Mated By The Demon Collections: Paranormal Romance

by Riley Moreno

  Alex was everything she had ever wanted in a man – even though most of these attributes were things she had never even considered in the past. He was good looking, kind, and very generous. He never forced anything on her and seemed simply to want her to be happy. He looked at her in a way that made her feel special and she could tell that he liked her. This was nice. A lot of men that she had been with before had liked to make it difficult – they liked the chase and the game. But not Alex, he wore his heart on his sleeve. He had even organised for her to get special horse rides each day, and after five weeks of riding the instructor seemed keen for her to go off on her own. He said that she had a way with the horses and that soon she might be one of the instructors too. She almost laughed at the idea – not because it was funny, but because it was so far removed from the life that had before. Her life seemed simpler now, but also a lot more real.

  Now, Alice was sitting outside, a blanket wrapped around her legs and was watching the sun slowly go down, completely lost in thought. She got a fright when Alex appeared behind her and jumped when she heard his voice.

  “Alice, you seem so far away.” He reached over and got another blanket, wrapping it around her shoulders and then came to sit next to her. The small gesture didn’t go unnoticed to her. The two of them sat like that for a while, just watching the horizon and allowing the silence to envelope them. She sidled up to him, feeling his body against hers and knew that she was going to have to tell him the truth. But instead of saying anything she continued to sit, waiting for the moment to come. But Alex beat her to it, obviously aware that something was on her mind.

  “Alice, is everything okay? Are you not happy here anymore? I understand if you miss the city.” His voice was so gentle and so understanding – which just made her feel even worse.

  “Oh no, Alex, that’s not it at all. It’s the opposite of that actually. I love it here. I have completely fallen in love with this place. It has totally taken me by surprise how easily I have settled in here. But I do have something I want to tell you. I just don’t know how to do it.”

  Alex took her hand, “Alice, you can tell me anything. “

  She took a deep breath and squeezed his hand back. She wasn’t sure if she was trying to reassure him or herself. “Oh Alex, I don’t even know how to tell you this. I’ve been trying to tell you for days now but I keep putting it off. I wasn’t ever really going to tell you, but I can’t keep pretending. Alex, I lied to you. I didn’t come here because I was looking for love. I didn’t come here because I felt like this would be good for me. I didn’t even come here because I wanted to run away from my life. I came here because I wanted to become a novelist, and I thought this would make a good story. As simple and as horrible as that – but that’s the truth. I feel so ashamed right now. I feel like I have completely used you. You were out here looking for love, and I came along and ruined it. And the worst part is that my book is actually going really well – it’s some of the best stuff I’ve written. My plan was simple: spend some time away from the city, discover new things, find out more about you and your life, write my novel, and then go back home. That was the plan from the start.”

  There was silence for a while and Alice wished that she knew what he was thinking. She wanted to ask him but at the same time she was so afraid of what his answer might be. Then he spoke, and his voice was softer and more gentle than she had imagined it to be – there didn’t seem to be any anger in it at all, “And now Alice? What’s your plan now?”

  “I’m not going to lie to you know Alex, I have completely fallen for you. And the ranch – I think I love this place more than I have ever loved a place in my life. I didn’t know a place could have such an effect on me. I didn’t want that to happen. I never planned for that to happen, but in just five short weeks I have found the place that I want to stay for the rest of my life. I even love everyone that lives here. Especially Beatrice – she’s like a mother to me and a best friend. I have told her more stuff than I have told most people. Oh Alex, I don’t want to leave here. But I’m so ashamed. And I know that I have to choose. It has to be your or my book. And I’m dying inside – knowing that what I did was wrong. I didn’t mean to hurt you Alex. I really didn’t.”

  Alex didn’t once let go of her hand. He didn’t speak for a while and the two of them sat together, looking out as the sun started to disappear. The less sun there was the more chill there was in the air and Alice pulled her blanket so that it covered the two of them. Then Suddenly Alex looked at her. His eyes were sparkling and a mischievous grin was starting to spread across his face.

  “Why choose Alice?”

  She wasn’t sure what he meant and was about to say something more but he spoke again.

  “Alice, you don’t have to choose. I’m so glad that my ranch has inspired you to be creative. And to be happy. I want you to write that story. And I’m going to help you do it.”

  Alice looked up in surprise, “What do you mean?” She said.

  Suddenly Alex was standing up, pulling her up with him and holding her hand. “Well Alice, you’re looking for an adventure aren’t you? Something to write about? I mean, you’ve already started your book, so we’re going to have to give you something more to write about. And there’s no greater story than a love story. Well I’m going to give you that story.”

  Alice looked at him in confusion, her heart beating fast. Then Alex got down on his knee and held out his hand, “Let’s give you something to write about. Alice, will you marry me?”

  THE END.

  Highland Hills

  Highlander Romance

  By Riley Moreno

  Highland Hills

  DARK DANGER IN THE HIGHLANDS

  CHAPTER 1

  Lester Abbey, Western Scotland, April 1321

  Angela shook her head and sighed. She felt that if she stared at the parchment any longer she would go blind. The candle had almost burned out; all that remained of it was a little stump of a wick floating in a big, broad pool of molten wax. She brushed her curly blonde hair out of her eyes and dipped her quill in the pot of blue ink, and leaned over to begin working on the task again.

  After a few minutes, her eyes had readjusted and she was absorbed in the artwork – doing the scales on a green dragon wrapped around a tree, to which a fair maiden was tied. After she had done the dragon, she would start on the knight who was charging in through the trees to rescue the damsel in distress. For him, she would use silver leaf to do his bright, shining armor. She was eager to get to that part, for she loved using the silver and gold leaf to really make her paintings gleam and glow.

  She had already been at work on this particular illustration for two days. The details involved in it were intricate and minute. Luckily, Angela had had an obsession with art since being a little girl. After her parents had died when a bridge had collapsed into a river, she, as an orphan, had been raised by the monks and nuns in an abbey near her village. She had spent her days as a young girl learning calligraphy and the art of painting illuminated manuscripts, watching the master monks as they immersed themselves for hours in the tiniest of details and the most complex of scenes.

  By her teenage years she had become as good as any of the master monks, and by the age of twenty-one, she had been, without a doubt, the best artist in the entire abbey. Lords and ladies from all over Scotland sent documents for her to illustrate. This particular one was for a prince, and indeed, he was paying a princely sum for it. The money, though, would not go to her, but to the Church.

  Angela didn't mind; she didn't do her art for money – she painted because it was in her blood, because it had been all she had wanted to do since being a child. Without painting, she felt, there would be no reason to live.

  She could read and write very well too; the monks and nuns had made sure of that. And while most of the literature in the abbey consisted of religious texts, on her days off she was able to ride a pony into the nearby town and browse through their library, in which she could f
ind tales of wonder, adventure and... love.

  Angela paused painting for a while when she thought about this last point. Romantic love... What a concept! She closed her eyes and imagined some prince sweeping her off her feet, some knight in shining silver armor on a white horse, or some brave, powerful Highland warrior with a great two-handed claymore and flowing locks of wild hair carrying her away.

  She sighed. Such things were just silly dreams, fantasies that could not possibly come true. Although she had not yet joined the nunnery, as someone who had spent her childhood in the abbey being raised by nuns and monks, it was subtly expected of her to become a nun herself. Mother Morag, the strict Prioress in charge of all the nuns, was quite explicit about this. Father Argyle, who was in charge of the monks, put less pressure on her and gave her more freedom, but he often dropped hints that he was hoping for her to make her vows soon.

  Angela frowned when she thought about this. Why should it be their choice what she wanted to do with her life? She was grateful to them for raising her and providing for her all her life, but with all the money she had made for the abbey with her expert painting, she had more than paid back her debt. Some days, she really thought in all seriousness about packing her meager collection of belongings and sneaking off at night to run away and start a new life somewhere. But where would she go? Her only experience of the world outside the abbey had been the nearby town – and it didn't really provide much more excitement than the abbey itself.

  No, she wanted to run away to lands far away – England, Ireland – maybe even go across the sea to France, Germany, Switzerland and Italy. Now that sounded like the kind of adventure she would like – not just sitting around this dull abbey for the rest of her days. And, of course, she wanted that man of her dreams, that rescuer with his powerful muscles, dashing good looks and boyish charm to accompany her. She found her skin warming and her pulse beginning to quicken as the fantasy moved more toward the man she would be with, rather than the places she would go. Oh, how she longed for him, this imaginary hero in her mind, this man who she had not yet seen – but had imagined in her dreams, in the eyes of her mind, so many times. He would have dark hair – chestnut brown or raven black, either would do, and light eyes. Blue or green – but green would be better, to go with her eyes, which were blue. And, of course, powerful, broad shoulders. There was nothing that got her pulse racing more than a set of huge shoulders. She had always had a vivid imagination, since being a young child. It did not take much work for her to close her eyes and conjure up a true-to-life image of how this man should look, and how he would act.

  She did not expect this fantasy man, built up so many years in her imagination, to walk through the door, at this very moment though.

  Yet, he did.

  “Excuse me, are you Miss MacClough?”

  A deep, sonorous voice disturbed the silence of her study. Angela spun around abruptly, and saw a young man dressed in a simple tunic standing in her doorway, looking sheepish. She gasped as she saw his face, because it looked exactly how she had always imagined her dream lover to look; he had light green eyes, set deep beneath finely-arched eyebrows, and a mane of deep chestnut hair. His strong, square chin was dusted with a thick coating of auburn stubble. He wore a simple brown sleeveless tunic, and tight black leather pants which revealed massively-muscled thighs and bulging calves – and another prominent bulge, in an area of his anatomy that immediately made Angela blush and look away – even though a part of her, hot and suddenly awoken, wanted to stare at that area for a lot longer. His arms were thick and heavily-muscled, and his shoulders were wide and ripped with muscle.

  “Yes,” she replied, “that's me. Angela MacClough.”

  “I'm Benjamin Campbell, the new blacksmith's apprentice. He sent me here to get your old pen nibs. He says you've ordered some new pen nibs to be made, and to get the metalwork exact, we need to have a look at the old nibs to make sure everything is the same. So, if you don't mind, could I get those from you?”

  “Sure.”

  Angela put down her pen and gathered all the steel pen nibs together, scattered across her oak desk. She put them in a small velvet pouch and sauntered over to Benjamin. She couldn't help but run her fingers through her hair as she approached him, and she saw him notice this and grin shyly. Invisible sparks seemed to shoot and fly through the candlelit air of the stone study.

  “Here you go,” she said as she handed him the pouch.

  She noticed how big and strong his hands were as he took the pouch from her.

  “Thank you m'lady. You can come by any time after tomorrow to pick them up. I'll be at the forge, working on these all day tomorrow. I want to get them just right. You have a reputation as an amazing artist, so I want to make sure you have the best tools you could have for your work. I'm honored to be making tools for someone as talented as you, in fact.”

  Angela smiled.

  “Also,” he said, looking into her eyes suddenly. “I wanted to say... oh, no, no, nothing.”

  He looked away as he seemed to change his mind, and she could swear that she saw him blushing in the dim light.

  “What else did you want to say?” she asked.

  “Never mind,” he said. “Come and get your new nibs any time after tomorrow. Farewell, Miss MacClough.”

  “You can call me Angela,” she replied with a smile.

  “Alright then... Angela,” he said as he turned around and walked away. He looked over his shoulder and flashed her a cheeky grin.

  “Angela,” he said as he rounded the corner. “What a pretty name. What a pretty name indeed!”

  She heard him chuckling as he left the abbey, and she couldn't help but grin herself. Her blood was hot now, and her heart rate had definitely quickened.

  She couldn't wait to get to the blacksmith's forge...

  CHAPTER 2

  Angela urged her pony on, pushing the old beast a little faster than he was used to going. Usually she took her time and dawdled on the way to town, enjoying taking in the beautiful sights of the Scottish countryside with her artist's eyes, but today a sense of purpose drove her on. All she had been able to think about, the whole day and night since first seeing him, was Benjamin. She realized that he had told her it would take more than a day to finish the nibs, but she simply couldn't wait that long. Once her mind got fired up over something, she would begin to obsess over that thing, and then she would be driven to take action instead of just sitting around, thinking wistfully of whatever it was.

  Today, that thing happened to be Benjamin Campbell, the new blacksmith's apprentice in town. She stopped her pony for a while, allowing the poor old creature to catch his breath and take a break while she stopped to think. Benjamin did look like the heroes she had always dreamed of, that much was true. In fact, his physical resemblance to the man of her dreams was striking. But, something was out of kilter with her fantasy and his reality. He was, after all, just a lowly blacksmith's apprentice. While blacksmithing was a respected profession, it was still a basic trade, a simple workman's job. There was no prestige or glamor attached to it, and like it or not, Angela had to admit that she did have a thing for prestige and power. In her dreams, the man who came for her was always a prince, a nobleman or a mighty knight, or a battle chieftain – not some lowly blacksmith, however handsome he may be.

  Still, she reminded herself, she was not royalty by any means. Her parents, from what she knew of them – she couldn't remember much, as she had been only three years old when they had died – had been simple farm laborers. She really didn't have much of a right to expect anyone of wealth and standing to want to have anything to do with her – even though her striking good looks and curvaceous figure got her plenty of male attention from all ranks of society whenever she journeyed into town. Nonetheless, a girl could dream, couldn't she?

  She smiled and spurred her horse on, rousing him from his rest. He started clopping reluctantly along the cobbled road, and she resumed thinking. To tell the truth, while it wou
ld be fantastic to be courted by a prince or a knight, such dreams were unrealistic. And, of course, who was to say a wealthy landowner would make a good lover or husband anyway? Such men may well prove to be arrogant, conceited and selfish – the exact opposite qualities she would hope for in a lover.

  She wondered, as the town began to loom on the horizon, just over the final hill in the journey, what life would be like living with Benjamin. After he had completed his apprenticeship, he would be able to start his own forge somewhere, and he would most likely have a steady stream of work. The hours of hammering with heavy tools and working with weighty equipment, combined with the heat of the forge, would mean that he would stay in peak physical condition for many years. She had known the current blacksmith, old Will Johnson, since she was a child. While his face had aged as the years had passed, his muscles had remained as thick and granite-hard as those of a twenty-year-old warrior.

  Yes, she thought, it would certainly be something to grow old in the company of a man who kept his body in top physical form. Such a man, even though he would not be rich and powerful, would definitely provide other benefits, other advantages that noblemen and knights, who got fat, weak and lazy in their old age, could not.

  Her blood seemed to grow hotter as she thought of these things, and her chest began to rise and fall as her breath quickened. She felt a definite flush as her pale cheeks started to redden. She almost wanted to put her hand inside her dress, to send her eager fingers down, down, down. Down there to that secret spot that she had heard the nuns whisper about. That tiny little dome down beneath the triangle of blonde hair between her thighs, that stayed hidden until she started thinking about such things. Things like Benjamin, running his powerful hands across her back, putting them on her breasts, lifting them, squeezing them, then running his fingers down her belly, touching the soft flesh there ever so lightly, heading inexorably towards her mound, where the wetness was beginning to flow, to pulse, to gush...