Carolina Pearl

by Sela Carsen

  “Unfortunately, Stede was eventually captured and executed. All his property was confiscated, too. But Temperance knew what was coming, so she packed up everything she could carry and took off before the government men got there.”

  “Hmph. And they called my husband a thief when they were no better themselves.”

  “She couldn’t go home to her family because she knew they wouldn’t take her back, so she traveled up here to the Congaree. She sold off little bits of her treasure to buy the house and the land, and lived quietly until Jack Cotesworth stumbled across her cottage with the Georgia lawmen on his heels.”

  “He was not so well brought up as Bayard, but he was bright and quick, my Jack. Quick with a laugh and quick with his hands. And handsome, as well.”

  “It seems like you had a thing for bad boys, Mrs. Cotesworth.” Blair smiled and winked at Conn.

  “Reformed rakes make the best husbands, you know.”

  The ladies shared a smile. Conn was rakish enough for her.

  “I don’t know much else. The story says she buried the biggest piece of her treasure under the house to keep it safe, but no one ever found it. I figure she spent it all. Her grandchildren or great-grandchildren built this house on top of her old cottage, but never dug up anything, so I thought it was all gone.” When Conn was done, he leaned back and took another bite out of his apple.

  “So what was the treasure?” asked Blair.

  “Something Bayard gave me for safe keeping. He wouldn’t have it on his ship, but he couldn’t give it up. It might have saved him, but likely not as it was a woman’s gift. Come with me. I’ll show you where it is.”

  She rose and led them to the kitchen. “I will show you, but I beg you to let it rest.” She reached through the masonry with a ghostly hand and brought it out of the hole.

  A great black pearl, larger than any Blair had ever seen, glowed silvery grey in her hand like a full moon on a starless night.

  Blair had been fascinated with pearls since receiving her earrings. She knew the legends and the stories, the superstitions and myths. And she knew about La Perla Plata.

  “This is…”

  “Stunning, is she not?”

  “She is. She is so completely stunning.”

  A thump sounded beside her and Conn’s apple core bumped into her foot.

  “Is that thing real?”

  “It most certainly is. La Perla Plata was stolen from the governor of Barbados about the time Bayard left the island.”

  “By coincidence?” he asked.

  “I think not,” replied Temperance. “This pearl has many stories connected to it, but they end with that theft. No one else in the world knows where it is. Most of the tales deal with the protection of a home, but it must be placed by a woman and she is the only one who can remove it. Every time it has been taken by a man, disaster follows.”

  “Which explains why you don’t want anyone to remove the pearl,” said Blair, still in awe of the deep gleam radiating from the gem.

  “If it is removed, the house will fall. Its protection will cease to exist. Those of us who linger on this plane have done so to protect the jewel. We have been here for far too long, I think. We need someone we can trust. Someone who can protect the pearl and leave it here to do its work.”

  “Then put it back. This house should stand until the wheels come off the world.” Conn looked over at Blair, who nodded. Magic at work shouldn’t be messed with.

  “I should perhaps mention that the pearl is not the only buried treasure here. The house still requires some upkeep. These might help.”

  She returned the pearl to its resting place, but came back with a handful of small to medium sized gems; rubies, emeralds and sapphires made a glittering, colorful pile on the hearth.

  “Wow.” If Conn had been holding another apple, it would have dropped too.

  “I’ll second that.”

  “These are for you to use as you require. I wish you nothing but happiness here together.”

  “Together?” asked Conn. “You know, Grandmother, you have a great idea. What do you say?” He turned to Blair with a smile.

  “What? Did you just ask me to marry you or something?”

  “Or something.” He was still smiling and she wanted to bop him over the head with a skillet.

  “Or something? That’s your idea of a proposal? That’s the best you can do? ‘Hey babe. I gotta house and a handful of rocks, wanna get hitched?’ You know, I have put up with a lot from you—”

  Blair didn’t get to finish her rant because he grabbed her by the waist and cut off her words. Hard lips on her mouth, hard body against her, hard arm around her waist, hard hand in her hair…until he gentled. Bliss as she returned his kiss, unconscious of everything but pleasure. Yes, she would marry him. Live in this house, have children here, raise a few dogs, run in the swamp, live and die here. With him. She didn’t need a black pearl to keep the house intact. All she needed was him.

  Temperance wrapped an arm around Pinkney’s waist. “Our work here is done. Will you not come with us to rest?”

  “Oh heavens no. They’ve got a lot to learn. Anyway, I think I’ll stay and see if I can try to bring the rest of the family up to snuff.”

  Temperance smiled and looked out toward the swamp. Two figures awaited her there.

  “So you get to spend eternity with two men. I’m not sure whether to envy you or feel bad for you.”

  “Happiness, I think, is the best route, Pinkney. And I think I will not be gone forever. No doubt someone will eventually forget the truth of the pearl and I shall be needed again.”

  “I’ll stay until then. I wish you joy, Temperance.”

  “And I wish you patience.” With one last smile, she peeked in on the couple doing some rather extraordinary things on the kitchen floor. She passed them her blessing in silence, then went to meet her husbands who were grappling with each other in the dirt. Temperance grinned. It didn’t do to have one’s rakes too reformed.

  Author’s Notes

  Congaree Swamp National Forest? Totally real. Culford, South Carolina? Totally not.

  Some of the names I used? Kinda sorta real. Eliza Lucas Pinkney is a prominent figure in South Carolina’s colonial history. She developed a strain of the indigo plant that thrived in the state, as well as the process for refining it. She was a scientist, a businesswoman, a wife and a mother. A yesteryear superwoman!

  I wanted to honor this real life historical heroine, so I borrowed a few names. Conn’s last name is Lucas, Eliza’s maiden name. Aunt Pinkney is taken from Eliza’s married name. Her eldest son was Charles Cotesworth and Harriot, which I appropriated for Conn’s middle name, was her only daughter. If you’re interested in learning more about this extraordinary woman, you can find a quick biography at Indigo Blues, a blog about notable places and events in South Carolina. You can also find some of the letters she wrote at the National Humanities Center Resource Toolbox.

  About the Author

  Sela Carsen is just your ordinary, average, everyday stay at home mom. Really. Ignore the two Monkey Children. And the disaster area she calls home. And the Darn-Near Perfect husband who patiently puts up with the chaos. And did she mention the Boxer?

  If you see her talking to herself while she’s going down the produce aisle at the grocery store with her travel mug of coffee welded to her hand, well, doesn’t everyone do that?

  No?

  Oops.

  Despite the caffeine-induced jitters, she has managed to write comic romances featuring smart, funny, mostly alive, occasionally dead (and undead) characters. Her writing runs the gamut from paranormal to historical, with several rabbit trails in between.

  She lives in the Midwest now after a gypsy life that allowed her to live in places from Idaho to South Carolina and from Egypt to England.

  To learn more about her, please visit www.selacarsen.com and check out her blog. You can also find her blogging regularly at Beyond the Veil—a group blog of paranormal
romance authors at http://paranormalauthors.blogspot.com/. Send an email to Sela at selacarsen@gmail.com. She’ll be thrilled to hear from you!

  Look for these titles by Sela Carsen

  Now Available:

  Not Quite Dead

  Heart of the Sea

  Carolina Wolf

  Anthologies:

  Love & Lore

  Tickle My Fantasy

  What happens in Atlantic City…changes everything.

  The Naked Detective

  © 2010 Vivi Andrews

  Karmic Consultants, Book 4

  The “gift” that makes Ciara Liung the FBI’s prized secret weapon makes her existence more like a curse. Unable to bear human contact, she lives as a hermit, immersing herself in the water that gives her peace and amplifies her power.

  Her new FBI handler, though, only believes what he can see. The problem? Her gift—the ability to psychically locate stolen jewels—only works in the nude.

  Special Agent Nathan Smith can’t believe he’s expected to babysit some psychic finder. Psychic…right. An undercover op gone wrong may have left him a desk jockey—and Ciara’s charms are more distracting than he cares to admit—but he’s a field agent at heart. She’s working some kind of angle. It’s just a matter of time before he unravels it.

  Sent to Atlantic City to recover a ruby necklace for Monaco’s royal family, both finder and Fed are pushed outside their comfort zones, and discover more than they ever believed possible. And when a trap is sprung, they realize they stand to lose much more than a sparkly stone…

  Warning: This book contains gambling, go-go dancers, public indecency, and every brand of trouble a troubled psychic can get into in America’s Playground.

  Enjoy the following excerpt for The Naked Detective:

  Ciara was standing in the stall, pulling her dress over her head, when she realized Nate had actually let her out of his sight. He hadn’t swept the bathroom to make sure there weren’t other exits or frisked her for a hidden cell phone. He’d just let her walk in here without so much as a second glance.

  In the four days she’d known him, that was unprecedented.

  Could Nate Smith actually believe her?

  Ciara came out of the bathroom to find Nate leaning against a slot machine as he waited. He looked utterly relaxed, as if there hadn’t been even a flicker of doubt in his mind that she would return to him. Trust. It seemed to have burst open between them impossibly fast.

  She didn’t know when she had started trusting him, a moment ago, a day ago, maybe a part of her had started trusting him the moment he rang her doorbell. But his trust of her seemed to hinge on that moment in the tank. Sure, she’d done it so he would believe her, but now she was suspicious of that instant faith.

  Nate levered himself away from the slots. “Come on. Let’s get you out of here.” He started to reach for her hand again, then snatched his hand back. His eyes scanned her from her flip-flop bedecked toes all the way up to her still-damp hair, as if checking for war wounds.

  Ciara rolled her eyes. “I’m fine. Better than fine. I’m—” Again words failed. This feeling, it was too much. “Come on. We’ve got a necklace to find.”

  She grabbed his hand and dragged him behind her toward the street exit. Ciara felt like laughing, though she didn’t know why.

  She wore his jacket over her dress—the shawl a casualty of her dunking—but as soon as they stepped out of the air-conditioning of the casino, she shrugged it off. The sun hit the skin of her arms and felt delicious. For once she was outside, surrounded by people and not worried about being brushed against.

  Though maybe she should be worried. What if it was only Nate she could touch?

  He hailed a taxi and ushered her into the backseat, careful as he had been all week not to touch her skin.

  “The Borgata, please,” she told the driver.

  Nate climbed in after her. “No,” he said, “let’s go back to the hotel. You can rest—”

  “The Borgata,” she repeated, more firmly. No more invalid treatment. No more hiding.

  There were a million things she’d never done. Too many things. A wild excitement pulsed through her veins. A thousand possibilities.

  She could eat in a restaurant, dance in a club, go to a movie in a crowded theater where the schmuck next to her would steal her armrest. She could fly on a plane. Go to Egypt or Bermuda or Taiwan. She didn’t know why she should want to go to Taiwan unless she was picking up a few sweatshop workers, but the fact that she could changed everything. It changed her.

  Nate wedged himself against the car door, as far away from her as he could get without leaping into oncoming traffic.

  “What are you doing way over there?”

  “Recovering from the heart attack you gave me on the pier,” he snapped. “And trying to figure out how to talk you into going back to the hotel and leaving the jewel thieves to the professionals.”

  “I thought I was a suspect,” she purred, scooting across the bench seat toward him. “Don’t you want my confession?”

  He leaned away, pressing into the door. “You aren’t a crook. I believe you. Now back off, before you give yourself another seizure.”

  Ciara kept her eyes locked on his, slowly shaking her head. “Nate, for the first time in the last decade, I can touch someone without feeling like someone dropped a cherry bomb into my brain. Do you honestly think I’m not going to take advantage of this for every second it lasts?” She reached out and laid her fingers along his jaw. She listened and the touch sang through her, a perfect pitch ringing sweetly, deep inside her rib cage.

  She slid her fingers down, drawing them along the column of his throat, listening as the note shifted with his every breath. Her eyes fixed on his mouth, the delicious masculine curve of it.

  Ten years. She hadn’t been kissed in ten years.

  “Nate,” she whispered. Her upper body leaned forward of its own volition, closing the distance between them. She wet her lips.

  “This is a bad idea. I don’t think—”

  “Don’t think. It’s overrated.” Ciara’s eyelids lowered, but she watched him through her lashes, not wanting to miss a single detail of the kiss. She brushed her lips ever so softly over his, a fleeting whisper of a touch. His breath was warm on her lips. His stubble grazed her fingertips, the tantalizing spice of his aftershave teasing her nose. Ciara pressed a closed-mouth kiss full on his mouth and a chord struck in her soul. She placed one hand over his heart, feeling his strength through the thin cloth of his shirt. She wanted bare flesh under her fingers. She wanted to bathe in touch, skin to skin.

  Nate kept his mouth closed, his head back. He was frozen against the door, as if afraid to touch her.

  Or as if he didn’t want her touch.

  Ciara drew back. Her eyes flew wide to find him watching her, his gaze steady and concerned.

  “You don’t—” She hesitated. Crap. With her luck, he was probably gay. Just because he seemed like a big strong macho man and gaped at her naked girly bits whenever the opportunity presented itself didn’t mean he wasn’t batting for the other team. “You aren’t—” She couldn’t very well ask him what his sexual orientation was five seconds after she planted one on him.

  God, her people skills sucked. That’s what happened when you lived in a freaking bubble for a decade and learned all of your social skills from the television and internet. Had she missed some signal?

  He watched her. God, the way he watched her. It made her feel like she was edible, sweet and sinful, and he was hungry for some decadent indulgence. Would a gay man look at her like that?

  But if he wasn’t gay, what the hell was he doing cowering beside the door like she was molesting him against his will. His body was eerily still, but his eyes raced over her.

  “Are you okay?” he asked, an odd urgency running under the words.

  Was she okay? She kissed him. He didn’t kiss her back. And now he was concerned that…what?

  “That didn’t hurt you?�
�� His voice was rough.

  Ciara blinked, the pieces suddenly jolting into place. Of course. Mr. All-American was concerned for her well-being. His moral fortitude prevented him from enjoying a kiss if it might be hurting her. Damn moral fortitude. Why couldn’t he just take advantage of her like a normal man?

  “I’m fine,” she assured him in a rush. “Great, actually. It feels amazing.”

  “Good.”

  Before she had time to react to that guttural growl, his hands were on her arms. He hauled her forward across his lap. His mouth crashed down on hers, urging her to open for him, and a symphony exploded inside her. Ciara threw her arms around his neck and held on tight. She parted her lips and his tongue slipped between them, a whip of heat unfurling in her stomach with each flick.

  She didn’t remember kisses like this. She remembered the fumbling, groping, wide-open-mouthed attempts of her adolescence, before her curse hit. This was unlike any of those. This was skill and persuasion, seduction and heat. As a fiery concerto radiated out from her soul, a clenching warmth rose up from her toes, tingling along every nerve. Nate’s hands chased those tingles and multiplied them, tracing her curves through the thin barrier of her clothes.

  He raised his head. His eyes searched hers as they clung together, both breathing rapidly. “Ciara?”

  “More, Nate,” she whispered. “Please, touch me more.”

  He groaned and crushed her to him, instantly obeying. His mouth slanted down on hers and she fell into sensation.

  Score one for the underdog…er…wolf.

  Wolf Tracks

  © 2010 Vivian Arend

  Granite Lake Wolves, Book 4

  TJ Lynus is a legend in Granite Lake, both for his easygoing demeanor—and his clumsiness. His carefree acceptance of his lot vanishes, though, when his position as best man brings him face to face with someone he didn’t expect. His mate. His very human mate. Suddenly, one thing is crystal clear: if he intends to claim her, his usual laid-back attitude isn’t going to cut it.