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Fouth Grave Beneath My Feet

How do I find the words to express how much I love the Charley Davidson Series and Darynda Jones? There's simply not enough ways to say it.

 But I'll try. 

Sometimes being the grim reaper really is that. Grim. And since Charley’s last case went so awry, she has taken a couple months off to wallow in the wonders of self-pity. But when a woman shows up on her doorstep convinced someone is trying to kill her, Charley has to force herself to rise above. Or at least get dressed. She quickly realizes something is amiss when everyone the woman knows swears she’s insane. The more they refute the woman’s story, the more Charley believes it.
 
In the meantime, the sexy, sultry son of Satan, Reyes Farrow, has been cleared of all charges. He is out of prison and out of Charley’s life, as per her wishes and several perfectly timed death threats. But his absence has put a serious crimp in her sex life. While there are other things to consider, like the fact that the city of Albuquerque has been taken hostage by an arsonist, Charley is having a difficult time staying away. Especially when it looks like Reyes may be involved. Just when life was returning to normal, Charley is thrust back into the world of crime, punishment, and the devil in blue jeans.

I asked Darynda to supply me with a small bio of the characters in the books. We hope you enjoy them. 

Reyes

Full Name: Reyes Alexander Farrow

Age: 30

Height: 6’4”

Weight: 230

Hair: Dark brown, almost black

Eyes: Deep brown with gold and green flecks

Factoid: Would level the planet to protect Charley

Charley

Full Name: Charley Jean Davidson  

Age: 27

Height: 5’7”

Weight: 125…ish

Hair: Chestnut brown

Eyes: Golden amber

Factoid: Likes boots and shiny things.

Garrett

Full Name: Garrett Lynn Swopes 

Age: 33

Height: 6’2”

Weight: 215

Hair: Black

Eyes: Silvery gray 

Factoid: Knows what Reyes is, what he is capable of. Has set out to destroy him.

Cookie

Full Name: Cookie Marie Kowalski  

Age: Old enough to know better

Height: 5’5”

Weight: You don’t want to go there

Hair: Black with gray, um, highlights

Eyes: Ocean blue

Factoid: Has a crush on Garrett but true feelings for Charley’s Uncle Bob

Angel

Full Name: Juan Angel Garza 

Age: 13 @ death

Height: 5’7”

Weight: Currently zero

Hair: Black

Eyes: Dark brown 

Factoid: Likes to see Charley naked

Mr. Wong

Full Name: Unknown (Called Mr. Wong in the interim)  

Age: Unknown

Height: Looks about 4’11”

Weight: None

Hair: Gray

Eyes: Unknown

Factoid: Has a destiny that will shock Charley to her toes

Find Darynda on the web:  CLICK HERE and for her new YA site : CLICK HERE

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Life in the "Fast Lane"

Introducing

 PALM SPRINGS HEAT

by DC Thome

Can an ordinary woman make a billionaire bachelor fall in love with her…so she can dump him as soon as he’s hooked? Lara Dixon sets out to make it happen with infamous international playboy Clay Creighton.

Lara embarks on a mission of justice, certain that Creighton’s Fast Lane media empire, with its philosophy of “fast women, fast cars and fast living,” encourages men to stray from happy homes. And by “men,” Lara means her ex, a Fast Lane devotee who turned out to have had not a single shred of respect for women.

Lara finds backers to help her get revenge on the notorious, but decidedly handsome, tycoon. With new fabulous clothes and a glorious makeover, she infiltrates Clay’s inner circle and uses her research about his likes and dislikes to charm him into believing she’s not just another L.A. woman looking to romance a rich guy.

But as she becomes steeped in the Fast Lane culture during a weekend involving an exhilarating ride in a very fast car and passionate moments in Clay’s very exotic Palm Spring resort, “Heat,” Lara discovers nothing is what she expected. Especially Clay. Women’s perceptions of him, it turns out, are based on fiction—the products of a skilled public relations team. Lara’s startled by how well Clay treats her, how much they have in common—and how much she’s falling for him.

So now Lara has a new problem: Can she put the brakes on her plan to destroy Clay and make the turn toward a happily-ever-after instead?

This light-hearted romp into today’s jet set includes a cast of wacky assistants, bubbly fashionistas and unexpected enemies—and friends.

Palm Springs Heat is a fast, fun read—a contemporary romance with a touch of intrigue and a reminder that nothing, not even a waterfall, is exactly what it seems.

EXCERPT

The limo jerked hard to the right, sending Lara Dixon sliding across the slick leather seat.

That can’t be good.

The man seated across from her—the man Gina had found to introduce her to Clay Creighton—scrambled upright and banged on the Plexiglas partition separating them from the driver, a uniformed woman who had quarter-inch silver hair peeking from beneath a livery cap.

“What the hell?” he demanded as the partition slid open. “Did you hit something?”

The driver met Lara’s questioning gaze in the rearview mirror. “Oops.” The partition slid shut.

That really can’t be good.

Lara flipped down a mirror to fix her hair. Her natural color shimmered through the semisweet chocolate veneer. Hard to get used to after thirty-two years as a blonde.

“Just a bump in the road.” Anton Roche worked his neck like a preening turkey and settled back in as the limo raced past Paradise Cove on the road to Malibu. “As I was saying, the girl thought she was the aurora borealis, Liberty’s torch and the leprechaun’s pot o’ gold rolled into one. But she knew she looked even hotter in my bustier.”

Lara suppressed a sigh. How does Gina put up with this guy? The lingerie designer had prattled about his life with the glitterati from the minute he’d picked her up at her humble Santa Monica apartment. She wished he’d let her concentrate on this new experience of riding in luxury. After tonight, she might never step into a limo again. Then again, Roche had put his turkey neck on the line to talk up Lara to Clay Creighton.

He has his own axe to grind, but I should at least pretend to be interested.

“Why is it the ‘STP’ bustier?” Lara asked, though after weeks of researching Creighton’s Fast Lane empire, she knew the answer. Never hurts to practice. You’ll be lying all the time if everything goes right tonight.

Roche straightened with pride. “‘Seconds to Paradise.’ It’s goddamn brilliant. Builds up the bust—and a man can unhook it one-handed like that.” He snapped his fingers. “You know how much money Creighton’s made from that thing? It’s the biggest seller in the Toy Store. But do I get the credit?” He looked more closely at Lara. “It wouldn’t have been a bad idea for you to wear one tonight.”

Lara had considered buying one from Fast Lane’s notorious online gift shop back when she was married. “I thought STP had something to do with gasoline.”

“Yeah, well…Fast Lane: Racy cars, the high life…and all that.”

Fast women, fast cars, fast living. I know all about Fast Lane and Clay Creighton.

Lara looked out the window as Roche chattered on. The sun drifting down through the maritime haze toward Point Dume reflected in her diamond-blue eyes. The conflagration of red, orange and purple looked no different from here than it did from the bluffs on the other side of Santa Monica Bay.

The limo jerked again as they turned up a gravel road. Lara’s heart quickened. We must be close.

“We’re here!” Roche announced as the car turned into a driveway that twisted skyward through desert terrain. “Are you ready?”

Lara thought about the weeks she’d spent in the gym. The coaching sessions on how to lie with a mysterious woman whose name and accent changed daily. The hours poring through the enormously popular Fast Lane website, reading Creighton’s daily encyclicals on materialism and carnality until she could easily extemporize on the advantages of gadgets she’d never use and the attributes of running backs she’d never cheer for.

But everything she learned did nothing to change her opinion: Fast Lane was nothing but a place where men like her asshole ex, Kyle, could leer at naked women and find validation for believing they deserved their own harems.

 An instructional guide on how to screw over your wife.

She closed her eyes and her mind to escape Roche’s jabber. When she had approached Gina Wray, creator of the pro-woman website HardCoreGrrrls.com, with the idea of infiltrating Fast Lane to reveal its sordid secrets, Lara had never expected to be the one doing the infiltrating.

“I know plenty of people who’d like to bring Clay Creighton down—people who’d pay big bucks for an exposé,” Gina had told Lara. “Putting an end to The Rotation wouldn’t be so bad, either.”

The Rotation consisted of three women who were at Creighton’s beck and call 24/7. Every six months, he dumped the most senior member and introduced a new plaything. Relationships arced, he said, starting out passionate and ending up routine, so a man had to bring in “new talent” to keep things exciting. Gina’s plan was for Lara to become the first woman in The Rotation’s disgraceful sixteen-year history to dump him instead.

“I don’t know,” Lara had protested. “I’m not exactly Fast Lane material.”

“The material is there,” Gina had assured her. “You just have to move it around a little.”

Nothing’s simple. The world is warm and cool and open and mysterious and bright and muddled—all at the same time. How do you live with that?

Lara opened her eyes to see Roche staring at her chest. He frowned. “Can’t you show a little more cleavage?”

Lara reflexively looked down the ruffled collar of her dress—a sleeveless midnight blue Roland Mouret crepe Gina had purchased for this night. Lara marveled at how easily the twenty-five-hundred-dollar price tag convinced her the dress fit and felt better than anything she’d ever worn.

But does it look good enough?

Even with her new body and hair, even with every follicle below her forehead sugar-waxed and ripped clean, her nails filed, polished and buffed to a mother-of-pearl sheen, her feet soaked in lavender-scented Dead Sea salt water and tucked neatly into a pair of Guillaume Hinfray platform slingbacks, even after two months of Gina’s pep talks, she had to ask this clown, “Do you believe I can even get into The Rotation?”

Roche leaned back against the velvety leather, his beady black eyes taking in Lara’s slender five-foot-eight-inch frame, long legs, toned and spray-tanned arms. She held steady under his gaze. He reached up and pushed a lock of hair off her forehead. She knocked his hand away and moved the hair back.

“Eh,” Roche said. “Stranger things have happened.”

Just what I needed: a big boost of confidence.

The limo crested a hillock and slowed to a stop. A busty young woman wearing the lowest-cut Lakers jersey Lara had ever seen opened the door. “Welcome to the ICE House!”

Happy Release Day!

OMG It is FINALLY here! 

What?  You don't know?  

Yeah, that's right. My buddy Darynda Jone's newest book is out today. Join me in wishing her good luck on her new YA project. She is AWESOMESAUCE!! 
OH WAIT.... You don't know anything about it?  I can't leave you hanging. That would be rude wouldn't it! 
Darynda Jones, author of The New York Times bestselling series that began with First Grave on the Right, brings us Death and the Girl Next Door, a thrilling Young Adult novel garnering high praise and early buzz from major authors

Ten years ago, Lorelei's parents disappeared without a trace.  Raised by her grandparents and leaning on the support of her best friends, Lorelei is finally beginning to accept the fact that her parents are never coming home.  For Lorelei, life goes on.

High school is not quite as painful as she thinks it will be, and things are as normal as they can be.  Until the day the school's designated loner, Cameron Lusk, begins to stalk her, turning up where she least expects it,  standing outside her house in the dark, night after night.  Things get even more complicated when a new guy—terrifying, tough, sexy Jared Kovach—comes to school.  Cameron and Jared instantly despise each other and Lorelei seems to be the reason for their animosity.  What does Jared know about her parents?  Why does Cameron tell Jared he can't have Lorelei?  And what will any of them do when Death comes knocking for real?  Thrilling, sassy, sexy, and inventive, Darynda Jones's first foray into the world of teens will leave readers eager for the next installment.

"Unique, witty, and touching—I LOVED THIS BOOK!" —P.C. Cast, New York Times bestselling author of The House of Night Series

~~I AM SO FREAKING EXCITED I COULD BURST -- says PIMPIN' READS~~

DO YOU WANT TO KNOW HOW EXCITED I AM ???? DO YOU REALLY??? 

THIS IS ME TODAY.  BECAUSE KRESLEY COLE ALSO RELEASED HER NEW RELEASE!  

#1 New York Times bestselling author Kresley Cole introduces The Arcana Chronicles, post-apocalyptic tales filled with riveting action, the dark mysticism of Tarot cards, and breathtaking romance.She could save the world—or destroy it.

Sixteen year old Evangeline “Evie” Greene leads a charmed life, until she begins experiencing horrifying hallucinations. When an apocalyptic event decimates her Louisiana hometown, Evie realizes her hallucinations were actually visions of the future—and they’re still happening. Fighting for her life and desperate for answers, she must turn to her wrong-side-of-the-bayou classmate: Jack Deveaux.

But she can’t do either alone.

With his mile-long rap sheet, wicked grin, and bad attitude, Jack is like no boy Evie has ever known. Even though he once scorned her and everything she represented, he agrees to protect Evie on her quest. She knows she can’t totally depend on Jack. If he ever cast that wicked grin her way, could she possibly resist him?

Who can Evie trust?

As Jack and Evie race to find the source of her visions, they meet others who have gotten the same call. An ancient prophesy is being played out, and Evie is not the only one with special powers. A group of twenty-two teens has been chosen to reenact the ultimate battle between good and evil. But it’s not always clear who is on which side…

I REALLY WANT TO GIVE AWAY SOMETHING~~~~~~ 
HOW ABOUT A COPY OF ONE OF THESE BOOKS.  THE WINNER GETS THEIR CHOICE!!!!!

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Welcome C.L. Parker

Announcing the 3rd installment of

Supernova Saga

NEXUS 

Kerrigan Cruz and Dominic Grayson have fulfilled their destiny, clearing the way for a new Guardian of the Light to emerge. The product of her parents’ mixed bloodlines, Victoria Milena Cruz-Grayson must defend the world as the only Guardian of Mankind in existence. 

With the weight of the world on her shoulders, Tori must find a way to keep it from falling before the gravity of her existence sends her crashing to her knees and mankind along with her. The real war is inside her psyche; good versus evil in a battle between Light and Dark. But she is not alone in her quest.

The Guardian of the Guardian, Dante is destined to fight by her side. With an arsenal of wicked charm, seduction, and the ability to ignite a raging inferno, his allure is powerful. Will it be enough to convince Tori to choose him?

Coming between them is a man whose existence is confined to her dreams. The only friend Tori has ever known, a man she has grown to love over her short eighteen years. She doesn’t know his name, or why he’s there, but she can’t deny the feelings she has for him. There’s only one problem; when he leaves, her dreams become nightmares plagued by demonic beings hellbent on viciously murdering her loved ones. Over and over again.

Two men, both pledging their undying love and unyielding loyalty, but one is not at all what he seems.

Torn between her lifelong friend and the man destined to stand by her side, the Guardian of Mankind must choose her path. The fate of the world depends on her getting it right. But how can she choose when she doesn’t really know who she is to begin with? 

Nexus: There is one truth . . . Everything happens for a reason

EXCERPT

Shortly after lunch, Dante had suggested Tori decide what they would do for the day. He had been noticeably exhausted and maybe even a tad bit sore after their morning training session—even with her bruised ankle, she’d still managed to kick his ass—so she had chosen a relaxing day in the park. Tori thought he might have even looked relieved when she had suggested it, the poor baby, but she had managed to keep her giggle to herself and had hidden her smile well enough that she hadn’t bruised his ego any more than what it had been. Although she couldn’t understand how on Earth his ego could be damaged in any way, shape, or form after what he had done for her before the training session.

So, she found herself sitting on a blanket under a beautifully aged London plane tree with her back against its flaking trunk while Dante’s long, very masculine body was sprawled out on his back with his eyes closed. The sun was high in the sky, and his skin glowed like a shiny surface reflecting solar rays. Her Guardian eyes had become used to seeing his brightness and were unaffected, but it made him no less stellar by definition. He really was a gorgeous man. How in the world could he have still been single?

On several occasions, she caught herself staring at his long fingers, and blood rushed to her cheeks as well as to other parts of her body with a yearning to feel them on her again.

Dante was the first man who had ever made her really feel sensual. There was no denying the urge Tori felt to run her fingers along the strong line of his jaw, the corded muscles of his neck, over the hard peaks of his chest, and down the punctuated divots of his abdomen, but she managed to keep her mind and her hands preoccupied. The gamut of emotions that overwhelmed her when she thought about all she had learned over the past couple of days, including the night before at the cemetery, needed to be recorded in the pages of her journal. Purging them from her system was the only way to maintain an element of control over the intensity of her thoughts.

Tori wrote about her excitement that she and Dante had found the key to keeping her nightmares at bay. She also expressed how pissed she still was at her parents for the secrets they had kept, when they had always preached to her about the ramifications of doing so. And then there was her confusion over the feelings she was having for Dante, and how miffed she was about the way he had treated her when she last saw him.

With Dante in the picture, she couldn’t even see him anymore. That was just fine with her after his behavior, but was that the cause of his outburst? Did he think she’d betrayed him? She decided it didn’t matter because whether that was the reason or not; he’d had no right to threaten Dante. It wasn’t like any of this was his fault. Hell, Dante didn’t even know heexisted. And how had he appeared to her when she hadn’t been asleep in the first place?

As she thought about the man from her dreams, she couldn’t help but feel like she was being watched. Like he was out there hiding behind some tree or bush, studying her with accusing eyes. It was all in her head. Logically, she knew that it wasn’t possible, but he had never really seemed like a figment of her imagination. Still, he had only ever been in her dreams, so it didn’t make sense that he was literally there. Had last night only been a delusional mishap as well?

Dante sighed and turned toward her. “I’m going to fall asleep if we don’t do something.”

“What would you like to do, Dante?”

His signature smirk came out and she knew he was about to suggest something inappropriate. “We could snog . . .”

Tori laughed to herself and shook her head. She knew him too well already. “You’re so predictable.”

Dante grabbed her by her good ankle and pulled her until her back was to the ground and he was hovering over her. “Is this spontaneous enough for you?” he whispered into her ear and flicked his tongue across her lobe before sucking it into his mouth.

She giggled and shoved at his chest, but he held her close, nuzzling her neck and peppering her skin with tickling kisses.

“Stop it, Dante,” she said, laughing even harder while smacking at his back with her journal.

“Mmm . . . yeah, baby. I like it rough.”

He growled and attacked her neck again. Tori managed to push him off while still laughing, and sat up again, straightening her clothes. Dante reached for the journal she had laid beside her.

“Are you drawing me again? Let me see.”

She stopped him before he could take it, and his hand recoiled with a pitiful pout on his lips.

“Yes, but I have no intention of you ever seeing the drawings.”

“Aw, come on, Angel. Why can’t I see them?”

“Because this journal belongs to me, Dante. Which means it’s off limits to you. My personal thoughts are inside here, and they’re not meant for anyone else to read.”

Dante grinned. “I think you write about the dirty thoughts you have about me in there. I hope you at least mentioned the amazing orgasm I gave you this morning, because that definitely bears repeating.”

Tori wrapped the leather strap around the journal to seal it shut and leaned forward, placing a chaste kiss to his lips.

“That’s for me to know and you to never find out,” she told him, and then stood.

He flopped onto his back with an exasperated huff. “You don’t play fair.”

“Oh, and you do?”

He bit his lip and shrugged. He knew damn well what she was talking about. He took liberties with her that no other man ever had or ever would get away with. And he hadn’t an ounce of remorse for it.

Tori offered her hand to help him get up. “Come on, Romeo, let’s go for a walk. Maybe that will ease the temptation.”

Instead of accepting her help, Dante folded his arms until his hands were pointing toward his shoulders on the ground and then kicked out, landing on his feet to stand before her.

Tori pulled her hand back and rolled her eyes. “You’re such a show-off.”

“That was nothing, Angel. I do my best stunts in the bedroom.” He waggled his brows. “I believe you experienced one of them firsthand. This hand, as a matter of fact,” he said, holding up said hand and wiggling his fingers. “Maybe if you play fair you’ll get to see the rest of the amazing feats I can accomplish.”

Tori threw her hands up into the air and let them fall back down to her sides. “Okay, tell you what . . . why don’t we just skip the walk and go back to your bedroom instead where you can have your way with me and steal my virtue so that we can go ahead and get that out of the way.”

Dante cocked an eyebrow. “Steal your virtue? You’re a virgin?”

Tori scoffed and crossed her arms over her chest. “Oh, as if you didn’t already know that.”

He hooked his finger through one of the belt loops on her pants and pulled her against his chest.

His voice was low enough for only her to hear, seductive enough to drive his words home. “If I were to ever be fortunate enough to be your first, it would not be in my bedroom. I couldn’t bear stifling those sounds of ecstasy ripping through your body, and I’d rather prefer to keep them to myself without the whole house hearing them. It would be somewhere much more secluded so that I can make love to you without reservation. And I can personally guarantee it would be the most memorable experience of your lifetime.”

Dante took her hand. Angling his body to shield his movements from any onlookers in the park, he placed her palm over the bulge in his pants, watching her to gauge her reaction. She wore a poker face, but only on the outside. On the inside, her stomach fluttered and her mouth went dry.

“This is what the thought of being inside you does to me. Just the thought.”

Tori wanted to pull away because that was what she should’ve done, but she didn’t. Instead, she allowed him to move her hand back and forth over his length, marveling at his size while knowing the thought of making love to her had caused that effect. The world around them melted away and her head swam with his words, wondering what it might be like to be with him in that way.

He leaned in and nuzzled her ear. “Does that sound like something you might like, Angel?”

His breath was hot against her neck, his masculine scent potent and intoxicating. His body was hard and deliciously warm as he flattened his other hand against her lower back and drew her closer. She wanted to turn into him, to offer her mouth to his until he kissed her so hard she was drunk from the taste of him, but that nagging sensation that they were being watched tugged at the corner of her mind, so she pulled away instead. The second she broke contact, she looked over her shoulder, feeling like he was out there somewhere taking note and plotting ways to avenge his jealousy.

“I guess not. My apologies.” Dante hung his head in either embarrassment or shame, probably a little of both.

Tori couldn’t stand to see him that way. “Dante, don’t apologize. It’s just that . . . well, we’re in a public park, and I’m not all that big on PDA. I feel like someone’s watching, that’s all.”

“Right then. Why don’t we just take that walk and forget all about it for the time being?”

Tori giggled when he turned his back on the rest of the park patrons and adjusted himself in his pants.

“If you had any idea how painful it is to walk with an erection the size of Italy, you wouldn’t be laughing.”

Picturing someone trying to fold Italy in half and stuffing it down their pants made Tori laugh even harder, but Dante draped his arm over her shoulder and nudged her along until they were finally walking. After a moment or two, Tori finally caught her breath and her giggle fit subsided.

“Quite finished now, are you?” Dante asked, and Tori nodded. “Good. I’m glad to know my uncomfortable predicament amuses you so.”

“I’m sorry, but you brought it on yourself.”

“I’ll have you know that since I first laid eyes on you, my cock has been in a permanent state of arousal. I’m sure that has nothing at all to do with the way you tease me.”

“I do not tease you!”

“Oh? You just told me to take you to my bedroom and have my way with you. Just the other day, you stripped me while straddling me on my bike and having your wicked way with me, you throttle me every day in our training sessions, and you press your arse against my cock in bed. Don’t think for a second I believe it’s simply by accident.”

Tori smacked his chest. “I do not press my ass against you!”

“Oh, yes you do. Worse than that, even when you’re not physically touching me with some part of your body, you look at me like you’re begging me to make you feel like a woman, which I partially did this morning.” He winked with a self-satisfied smirk.

“Dante Dickens, you’re making all that up!”

“Am I? Why is it so difficult for you to be honest with yourself? I’m a man, you’re a woman, and we want each other. It’s simple maths. Add to that the fact that we’re bound together for a lifetime and it only makes sense that we bind ourselves together in more primal ways as well.”

“You’re killing me with your romanticism here,” she said, her voice dripping with sarcasm.

“It’s romance you want, then? I can be romantic. I’ll bring you flowers and sweets every day, open doors for you, pull out your seat before you eat, whatever it takes to make you mine.”

He stopped walking and turned her to look at him. “I’m not just referring to the physicality of it all. I want you in every way that a man wants a woman, but more than that—and I can’t believe I’m about to say this because I’ve never felt this way about a woman before—but I want to call you mine, Angel.”

Tori didn’t know how to respond to that. Butterflies fluttered in the pit of her stomach and her pulse raced as blood pumped erratically through her veins. Then, out of the corner of her eye, she saw a tall man dressed in black with white-tipped hair. Tori snapped her head in that direction, finding an older gentleman jogging by. She could’ve sworn it was him, but it wasn’t. Feeling him nearby, she turned to the other direction and just barely caught a glimpse of shimmering eyes in the bushes before they disappeared, too.

Could it all have just been a figment of her imagination? Was her mind conjuring up images of him out of guilt because she was starting to fall for Dante?

She had felt like she was betraying him by using Dante to keep the nightmares, and thus him, away. Could that be the reason she now thought she was seeing him everywhere, the reason she was plagued with guilt over her desire for more with Dante?

Tori shook her head. “I’m not ready for something like that right now, Dante. Besides, I’m only here for three months. What happens then? I can’t leave my parents to stay here with you, and what are you going to do? Pack up and leave everything behind to follow me to the States?”

Dante dropped his hands from her shoulders and shrugged. “I have nothing here.”

“You have your parents.”

“And they don’t need me here. My destiny is to be by your side. You have my unyielding devotion, unwavering loyalty, and impenetrable fortitude. It’s a vow I don’t take lightly.”

“Are you asking me to marry you, Dante? Because that sounds oddly like a proposal.” Tori laughed to lighten the mood.

“I can’t even get you to agree to be my girlfriend and you think I would be foolish enough to ask for your hand in marriage? My pride has been wounded quite enough for one afternoon, thank you very much.”

Tori stepped into him and fisted the fabric of his shirt over his stomach. “Look, can’t we just enjoy our time together while I’m here and see where things go? I mean, we’re having fun together, right? Why do we need to put a label on it?”

Dante smiled down at her. “You realize you sound like the guy in this relationship that isn’t really a relationship, right?”

Tori smiled back with a teasing in her eyes. “Does that make you my bitch, then?”

Dante let out a full-bellied laugh. “I am nobody’s bitch, Angel.”

She cocked her head to the side and furrowed her brows in contemplation. “Really? Because I’m pretty sure you were my bitch this morning when I was wiping up the mat with your pretty-boy face.”

Dante drew his head back and his eyebrows shot up. “Wiping up the mat with my pretty-boy face?”

“Mmmhmm.”

“Angel, you might want to run. Because if I catch you, I’m going to take you down to the ground and show not only you, but all the fine people of London, exactly who is wearing the pants in this so-called relationship, and then I may strip you of yours and make you walk back home in nothing but your knickers.”

“You wouldn’t!”

He bit down on his lip and looked her over. “Care to place your knickers on the line as well?”

Oh, he was serious.

Tori took a step back from him and he followed.

“I’ll give you a ten-second head start.”

wow!

C.L. Parker is a paranormal romance author who writes smut and knows how to use it. She smokes like a cowboy, drinks Patron Silver like a fish, and cusses like a sailor. In her world, everything truly does happen for a reason.

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