by Nikki Duncan
“I didn’t say it before, because I was still trying to deny it.”
“Deny what?” She knew the answer she wanted to hear. She just didn’t know what it would mean if he said something different.
“I love you, Lana.” He kissed her nose. “From the tiny freckle in the crease of your nose to your perfectly painted toes and every vibrant inch in between.” Brief and tender, he kissed her lips. “Your spirit, your drive.”
The hope she’d been holding back burst forth. Tears streaked down her cheek as he granted her wishes more with every word he spoke.
“I love you,” he said again. Smiling, he wiped a tear from her cheek. “And I trust you with my secrets, because I trust that you’re the only person strong enough to protect them.”
“I love you too, Aidan. And I trust you.”
About the Author
Heart-stopping puppy chases, childhood melodrama and the aborted hangings of innocent toys are all in a day’s work for Nikki Duncan. This athletic equestrian turned reluctant homemaker turned daring author is drawn to the siren song of a fresh storyline.
Nikki plots murder and mayhem over breakfast, scandalous exposés at lunch and the sensual turn of phrase after dinner. Nevertheless, it is the pleasurable excitement and anticipation of unraveling her character’s motivation that drives her to write long past the witching hour.
Whether it’s romantic suspense or contemporary romance with a focus on the lovers, the only anxiety and apprehension haunting this author comes from pondering the mysterious outcome of her latest twist.
Learn more about Nikki by visiting her website at www.NikkiDuncan.com. Nikki is also on Facebook and Twitter at /NDuncanWriter
Look for these titles by Nikki Duncan
Now Available:
Sensory Ops
Sounds to Die By
Scent of Persuasion
Illicit Intuitions
A Killing Touch
Tulle and Tulips
Tangled in Tulle
Twisted in Tulips
Whispering Cove
Wicked
Burned
Her Miracle Man
Coming Soon:
Tulle and Tulips
Handcuffed in Housewares
Fate has a way of rearranging everything…
Twisted in Tulips
© 2012 Nikki Duncan
Tulle and Tulips, Book 2
After months of just getting by on military disability pay, Jace Nichols is going for his dream job in Miami. Until he stops to rescue a woman under attack. Thanks to his deeply ingrained sense of duty, he misses his one-shot-only interview—for a woman who seems more grateful he saved her way-too-sexy shoes than her life.
No one knows better than Misty Morgan that everyone is fighting some kind of battle. Hers is against her snobby family, who look down on her chosen profession as a wedding floral coordinator. Behind Jace’s surly exterior she senses wounds that run deeper than a missing arm.
When Jace spots Misty fending off yet another fawning male. he’s not sure what makes his control snap. The fact that she insists on wearing her skirts too short, or the fact he can’t resist kissing her.
Best to get it over with and give in to one crazy night that should get her out of his system. Instead he finds himself with more second chances than he can shake his steel hook at—if he can find room in his wounded heart for love.
Warning: This title contains a jaded hero and an independent heroine who find that when push comes to push-back, an argument is the quickest route to steamy sex.
Enjoy the following excerpt for Twisted in Tulips:
Jace nursed the beer he’d ordered for another hour and thirty-three minutes. Kyle had left quickly after realizing Jace wasn’t interested in conversation, but the talking armpit of Misty’s date continued to miss the clues of her disinterest.
The longer they sat, the more she glanced in the mirror, occasionally meeting Jace’s gaze. The more she fiddled with the drink she wasn’t drinking and studied the grain of the wooden bar. The more she shifted away, millimeter by millimeter.
Every shift flexed and released the fine muscles in her legs. The more Jace watched those long, lean legs the more clearly he saw her naked except for her stilettos with those legs wrapped around his waist. Her back, held erect in refined posture, would curve as she arched in orgasm.
Her taste, peaches and margarita, lingered on his tongue.
The training drilled into him after years of service kept him from shifting in his seat, but the erection pressing against his zipper increased the challenge. The bigger challenge was stopping himself from crossing the bar a second time.
Misty shifted again. Her skirt slipped a little higher on her thigh.
Jace’s dick twitched. He dropped a shaking hand to his crotch, flattened his palm on his cock and pressed.
Across the bar, Misty flattened a hand on her thigh and rubbed her bare skin.
Rather than ease any tension, the pressure of his hand, the imagined pressure of hers, amped up his arousal. His balls drew tight and without touching the woman haunting him, fully clothed and in a public place, he lingered on the precipice of release.
Before shaming himself, he slid his hand to the middle of his thigh and dug his fingers in until his muscles bellowed with pain. His hunger inched back, not much, but enough for control to slip back to the forefront.
Twenty-eight more minutes passed with him fighting for control when Armpit finally paid the tab and escorted Misty to the door. Not caring if he was obvious, Jace threw some bills on the table and followed.
Whatever it was about the woman he’d rescued that called to him—he’d identify it later—he couldn’t let her walk away and risk never seeing her again. She interested him beyond the desire for sex.
She spoke to him the same as she’d speak to anyone, as if she hadn’t been scared by his arm. Or didn’t care.
Rather than taking a car, Armpit and Misty walked along the sidewalk, close but not intimately close. Satisfaction twitched the muscle between Jace’s nose and upper lip on the left side. She wouldn’t be inviting him over for a nightcap.
After a few blocks, they turned down a side street and stopped shortly at the gate of a small courtyard shared by six town homes. The place was secured with a coded keypad on the gate. Beyond was an immaculately manicured lawn with lights hidden in the foliage that offered a well-lit security among the beauty of the garden.
Fading into the shadows across the street, Jace watched as Misty hugged Armpit goodnight and keyed her code into the gate. He couldn’t see the numbers from his position, but her finger strokes were enough for him to figure it out.
When Armpit had turned the corner at the end of the street and Misty had let herself into the corner home, Jace crossed the street and entered her gate code. Moving like he belonged there, he approached the door that stood between him and the woman of his desires. He rapped twice.
“One minute.” Her muffled call came out husky and a little breathy through the wooden panel. When she opened the door her burgundy suit jacket hung open, a lace-edged camisole in the same color peeked out.
His blood surged with heat.
“What are you doing here? How’d you get through the gate? Did you follow me?”
Driven by instinct, Jace stepped inside, grabbed her hips and backed her to the entryway wall. His mouth descended to hers. His tongue plunged into her warmth.
Misty’s hands gripped his shoulders. Her body arched against his. She mumbled against his lips. “The door’s still open.”
Taking her response as acceptance, he stretched a booted foot behind him and nudged the door closed. No longer caring about her nakedness, at least not for the first time, Jace hitched her skirt to her waist. She released him long enough to take off her thong while he stripped off his boots and jeans and pulled a condom from his wallet.
“You’re prepared.”
“A military man always is.”
“Because you hav
e a woman in every port?”
“Some do. I didn’t.” He eased her jacket off so she stood before him in only her satin and lace camisole and stilettos. From her pale brown eyes to her swollen lips, her fist-sized perky boobs with erect nipples, to the tips of her stilettos the woman was walking sex. And she was his for the night. “Now stop talking.”
“Make me.”
The more she wanted out, the more they dragged her back in.
With A Vengeance
© 2013 Jacqui Jacoby
Daughter to murdered CIA officers, niece to a deputy director, Jaime Walsh has never known life outside the world of espionage. Until a high-action case in Buenos Aires leaves her gutted. Physically, emotionally…and professionally.
She’d planned for her long-overdue vacation to be a time to rest and reassess. With her longtime partner Stephen not far behind, it’s a tropical paradise away from work. A paradise where boundaries will be tested.
From their training days, Stephen Reid has watched Jaime kick ass while performing what has become his second job—watching her back. But now his feelings have grown.
As best friends look at each other in a new light, they like what they see. And Jaime dreams of a new life outside “the company”.
Except someone from their past won’t be satisfied until Jaime and the man she loves are hunted to the brink of death. Now Jaime must find the strength to trust her heart and let go of her fear. Before she loses everything…
Warning: This book contains world travel with stops in exotic locations, a kick-ass heroine who just wants to be left alone and a sexy hero who can’t seem to stop himself from watching her back.
Enjoy the following excerpt for With A Vengeance:
Jaime, Collin and Stephen splashed through the drainage pipe, heading into the belly of the city, long since immune to the stench around them. The pipe narrowed two more feet, forcing them to hunch over. In the dark, they felt their way along the wall, knowing sooner or later they were going to find a manhole or drain from the street or something big enough to let them crawl out of this hellhole.
“Hawaii,” Jaime said, breaking a long silence.
“What about it?” Stephen asked, directly behind her. He kept one hand in hers, the other on the wall.
“I think I’m going to go to Hawaii.”
Collin chuckled from in front of her. Always the heroes, they had stuck her in the middle. Again. “When is that taking place?”
“As soon as I get out of here. I need a vacation.”
Now Stephen laughed. “You wouldn’t know how.”
She stopped to stretch. The roof was too low for her to stand, so she leaned over, stretching her back and arms. “I might surprise you.”
Here in Argentina their job had been simple. To ascertain the production of uranium was used for nuclear reactors and not nuclear weapons. So far, the job had been a piece of cake. Posing as American representatives of the civilian company, Agency of Nuclear Technology, they had easily obtained access to the Ezeiza Processing Plant and the Pilcaniyeu Enrichment Plant.
Rico Chavez, an employee of Ezeiza, had been born in Argentina and educated at MIT. Already suspicious of his superiors’ motives when Jaime had approached him with an offer of cash in exchange for a look into the Ezeiza records, he had readily agreed.
The records indicated nothing improper was happening at the plant, and the crew had been about to call it quits and head home.
Except now Rico Chavez had been hit and Jaime had been seen in the room.
God, I’m tired. Jaime couldn’t even remember the last time she had taken a holiday.
Keeping to the left, they traveled through the maze.
The tunnels led to a ladder. A manhole. The street above. Two cars were parked directly beside them, blocking their ascent to the real world from anyone who might happen by. The rain fell, but it had lost its wrath.
When they crawled onto the street, they didn’t have a clue how far they were from where they entered the drains.
Collin replaced the cover and put his arm over Jaime’s shoulder. They walked off, Stephen two steps behind. The buildings they walked by advertised rooms for rent by the hour.
Collin detoured into a late-night market while Jaime and Stephen leaned against the outside wall.
Collin was back within three minutes, stuffing a small package into his jacket pocket.
They kept moving.
Walking past a dilapidated building whose neon window sign proclaimed the establishment simply as “Hotel”, they exchanged looks, walked over the threshold and got themselves a room.
The clerk’s eyebrows arched when he looked up from his newspaper. His chapped lips spread into a crooked smile over his short, dirty beard when they requested one room for the three of them.
“Si.” He leered. “Si, si.”
If they hadn’t been so tired, if they had cared one iota what this moron thought, they might have defended themselves. But they were and they didn’t, so they let him think his perverted thoughts, grabbed their key and took the stairs to the second floor.
The carpet had been red at one point. Torn and discolored, it fit perfectly with the spotted walls that screamed for paint.
Room 2A. Top of the stairs and to the right.
Stephen entered first, turning on the lights.
Collin shut the door behind them, snapping the lock.
“Bathroom. Now,” Stephen ordered Jaime.
She grunted as Collin pulled out the brown paper bag and tossed it to Stephen. Stephen caught it overhand.
Jaime sat down on the edge of the stained tub, her hands on her knees as she waited for the torture.
The three-by-five bathroom reeked of things living where they shouldn’t be living. Stephen sat on closed toilet seat and used the back as a table. Opening the bag, he pulled out the peroxide, aspirin, gauze and first-aid tape. Stretching his leg out, he reached into his jeans pocket and got out his Swiss Army knife.
She saw him in the mirror on the back of the door as he worked, the concentration etched on his chiseled features, his blue eyes watching his own fingers move.
“This could really use some stitches,” Stephen said.
“And?” she said, wincing when he dabbed at the wound with a cloth soaked in peroxide.
She could see her blood on his fingers and on his watch. A droplet was even running down the back of his hand, but he ignored it.
“FYI,” he said, tossing the cloth into the sink. “You scared me,” he added, looking her straight in the eye before cutting a couple of butterfly bandages.
“You should learn to drive better.”
He smiled. Jaime always loved his smile. It made even the worst times seem okay.
Like now.
“You do need to get another hobby besides babysitting me, you know,” she told him. He smiled again, only this time there was a mischievous edge to it and she knew she would pay.
She did.
He pushed harder on the cut, making her yelp.
“Bastard,” she said.
“Whiner,” he shot back.
Collin appeared in the doorway. “There’s no phone so we can’t check in,” he said.
Jaime winced as Stephen pulled the edges of the cut together with the tape.
“We’ll sleep here and call first thing in the morning,” Stephen said.
“There’s only two double beds,” Collin said. He reached in his pocket and pulled out a coin, positioning it on his bent thumb. “Head’s gets the single. Tail’s gets her.”
A Killing Touch
Nikki Duncan
He’s everything she craves. She’s everything he dreads.
Sensory Ops, Book 4
Journalist Lana Quinn has a way with hard-hitting news. The story she’s uncovered has potential, but she needs the help of her best friend’s FBI team. She’s been rescued by them, worked with them, and partied with them, but convincing the second in command to believe her theory—that a killer’s touch sets off
a lethal allergic reaction—is a frustrating challenge.
Especially since he excites her, body and mind. He’s a danger she shouldn’t indulge.
Aidan Burgess is resistant to helping Lana, but not for the reason she thinks. She has a knack for landing herself in trouble, which means she needs protection. Protecting her means staying near her, a journalist, who like all journalists uses whatever—and whomever—it takes to get her story. It’s a case he wants to refuse.
Especially since she lights a fire in his blood. She’s a danger he can’t afford.
As Lana follows up on lead after deadly lead, learning to trust and rely on each other becomes their only lifesaving hope. If their pride doesn’t become their final pitfall.
Warning: This title contains a grudge-holding hero who gives “kiss my ass” new meaning, a heroine out to prove herself, and a danger that dares them to trust.
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This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.
Samhain Publishing, Ltd.
11821 Mason Montgomery Road Suite 4B
Cincinnati OH 45249
A Killing Touch
Copyright © 2013 by Nikki Duncan
ISBN: 978-1-61921-473-6
Edited by Tera Kleinfelter
Cover by Kanaxa
All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
