Kiss Across Seas

by Tracy Cooper-Posey

  “I’m out of practice,” Alex said. “The last time I did this was when the twins were born.”

  “It’s a bike-ride thing.” Rafe put the baby in his arms and sat down again. “Soon as you’re comfortable, it’s Sydney’s turn.”

  “No, I’m fine,” Sydney said quickly.

  “You’re freaking out of your sweat socks,” Rafe said. “I’ll get you through it. Immersion therapy.”

  Sydney blew out her breath. “Well…”

  “We’re going to keep her, aren’t we?” Rafe said.

  “Given where she came from, we can’t really do anything else but keep her,” Sydney said. “I promised Alim.”

  Alex smiled. “I didn’t know at the time that I would be standing next to you while you rear her. Count me in, though. It seems fitting that we do it. Rafe, are you asking because you’re anxiously looking for the next surrogate family?”

  Rafe shook his head. “Morrigan verbally slapped me out of that.” He glanced at Sydney and smiled. “You were one scary lady.”

  “Good to know I will have your respect in the future, at least,” Sydney murmured.

  “I was asking, because it doesn’t feel right to hand her over to Taylor and Veris and Brody. Just because we all suck at the kids thing doesn’t mean we can’t change.”

  Alex leaned forward and kissed him. “I love you, you mangy Iberian.”

  “Yeah, about that…” Rafe kissed him back, quickly. “I did some research. About slavery. Brody actually suggested it.”

  Sydney glanced at Alex. They had both been waiting for Rafe to open the subject. Now he had. Sydney silently thanked Brody for nudging him.

  “What about slavery?” Alex asked.

  “It’s everywhere.”

  “Yes, it is,” Alex said.

  “If you broaden the definition to people who are tied to another individual for economic reasons, or extortion, or in any way have their freedom of choice curtailed by another human…then that’s a form of slavery, too.”

  “Agreed,” Sydney said.

  “Then, by that broadest definition, most of the human fucking population throughout time has been enslaved in one way or another.” Rafe’s voice rose. “The really offensive thing though, is that by far, the biggest portion of those people are women. Then children. Then the pitiful idiots like me make up the minority.”

  Alex handed the baby to Sydney, his gaze on Rafe. Sydney took the blanketed bundle automatically, to give Alex both hands.

  Alex bent over Rafe, put his hands around his face and kissed him, even more thoroughly than the first one. He rested his head against Rafe’s. “You are a beautiful man. No wonder I fell in love with you.”

  He sat down again, while Rafe wore a little, warm smile. “What are you going to do about it?” Alex asked him.

  Rafe’s smile faded. “I don’t know yet. I’m still trying to figure that out. Picking up former slaves, dusting them off and easing them out into the world again is going to be part of it. It felt good seeing Neven perk back to life the other day. Beyond that…it’s nebulous. Whatever it ends up being, I was kinda hoping…I want you both to help me.”

  Alex let out a sigh. “Took you long enough.”

  “I accept,” Sydney said.

  “Hey, look at you, mother,” Rafe said, smiling.

  Sydney realized she was rocking and patting the baby without thinking about it. She had just done it, too busy watching Rafe wind himself up to ask them, to help him to worry about whether she was doing it right.

  “I guess it’s there in all of us,” she said. “Just buried more deeply in some.”

  Alex rested his hand on her shoulder. “Rafe, you said you had a name for the baby.”

  Rafe rolled his eyes. “It’s pretty awful. I was thinking about what you two told me, about Sydney’s time back in the eleventh century. The whole thing sounds very Arabian Nights.”

  Sydney sighed. “Alex, you so have to buy a horse. I mean it.”

  Alex’s smile was heated. Only last night, Sydney had shown Rafe what they had done on Basel’s back, by climbing onto Rafe’s lap, impaling herself and guiding his hands to the same spots.

  With Alex watching and responding to the sight, the experience had been twice as intense. Rafe had been trembling at the end.

  Rafe paused to recall the night, his eyes growing as warm as Alex’s.

  “The awful name you were considering?” Alex asked him.

  Rafe sighed. “Shahrazad. It means—”

  “City of Freedom,” both she and Alex finished.

  Rafe raised a brow. “Show offs. You see what I mean, though. She would never forgive us, saddling her with that name.”

  “Saddling?” Sydney repeated.

  “Wow, we’re all stuck in that channel,” Alex said. “There’s a good stud stable just outside Granada. I’ll call them, first chance I get.”

  Rafe fished out his cellphone and held it out toward him.

  Alex laughed. He had been doing a lot more of that lately, Sydney realized.

  The baby stirred and made the soft, weak sounds she found so fascinating. The helplessness of the infant made her heart stir and beat with a fierce determination to protect her from anything and everything.

  Sydney touched the tip of her finger against the child’s palm. Instantly, her fingers closed over the tip, too tiny to completely encircle her finger. The baby’s eyes opened a sliver. She looked at Sydney, then closed her eyes and slept once more, her hand firmly around Sydney’s finger.

  Sydney looked up. Alex and Rafe were both watching her. The heat that had been in their eyes had shifted to a different sort of warmth and she realized the child in her arms was the key that would unlock the scars of the past for all of them. She would allow them to slough off their histories and take up new lives.

  “I know what to call her,” Sydney said softly, so she wouldn’t wake the baby. She looked down at the little girl’s delicate face, then up at the two men she loved most in the world. “Liberty,” she said.

  Alex considered it. He stared to smile again. “It’s—”

  “Perfect,” Rafe finished.

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  You can jump to the book’s page by clicking on this link. https://books2read.com/KissAcrossSeas

  Thank you so much!

  Tracy

  The Next Book in the

  Kiss Across Time series

  Book 7 of this series, Kiss Across Worlds, will be released in August 2017.

  In the meantime, try more vampire time travel ménage stories from the Beloved Bloody Time series.

  Bannockburn Binding, Book 1, Beloved Bloody Time series.

  Time is theirs to keep. But it comes with a price

  In the early 23rd Century, vampires learned how to travel back in time, and created a time-tsunami that threatened life as we know it, until they corrected their mistake. They created the Chronometric Conservation Agency, which is tasked with preserving history and therefore protecting humanity’s future. The Touring arm of the Agency offers trips back into the real past, with vampire guides, called travelers.

  When Natalia (Tally) Marta, vampire and traveler, takes her client to visit the siege of Stirling Castle in 1314, she is caught and held hostage for ransom by Robert MacKenzie, a Bruce clansman. Rob finds himself drawn to the wilful, stubborn and very different English lady he has captured and the relationsh
ip becomes an intimate, highly-charged sexual pairing. Swiftly, Tally and Rob realize their bond is more than sexual, that the emotions stirring their hearts are true.

  Christian Lee Hamilton, vampire, one of the last true southern gentlemen, and Tally’s ex-lover, knows the 1314 time marker enough to jump back and help Tally return home. His arrival at Bannockburn adds complications, for Christian finds himself drawn to Rob MacKenzie as much as Tally is. But neither of them can stay in the past forever. To do so means certain death.

  ___

  Amazon Best Seller – Top 100 (#5)

  #1 Amazon Time Travel Romance Bestseller

  #1 Amazon Fantasy Romance Bestseller

  Reviewers’ Top Pick —The Romance Reviews

  Nominated Erotic Paranormal Book of the Year 2011—The Romance Reviews

  Reviewers’ Top Pick: Oh wow, is this a great read! I simply couldn’t put this down once I started. OMG! I didn’t see this resolution coming. —The Romance Reviews

  Get your copy of Bannockburn Binding now – it’s free!

  https://books2read.com/BannockburnBinding

  About the Author

  Tracy Cooper-Posey is an Amazon #1 Best Selling Author. She writes romantic suspense, paranormal, urban fantasy, futuristic and science fiction romances. She has published over 80 novels since 1999, been nominated for five CAPAs including Favourite Author, and won the Emma Darcy Award.

  She turned to indie publishing in 2011. Her indie titles have been nominated four times for Book Of The Year and Byzantine Heartbreak was a 2012 winner. Faring Soul won a SFR Galaxy Award in 2016 for “Most Intriguing Philosophical/Social Science Questions in Galaxybuilding” She has been a national magazine editor and for a decade she taught romance writing at MacEwan University.

  She is addicted to Irish Breakfast tea and chocolate, sometimes taken together. In her spare time she enjoys history, Sherlock Holmes, science fiction and ignoring her treadmill. An Australian Canadian, she lives in Edmonton, Canada with her husband, a former professional wrestler, where she moved in 1996 after meeting him on-line.

  Other books by Tracy Cooper-Posey

  For reviews, excerpts, and more about each title, visit Tracy’s site and click on the cover you are interested in: http://tracycooperposey.com/books-by-thumbnail/

  * = Free!

  Blood Knot Series

  (Urban Fantasy Paranormal Series)

  Blood Knot*

  Southampton Swindle

  Broken Promise

  Vale

  Amor Meus

  Blood Stone

  Blood Unleashed

  Blood Drive

  Blood Revealed

  Blood Ascendant

  Beloved Bloody Time Series

  (Paranormal Futuristic Time Travel)

  Bannockburn Binding*

  Wait

  Byzantine Heartbreak

  Viennese Agreement

  Romani Armada

  Spartan Resistance

  Celtic Crossing

  Kiss Across Time Series

  (Paranormal Time Travel)

  Kiss Across Time*

  Kiss Across Swords

  Time Kissed Moments I

  Kiss Across Chains

  Kiss Across Deserts

  Kiss Across Kingdoms

  Time and Tyra Again

  Kiss Across Seas

  Kiss Across Worlds

  The Kine Prophecies

  (Epic Norse Fantasy Romance)

  The Branded Rose Prophecy

  The Stonebrood Saga

  (Gargoyle Paranormal Series)

  Carson’s Night*

  Beauty’s Beasts

  Harvest of Holidays

  Unbearable

  Sabrina’s Clan

  Pay The Ferryman

  Hearts of Stone (Boxed Set)

  Destiny’s Trinities

  (Urban Fantasy Romance Series)

  Beth’s Acceptance*

  Mia’s Return

  Sera’s Gift

  The First Trinity

  Cora’s Secret

  Zoe’s Blockade

  Octavia’s War

  The Second Trinity

  Terra’s Victory

  Destiny’s Trinities (Boxed Set)

  Interspace Origins

  (Science Fiction Romance Series)

  Faring Soul

  Varkan Rise

  Cat and Company

  Interspace Origins (Boxed Set)

  Short Paranormals

  Solstice Surrender

  Eva’s Last Dance

  Three Taps, Then….

  The Well of Rnomath

  The Vistaria Affair

  (Romantic Suspense)

  Red Leopard*

  Black Heart

  Blue Knight

  White Dawn

  Go-get-‘em Women

  (Short Romantic Suspense Series)

  The Royal Talisman

  Delly’s Last Night

  Vivian’s Return

  Ningaloo Nights

  Jewells of Tomorrow

  (Historical Romantic Suspense)

  Diana By The Moon

  Heart of Vengeance

  Scandalous Sirens

  (Historical Romance Series)

  Forbidden*

  Dangerous Beauty

  Perilous Princess

  Romantic Thrillers Series

  Fatal Wild Child

  Dead Again

  Dead Double

  Terror Stash

  Thrilling Affair (Boxed Set)

  The Endurance

  (Science Fiction Romance Series)

  5,001

  Greyson’s Doom

  Yesterday’s Legacy

  Promissory Note

  Quiver and Crave

  Xenogenesis

  Junkyard Heroes

  Contemporary Romances

  Lucifer’s Lover

  An Inconvenient Lover

  The Sherlock Holmes Series

  (Romantic Suspense/Mystery)

  Chronicles of the Lost Years

  The Case of the Reluctant Agent

  Sherlock Boxed In

  The Indigo Reports

  (Space Opera)

  Flying Blind

  New Star Rising

  Non-Fiction Titles

  Reading Order

  (Non-Fiction, Reference)

  Reading Order 2016

  Copyright Information

  This is an original publication of Tracy Cooper-Posey

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales, is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for third-party websites or their content.

  Copyright © 2017 by Tracy Cooper-Posey

  Text design by Tracy Cooper-Posey

  Edited by Helen Woodall

  http://helenwoodallfreelanceediting.blogspot.ca/

  Cover by Dar Albert, Wicked Smart Designs

  http://wickedsmartdesigns.com

  All rights reserved

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  FIRST EDITION: April 2017

  Cooper-Posey, Tracy

  Kiss Across Seas/Tracy Cooper-Posey—1st Ed.

  Romance—Fiction

  Paranormal – Fiction

 

 

 
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