Hearts Aflame Collection IV: 4-Book Bundle

by Melissa F. Hart

  A tone of defeat colored his words and she cocked her head. “Giving up so early?”

  He took another sip and leaned over her to set his glass on the table beside her elbow. Sin inhaled the rich scent of him, making her sex throb with need. Her pulse skittered, and she pressed her thighs together tightly. His fingertips trailed from the wineglass to the couch arm, across her lap, and up her arm. “Finish your wine before I get back, will you?”

  She smiled into those dimpled cheeks and tried to keep her composure. “Maybe.”

  He cradled her face and brushed his lips against her forehead. Sin was going to die right here on the couch. There was a vibrancy about Tate that made her want to step into the electrical charge that seemed to continually surround him. She was drawn to him like a magnet and if she didn’t figure out how to resist his pull, the entire point of this interview was going to be defeated the moment he got her naked.

  Which wasn’t going to be long if he kept plying her with alcohol and touching like that. She absently sipped her drink and by the time he came back in low-slung sweat pants and a fitted T-shirt, she’d nearly done as commanded and finished the entire glass. He brought the bottle over and topped off both their glasses, then set the bottle on the table and dragged an ottoman over. Perching on it, he draped his knees on either side of hers, and rested his fingers within inches of her skin.

  His piercing blue gaze teased her. “First question.”

  Sin licked her lips and glanced at her notepad—not to remind herself of the question, but to buy a second of composure. “Tell me about a time when you wanted to quit.”

  “Never had one. Take off your bra.”

  A loud bark of laughter jumped out of Sin. “That’s not how you play.”

  He lifted an eyebrow. “Oh? I thought we were making up the rules as we go along.”

  She shook her head in mirth. “No.”

  His hands widened, fingers expanding before they slide up each side of Sin’s thighs. They were dark and tanned in contrast to her white pillowy flesh. Wetness pooled as her insides clenched at the thought of those fingers being inside her. And now he was asking her to start stripping. He could not get any sexier than this moment. With a wicked smile, Sin lifted a foot and nestled a six-inch heel against his semi-hard cock. “We’ll start with one shoe.” She lowered her lashes. “I have a lot of questions.”

  Without a complaint, he cradled her shoe and lifted it higher onto his chest until the spike indented the flesh above his nipple. There was no way to keep from giving him a shot of her wet panties, so she let her thighs part. His nostrils flared, and he kissed her anklebone, then slid the shoe off her foot.

  For a moment, Sin felt more like Cinderella than the girl with the devilish name. But then he raked his rough beard against her sole and laughed and she was glad to be a woman who’d been around the block instead of the sheltered princess who wouldn’t have known a prince from a thief.

  His gaze drifted back to her shadowed pussy, and his tongue darted out to press against the center indention of his upper lip. A rush of sparklers raced up Sin’s back and she was wet for him again.

  He grinned and lowered her foot slowly, nestling it back between his thighs until she could feel the weight and warmth of his testicles against her toes.

  Sin inhaled and tried to focus on why she was here but her quavering insides were making it crazy hard.

  She swallowed and met his cheeky grin. “Is this everything you thought it would be?”

  He paused for only a second, but it was long enough for Sin to see the cloud pass over his bright smile. “And then some.”

  She tipped her head to the side and studied him. “I think there’s more to that story.”

  “Nope. Give me your other foot.”

  She did and he repeated the sensual divesting of her shoe, but he tossed this one over his shoulder with a flair of showmanship.

  Sin wanted to toss her notebook over her shoulder and push him down onto the floor and lick him like a lollipop. The more he played with her, the hotter and wetter she got. He was supposed to be a hot—but jerkwad—typical rocker. Not this fun to be around, jokey guy. He was tugging at more than her pussy strings, and she was getting to know him on a level that made her both respect and need him to tell her more. One interview wasn’t going to be enough, just like she knew one time with that giant piece of equipment would only make her want more.

  “Think up a good question, because for this one I’m getting that tight, sweet skirt of yours.”

  Sin’s belly clenched in anticipation of his hands dragging the fabric down over her hips and revealing her tiger-print thong to the moon and stars.

  The interview continued in a playful back and forth until Sin sat naked on the couch, notepad full of notes, breasts bare to the cool air-conditioned room. When she’d had to lose her shirt, he’d matched her top for top, so he sat barely clad in his sweats that only enhanced the size of his massive erection.

  Sin’s throat stuck and she took another sip of wine, but it didn’t ease any of the tightness that captured her entire body. “Advice to a young musician?”

  “Find a sexy woman with some curves and make her interview you naked.”

  Sin laughed heartily, making her heavy breasts swing and bounce. Tate reached for one, but she slapped his hand away.

  “What? You didn’t say what kind of advice.”

  “Real advice. What would you say to the young Tate McQueen stepping onto the stage at McFlannery’s Tavern all those years ago?”

  His hand stilled on her thigh and his gaze questioned her, scanning her face for the mocking he must have seen in others. When he didn’t find it in Sin’s, he turned wistful for just a few seconds before answering. “Live the moment. They go by too fast and before you know it, you’ve done a hundred tours in as many towns, and you’ve fucked—” The tips of his ears reddened, and he smoothed his palm flat against her calf. “The women are plentiful, but worthwhile company is rare.”

  Sin’s voice caught in her throat. Even though she’d gotten the interview she’d wanted, there was a vulnerability she hadn’t expected—and one she wasn’t sure she wanted a hand in exposing. Her body leaned forward to meet Tate’s as it drew closer. His hand lifted to thread through her hair, and he cupped the side of her face. The kiss was soft, sweet, and totally unexpected. The showman had hidden behind the young artist taking the stage for the first time.

  He pulled away and searched her face for something she couldn’t voice. “What if I made you another offer?”

  Sin found her voice, but it cracked. “What kind of offer?”

  His head dipped low to pull a nipple into his mouth.

  Sin grabbed a handful of his hair and held him a breath away from her skin. “Hmm?”

  “Don’t submit this interview and come on tour with me as my PR Manager.”

  Do you like this book? Be sure to check other books in this series

  Sinful Seduction - Volume 2

  Sinful Incitation - Volume 3

  A Worthwhile Sin (Trilogy Bundle)

  The Book of Unbound Chains

  Synopsis

  Tara spends her days teaching at the local college and her nights dreaming of something more, but she never thought that picking up a strange old book at a used bookstore could change her life like this! Before she knew it, there were monstrous winged creatures knocking on her door, and the handsome but mysterious werewolf Mads Magnussen coming through her window!

  Tara's careless purchase sets off a chain of events that put her body and her heart to the test, and soon she realizes that there is far more to the world than she has ever considered.

  It all began in a bookstore.

  The day should have been perfect. It was a bright and warm day, she had just finished grading her students' final papers, and the university itself was buzzing with the energy of being finally free of a cold wet spring. It was the perfect day, unless you were Professor Tara Roth, who had previously dated the man who w
as making his way down the street toward her with a gorgeous blonde on his arm.

  Tara, who had had nothing on her mind besides possibly lunch at her favorite Thai place, felt a blush of panic and shame creep up over her face, and before she knew it, she had dodged in the doors of the used bookstore.

  As the heavy door closed behind her and she watched her ex pass by with her replacement on his arm, she sighed at herself. It was a little silly to be this distraught over a relationship that had lasted only a few months, but she’d had a good feeling that had turned out, as it so often had, to be false.

  “Oh, Tara dear, welcome back. Are you looking for more cookbooks?”

  Mrs. Pillson was the elderly proprietor of the used bookstore, and she smiled kindly at the young woman who stood so sadly in the entryway.

  Tara Roth was twenty-eight, but with her slender figure, round face, and mass of ash-blond curls, she could have passed easily for one of her own students. She tried to dress up in skirts, leggings and cardigans, but she always had the sneaking suspicion that she looked like a little girl playing dress up.

  She shook her head at Mrs. Pillson, who had a habit of lightly mothering everyone who came in the door.

  “No, I'm still working my way through the last one I bought, but thank you. Is there anything new?”

  Tara figured that even if her love life was doomed to end in with a whimper rather than a bang, her fantasy life didn't have to. She was an avid reader and had been since she was a child. It led to her life-long love of language and words, and eventually, to a scholarship to study ancient linguistics in France.

  She drifted toward the New Arrivals cart that Mrs. Pillson pointed out and ran her finger haphazardly across the spines of elderly romances and self-help books. She was wondering if she was looking at her future, spent entirely in used bookstores and take-out Thai when she blinked and noticed something different.

  The book was small but thick, and to her surprise, it seemed to be bound in genuine leather. There was no name on the spine, but when she opened it up, she was greeted by a vivid red illustration of a dragon chained to a pillar, surrounded by words she thought she recognized.

  It had the look and feel of some of the manuscripts she had worked with, the ones from the very earliest days of printing, but she knew that was foolishness. Those books were worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, and there was a faint sticky spot on this book where Mrs. Pillson had probably scraped off an old price sticker. Still, it was odd and the leather cover was attractive, so she brought it up to the front.

  “Oh, that's part of that strange lot that came in the other day,” said Mrs. Pillson, checking the price she had lightly penciled into the front cover. “Hm, I said ten for this, but we'll just say five for you, dear.”

  Tara smiled, because if Mrs. Pillson continued to treat her like a broke college student, she wasn't going to complain too loudly.

  She only remembered the book after she had finished her dinner that night. There was still a chilly bite to the spring air, and she was cozily wrapped in a blanket on the couch. Turning off the television, she fetched the book from its plastic bag and opened it curiously.

  Now that she was looking at it much more closely, she realized that it was indeed very old. Her area of expertise was in the words, not the pages that they were written on, however, so she turned her attention to them instead.

  It was not Latin or Coptic, as she had assumed, but instead it was a code, one used by a group of people who considered themselves wizards. They were known as the Sybelline Brotherhood, and she had done her thesis on them just four years ago. An odd shock ran down her spine as she realized that this must be a piece of writing from the same group that she had spent so much time researching.

  They were strange men, convinced that they held the keys to the universe, and now, she was holding something that she was becoming more and more certain was part of their library. Her excitement rose, and she hastily opened her laptop, consulting her notes on their strange code. There were perhaps five people in the world who would have even known where to start when confronted with this book, and Tara was one of them.

  In a fever of excitement, she wrote down the words that she saw in the book, typing them hastily onto her computer. She was so consumed by the act of translation that she didn't even look up to see what she had until she had finished.

  “For the freeing of things once caged, and for setting right the wrongs that have been done...” she murmured in confusion. Deep inside her, she felt a cold shiver, something that chilled her to her fingertips.

  Things are changing, she thought incoherently, and for a moment, Tara was almost frightened.

  The moment passed, and she started to laugh at her own silliness. The Sybelline Brotherhood was a group of rich men with too much time on their hands, she reminded herself. They had produced some fascinating works, and they offered a glimpse into the mystical minds of the era, but no matter what fantasies they spun, they meant nothing in the new era. She knew this.

  The knock on the door nearly made her jump straight out of her blankets. Then she remembered that a knock meant that there was someone at the door and, pulling her robe over pajamas, she went to investigate.

  Her hand was just on the knob when her window exploded inwards. The shattering glass was terrifyingly loud, and she instinctively threw herself to the ground, covering her head with her arms. When she looked up, she realized that she was completely unhurt, but now there was a wild-looking man standing in her living room.

  He was tall enough that he seemed like a giant in her home, and she froze as his startlingly bright blue eyes roved the room. He saw her crouched by the door, and with a sound like a bestial growl, he strode toward her as she tried desperately to push herself to her feet.

  His hand clamped like an iron band around her shoulder, hauling her to her feet, and he loomed over her, menace etched in ever line of his body.

  “Where is it?” he growled. “You have it; you must tell me where it is.”

  Gulping back a whimper of fear, Tara tried to tell him that her purse and her wallet were on the table, that he should take it as long he left her alone, but she couldn't make the words come out. Her voice shivered and shook, and for a brief moment, the intruder looked almost repentant.

  He started to speak, but then the knocking at her door came again. No, not knocking, pounding, and to Tara's shock, she saw the door, heavy and steel, start to bend inwards.

  The man swore in a language that Tara's distracted mind recognized as Scandinavian of some sort and thrust her behind him.

  “I'm sorry,” he whispered. “Damn me for a fool but I have led them right to you.”

  She knew that she should be running to her bedroom where she could lock the door, or that she should take her chances going through the window that had been broken. Instead, she skittered back and away, unable to take her eyes off the man who was staring so ferociously at her door.

  “Come on, come on, you feathery son of a bitch.”

  The man crouched like an angry animal, and as they both waited, the door bent further and further until one final blow flattened it, revealing the thing behind it.

  Tara caught a glimpse of wings tall enough to brush her ceiling, and a face that was ruined with scars before the thing was borne to the ground by a snarling whirlwind of fur and teeth.

  Her brain refused to believe what her eyes told her. Where there had been a man, there was now a wolf, and it hit the thing in the door with a demented snarl. She was frozen to the spot, unable to do anything, unable to breathe or scream or call for help, but then she saw the winged being wrestle the wolf to the ground. The menacing growls turned to a pained, choked howl, and now she acted on instinct alone.

  It took two steps to the large heavy vase on the table, and three steps to the fight on the ground. With a calm and grace that would always surprise her in years to come, she brought the heavy vase down hard on the winged thing’s head. The vase shattered into a thousand s
hards, and the winged thing uttered a startled shriek that sounded like sharpened nails over chalkboard.

  It drew away for a moment, giving the wolf enough of a chance to bound to its feet and chase it again. The winged being seemed to decide that that was enough, and in a flurry of feathers that dragged a cold wind into the room, it plunged out the window and was gone.

  The adrenaline that had been holding Tara up let go abruptly, and she wound up on the floor, her teeth chattering hard. She couldn't seem to keep her eyes open, and the next thing she was aware of was a pair of warm, strong hands wrapping around her shoulder.

  “Oh, hell below,” the man swore. “Are you hurt? Did that bastard harm you?”

  He’s back. The wolf is gone and he is back.

  She shook her head as best she could, but she couldn't make herself speak. The man stared at her, confused and concerned, and it occurred to her that he was quite handsome. He was clean-shaven, with features that were perhaps a little too rugged to be conventionally handsome, and his mouth, even when twisted into a worried frown, was almost shockingly sensual. His hair, she could see now, was a deep brown, cut too long for fashion, and with just a hint of a curl at the ends. He filled up the space like a stone, solid, immoveable and strong, but she had seen how fast he had moved, and how powerful he was.

  She was too shocked and cold to do much more than whimper when he lifted her up in his arms, and then all she could do was be grateful for his warmth and the solid bulk of him against her.

  “I'm sorry, precious, but we have to move,” he said urgently. “That coward's gone, but his friends will be back, and though I wish to god you could take them all out with pottery, that just won't work.”

  She chuckled a little dryly at his words, but even that took enough effort that she fell silent, burrowing into his comforting warmth. The smell of him was warm and woodsy, and underneath it, there was something so elementally male she couldn't resist a soft sigh.

  He made a clicking sound with his tongue to get her attention, and when she looked up, he nodded.