by Tate James
“No, it’s perfect,” I promised, pulling him back down so I could press our mouths together.
We stripped each other slowly, learning each other’s bodies with the kind of exquisite reverence that only happened when you’d waited for that moment, longed for it, dreamed about it, for years. We’d been given a second chance, and we wanted to savor it.
We touched and kissed and explored until we couldn’t wait any longer. Krew settled between my thighs and held my gaze with his as he pushed inside me, filling me up with his thickness. We gasped, moaning at the intense pleasure as we joined for the first time, but never looked away.
He moved over me, inside me, with slow, steady thrusts. With deliberate patience, he carried us closer to the edge, heightening and prolonging our release until we were both slick with sweat and breathing raggedly.
I cried out his name, both a warning that I couldn’t hold back and a demand that he stay right there with me. A hard shudder traveled through him at my cry, ending on a deep groan. “Come for me, my Mer. Let me feel you,” he growled, thrusting inside me harder, faster, pushing us both over the edge.
I screamed as I came, echoed by Krew’s roar, every muscle in our bodies locked up with the power of our orgasms.
We were both shaking and panting by the time we came down.
“I love you, Mer. Always have, always will. I’m never going to let you go,” he swore, our bodies still intertwined as he stared at me from inches away, the love and devotion in his emerald eyes so intense they took my breath away.
“Good, because I’m never letting you go either.”
There were no guarantees in life, no way to know what the next day might bring, but I knew with absolute certainty that Krew, Denver, Tatum, and I would face whatever life threw at us, together. They were my home and I was theirs.
THE END
About the Authors
To read more from these authors please follow on Amazon:
Amazon.com/Coralee-June/e/B078MXL6HS
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www.authorcoraleejune.com
TEN CATS PARANORMAL SOCIETY: POSSESSED
Part One
C.M. Stunich
Description
Ghosts? Ghouls? Demons?
No problem! Ten Cats Paranormal Society, at your service.
We guarantee a spirit-free home—because if we don’t, the gig is up, and our con’s revealed.
Hi, I’m Alexiah Harcourt, and I pretend to hunt ghosts for a living.
But really, I’m just a professional liar.
My boss is even better at it, but I’m in love with his lies anyway.
Our resident demonologist is an asshole; I hate him so much my chest hurts sometimes.
The King of Ghosts and Demons has cursed us, but also he wants me as his bride.
Oh, and I’m pretty sure there’s something fishy going on with that six-toed cat.
We trick people into believing our lies.
Now, our lies are nightmares turned reality.
If we can’t work our biggest con yet, we’re all screwed six feet under.
I never should’ve opened that damn box.
1
“No Such Thing as Ghosts … or Unicorns
But They Both Make Money on T-shirts!”
I hunt ghosts for a living.
Okay, so that's a lie. I con people for a living. Well, my boss, Dutch Wylde, cons people for a living. Mostly, I just watch.
“I feel a very strong spiritual presence in here,” Dutch murmurs, tilting his bowler hat down and giving me a little smirk and a wink that the client isn't supposed to see. Because Dutch is such a professional, she doesn't. All she sees are those cunning silver eyes of his, like newly minted coins.
“Probably a strong wind,” the client's husband sneers, grabbing his coat and heading for the front door. He pauses next to me as I wince; I’ve got a headache coming on, but it’s not bad. I get them all the time, sometimes to the point of incapacitation. This one’s just a little niggle behind the eyes.
I do my best to keep smiling politely—that’s sort of my job—as the man looks me over in my pleated skirt and white button-up. I hate wearing my school uniform on the job, but sometimes Dutch books these things so last minute I don't have time to change. Good thing I only have a few months left before I graduate.
“I assure you, sir, that there’s a case here, one that we’ll be documenting extensively.” Dutch gives his biggest, brightest smile as I ignore the slight flickers at the corners of my eyes. I’ve always seen floaters—the term my optometrist gave to the bright balls of light that are always floating just outside my field of vision. I’ve been to doctors galore, had my fair share of eye exams and CT scans, but I’ve heard the same thing a million times over: it’s all in my head.
“If you want to be taken by con artists, honey, you go right ahead.” The man—a Mr. John Nowaki—storms past me, slamming the front door so loud that I cringe, my skirt ruffling in the breeze. I pretend to be enthralled by my iPad as the cats hiss in their carriers behind me. Angry reactions from skeptical family members? Check. We’ve been here, done this before.
“Not very spiritually sensitive, now is he?” Dutch asks, making a circle around the room and pausing with his fingers on the edge of a framed family photo. He's the consummate actor, Dutch is, but I feel he stares at the picture for just a beat too long, so I clear my throat.
That's my job in all of this, keeping the leash on Dutch.
He spins around with a magnanimous smile, touching two fingers to the brim of his hat. His silver-blue hair peeks out in tufts from underneath as he refocuses his attention on our resident techie, Luke James.
He's checking an EMF meter and raising his eyebrows in a very convincing performance.
“The readings in this room are off the charts,” he stage whispers to Dutch, showing him the EMF meter—a real one that they rigged, so that they're able to make the little lights jump whenever they want. They pretend like they’re trying to hide this information from Mrs. Nowaki, while making it quite easy for her to ‘overhear’ them. They needn’t overdo it: our client looks terrified already. “I think it'd be best if we set up surveillance equipment, see what we can capture before we bring in the medium.”
“A medium?” the woman asks, glancing over at me with soft, brown eyes. Do I feel bad for taking advantage of her? Of course I do, but I'm an eighteen year old who's still in high school that needs a place to live and a job. I'm doing what I can. “You think we need a medium?”
Dutch glances up from the EMF meter and lets this horribly grave expression fall over his gorgeous face. I keep wondering why he chose to become a paranormal researcher instead of a rock star (okay, so he can't sing but there's always Auto-Tune) or a model or something.
Anyway, his acting is on point, so if he ever wants to move from conning people to starring in films …
“We have a very trusted medium in TCPS,” Dutch begins, using the acronym for our … well, his business: Ten Cats Paranormal Society. There's a good reason for that name, too. Actually, there are ten of them. A mewl escapes from one of the carriers behind me, and I glance over my shoulder to see Tom Thumb, one of Dutch's cats sticking his paw out between the metal bars. He manages to hook a single claw into my knee-high socks and snags them.
Figures.
I step away and glance down at the iPad again where ‘Medium Schedule’ is listed at the top of my spreadsheet. I see we have ten appointments already booked for this week. Squeezing another one in is ludicrous, but the landlord's just raised the rent again and Dutch is desperate to keep the Ten Cats office up and running.
“We bring her in on cases that are … more severe. And we don't tell her a thing about the property or the occupants. The only thing we give her is the address.” Dutch grabs the lapels of his gray jack and snaps the fabric to shake out any imaginary wrinkles. The client nods, twisting her hands in her dress. She's report
ed faces peering in the windows at night, footsteps on the roof, and claims someone—or something—was in her bedroom yesterday morning.
If there's something real to be found here, we'll find it and deal with it.
And then we'll make up a lie pretending it was ghosts, collect our money, and move on.
“Is the medium included in the standard fee?” the woman—I think her name is CoraLee—asks as she glances from me to Dutch. He sweeps in and wraps an arm around her shoulders, guiding her away from the living room and toward the kitchen.
I can hear him using what he calls his make-the-sale voice.
“There's no price that can be put on the safety of your family, Mrs. Nowaki. Don't worry: Ten Cats will negotiate a fee you can afford.”
He disappears around the corner and I exhale, closing my eyes for a moment.
“You're still not used to this, are you?” Luke asks, moving over to the stacks of carriers and peering inside at a Siamese cat named Angel. He wiggles his fingers and the cat hisses at him. Angel only likes Dutch.
“I don't think I'll ever get used to it,” I say, tucking pink hair behind one ear. The right side is only about shoulder-length, but the left hangs down past my waist. It used to all be waist-length, but part of it was burned in the accident and I haven't had the heart to cut the rest to match. “Six months in, and I still cringe every time the phone rings.”
Luke gives me a sad half-smile and runs his palm over his super short blue hair. He dyed it to match his favorite book character. I'd say nerd alert, but his shirt literally says it for me. And besides, I’ve got no room to talk: I trip over my own shadow, blurt random trivia facts when embarrassed, and sleep with a nightlight. I may even out-nerd him.
“We do help people though,” Luke suggests, but I've heard that argument before.
Usually we help people. Usually. But if we don't get enough calls, then we start making work for ourselves. That's what I really don't like.
“Let's just prep the cats, shall we?” I ask, setting my iPad aside. Because even if we con people, at least we give them a damn good show for their money. I open my big leather bag and pull out the old coffee tin with the treats. Dutch makes them homemade, just like his mother used to. These animals will walk on water to get a bite of the goodies he whips up.
With a click of my tongue, I signal that it's time to get to work and all the cats sit pretty in their carriers. I pass treats through the bars, open the doors, and then give a second round of snacks.
Not a single cat steps out of their carrier without being told to.
When Dutch comes back in, we're ready for him.
“Cats are spiritually sensitive animals,” he explains, holding his hands out in the direction of the carriers, stacked two high in rows of five. “The ancient Egyptians knew that. And if that's good enough for the pharaohs, it's good enough for me.” Dutch flashes another grin and snaps his fingers.
The kitties hop from their kennels, and take off through the house. They're searching for the treats I planted earlier while Dutch was distracting the homeowners, but Mrs. Nowaki doesn't know that, now does she? She stares in fascination as Tom Thumb—a black cat with a smudge of white on his forehead that looks like a fingerprint—circles around the living room and then sits in the center of the area rug, staring up at a point on the ceiling.
“Do you see that?” Dutch whispers in an excited rush, eyes sparkling. He's so sincere, I almost believe the act. “This must be the spirit's access point.”
“Access point?” Mrs. Nowaki asks as Dutch rushes into the living room and kneels down beside the black and white cat, sliding a treat from inside the sleeve of his weathered gray military jacket. He says his great-great-whatever-grandfather wore it in the Revolutionary War, but it's hard to tell which of Dutch's stories are true and which are lies. I figure at least half are made of glitter and unicorn shit.
“A portal, so to speak,” Dutch continues, and when he says the word portal, Tom Thumb stands up on his hind legs like a prairie dog or a squirrel or something. I see the corner of Dutch's mouth twitch as I pretend to sneeze—another trigger for the cats—and several more of them rush into the room.
Upstairs, we hear the thump of several items falling to the floor.
That's no accident.
Dutch frowns dramatically and stands back up, coat billowing with the motion. He looks like a war hero, the way he raises chin and curls his hands into fists at his sides. My heart skips a beat, but I crush my crush, so to speak, and focus on the job at hand.
I spend far too much time crushing on Dutch Wylde as it is.
“Do you hear that?” he asks, and the cats in the room with us begin to hiss while upstairs, our secret weapon continues to knock objects off shelves and dressers.
“Isn't that just the cats?” Mrs. Nowaki asks, swallowing hard, but even she doesn't seem convinced. Doubt is a mighty powerful thing.
“I assure you my cats are trained not to disturb a homeowner's property.” Dutch slides two fingers between his lips and whistles, and the remaining cats reappear.
Well, all the cats the homeowner knows about.
We're called Ten Cats Paranormal Society … but there are really eleven.
Put two black cats in the same carrier though, and nobody knows the difference.
Dutch makes a serious show of counting them.
“That makes ten,” he says, and then we all jump as a huge crash sounds directly above our heads. Dutch and Luke exchange looks, and then take off for the stairs. “Stay with Mrs. Nowaki!” he shouts as the two of them pound up the steps, and the client looks like she's about to have a heart attack.
“It'll be okay,” I promise her, but even my pulse is pounding. I'm always afraid that one day, we'll get caught … or that one day these lies will catch up to us. Using the whistle around my neck—because I can't whistle with my fingers like Dutch—I call the cats back to their carriers and purposefully close up all ten.
The illusion works best this way.
When I turn around, I see Mrs. Nowaki staring up at the second floor with eyes clouded by fear. Syxx—a very aptly named pussy with six toes on each front foot—sneaks up behind her and scratches her on the back of her bare calf. The woman screams and whirls, but Syxx is already gone, hiding in the shadows. He’s the smartest one of the bunch, even more clever than Tom Thumb.
“Something scratched me!” she screams, reaching down and lifting away fingers tipped with blood. She stares at the glistening ruby red until Dutch and Luke come flying back down the stairs. Dutch's shirt is torn, and he's panting so heavily I almost believe there's something really wrong with him.
“Something got me, too,” he whispers, gingerly touching the three big scratch wounds on his chest and grimacing like it hurts. In all reality, he's just got the blood and gut makeup skills of a Hollywood special effects artist. “Luke, document this.”
“On it, boss,” he says, lifting up the old fashioned camera from the strap around his neck. I once made the mistake of asking why we didn't just use our phones to take pics, and got a lecture on staging, impact, and photography. Silly me. Luke snaps a few shots of Dutch's chest before he asks, “May I?” and kneels down to look at Mrs. Nowaki's leg. “Um, Dutch, I think you should see this.”
Dutch bends down next to him and makes a choking sound that causes Mrs. Nowaki to jump.
“What is it?” she asks as Dutch stands back up and meets her stare with a hard, dark gaze.
“Three scratches,” he says, flicking his eyes briefly down at Mrs. Nowaki's rosary. She clutches it in her fist and meets his eyes when he lifts them back up. “We might be dealing with more than just a ghost here.”
“What do you mean?” she asks as I cover each cat carrier with a glittering velvet cloth. Once I'm finished, I'll need to make notes on my iPad, reminding us who has what wounds and where, so Dutch can recreate them for our next session with the Nowakis. I feel a muscle in my cheek tick.
I know where this conversation
is going, and I'm already annoyed by it.
“These three scratches,” Dutch continues, pointing at his own chest. “These are mockeries of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Mrs. Nowaki, I don't necessarily think it's ghosts we're looking at here: I think we're dealing with demons.”
“You didn’t tell me Rhythm was working this job with us,” I whisper to Dutch as we climb out of the old van with the Ten Cats logo on the side. Dutch has nicknamed the vehicle Lorraine, after Lorraine Warren, a woman who’s either the greatest ghost hunter or the greatest con artist of all-time, depending on who you ask.
The door sticks and only opens if you kick it, and the damn thing has over two-hundred thousand miles on it, but the old Aerostar is Dutch’s baby. I’m pretty sure he’ll never sell it. It belonged to his mom, after all.
“Why would Rhythm working the gig be a problem?” Dutch asks, totally and completely ignoring me as he focuses on the beautiful blond girl standing inside the grimy window of our office. Pain crashes over me as I catch a glimpse of his flirty face, always directed at someone else and never at me. I roll my eyes, but it’s all a front to block how upset I really am, focusing instead on Luke as he struggles with his equipment bag behind us. Usually, Tate, our resident psychic, helps him carry our gear. That girl is crazy strong.
“Aren’t you always complaining he only works half the jobs, but takes a fifth of all the commissions?” Luke inserts, huffing and puffing under his breath. I take one of the camera bags from him, and give the back of Dutch’s head a pointed look.
“We spent all of last night screaming at each other,” I remind them both with a sigh. “Rhythm broke my laptop. I’m not really in the mood for working with him right now.”
