Fire in the Smokies (Durham Wolves)
Page 16
Enjoy the following excerpt for Rescue in the Smokies:
A strong whiff of his mate made Sergius lift his head.
She was close. She was also alive. If he could have sighed audibly in wolf form, he would have.
Serg ran. Fear of what he would find made his blood boil.
He pushed through a grove of trees and suddenly she was there, right in front of him, sleeping on a bed of leaves, curled up in a tight ball under a shiny Mylar cover.
He stood for several seconds, staring at her. His chest heaved from the mad dash to find her. He took a deep breath in and held it.
She was slight compared to him. Long, gorgeous, red curls feathered out in every direction, some covering her face.
The urge to lurch forward and nuzzle her made his front paws twitch.
He needed to shift and get her to safety, but he also wanted to burn this moment into his memory, the second he first saw his mate. His jaw clamped down on the pack he carried, his dry mouth reminding him of its presence.
Finally, he backed away from her several yards, hiding himself amongst the bushes he’d come through to let the change take him back to human form.
In two minutes, it was over and he was dressed. And this was why he always carried the cumbersome pouch.
She was so still.
He crouched beside her. Her breaths were shallow, her face totally relaxed in deep sleep. He laid a hand on her shoulder. “Juliana?”
His fingers shook where they’d made contact with her warmth, shockwaves traveling up his arm even through the jacket and whatever she wore underneath. The urge to haul her into his embrace made him tense. He needed to know she was all right. Every bit of her.
She startled awake and bolted upright. “Ohmygod,” she gasped. A strangled sound left her throat.
Her gaze met his from only a few inches away, green eyes like deep pools of water reflecting her shock, her fear and her relief all at once.
“Are you okay?”
She smiled up at him, cute dimples forming on both cheeks. “I am now.” She inhaled, releasing it slowly.
Her heart rate slowed under his palm after the initial surprise. He could feel her pulse in her neck, the swish of blood as it coursed through her.
“Are you injured?”
“Only my pride.” Her pale face tipped back again, her cheeks now flushed. “How did you find me? Where am I?”
“You’re a long way from where you left the path, that’s for sure. Scores of people are combing the woods searching for you.” In a completely different direction. But she didn’t need to know that right now. “How did you get so far from where you started?”
“A man recommended I take a shortcut. When it got late I backtracked. I must have taken a wrong turn, because before I knew it, it was dark. I walked for a little longer and finally saw a light in the distance.” She dipped her head down, her face no longer visible to his perusal. “How embarrassing. I hike hundreds of miles every year. I’ve never gotten lost before. I-I’m not sure how this happened.”
“It doesn’t matter. You’re okay now. Everything is going to be fine. Did you walk all night? You must be exhausted. Hungry.” He was rambling. He never rambled. She had him tongue-tied. No, he’d never acted like this even as a youngster. Wolves didn’t fall all over themselves quite like humans did. Not until they met their mates, apparently.
She giggled. The sweetest sound he’d ever heard. “I think I’m okay. Relieved you found me. Wasn’t sure what I was going to do if I had to keep walking all night again.”
Why had she chosen to travel by night and sleep by day? Sure, it was a better idea as far as warmth was concerned, but not many people would think of such a thing under stress.
Sergius stood and extended his hand to her. She rose alongside him, steadying her slight frame. But her grip sent his mind whirling. Every hair on his body felt electrified. His heart raced. And damn if his c**k didn’t jump to attention.
Lord, she was half a foot shorter than his six feet. And might weigh one fifteen, one twenty, soaking wet.
He could feel the firm muscles on her arms where his hand had landed as they stood. She was strong, apparently both physically as well as emotionally. She hadn’t started crying as he would have expected and didn’t appear to have spent the night crying either. Her eyes weren’t puffy, but weary. Stress lines marked her face.
“Why did you walk all night?”
“Well, the light for one. I thought it was a campfire, but it always remained elusive. I was sure if I followed that damn light, there had to be people around wherever it led when I got there. The strange thing was it was like a mirage. It seemed to keep moving farther away the closer I got to it. Exasperating, really.” She chuckled. “Now it seems absurd. Maybe I imagined the damn thing.”
Her brow furrowed and she bent to examine herself and brush off the twigs and leaves sticking to her body.
Serg reached to pull a leaf from her hair and tucked the unruly strand back behind her ear. When his thumb brushed her cheek, a shock jolted him. She jerked her gaze up to his and sucked in a breath.
She was so beautiful, even with tangled hair and a streak of dirt across her chin. Her round face was pale against his darker hand, a light sprinkling of freckles above her button nose. Sergius let his thumb travel across her cheek again, cupping the side of her head with his palm. His gaze traveled around her face, landing finally on her heart-shaped pink lips, which quivered as she licked the dryness away and tucked the bottom one inside, biting it between her teeth.
Her breath rate increased, in and out through her nose, while she dented that bottom lip with the tight grip of her front teeth.
Did he turn her on? He hadn’t been around mated couples for so long he’d forgotten what it was like when wolves met their mates.
His own heart was racing, threatening to pound out of his chest. He tried not to breathe too often or too deeply, because every inhale dragged more of her sweet essence into him, driving him crazy with the need to take her.
She was ready for his steel, but not for his flesh.
Mistress of the Stone
© 2012 Maria Zannini
Luísa Tavares has a list of sins the length of the Antilles, but there’s no time to repent for them now. When a pockmarked Frenchman hands her Papa’s ring—still attached to his severed finger—she orders the Coral back to the Caribbean, despite her father’s earlier warning never to return.
It’s Luísa’s luckless fate that the only man who can help her is a blasted Inglés pirate hunter who’s more dead than alive and locked in a curse he doesn’t want lifted. Worse, his feral sensuality sparks a hunger she can’t ignore.
Xander Daltry hadn’t planned on kidnapping this wild woman—or succumbing to his uncontrollable desire for her. But he needs Luísa and the moonstone she wears around her neck to rescind a witch’s spell. His sister, long dead, and others like her have been cursed to remain in the mortal plane for eternity. Only the stone can set them free.
The only way to convince the reluctant pirate queen to help him is to withhold one small bit of the truth. For if she learns who really betrayed her father, the longing in her fiery eyes could easily turn to murderous wrath…
Warning: Contains a pirate queen with a sacred gem, a werewolf with an agenda, an island where nothing is as it seems, and a hero with a Jolly Roger that’ll make you purr like a kitten.
Enjoy the following excerpt for Mistress of the Stone:
Xander awoke with the delicate arm of a woman across his midsection. He looked down and smiled to find Luísa lying next to him.
He scanned the dim room. His sister wasn’t here as far as he could tell. Even invisible, she usually manifested a faint mist of effervescence.
It hurt to move, but he managed to turn so he could face his bunkmate.
She was a lovely she-cat. Her skin was smooth and tanned, and her hair was the color of Brazilian mahogany. Her soft, pouty mouth begged for kissing. But so young.
He pushed a curl of dark hair off her face.
She’d enter the tomb for him. He was sure of it. But he had to get her through the jungle first, before Saint-Sauveur retook their trail. The merged stone could only be used once and only on the blood moon. He had no right to choose who was worthier of freedom, but he was willing to take that license if it meant saving his little sister from an eternity without rest.
The curse of the werewolf was an act of God. There was no guarantee the moonstone would even help the lycan. But it would help the lost souls. It was Luísa’s ancestor and that cursed stone that had trapped the dead on this island in the first place. Only the stone and the Sorceress’s descendent could set them free. And both were within his grasp.
Luísa stirred momentarily, looking like a flower stretching its petals outward.
Xander felt unusually guilty. This wasn’t her fight. It wasn’t her burden, but without the girl’s help, their suffering would have been for naught.
A monkey’s rowdy chitter redirected his attention. He looked up at an unshuttered window above their makeshift bed. There, looking quite the dandy, was Koko, Sibyl’s Capuchin monkey.
He was a reckless little fellow with warm brown eyes that looked like pools of melted cacao and a grin that always betrayed his wicked intentions. The saucy monkey was a thief—and a good one too.
Koko wound his way down to Luísa’s side. He seemed as much in awe of her beauty as Daltry, but it was the moonstone pendant she wore around her neck that caught his fancy.
With Luísa on her side, the only thing Koko could see was the glimmer of silver surrounding the watery blue stone, but that seemed enough to lure the naughty monkey into more nefarious deeds.
It began with a little paw gently pulling her hair out of the way so he could see his prize. Luísa turned around then so that she lay flat on her back. The little heathen grinned with delight.
The pendant reburied itself under her shirt leaving Koko with only one possible solution. With his tail hooked around the base of the window, he rolled his body until he hung upside down. Once in position, he unbuttoned the top button of her shirt, looking up at Daltry only once to make sure his deed wouldn’t risk intervention.
Daltry felt a similar lascivious grin creeping on his mouth. He perched his head on one hand and, like a grand potentate, waved permission to Koko with the other.
Koko widened his mouth to a toothy grin, a wet excited breath escaping through his teeth. The monkey snapped a perfectly English salute before pawing furiously on a second button.
Daltry began to have stirrings of his own. His wounds were healing, but it hurt to take a deep breath. That didn’t seem to stop his sex from returning a firm salute of its own.
The depraved little beast, (the one with monkey breath), wormed his way down to the third button even though he could easily cup the prize in his greedy hands.
It was then Luísa woke up. Her eyelids fluttered a bit before they opened, but when they did they flew wide, her soft pouty lips following suit, screaming a slew of curses Daltry had never heard from a woman before.
She jerked to a sitting position even while Koko jumped back, mimicking her screams octave by octave, his little hands shooting into the air in submission.
Daltry, who had been showered with loosened monkey fur and spit when Koko made his hasty retreat, barked a laugh that ended with a painful wince. He didn’t care. The look of horror on both these heathen creatures was worth the suffering.
He choked back his laughter when Luísa smacked him with her grass-woven pillow.
“Were you going to let that beast undress me?” She screeched at him like a wheel about to come off its pins.
Daltry caught his breath and held on to his sides. “Come now, luv. It’s not as if this love affair would ever last. He only wanted you for your treasure.”
Luísa smacked the pillow straight at his face and jumped up, grabbing her shirt closed as she did so.
Koko, ever the accommodating mercenary, clapped his little hands at the magnificent beating, then saluted Luísa on a job well done.
“I’m not through with you either, little man,” she said, pointing a finger at the monkey.
Koko clasped his paws together and hung his head in a penitent pose. He lifted his eyes only once to see if Luísa was still watching.
Her mouth twisted to a smirk and then a full grin before she broke into laughter.
“Blasted monkey. No doubt he belongs to you.”
Daltry sat up against the wall and gestured to the monkey. “You could say Koko is his own man, but he always has an eye out for pretty girls, especially those wearing shiny baubles.”
“Bah!” She barked at Koko, shoving her hands at him.
Koko returned the compliment by jumping on the mat between them and hooting at her.
Luísa crossed her arms. “You don’t impress me, beast.”
The monkey seemed to think about this for a moment before he raced up her leg and into the crook of her folded arms, bussing her cheek with a kiss of apology.
What little resolve she had left washed away in an instant. “You little imp,” she said and cradled him in her arms.
Koko leaned his head against her chest and sucked his thumb.
Luísa pulled out the pendant and showed it to him. “You see. It’s not much. A worthless blue stone on a silver chain. My boots cost more.”
Koko listened to her intently while fondling the jewel. At long last, he seemed to agree with her assessment and gave her another kiss before jumping out the window.
Xander snorted a laugh. “Do your lovers always leave you so quickly?”
“You’re not funny. That hairy beast scared the devil out of me.”
Daltry didn’t smile. “It seems I’ve given you cause to know worse.”
Luísa swallowed visibly. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it that way. Your sister told me about your affliction. It startled me at first, but I understand now.”
“It’s not an affliction. Being a werewolf isn’t the curse. It’s not knowing when the change will come on that causes us grief. We can’t control it—not on our own anyway.”
“That’s why you use the wolfsbane. To keep you from turning involuntarily.”
“Yes. But it’s a false blessing. The wolfsbane is addictive, and it takes more and more of that vile weed in order to control our urges. That’s why so many of our kind live here, where we won’t frighten anyone should the change take us unaware.”
“But you don’t live here. I’ve heard stories of you sailing the seas for years.”
Daltry looked away. “Yes. After my sister…” He looked up, his brow furrowed in anger. “My sister—”
Luísa knelt down and put her hand on his arm. “She’s dead. I know. She told me. She said Saint-Sauveur killed her.”
“Aye, and that devil has stayed out of my reach since then. It takes a whole army to watch his back, and every were-tribe on the island recognizes him as pack leader.” His hands curled into fists. “But I’ve not forgotten my oath. I’ll have his wolf’s head if it’s the last thing I do on this Earth.”
“Then we both have a score to settle. I want Saint-Sauveur too. He has my father, and I intend to get him back.”
“We’ll get your father, luv, then I’ll get you both off this island.” He sat up straighter and squinted in the dim light, trying to locate his sister, but it seemed he and Luísa were alone. “Why isn’t my sister here?”
“She said she had to gather allies for you.”
Daltry grunted. “Allies! Damn that girl. She’s wasting her time. She’s probably gone to visit Jovis, the werewolf leader on this island. I wish she had waited for me to wake up. I don’t like her going alone.”
“No disrespect, but I don’t see that there’s much that can harm a ghost. I’m sure she’ll be
fine.”
“Aye. You’re right, of course.” He sighed in resignation. “She’s suffered so at my expense. If I had been there for her—”
“Someone was with her. She said she didn’t die alone.”
He huffed at her. “So she tells me. But she refuses to name this guardian and that vexes me.”
Luísa’s quirked her mouth into a lopsided grin. “Sibyl lit up when she spoke of her companion. Methinks it was a paramour—and she doesn’t want a troublesome brother giving him grief.”
Daltry nodded. “I knew she’d been seeing someone before she died. I suspected it was someone from the pack. Sibyl caught the attention of every werewolf on the island.” He barked a laugh. “I was always running them off.”
“You love your sister very much.”
“Aye, I do. She’s the only kin I have who hasn’t turned her back on me. If Saint-Sauveur hadn’t reached you first, I would’ve stolen you off the Coral and brought you here myself. I want only to give Sibyl peace. You understand, don’t you, Luísa?” He shifted and looked at her hesitantly. “I’m not asking for myself, but for her.”
Luísa fussed with the pendant at her breast. Hesitantly, she raised her eyes, then planted a soft kiss on his cheek. “You saved my life, Xander Daltry. Man or wolf, I owe you a debt.”
“Luísa, you should understand the risks.”
“I understand family. And I understand duty. I still think you have the wrong woman, but lead me to this second moonstone and I’ll gladly do what I can.”
Daltry felt his apprehension evaporate. “Bless you,” he whispered.
Luísa fingered the knotty weave of the grass mat bed. She glanced up at him before casting her gaze elsewhere. “You’re probably hungry. I’ll see what I can muster.” She stood up, careful to step around him.
Daltry scrunched the blanket around his loins. He was uncomfortably aware of an erection that refused to diminish.
“Sibyl usually keeps tea for me in that little gray jar above the hearth.”