by Moira Rogers
“Almost done.” It was solid, sound, and it would serve them well through the impending winter. “Not much time left.”
“Wind’s got a fearsome bite to it. It’ll snow any day now. Some of the men may be taking it in shifts bedding down in the barn as wolves, but we’ll get through.”
Yes, they would. “Remind me to check the coal stores again. You might have to make one last trip into Searsport.”
Victor groaned. “That woman has been after me to take her along. Says men don’t know how to shop for the things a woman needs.”
That had to be Simone. Seamus grinned and settled the finished door against the side of the cabin. “Better listen to her. I get the feeling she doesn’t give up easily.”
“She’s already gone and whined to your mate, and I got that look this morning.” Victor’s eyebrows pulled together as he slid down the roof and hopped to the ground. “Not telling you how to manage your woman or anything, but shouldn’t a newly mated wolf be less crabby?”
“With you? No.”
“Damn.” Victor tossed his hammer onto the makeshift table and took a step back. “Well, we’ve got that order coming in from Boston in a few weeks. And there’s a lot of work to do here, still. No time to take two trips, so she’ll just have to wait.”
“Simone will manage.” Seamus stretched and slid his arms into his shirt. “Joan’s expecting me for lunch. Something special, she said, and keep your mind out of the gutter.”
“Mm-hmm.” Victor didn’t take his gaze from the house. “This is going to be a long winter, Whelan.”
“A hard winter.” There was no use sugarcoating that particular fact. “We’ll all have to work, no doubt about it.”
“It could be years before we can get reliable electricity going out here. How many of these girls want to live like this? They’re soft. City girls.” Victor’s jaw tightened. “Christ, they’re scared.”
Their fear had to be eating at Victor, just as it was at him. But at least he had Joan to soothe him. “We’ve got money, Vic, and that makes things happen. It’ll be faster than you think, we just have to keep it together until then.”
“I know.” Victor sighed and ran a hand through his disheveled hair. “Go. See your woman. And ask her to keep her friend from pestering me. That one hasn’t got a scared bone in her body.”
“Right.” Even Victor’s grumpiness couldn’t disguise the fact that he admired Simone’s fearlessness. “Watch yourself. She’s got a beau. One who could turn you into a frog, come to think of it.”
“Ain’t afraid of any wizard.”
Most of the others didn’t feel that way. The magic at the wizard’s command was strong, and beyond most of the wolves’ understanding, including his own. That sort of magic could confine him, or compel him to act against his own desires or conscience—and that was terrifying.
But in this first year, when their tiny island still lacked for so many comforts and amenities, magic could prove invaluable. “We need him here in case something goes wrong. He’s a skilled healer.”
“Yeah, yeah. I’m not arguing. If I live another hundred years, I hope I never have to deliver a baby in the backseat of a car again.”
“With luck, you shouldn’t have to.” Seamus raised a hand in farewell. “I’ll tell Joan you said hello, and please keep Simone the hell away from you.”
Victor turned back to the house and picked up his hammer. “I’m gonna finish up here. See you later, Whelan.”
A short walk brought Seamus to his own door. Given a choice, he’d have preferred privacy, to be set away from the others a bit, but for the sake of safety and convenience, they all needed to stick close together.
Especially the alphas. When he opened the door, the scent of blueberry pie greeted him. “Smells good.”
“Because Mary was here. All I have to do is manage not to burn it.” Joan had a patchwork apron tied over her jeans and thick sweater, and the sight of her bent over the table made his mouth water. “But Guy brought in his first haul from the traps today. And he showed me how to cook them. I think.”
“Good, lobster for dinner.” He caught the ties of her apron and spun her around to land in his arms. “Good afternoon, Miss Fuller.”
She laughed, happiness brightening her face. “Mr. Whelan, your obsession with ambushing me in the kitchen is becoming its own vice.”
“I gave up all my others. You’re the only one I have left, sweet Joan, and I intend to indulge.” Especially over the long, cold nights ahead.
Her fingers traced along his jaw as her eyes softened into the look she never wore for anyone else, the one that said more clearly than words that she was his lover, his mate. His. “Well, fancy that. I’ve redeemed your criminal heart. Of course, you’ve turned me into a shameless wanton who might very well have her way with you in broad daylight on the kitchen table.”
“Mmm.” He lifted her and set her down on the edge of the aforementioned table, urging her legs around his waist as he moved. “I could get used to it, but your aprons might start to excite me.”
Joan landed a playful nip on his chin, but when she leaned forward to wrap her arms around him and bury her face against his neck, it became clear she was more interested in cuddling than sex. “Victor said to expect a blizzard soon. I admit, I’m almost a little relieved. We’ve been so busy getting ready, some days it seems like the only time we get to spend together is while we’re sleeping.”
“We’re as ready as we can be.” He was looking forward to it too—no one in the white, whirling world except for them. “Nothing we can’t handle if we work together, right?”
“Nothing at all.” Her breath tickled against his neck, warm and teasing. The soft words that followed, however, were deadly earnest. “I love you. More every day.”
Three tiny words, but they never failed to move him. His chest tightened, and he cradled her closer. “And I love you.”
“I’m so lucky to have you. After everything—” Her voice hitched, and her fingers dug hard against his shoulders. “But we’ve done it. We made a safe place. A sanctuary.”
“Yes.” He knew only one dark spot remained, sullying her happiness. “I wish we could have convinced Adam to stay here this winter.”
“We couldn’t. Not without Astrid…she was his contemporary. I was… We were never close. Not like that.”
“Then he’ll need time.” There was nothing they could do to help him heal, not if they only served as painful reminders of the deaths of those under his charge.
“We all need time.” She pulled back and lifted her hands, cradling his face with a gentle smile. “Now we have it.”
“There’s my smile.” He traced his thumb over her lower lip. “Blueberry pie. Is that my surprise?”
Joan twisted in his arms and reached behind her, turning back to him with a rich-looking leather-bound book cradled between her hands. “It’s not much, but I thought we needed at least one book in our library before the blizzards start.”
Only Joan would have known that being stuck without something to read would vex him more than any other amenity the island lacked, and the knowledge filled him with a warming satisfaction. “I love Whitman,” he told her as he set the book aside, “but nowhere near as much as I love you.”
“I expect you to spend the long winter nights reading me poetry now, you know.”
“I’d be happy to.” Happier than she knew, but that was all right. He had time to show her. “I’ll read it in bed. Wanna try it out?”
Joan laughed, all traces of grief vanished in a joyful rush of power and pleasure. “The pie will burn.” She didn’t sound like she cared.
“It’ll be fine.” The pie, like just about everything else, could wait, but his need for Joan was paramount. Overwhelming.
Overwhelming because it was a need borne of affection as well as lust. He could talk to her, share things with her.
She arched an eyebrow. “You’re staring.”
“I’m looking.”
“Looking at what?”
That answer was simple. “My love.” Joan was his partner, a true mate, and he would never turn back.
About the Author
How do you make a Moira Rogers? Take a former forensic science and nursing student obsessed with paranormal romance and add a computer programmer with a passion for gritty urban fantasy. To learn more about this romance-writing, crime-fighting duo, visit their webpage at www.moirarogers.com, or drop them an email at [email protected]. (Disclaimer: crime-fighting abilities may appear only in the aforementioned fevered imaginations.)
Look for these titles by Moira Rogers
Now Available:
Red Rock Pass
Cry Sanctuary
Sanctuary Lost
Sanctuary’s Price
Sanctuary Unbound
Southern Arcana
Crux
Crossroads
Coming Soon:
Undertow
Deadlock
They’ve been hiding from the past. Now it’s time to fight for their future.
Sanctuary Unbound
© 2010 Moira Rogers
Red Rock Pass, Book 4
New England is ideal for vampire Adam Dubois. His cozy home in the Great North Woods reminds him of a happier time when werewolves and witches were stuff of legends, and he was a simple lumberjack.
Hiding from past failures has worked for over eighty years, but a life debt owed to the Red Rock alpha has forced him to leave his retreat—and come face to face with a woman who challenges and tempts him on every level.
Hiding secrets is a lonely business, and Cindy Shepherd is lonely with a capital L. Red Rock isn’t exactly crawling with available men, but her interest in the mystery-shrouded new vampire in town seems mutual. After all, it’s only sex—there’s no danger he’ll dig deep enough to unleash the demons of her past.
Casual flirtation turns deadly serious when Adam discovers that the vampire plaguing Red Rock is using his mistakes as a road map. When it comes to his life, he knows Cindy has his back. But in order to secure the future, they both must trust each other with more—even if it means sacrificing themselves to save everything they hold dear.
Warning: This book contains epic werewolf battles, mystical vampire blood bonds, unexpected sex on the kitchen floor and a dangerous attraction between a secret-burdened werewolf and a vampire lumberjack.
Enjoy the following excerpt for Sanctuary Unbound:
“You’re like a mule.” Even as she rasped out the words, she lifted her hands to frame his cheeks. “When I start calling you stubborn, you know you have a real problem.”
“I’m old enough to be set in my ways. I earned every damn scrap of stubborn I have.” He turned his head and kissed her thumb. “All of it, honey.”
He was fascinating, and he scared the hell out of her. “Last chance, Adam,” she whispered. “Don’t you want to go?”
“Fuck, no.”
Fighting the inevitable was exhausting, so Cindy let go and touched her mouth to his. She meant it to be a slow exploration, but her hands shook as she rested them on his shoulders. Arousal coursed through her, hotter and faster than anything she could have expected, and she quickly deepened the kiss.
His fingers thrust into her hair, holding her head still as his tongue stroked over hers. She had to get closer, so she angled her leg over his and slid into his lap.
He stared up at her from glazed, hungry eyes. “We doing this for the right reasons?”
She’d already lost track. “What are the right reasons?”
“Because we’re so hot for each other that we can’t stop ourselves.”
“I didn’t think there was ever a question about that.” Cindy shifted in his lap, easing her hips against his. He was hard between her legs, solid and hot, and he groaned as she rocked down against him.
His hands fisted in her hair, tilted her head back until his lips brushed her throat. “Best reason in the world, then.”
The simple touch streaked hot pleasure through her. “Does lazing about in bed like rich people include torrid sexual encounters?”
“Even if it didn’t, I don’t mind a little revisionist history.” His tongue dragged across the skin over her pounding pulse, and dark, hot magic twisted tight between them. “The past isn’t as pretty as people like to pretend these days.”
“Nostalgia’s easier.” Certainly easier than trying to maintain a conversation while he licked her throat. “Adam.”
“Cindy.” Another lick, a little faster. Rougher.
“You’re a tease.” She turned her head and bit his earlobe, almost hard enough to hurt.
“Am I?” He braced his hands on her shoulders and pushed her back against the rumpled blankets. “Seems to me I’m plenty willing to follow through.”
“So the unresolved sexual tension is my fault?” Playing around felt good, almost as good as having him lean over her with the promise of such heat in his eyes.
“Or we’re just both responsible adults in the middle of a crisis.” His fingers trailed down her body, teasing at her breasts through the fabric of her shirt. “Mostly responsible, anyway.”
Cindy moaned, feeling less responsible by the second. She needed his hands on her bare skin, so she dragged the thin cotton up and over her head. The fabric had barely cleared her hands when he rewarded her, cupping her flesh with warm, work-roughened hands.
There was no stifling the cry that rose in her throat. She wanted him too much, and denial had driven her almost to the point of pain. “Don’t stop touching me this time. Please.”
“We don’t have time for me to take you like I want.” His voice was as harsh as his fingers were gentle, a delicious contrast. “But I’m not leaving this bed until I see you come.”
Cindy trapped his hands against her skin. “Don’t jinx us like that. We have time, plenty of it.”
“Shh.” He lifted his hands, moving hers easily enough. They ended up trapped against the bed as he leaned down and let his breath feather over one tight nipple. “Stop thinking so much.”
She strained toward his mouth, caught between another whimper and a laugh. “It’s what I do.”
“Not anymore,” he whispered, then closed his lips around her.
Everything in her zeroed in on that single touch, focused on the hot pull of his mouth and the way he slicked his tongue, rough and wet, over her nipple. She forgot to think, forgot everything except how to moan his name.
He groaned and lifted his head, eyes blazing. “My name sounds good on your lips.”
She yanked her hands free and pulled his mouth to hers. There was no finesse in it, no careful caresses specifically crafted to make him want her more. All she could manage was need, and she poured it into every second of the kiss.
What she got back was passion, pure and simple. He tilted his head and pressed closer, his deliberation fading. Pain lanced through the pleasure as her tongue snagged on the tip of a fang, and Adam stiffened at the hint of coppery blood.
He lifted his head, breathing ragged. “Sorry, that wasn’t—not on purpose.”
“I know.” Cindy rubbed her tongue against the roof of her mouth until she felt the tiny wound close.
“I’m not in control. I’m not—” He laughed and shook his head before leaning down to kiss the corner of her mouth. “I know you don’t want blood and sex to get confused. I’ll try harder.”
“It doesn’t matter.” She gripped the front of his shirt and kissed him firmly. “As long as you want the sex more, I mean. Of course you want my—my blood.” It felt odd to say, and even odder to be fine with it.
“No.” Adam caught her hands again, this time pressing them to the bed on either side of her head. “I want you. The blood is a means to an end, Cindy. Sometimes it’s to give me strength, and sometimes…”
He nipped her lower lip and she felt the tiniest prick before his tongue slid over the spot. Magic roared to life and heat crashed into her as he kissed her again, and this
time she felt each hard thrust of his tongue as a hot, tugging pull deep inside her.
Cindy had already come to associate it with him, the dizzying combination of too much and not enough, and she bucked under him. His grip on her wrists held, somehow soothing the most primitive, animal part of her. Adam was strong, commanding, and she wanted him.
She relaxed without thinking then, pulled her mouth from his and bared her throat.
A wolf might have taken that invitation and bitten her, leaving a very human mark that served an instinctive purpose. Instead Adam licked her pulse and settled his body over hers, his hips cradled between her thighs so his first rocking grind let her feel the hard length of his erection through their jeans.
The sensation wrenched a cry and a shudder from her. “Adam.” She needed him closer, his skin against hers. Him inside her.
“Don’t move your hands,” he whispered, then slipped away, leaving a blazing trail of hot, wet kisses along her body as he went. Down, down until his breath blew hot against the skin just above her jeans and his fingers tugged at the button.
These elements have no desire to be tamed…
Stormchild
© 2010 Vivian Arend
Pacific Passion, Book 1
As the new traveling doctor for the Pacific Inside Passage settlements, Matthew Jentry balances dual roles for his water-shifter people—caring for their health as a human-trained physician, and for their spiritual needs as a shaman.
Distractions of the female kind are not on his agenda, but his magical bloodline makes him a target for every marriage-minded woman within range. There’s something about the mysterious Laurin Marshall, though, that he finds far too enticing. It’s just as well that it’s time for him to move on.
Laurin thought she had perfected her guise as a mild-mannered teacher, but the sexual fireworks she and Matt touch off are threatening to blow her cover out of the water. Luckily it’s time for her to catch the boat to her next assignment.
When she discovers she’ll be sailing with Matt, she realizes there’s only one thing more dangerous than their unforgettable one-night stand—being trapped with him on a boat that gives “riding out the storm” a whole new meaning…