Alexandre
Page 21
“Jarlath! You should let me go first.”
He ignored Ellard, examining their surroundings instead. Ah, there was someone on the path. The disturbance wasn’t his imagination. He signaled his mount to slow but the cambeest increased his speed.
“Halt, beest!” Jarlath shifted his weight and hauled on the harness reins. Black ignored the command and bolted, the cool air whistling against Jarlath’s face. His cambeest shot past a tree. Too close! Jarlath gritted his teeth at the friction of leg and coarse trunk. Pain reverberated down his limb. He gripped Black’s shaggy hump with pincher fingers to right his balance. “Stop, you cantankerous beest!”
Without warning, Black screeched to a halt. Jarlath shot forward, flipping over his beest’s head. His world slowed, lurching back into place when he struck the ground. Packed earth and gravel punched his head, his shoulder, smacked the breath from his lungs. Fire burned along his cheek. He struggled, wheezed to get air. A groan rippled up his throat as he lay there. Then a familiar snort had him attempting to move. Pain streaked along his arm, and he realized he still held the reins.
“Oh, dear,” a soft, feminine voice said. “Are you injured?”
A murky shadow obscured his vision. Jarlath squinted, desperate to see the source of the musical accent. Another breath sawed down his throat. The roar in his head subsided to a dull throb that sat behind his right eye. Flowers. He could smell flowers. Something cool stroked his cheek, wiped across one eyelid and the darkness lifted. He blinked. Once. Twice, and his world came into sharper focus. A woman? A third blink brought the shimmer into one unwavering vision.
A beautiful, exotic woman.
Her skin was pale, and bore a tinge of pastel green while her sable-brown hair hung in loose waves around her shoulders. He dragged in a breath, his mouth dropping open. She was no figment of imagination. Not with the soft ends of her hair tickling his cheek. Black trews constructed of synleather covered her legs and a white tunic clung to the swells of her breasts. A black vest and knee-high black boots completed her masculine attire. The scent of berries and sugary sweetness, greenery and female filled his nostrils. An enticing combination.
Fascinated, he continued staring. Rude, of course, yet his mind catalogued the differences between her and the women he interacted with at the castle. This one wore a blaster strapped to her thigh. The hilt of a knife peeked from the top of one boot. No doubt, her means of protection against wild animals or the brigands who sometimes frequented the forest. His rapt gaze returned to her face, her berry-stained lips and higher to stare into green eyes flecked with gold.
“Have you addled your head? Beest, shift out of the way, so I can tend to your master. You have blood on your face.”
“No,” Jarlath cried, panic overtaking the pain hammering his shoulder and eye. Black would hurt her. His cambeest disliked contact with strangers and several stable hands bore the scars from his beest’s uncertain temper. He’d raised Black from a youngster, and like all cambeests, Black had bonded with one person and one person only—him.
“Out of the way, beest.” To his amazement, the woman scolded Black and shouldered him away so she could crouch on his other side. Black behaved like an inside pet and nuzzled the pockets of her vest. His cambeest rumbled—the equivalent of a feline purr—and Jarlath felt his mouth go slack.
“Jarlath, my prince.” Ellard thundered into the clearing and was off his cambeest in secs. His weapon cleared his holster, his homely face set in ferocious lines. “Take your hands off him.”
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About Shelley
Shelley Munro is tall and curvaceous with blue eyes and a smile that turns masculine heads everywhere she goes. She’s a university tutor and an explorer/treasure hunter during her vacations. Skilled with weapons and combat, she is currently in talks with a producer about a television series based on her world adventures.
Shelley is also a writer blessed with a VERY vivid imagination and lives with her own hero and a rambunctious puppy in New Zealand. She writes erotic romance in the contemporary, paranormal and historical genres and has several self-published titles. Follow the links below to learn more about Shelley and her books.
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Other Works
Contemporary
Playing to Win
Spies, Lies and Sapphires
Stranger Things Happen
Wild Child
Tea for Two
Cat Burglar in Training
One Night of Misbehavior
Blindside
Fringe Benefits
Lovers at Last
Ain’t Misbehaving
Love and Friendship series
The Bottom Line
Past Regrets
Farmer Wants a Wife
Clare Chronicles
Part-Time Lovers
Enemy Lovers
Fancy Free series
Fancy Free
Christmas is Coming
Feeling the Buzz
Paranormal
Price of Love
Curse of Brandon of Lupinus
Sea of Change
Sci-fi/Futuristic
Sex Idol
Interplanetary Love
Middlemarch Capture
Snared by Saber
Favored by Felix
Lost with Leo
House of the Cat series
Captured & Seduced
Claimed & Seduced
Merry & Seduced
Stranded & Seduced
Seized & Seduced
Alien Encounter
Janaya
Hinekiri
Alexandre
Gay Romance
Eye on the Ball
Lone Wolf
Seeking Kokopelli
Stoned
No Defense
Best Man
Last Wish
Historical
Mistress of Merrivale
The Spurned Viscountess
Unforgettable
Copyright
Alien Encounter: Alexandre
Copyright © 2015 Shelley Munro
ISBN: 978-0-473-31898-7
Editor: Mary Moran
Cover Art: Kim Killion of Killion Group Inc.
This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any manner whatsoever without the prior written permission from the author except in the case of brief quotation embodied in critical articles and reviews.
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