Dirty Little Misery (Miss Misery)

by Tracey Martin

  “Little siren…”

  “You mean stupid, dead woman.”

  “Jessica, it won’t be the end of the world. Hitting that Gryphon with a chair was not in your best interest, but it was in mine, so I appreciate it. But so what if the Gryphons decide you can’t be trusted among humans anymore? You’ll live among us. You see we’re not so bad.”

  I twisted around so I could laugh in his face. “Yeah right. Except when you’re all trying to turn me into an addict. From my perspective, that’s plenty bad, thanks.”

  “Has anyone tried to addict you yet?”

  “Not yet, but Dezzi’s counting on my help. When she’s done with me, any of you could.”

  “And I’ve known you for ten years. If I wanted to addict you, I’d have done it. Don’t you think?”

  Actually, no. I didn’t know what to think about that. Never had. I should have kept my mouth shut, but fear made me angry. “No. I don’t know all the details about addictions. For all I know you’re waiting for the right time. For one of your addicts to die or something.”

  “You know as well as I do that I could cut one or all of them loose at any time. It’s not a question of not being able to handle one more.”

  “So why wait? You could break my will just like that.” I snapped my fingers. Brilliant, Jess. Just challenge him to do it, why don’t you?

  “Do you think I’d enjoy that?”

  “I know you would.” Oh yeah, I was earning a Ph.D. in stupidity tonight.

  “You’re right. I would.” Lucen scowled and flopped back on the sofa.

  I held my breath. Maybe I’d gotten lucky and my outburst wouldn’t get me in trouble, after all. Strange, but I was almost sad about that. I’d primed for a fight. I had anger to expel.

  Then Lucen sat up, the scowl gone and replaced by a devious intensity. My stomach twisted. Okay, perhaps a fight hadn’t been a good idea. And I hadn’t gotten lucky. But it was too late now.

  “Actually I’m far more insidious than you give me credit for. Your gift was cursed. My magic is inherent in my nature. You can’t compete, and therefore can’t really comprehend what I’m about. But, you see, being evil is a lot like sex. The release is fantastic, but the release is fleeting. It’s the buildup to the release that’s so sweet and lasting. Once I break you, it’s over. Done. But this way I can toy with you for a while, build your fear, prolong the anticipation—ten years so far—and savor the possibility that one day I’ll be too tempted not to finish you off.” He reached toward me, and I stiffened. “What do you think now?”

  His fingers brushed my hair. My blood raced, but my breathing stopped. I couldn’t move.

  Lucen pressed in closer, and his breath coated my ear like honey. “I haven’t touched you in ten years, little siren. Ten years because you simply asked me not to. What…” He tugged off the band around the bottom of my braid. “Are.” Started undoing the twist. “You.” I wanted to tell him to stop, but I was paralyzed. “Afraid of?”

  The last of the braid came apart in his hands. I shivered, breaking the paralysis. “The potential.”

  I closed my eyes, wondering what I meant. The potential for him to break me? For me to lose myself and become emotionally attached? For my humanity to drain away? I didn’t know. I didn’t even know whether I should take that speech of his seriously.

  Lucen’s hands were on my shoulders now, and my ability to think clearly was fading. “I would never hurt you, little siren. I promise.”

  I wanted to believe him, always had, but it seemed suicidal. All the promises in the world didn’t change what he was. He’d practically said as much me to the other day. He was what he was. He did what satyrs—what preds—did. He enjoyed it, and he could do it at any time. Letting him touch me was like baiting a lion. The best animal trainers could get away with it for a while, but occasionally their beasts turned on them.

  Lucen’s cellphone rang in the kitchen. Saved by the bell, or the ringtone, rather.

  It rang again, and he made no move to get up.

  “Aren’t you…?”

  “This is more important.” He moved closer, and his knees pressed into my back.

  “But it could be Dezzi with information.”

  “I doubt it’s urgent. She’ll leave a message. Jess.” He ran his fingers through my hair, lifted it off my neck. The phone made a last desperate plea for attention and went silent.

  Crap. Now what?

  Every bit of tension from where Lucen’s fingers played with my hair slid from my scalp down into my groin. Each muscle tensed with anticipation. Stop it, I wanted to say, but it was impossible. Even my mouth was too enthralled by his attention. “Why are you doing this?”

  “I want you to trust me, little siren, but you won’t. You came to me on Monday because you felt you had no choice. You didn’t come to me because you trusted me, or because you thought I’d help you.”

  “That’s not—” Well, it was a little true.

  “Please, Jess. I can read you better than you read yourself, because you hide things from yourself and you can’t hide them from me. But it’s not a good idea. Don’t you see? You were right when you said nothing can be the same again. And that means you’re going to need to trust someone, and you don’t.”

  “So you’re trying to earn my trust by breaking it?” But my body didn’t care how warped Lucen’s logic was. My will was cracking.

  Passion burns. Betrayal scars.

  Talent to Burn

  © 2014 Laura Welling

  Cat Wilson grew up a misfit among misfits. She couldn’t read minds, see the future, or start fires like the other Talented kids inside the shadowy Grey Institute. Finally she ran, leaving her beloved brother, Eric, behind. She’s been running ever since.

  When she learns that Eric has escaped, leaving deadly fires in his wake, Cat is torn between fear for her brother, and unwanted attraction to the messenger, a charming, Talented ex-con who lives for the next adrenaline rush.

  Jamie Murphy is sure his group of outcast Talents can help Eric—if they can get to him before the cops or the Institute, and before he kills again. Cat’s aversion to Talented bad boys is like a wall of ice, but to his surprise, he doesn’t have to use an ounce of his own unique gift to find a way through it.

  Yet locating Eric is only the beginning. In the battle to pull him back from the brink, Cat must find the courage to unlock a fearsome Talent of her own. And pray the psychic backdraft doesn’t destroy everyone she loves.

  Warning: Contents are hot. If you smell smoke, keep reading and ignore those pesky smoke alarms on the ceiling. Okay, just kidding! But oven mitts might come in handy.

  Enjoy the following excerpt for Talent to Burn:

  When I walked out of Reilly’s bar shortly after midnight, every vestige of psychic Talent I possessed stood up and shivered.

  I stopped on the doorstep in the frigid Washington night, turning my head, listening, trying to work out what had triggered the feeling. Reilly’s had one lamppost in the parking lot, an island of light on the concrete. The only other illumination came from the neon beer signs in the window beside me, beacons against the dark.

  I’d been working at the bar for nine months now, and the late-night noises had ceased giving me the creeps long ago. I knew the scurry of rats in the Dumpster and the hum of the lamp. This was something else, one of the echoes of Talent that sometimes broke through. Unlike other members of my family, I had no real Talent. Only shadows.

  Nothing unusual jumped out at me. My rational brain took the bad feeling—hunch, whatever you want to call it—and shoved it in a corner. My heart slowed again. I shuddered, pulling my coat closer around my body. Years ago, I’d grown tired of starting at every little thing, despite my upbringing. Time to go home.

  I trudged over to my hunk o’ junk car and climbed in. The key turned and the engine coughed and
struggled.

  My father would have parked closer to the door, checked both directions before crossing the ten feet in between, looked under the car for suspicious packages, and driven away white-faced, pretending everything was normal. Screw that. There were plenty of rational things to be afraid of, like being stuck working in a dive bar for the rest of my life. I had bigger plans.

  The car started at last, and I pulled out of the parking lot and headed home.

  A few minutes later, I jogged up the stairs to my apartment. The stairwell stank of tomcat and mold, but the place itself wasn’t bad, although kind of cold at this time of year. Winter would be over soon enough.

  I pulled out my key and as I touched it to the lock, the door drifted open. The apartment lay dark in front of me, and I swore under my breath. My last place had been broken into, and I’d lost everything of value. At least there would be less for them to take this time.

  I stood still and quiet, waiting, but the apartment lay silent. I detected no trace of an aura within.

  I couldn’t stand out here all night, and it wasn’t like I could call the police. Quietly, I slid my arm around the doorframe and flipped on the light.

  The living area resembled the aftermath of a hurricane, at least a category three. Complete disaster area. Everything I owned lay on the floor, and all of it broken. Among smashed plates and glasses were chunks of foam rubber from my couch, which had been knifed. Everything from the fridge had been poured out, my cookbooks torn up, DVDs smashed.

  I repeated my cautious approach to the bedroom, although my instincts told me whoever did this was long gone.

  The mattress had suffered the same treatment as the couch. Ripped from the closet, my clothes lay in a pile of slashed rags at the foot of the bed. Even the cheerful red and white snowflake curtains I’d sewn myself had been torn down. The window had been thrown open and an icy draft stirred the ruins of my possessions.

  I slid down the wall and rested my head on my arms, let things get the better of me. I knew I’d stand up again in a minute and start cleaning, but I needed to breathe first, to get my head back in a positive place. No crying allowed, because if I started it would be hard to stop.

  “Those bastards made a real mess,” a voice said, and I leaped to my feet, stumbling, reaching for a weapon I didn’t own anymore.

  A huge man in a leather jacket stood in the doorway of my apartment. The aura of his Talent surrounded him, a dark gray blur of pure power around his edges. He stepped toward me.

  “Get out!” I heard the note of hysteria in my own voice from far away, like a long distance call on a bad line. I turned to run, to escape, but my legs gave out and I tripped over something in the mess and fell flat out on the floor. I began to crawl away as fast as I could manage, panting to drag air into my lungs.

  The man’s legs moved into my field of vision, and he crouched down in front of me, blocking my path. “Are you all right?”

  “Get away from me!” I sat up and shoved myself back into a crouch, ready to run. The fear dropped from a roar to the hum of blood rushing through my ears. Get it together, Cat. Remember your training.

  He spread his hands in front of him, whether to show me he didn’t have a weapon or to calm me as if I were a skittish horse, I didn’t know. “I’m here to help you, if you’ll hear me out.”

  “What did I do to you?” I tensed my muscles, ready to fight. “Why did you do this?”

  “I didn’t.” He must have seen the disbelief in my eyes, because he reached out and put a hand on my shoulder, steadying.

  Although I wanted to smash his hand away, I didn’t flinch.

  “I wouldn’t do this—partly because I have no reason to, and partly because I’m not that much of an ass. This was done by Grey Institute men.”

  A cold feeling settled in the pit of my stomach. I hadn’t heard that name since my father had passed away when I was seventeen. I rose to my feet, slowly, warily, and the man did the same.

  “Are you one of them?” My voice came out raw and scratchy. Perhaps it was a naïve question, but I wanted to gauge his reaction when I asked.

  “No.” His eyes turned dark, the pupils huge. “I swear to you, on my mother’s grave. I have nothing to do with those sons of bitches. You couldn’t pay me enough.” His voice held steady and strong. He held out his hand. “I’m Jamie Murphy. I already know you’re Catrina Wilson.”

  I ignored his hand, watching his face and his aura instead. “What do you want with me?”

  He lowered his hand to his side. “The Greys are looking for your brother. I want to find him before they do.”

  Eric. I hadn’t even thought his name in years.

  I considered, watching Jamie, adding up the evidence. He knew the Greys existed, which could mean he was one of them, or he worked for one of the few top-secret government agencies who knew of their existence, or he’d tangled with them like I had. He didn’t look regimented enough to be one of them, or boring enough to be a government employee. The hatred in his voice had been heartfelt. His aura churned around him, his control slipping. I saw no traces of deceit in it.

  Through the open window came the sound of a car door closing quietly. The hairs stood up on the back of my neck, and my gaze connected with Jamie’s.

  “We need to get out of here,” he said, not whispering, but hushed. “They might be coming back for you. This stinks of trap.”

  I walked to the window. My apartment faced the street. Several identical black vans had appeared, parked in a line along the curb on the opposite side of the street. No one in sight. I had a profoundly bad feeling about this.

  “Come with me?”

  I looked back at Jamie. “Where are we going?”

  “Somewhere we can talk.”

  Not a good choice, to trust a complete stranger. He looked like a clichéd bad boy— dark hair falling in his eyes, unshaven jaw, leather jacket. I’d bet he had a raft of bad Celtic knot tattoos. But he had a remarkably clear aura. Something about it felt right to me, and if I’d learned anything in all these years, I’d learned to trust my gut. I made an instant decision. “All right. We can talk. I’m not promising anything else. I need to get out of here, anyway.”

  Jamie led the way out to the stairwell. Suddenly, he stopped, turned and lifted a finger to his lips. In the darkness, several people’s footsteps echoed up the stairs. They were running.

  My heart kicked back into overdrive, the adrenaline rushing through my system once again. I beckoned to Jamie and then made my way down the dark hallway, past the neighboring apartment, to the window that opened onto the fire exit.

  He took one look at the window and grimaced. Setting his hands, he forced the window open, making the old sash screech against the frame. Footsteps pounded behind us and he said, “Go, go,” as I pushed myself through the window and hit the fire exit running.

  May the best hero win…

  Behind the Curtain

  © 2014 Heather Long

  The Amazon librarian Jaimela serves in the Midnight Mystery Lounge as a dancer, distant and cool even to the best of her sisters. Until the exodus of Anthony and Roseâtre stirs her sleeping mind, sending her on the hunt for knowledge which first drove her to the Arcana Royale.

  But that thirst only comes in daylight. Her nights are spent in trapped service to the whim of the stage. Until the warrior arrives.

  Dimitri Abraxas, who serves at the pleasure of the Goddess Demeter, is on a quest to find Prometheus’ flame. He will leave no earthly stone unturned to decipher clues as to its location, for the world needs it more than ever.

  One look at Jaimela and he knows the answer is within reach…but the sphinx harbors more than one secret. To awaken it, he must rouse the Amazon who would take the prize for her own. But unless they can put aside their differences and combine their quests, they will lose to the greatest foe of all…the Arcana Ro
yale.

  Warning: This book includes Greek gods, heroes, trials, myths come to life and a passion that cannot be denied…power, passion, and persistence, oh my!

  Enjoy the following excerpt for Behind the Curtain:

  He leaned against the doorway to Heidi’s office, not quite crossing the threshold. If he remained absolutely still, cloaked in the shadows cast by the single lamp on her desk, she wouldn’t notice him. His quarry leaned back in her chair, absently toying with a charm on the end of a long silver chain around her neck. The mind still proved to be the oddest of obstacles. He’d forgotten about the chain, about the charm and about its value until he locked on the way her fingers caressed it.

  The stubborn woman confounded him at every turn, pushing him away, rigidly denying him access. But a few weeks earlier she’d given him a gift. Her arrival in the bar had startled him, but she’d joined him for the length of time it took her to drink a glass of wine. Fortunately for him, she’d never been overly fond of alcohol, and had nursed the single drink for hours.

  A line creased the space between her brows, but she continued to rub the charm. Hints of sulfur perfumed the air and a hollow popping sound preceded the arrival of the tufted-eared Minion.

  “Heidi!” The creature bounced onto his quarry’s desk and flung herself with unabashed enthusiasm at the stage manager.

  Intrigued, he drew the shadows tighter around himself. Heidi let go of the charm and wrapped her arms around the miniature being. Barely three feet in height from the top of her head to the tip of her tail, Minion bubbled with vibrant enthusiasm. Her large eyes shimmered and her ears flicked back and forth like a cat’s, though at the moment they were pointed toward the woman giving her a hug.

  “Kiki called and there is a shopping trip to Paris and London and Rome and then back to New York, and she will be opening her club and I get to go and I want to go and can I go? Fang Daddy said I could and promised lots and lots of ice cream and protection, but you have to say yes. Please say yes. Please?” The words came out like a rockslide, gaining momentum as they crashed down the mountainside.