All Fired Up

by Kristen Painter

  Badu nudged him. “Leave them be. That is what love does to a person.”

  Seamus grinned. “I’ll show you what else love does to a person when we get home.”

  Badu laughed as Vincentius rushed up, a serious look on his face.

  Alrik glanced to his friend. “Is something wrong?”

  The Roman shook his head but kept his voice low when he spoke. “Sorry to interrupt but I have to go.”

  He clasped Alrik’s wrist. “Blessings to both of you. Be well, brother.”

  “Aye, brother, and you as well.” Alrik clasped the Roman’s wrist in farewell.

  Calleigh laid her hand atop both of theirs and shook her head. “You can’t go yet. The party’s barely begun. Besides, I think my friend Erika likes you.”

  Flames glittered in Vincentius’ eyes. “I have no choice. My talisman has just been found.”

  Epilogue

  “Would you like a glass of champagne, orange juice or a mimosa before we take off?” The flight attendant smiled as she held out a tray of glasses.

  “Orange juice would be great, thanks.” Calleigh helped herself and Alrik did the same.

  The flight attendant moved on to the next row of first class passengers. Calleigh set her juice down on the wide armrest between her and her Viking.

  She squeezed his arm. “Can you believe it? A honeymoon in Japan. We’re going to have so much fun. I think you’ll like Japan. They’re really into swords over there.”

  Alrik set his juice down beside hers and smiled wickedly. “I believe I will be too busy with other things to spend much time thinking about swords.”

  Seamus looked over the seat in front of them. “I’d like to remind you that the first half of this trip is about work, not pleasure. We have a campaign to shoot.”

  From the seat next to him, Badu patted his arm. “And I would like to remind you that the last half of this trip will have nothing to do with work. Now leave the lovebirds to coo over one another and tell me again why I agreed to come with you?”

  “Because you can’t get enough of me? Or is it because I’m irresistible? Or maybe it’s my charming good looks?” Seamus blew her a kiss and sat down.

  Alrik groaned under his breath and leaned closer to Calleigh. “I lied. I am thinking about swords very much right now.”

  She slid her hand up his arm to cup his face in her palm. She drew him closer and nibbled on his bottom lip before giving him her best naughty smile. “I’ll just have to give you something else to think about then, won’t I?”

  About Kristen Painter

  Kristen Painter resides on the Spacecoast of Florida with her retired Air Force hubby and three feline dependents. Her writing has explored many genres—poetry, non-fiction, short stories, and now fun paranormals, quirky young adult or dark & twisty urban fantasy. Her work has been seen in Sun magazine, Cosmopolitan, and the Romance Writers Report. A two-time Golden Heart finalist, she’s also the co-founder of the award winning site, Romance Divas, and the past vice president and webmaster of two RWA chapters, Chesapeake Romance Writers (CRW) and SpacecoasT Authors of Romance (STAR) and the current President of ESPAN. She’s represented by The Knight Agency.

  Love haunts…

  Another Time Around

  © 2009 Catherine Wade

  Brin Maxwell once lived the ultimate rock-n-roll fantasy as the wife of the frontman for Hell’s Fury. It all ended in a flash—literally—with a lightning bolt that took Max’s life and left hers in suspended animation.

  Two years later she’s ready to move on, but there’s a stumbling block: her sanity. Max’s ghost has decided to haunt her, and he’s got a bad habit of showing up at the most inconvenient moments. Like when she’s about to plant a long wet one on event planner David Lyle, the man she hopes will resurrect her love life.

  David is real, solid, and makes her heart do the tango. He’s also curiously inept at his job—yet he has certain other talents that leave her wondering just what he’s hiding in his shadowy past.

  Then there are the death threats. As they escalate from notes slipped under her door to full-scale, Kodak-moment terror, Brin realizes Max’s return is no coincidence. And that the only one she can turn to is David.

  The man with the skills to save her life—unless he’s there to take it…

  Warning: Contains strong language, violence, bad fake accents, and a fearless dog. May cause an overwhelming desire to put a lock on your underwear drawer.

  Enjoy the following excerpt for Another Time Around:

  “Do you always ask so many questions?”

  “I warned you. I’m solving your mysteries.” David looked up at her and smiled, his hands working independently to split a vanilla bean and drop it into the cream. “I’m a curious person. If it annoys you, just say so.”

  “It doesn’t exactly annoy me.” But she was still hesitant. “I guess I did tell you that if you had any questions to just ask.”

  David winked. “I guess you didn’t expect me to take you so literally, did you?”

  Brin sighed softly and smiled. What was her problem, anyway? Why the hell was she running so damned hot and cold? “That’s okay. But let’s talk about you for a while.”

  “Fair enough. Quid pro quo.”

  “Something like that. Hank tells me you were once a cop.”

  David nearly scalded himself with hot cream. “Wow. And I thought I was the one with all the sources.”

  “Didn’t I tell you that Hank’s really a spy? The FBI’s been trying to recruit him for years, but he’s holding out for the New York Times gossip-columnist spot.” Brin looked him over. “From your reaction, I take it that being a cop wasn’t the most pleasant experience of your life.”

  He shook his head, going back to the cream. “Nah, nothing like that. It’s just that not many people in New York know about it.”

  “Maybe because you ask too many questions and don’t answer any.”

  David stopped stirring the cream long enough to return her grin. “Touché.”

  He pulled the bananas out of the oven and the aroma hit Brin’s nose. Despite being full of steak and umpteen tons of bread, she was ravenous. “Man, that smells good.”

  “Told you it’d get better.” He walked around to the table and pulled out the chair for her. “We’ll eat and I’ll tell you anything you want to know.”

  He sat beside her as she took her first bite. It was like banana heaven. “Oh my God, this is fabulous,” she mumbled around the flaky pastry.

  “I’m glad you like it.” He made a sweeping bow even as he sat. “So quid pro quo, then? Shoot.”

  Brin looked him over as she nibbled on a tender banana. Why start being delicate now? “Tell me about being a cop.”

  He dug into his own plate and chewed thoughtfully. “I was on the force once upon a lifetime. Down in Arlington, Virginia.”

  “Nice town. What made you leave it? And what made a cop turn into a party planner?”

  “Event planner,” David corrected with a crooked grin.

  “Sorry. Event planner.”

  David flashed a smile that made her toes curl. “I see I’m not the only one solving mysteries here. Why beat around the bush when you can burn straight through it, right?”

  “Right.”

  His gaze shifted and he put down his fork. He laced his fingers and drew a breath. “I’d been on the force for about ten years when I was assigned a new partner. She was straight out of the academy, but she knew what she was doing. A good cop. A good friend.”

  Brin chewed slowly, letting his intensity settle over her. “What happened?”

  “There was an incident. There had been a break-in. Two perps. I went after one, my partner went after the other. I got my guy, but the other pulled a gun on my partner. Or so it seemed at the time. Turned out he was trying to empty his pockets of the drugs he had on him. In the end, my partner went down for shooting an unarmed suspect.”

  She felt a sudden urge to reach out to him, but resisted it. �
�Did they think—I mean, were you—”

  “Implicated? No. I was a block away at the time.” He took another bite of his tart, taking out his frustration while he chewed. “But after that I just couldn’t be a cop anymore. I needed out.”

  Brin swallowed hard. “So you came here.”

  He nodded. “There wasn’t much to stay in Virginia for. My partner was gone. Reputations were ruined. It would never be the same for me and I knew it.”

  Brin swallowed again, trying to get rid of the lump that was lodged in her throat. “Was the guy killed?”

  “The suspect? Yeah.” David focused on his plate again.

  Way to step on a landmine, Brin. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have pried.”

  David shrugged and smiled. “Well, like you said, when in Rome…”

  She closed her eyes and allowed herself a small chuckle. Opening them again, she saw him staring at her. His eyes shimmered with intensity. Her body tingled and her belly did a flip-flop. She tried to smile and jolted out of her seat. “I’m sorry, but I really must use the powder room—”

  “Of course.” David rose and pointed across the room. “Just through that door.”

  She made her way across the generous space, ending up where the high ceiling gave way to the loft. She could only assume she was directly under his bedroom, but refused to let her mind wander further than that. In front of her were two doors beside one another. She looked back at David for guidance, but he was busy clearing the table. Taking a chance, she picked the door on the right.

  When she entered the room, she searched for the light switch. She flipped it on, and was bathed in a glowing red light. Adjusting her eyes, she looked around to find photographs hanging from wires strung like clotheslines across the room. Some photos were of people, some of places and buildings. All seemed very artistic, though she’d be the first to admit she knew nothing about art.

  A framed picture hung on the far wall drew her attention. It grabbed her and made her step closer and closer until she was standing right at the base of it. It was a close-up of a woman’s jawline, warm and dewy and glowing red in the light from the bare bulb that swung above it. Her lips were full and wet, barely parted to reveal a row of sparkling teeth. Though she couldn’t see her entire face, Brin could tell she was an extremely beautiful woman.

  “You found Claudia.”

  Brin jumped, startled by David’s entrance. “I’m sorry. I must have taken a wrong turn.”

  “Quite all right. Easy to do.”

  She pointed around the room. “I take it you’re a photographer.”

  “Picked up the hobby at the academy. When we were training in forensic photography.”

  “I take it you never went digital.”

  David shook his head. “Nah. Film is much more vibrant to me. More personal.” He stepped up behind her to look at the photograph. “I took that while we were on vacation in Cabo.”

  “Who is she?”

  David grew very still. “Claudia Moran. She was my partner on the force in Virginia. The one I was telling you about.”

  Brin’s mouth went dry. “Oh God. I’m sorry. I had no idea your partner was a woman.” She looked at the photograph again and noticed the raw emotion of it. “Were you…involved with her?”

  “Yes.” He didn’t even bother to hedge. “We were very much in love once.”

  “But this picture…” She turned back to it and saw it with a new appreciation. “You keep this picture up to remind you of her.”

  He shook his head, moving between Brin and the photograph. “No. I keep it around to show me that I have a talent for art. To remind me that there are other things in life besides waste and crime and ugliness. I keep it because it stirs something in me and because it’s hard in my line of work to remember that I have an emotion other than disgust.”

  Brin swallowed hard. She hadn’t seen this side of David before, and part of her wanted to turn around and run out of the place as fast as she could. But she was frozen to the spot. Only frozen wasn’t the word that was coming to her mind. It was heat. Blazing heat.

  “Disgust?” she asked, her voice a mere whisper. “Planning parties?”

  David’s eyes shifted suddenly. A smile came to his face, but Brin knew it was forced. And it made her heart pound.

  “I simply meant the extravagance of it. Rich people will throw money at a cause, but it has to make them look good. They want their names on plaques acknowledging their supposed generosity. They don’t want to help. They want to be looked upon as benefactors.”

  Brin had to swallow again. “Not all of them—us—are like that.”

  David’s gaze fell, but it didn’t seem to break the tension. “No, you’re not. That’s not what I meant.” He brought his eyes to catch hers in a relentless hold. She just stared back, unable to even blink. “You’re different, aren’t you? You’re soft around the edges. Caring. You have a passion in your soul, but it seems to be dying.”

  He reached up and brushed her cheek with his rough palm, making her shiver. The chill ran down her spine and up again, and her knees went weak. Parts of her she’d thought would never stir again went wild as his hand wound in her hair. Soon his lips were millimeters away from hers.

  “Why is that fire dying, Brin? What could put a damper on that passion? And what could fuel it?”

  Her eyes closed, but she had no control over her own body anymore. She was completely on autopilot. Baser instincts had taken over, and she was at his mercy now.

  There’s more to life than playing make believe.

  The Role of a Lifetime

  © 2008 Jennifer Shirk

  Sandra Moyer has a good reason to distrust actors. She was once married to one who left her and her child. However, she’s desperate for publicity to help her struggling preschool. Hollywood playboy Ben Capshaw’s request to access her classes to prepare for a role is an offer she can’t refuse.

  Sandra second guesses herself on that decision until she sees Ben in action with the children. Her apprehension turns to wonder, and then to feelings she’d thought were closed off forever. Yet how can she trust that what she’s seeing is real?

  As a boy, Ben learned that acting was the answer to everything. The role he’s up for now will enhance his career and, he’s sure, secure his happiness. But spending time with Sandra and her daughter stirs up emotions that—for once—aren’t pretend.

  Ben’s ready for a lifetime role as husband and father—if he can convince Sandra not to typecast him.

  Enjoy the following excerpt for The Role of a Lifetime:

  Ben had the nerve to pop his head in her office exactly two hours later. “Uh, do you mind if I wait in here while the parents pick up the kids?”

  Still angry with him—and herself—Sandra didn’t bother to look up from writing at her desk. “You mean hide in here while the parents pick up their kids?”

  He cleared his throat. “Yeah, I mean hide,” he said with a trace of defeat.

  She finally put her pen down and lifted her head. Ben was doing one heck of a personal repentant show for her, hovering in the doorway with wide eyes and his hands folded. She practically saw the halo hovering over his golden-brown head. “Okay,” she said. “Then no, I don’t mind.”

  “Great. Thanks, Sandals.”

  She looked at him sharply as he stepped in. Five seconds had barely gone by and he already had her back on the defensive. “That I do mind. My name is Sandra—not Sandals.”

  “Yeah, I didn’t figure you for a nickname type of woman,” he agreed, looking pleased with himself.

  “Good.”

  He shoved his hands in his pockets and leaned back against her door. “Ah, but you need to loosen up. That’s why I’m going to call you Sandals.”

  “You know, typically a nickname is shorter than the given name.”

  “Is it?” he asked in mock seriousness. “Oh. Well, tell you what, you can call me…”

  She waited several beats, thinking of more than a few unkind e
xamples. “I can call you what?” she finally asked.

  “That’s it.” He shot her his bone-melting smile. “You can just call me. Anytime.”

  She rolled her eyes, refusing to give in to the smile that threatened. “That sounds like a line from one of your movies.”

  He shot her a triumphant look. “Ah, ha! I knew you were a fan.”

  “Please. Don’t flatter yourself. I just meant that it sounds like a very generic line from a very generic movie,” she lied.

  “Ouch.” He played wounded and made a show of sticking in and taking out a pretend knife from his gut.

  She’d seen better performances by him.

  “You know, it’s okay to admit the truth,” he told her. “It means you’re human.”

  “I know I’m human, thank you very much.”

  He chuckled. “Okay, if it makes you feel better, I’ll give you a truth. That’ll show you I can be human too.”

  “I doubt one piece of trivia will accomplish that enormous feat.”

  “Come on,” he cajoled, undaunted by her attitude. “It’ll pass the time while we wait for the kids to be picked up.”

  She narrowed her eyes. “What do you mean, like that twenty-questions game?”

  He shrugged. “I was thinking more along the lines of truth or dare, but okay. We can play whatever game you like.” His gaze traveled over her body, slow and thorough, giving her an idea of where his thoughts were going.

  A mixture of curiosity and excitement had her swallowing hard. But she hid her emotions with an amused huff as she stood and walked over to her filing cabinet. Ben was worse than Hannah, always wanting to play games. She didn’t have time to entertain his childish whims, even if they did seem…a little enticing. But she needed to find the number of a handyman. The building was falling apart, and a coat of paint might gloss over the many imperfections of it. Unfortunately, she was so intent on finding an old invoice, she didn’t notice Ben come up behind her until his hands braced the filing cabinet on either side of her, caging her in.