Blooming in the Wild

by Cathryn Cade

  “Stay with you,” he repeated. “Are you asking me to marry you, Princess?”

  She huffed indignantly and turned away. “Oh, that’s just like you, turn everything into a joke. I just—I want to—yes, damn it!” She turned on him and nearly bumped her nose on his chest, because he’d followed her, crowding her, looming over her. “I am,” she finished in a small voice.

  His big hands lifted, cupped gently around her face and tipped her head back. She saw the light of laughter in his eyes, and lambent heat.

  “That’s my princess,” he said tenderly. “Making it all work out for everyone she loves.”

  She blinked. That wasn’t a yes, but it wasn’t a no… Was it?

  He kissed her and then rested his forehead against hers and chuckled.

  “You know, you asked me in the hospital if I was happy. I thought I was. But a couple of weeks ago, everything I thought I knew just kind of…went poof. Like one of your pretty red hibiscus blossoms blowing in the wind.

  “I love you, Bella Moran-Ho’omalu. I realized it when you nearly died, trying to save everyone else. No, I realized it when I first made love to you, by that pool. No, it was when you looked down at me from that rock, up above the trail, and ordered me to go away. No, it was before that.”

  Now he was really laughing, his chest quivering, breath huffing softly on her face. “It was when you did that damn striptease on a public dock, and I knew I’d follow you anywhere.”

  “You love me?”

  “Nani, I’ve been telling you I do.”

  “Yes, but I thought…you were just saying that because I rode you like a paniola, a cowgirl.”

  He laughed again. “That made me very, very happy, but I already loved you, sweetheart. You are the most fearless, aggravating, managing wahine I’ve ever met, and you’ve spoiled me for other women. I have to have you. Yes, I’ll marry you.”

  “Even though…” She gathered herself for the final hurdle. “Even though I’m a ho’omalu? One of Pele’s guardians?”

  “Even though,” he said solemnly. “Or maybe because of, I don’t know. That’s part of you, Princess, and I want the whole package. I’ll catch you, remember? Aww, Nani, don’t cry.”

  “I remember,” she said, smiling through her tears. “I’ll catch you too. Always.”

  After he kissed her for a long time, because neither one of them wanted to stop, they wandered back toward the house.

  “There’s just one more thing,” she said, as he swung her hand in his.

  “Uh-huh. I figured.”

  “Well, I—I want children. I hope you do too.” She looked up at him.

  He grinned. “Yup. Anything else?”

  “Four?”

  “Ouch! How about two, maybe three?”

  She smiled glowingly. “Three’s good.” She’d talk him into the fourth one after keiki number three was toddling.

  He slipped his arm around her, pulling her close to his side.

  “You can travel all you need to,” she told him, her head on his shoulder. “As long as you come back to me.”

  He kissed the top of her head. “Thank you, but you know, a guy has plenty of time to think, lying around convalescing. And I realized that as much as I’ve enjoyed the Zone, another year may be plenty for me. I’ve got a lot of money in the bank, and investments. How much more do I need? And I got to thinking, what about a Hawaiian version of the show? You know, a year’s worth of outdoor specials, all around the islands.”

  She listened happily as they walked side by side through the verdant Hawaiian landscape, to his words and to the delighted murmur of the trees and plants around her.

  She was home.

  No, they were home. Home in Hawaii.

  About the Author

  Cathryn Cade lives in the Big Sky Country of Montana. She and her family share their property with a golden retriever, and the various deer, antelope and elk that wander through their hay fields. From her computer, Cathryn looks out across the prairie at the rugged Rocky Mountains. Without much effort, she can visualize the cowboys, Indians and vigilantes who once rode the range—some from her own family.

  When she’s not inhabiting her fantasy world—um, when she’s not writing— she is usually reading, quilting or trying a new recipe. She also enjoys boating with her husband, hiking and exploring their home state’s colorful history in museums and ghost towns.

  She and her husband love Hawaii, and on their yearly visits like to snorkel, stroll on the beach and fantasize over mai tais about how to make the Big Island their second home.

  Cathryn spends way too much time on the Internet and can often be found chatting on Facebook, Twitter, or via email. She loves to hear from readers.

  Stop by her website to join her contests, sign up for her newsletter, read reviews of her books, and enjoy her Free Reads.

  You can find her at www.cathryncade.com

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  Look for these titles by Cathryn Cade

  Now Available:

  The Orion

  Tyger, Tyger, Burning Bryght

  Her Commander

  Prince of Dragons

  Deep Indigo

  Hawaiian Heroes

  Walking in Fire

  Rolling in the Deep

  Born to defend his people, he will sacrifice everything…for her.

  Walking in Fire

  © 2012 Cathryn Cade

  Hawaiian Heroes, Book 1

  Nawea Bay, a remote Hawaiian paradise, is just the haven Melia Carson needs to escape the chill of heartache. Instead, she finds herself swept up in a tropical heat wave, fueled by her unexpected attraction to a handsome native she meets on a snorkel tour.

  He’s big, powerful, hot enough to melt her defenses—and he’s not all he seems. How else could he survive an injury that should have killed him…and why does she dream of him garbed in ancient native dress and wreathed in flames?

  David “Malu” Ho’omalu is on the Big Island to find and destroy a cache of dangerous designer drugs before they can be sold to his people. Fending off amorous female tourists is part of the job, but one look in Melia’s blue eyes, and his instincts scream that she is his.

  As Melia surrenders to the desire burning between them, she discovers more than a fiery heritage that defies modern logic. She discovers a man who would descend into the molten heart of the volcano to protect his island. And her…if she can find the strength to trust her heart to him.

  Warning: Hot, hot Hawaiian hero with volcanic passion on his mind. Better pack a heat-proof bikini for this island paradise.

  Enjoy the following excerpt for Walking in Fire:

  Malu set the cooler down and leaned back on the counter, crossing his arms over his chest. His biceps bulged. Melia realized she was staring again and looked quickly away. Darn it, she had to quit that. She had the mad urge to race out of the house and dive into the water again, to quell the flush of heat under her skin—equal parts arousal and embarrassment. She always seemed to be flushed around him, as if heat emanated from his very persona.

  “You just saying dat because I have to cook so much when you’re here,” Leilani said to Malu, but she was smiling. “Dis man eat for days.”

  “Hmm,” Melia answered. Hard not to notice when he sat across from her eating two helpings to the others’ one—he obviously had to fuel that physique. “Maybe Melia cook for us, yeah?” He was laughing at her again, darn him.

  Not out loud, but that sensual mouth was tilted up at the corners, and his dark eyes held a suspicious gleam. She’d like to cook for him all right—a nice serving of ipecac. “Melia paha.”

  Leilani laughed easily, then looked quickly at Melia. “Sorry, not laughing at you. Malia paha mean ‘maybe’. Close
to your name.”

  “Meh-lee-ah,” Malu said, rolling her name on his tongue. “You have a Hawaiian name.”

  “Yes. It means plumeria. My parents spent their honeymoon here,” she said.

  “They liked the name.”

  “So, you cook Hawaiian?” he went on, still with that gleam in his eyes.

  “Know any good Spam recipes?”

  Melia frowned, wary of a trap. She knew the canned ground ham product was an island favorite, but she’d never actually eaten it. Malu grinned, and she narrowed her eyes at him. “I’m sure I could come up with some recipes, just for you.”

  Leilani shook her head at him. “She cook fresh, not canned. Anyway, dis girl here on vacation.”

  “Yes, I am. Nice talking to you, Leilani.” Without looking at Malu, Melia turned and sauntered out the nearest door, which turned out to be the one to the rear lanai.

  Behind her, she heard Malu say something to Leilani. Both of them laughed.

  She wondered if they were laughing at her, and then rolled her eyes at herself.

  That was so junior high. And Leilani was nice, even if Malu was a big recipe gone bad.

  It was dark on the back lawn, just the light shining from the windows. The only sounds were the rustling of foliage and a few frogs piping in the forest. Melia flipped her hair off her shoulders and blew out a long breath. Good grief, why did she let him fluster her this way? She wandered slowly along the lanai. The soft caress of the humid air and the sweet scents wafting on it soothed her. Walking on, she stopped to sniff a familiar acrid odor, then wrinkled her nose. Eww, some of the group were smoking pot, right up in the trees. She heard Clay or Jimmer laugh, and shook her head. What a useless waste of time, not to mention illegal.

  She followed the faint sounds of island music around the corner. Frank was perched on the porch railing, playing a small ukulele. He smiled at her as she walked into the light of the tiki torches stuck in the garden. Curling up on one of the rattan loungers, she listened to the soft melody and let her mind drift. She was bothered and bewildered by her attraction to Malu. She’d better handle it before she was bewitched. The Big Island was exerting its magic on her.

  That was it—he was part of the tropical ambience, like the lava flows, jet black against the green-and-gold mountainsides, like the turquoise water in the bay, the surf curling into frothy white on the golden, sandy beach.

  Just another Hawaiian native, as beautiful as the fish eddying over the reef, the sea turtles paddling slowly along or the dolphins leaping joyously from the waves, as full of quiet power as the mountain that towered behind them.

  Hopefully without the menace.

  Realizing the poetic nature of her thoughts, she blushed, glad no one else could see in the dim, flickering light of the torches. Good grief, next she’d be putting it to music and playing the ukulele in the moonlight.

  She opened the nearest door into a quiet sitting room now in shadows. She bumped an end table, and something fell with a rustle to the woven floor mat.

  Melia fumbled for the nearest lamp and snapped it on. A sketchbook lay on the floor, a page poking out as if torn.

  Bending, she picked it up and opened it, then blinked in surprise as she gazed at a pencil sketch of the bay, obviously done by someone on the front lanai. The sketch was rough, as if it had been done quickly, but even to her untutored eye, it was very good.

  She sank onto the rattan settee next to the lamp and turned the page.

  Another sketch of the bay, like the first, only a little more refined, the black lava rocks shaded in, the palm trees textured. Were these by the same artist whose work hung on the walls?

  She flipped to the next page and the next. To her disappointment, all were bare, except the loose one. As she pulled the page carefully from the sketchbook, she caught her breath. This sketch was of a woman. She was seated on a rock, foliage behind her, her head bent. She held a single flower in her hands, and she looked down at it with dreamy concentration. Her shoulders were bare, a few vague lines suggesting she was nude.

  Melia narrowed her eyes. The woman’s hair was undefined, her features only a few tender lines. And yet she looked somehow familiar. The edge of the paper was crumpled, as if the artist had begun to discard it and then changed his or her mind. A little guiltily, Melia set the sketchbook back on the end table, the sketch of the woman still in her hand.

  The artist had nearly thrown it away. Surely he or she wouldn’t miss it if she just enjoyed it while she was here. She’d return it before she left.

  She went to her room. After setting the sketch carefully on her bedside table, she readied herself for bed, her mind full of the activities and tensions of the day.

  When she closed her eyes, she felt as if she were still in the water, being rocked gently by the waves. She turned onto her side and hugged the extra pillow to her.

  She dreamed of Malu.

  He lounged in the shade of the beach palms, smiling lazily at her, even though Cherie and Jacquie snuggled close at his sides in their bikinis.

  Melia walked toward him, drawn by a force beyond her control. His dark eyes slid down over her in a caress as strong as if he had stroked her with his hand. Heady triumph filled her—he wanted her, even with the other women available.

  He beckoned her with one finger.

  Her heart beat in slow, heavy strokes. She knew what he wanted. Slowly, she lifted her hands to the ties of her bikini top and unfastened them. The top dangled from her fingertips, then fell to the sand, leaving her breasts bare to his gaze. Her nipples hardened, thrusting toward him, feeling his gaze like a caress as soft as the fresh flower lei she wore.

  He gestured again, and, naughty excitement flooding her, she hooked her fingers in her bikini bottoms and slowly pushed them down until they fell in a soft puddle around her bare feet. As his hot gaze fell to her mons, she caught her breath, trembling with the force of her excitement and arousal. She felt daring, free, and so turned on her legs were weak.

  In the perverse way of dreams, she suddenly realized that Dane sat nearby, watching her with an enigmatic look on his tanned face. Clay and Jimmer were there too, smiling avidly.

  Uncertainty filled her. She looked back at Malu, and he smiled as Cherie and Jacquie pressed close to him, their hands all over him.

  With a whimper of sheer humiliation, Melia turned to run.

  He’s found the woman of his dreams—in the midst of his worst nightmare.

  Lucidity

  © 2012 Raine Weaver

  Carlotta Phelps never considered herself special, except for a peculiar ability to control the course of her dreams. Other than being a handy cure for nightmares, it's a pretty worthless talent. Until she’s recruited for the One Hundred, a team of lucid dreamers whose combined visualizations have been proven to affect reality.

  With a giant asteroid hurtling straight toward Earth and the scientific technology to avert it iffy, the dreamers are the fallback—the last line of defense. And the man who’s been assigned as her bodyguard is messing with her focus, big time.

  Ex-Special Ops soldier Parker Munroe has no idea why he’s been assigned to protect the luscious, gentled-eyed Carly. She’s a frustrating temptation, but he’s a hard-core realist. The only power he believes in is brute force.

  Then he learns that his charge, who practically lives in lacy negligees, wields an awesome power—and an even bigger responsibility. She and her kind are being hunted by an enemy he can’t even identify, against which all his skill with weaponry is useless. If he can’t find a way to protect her, the world is as doomed as the heart he’s already lost.

  Warning: This title contains a hero who packs a really big gun, government conspiracies, hot-buttered murder, witch hunting, and drop-your-drawers-there’s-a-newsheriff-in-town-and-she’s-carryin’-cuffs kinda sex.

  Enjoy the following excerpt for Lucidity: He touched me.

  Not in a protective way or to chastise her, and not to get her into motion as he did when a threat was
imminent. He’d actually touched her as a man intrigued by a woman might.

  Carly licked her lips, trying to calm the nervous fluttering of her stomach. Such silliness. She couldn’t let such a simple gesture affect her. He was probably horny, and she was feeling vulnerable. Loneliness and isolation were the only things drawing them together.

  She could only be so honest with him, after all. Against orders, she would talk about the experiment, the One Hundred, and the worldwide danger to them all. But to tell him how much more she really wanted from him, that she could barely sit this close without wanting to jump his bones, was courting complications. And they had enough to deal with already.

  Besides, she’d never agreed with her superiors about keeping this secret from the populace. And this man who regularly risked his life for her certainly deserved the truth.

  “I am what’s called a lucid dreamer. That is, a person who, while dreaming, is not only aware that they are, but they’re often able to control the dream itself.”

  He gave her a long, blank stare, as if waiting for her to get to the real point. Okay, this was not going to be easy if he couldn’t believe this was the point. “The gift wasn’t produced in a laboratory. It’s not unnatural, not even all that unusual. A significant percentage of the general population has the ability.”

  “Do they?”

  “Yes. Haven’t you ever found yourself in the middle of a dream and—”

  “I don’t dream.”

  “Of course you do. Everyone does.”

  “Then I guess I don’t remember them.”

  She blinked, at a loss for what to say. Most people experienced dreams for at least two out of every eight hours of sleep, three to five per night. She couldn’t imagine what it would be like to be totally unaware of such a huge part of one’s existence. “I’m sorry. How very sad for you.”