Celeste Files: Unlocked
Page 18
“Done,” John said. “How much?”
Celeste grabbed John’s arm. “Don’t you think we should discuss this?”
“What’s to discuss? If this dog can help you and Olivia—”
“Olivia?” Celeste asked.
He turned to her and took her hand. “If this dog can do what Jim claims, think about how different things would’ve been the day Kelly came to the house. And if Olivia has your gift, she might need Ruth, too.”
Celeste looked to Olivia, who was hugging the Lab. The dog’s tail thumped against the hardwood, her tongue hung out and her eyes were closed as if she were loving the embrace. “I’m game, but it sounds expensive.”
“Don’t worry about the cost.” Maxine smiled. “Ruth is my gift to you.”
Celeste went to Maxine and hugged her. “Thank you.” As she held the woman, she wasn’t sure if Ruth was the answer to her trances, but prayed the dog would help. If she didn’t, at least they had added protection in the condo and a new friend for Olivia.
*
Later that night, Celeste and John stood in the doorway of their daughter’s bedroom, watching Ruth doze in front of Olivia’s crib.
“I thought Ruth was supposed to be your dog,” John said, and wrapped an arm around her shoulder.
“If you think about it, our main concern is Olivia’s safety should I slip into a trance. Maybe it’s not such a bad idea that Ruth has taken to Olivia. I like the idea that she has someone to look out for her.”
“Me, too.” He kissed her temple. “Come on, let’s go to bed.”
When they entered their room, Celeste slipped out of her robe, then crawled onto the mattress. John met her in the middle and snuggled her close. “I can’t believe we own a dog,” she said, thinking about how tomorrow she’d have to go to the pet store and buy doggie supplies. Jim had given them food, but only enough for a couple of days.
“I know a dog wasn’t your idea of how we’d expand our family,” he said, settling his hand on her hip. “And I know we haven’t finished discussing having another baby.”
She turned in his arms and wished the room wasn’t dark so she could read his eyes. “After everything that’s been going on, that’s the last subject I wanted to bring up.”
He pressed his forehead against hers. “Please don’t ever be afraid to talk to me about anything,” he began, “but there is something we should consider.”
“What’s that?”
“We live in a two-bedroom condo and have no yard for a seventy-pound dog.”
“You want to move?” she asked, both excited and nervous. She loved John’s condo, but it wasn’t a house, and it still had that bachelor pad feel to it. They could afford to move. Only that would place a hold on the second bakery she’d hoped to open at some point during the next few years. Besides, the Sugar Shack made her money and she’d sacrifice her business plans for a new house and baby.
“You deserve a big kitchen, and we’ll need more space for the dog and kids.”
She grinned. “Kids. I like the sound of that.”
“I do, too. So what’d you say? Let’s get your trances under control, find us a new house and then have us another baby.”
She kissed him. “I love that plan.”
“I love you,” he murmured, and slid his hand beneath the waistband of her panties.
After they practiced their baby making skills and Celeste began to doze off for the night, she didn’t picture the images of an evil black mass or murder. Instead, she imagined a house, filled with laughing children and a barking dog.
THE END
* * *
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Celeste Files: Unjust
Book Two of Psychic C.O.R.E.
June 2015
Look for Shane’s story April 2015…
Perfectly Twisted
Book One of C.O.R.E. Above the Law
What do you get when you mix a snake-handling reverend, a necrophiliac, a cop and an ex-con? Something perfectly twisted…
Sound like the start of a bad joke? Not to Shane Monahan. The ex-con and newest recruit to the underground criminal investigation group, A.T.L. or Above the Law, has it bad for Collier County Deputy Beth Price. But ex-cons and cops don’t mix, especially when this particular ex-con is looking at going back to prison for his involvement with A.T.L.
All Beth wants is a fun distraction from the stress of her job and law school. She thinks she's found that when she meets Shane during an airboat tour through the Florida Everglades. But Shane’s a felon, a man who could destroy her career as a deputy, and jeopardize her future as an attorney. She doesn’t know what to do—until dead bodies start showing up around the county.
When three abused corpses are found with snake remains inside them, the discovery brings a murderer out of retirement. The Reverend, as he calls himself, doesn’t like his kills being mimicked, especially by a man who abuses the dead—after all, the Reverend does have a reputation to uphold and a congregation to scam. Now it’s time to teach his copycat a deadly lesson…
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Ultimate Kill
Book One of the Ultimate C.O.R.E. Trilogy
When the past collides with the present, the only way to ensure the future lies in the ultimate kill…
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Jake Tyler, former Marine and the newest recruit to the private investigation agency, CORE, has been in love with a woman who never existed. When he learns about the lies Naomi has weaved, he’s ready to leave her—until an obsessed madman begins sending her explosive messages every hour on the hour.
Innocent people are dying. With their deaths, Naomi’s secrets are revealed and the truth is thrust into the open. All but one. Naomi’s not sure if Jake can handle a truth that will change their lives. But she is certain of one thing—the only way to stop the killer before he takes more lives is to make herself his next victim.
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Ultimate Fear
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When a deranged mother’s grief drives her to replace her dead son over and over, obsession leads to murder…
Chicago detective Jessica Donavan will never stop looking for her missing daughter. Her obsession has destroyed her marriage, but the search is the only thing that helps keep her sane and her mind off of everything she’s lost—her husband and her baby girl. When she uncovers a string of unsolved disappearances and reappearances of a number of baby boys, Jessica turns to her soon to be ex, Dante Russo, a former Navy SEAL turned investigator for the private agency, CORE, to help her fit together the pieces in this perplexing puzzle. But as Dante helps her, she realizes just how much she still craves his support—and his touch.
Dante is still in love with his wife and would do anything to have her back in his life again. He’s been miserable since she left him to deal with the grief over their daughter’s abduction, never understanding how much he grieves as well. When Jessica tells him about the case she’s working, he jumps at the chance to take part in her investigation. He’s hoping not only to save their marriage and ease his personal pain over the loss of their daughter, but to stop a serial kidnapper from taking another victim.
As Jessica and Dante work side by side, pregnant women begin to turn up missing or dead, and they start to uncover the consequences of another woman’s unfathomable grief. The childless mother doesn’t just want a baby. She wants a newborn straight from the womb.
And when forced to confront the dark and twisted perversion of a mother’s obsession, can Jessica and Dante find their lives again…or merely more death?
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Ultimate Prey
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When the hunter becomes the hunted…who will become the ultimate prey?
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Shadow of Danger
Book One of the C.O.R.E. “Shadow” Trilogy
Four women have been found dead in the outskirts of a small Wisconsin town. The only witness, clairvoyant Celeste Risinski, observes these brutal murders through violent nightmares and hellish visions. The local sheriff, who believes in Celeste’s abilities and wants to rid their peaceful community of a killer, enlists the help of an old friend, Ian Scott, owner of a private criminal investigation agency, CORE. Because of Ian’s dark history with Celeste’s family, a history she knows nothing about, he sends his top criminalist, former FBI agent John Kain to investigate.
John doesn’t believe in Celeste’s mystic hocus-pocus, or in her visions of the murders. But just when he’s certain they’ve solved the crimes, with the use of science and evidence, more dead bodies are discovered. Could this somehow be the work of the same killer or were they dealing with a copycat? To catch a vicious murderer, the skeptical criminalist reluctantly turns to the sensual psychic for help. Yet with each step closer to finding the killer, John finds himself one step closer to losing his heart.
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Book Two of the C.O.R.E. “Shadow” Trilogy
What happens when negligent plastic surgeons receive a taste of their own medicine…?
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Shadow of Vengeance
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Welcome to Hell Week. You have seven days to find him…
At Wexman University, male students will do anything to get into a top fraternity. They’ll prove their worth during Hell Week by participating in various physical, psychological and even juvenile pranks. But those shenanigans aren’t so funny when pledges start disappearing. What kind of evil has stalked this small Michigan university for the past two decades? Theories range from obscene scientific experiments to grotesque satanic killings…but they’re all wrong. The murdered boys serve a single purpose…the ultimate revenge.
Rachel Davis, forensic computer analyst for the private investigation agency CORE, has been itching to leave her desk behind and work in the field. When her brother Sean, a student at Wexman, is found beaten and his roommate kidnapped during Hell Week, she gets her chance. Only her boss insists former U.S. Secret Service Agent, Owen Malcolm, helps her with the investigation. Owen is the last person she wants on this assignment. She’d been secretly half in love with him for over four years, until the night he’d crushed her ego and destroyed her hopes for any kind of future with him.
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Contemporary Romances by Kristine Mason
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About Kristine Mason
Kristine Mason is the bestselling author of the popular romantic suspense trilogies C.O.R.E. Shadow and Ultimate C.O.R.E. She is currently working on her next trilogy, C.O.R.E. Above the Law, along with a series of Psychic C.O.R.E. novellas.
Although Kristine has published a few contemporary romance novels, she focuses most of her energy on her romantic suspense stories, which she loves for their blend of dark mystery/suspense and sexy romance. She is fascinated with what makes people afraid, and is famous for her depraved villains whose crimes present massive obstacles for her heroes and heroines to overcome.
Kristine has a degree in journalism from Ohio State University and lives in Northeast Ohio with her husband, four kids, and two dogs. If she’s not writing, she’s chauffeuring kids, gardening, or collecting gnomes. Oh, and she makes a mean chocolate chip cookie!
Connect with Kristine on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/kristinemasonauthor, Twitter https://twitter.com/KristineMason7 or email her at authorkristinemason@gmail.com. You can also find out more about Kristine’s books at http://www.kristinemason.net.