by Tasha Black
Crush This!
A 300 Moons Book
Tasha Black
13th Story Press
Copyright © 2017 by 13th Story Press All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
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13th Story Press PO Box 506 Swarthmore, PA 19081
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Cover design 2017 by Sylvia Frost
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Contents
Tasha Black Starter Library
Crush This!
Introduction
1. Adrian
2. Lucy
3. Adrian
4. Lucy
5. Adrian
6. Lucy
7. Lucy
8. Adrian
9. Jeremy
10. Adrian
11. Jeremy
12. Lucy
13. Adrian
14. Lucy
15. Adrian
16. Lucy
17. Adrian
18. Lucy
19. Adrian
20. Jeremy
21. Adrian
22. Lucy
23. Adrian
24. Lucy
25. Jeremy
26. Adrian
27. Lucy
1. Crave This! (SAMPLE)
Tasha Black Starter Library
About the Author
Curse of the Alpha: The Complete Bundle
One Percent Club
Tasha Black Starter Library
Packed with steamy shifters, mischievous magic, billionaire superheroes, and plenty of HEAT, the Tasha Black Starter Library is the perfect way to dive into Tasha's unique brand of Romance with Bite!
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This pent-up panther craves release. But he’s determined to crush his feelings before they crush him…
Lucy Wren is a junior director at Glacier City’s premiere casting firm. She spends her days teasing brilliant performances out of the actors she auditions. And she spends her nights fantasizing about her mentor, tall, dark and handsome Adrian Harkness. When a business trip leaves the two of them in closer quarters than planned, Adrian’s animal magnetism will put her determination to hide her feelings to the test.
Adrian Harkness has been under a spell that granted him reprieve from shifting into a massive wild panther. But the magic that held his animal in check for 300 moons is lifting on the very weekend he’s accompanying his brilliant young protégé on the casting trip of a lifetime. Lucy is talented, hardworking, stunningly sexy and one hundred percent off-limits. It doesn’t matter that Adrian is half in love with her. Or that he can tell she’s attracted to him too. She’s a young woman. For her it’s just a crush... And the panther doesn’t respect limits. Or believe in crushes.
When things go sideways, will Adrian unleash his panther to protect the woman he loves? Or will violence crush this romance before it can blossom?
Crush This!
Introduction
Things are changing this year at Harkness Farms…
Kate Harkness has always opened her home, and her heart, to troubled shifter children. Children who shifted early, or lacked the power to control their animal natures. Children who were born to unsuspecting normals, or who were too much for even some shifter parents to handle.
But not too much for Kate Harkness.
With some help from her friends, the children were each given the blessing of a spell to keep their animals in check for the span of 300 moons.
And so for these foundlings, life on Harkness Farms was about as normal as could be.
For a time.
When the first group of shifter children grew up and reached their 300th moons, forces of darkness attacked them - starving shadow demons chasing the vestiges of magic cast off as the spell that protected them wore away.
But recent events have rocked the nearby town of Tarker’s Hollow. And the repercussions are pulling back the veil between the ordinary and the supernatural. All over the world, magical abilities are being quietly awoken in regular people who never suspected their own hidden gifts. And the shadow demons have more magic to chase elsewhere.
With the demons otherwise occupied, Kate hopes that this next group of her foster children will make it through their 300th moons unscathed.
But some memories refuse to stay forgotten.
And some prices won’t remain unpaid.
1
Adrian
Adrian was dreaming.
In the dream, he stood on top of a large, flat rock, surrounded by trees. Everything around him seemed so real, down to the buzz of a passing mosquito. But he knew he was dreaming, because he was a panther.
And Adrian hadn’t been a panther since he was a child.
He stood perfectly still, the stone cool beneath his sensitive paw pads. It was twilight, but his sensitive eyes gave him the ability to see the ferns dancing in the breeze, their lush green only slightly muted by the darkness.
Night birds called, and somewhere in the distance a bell sounded.
But he was so attuned to his olfactory sense, that the others were all but abandoned.
Something juicy moved closer through the trees, its heartbeat thrumming wetly. It smelled like a steak dinner.
His body flattened to the rock before he even realized he wanted to move. The smooth coolness felt good to his warm belly. He folded his ears down, readying himself to pounce.
It moved closer, with quick, tentative steps.
Adrian’s hind end lifted, muscles coiling.
Long minutes passed, but Adrian was unhurried. His mind made fresh calculations with each tiny movement of his prey, his muscles rippled to adjust to every clue.
At last, he was able to see the small furry thing with the long ears. It scampered almost directly below the rock.
But Adrian held off, still refining the angles, determining the speed and power he would expend. Time seemed to slow and he felt perfectly content to restrain himself until the precise instant when his muscles and prey were arranged perfectly.
The rabbit paused, swiveling an ear as if it knew something was amiss.
And just like that, everything aligned.
Adrian allowed his body to release its coiled energy and he landed with his jaws around the unfortunate creature’s neck. It was dead in less than a heartbeat.
The rich scent of blood filled the air, while the liquid itself ran down his parched throat.
As his powerful jaw tore the fresh meat, Adrian swore he was imbibing the creature’s timid soul as well as its savory form. He closed his eyes, tasted clover and felt the sunlight on those sensitive ears.
Then the breeze changed and he let the meat drop from his jaws, forgotten.
She was here.
He would know her scent anywhere.
There was a rustling in the ferns, and Lucy appeared before him.
Her dark curls tumbled down her back over the filmy white dress she wore. She walked slowly to the center of the clearing, like a virgin to the sacrifice.
It might have been an apt comparison. She stimulated his most primal appetites.
Panic engulfed him for a moment. He was a panther. He couldn’t claim her this way. But how could he go from this form to the other? The fur and fangs felt as permanent as his human skin always had. There was no road map telling him how to get to there from here.
Before he finished the thought, the world around him went dark, his sense of smell dwindled almost to nothing, and he was a man again.
He could just make out the silhouette of her against the moon.
“Lucy,”
he breathed.
She turned to him and he remembered that he wasn’t wearing anything. She didn’t seem perturbed to find him there, naked in the moonlight, waiting for her with all his muscles coiled, as if he were still a panther.
He struggled to show restraint, but the patience belonged to the beast alone. Adrian moved to her, and she flowed into his arms as if she had always been there.
“Lucy,” he said again, overwhelmed at the joy of holding her. He tore the gown from her body with one hand, sliding the other hand up to cup her cheek.
Her eyes sought his, her expression so familiar, mimicking his own.
She looked hungry.
With a growl, he pulled her closer as he leaned in and claimed her mouth with his own, trying not to hurt her with the strength of his animal.
She relaxed against him, yielding to him, accepting his kiss.
His whole body pounded with satisfaction and he kissed her harder, lifting her up so that she instinctively wrapped her legs around his waist. She would drive him mad, wrenching emotions from him until he was tender and ferocious at once.
She whimpered, sending his blood boiling with lust.
He broke the kiss to carry her to the rock. He ached with the need to claim her, but first he would lay her down in the moonlight, pleasure her until she was blind with desire.
“Adrian,” she breathed.
“Lucy,” he growled back.
2
Lucy
Lucy Wren woke to the sound of someone moaning her name.
In the moment of blinking wakefulness, she wasn’t sure where she was.
Then it all came back.
She was on an airplane. The warmth pressed against her leg was the thigh of her mentor, Adrian Harkness.
And the deep voice crooning her name was his, too.
Maybe she had misheard him, or simply imagined it in her own grogginess.
A quick glance over at him told her he was sleeping.
I should close my eyes again. I should pretend I’m still asleep so I can listen to him say my name like that again.
But she couldn’t take her eyes off him.
Adrian was so sexy. She had always thought so, even when it was far less appropriate than it was now. He was tall, lean and muscular, with chestnut hair that was too long to be professional, and an inch or two of beard.
His brown eyes could be playful or smoldering. But right now they were closed, the slight movements of his lids letting her know he was dreaming.
“Lucy,” he groaned a second time.
Dear god.
There was no mistaking it. But she chided herself for her overactive imagination. He was probably just dreaming about calling her over to look at another stack of actor headshots. Lord knew they’d done that so much, that she saw them in her sleep.
Of course she could still sit here and pretend it was something else, right? Something more…forbidden?
The Fasten Seatbelts light came on and the screen in front of her told her they were going to be landing soon.
With a sigh, Lucy decided to do the right thing.
“Adrian,” she murmured. “We’re almost there.”
He sighed, but didn’t open his eyes.
She reached out a tentative hand and touched his arm.
In a movement so fast her eyes almost couldn’t track it, his large hand encircled her wrist.
Lucy caught her breath, astonished at the electricity that seemed to flow from his hand into her wrist.
“Hey,” his deep voice brought her attention to his dark eyes.
“Hi,” she squeaked. “Um, we’re almost there.”
He glanced at the Fasten Seatbelts light. “I see.”
“You were dreaming,” she yammered on helplessly.
Suddenly her wrist was free again.
“Really,” he remarked with studied casualness, glancing around the cabin.
Oh, god, it had been a sex dream.
She straightened up, grateful when the captain’s voice came over the speakers, preventing further conversation.
“Ladies and gentlemen, we’re about to land in Myrtle Beach. Weather is fifty-nine degrees and rainy. Thank you for flying with us.”
There were the sounds of seats and trays being returned to their upright positions all around. Lucy slipped her hand into her bag, retrieved her glasses and put them on.
“You look tense,” he observed, calm and collected as always. It seemed unfair that Adrian could keep his cool that way.
“I hate landings,” she said, trying not to make eye contact.
“It’ll be okay,” he said more kindly. “It’s less risky than driving.”
“Yeah, I’ve heard that before,” Lucy replied with an ironic smile. “But it still doesn’t feel right.”
“Well,” he said. “You can’t argue with your feelings.”
What was that supposed to mean?
She was probably just nervous about the landing, and the fact that she’d just caught him dreaming about her.
She wanted to play with the idea, work it over in her mind. But not in front of him.
Adrian Harkness was a powerful person, and like many powerful people, he was moody. While he managed to keep his cool around the clients and the talent, Lucy bore the brunt of his occasional impatience and coldness. Lately it had gotten bad enough that she was considering the idea of moving on - not a step she would take lightly, given that she owed her career to William Howard Casting and, more specifically, to Adrian Harkness.
But his dark moods affected her. And when she was honest with herself, she knew they didn’t just affect her professionally. They affected her personally, more than they had any right to, and more than she cared to admit.
Since her grandmother’s death earlier in the year, Lucy had begun to better appreciate seizing the moment, and chasing happiness while she had the time. But it was easier said than done to walk away from a job and a man she adored on the hope that she could find happiness elsewhere.
The plane jerked and shuddered as the wheels came down.
The lunch she’d eaten during the flight threatened to revisit her. Unthinkingly, she grabbed for her arm rests.
Except that her left hand grabbed Adrian’s arm instead.
She felt that familiar shiver of electricity that happened every time they touched. Then his whole arm went stiff as steel. She glanced up at him.
His expression had turned to one of anger - all flashing brown eyes and clenched jaw muscles.
Uh-oh.
Lucy let go of his arm and felt her cheeks go scarlet with shame.
They were colleagues. She looked up to him. And he had just finished a sexy dream about her. Why was he so bent out of shape that she would touch him when she’d told him she wasn’t fond of flying?
Determined not to let his bad mood get the best of her, Lucy faced forward, smiling back at the flight attendant who was checking everyone’s trays.
3
Adrian
Adrian Harkness ran a hand through his too-long chestnut hair and tried to focus his attention on the stretch of runway outside the window.
Beside him, Lucy turned away, sending her hair cascading over her shoulder and unleashing a whiff of peach shampoo and the intoxicating spice of her own scent.
The flight had been long. Before the dream he’d been tortured by the proximity of his favorite colleague.
It was such an intimate thing to sleep beside someone.
His normally buttoned up and business-like junior associate was the picture of abandon and innocence in her sleep. Her lips curved upward as if she were having a happy dream. Dark lashes kissed her cheeks, while dark curls framed her heart-shaped face and fanned out like a starfish on the seat around her.
When Lucy was awake, she carried herself with beautiful posture, but her body was soft and rounded in sleep.
Adrian had longed to wake her with a ferocious kiss, pin her to the seat and annihilate her with pleasure. He didn’t care how many
passengers watched.
Instead, he had gone to sleep.
And then he’d had a dream about her.
Had he said her name? He thought he might have, and that maybe she’d heard him. He hoped it was all he said.
Not her. You can have anyone you want, Harkness.
Except her. Just get it through your head.
It must have been the millionth time he’d repeated the mantra, but it didn’t seem any closer to convincing him.
It wasn’t just that Lucy had been his intern, once upon a time, or that she was ten years younger. Heaven knew he’d been involved in far less appropriate relationships.
And it wasn’t just the animal inside his body, clamoring to come out, to claim and conquer - something that must be avoided at all costs, and something that the girl herself seemed to urge without realizing it.
No, those weren’t the only reasons he needed to back off.
Lucy was special.
She was a truly gifted casting director - maybe the best he’d ever worked with. Though Adrian had trained her and fought for her promotion, she had come to him fully equipped to make the magic happen all by herself. And her hard work led him to expect she would soon outrank him.
She was that good.
He couldn’t mess that up for the company or for himself. He and Lucy were a fantastic team. And he wasn’t exactly one to keep a relationship going for very long.
