When Ashes Fall

by Marni Mann

  About the Author

  Best-selling author Marni Mann knew she was going to be a writer since middle school. While other girls her age were daydreaming about teenage pop stars, Marni was fantasizing about penning her first novel. She crafts sexy, titillating stories that weave together her love of darkness, mystery, passion, and human emotions. A New Englander at heart, she now lives in Sarasota, Florida, with her husband and their two dogs. When she’s not nose deep in her laptop, working on her next novel, she’s scouring for chocolate, sipping wine, traveling, or devouring fabulous books.

  Want to get in touch? Visit Marni at …

  www.marnismann.com

  MarniMannBooks@gmail.com

  Also by Marni Mann

  STAND-ALONE NOVELS

  The Unblocked Collection (Erotic Romance)

  Wild Aces (Erotic Romance)

  Prisoned (Dark Erotic Thriller)

  * * *

  THE AGENCY STAND-ALONE SERIES—Erotic Romance

  Signed

  Endorsed

  Contracted

  Negotiated

  * * *

  THE SHADOWS SERIES—Erotic Romance

  Seductive Shadows—Book One

  Seductive Secrecy—Book Two

  * * *

  THE PRISONED SPIN-OFF DUET—Dark Erotic Thriller

  Animal—Book One

  Monster—Book Two

  * * *

  THE BAR HARBOR SERIES—New Adult

  Pulled Beneath—Book One

  Pulled Within—Book Two

  * * *

  THE MEMOIR SERIES—Dark Mainstream Fiction

  Memoirs Aren’t Fairytales—Book One

  Scars from a Memoir—Book Two

  * * *

  NOVELS COWRITTEN WITH GIA RILEY

  Lover (Erotic Romance)

  Drowning (Contemporary Romance)

  Sneak Peek of Memoirs Aren’t Fairytales

  Chapter One

  Eric sat behind the wheel of his beat-up ’89 Toyota Corolla. His seat was so close to the steering wheel that his knees hit the dashboard, and he couldn’t see out the rearview mirror. He hadn’t complained once about having no legroom or that his back was slumped forward because there was an enormous box of clothes behind his seat. His lips were stuck in a perma-grin, and his eyes were wide and glued to the taillights of the car ahead.

  It had taken us almost six hours to reach the border between New Hampshire and Massachusetts when it should have taken less than four. Eric said the Rabbit—what he had named his Corolla because the thing wouldn’t die, like in those battery commercials—topped out at sixty. I didn’t think all the extra weight was healthy for the Rabbit either. I could hear the poor thing chugging.

  Eric had emptied his entire bedroom and packed it all into the backseat and trunk. A lampshade teetering on top of a pile of clothes kept jabbing into my head, and the corner of his TV rubbed against my elbow. But I didn’t complain either.

  I hadn’t put that much thought into packing. I grabbed some pants from my closet and some dirty shirts that were on my floor. I swiped a few toiletries from the bathroom and crammed it all into two backpacks. The ounce of weed I’d scored the night before went into my purse, and that was all I brought.

  No one ever left Bangor; we called it The Hole. There was something about the place that sucked you in and kept you in shackles. If you went away for college, you never came back. If you stayed in state, like Eric and me, you were a Bangor lifer. No matter how much money you tried to save or plans you put together, you’d end up, years later, married to someone you met in high school, with kids, a Labrador, and a Cape Cod house. And then it was too late to leave. You had to escape as a teenager. It was the only way.

  Two weeks earlier, Eric and I had been sitting in his car. It was late at night, and we were passing a bowl between us. He went on about his dead-end job at the auto repair shop, never having any money, and the nerve of his parents for charging him rent. My advice had always been the same. I told him to go back to college. He never should have dropped out in the first place.

  But that night, my advice was different.

  A month before, I’d dropped out of the University of Maine, halfway through the spring semester of my sophomore year. I’d quit my job at the campus coffee shop, too. And since then, I hadn’t done much besides sit on my parents’ couch and watch TV all day. I was ready for a change.

  After the third bowl and a couple shots of some peppermint shit, I said, “If you hate it here so much, then move. I’ll go with you.”

  He sat silent for a minute, then he pulled out his wallet and slapped forty bucks on the armrest.

  We were almost out of weed, and it was his turn to buy.

  “Let’s go,” he said.

  He was the one driving, so I looked at him to start the car.

  “I mean it, let’s get the fuck out of here,” he said.

  And then he started talking so fast it was like he was rapping along to the Jay-Z song on the radio. I couldn’t even get a word in. He was going to pick a city along the East Coast and find us a cheap apartment to rent. He would give notice at his job and save the next paycheck, and in two weeks, we’d be out.

  He showed up at my house the next morning with coffee and bagels, and we ate breakfast on my bed. He was quiet and ate his bagel really slow.

  I knew Eric too well. We’d been best friends since kindergarten and even dated for a week in the fourth grade.

  So, when he started fumbling with my comforter and acting all antsy, I knew he was getting ready to tell me we couldn’t leave until he saved more money.

  I was dead wrong.

  Under his jacket, he had hidden a bunch of papers. He’d stayed up all night, researching different places to live and apartments to rent. He’d wanted to surprise me. And he did.

  We were moving to Boston into a studio apartment in Chinatown, and all he needed from me was half the security deposit and a yes. I gave him both.

  I didn’t know what our apartment looked like. I’d never been to Chinatown before, and I didn’t care. We were approaching the Tobin Bridge, and for the first time since I’d moved back in with my parents, I felt free.

  At the start of the bridge, my hands grabbed the support bar on the door. Eric’s hands were on ten and two, his knuckles white. It was like we were strapped in a cart, riding up to the peak of a roller coaster. The skyline of Boston was in front of us, and somewhere in the middle of all those tall buildings was the place we were going to call home.

  Eric shouted over the music, “We did it, Nicole! We’re here!”

  All four windows were open, and I leaned my head against the back of the seat. My eyes closed. Wind was rushing through the car, filling it with the smell of smog and fish from the Mystic River.

  A clothes hanger was tickling the side of my ear and pulling out strands of my ponytail every time we went over a bump. The metal was cold, and as it touched my hair, it reminded me of my mom’s cool hands, brushing the hair out of my face and tucking it behind my ear when she put me to bed as a child.

  My hands let go of the bar, and I put my arms up in the air, feeling the breeze swish between my fingers. “Hell yeah, we did,” I said.

  If you would like to keep reading, click HERE to purchase Memoirs Aren’t Fairytales.

  Sneak Peek of The Unblocked Collection

  Chapter One

  His mouth caressed the skin across my navel as my back arched off the bed. My nails dug into the mattress; a long, drawn-out moan escaped from my lips. His kisses quickly turned to licks. The tip of his tongue changed to a point during the upstroke, traveling as high as my nipples, and went flat during the downstroke where he paused at my folds. My legs spread, waiting for that pointed wetness to flap against my clit.

  Nothing but air swished over me. His breath. Exhales that triggered the throbbing to pulse even faster.

  “Please,” I begged. “Please make me come.”

  A tease. That’s what this was.

/>   I couldn’t remember a time when I had craved a man’s tongue this deeply. I hadn’t begged him with just my words, but with my hands, too, drawing his face even closer. I combed his soft locks as I drove the back of my head into the bed, anticipating the feeling that would shoot through me when he eventually gave me the pressure I needed.

  His breathing continued, his mouth hovering over my sex while his hands moved to my nipples. He squeezed with a fierce intensity. My stomach shuddered from the ripple of pleasure.

  “Please,” I repeated. “I need your tongue.”

  “If I give you my tongue…” His voice startled me. Up until that point, I hadn’t heard him speak. I hadn’t seen his face, either, now that I thought about it. “You’ll be moaning too loud to answer your phone.”

  My back straightened, and I glanced between my spread legs and bent knees. The night’s darkness casted a shadow over half his face hiding everything but his parted lips and wide tongue. Both dove forward and traced the inside of my folds, flicking across the middle and sucking slowly.

  “Screw my phone,” I grunted.

  Lick, suck…breathe. Lick, suck…breathe.

  My hips bowed to his pattern, his rhythm. The wetness he created mixed with my own arousal and it began to drip down my thighs and onto the sheet. The pressure he was using wasn’t strong enough to give me an orgasm. He was gentle—too gentle. That was all I’d ever had…I needed more now.

  “Harder,” I said. As soon as the word left my mouth, he stopped touching me. I wanted him back and even closer. I reached for his hair, but there was nothing. The tongue that teased me so delicately was gone, and the fingers that had squeezed my nipples. Darkness filled the space where he had been.

  “What the…” My voice trailed off when I heard the ringing.

  You’ll be moaning too loud to answer your phone.

  The ringtone was a siren, a sound that wouldn’t blend into background noise, and one I had specifically chosen for my father so I would never miss his calls.

  Where the hell had this man disappeared to? How could his tongue and fingers simply vanish in seconds?

  I sat up and pushed my back against the headboard, a movement that made me gasp. My eyelids popped open.

  My eyes…hadn’t been open before?

  I scanned the room for evidence of this mysterious man who had pleased me in the middle of the night. From what I could see, nothing looked out of place and there weren’t any clothes on the floor. My blanket and sheet were still on the bed, and I was wearing my pajamas. I turned toward my nightstand and felt the wetness…a small spot on the bottom of my cotton shorts and a dampness between my thighs. I knew if I smelled my fingers, my scent would be all over them...

  And it was.

  He was just a dream.

  I lifted my phone and cleared my throat. “Isn’t it a little early to be calling?”

  “Business doesn’t sleep, therefore neither do I. You know this about me, probably better than anyone else.” I said nothing. “Technically, it’s quarter to five.”

  “This had better be an emergency, then.”

  “Call it what you’d like. Be at the office in an hour, Frankie.”

  “Wait…” I needed caffeine and a scalding shower—and for the wetness that still clung to my sex to be completely dry—before my brain would really start to work. He would hang up before I had time for any of that, so I forced myself to recount yesterday’s hot items. Everything had been settled prior to me leaving the office from what I recalled. Why else would he call? It was too early to open escrow on any of our accounts as none of the lenders were open yet, and funds only processed during banking hours. Emails could wait. It had to be a meeting with one of our international clients. Their trips to the States tended to be so short, they didn’t bother getting acclimated to our time zone so this wasn’t uncommon. I was just surprised by the short notice. “Who’s the appointment with? Giovanni? Hamad?”

  “On your way in, why don’t you grab me a bagel with the veggie cream cheese I like. And a latte, extra hot, with that foam stuff on top and real sugar, none of that artificial crap. Oh, and Frankie, don’t be late.”

  He disconnected the call before I had a chance to repeat my question or say good-bye. That didn’t matter. He knew I’d be there within the next forty-five minutes with his bagel and coffee exactly the way he had requested it. That was how he had raised me to act, and that was one of the reasons he would soon be handing me his company.

  “Take a look at those papers,” my father said, pointing to the folder at the end of his desk. His peppered hair was longer than usual, swept back and sprayed, almost like a headband that framed his crown—a suggestion from his most recent fling, I suspected.

  I set his bagel and coffee in front of him and sat in one of the chairs. I opened the folder to find Block Development printed at the top of the first sheet, the words encircled with long, sleek, winding branches that added warmth to the contemporary logo. Derek Block was known for using wood and naturalistic aspects in all his architectural designs. His overstated earthy elements were what set his work apart. Under the logo was a press release that highlighted his most recent venture: an apartment conversion in the Back Bay where he was renovating one hundred and eighty-one units. The development, listed as Timber Towers, was an exclusive, state-of-the-art green building with an array of amenities that included underground parking. This was his first project in Boston; his prior build-outs had been in intimate beach towns throughout New England. Thanks to the connections I had at the building division office, I’d been notified over a year ago that Block had filed permit applications and that the city had awarded them. I only lived a few blocks from the site, and I’d been watching its progress.

  “So?” my father said, wiping a glob of cream cheese from the corner of his lip.

  “My research shows he employs a full-time agent and handles all sales in-house,” I answered. “It’s a dead-end.”

  “Your research is correct, except for this building.”

  The papers dropped from my hand, and a smile spread over my face. “He’s shopping for an agent?”

  “Not just any agent, my dear. He wants the best agent in Boston…and she just so happens to be my daughter.”

  I felt my cheeks turn red. My father was a hard and often ruthless businessman, and his compliments were rare. When they came, I cherished them.

  “I certainly can’t be the only candidate. There must be others vying for the job?”

  “Correct again.” He sifted through several sheets until he found the one he was looking for and rattled off the names of my competitors. I wasn’t surprised by the agents Block had chosen to interview; they were all competent—one with more experience than me, another who was known for sleeping with her clients. None had Jordan International, a forty-year-old agency backing them, or the mentorship and knowledge of my father, Garrett Jordan, the man who’d built the company from the ground up—or the connections we had secured over the years, or our database of buyers. Our reputation in this city was flawless, all of which Block undoubtedly knew.

  “When’s the meeting?”

  “At seven.”

  My steel and yellow gold Rolex showed I had a little time to prepare. The watch was five years old; I’d bought it right out of college after closing my first large sale. My father always said that in order to successfully sell luxury real estate, you had to experience fine luxury for yourself. Our agency didn’t represent knock-offs, and our clients weren’t looking to buy them, either.

  “I’m going to go prep,” I said.

  He nodded silently, his eyes moving to his computer screen. “Frankie,” he said as I reached the door to his office.

  I turned around, gripping the framed arch. “Yes, Dad?”

  “Land this one.”

  I nodded back, mirroring him.

  Flipping on the lights in my office, I sat behind my desk and booted up my computer. Several emails had come in from my assistant, Brea, providing
even more information on Block Development. While I read through the first article, she called my cell.

  “I’ll be there in ten minutes,” she said. I could hear traffic in the background. I pictured her walking to the subway. “Did you get the emails I sent?”

  “I’m reading it all right now.”

  “All I could find was info on Mr. Block’s company, but nothing on him personally.”

  “I’m sure what you found will be perfect.” The clock on the wall chimed. It was now six o’clock. “It’s too early for you to be on your way here.”

  “I want to dig around a little more and see if I can get you some key talking points.”

  She was the most dedicated assistant I’d ever had. I didn’t doubt this was a reason she was coming in, but I knew it wasn’t the only one.

  “Brea…”

  “Don’t worry. I’m fine.”

  I moved over to the window, looking down at Faneuil Hall and Government Center. The city was so gentle at this hour. “Are you?”

  “I’m having a hard time sleeping, that’s all.” There was honking in the background. “You don’t sound so rested, either.”

  “It’s early. That’s all.”

  “No…it’s more. Let me guess: the dreams are back?”

  I turned and rested my back against the window to let the icy glass cool me off. Just the mention of those dreams had me sweating. “I can’t believe I told you about those.”

  “Girl, you’ve got just as much dirt on me.” It now sounded like she was running—and probably in heels. “So they’ve returned just as powerful as before, I take it?”