let out a deep sigh, and her arms fell to her sides, but only for a moment. She then remembered where she was and leapt off her horse and ran towards the porch where her parents stood, arms outstretched and waiting for Annie to fall into them. She stayed in their embrace for some time until she heard the clearing of Brighton’s throat from behind her.
“Thank you, young man,” Annie’s father said as he reached out his hand to Brighton. “You saved our town, and our daughter, two debts I don’t know if I could ever start to repay.”
“It was a pleasure, sir,” Brighton said, steadily looking down at Annie. “But if I may, I do have one request.”
“What’s that, young man?” Annie’s father said, ready to appease the blue-eyed hero on his porch.
“I would like to ask yours, and Mrs. Potter’s, permission to wed your daughter,” Brighton said bashfully.
“Well,” Annie’s father said as he looked down at Annie’s smiling face with surprise and pleasure. “You have my blessing, son, but I am not the person you need to ask for Annie’s hand.” Annie’s father pushed Annie forward on the porch and the sun, high in the sky, hit her beautiful eyes and glistening hair.
“What do you say, Annie?” Brighton said, shifting his tone softer and presenting the idea to her. “Would you do me the honor of being my wife?”
Annie’s eyes lit up with happiness, and she threw her arms around Brighton before she could even open her mouth to answer. Brighton buried his face in the curve of her neck and held tightly to her. Annie pulled back slightly and glanced at her father and winked.
“I will say yes, but,” she said with a mischievous grin, “I have a few stipulations first.”
Annie’s parents burst into laughter, and Brighton rushed forward, picking Annie up and tossing her over his shoulder. The scene was as perfect as Annie had always dreamed of. She looked at Brighton’s blue eyes with love
, and she laughed wholeheartedly as he spun her around on his shoulder and then manoeuvred her so that he was holding her in front of him, cradled in his arms.
“I will give you the world, Annie Potter; all you have to do is ask,” Brighton said, as the sun sparkled overhead and he leaned in to give her one more long, passionate kiss.
The End
Tia’s Mate
Shifters of the Bulgarian Bloodline
Book 1
By: Dalia Wright
Preview
Prologue:
Blood. Blood, everywhere. Hands swimming in it, the floor saturated with the iron tang of rusting death. It clings to his pants and shoelaces, finding all the impossible places, making him feel as if he would never be clean again. The boy wants to be anywhere but here. The mocking eyes of his father watch him as he backs into the corner, away from the male corpse splayed out on the floor, head turned toward the boy with eyes like clouded green glass.
“Come on, boy,” his father urges, mouth twisted like a grinning demon. “How are you gonna learn to like the taste if you’re too scared to take the first step?”
The boy shakes his head, shivering. That man with the empty green eyes, he had been alive only moments before. “He was alive. I spoke to him. He was scared.”
“And now he’s dead. Useless whelp,” his father snarls, yellow eyes gleaming as his son turns away. He strides up in a swoop of malice, and seizes the trembling boy by the cuff of his neck, shoving his face into the pooling blood of the freshly killed human. “Eat!” A manic expression enters his father’s face. His fingernails lengthen, his canines become that little bit longer. Passion is leaking, the emotions manifesting in physical form.
The boy trembles and cries, as he is forced to bring his mouth to the dead man, and tear into his skin, resisting the urge to retch the whole time.
Chapter One
Tia locked gazes with a man across the bar. He was sprawled out on a black leather stool in a white shirt and blue jeans, not dressed to kill, but as if he had rolled out of work and walked straight in. In the orange light, under tufted, messy iron gray hair, protruded amber eyes, which made Tia blink, and investigate the odd combination of color. She contemplated whether he was faking the whole appearance, with contacts rammed over his irises and hair dyed in the rebel manner of teenagers acting out against their bonds. She estimated his age to hover around the thirty mark, noted the casual button shirt, still trying to figure out if she found him handsome or pretentious.
Certainly, there was something there, brooding under the fathomless features. Despite the much hotter women to his left, baring a scandalous amount of flesh, he focused only on Tia Winters.
The lights in the bar deepened to a violent red, and heavy rock music blared out the overhead speakers. Those already on the dance floor spasm faster to the beat of the music, and others pushed past Tia and Anna in a scream of noise and laughter, all deciding at once to grind their sweating, heat trapped bodies on the floor. One man spilt his foaming yellow drink on someone who had no right to the amount of muscle on his broad-shouldered frame. It made Tia think of the image of a gorilla in a suit, and the image brought a smirk to her face. The larger, bald man proceeded to beat the absolute shit out of the drink-spiller, which drew her attention away from the stranger with the unusual colorings, and a face smeared crimson by splotched lighting.
Anna watched as well, and tapped Tia’s drink closer to the edge of the table, prompting her to pick it up. “Hey, Tia. Totally saw you checking out the fake hair dude over there,” she stated, slurping her drink in a manner that would make Tia’s father turn in his alcohol soaked grave. “You could do worse. Gonna try for him?”
Tia shrugged casual dismissal, and ran a hand through her thick dark hair. “I probably won’t.”
“Why not?” Anna asked, genuinely curious. Of course, they both had come here for one thing and one thing only – the chance to get lucky. Anna had recently broken up with her boyfriend and had been practically clawing at Tia to be the honorary wing-woman – though she didn’t have anyone trapped in her sights. Any man would do, as long as they were reasonably good looking and could hold sentences longer than three syllables.
Tia preferred keeping it simple. She was quite the fan of an uncomplicated life, though Anna argued it was because Tia hadn’t met the right man, or she tended to scare people away with dead baby jokes. Tia conceded she was probably right on that score, but still thought anything could be funny in the right context. In the seedy haze of the nightclub, Tia examined her blonde-haired friend, who hid a depressed mind under mascara and a wide smile. Although she insisted she was here to get Tia out of the house, in truth, Tia was here for Anna, to make sure she didn’t do anything stupid, or hook up with the wrong sort of guy. She considered it friendly and saintly duties.
“Well,” Anna said, once more slurping at her drink, “he’s coming over. If you don’t go for it, I will.”
“Fine,” Tia said, rolling her eyes, but feeling a thrill of excitement course inside. “Since I did the soul-searching eye exchange, I’ll deal with him.” What Tia had to look forward to back home was a cold apartment, where she was stuck within the crumbling walls of a place for which she barely made the rent every month from hour based retail work. She had the independence, but it went hand in hand with a smash of loneliness. Prices had to be paid.
The gray haired man weaved through the thong of people fishing for new drinks from the bar and up to Tia and Anna. Paying little regard to Anna, he examined Tia with those peculiar amber eyes. He smiled wolfishly, pulling Tia’s attention in further, finding the expression mesmerizing on a level. Anna, of course, flicked back her blonde hair and puffed out her substantial chest, but he continued to ignore her.
Eventually, Tia cleared her throat. “Are you going to introduce yourself or stand there awkwardly?” She plumped some sass in there, with a healthy dose of eyebrow raising.
His lips curled at the corners, revealing jagged canines. “Danny. And you?” He slid into a spare seat by the women. Anna glowered, a little put out, though true to her nature, she gave Tia a wink, before scouring the crowd for any other potential men to hook up with.
“Tia.” When he reached out a hand to shake, Tia took it. She noticed that his nostrils were flared, every now and then making sharp inhales, as if absorbing the scent of everything around. Several questions sprang to mind. “Is that hair for real or are you just a fan of the color?” she said, not sure if she would believe him, even if he said yes.
“Real. So are the eyes,” he confirmed, before politely enquiring for Anna’s name as well. Tia liked the sound of his voice, a musical baritone with a hint of gruffness to it. She liked the way he looked at her, attention flickering from top to bottom, the fascination shown in his leaning forward body language, though she couldn’t exactly tell why. There were plenty other choices, and far more attractive women willing to give everything in a night. Maybe he appreciated the way Tia wasn’t trying to thrust her breasts into his face, like Anna preferred in her man-snaring methods. Or perhaps, it was because of Tia’s charming personality. Of course, sometimes Tia could do with some extra lessons, and with less inappropriately timed jokes, but she wasn’t about to turn the guy away at a whim. Shivers rippled through her spine at the presence of him, and the strong, pine needle scent emanating from his skin. She detected a kind of field around him, something that naturally attracted and repelled at the same time. It was hard to describe how it worked or felt, only that Tia knew that there was something about him scratching at her subconscious. The eyes, though they crinkled at the corners just right, seemed cold and apathetic, even as he flirted and smiled.
Danger, Tia thought. The primal instincts of her brain stirred. This man reeks of danger.
“I can’t place your accent,” Tia continued, shortly after the man had seized drinks from the bar to share with her. Anna, at this point, with a hug and a whisper in her ear to stay safe and enjoy the romp, had advanced onto the d
ancefloor, under the neon lights, joining the grinding mass. “But, then again, what would I know about accents? I’ve never even made it out of the state of Virginia.”
“Really?” Danny acted surprised. The drink of choice was something Tia had never tried before, and it sported a strong, cherry aftertaste.
“Never.”
“You’re missing out, then! There’s an entire planet with amazing things and people. Some people, not so much. Is normal, though. Depends on the places you pick.” He drank a long draught of his drink. “This is Belgian beer. Cherry flavored. Belgium is quite famous for it. I went to Bruges, once. Magnificent city. If you ever travel, I recommend you go there. I can show you pictures on my phone…” He started thumbing through his cellphone, making Tia smile as he gestured for her to peer over his shoulder at the glitter of buildings and lights. Most of the designs made her think of the gingerbread house from Hansel and Gretel, as they held that same, edible look. Despite the initial reservations she had about him and the cold glint of his eyes, she liked how emphatically he talked about the places he had seen, insisting she shouldn’t limit herself. He put his phone away, not wanting to be attached to it rather than miss out talking to her. He eventually admitted that he came from Bulgaria – a place Tia had only ever thought about when it was mentioned as a Quidditch team in Harry Potter.
Maybe I was mistaken about the danger. Or maybe I wasn’t. She kept on the cautious mask, in the meanwhile switching between her conversation with the charming Danny and making sure Anna wasn’t making a fool out of herself. Thankfully, her best friend was not snogging the face off anyone yet, and had instead fallen in what appeared to be engaging discussion between her and a short-haired girl with high cheekbones and pixie-like curves.
