After Sundown

by Shelly Thacker

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  Thanks so much. I really appreciate your kindness!

  Warmest wishes and happy reading,

  Shelly

  AFTER SUNDOWN

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, business establishments, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Publishing History

  First edition published by Dell under the title Into the Sunset

  Copyright © 1999 by Shelly Thacker Meinhardt

  Second edition published by Summit Avenue Books

  Copyright © 2013 by Shelly Thacker Meinhardt

  ISBN: 978-0-9847646-8-6

  All rights reserved. No part of this book, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews, may be reproduced in any form by any means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without prior written permission from the author.

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  Cover design by Kim Killion of Hot DAMN! Designs www.hotdamndesigns.com

  Digital formatting by A Thirsty Mind www.athirstymind.com

  Bonus Content: Excerpt from RUN WILD

  (Escape with a Scoundrel Series)

  A sexy pair of scoundrels run from the law—shackled together by an unbreakable iron chain.

  Nicholas Brogan is an ex-pirate with years of sin branded on his soul. Samantha Delafield is a high-born lady turned devious thief. Captured by His Majesty’s marshals, the two are on their way to the gallows until they stage a daring escape and run for their lives—shackled together by an iron chain that quickly proves unbreakable.

  Forced to work together to survive, the outlaws find themselves locked in a battle of fierce wills and fiery passions. From a remote forest in Staffordshire to a secret hideout in London’s most elegant square, they must learn to trust one another as they face old enemies, dark secrets... and discover a love more priceless than any gem they’ve ever stolen.

  “4 stars (highest rating). This could be the romance that takes Shelly Thacker to the big time: the hardcover contract, the fan club... Thacker always spins a good story, but Run Wild is her best ever. This time out, there’s a new depth of soul to go with all that heart.” –The Detroit Free Press

  “Thacker skillfully entangles a notorious ex-pirate with a high-born lady turned thief... Run Wild offers an exciting and innovative plot... and many steamy love scenes.” –Publishers Weekly

  Run Wild

  London, 1741

  Stretched out on the forest floor, with his disheveled black hair and glittering green eyes and bloodied shoulder, he looked like he belonged here in this wild place. Fit in with the other untamed things. A wounded predator. Dark and fierce... and capable of all sorts of unpredictable behavior.

  His gaze skimmed downward, coming to rest on her legs. He was still breathing harshly. “Come here.”

  Sam stiffened. His voice sounded weaker than before, but she wasn’t taking any chances. Shifting her eyes quickly left and right, she sought some weapon she might use to protect herself. A rock. A branch. Anything.

  “I said come here,” he repeated impatiently.

  When she didn’t comply, he reached out and grabbed her foot.

  “What are you doing?” She tried to wriggle out of his grasp. “Unhand me!”

  “Gladly,” he said tiredly—yet he hung on to her, pushing himself up on one elbow. Snagging her ruined slipper with his other hand, he flipped it off her foot. “I’d like nothing better than to unhand you, unchain you, and be done with you.”

  Instead of attacking her, he attacked the shackle around her leg.

  Sam gave up her struggle, even though she knew she could kick her way free. One blow to his wounded shoulder and he would let her loose. But he was already in a foul mood and she didn’t want to make it worse.

  Besides, she realized what he was trying to do. He pulled at the shackle, trying to slide it off over her foot.

  Which just might work.

  “Maybe if we had some kind of...” Glancing around, she took a handful of slimy mud from beneath the leaves and smeared it over her skin.

  “Come on,” he muttered under his breath, pushing the cuff, turning it, swearing at it. “Come on.”

  Sam tried to help but he clearly didn’t want her help. Holding her bare foot with one hand and the iron cuff with the other, he turned both at different angles, trying to coax the cuff past her ankle bone.

  “It’s too tight and it’s bolted on,” she said finally, exasperated at being manhandled. “It’s not going to come off.”

  With a short, expressive oath, he released her. Lowering himself back down into the leaves, he tossed the muddy slipper into her lap. “Perfect,” he growled. “Of all the lady thieves on the run in England, I have to get myself shackled to the one with big feet.”

  Sam scuttled backward, as far away from him as the chain would allow. Which wasn’t nearly far enough. “I’ll thank you to keep your opinions to yourself.”

  Her tone was frosty, but she feared that even her haughtiest drawing-room airs couldn’t conceal the fact that her cheeks felt hot. Scalding. She rubbed at her ankle, wiping away the mud and the unexpected warmth that lingered from the touch of his callused fingers on her bare skin.

  Grabbing her slipper, she put it back on. Her foot and her ankle ached with soreness, felt cool from the gooey muck. She couldn’t understand why they also... tingled.

  She decided that the unfamiliar sensation must come from the hours of unaccustomed physical exertion.

  “It’s not my fault that the shackles are so tight.” She glared at the man stretched out on the ground, adding in a mutinous whisper, “And I do not have big feet.”

  “Doesn’t bloody well matter now,” he grumbled. “Short of a convenient bolt of lightning from above or a blacksmith, it looks like there’s no way for me to get free of you.” Opening his eyes, he peered at the lengthening shadows, almost as if he were measuring the sun in some way. “Two hours of daylight left. You ready to press on, Lady Bigfeet?”

  She ignored the sarcasm, every muscle in her body aching at the words press on. “No.” She groaned. “No, I’m not. Can’t we stop? Can’t we rest just for a—”

  “Not unless you’re eager to wind up back in gaol.” He pushed himself to a seated position. “As soon as word spreads about a pair of dangerous fugitives on the loose, two marshalmen killed, and rewards offered, every lawman and bounty hunter in the north of England will be on our trail. By morning, if not sooner. And if they use dogs...”

  He let the sentence trail off, running a weary hand over his face.

  Sam felt a surge of fear. Dogs. Dozens of men hunting her down. Skilled, experienced men.

  And they would know right where to start looking. The young guard Tucker would show them.

  Her throat tightened. The rogue was right. They had to keep going. Put as much distance as possible between themselves and the point where they’d disappeared into the forest.

  Yet her fear mingled with anger at his apparent nonchalance. “Didn’t you consider any of that before you decided to take a flying leap out of the cart? Didn’t you think that far ahead? Didn’t you think at all?”

  “Aye,
I did,” he retorted, “but I wasn’t counting on your charming company, Lady Bigfeet. I planned to be long gone by now. You are slowing me down.” He reached up to unfasten the bandage knotted around his shoulder. “But before we go any further, you’d better take a look at this damned wound.”

  She felt like spitting in his face. One minute he was insulting her, and the next he expected her to see to his comfort? “If you think I’m going to lift one finger to help you,” she said in a low, even voice, crossing her arms over her chest, “think again.”

  He clenched his jaw, wincing as he unwrapped the blood-soaked cloth. “Listen, angel,” he said tightly, beads of sweat sliding down his face, into his beard, “if you think you’re in trouble now, just try to imagine what would happen to you if I pass out from loss of blood. Or if I die.”

  She had barely started to contemplate the pleasant possibilities when he demolished every single one.

  “You’d be stuck here with one hundred and eighty pounds of dead weight chained to your ankle.” His eyes pierced hers. “Helpless as a trussed-up Christmas pigeon when the authorities come looking for you. If their dogs don’t get you first, their guns will make mincemeat out of you. When dealing with fugitives who’ve killed two of their fellow lawmen, they tend to let their bullets do their talking for them.”

  The violent image stole the air from her lungs. “But I didn’t kill those marshalmen!”

  “I doubt you’ll have time to explain that.”

  They stared into each other’s eyes for a long moment, the truth swirling between them like one of the hot beams of light from the dying sun.

  Then he said it aloud.

  “If I die, you die,” he put it plainly, his stark words all the more powerful for their lack of embellishment. “If I live...”

  For some reason, it took him an extra moment to finish that sentence.

  “You live.”

  Mute, shaking, she tried to control the fear and resentment careening through her. He was insufferable. Cold-hearted, uncivilized, utterly self-interested.

  But he also had a point. As unavoidable as it was true. If they wanted to survive...

  They were going to have to work together.

  Swallowing hard, she tried to tell herself that everything would be all right. As long as the chain bound them together, they had to keep each other alive and well. Once they found some way to get the shackles off, they would go their separate ways.

  For now, she just had to endure his presence and make the best of this deplorable situation.

  Because her very life depended on it.

  ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

  Buy this book now at your favorite ebook retailer:

  Run Wild http://www.shellythacker.com/runwild.html

  Bonus Content: Excerpt from MIDNIGHT RAIDER

  (Escape with a Scoundrel Series)

  Dear Reader,

  I’m currently working on a new, fully revised edition of MIDNIGHT RAIDER, an award-winning historical romance about a lady highwayman and her handsome rival who form a dangerous alliance to defeat a powerful mutual enemy. The odds of both of them surviving the scheme are not good—and falling in love was never part of the bargain. Enjoy this exclusive, advanced sneak peek!

  ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

  Midnight Raider

  London, 1735

  “Lord Pierce Wolverton, fourth Earl of Darkridge. So pleased to make your acquaintance.”

  He spoke with the smoothness of a man born and bred in Cavendish Square, but Elizabeth got the impression he would be more at ease trading curses with a Thames ferryman. If he were truly a lord, he was strangely attired, for he wore neither wig nor hat nor any face powder. His hair was tied in a simple queue at his neck, one dark brown lock straying over his right eye.

  “I... I am...” Trapped by that unyielding, dusky gaze, Elizabeth could not remember by which name she should introduce herself. He was studying her face, her chin, and most of all her eyes. She found the intense interest both odd and disturbing. He still held her wrist, and the sensation of his strong fingers clasping her bare skin filled her with the strangest prickly warmth. “I am—”

  “Lady Elizabeth Barnes-Finchley,” he said with a cynical bite to his voice. He released her at last, seeming satisfied with his perusal. “I was told you would be here tonight.”

  Elizabeth felt unsteady on her feet, but a rising sense of alarm quickly cleared her head. “By whom? And how do you know who I am?” Had Arkwright said her name? She couldn’t remember.

  Lord Darkridge wandered to the edge of the pond. “You, my lady, have swept London society off its feet. Every drawing room and concert hall is abuzz with talk of the beautiful young woman who arrived with her aunt from the Continent, three months ago. When I heard you had the most striking violet eyes, I simply had to meet you.”

  Elizabeth’s heart began to pound. Was this merely a wealthy nobleman interested in seduction? Or did he somehow suspect that she was not what she seemed? “My eyes have brought you all this way out into the country? To attend a party where you are obviously not wanted?”

  “Yes.” He said the word harshly, and when he turned to look at her, Elizabeth thought she saw a flash of some emotion in his eyes—anger, or perhaps hurt. But when he spoke again, his voice returned to its rich, low tones. “I am something of a poet, you see. I asked where I might find you because I am currently working on a volume of odes to London’s great beauties. I should like to include you.”

  She blinked at him in disbelief. As he stood at the edge of the water, framed by the light of the lamps and the moon, he looked like a dark god of war, just arrived in a new land, ready to conquer all he surveyed. The idea of this man as a poet was ludicrous. His flattery was obviously intended to lure her to his town house and into his bed. Elizabeth couldn’t explain the twinge of disappointment she felt upon discovering he was no better than the other lords she had met.

  “I would not be interested, Lord Darkridge.” She started to walk back to the house.

  He stepped in front of her before she could get more than a few paces. “But we have only just met. Or have you another engagement tonight?”

  Elizabeth glared at his chest, annoyed at his persistence and distressed by his question. She could not shake the feeling that this man knew much more than he should, that she was not safe out here alone with him. “No, I haven’t another engagement. But my aunt does not like to stay out late, and I am sure she is ready to return home.”

  Before she could move around him, he reached out and took her hand.

  “Sir,” she ground out, “if you are any kind of a gentleman, you will let me go. And if you do not, I shall scream.”

  ~ ~ ~

  Pierce didn’t heed her threat. He believed her, but found himself unwilling to let go. He had been wandering the grounds for an hour, trying to think of a way to get inside and find her, when she neatly presented herself, a pale wisp of lavender moonlight, floating over the lawn in her silk gown.

  She hesitantly raised her head, and he felt the strangest clenching sensation in his chest. Her eyes, so bright—and somehow so haunted—drew him in like a song of bittersweet beauty. Her blunt, straight nose and slightly uneven lips didn’t detract from her charm. On the contrary, they elevated her looks to the realm of the uncommon. This was no angel drifted down from heaven, made for poets to sing of. This was a woman as real and dark and intriguing as the night itself, a woman made for a man.

  “You really must let me go,” she said.

  “No, I don’t think I shall.”

  There was no mistaking her voice, either. The Cockney accent was gone, but the husky, throaty sensuality in its place held him enthralled. Hellfire, he should just let her leave. He couldn’t for the life of him understand why he had stepped in front of her. His first look at her face had told him all he needed to know.

  There was no doubt in his mind that Lady Elizabeth Barnes-Finchley and the highwayman Blackerby Swift were one and the same. The London magistrate
s, however, would not believe him if he presented this lady, looking like she did now. They would laugh him out of the Old Bailey.

  He would have to capture her at the scene of one of her crimes, in her disguise. He guessed that the real reason she was so eager to leave was that she intended to take Montaigne’s midnight coach. He might catch her in the act this very night.

  So why didn’t he just let her go?

  The moon bathed her skin in pearl-white light, from the delicate line of her chin to the shadowy edge of her shoulders. The upper curve of her full, high breasts was just visible above her décolletage, and Pierce’s whole body tensed unexpectedly at the sudden image of this woman—Lady Elizabeth Barnes-Finchley, Blackerby Swift, or whoever the devil she really was—lying naked beneath him, here on the grass.

  His fingers itched to touch her, just there, at that vulnerable spot where lavender silk and white lace gave way to warm, soft woman.

  The next instant, he lowered his lips to hers.

  “Please.” She jerked her head to one side, a note of panic in her voice. She tried to pull her hand out of his, and this time Pierce released her, amazed at his own impulsiveness. This wasn’t like him at all. He hadn’t paused a second to think about what he was doing.

  She backed away a step and stood there, staring at him, those eyes of pure amethyst wide with confusion, her black lashes and brows stark against her skin, like ink strokes on a fresh white page. In an instant, her features changed from uncertainty to anger, and she hiked up her skirts and turned away. She walked off with a proud, graceful sway that sent Pierce’s blood hammering through his veins.

  He couldn’t resist having the last word. “Good night, Lady Barnes-Finchley.”

  At the sound of his voice she broke into a run like a startled doe, fleeing from him toward the house in a flurry of shimmering silk.