K. D. Grace: 'The Initiation of Ms Holly'

I gleaned a lot of inspiration for my erotic romance, The Initiation of Ms Holly, from being stuck in the Eurostar Tunnel in the dark on a malfunctioning train; at least that was the catalyst. But the idea of being forced to use our other senses as a replacement for the over-developed sense of sight has always intrigued me and has played a role in several of my short stories. I wanted to create a world in which my hero and heroine would be forced to rely on other senses.

Often in novels, we literally see the world through the eyes of the author, and our eyes are constantly at the forefront of our Panoply of the Senses, with television, films, internet, even books. We get a visual glut of input with not nearly enough attention paid to the other senses. As writers, it’s not unusual for us to view our heroine or hero up close and personal in our mind’s eye. In many cases we may even have already picked out the perfect actor or actress to portray them in the inevitable movie that will surely follow (Please tell me I’m not the only one who does thisJ.)

A good bit of the first three chapters of The Initiation of Ms Holly takes place in the dark or with Rita Holly blindfolded. But the novel goes way beyond a few chapters in a blindfold. Rita is not permitted to see the face of her lover, Edward, until she completes, to the High Council’s satisfaction, the initiation ritual into the secret society, of which Edward is a part -- The Mount. Neither is she allowed to have sex with him until she is a fully-fledged member.

What I wanted to do was create a world in which our most common method of being attracted to each other – sight, and our most common response to falling in love – sex, are taken away. Rita and Edward are left with only their other senses and with their wits to overcome the obstacles set before them, that is IF they care enough about each other to endure the challenge. And Vivienne, the sexy but vicious head of the High Council of The Mount, has no intention of making it easy.

It’s an archetypal story -- not being able to experience one’s lover through the sense of sight. In Greek mythology, Psyche is not allowed to see the face of her lover, but he is so tender, so engaging so charming. And since he visits her in the dark of night, it’s a fair assumption that he’s good in bed too! Whatever he does, he does it well, caring for her in ways that inspire love. But of course it’s not enough. Psyche needs to SEE the man she loves to reassure herself he’s as wonderful as she believes him to be and not the monster her sisters tell her he is. Of course he’s neither man nor monster. He’s Eros, the god of love, himself, and she has broken his only command – not to look upon his face. Let the fun begin! The tale of their love and Psyche’s abandonment and reunion with Eros is one of my very favourite myths. The Initiation of Ms Holly is a modern retelling of that story, all dressed up and turned about and set in London.

Which brings me back to the other senses. Can we truly trust what we can’t see with our own eyes? Most mammals trust their noses far more than their sense of sight, and there have been studies done that suggest we humans still have those latent mammalian olfactory abilities. We just don’t use them anymore. Barn Owls can hunt quite effectively in total darkness by using only their amazing sense of hearing. Could we actually recognize true love with our sense of smell, could we recognize the heartbeat of our lover, or the shape of his face against our fingertips? Could we rely on the sense receptor in our skin to define for us what we can’t see? How much of what is unseen could we perceive with our ears or with our sense of taste? Edward tests some of Rita’s other senses in the beginning chapters of The Initiation of Ms Holly, with some very yummy results. ‘I don’t have to see you to appreciate you,’ he tells her upon their initial meeting in the pitch black of the train.

For me, toying with the senses and how they affect our desires and feelings for other people, how they affect our perception of intimacy, provides one of the most fascinating angles to any story. If we can’t see our lover, can we trust our other senses to tell us if we’re living with a monster or with a god? And even if we do see our lover, do we trust what we see with our own eyes to be the whole truth?

Rita and Edward’s journey is fraught with sensual twists and turns as well as the usual emotional mine fields that litter the path to love – jealousy, doubt, lack of trust, fear of loss, and all sorts of other tantalizing goodies. Emotions and senses – put the two together and watch the fireworks. Sometimes what we see with our own eyes is not to be trusted. And sometimes we CAN smell a rat. So the journey of a thousand miles, the journey to love, begins with a kiss in a dark train – at least for Rita and Edward. That and some very expensive chocolate.

*****

K D Grace was born with a writing obsession. It got worse once she actually learned HOW to write. There's no treatment for it. It's progressive and chronic and quite often interferes with normal, everyday functioning. She might actually be concerned if it wasn't so damned much fun most of the time.

K D's erotic romance novel, The Initiation of Ms Holly, published by Xcite Books, is now available everywhere.

Her erotica has been published with Xcite Books, Mammoth, Cleis Press, Black Lace, Erotic Review, Ravenous Romance, and Scarlet Magazine.

Her second novel, The Pet Shop, also published by Xcite Books, will be available in October 2011.

Find out more about K D Grace on her website, http://kdgrace.co.uk/. She's also on Facebook and Twitter.

Grace Elliot: Inspiring romance

Hi there, I'm so excited to be here with fellow romance lovers!

My favourite romance genre is historicals and of these I have a weakness for Regency romances. I love the concept that a reputations could be ruined just by being alone with a man…. men were obviously a much more dangerous lot back then!

My debut novel ‘A Dead Man’s Debt’ is a story of blackmail, duty and unexpected love and it may sound bizarre, but the idea for the book sprang from a portrait of Emma Hart (who married Lord Hamilton and famously became Admiral Nelson’s mistress.)

The painting by George Romney shows an innocent yet lush young woman, scantily clad with a hint of bosom, brazenly staring out of the canvas with an allure that is quite hypnotic. It struck me as sensational for an 18^th century work, that the sitter was not prim, proper, straight backed and starchy. It must have been utterly scandalous at the time! But who would be bold enough to commission such a portrait? (As it happened Emma Hart was ahead of her time and loved to flout convention…but that’s another story.)

What a delicious idea for a novel! What if the woman in the painting wanted to shock? What if, years later, this rebellious streak threatened to disgrace her family? What if only the son she despises can save her reputation… but at the price of his secret love?  And so ‘A Dead Man’s Debt’ was born.

“Historical romance at its best.” OnceUponAChapter

“Totally engrossing…sensual and evocative writing.” FictionBooks.

“Breathtaking sensuality…page turning drama…a wonderful talent.” The Romance Reviews.

‘A Dead Man’s Debt’ - Grace Elliot.

Celeste Armitage has a plan…and it doesn’t include marriage.

Celeste’s despairing parents exile her to the country, where she finds a sketch book of nude studies and is shaken to find the artist is her hostess’s son, Lord Ranulf Charing. This cynical lord is the exactly sort of dissipated rogue she despises most…if only her blood didn’t heat at the sight of him!

Lord Ranulf faces ruin as a blackmailer uses his late brother’s debts to destroy the Charing’s reputation. When Ranulf unexpectedly falls for the rebellious Celeste he must chose between true love and family duty…but Ranulf underestimates Celeste’s resolve to clear his name and unwittingly places his soul mate in mortal danger….

EXCERPT:

So be it. Ranulf gritted his teeth as he grasped the leading leg and pushed. It was like fighting against a brick wall, the calf barely moving. A lamb was difficult enough, how much more so a calf? Just as he was wondering if one man was strong enough, a shower of pebbles rattled down the bank. Concentrating on the calf, he barked.


“Don‟t just stand there. Get down here!”

“I beg your pardon!” A woman‟s voice answered.


With a flash of annoyance Ranulf glanced upward.


A wide eyed young woman in a straw bonnet peered down. “I say, is everything all right?”


“Does it look all right?” Muttering under his breath, all he needed was some sensitive Miss fainting on him. “Go! Fetch help from the house.”


He saw her hesitate, biting her top lip. “But you need help now.”


A contraction clamped around his arm as the cow's tail switched across his face, stinging his eyes like a cat-o-nine-tails.


In a flurry of muslin and lace the Miss slid down the bank, landing with a thud in the ditch.


“Ouch.” She rubbed her ankle. Ranulf glared back, dark eyes flashing.


“You should have gone to the house.” Damn it all, she could make herself useful then. “Hold the tail aside.”


Pulling a face she limped over. Ranulf's eye lingered for she merited a second glance. Of middle height with a tidy waist and curves where God intended them, she appeared quick witted and bright eyed. Without further ado, she stripped off her gloves throwing them onto a bramble bush. Long, sensitive fingers grasped the muddy tail. Practical, Ranulf thought, silently impressed.


“Why didn't you go for help?”


“There wasn't time.” Her bonnet slipped backwards, revealing a quirky face with a pointed chin, her lips finely drawn with an arched cupid's bow. The sort of face an artist could lose himself in, all shades of the sea to be found in deep emerald eyes framed by a tangle of chestnut hair.


Ranulf tightened his grasp and pushed. Sweat beading his brow. The calf retreated an inch.


“What are you doing?” Her voice was gentle and calm, if somewhat deep for a woman. Ranulf guessed it would be husky in bed, whispering over a pillow after a night of passion. Her eyes were on him - deep green eyes, lively and entrancing. Suddenly he remembered that he was undressed to the waist, her curious gaze on his skin as he was gripped by the idea of those lily white hands gliding over his naked chest, her almond shaped nails digging into his skin. He shook away the thought, trying to remember her question.


All innocence and interest she watched, blushing faintly in a charming way and yet, he realized, no wilting flower. He shook his head. The woman had asked a question, damn it. He would answer.


“The calf is breech.” He grunted, “I need to push her back into the womb to turn her…” He wanted to shock this stranger, to test how bold she truly was. She stared back, biting her top lip, exaggerating her snub nose.


“Ah!” Her gaze met his.


“Think of the calf as a carriage in a narrow driveway. To turn it around you push it back into the stable yard…”


“What can I do to help?”


“Nothing.” He growled.


Throwing him an angry look, she anchored the tail with a log and scrambled round to the beast's head. After a moment‟s thought, she placed her pelisse under the cow's head stroking the broad nose and crooning words of comfort.


“She's relaxing.” Ranulf's arm was numb from the contractions. He fell forward, as the first leg finally slid back into the womb. "That helps." His hair had come free from the ribbon, falling thickly about his shoulders. He glanced at the Miss. She was leaning forward, her bosom straining against a tight bodice, a satisfying cleavage between her breasts. He swallowed hard. She was odd looking, he decided, not exactly beautiful but eye catching none the less. Her face showed character, determination…and her complexion too healthy to be fashionable, rosy cheeked and peppered with freckles which with a hint of sunlight burst into a profusion.


The Miss was glaring at him now, her skin glowing bright pink. Had he been staring? His heart raced as he returned to the calving.

If you would like to know more then please visit:

http://graceelliot-author.blogspot.com/

or

http://www.graceelliot.webs.com/

‘A Dead Man’s Debt’ is now available from Amazon, Books on Board and most eBook retailers for just GBP 2.14, so why not take a chance on an unknown author?

Amazon.co.uk

New Release - Collective Shivers: Can You Spare a Dollar for Japan?

The entire world has been affected in some way by the terrifying events caused by the Sendai earthquake this past March. News stories continue to add more about these devastating events and the tenuous circumstances in Japan.

Upon being bombarded by these news stories, romance and speculative fiction writer L.K. Below could not bear to stand idle. Rather than indulge her feeling of helplessness, she did the only thing she knew how to do: she wrote. Two weeks after the Sendai disaster, the product is a short fantasy story called Collective Shivers.

Hailed by beta readers as an “out-of-world experience,” Collective Shivers contains an earthquake, a mysterious and resilient people, and one man who suddenly doesn’t feel up to scratch. Who knew that a people so outwardly unfeeling could have touched Gunnarr in such an emotional way?

More information about this story can be found at the author’s website, www.lbelow.net/japan. All proceeds from this book will be donated to the Red Cross foundation to help with relief efforts in Sendai and elsewhere as new tragedies unfold.

So the real question is: Can you spare a dollar for Japan?

Researching Luckpenny Land

Writers are told to write about what they know. Good advice, although it doesn't take long to realise how little you do know when you start writing a book.

Luckpenny Land was the first saga I ever wrote. We were living on a small-holding at the time, out on Shap Fell in Cumbria, and as I trekked up the fellside in the freezing dark to check if our sheep were about to lamb, or to feed a pet lamb, I would be thinking: ‘There must be a book in this.’ But who would want to read about a middle-aged mum, with arthritis, being so stupid as to choose to live in a place where the pantry was colder than her wonderful Zanussi fridge, the winter snows would freeze the mains water supply in the field below the house every winter, as well as the battery of her car as it stands buried in snow in the yard. This was not a place for sun-loving wimps, which is what I’ve turned into now, of course.

So I thought why not write about a girl who wants to be a sheep farmer during World War II, only her Victorian father thinks it’s not women’s work. I could then use many of the incidents and anecdotes, the difficulties and drama of living this life, but write it as fiction. Of course, I realised that running a smallholding did not qualify me to write knowledgeably about running a large sheep farm, let alone during WWII, so I began by interviewing farmers.

Cumbrian farmers are a breed apart. Stoic, strong, taciturn, and distrustful of strangers, particularly those who have not lived in Cumbria for three generations. It’s not that they are unfriendly, only they’re more used to the company of themselves and their animals rather than a nosy, would-be author. At this point in my career I’d published 5 Mills & Boon historicals, but the prospect of a full-length saga was daunting, and I’d never done an interview in my life.

When I rang the first name on my list, a farmer out in the Langdales, I spoke first to his wife to ask if he would see me. ‘Happen’, she said, which I took as a yes. To be on the safe side I took my husband with me as he was used to dealing with Lakeland farmers in his business. And it worked like a charm. I asked the farmer a question, and he told David the answer. I was so nervous I didn’t even dare to switch on the brand new tape recorder I’d taken with me, so I scribbled notes like mad, and then even more later. I didn’t make that mistake again. But he was marvellous. He took me through his farming year, explained everything he did most carefully, and showed me pictures of his dogs. Not his family, his dogs. All the farmers I interviewed did that. It’s a nonsense to say farmers don’t care about their working dogs. Mr G’s dog appeared in the book, much to his delight, although the accident the fictional dog suffered was far more dramatic to that of the real dog, even if it had the same outcome. And no, I can’t say anymore on that without spoiling it.

Some of the farmers I spoke to were women. Although farming was a reserved occupation during the war, some men opted to join up and leave their wives to run the farm. I learned how to kill and scald a pig, how to wring a chicken’s neck and pluck it. (I kept hens myself but they all lived to a ripe old age) And all the various wangles they got up to during the war, like dressing up a pig as a person in the car so they wouldn’t be caught out selling one. Talking to these women inspired many plot incidents and ideas, many based on real life, including the most dramatic which takes place in Luckpenny Land. And I won’t spoil it by telling you that either.

I loved writing this series of books, now available in ebook form on Amazon, Apple etc.

Luckpenny Land is also newly out in Large Print as the original version was too long, being nearly 200,000 words. I’ve now cut it in half. The second part is called Storm Clouds Over Broombank, also available as an ebook, and coming soon in Large Print. I’ll tell you about the last two books in the series another time.

You'll see that the covers are different, the one above is the Large Print, availabe in your local library, the one adjacent is the ebook.






The story
Life is hard for Meg Turner. She lives on a lonely farm in the bleak but beautiful mountains of the English Lake District with a bully of a father and a brother who resents her. They want to keep her stuck at home, but Meg wants more than the kitchen sink. For love and comfort she turns to her best friend Kath, and to Lanky Lawson, who’s more of a father figure than her own father will ever be. But it’s Lanky’s son, Jack, with his dark good looks, she loves and hopes to marry one day. Loyalties are threatened as World War Two approaches and Meg gradually realises that the only thing she can really count on is her passion for the haunting land she loves. Until one day a stranger arrives in the dale and her world changes for ever.

You can check out my website for an extract www.fredalightfoot.co.uk

The Blarney Stone

One thing I'm absolutely nuts over is history. I love to dig and find the folk lore behind things, which more often than not sparks a story for me. In this case, that story is my new release, Stone Cold Kiss.

The idea popped into my mind when I read about the Blarney Stone, located at the top of Blarney Castle Tower. There are several legends on how this stone came to be -- some of which have biblical significance -- but all agree that kissing the stone gives the kisser the "gift of gab."

Here's a paraphrased version of my favorite legend:

About 500 years ago, a witch was saved from drowning. Some versions of this legend state that the King of Munster himself saved her -- others that it was a common soldier. Regardless, to show her gratitude, she cast a spell on a stone in Blarney Castle which would grant the King, if he kissed it, the power of persuasion.

This persuasion was reputedly used by Dermot McCarthy when he was asked to surrender Blarney Castle during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I. While he said he would be delighted to prove his loyalty in such a fashion every time the official came to ask him to surrender, something outrageous happened which provided him with an excuse.

In my story, Kelsey needs the power of persuasion in order to give a pitch to her bosses at Sullivan Advertising. If she can do so successfully, she will be awarded the position of Vice President, which she's worked diligently to achieve all her adult life. The only crimp in her plans? A sexy Irishman by the name of Seamus who asks her to move to Ireland to be with him.

Stone Cold Kiss by L. K. Below

One Kiss…

Dangling over the parapet of a castle, Kelsey Donovan doubts her decisions as she battles with her fear of heights. How will kissing the Blarney Stone change her life? But as the arms of a sexy Irishman close around her, she begins to change her mind.

Can it lead to a lifetime?

When Seamus McKinley rescues a tourist gripping the Blarney Castle for dear life, he never expected her to grab hold of his heart just as tightly. But can he convince her to meet him halfway?

Read an excerpt or buy the book here.




L. K. Below writes romance and speculative fiction. Her newest release, Stone Cold Kiss, is now available from Lyrical Press, Inc. Visit her online at www.lbelow.net or on her blog at http://lbelow.blogspot.com.

Deborah Melanie: 'Winter's Spirit'

Blurb:


Winter McAndrew is on the brink of divorcing her philandering husband, Philip, when he dies in a car crash. One year later and with unfinished business; Philip is still earth bound and interfering in his wife’s love life. Trying to make amends isn't always easy when you're dead. Not only has Winter fallen for her old crush, Jack Tobin, but he also happens to be Philip’s cousin. With more complications than a woman needs at Christmas, Winter tries to find peace at her holiday home in The Lake District. However, when she finds herself snowed in with Jack; ghosts, old and new cause quite a stir. Will Winter get her man, or will ghostly Philip put an end to all her festive fantasies?


Excerpt:

“Oh heck,” she muttered. Not only did the vase shatter, but so too did her sexy daydream. Would it ever be possible for her to get though one of these daytime fantasies without breaking something in the shop? Last week it had been a coffee mug, the week before, a china soap dish. It wouldn’t do to get her sister too suspicious.

“Tut, tut,” came the voice she was fast learning to hate. “Not another one of your smouldering day dreams I hope.”

She turned around to see Philip; floating somewhere between the fragranced soaps and bath bombs.

“I’m starting to get annoyed at you just turning up here uninvited, Philip. Can’t you send out a psychic calling card or something? Or even better, leave me alone.”

He grinned, displaying his still perfect white teeth. Sadly, death had done little to deteriorate his charming good looks. “I can’t leave you until the deed is done. Whatever it may be. You know full well I need to do my good act on earth before I can pass over.”

“Well hurry up and do it. It’s been a full year already. I thought you would have figured it out by now. Haven’t you any idea what it is you need to do?”

“No. I haven’t. Believe me, I wish I could. This situation is just as bad for me as it is for you. I didn’t ask for it. Or this.” He gestured towards his attire. “It’s bloody freezing at the best of times, but this week has been awful. The cold gets everywhere.”

“Perhaps you should have thought about your appearance before you died in a hospital gown. I’ve no sympathy at all. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to tidy this mess before Summer comes in.”

“Ah, yes. You wouldn’t want her to see the evidence of your day dreams would you? If only I could read your mind dear wife. I’d love to know who is occupying your thoughts these days.”

“Well let me assure you, it isn’t you. Now go.” He folded his arms sulkily and vanished into the ether.

“Good riddance,” she muttered, bending to pick up the pieces of the broken vase. Her occasional clumsiness could be explained away, but she shuddered at the prospect of explaining her dead husband’s haunting.


Website: http://www.deborahmelanie.com/

Buy link: http://www.solsticepublishing.com/products/Winter%27s-Spirit.html


Biography:

As a child I loved to create my own stories; sometimes for friends and sometimes for my own enjoyment. At the age of eleven I entered my first story writing competition. However, it wasn't until many years later that I seriously returned to writing. In the past I have worked as a reviewer, but my first love lies with creating my own characters and their own adventures. Thanks to the encouragement of my husband, I am making a lifelong dream come true.

Marie Treanor: Blood on Silk

One of the most beautiful things about romance is when it blossoms in quite unexpected situations – like when friends suddenly discover there is more to their relationship than they’d thought; or when people who would normally never encounter each other are thrown together by circumstance and discover mutual passion.

Romantic fiction plays on this wonderfully, and when it comes to paranormal romance, well, I’ve come across some very unlikely lovers! And yet their romance can be all the more poignant because of that. I like improbable romances in my own writing – for me it adds edge and depth.

Take this situation: a vengeful and extremely powerful vampire is accidentally awakened by an academic who doesn’t believe in vampires. Forced to believe, she realizes she has to help kill him for the sake of humanity. Worse, she has to kill him before he kills her, because he needs the blood of his awakener to reach his full strength – which he requires in order to achieve his goal of world domination.

This is the premise of my vampire romance trilogy, Awakened by Blood, and in particular of the first book Blood on Silk. It sets the scene for a straightforward battle, you might think - except for the overwhelming attraction between the main characters. As they try to trap each other, each using the sexual attraction they know the other feels, they are both intent on murder, although only the vampire truly means to make love before he kills.

It’s a wickedly sensual situation, but hardly romantic… Or is it? As I said, romance can blossom in very unexpected situations, and people can fall in love without meaning to. Is this what’s happening to my heroine, Elizabeth Silk, in this scene? The Ancient vampire Saloman has finally kidnapped her and taken her to his palace to complete the kill in comfort…


BLOOD ON SILK: An AWAKENED BY BLOOD Novel
By Marie Treanor


Scottish academic Elizabeth Silk is spending the summer in Romania researching historical superstitions for her PhD. While she is tracing local folktales, one subject in particular sparks her imagination. His name is Saloman, legend's most powerful vampire, a seductive prince staked centuries ago. Now, in the ruins of a castle crypt, Elizabeth discovers the legends are real. Her blood has awakened him. Her innocence has aroused him. But Elizabeth unleashes more than Saloman's hunger.

An army of vampire hunters has amassed to send Saloman back to hell. Sworn to help - yet fearing Saloman's deadly blood lust - Elizabeth seeks to entrap him, offering her body as bait. But something stronger than dread, more powerful than revenge, is uniting Elizabeth to her prey. Caught between desire and rage, Elizabeth must decide where her loyalties lie...and what the limits are to a yearning she can no longer control.

***************************************************************************


As he spoke of his people—the Ancients—all of whom were now gone, she caught a glimpse, dark and unbearable, of a loneliness well beyond anything she’d ever known, even in her worst moments. It hurled her into speech. “They say you’re insane.”


His lips quirked again. “Who do? The vampire hunters?”

“There are documents,” she said defensively.


“Of course there are. Written by whom?”


By those who were left when he’d “died.”


As if he read the dawning comprehension in her eyes, he smiled. “There’s a lot of truth in your thesis, Elizabeth Silk. Many things are said and claimed to justify acts that are otherwise unjustifiable.”


He leaned forward to set down her glass. “They say you killed the only other Ancient still in existence. Over a woman.”


“Tsigana.” He watched her as he spoke the name. But she could see no trace of emotion.


“Did you?”


“Perhaps. Oh, I killed him. Perhaps it was insanity—certainly I can’t justify it. And some of it was about Tsigana.”


Elizabeth took a deep breath, but she had nothing to lose. “Is that why she betrayed you?”


His lips twisted. “No. She betrayed me because I wouldn’t give her what she sought—eternal life.”


“She wanted you to make her a vampire?”


“She loved power, poor Tsigana. It was what drew her to me. But when you can see power without touching it, it’s no longer enough. She wanted more. I refused it, and Maximilian promised it. The rest was inevitable. Although it must be said the last laugh is mine. Maximilian never gave her the promised gift. She died a very old woman, I understand.”


It might have given him satisfaction. It was hard to tell. He was gazing into his wine, the half smile not fading on his full, sensual lips.


“Didn’t you know?” Elizabeth blurted. “Didn’t you suspect they were betraying you?”


“I should have,” he agreed. “I knew them both—knew them all—well enough. I suppose it must have been the insanity you spoke of.” He lifted the glass to his lips and drank, as if that would hide the old, ugly wounds. But the softness of tragedy stayed in his black, not-so-expressionless eyes.


The knowledge rushed on her like a revelation, peculiarly devastating. Not insanity. Just simple love.

He lowered the glass and caught her staring. He laughed. “What’s the matter? You think me incapable of love because I’m evil?”


“Are you?”


“Incapable of love? Come here and I’ll show you.”


“Evil,” she said firmly.


“Like beauty, it’s in the eye of the beholder.”


It was so easy to drown in his eyes, in his darkness. To lose the fraying thread that bound her to reality—just.

“You really want to rule the world? Like some insane megalomaniac from an old B movie?”


The gleam was back in his eyes—mockery or lust. Or both. “It’s a long-term goal. Just now, all I want is to make love to you.”


Her stomach lurched downward. “Oh no. I know what comes after that.”


“It’s a long time until sunrise.”


They were bantering, flirting over her life. She should have been appalled. She should have been running like hell, whatever the futility. Was she so pathetic that she would just lie down and die for him?


Face it, Silk. It’s not the dying you want. It’s the loving.


Reaching out, he stroked her hair, brushing the tousled locks behind her bare shoulder. She might have been mistaken, but she imagined his hand shook. His touch on her skin was soft, sensual, unbearably tender. His compelling eyes burned.


He ached—as she did.


Her breath caught. The game wasn’t over. She had one last throw, if she dared to take it.


She leaned into him and lifted her face closer to his. He inhaled her, not smiling now, but savoring. His lips parted, but still they didn’t take hers. His only contact was the hand lying still and heavy on her shoulder.


God help me. . . .


Her heart pounded at the enormity of what she was about to do. She closed her eyes, gathering courage and strength, and brushed her lips across his. When they moved in instant response, she flicked her tongue along his upper lip, from corner to corner, then snaked inside his mouth, and fastened her whole mouth to his.

BLOOD ON SILK: An AWAKENED BY BLOOD Novel by Marie Treanor is published by

NAL Signet Eclipse, and is available from Amazon; Barnes & Noble.

BLOOD SIN, the second AWAKENED BY BLOOD novel will be released on 5th April 2011, and is available now for pre-order.

Watch out for the third book, BLOOD ETERNAL, coming October 2011.

Marie Treanor lives in Scotland with her eccentric husband and three much-too-smart children. Having grown bored with city life, she resides these days in a picturesque village by the sea where she is lucky enough to enjoy herself avoiding housework and writing sensual stories of paranormal romance and fantasy.

You can find out more about Marie and her books on her website: http://www.marietreanor.com/.

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