Sole Survivors: Crux Survivors, Book 2 (22 page)

It brought to life every inappropriate feeling he’d experienced over the last couple of years. At twenty-five, Jenna had grown into a stunning woman.

“You have the hottest mouth,” she said, voice low and throaty.

They didn’t know he hadn’t left yet.

Dorian and Jenna always muffled their lovemaking when he was home. He knew it for sure now because these sounds were unfettered and passionate. A deeper noise from Dorian, like a growl, followed, and Ross’s body snapped taut. The door to the supply closet was open. He heard the heavy breathing, the gasps…and two seconds later, the slap of a bare back hitting the wall.

“Oh yeah, right there,” Jenna said. “Your fingers…yes. Damn, you have great fingers too—”

Her voice broke off, the last word a cry.

“So beautiful.” Dorian’s tone, strained and hoarse, told Ross so much about the man’s feelings for Jenna.

Feelings Ross understood more than he cared to acknowledge.

The darkest secrets are the hardest to unearth.

Secret Unleashed

© 2013 Sierra Dean

Secret McQueen, Book 6

After her last mission tested the limits of her humanity and took her out of this world, Secret’s friends, determined to keep her safe from her old nemesis Alexandre Peyton, keep ushering her from one babysitter to the next.

Couch surfing would be a lot more fun if Alexandre would let up on her long enough to allow her to get in some alone time with her lovers. Including Holden, her self-appointed shadow.

As if living out of coffin isn’t bad enough, Secret literally brings down the house while hunting a rogue, causing the council to exile her from New York—for her own safety, of course.

With her list of people to trust getting shorter and shorter, Secret ends up embroiled in a mystery to find a vampire warden gone AWOL and a missing artifact. Things go from bad to worse when she falls into the hands of a man who will prove that humans can be the worst monsters of them all.

Warning:
Contains a cross-country journey, an unexpected family reunion, heated lovers’ embraces and a hell of a lot of trouble.

Enjoy the following excerpt for
Secret Unleashed:

I scrambled off the bed and put the full distance of the room between us. I didn’t want to be within arm’s reach because the urge to deck him was one thing, but I also had a habit of tangling limbs with him whenever I got mad.

“I thought you loved me,” I said quietly.

“I do.” He stayed sitting on the bed, but his gaze was locked on me, following as I paced the length of the room. “I’ve always loved you. I will love you as long as I live. That’s not the point. It’s not fair what you do to me and Desmond. I can’t speak for him, but I can tell you the last thing I want is more competition. A heart can only be divided so many times before the pieces stop feeling anything. How many times can yours be divided?”

I stopped pacing and stared at him. All the guilt that had come and gone like tides in the moonlight came swelling back over me now. I’d thought I was the only one feeling the burden of this three-way love affair, but now here was one point in the triangle telling me it injured him too.

“I don’t want to hurt either of you.”

“But you are. You’re hurting us, and you’re hurting yourself.”

There was a leather settee in one corner of the room, and I sat down, placing my face in my upturned palms. I didn’t know what to say. I couldn’t choose between them, and I couldn’t give them up. I was stuck between having everything I wanted and having nothing at all, and I believed it was better to stay still than to take any risks.

“I can’t do this right now.”

“Fine.” He got to his feet and crouched in front of me, taking my hands in his so I had no choice but to look at him. “I’m not asking you to make a choice this second. I just want you to know why I’m relieved another option has been taken out of the running.”

Staring at him, I tried to decide if he was being cute or making a joke at my expense, but he seemed totally earnest. I let him hold my hands while he watched me. He had the eerie vampire ability to sit perfectly still, as if he’d been turned to stone, so sometimes it felt like I was looking at a statue version of Holden that didn’t breathe or move its eyes.

Not that Holden breathed on a normal day.

“Sig isn’t another option,” I assured him.

“Good.” He offered up a faint smile and squeezed my hands. “Good.”

“Are you really so unhappy?”

“It’s not that I’m unhappy. But I’d be much happier if I didn’t have to share you at all.”

“I imagine Desmond feels the same way.”

“Probably.”

I slid off the settee and straddled his lap, looping my arms lazily around his neck so I could get close enough to press my forehead against his. I liked the way his cool skin made my own seem warm by comparison. The way I felt when I was close to him was something I wouldn’t be able to give up easily. He made me believe I was safe even when I wasn’t. Like I could get through any situation.

Even this one.

“I promise you, when this is all over…Peyton, my mother, Sutherland…when it’s all done, we will talk. You, me and Desmond will sit down and figure this whole awful mess out. Okay?”

He supported my lower back with wide, strong palms, and leaned us towards the settee, his lips dangerously close to mine. “In the meantime, do you think you might relent on this silly celibacy mission you’re on?”

Given my position, it was impossible to ignore the rising presence of his erection, or the possessive way he tightened his hands into fists on my shirt. If I waited a few more seconds, he might shred the garment and have his way with me on the floor.

It wouldn’t be the first time we hadn’t made it to a bed.

I weighed the options in my head. On the one hand, I wanted to be thoroughly consumed by him. I craved his bite more than almost anything, longing for the intoxicating thrill it gave me. And he’d mentioned we would be better able to sell our story if we were heard by others.

That was what made me push myself off him. Not the notion of selling our relationship, but the idea other people could hear us. I had no interest in turning my bedroom sessions into an audience event. The members of the West Coast council had no place in my relationships.

No matter how badly I wanted to end my three sexless months and put Holden and me out of our misery, it wasn’t the right moment.

“I’m sorry. I want to, but it’s not—”

He lifted me off the floor and backed me into the wall, rattling the large mirror beside us. With barely any effort he hoisted me up with one hand so I was once again positioned over his hardness. Briefly his eyes fluttered closed, and he stilled the hand that had gone to my throat.

“Holden.”

His fingers grazed the thin skin of my neck, and when he reopened his eyes, they’d gone black. For a fleeting moment I wondered if I should be afraid of him. Years of training to kill vampires made me wary of their black-eyed state because it usually meant they were about to rip your carotid artery out.

Holden wasn’t interested in a traditional feed though. He might want to bite me—hell, I wanted him to bite me too—but his interest was carnal in a different way.

“You want to,” he said, his voice harsh and raspy. “You said you wanted to.” He kissed my collarbone, and he must have heard the loud thump of my heartbeat because he lowered his ear to my chest and listened for a long time.

Which was when he seemed to understand why my heart was beating so fast.

He lowered me back to the floor and took several steps away, raking his fingers through his hair and looking completely disgusted with himself. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay.”

“It’s not okay.”

“You didn’t hurt me. I wouldn’t have let it get out of hand. And you’re right…I did say I wanted it. Just not here. Not like this.”

He sat on the bed, the blackness fading from his eyes as he continued to stare at me. I tried to smile, but I wasn’t feeling very smiley right then.

Maxime had a hell of a sense of timing, because he knocked quietly and opened the door, giving Holden and me a much-needed reprieve from the tension.

“Is it a bad time?” Max asked.

“No. Couldn’t be better,” I replied.

Sole Survivors

Dani Worth

In a harsh new world, only she can bring him to life…

Crux Survivors, Book 2

Chase Hawthorne is on the run from a ghost. The shooting that took his little sister and scarred Chase’s face and body has left far deeper scars on his brother Tripp’s soul. Driven to pull up stakes and head for the most haunted place in Louisiana, Chase hopes to prove to Tripp there
is
no ghost of his twin beckoning from the afterlife.

When he comes upon a young woman fighting off raiders, Chase doesn’t hesitate to help the first female he’s seen in years. And he tries to ignore his instant attraction, hoping Tripp will feel it, too—and emerge from his frightening depression.

Keera has been alone too long, and Chase makes her feel things she never thought she’d feel again. Tripp may be the needier brother, but it’s Chase she wants. Scars and all.

But letting people too close comes with risks. And as they are drawn into the search for a young man’s family, both must accept the possibility that there’s more to life—and love—than simple survival.

Warning: A hero who puts his own needs aside for family. And a woman who’s out to prove there’s no law against a man listening to his body once in a while.

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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, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.

Samhain Publishing, Ltd.

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Sole Survivors

Copyright © 2014 by Dani Worth

ISBN: 978-1-61922-130-7

Edited by Holly Atkinson

Cover by Kanaxa

All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

First
Samhain Publishing, Ltd.
electronic publication: January 2014

www.samhainpublishing.com