Broken Heart 06 Come Hell or High Water
Read Broken Heart 06 Come Hell or High Water Online
Authors: Michele Bardsley
Tags: #Romance Speculative Fiction
SIGNET ECLIPSE
Published by New American Library
a division of
Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
375 Hudson Street,
New York, New York 10014, USA
Penguin Books Ltd.
Registered Offices:
80 Strand
London WC2R 0RL, England
First published by Signet Eclipse
an imprint of New American Library,
a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
First Printing, January 2010
Copyright (c) Michele Bardsley, 2010
eISBN : 978-1-101-17125-7
SIGNET ECLIPSE and logo are trademarks of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
PUBLISHER'S NOTE
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.
Table Of Contents
The Eight Ancients (In order of creation)
To Dakota Cassidy
Thanks for coming to the rescue.
To Eleanor Cartwright
Ditto.
As always, I owe my BFFs, Renee, Dakota, and Terri, the world. They are my family. I mean it. Friends are the family you choose, and I am so grateful to have these three women as my soul sisters.
My agent, Stephanie Kip Rostan, and her assistant, Monika Verma, kick freaking ass! You both always go above and beyond. Thanks for all that you do.
Big heapin' cheese-covered thanks to Kara Cesare for keeping me on track and helping me create better books. I so love this writing gig!
I owe
mucho
gratitude to everyone at NAL, from cover artists to line editors, from marketing gurus to the dude (or dudette) who gets the coffee, and to the ever-patient production team, for contributing to the success of the Broken Heart series.
As always, I lurve my Yahoo! Group ( [http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MicheleBardsley/] http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MicheleBardsley/ join). Thanks so much for your support. I appreciate it more than you'll ever know.
I'm very grateful to be a member of the League of Reluctant Adults ( [http://www.leagueofreluc-tantadults.com] http://www.leagueofreluc-tantadults.com). Here's a shout-out to my fellow members: Mario Acevedo, Dakota Cassidy, Molly Harper, Mark Henry, Stacia Kane, Jackie Kessler, Caitlin Kittredge, J. F. Lewis, Richelle Mead, Kelly Meding, Nicole Peeler, Cherie Priest, Jennifer Rardin, Michelle Rowan, Diana Rowland, Jeanne C. Stein, Anton Strout, and Jaye Wells.
The awesome information about hoodoo I found at [http://www.luckymojo.com] http://www.luckymojo.com. Any errors made (or liberties taken) are mine. Please don't goofer me.
To the makers of
Rock Band
and
Guitar Hero
: Bet you didn't figure that women in their forties would love your games, did you? We do. A lot. We
insist
you do a version with songs from the 1980s, because we want to relive our youth. Plus, some of the songs on the current games kinda suck. If you need help deciding which tunes should be included in the "Older Women Rock: 1980s Edition," just e-mail me at michelebardsley@yahoo .com.
"We are each our own devil, and we make this world our hell."
-- Oscar Wilde
"Somehow our devils are never quite what we expect when we meet them face-to-face."
-- Nelson DeMille
"What do you want me to do, Sam, huh? Sit around all day writing sad poems about how I'm going to die? You know what? I've got one. Let's see, what rhymes with 'Shut up, Sam'?"
-- Dean Winchester, Supernatural, "Fresh Blood"
"Off to the ol' coffin, Phoebe?" asked Connor Ballard. He'd finished his shift at the Old Sass Cafe a few minutes early and had helped me finish mine. We'd wiped down tables together, and flirted all the while. He was Scottish, so every one of his words sounded like melted sugar.
"Ha. Ha." I'd been a vampire for nearly four years now. A few weeks after my son, Danny, was born, I was killed. I woke up undead, sporting a shiny new set of fangs and no heartbeat.
Oh, it gets better. Not only had I become a vampire, but I had the ability to control demonkind. Y'see, every bloodsucker gets the basic package: glamour, strength, speed, the inability to tan. Then each of the seven vampire Families has a different superpower.
I'm from the Family Durga. I can summon demons, send them back to the Pit, make them clean my house. They really hate scrubbing toilets. (Who doesn't, right?) I'm joking. I wouldn't let a demon in my house on purpose. Woe to the Pit dweller who even tried.
Thanks to the Consortium, we lived in a safe paranormal community protected by an invisible force field. Technology and magic at their finest. Ever since the Invisi-shield went operational, we've enjoyed some peace and quiet. The town's prospered. Vampires, dragons, witches,
sidhe
, lycanthropes, and even a few ailuranthropes, or were-cats, had settled down here.
Connor and I leaned against my car, which was parked in front of the cafe, and flicked glances at each other. It was a few minutes past four a.m., which was closing time for most of Broken Heart. Nearly all the lights on Main Street were off, including the neon sign for the cafe. Broken Heart businesses usually closed about three hours before dawn; that way we could get our kids and ourselves tucked in in plenty of time.
According to Connor, he was Ghillie Dhu, a Scottish fairy. Once, they lived in birch trees and used their powers to protect the forests. But the Ghillie Dhu numbered too few these days. So he'd moved here and I'd hired him as a short-order cook. It seemed to me he should've been a gardener, or maybe even joined the security team. God knows he was built like a warrior.
Even though I managed the place now, I'd been waitressing at the cafe since I was sixteen. I didn't figure death should stand between me and a pay-check. Besides, the cafe was like a second home to me.
I went by my maiden name, Phoebe Allen, though I'd been Phoebe Tate for all of two minutes. A quickie marriage to the guy who'd knocked me up turned out to be a big-ass mistake. Don't get me wrong: Jackson Tate was nice enough, and definitely a good daddy. But we sucked as a couple and called it quits before our kid was born. We shared custody of Danny, and since it was the summer, my son was with his father. Jackson had taken him to Florida yesterday, the start of a two-week vacation at Disney World. I was in that mommy limbo of feeling relief (four-year-old's absence equals sleep and quiet and tidiness) and the ache of missing my kid, shaded by irrational panic that something might happen to him if I wasn't there to protect him.
"Am I borin' you, lass?"
"No," I said, laughing. "I'm just thinking 'bout stuff."
"You miss your boy."
I was surprised he'd guessed my thoughts. Connor had never struck me as the familial type. I looked at him beneath my lashes. His face was slashes and angles. Hard-edged. Even the look in his eyes was all knives. The only softness I detected was the lushness of his mouth, the bottom lip slightly fuller than the top, lips that showcased perfect white teeth. And there was the dimple, of course. He had chocolate brown hair that he wore long; the ends brushed his shoulders. His eyes were the color of Crown Royal, rich amber, filled with secrets.
Wickedly handsome.
He exuded a caged strength I'd wanted so badly to see unleashed in bed.
Whew.
It was unusual for me to waste time flirting. Or hoping for, you know, a little nooky. Well, not all-the-way nooky. Since sucking blood was such a sensual act, the original seven vampires magicked up the binding. If you had intercourse, you were bound to your lover for a hundred years. Needless to say, most of us were careful about mealtimes.
