by Marie Harte
What the hell had they copied? Hunter needed a bead on the computer, but knew he had little time. Though he’d kept out of the way of the security cameras, these two had activated the motion sensors in Omaney’s office. Even now, others rushed to investigate the warehouse’s silent alarm. He needed to get his ass out of here. Yet…how had these two known to come here, to this particular site? Omaney kept this place off the radar.
Unfortunately, nothing about the masked pair seemed familiar. Running out of time. He willed them to reveal some important detail as to their identity before he was forced to flee. Westlake Enterprises couldn’t afford to be linked to this break-in, or they’d blow their case.
As if hearing his plea, the man behind the computer did something fairly strange and decidedly stupid. He removed a black glove and placed his hand directly over the keyboard, lightly stroking the keys with his fingertips.
A chill bristled Hunter’s spine, even as he scented the faint trace of extrasensory miasma—a cloying aroma Hunter associated with anything remotely psychic in nature. Holy shit. Jurek needs to know about this, pronto.
The man placed his hand back in the glove, pulled out and pocketed the memory stick, and turned off the computer. His accomplice tossed him a spray bottle and rag and waited while he wiped the keyboard clean of prints.
Saying nothing, they moved together out the office door. Hunter remained still, watching with great curiosity as they backtracked their way to the exit. They paused while the large man listened at the top of the stairs. He nodded and exited, swallowed by the darkness.
Who the hell were they? More importantly, who were they working for? Hunter needed to get J.D.’s ass out here right away to look at that computer.
He waited for the woman to follow her partner and took a second shock to his system. She turned and looked right at him. Even in the dim light, Hunter could see her gray-green irises. With grudging respect, he studied those eyes that slowly examined his form hidden in the shadows.
When he remained unmoving, the woman disappeared into the darkness. He allowed her a small lead before he followed, his curiosity growing in leaps and bounds while he burned to know the woman’s identity. But, when he reached the ground level, he found the exit door stuck in place. Swearing under his breath, he wrestled with it until the frame cracked and the door swung open.
He pushed through and swept the perimeter. To his immense frustration, they had vanished.
He’s going to be the love of her life…if they survive the night.
A Cop and a Feel
© 2011 Vivi Andrews
Karmic Consultants, Book 5
With a single touch, Ronna Mitchell can catch stolen glimpses of the future and separate truth from lies. But life as a human polygraph machine can be lonely. Craving human contact, she moonlights as a palm reader whenever a carnival comes to town.
Officer Matt Holloway is intent on trailing a hit man when he ducks into a palm reader’s booth to avoid being spotted by his quarry. The beguiling Jamaican fortune teller is definitely intriguing, but she’ll have to wait. He’s close on the assassin’s tail.
When Ronna takes his hand, a startling vision of the future flashes in her mind’s eye. Matt isn’t a typical client, he’s The One. Before she has the chance to introduce herself as the mother of his unborn children, he’s gone, leaving her with a terrifying vision of her soul mate covered in blood. And dead certain she’s the only one who can save her happily ever after.
Warning: This book contains carnies, cops, chases, chance encounters and love at first touch.
Enjoy the following excerpt for A Cop and a Feel:
Ronna’s panic level reached a new high when Matt’s sandy head disappeared around the back of the Ferris wheel. The image of the gears of the Ferris wheel splattered with blood replayed vividly in her mind’s eye. The crowds swarmed around her, and her heart thudded loudly in her ears. He was going to be killed, and she couldn’t get to him.
Why were there so many people at the damn carnival? And why were they all moving at an excruciating shuffle pace? Didn’t they realize while they plodded along forming the impenetrable mass of a human herd, the man she was meant to spend the rest of her life with, who was going to give her adorable green-eyed babies and make her laugh until she was ninety-two and too senile to get his jokes anymore, was in peril at this very moment behind the Ferris wheel? So why they the hell weren’t they moving faster?
Ronna pushed her way through the wall of bodies, too afraid of what might be happening to Matt to toss off apologies as people around her protested her shoving and stomping on feet.
She had to get to him.
Not that she’d be much help if she did. Touch-reading was hardly a super-power capable of stopping a speeding bullet, but she was sure she could save him if she was just there with him. He was the love of her life, or at least he would be, and she wasn’t about to let some carnie thug off him behind the Ferris wheel.
A pocket opened up in the crowd between her and the Ferris wheel, and Ronna sprinted forward, running full tilt around the side of the ride and into the heavy shadows behind it, half expecting to stumble over Matt’s lifeless form. In the moment it took for her eyes to adjust to the relative darkness after the spinning strobes of the carnival, she tried to remember how to breathe, gulping in oxygen. She squinted into the dark, one hand pressed over her drumming heart as a figure materialized out of the shadows in front of her.
“Matt!”
Thank God. Ronna took two running steps forward.
The man in front of her turned toward her. Something was wrong. Ronna slammed on the brakes, her sandals skidding on the sticky asphalt. The form in front of her was too heavyset to be the tall, lean Officer Holloway.
“I-I’m sorry,” she stammered. “I thought I saw someone come back here.”
As soon as the words left her lips, Ronna could have kicked herself. He was probably a Ferris wheel operator. If he found Matt skulking back here, the future love of her life would get in trouble with the carnival operators. Which was better than his blood splashing all over the gears, but still…
“You know, I didn’t see anyone,” Ronna said quickly. A second figure shifted in the shadows to her left. She knew him as soon as he moved. Matt. He was okay. Hiding, which, yeah, was kinda weird, but totally okay. She’d been panicking over nothing. “Nobody here!” she sing-songed to the shadow man, bypassing subtle and going straight to obnoxiously Cinderella-cheerful. “Nobody at all.”
She tossed the shadowy Ferris wheel operator a loopy smile. He didn’t say much for a carnie. She still couldn’t make him out, but he didn’t seem familiar. She spent most of her time at the carnival in her booth, but she knew most of the regular operators at least on sight.
He reached toward her, waving something metallic, and Ronna’s vision from Matt’s touch replayed in her mind.
Oh crap, is that a gun?
“Get down!”
The shout came from her left. Matt surged into the open, a gun of his own braced between his hands. Ronna didn’t think. And she didn’t obey. In that split second in the shadow of the Ferris wheel with two armed-and-dangerous men, she couldn’t see anything past the nightmare vision in her mind of Matt’s gorgeous eyes, wide with horror and shock, in a face sprayed with blood. She dove toward him, slamming him to the ground in a tackle worthy of an NFL All Star. The spit of a silencer and the answering deafening report of an unsilenced gun split the shadows.
Matt grunted as he hit the ground and her weight hit him. Footsteps pounded the dirt nearby, and he rolled, pinning her protectively beneath his body as he twisted to scan the darkness around them, his gun trained on the spot where the gunman had stood.
The shadows were empty of crazy gun-wielding Ferris wheel operators now, but Matt’s body didn’t relax. He stayed tense above her.
Tense and whole. He’s alive.
There wasn’t any moisture where her front was pressed against his, no gushing fluids to indicate exces
sive bleeding from a mortal wound, but she ran her hands over his torso just to be safe, checking for bullet holes. When her hands hampered his range of movement with the gun he was still pointing into the darker shadows, he knocked them out of his way.
“Lie still,” he snapped, clearly not appreciating her life-saving tackle or her continued concern for his well-being. He dug into his pocket, shifting his weight so he wasn’t pressing her down into the filthy ground, but still shielding her as he lifted his cell phone, punched a number in with his thumb and pressed it to his ear, never taking his eyes off the shadows or lowering his gun.
She was close enough to hear the bleeping tone of a dropped call.
Matt swore and dialed again, snarling another obscenity when the call failed a second time. “Is it too much to ask for a fucking signal?”
Ronna couldn’t make herself care about crappy cell providers. “You’re alive.”
“Of course I’m alive. You could have gotten yourself killed. What the hell were you thinking?”
“I saved your life,” Ronna explained patiently. “I ruined his shot.”
“You ruined my shot.” Matt shoved his phone back into his pocket. “Not to mention my chances of getting a permanent spot on the task force. Damn it.” He rose to a crouch, still alertly surveying the area.
Ronna sat up as well, taking stock of her now-filthy Madame Ramona getup. There was no fabric on earth capable of withstanding being ground into popcorn, cotton-candy residue and Ferris wheel grease and coming out unscathed. Her entire outfit would have to be burned when she got home to avoid contaminating the rest of her closet.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing back here?” Matt straightened and helped her—none too gently—to her feet.
He would probably react badly if she told him she had envisioned his death and followed him out of her booth to protect him from a horrific Ferris wheel-related death. He didn’t seem to be in a very receptive mood.
Before she can build a future, she must dig up the bones of her past…
Uncovered
© 2009 Linda Winfree
A Hearts of the South Story
After nearly twenty years, her career in possible ruins, homicide detective Madeline Holton returns to her hometown for a temporary stint working with the local sheriff's department. The demons of her teen years lie in wait, rising once more in the form of a cold case she must solve. And when it comes to a handsome farmer who’s making good on her family’s former land, she can’t seem to keep her foot out of her mouth—or her hands off him.
Agricultural businessman Ash Hardison won't lie to himself—despite Madeline's obvious issues, he's more drawn to her than any woman he's ever known. He's already laid the ghosts of his past to rest, and he's determined to help Madeline purge hers. Whether she likes it or not.
Because he knows it’s the only way they have a chance to forge a future together.
Warning: Contains deadly secrets, a prickly heroine and a determined man who knows what he wants.
Enjoy the following excerpt for Uncovered:
Ash flicked on the small lamp sitting atop his dresser. In the soft light, he gazed down at Madeline, a quiet surge of need pulsing in him. She stepped forward and laid her palms on his bare chest. Sensation spread out from her hot hands and he shivered.
He’d been right the first time. She was dangerous. Doing this, taking her to his bed, probably ranked as one of his less-than-smart decisions, but he was going to do it anyway, consequences be damned and consigned to be dealt with later.
Because he simply couldn’t make himself walk away.
He slipped a finger beneath one thin bra strap and slid the knuckle down her chest, her skin smooth and heated under his easy touch. She watched him, hazel eyes slumberous and dark, and she took another step toward him, gliding her hands up his pecs to his shoulders, fingers exploring the dips and rises of his muscles.
Sensual mischief curled her lips and glinted in the depths of her eyes. “Nice.”
Chuckling, he lowered his head to kiss her. She didn’t hold anything back, but opened her mouth beneath his, stroking her tongue between his teeth with teasing little curls. Oh yeah, she was dangerous, but he couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt this overpowering urge to get closer, to strip everything away until there were only the two of them and the building desire. He sure as hell hadn’t felt this way with Angie or Layla or any of the safe women he’d dated the last few years.
“Madeline,” he mumbled against her lips and stroked his hands over her curves to rest at her hips. He dipped his fingers beneath the waistband of her low-rise jeans. The skin there was soft and hot too. God, she was hot all over. He couldn’t wait to have her all over him.
She purred and tilted her hips into his. Wanting spread through him, firing through his groin, his dick growing heavier, harder, with her nearness. She rubbed against him, a slow, naughty movement. “Very nice.”
Leaning back, she grasped his belt and went to work on the buckle. His mouth went dry and she held his gaze while she wrestled the buckle free and popped the button loose before lowering his zipper.
She wrapped her fingers around the waistband of his boxer briefs, brushing his stomach. Every muscle in the vicinity jumped. Shit, the woman wasn’t dangerous…she was deadly. She’d taken him from half-ready to damn-if-she-touched-him-he’d-lose-it in a few short moments. Was this Madeline, confident and utterly sexual, the real one? The wary, isolated Madeline had disappeared as soon as they walked through his bedroom door.
Head tilted back, she lifted her eyebrows. “Can’t wait to find out if you look as nice as you feel.”
He had to force air into his lungs, and his laugh came out shakier than he would have liked. “Damn, I like a woman who isn’t shy.”
The woman actually laughed. She shoved his jeans and briefs down a few scant inches, not quite exposing him. “Then you should love me.”
He opened his mouth, intending to parry with some smartass comment. Her hand cupping, squeezing, his pulsing erection through his jeans sent every coherent reply out of reach. Instead, he attempted to catch his breath and stiffened his knees so he wouldn’t end up on the floor.
She eased jeans and underwear down, his happy-to-see-her anatomy bobbing free. Slipping his shoes from his feet, she tossed them behind her and nudged him into stepping out of the denim and cotton garments. Kneeling before him, she slid those hot palms up both thighs. His belly tightened with an unbearable anticipation.
“Very, very nice.” She curved her fingers around him, tracing the vein running from base to tip. Holding him firmly, she swirled her tongue around the head. Sparks shot along his veins, and he groaned. Hell, he was gonna end up on the floor for sure, and God, if she kept that up, he was gonna cry.
Still fisting him, she took him into her mouth. Heat and moisture surrounded him, enveloped him. Head thrown back, he let his eyes slide closed.
Oh, yee-ha.
He tangled his uninjured hand in her hair. “Hell yeah, baby, that’s good.”
With a quick pinch on his thigh, she let him go. “I’m not your baby. Find another endearment.”
Humor spiked in him, tempering the raging need somewhat. “Honey, sweetheart, sugar…whatever you like.”
“I’m not much for love names, period, Hardison.” She twirled her tongue about him once more, like he was a melting ice cream cone on a hot day. “Although I like the way honey drips off your…lips.”
He laughed, and she chose that moment to take him to the back of her throat.
“Madeline,” he gasped, barely controlling the urge to lunge forward. His fingers tightened in her thick tresses, pulling.
She pinched him again. “Careful,” she mumbled around the head of his dick.
“Bossy, aren’t you?” The words came out on a strangled moan. Hell, she was killing him, with that slow spin of her tongue, the playful scrape of teeth, the way she took him deep then sucked the head, making him hurt with need, then slo
wing him down so he buzzed with a simmer of wanting.
“Mm-hmm.” She slowed on him, nails a light abrasion on his balls. Under her easy teasing, they tightened, desire rippling up into his belly and out to his bloodstream. If she didn’t stop that…
“Damn, honey, you’re dangerous.” He eased away and tugged her up, covering her lips with his. Dipping his tongue into her mouth, he skimmed the straps down her arms and fumbled with the back until the clasp sprang free. The silky little bit of nothing fell to the floor. He cupped her breasts, the rounded flesh filling his palms, and flicked his thumbs over hardened nipples.
“Oh, that’s nice too,” she murmured. She moved, shimmying out of jeans, until she was naked and pressed against him, belly nudging his erection while he toyed and played with the stiff peaks, tugging, kneading, pulling.
One arm wrapped around her waist, he caught a reddened nipple between his lips, nibbling, sucking. She arched, rubbing against him. “Yes, like that. Just like that.”
With a groan of approval, he lifted her against him and took the two long steps to the bed, stretching her across it, never taking his mouth from her breast. She dug her hands into his hair and shifted beneath him, panting.
“You’re strong. I like that.” She bowed into him, damp curls sliding along his belly. “Fuck me.”
Yeah, she was bossy. He liked that too. But she probably needed to know up front that he’d followed all the orders he was going to back during his military days. “Not yet.”
“Ash—”
“I said not yet.” He pressed open kisses down her belly, holding her hips and ignoring the throbbing at his stitches.