by Carmen Caine
“The name is Cassidy,” I breathed in confusion. “What kind of spell have you cast over me?” Oh, how I would wish I’d never asked that question.
A smile of the smuggest kind entered his magnificent blue eyes. “That attracted to me, are we?” he practically purred.
For a moment, I thought he would pin me against the wall and kiss me again. And honestly, I was vastly disappointed when he didn’t. I stood there, wanting to hate him for his betrayal. Wanting to hurt him. Wanting to get even … even as I wanted him to kiss me, claim me, make me his.
It was all so … complicated.
Revenge. Love. Were both possible? If not? Which one would I choose?
Revenge?
I’d taken a step back before I’d realized it.
Revenge. The desire for revenge just ran too deep within me.
I wouldn’t let myself forgive him. I couldn’t. What would happen to my revenge then? No. I couldn’t let any of it go. Everyone who’d cursed me to this life would have to pay.
Everyone.
He followed my thoughts. I know he did, because he murmured, “One day soon, you’ll discover that your darkest secret will become your greatest threat.”
Who was he to preach to me? “I’d never get into the same mess as you,” I hissed.
His brow arched in irritation. “And you have no secrets?” he challenged. “What of the mist that night in the churchyard. The fog? The blanket that shrouded the Chosen Ones from finding us? Do you remember?”
I held still. Of course, I remembered that night. The entire thing was burned into my brain from beginning to end. “What of it?” I meant to snap the question, but my voice suddenly lacked the strength.
And then Lucian said the last thing I’d ever expected him to say. “Calling the mists of the Nether Reaches, it’s not something that I can do.”
I shuddered. In an instant, I knew he was speaking the truth. “But you saw it,” I gasped in denial. “It had to be you. You saw it, even though everyone else didn’t!”
Leaning forward ever so slowly, his lips brushed the top of my head. And then he whispered into my hair, “Oh, there may be other reasons for that, my dear. You’re no different than I. We each keep our secrets. And I’d wager yours won’t let itself hide much longer. It will come to find you soon.”
He knew. With a cold, nasty jolt of insight, I realized that he knew. He knew about the beast slumbering in me.
Closing my eyes, I drew a long, shuddering breath.
When I opened them again, he was gone.
* * *
Revenge.
It still drives me.
Revenge against those who betrayed me, who sought to use me for their own purposes. Even after all that had happened, I still wanted revenge. In some ways, even more than before.
But … what of my heart? Did what it want even count—especially if it prevented me from achieving my ultimate goal of revenge?
I honestly didn’t know.
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About the Author and Other Books
Click this link for a list of Carmen's books on Amazon
Like many of us on this planet, Award-winning and Bestselling author Carmen Caine (aka Madison Adler) is from another world. She spends every moment she can scribbling stories on sticky notes that her kids find posted all over the car, house, and barn.
When she is not working as a software engineer, she is busy ferrying her kids to various appointments, writing lyrics for her husband's songs, raising her Doberman Ajax, attempting to tame her three insane cats, befriending her rescue llama named Cusco, scratching her three Nigerian Dwarf Goats behind the horns or coddling her flock of thirty bizarre chickens from around the world.
Although I am terrible at tweeting and posting on Facebook (though I do strive to improve), please find me at the following places:
Carmen and Madison's Facebook Fanpage
Facebook friends with Madison Adler ( aka Carmen )
Facebook friends with Carmen Caine ( aka Madison )
Madison's Twitter - more paranormal content
Carmen's Twitter - more medieval content
Carmen and Madison's website
Carmen Caine Collections and Other Books
The Glass Wall – A Contemporary Paranormal Faerie Romance Series
From Award-Winning Author Carmen Caine, a Contemporary Paranormal Faerie Romance: The Complete Glass Wall Collection - Four Full-length Novels and the Prequel Short Story.
The Glass Wall Series
What if humans were more powerful than they thought? What if an alien race had a reason to keep humanity entrenched in fear? And what if ancient beings that we've met before were still trying to protect us? And just what if the fate of Earth depended upon an average 17-year-old girl with a few secrets of her own?
Would she discover that the power of love was truly the strongest of all?
"The Glass Wall" - Book One of the "Glass Wall"
- A mysterious and dangerously handsome stranger ...
- A slightly jaded 17-year-old girl ...
- A paranormal world hidden within our own ...
17-year-old Sydney's only interest in life is flying under the radar. But destiny has other plans when the tall, handsome, and unusual Rafael Channing moves into the neighborhood. Athletic and with killer looks, he wears black eyeliner like a magician and always seems to be there when she needs him the most.
What starts out as a light-hearted investigation with her gadget-happy foster father takes a serious turn when she discovers that Rafael isn't human. Add Jareth, the country's latest rock sensation, into the mix and Sydney is swept into a mysterious world of Tulpas, the Fae, and the Brotherhood of the Snake.
Sydney doesn't know she's a Blue Thread of Fate. She doesn't know the fate of humanity depends on her choice of whom to trust--Jareth or Rafael. And she certainly doesn't know that she's taken the first step on the unexpected path of love.
"The Brotherhood of the Snake" - Book Two of the "Glass Wall"
- The first kiss ...
- A secret revealed ...
- The arrival of the Mesmers ...
After breaking the Glass Wall, Sydney finds herself on the run with Rafael. And as her feelings for him awaken, danger arrives in the form of Mesmers, agents of evil sent by the Brotherhood of the Snake.
But when Jareth struts back onto the scene, it isn't long before Sydney finds herself immersed in sinister secrets, and the subsequent whirlwind of events leaves her wondering just who is right and who is wrong?
"The Inner Circle" - Book Three of the "Glass Wall"
- A love is born that cannot be denied ...
- The Brotherhood of the Snake just might be winning ...
- A Decision of Fate is made ...
As Sydney navigates through the supernatural dangers surrounding her, she seizes control of her destiny and begins to fight back. And as she spies on the Inner Circle and the Brotherhood of the Snake, she discovers the power of human thought.
And finds out she can no longer deny the love that she feels. But then both Rafael and Jareth's secrets are revealed and a Blue-Threaded decision of fate is made. But is it the right one?
"The Egg" - Book Four of the "Glass Wall"
- A death ...
- A beginning ...
- An egg to change the world ...
Faced with her Blue Thread of Fate, Sydney must make a choice if Rafael and Jareth are to survive. But what if it is an inner demon she's not expecting? Can she truly understand the many shades of love?
Prequel - the short story "Behind the Mirror"
Rafael Channing is a Fate Tracker, protecting his world and Earth from disaster, but what should he do when disaster appears in the form of love?
The Highland Heather and Hearts Scottish Romance Collection
The Hearts Collection – Four full-length novels
Four full-length nove
ls of Medieval Scotland. This set includes the two Award-Winning novels ("The Bedeviled Heart" and "The Daring Heart") along with the first book Carmen Caine ever wrote: "The Kindling Heart".
The Kindling Heart (Scotland, 1478) - Ruan MacLeod was through with women. They were nothing but trouble.
Leaving the rash life of his youth behind, he returned to Skye, seeking peace. He never meant to split the clan or start a war with the MacDonald of Duntulm. He certainly never foresaw an arranged marriage to the most scandalous woman in Scotland. Even though she was twice his age, the size of a horse and mother to more than one illegitimate child, he agreed to secure his sister's freedom.
However, even that plan goes drastically awry. On his wedding day, he finds himself faced instead with an enticing, green-eyed lass named Bree. A walking disaster, his bride immediately turns his world into chaos and threatens to melt his resolve never to love again.
Award-Winning Novel: The Bedeviled Heart (Romance Silver Medal Winner) (Scotland, 1479) Cameron Malcolm Stewart, Earl of Lennox, had made his peace with destiny. It was not his fate to love as other men.
Each of his politically arranged marriages had ended in disaster. And though he had never touched a one of his wives, he had come to believe that sharing his name would consign a woman to an early grave. So, on the sunny spring day Cameron encounters a delightfully devious, bright-eyed lass selling charmed stones in one of Stirling's alehouses, he tosses her a shilling, thinking only to steal a kiss. But it is a kiss that will change his life forever.
The Daring Heart (Bronze Medal Winner) (Scotland, 1482) - To the scandalous Lord Julian Gray, marriage is a malady and nothing more.
How can a man even court a lass longer than a fortnight when there are so many pouting lips to kiss? Roaming the courts of Europe, Julian appears to spend his time drinking wine, wagering gold, and dandling willing lasses upon his knee. But no one knows the man behind the mask. No one knows that he is Le Marin--Europe's most daring and brazen spy.
But everything changes the night he finds a dagger pressed against his ribs and an alluring hazel-eyed minx in his bed.
The Bold Heart (Scotland, 1488) - Ewan was a battle-weary warrior with haunted dreams. He no longer believed in love.
As Scotland's greatest warrior and heir to the earldom of Mull, few dared to cross swords with Ewan MacLean. But the price he paid for his fearsome reputation was a heavy one. To survive, he buried his emotions and became only the warrior, riding from battle to battle with his men to protect Scotland from threats within and without her borders and letting himself feel nothing else.
But when his right-hand man, Alec Montgomery, is caught dallying with a powerful Lord's daughter, a trap is set. And both Ewan and Alec find themselves in an English prison, their necks headed for the noose.
On the Isle of Skye, the raven-haired Merry MacLeod spends her days caring for the clan elderly and hurtling across the moors on the back of her black stallion. A high-spirited, adventurous lass, she is no longer troubled by childhood memories of the day the braw lad, Ewan MacLean, rescued her from her husband, the cruel MacDonald. But when she hears the very same Ewan is now confined in an English prison, she disguises herself as a lad and sets out to repay her debt.
After a bold, mysterious youth rescues Ewan and his men from the English, the group swiftly makes their way back to Scotland. But no sooner embarked on their journey home, a young Prince James sounds the call to arms, rises against his father, King James III of Scotland, and plunges Scotland into a dangerous civil war.
But as they journey to join the prince, both Ewan and Alec discover their rescuer's secret and both men find themselves falling unexpectedly in love with a raven-haired beauty.