by Eden Butler
“Mine? Why me?”
Bane sighed, holding my face still. “Because you’re the only one I know that would point out how beautiful the sky is in the middle of a hurricane.”
“That’s not what I mean and you know it,” I told him, moving my head away when he tried to kiss me.
But he would not be rebuffed, would not be delayed for very long, that much I could tell with how vigorously he held me, how his bright gaze moved over my face like he couldn’t get enough of the sight of me.
“My whole life, someone told me what was expected of me. I had to marry a Rivers. I had to lead the coven. I had to protect our folk from the curious mortals and the shit they do to the world. All the expectations, Jani, and I thought you were the only one who didn’t level any at me. But then…” I couldn’t look at him, not even when he stood in front of me, challenging me with one of his stares, calling me a coward without uttering a word. Then my gaze went up and I met his, chin a little higher. “But then,” he continued, “then you took away the only moment of my life where I didn’t have expectations, where all I had to do was touch and taste and take. What that did to me, gods above. Your mouth was pure freedom. Your touch set my skin on fire. All that hope and heat right between my fingers and then you ripped it away.”
“Bane, I’m sorry. I thought…” I looked down, still ashamed, before I exhaled. “I thought it was what you’d want.”
“Why in the name of all the gods would I want to forget something that made me feel so alive?”
He held me so tight, not letting me budge even the smallest degree. “And it still matters? After all this time?”
“It matters always, Jani. I don’t want expectations.”
“But your family…”
“Will have to learn what disappointment is. I don’t want a life with old wizards and witches comparing how many of their dead relatives were burned alive in Salem. I don’t want some life that doesn’t allow me to scream every once in a while.”
He was higher coven. He had money and power and strength I never would. We’d never fit into each other’s worlds. “You deserve a good mate. Someone…”
“I don’t want a good mate. I just want you.”
If I lived a thousand years, I’d never feel again what those four words meant to me. It was the first time I was completely claimed. The first time I knew someone could want me, could say they did and truly mean it. We struggle and fight. We try to grab what small pieces of happiness we manage to glimpse in this life and sometimes, if we’re very, very lucky, some of those pieces land. Sometimes, they stick to us, become part of us.
Bane smiled at me, and I loved that expression, loved more the strong glint of the ley lines I sensed under his touch, the red energy that flirted against my skin.
“When you saw the memory, Bane, I saw the look on your face. I…I never want to put that look on your face again.”
“You can’t make that promise, Jani. None of us can.” He moved the hair from my forehead, watching as the small strands fell into place as though he didn’t want to miss a detail about me, and right then I knew without any doubts that I loved Bane Iles. “I can’t promise that I won’t put the same look on your face one day.”
“So why would we bother if there’s a chance we’ll hurt each other?” Something shifted in Bane’s expression then, something real, something that had me forgetting what I’d asked. I only knew that I wanted to keep that smile on his face, that I’d kiss him again and again to make sure it never left his mouth.
“Because, little witch, out of everyone in the world who will hurt me, you’re the only one worth the pain.”
And with my smile came his kiss, that slow, long movement that I’d come to love, the one I’d missed and craved and needed for ten long years. And as Bane kissed me, as he took me to the floor, devoured me completely right among my tarps and paint cans and dried out brushes, I knew he was worth whatever the future might bring.
Please Add Your Review!
* * *
Want to be the first to get a look at covers, sneak peeks and excerpts?
Join Eden’s newsletter.
* * *
Want to hear all about her pre-orders?
Follow her on BookBub.
* * *
Interested in meeting fellow Saints & Sinners?
Come hang out with Eden and her exclusive reader group.
* * *
If you’re looking for Eden elsewhere, she’s always hanging out on social media. And she would love to hear from you!
* * *
www.edenbutler.com
Want more from Eden Butler? Try her timeless love story, INFINITE US, and more at www.edenbutler.com
Love is timeless…
Nash Nation loves zeroes and ones, over-sized monitors, and late office hours. He’s too busy taking over the world to make time for relationships—that is, until his new neighbor Willow O’Bryant barges into his life, and now Nash can’t shake the feeling that this isn’t the first time she’s interrupted his world.
Then, the dreams start. And in the dreams—memories.
Memories of a girl named Sookie who couldn’t count on love or friendship, never mind forever. Memories of a library and a boy called Isaac and secrets made in private that destroyed his world.
The memories seem real, but who do they belong to?
When Nash and Willow discover the truth, life as they know it unravels.
The bridge between this life and the next is shored up by blood and bone and memory. Sometimes, that bridge leads to the place we’ve always wanted to be.
BUY NOW!
Want More City Owl Press Books?
Click here to sign up for the City Owl Press newsletter and be the first to find out about special offers, including FREE book days, contents, giveaways, cover reveals, and more!
* * *
Sign up now and become a City Owl Reader today! And join our City Owl Reader-Author group here for even more deals and a whole lot of community and fun!
Acknowledgments
Everything I know about magic (and fantasy fiction), I learned from really great books. I read many of them. I keep reading them and I’m not likely to stop. Some come from authors I hope I never meet (because sometimes the human people who write the stories we love can disappoint us), some come from people who I call my friends. Each story has laid the foundation, however inadvertently, to the writer I am today and tomorrow. To them I offer my most humble thanks.
I’d like to especially thank Sharon Browning, my first editor of this book. No one I’ve ever met can crawl inside a story and examine, adore, critique and explain it the way she does. I love you, Sharon, even though your Vikings beat my Saints this season (2020).
My fondest gratitude to Tina Moss, Yelena Casale, and the entire City Owl family for letting me breathe new life into this story. I love working with each of you and am so excited about the journey we’re on together.
To the sisters of my heart, Marie, Sherry, Barbara, Sarah, and Kalpana, and my “Sweet” Team and betas, especially Trish Leger, Judy Lovely, Jennifer Holt, and Heather Weston-Confer, thank you all for your immense support and encouragement.
Thank you, as always, to my bints, especially Judy, Aymes, Allison, and Lisa for always reading and cheering me on, and to my beautiful nieces: Joy, Jenn, Kayla, and Juli for your constant love and support.
Thank you to each of my readers who are on this journey with me. Thank you for your opinions and advice, for coming out to see us at signings and supporting every event we are involved in. Thank you also to the writing community and the wonderful friends I’ve made within it including Heather McCorkle, JD Hollyfield, Chelle Bliss and Renita McKinney. You all mean the world to me.
Finally, thank you so much to my girls, Chelsey, Trin, Faith, Grace, to our sweet moon baby, Jax, and to my Himself, Chris, for always believing in me and for helping me live such a blessed and beautiful life. None of it would matter at all if it weren’t for you.
>
Also By Eden Butler
THE SERENITY SERIES
Chasing Serenity
Behind the Pitch
Finding Serenity
Claiming Serenity
Catching Serenity
* * *
THE THIN LOVE SERIES
Thin Love
My Beloved
Thick Love
Thick & Thin
* * *
SAINTS & SINNERS SERIES
The Last Love of Luka Hale
Roughing the Kicker
Offsides
* * *
GOD OF ROCK SERIES
Kneel
Beg
* * *
STANDALONES
I’ve Seen You Naked and Didn’t Laugh
Platform Four
Fall
Infinite Us
* * *
COLLABORATIONS
Nailed Down, Nailed Down Book One, with Chelle Bliss
Tied Down, Nailed Down Book Two, with Chelle Bliss
Kneel Down, Nailed Down Book Three, with Chelle Bliss
Stripped, Nailed Down Book Four, with Chelle Bliss
* * *
Santa, Baby, A Carelli Family Christmas Novella with Chelle Bliss
* * *
Find out more about Eden’s books on her site www.edenbutler.com
About the Author
Eden Butler is a writer of contemporary, fantasy and romantic suspense novels and the nine-times great-granddaughter of an honest-to-God English pirate. This could explain her affinity for rule breaking and rum.
When she’s not writing or wondering about her possibly Jack Sparrow-esque ancestor, Eden patiently waits for her Hogwarts letter, reads, and spends too much time in her garden perfecting her green thumb while waiting for the next New Orleans Saints Super Bowl win.
She is currently living under teenage rule alongside her husband in southeast Louisiana.
Please send help.
About the Publisher
City Owl Press is a cutting edge indie publishing company, bringing the world of romance and speculative fiction to discerning readers.
www.cityowlpress.com
Additional Titles
MAGIC TOUCH
By: Luna Joya
A witch with secrets, her reluctant protector, and a murder to solve. What could possibly go wrong?
* * *
A TOUCH OF DARKNESS
By: Yelena Casale & Tina Moss
USA Today Bestselling Authors
Cassie Durrett dreams of the darkness. And lives the nightmare.
Award Winning Urban Fantasy
* * *
BLACKBIRD SUMMER
By: Em Shotwell
When the world fears you, being Gifted is a curse.
* * *
BLOOD AND MAGIC
By: Melissa Sercia
Gray is a Dhampir—a woman alive, but also dead. With supernatural powers and an insatiable need for blood, her existence is cursed.
* * *
BLOOD KING
By: Amber K. Bryant
While Sybille’s ability to summon and guide spirits of the undead to the afterlife pays the bills, it comes with colossal risks, including becoming undead herself.
* * *
BOHERMORE
By: Jennifer Rose McMahon
USA Today Bestselling Author
When your dreams become reality, being cursed can be a real nightmare.
* * *
CODE BLACK
By: Tina Moss
USA Today Bestselling Author
Gossip mag reporter Sera Benenati knows a thing or two about unearthing secrets...and burying them.
* * *
FREYJA’S DAUGHTER
By: Rachel Sullivan
Well behaved women seldom make history, but they still end up as the monsters of folklore.
* * *
FROSTBITE
By: Joshua Bader
Getting hired to be a personal wizard for a billionaire may just become a death sentence.
* * *
HEART OF MALICE
By: Lisa Edmonds
The first time Moses Murphy’s granddaughter killed on his orders, she was six years old.
* * *
HOUSE OF ASH & BRIMSTONE
By: Megan Starks
Hell has come to collect, but Gisele Walker has no plans to pay the debt.
* * *
MIDNIGHT DESIRE
By: Shari Nichols
Danger and desire collide to form an unlikely alliance between a witch with a sordid past and a special agent who might be her future.
* * *
PURGATORY’S ANGEL
By: B. Hughes-Millman
We all have a dark side where inner demons roam. When devils of our nightmares murder in their sleep, only she can stop them.
* * *
SMOKE AND RITUAL
By: Melissa Sercia
The voices haunt her. Their whispers taunt her with a war she never wanted. But Arya Frost has more to contend with than the cryptic voices disturbing her sleep.
* * *
TRUTHSIGHT
By: Miriam Greystone
Rowan and Amy must join forces with the creatures who were once her patients and fight to uncover the one secret that may be powerful enough to save them all.
* * *
WAKING THE DEAD
By: D. B. Sieders
The road to hell begins when the reaper darkens her door.
Don't miss out!
Click the button below and you can sign up to receive emails whenever Eden Butler publishes a new book. There's no charge and no obligation.
https://books2read.com/r/B-A-GTKK-CBDGB
Connecting independent readers to independent writers.