Quotes and TEASERS from AWAITED: Durk smiled as if he knew a secret. Well, he did. I was four hundred and thirty-nine years old. Couldn’t really tell Annabelle that, though. But now that I knew she was over the legal age, resting my hands on her hips didn’t feel so wrong.
She stood straight as if the memories flooded back. Her eyes flickered with recognition deeper than sight. It resonated with her soul.
There I sat naked on a plane. No sword. No daggers. No idea what to expect when I landed. I had only the bit of knowledge that I was charged with finding the first female Guardian in over two hundred years. Naked, indeed.
My mind scrambled at her soft finger grazing over me, and I couldn’t get a thought together.
She snatched the paper.
I have many scratches. You have none. “Oh. That. Well…we were lucky.” Lame explanation, but what else was there? Couldn’t very well tell her I was a four-hundred and thirty-nine year-old Guardian. Oh, and by the way, I’d been dreaming of her for three months.
Repeatedly.
I’d hated sitting around the castle these last three months. Save the few small tasks Jessica needed my assistance with, I’d been stuck there. Waiting for an assignment. The training with Durk, Saul and the rest of the Guardians no longer sated my needs. Not since I saw
her.
Doubt etched her smooth face. The darkness of realization bloomed in her sapphire eyes. She knew she was going to die.
“Annabelle,” I whispered.
She captured my gaze and held it strong. Her name sounded like beauty personified as it flowed from my mouth.
Annabelle. Ma Belle. My beauty. Annabelle watched with wide eyes as if absorbing every detail of her surroundings. I got the feeling she understood everything. Perceived even more.
She glanced over her shoulder at me and smiled. God, I wished she could talk. I needed to know what went on in her mind.
More importantly, had she dreamed of me, too?
Annabelle looked down at me with smiling eyes. Like from my dreams. Actually, this very moment reminded me of a dream from only two nights before I boarded that fatal flight. Darkness surrounded her, yet her face, no her smile, beamed as if highlighted by the moon above. Strands of hair shifted in the breeze making for a bronzed halo around her illuminated face.
No. This woman was not human. Couldn’t be. No human could possess such beauty. Her gaze shifted down, and she pressed her lips together. Her brows pulled to a vee, creasing her smooth forehead.
She reached out and smoothed some of my unruly hair back, then rested her palm to my cheek. Her mouth moved, but no sound came out, nor could I make out what she tried to say. She turned at the waist and leaned forward, sliding into my arms with a natural ease. Like she knew I’d catch her, had no doubt she belonged where she’d landed.
“Shhh, don’t cry.” I dared to reach for her again, and she captured my hand. She pressed it flush to her warm cheek. Her eyes brimmed with emotion. If only I could read minds. It looked as if she had so much to tell me.
And I wanted to know everything about her. Then, I would find whoever hurt her and end them.
Violently.
I had seventeen hours with Annabelle.
Ma Belle. Alone. And hopefully uninterrupted.
Here Durk was worried about having feelings for someone young like Jessica. Belle had only been alive for nineteen years.
Now who was the cradle robber?
She was a feast for my eyes. A dream come to life. She padded forward on bare feet, holding my gaze the entire time. My pulse hammered harder with each step she took.
I started to lean back, but she followed me, nipping at my bottom lip. Her grip on my shoulders tightened as if she held a buoy in a stormy sea.
I’d be that for her.
I held my dream in my hands. Was kissing her. Touching her. Maybe it was true that a plain, old Guardian like myself could find love.
A mate.
Or, I’d fallen into a fantasy world that would leave me burned and in want.
So much pain for a person so young. Whether it was right or wrong, I silently vowed to protect her, love her and care for her. I wasn’t sure what that meant for the Guardian castle, but at this moment, I didn’t care. My goal was to find out what happened to her and fix it. Make it better.
Then make her mine.
“Can I say one last thing,
sir?”
“I think you’ve outgrown the
sir part, friend. Right when you bested me with the sword.”
He dipped his head. “So, then I can speak frankly?”
“Can’t promise I won’t hit you if I don’t like what I hear, though.”
“Did she say anything about Belle?”
“Nothing other than she would come check her out, which I immediately said no to.”
“Great. We should expect her in a day or two, then.”
Durk whipped his head around. “She wouldn’t dare.” He cursed as realization smacked him in the face. “She’ll do it because I forbade it.”
“You forbade it? And here I thought
I was clueless about women. Durk, what were you thinking?”
From the rear view mirror I saw Belle shaking her head. Even she knew. There was no telling a woman, especially one like Jessica Hanks, she couldn’t do something.
Another nod. Her tongue jetted out and wet her lip. She audibly gulped. Blackness ate up her honey eyes as her pupils dilated. I leaned forward, drawn in as if hypnotized. She raised up and met me halfway.
I paused, raining kisses at her throat, wishing they’d coax her voice box into working. I pressed my forehead to hers, working to catch my breath. “Let me hear you, Belle. Talk with me.”
A tear glistened and carved a path over her cheek. What had they done to her that she would choose to be forever silent?
“Thank you.” I held her face between my hands. “Maybe you can get things settled. Are you any good at cooking?”
That earned me a huff. We might be ordering out a lot.
The sense deep within my soul danced its familiar dance, alerting me to the presence of evil.
She squeezed my neck with a strength I hadn’t expected from such a small woman. I petted her hair and made my way out of the closet, thankful to be out of the stuffy, small space. Mostly because I held my treasure.
“The things I do for the Light.” I rammed my fingers through what was left of my hair. “Hundreds of years I’ve had long hair.”
Belle bent over her phone, and in the next second mine scooted across the dresser.
Very cute. I huffed. Four hundred and thirty-nine years old and a nineteen-year-old told me I looked cute and my face heated up like a horny teenager.
I normally liked silence. What guy wouldn’t wish for a woman who didn’t talk much, but I craved her voice. So much. Wanted to hear her talk. Say my name. Something.
“I’m not sure I should stay in here with you, Belle.” In fact, I was sure I shouldn’t. My body was already starting to warm up to the idea of sleeping in the same room—the same bed—with Belle.
“So. Um. Immortal? Like, I’m going to live forever? I mean, as long as I don’t get my head chopped off?” Rain clutched her throat.
“So, um, you’re a Guardian? Super strong and old and unbeatable, right?”
“You got the Guardian and super old part right. But obviously even I can be bested since I was brought here.” I winked at her. “But I know a few tricks. I’ll protect you.”
I leaned over the edge. At least five stories to the grass below. I cast her a quick glance. “Ready to try your first stunt as a Guardian?”
Rain squealed and dropped. I dove at her, but her fingers slid through mine. Her scream trailed after her as she plummeted into the darkness below. The ground shifted below me and in the next breath I, too, was weightless, floating through the air.
Well, this was one way to get down the mountain fast.
MAIN EXCERPT on website: My feet finally found the water’s floor. I tugged the female from Durk’s grasp and hoisted her up into my arms.
The water had washed away the crimson stains, but left her lips thin and blue. Durk pressed his fingers to her neck. “No pulse.”
“Go. Find wood dry enough to burn. We need fire. I’ll start CPR.”
He bolted to his feet and darted away. I settled her on the damp foliage covered floor and ripped her buttoned blouse apart. I rested my ear to her chest. Nothing. Cheek to her mouth. Nothing.
I clamped my hands together and started counting out compressions. “Please. You can’t die. I just found you.”
Her chest caved beneath my weight with each push I offered to start her heart. Pumping it for her. She looked so cold. So small. So fragile. Darkness tainted her lips. I imagined they’d be full and bright red like in my dreams. Her glowing skin was now dull and lifeless.
Please. Michael. There must have been a reason for me to be on this plane. This time. This date. This instance. Not to let me find someone I’d dreamt about, then to lose her.
I pinched her nose. With my other hand I cradled her neck and opened her mouth to mine. My lips formed a seal around hers, and I blew. Her chest raised. One more breath.
I turned my head, listening. Nothing.
I repeated it for another cycle. Durk returned holding an armful of branches. He ripped open his pack and pulled out a bag.
“Zip lock?”
“Jessica made an appearance at my room while packing.” He held it up. “I thought she’d lost her mind. Matches, magazine, and tiny foil blanket.”
“You didn’t say anything.”
“Told me not to.”
Durk went to work on the fire as I finished the second round of compressions. I leaned down to breathe for her again and paused an inch before contact with her lips. “Please,” I whispered and sealed her mouth with mine.
I breathed into her, then turned and drew in a gulp of air and let it flow into her. A gentle scent of sandalwood and sugar wrapped around me. Coiled me in warmth. The woman flinched beneath me.
Then coughed.
I tilted her to the side and water spewed from her mouth. A tremor rocked her little body. The crackle of a flame, and the scent of burning leaves filled the air. “There you go. Get it out.” I patted her back.
She flopped back and her eyes opened wide.
The same honey irises I’d seen a hundred times in my dreams stared at me. “Can you hear me?”
The lids hung heavy over her dilated eyes, then slid shut.
“No. No. Stay with me.” I patted her shoulder.
Durk joined me, kneeling beside her on the other side. I pressed my finger to her neck.
“She’s got to be in shock. Freezing. Get that fire going.” I peeled my shirt over my head as I stood. “Find all you can to get a small shelter formed around the fire.” I ripped at the belt securing my soggy pants to me. “I’ll warm her up.”
Wasn’t exactly how I’d dreamed I would first lay with a woman, but I’d be damned if I was going to let her die.
She was mine.
MY BOOKSWasteland (Wasteland, #1) –Available NowISBN: 9781937254018Amazon:
http://amzn.to/pavzwE Barnes and Noble:
http://bit.ly/pbigOg Goodreads:
http://bit.ly/k6NAZa All Romance E-Book:
http://bit.ly/zQE50s Kobo:
http://bit.ly/Iastwa Book Blurb for Wasteland: Salvation comes with a price…Bound by the blood contract his human mother signed four centuries ago, half-demon, David Sadler, must obey his demonic Master’s order to capture fifteen-year-old Jessica Hanks. But as he learns more about her, he realizes she may be the key to freedom from his demonic enslavement.
The only obstacle—Jessica’s distractingly beautiful Guardian, Rebeka Abbott. He must not give in to their steamy chemistry, or he will lose his humanity. But fresh off a quarter millennia of sensory deprivation as punishment for not retrieving his last target, he may not be able to resist temptation long enough to save what’s left of his human soul.
"A pulse-pounding adrenaline surge brimming with poetic pyrotechnics, Rush’s story caresses your heart. Wasteland is a game-changer in the ho-hum angel/demon world. Beautifully written prose, strong characters and a compelling plot will keep readers hooked until the last page." --Romantic TimesAwaited (Wasteland, #2) –Now AvailableISBN: 9781937254216Amazon Print: http://amzn.to/HTGzgR Amazon Kindle: http://amzn.to/IDvp4H Barnes & Noble: http://bit.ly/JewjTXAll Romance E-Book: http://bit.ly/HHTx2U Kobo: http://bit.ly/JrPIDiGoodreads: http://bit.ly/AAxAz4 Book Blurb for Awaited:
The voice is a powerful thing. . . Russell Leonard is a centuries-old Guardian who’s lost faith in his purpose. So when he’s charged with procuring the first female Guardian in over two centuries, he can only hope it’s the red-headed beauty who’s been haunting his dreams for months. And if it is, he intends to claim her as his. But when he finds his dream woman, Annabelle is mute and bears no Guardian’s Mark.
He soon realizes she’s been tainted by an ancient evil. Russell must somehow release the secrets trapped within this delicate soul to help her tap into the only weapon powerful enough to silence a millennia-old demon--
her voice.
“From the first action-packed scene, AWAITED grabs you and doesn't let go until its awesome conclusion.” ~~Caridad Piñeiro, NY Times Best-Selling AuthorPrelude to Darkness (Wasteland, # .5) Now AvailableISBN: B00814YWBA Amazon: http://amzn.to/JMgGz9 Goodreads: http://bit.ly/wnP9zi Book blurb for Prelude to DarknessFor a slave, hope is a dangerous thing…Margaret Rousseau dreams of freedom from a life of servitude. When a mysterious woman saunters into the servants’ tavern promising the impossible, Margaret dares to hope she could win the heart of the one man she has secretly coveted since she first wore a corset...
The Prince.
Margaret desperately grasps for the opportunity to change her bleak destiny by placing faith in a woman who is not as forthcoming as she seems. Blinded to the stranger’s dark motives, Margaret surrenders herself to gain her heart’s desires.
But her choice may bring forth a darkness that could destroy all she holds dear.
