Shameful

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eBooks are not transferable. They cannot be sold, shared or given away as it is an infringement on the copyright of this work. 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. 512 Forest Lake Drive Warner Robins, Georgia 31093 Shameful Copyright © 2007 by Amanda Young Cover by Vanessa Hawthorne ISBN: 1-59998-517-9 www.samhainpublishing.com 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: June 2007

Shameful Missing in Action Amanda Young

Dedication For Mom.

Shameful

Prologue

Humid night air whistled through the open car windows, whipping Shame’s hair into his tired, gritty eyes. The sting served to keep him awake and focused on his goals. For the first time in too long, he had a damn good reason to be glad he was alive. After almost seven years of being cut off from his family, Shame was finally on his way home. His gaze on the double yellow line in the middle of the road, Shame wiped a hand through his overly long hair. Exhausted from too many days on the road and a vast number of misgivings—everything from the guilt he harbored over sleeping with so many different people throughout the years, to not being able to remember the sound of his daughter’s laugh—the need for a haircut slipped his mind. That small, insignificant detail had managed to escape his attention until now, when it was too late to do anything about it. He was too close to his destination to stop. Though he wanted to look his best when he saw Maria and Sophie again, beggars couldn’t be choosers. He was too impatient to postpone their reunion for even the minuscule amount of time it would take to make himself more presentable. He could only pray they would overlook his shortcomings. Wasn’t that what family was all about? The shock they would receive from seeing him again, alive and well, would be enough to make them forgive his disheveled appearance.

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At least, he hoped so. An upbeat classic-rock song blared through the speakers. Shame crooned along with it, out of tune, but unconcerned about how he sounded. Blood sang through his veins like molten happy juice. He leaned forward and turned the volume up as loud as the shoddy speakers would allow before they began to crackle and pop, needing the noise to help keep him alert and focused on his goal. Beneath the thick denim of his blue jeans, Shame’s thighs ached from the numerous times he’d pinched himself to make sure he was really awake. It would be all too easy to believe he was trapped in a dream, still back at the SCS military base, sound asleep on his bunk and dreaming of the family he longed for, but would never again be allowed to see. Emotions he hadn’t let himself feel in longer than he cared to admit filtered anew into his system. Joy. Love. Most of all, hope. Each mile he whittled away, between where he’d been and where he was going, resurrected an onslaught of optimism for the future. A smile tugged at the corners of his lips, happiness fighting to bubble to the surface. He pushed his giddiness down, afraid something would jump out of the darkness to yank it away from him. He could be happy later, after he held his wife and daughter in his arms where they belonged. When he finally pulled into the darkened driveway, it was the middle of the night. As to be expected at three o’clock in the morning, the quaint Cape Cod house was dark, silent as a tomb. A fresh plague of doubt rushed over him. Should he leave and wait until morning to arrive? No. He couldn’t wait another nanosecond; too much time had already been lost. He gulped air and slipped from the car, practically floating up the walk and onto the small, covered porch. 6


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Although years of practice gave him the ability to sneak into the house without notifying them of his presence, he chose to ring the doorbell instead. Being there was going to be surprise enough. He didn’t want to chance scaring them by stealing into the house like a thief. From where he stood, he clearly heard chimes ring through the interior of the house. A smile crawled across his face when he recognized the doorbell’s theme. Maria hadn’t changed it. It played the same tune they’d chosen together so long ago when they bought the house—the theme song from The Wizard of Oz. Shame tapped his foot impatiently on the wood. Minutes passed and still no one stirred inside the house. He hit the doorbell again. God, this…waiting was hard. He wanted to open the door and walk right in. Wake his sweet wife up with the first of a thousand kisses on her beautiful, sleepy face. Wake up, wake up. Open the door. Still nothing. A sense of unease swept over him. Hyper-alert senses kicked in. Something was wrong. The doorbell was too loud, too annoying, not to have woken them up after being rung twice. Maria was a light sleeper. She would have come to the door by now, even if only to cuss out whoever had the nerve to ring the bell in the middle of the night. Shame swallowed down the sour taste of paranoia. Nothing was wrong. It was only his uncertainties creeping in, making him think the happy homecoming he wanted would never happen. He rang the bell a third time. It was late. He would give them another minute. A minute passed, and then three more. He was going in. With deft fingers and the slim blade of his pocketknife, Shame picked the lock and eased open the door. He entered into the foyer, his feet www.samhainpublishing.com

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moving silently over the parquet floor. A mixture of excitement and dread soared through him. Made him jumpy. He stepped deeper into the foyer and was overwhelmed by the acidic, coppery tang of blood. He could smell it, taste it on his tongue. The hair on the back of his neck stood up. “Please, God, no.” He moved farther into the house, mumbling feverishly whispered prayers under his breath. The smell grew stronger, thicker, as he approached the living room. He crossed the threshold and pungent bitterness slapped him in the face. As a trained soldier, someone accustomed to bloody battles that didn’t always end the way one would hope, the aroma was one he easily recognized. Death. Moonlight filtered in through the uncovered bay window, illuminating a fraction of the large space. Shame edged deeper into the room, nervous sweat forming a thin veil over his forehead and upper lip. As he navigated around the sofa, the source of the stench became apparent. A dainty foot, adorned with dark toenail polish, peeked garishly from behind an overstuffed chair. Time slowed to a snail’s pace as he inched closer. Maria. Her name screamed through his mind even before he laid eyes on the mutilated corpse of his wife. Her throat was ripped open. A pool of congealed blood framed her head and shoulders in a gruesome crimson halo. Shame dropped to his knees, unconcerned of the blood that soaked through his pants and clung to his skin as he pulled his wife’s stiff, cold body into his arms. Rocking her, he threw back his head and howled. Nonsensical pleas for her to wake up, for him to awaken from this nightmare, spewed from his mouth. 8


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Without thought, he rose to his feet, his wife’s battered body held to his chest. Sophie. He had to find their daughter. A dozen steps away, he stumbled over her. Much the same as his wife, her thin, lifeless body lay hidden behind a piece of furniture. Her arms were outstretched, legs akimbo, as if she’d lived for an instant beyond the attack and had tried to crawl for help. Beautiful brown eyes, the same shape and color as her mother’s, were wide open, sightlessly staring up at him. Shame gently laid his wife down alongside their daughter and stretched out beside them, his arm extending over them both, cradling them to him. He squeezed his eyelids down tight, moisture seeping from beneath his lashes, and prayed for divine intervention. To wake up back at the base and find that the entire thing was a horrible dream he could escape. That his family was happy and healthy, as they’d been the last time he’d dared to look in on them from afar. And when that didn’t work, Shame broke down and sobbed. Loud wailing cries bounced off the walls and echoed deep within his soul, blackening his heart. Night turned to dawn and grainy light began to spill over the floor. As it neared where they lay, Shame’s eyelids crept open and he focused on the ceiling. An eye for an eye was scrolled across the plaster in dark, congealed blood. As he read the message, over and over again, Shame’s will to die with his family fled. In its place, a new plan for his life emerged from the ashes of his battered soul. Vengeance.


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Chapter One

Gail sat behind the tall customer-service desk, her gaze trained on the glass doors leading outside. Beyond them, snow fell fast and hard, covering what little remained to be seen of the landscape. Great gusts of wind swept clumps of white from one end of the parking lot to the other, creating drifts that appeared every bit as deep as she was tall. Her hawkish gaze moved inward and lazily roamed over the vacant motel lobby. Keeping with the instructions her boss had left, Gail had already run the vacuum over the thin burgundy carpet and polished the faux cherry-wood frame on both the couch and chair. She’d also run the lint brush over their cheap, dark green upholstery. Everything that needed to be done during her shift was finished, which left her with a lot of hours to twiddle her thumbs and stare at the walls. It was going to be a long night. If the weather didn’t improve soon, chances were good that she would have to work her regular third-shift position, plus the following day shift as well. Megan, the ditzy college student who worked the day shift, wouldn’t want to risk driving her precious new sports car out in this kind of weather. Gail snorted and the sound echoed through the silent room. She’d be lucky if she made it home at all in the next few days. Leave it to good old Gail. She was reliable and ready to be walked all over at the slightest request. It was a damn good thing she didn’t have any pets waiting for her at home, or God forbid, an actual family.

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Having turned twenty-five the week before, she’d pretty much given up on meeting Mr. Right. Hell, she was lucky to occasionally find a Mr. Right-now. Shyness paired with the innate quirks and oddities to her character that she always felt forced to hide from people she didn’t know well made for awkward first meetings and difficulty in finding someone to connect with. She’d been told more than once that she came off as cool and reserved around strangers. Not exactly a good first impression on people. It’d been so long since she’d seen a real cock, much less felt one, that she figured she’d probably regrown her hymen. Gail sat back, propped her feet up on the monstrosity of a printer beneath the counter and picked up the romance novel she’d purchased on her way to work. On the front cover, a man and woman embraced. The man’s long black hair was swept away from his face. The woman’s flowing blonde locks partially covered her artfully arranged nude body to hide her naughty bits. In the background stood another man, only the shadowy outline of his body visible behind a tall tree. Typically, she would’ve been embarrassed to get caught reading such blatantly erotic material at work but at the moment she didn’t care. Her life was the pits and she desperately wanted to escape reality for a little while. Besides, no one was around to see what she was doing. She could dance a naked jig on the countertop and nobody would be the wiser. The motel was deserted. There hadn’t been one reservation on the computer for that day and no one in their right mind would be out driving on the roads during the snowstorm. She was all alone and it looked like it would stay that way. She settled back on her uncomfortable stool, popped the cover open and began to read… Dakota stilled on the back of her black stallion. A man stood in the barn’s open doorway. Though she couldn’t see his features, she knew who www.samhainpublishing.com

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he was. Her heart beat a fast tattoo as she took in the long, lean line of his silhouette. “Lucian,” she whispered into the cold night air. Her foot prodded the horse’s flanks, urging him on toward the man awaiting her. With each bump, her sex grew wetter, more desperate. Surely he wouldn’t leave her in need as he had the night before. Tonight, he would take her, finally seal his claim on her body as he had her heart so long ago. Climbing down off her horse, Dakota ran toward Lucian. Reaching him in seconds, she threw her arms around his neck and pressed her lips to his. He groaned, opening beneath her touch, allowing her tongue to slip between his teeth and into the moist heat of his mouth. From there he took over, his tongue plunging deeper, rougher, stealing her breath. Lucian pulled back from her, his misty blue eyes filled with heat and another emotion that looked suspiciously like—dare she think it?—love. “Missed you, baby,” he whispered against her mouth, nipping the full pout of her lower lip. He twirled her around, the hard length of his body pressing her back into the wall. Dakota squirmed, wanting to be closer, to be one with the man she loved. “I missed you too, Lucian, so much.” “I’m glad you missed me, baby, but I bet I missed you more. I have a little something for you.” The light behind his eyes grew brighter, more wicked. “Oh yeah, and just what would that be?” He gripped her wrist, the pressure around the delicate joint firm but gentle. Slowly, he led it down to the front of his pants and pressed her palm over the rigid erection behind his fly. Dakota whimpered. “It doesn’t feel so little to me.” 12


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A rush of adrenaline shot through her system. Apparently she wasn’t the only one with needs gone unfulfilled for too long. She ran her fingers up and over his length, teasing his penis to grow harder, hotter for her. She licked her lips in anticipation. “It’s just what I was hoping for.” A groan spilled from his sensuous mouth as his eyes followed the movement of her tongue across her lips. This was it. He was right where she wanted him. And just to make sure he didn’t back out on her this time… Dakota dropped to her knees. Her fingers trembled as she undid his britches, pulled the flap in the front apart. His penis swung up, thick and hard, full with desire for her and her alone. The shrill cry of the phone interrupted Gail’s concentration. She’d been so lost in the story she’d completely forgotten she was at work. She clenched her thighs together, trying to relieve the insistent ache between them. Her nipples pebbled, poking against her bra, and her panties were damp, the folds of her neglected sex awash in lubrication. She cleared her throat and reached for the telephone. “Thank you for calling the Dew Drop Inn. Gail speaking. How may I help you?” Silence. “Hello? Anyone there?” “Gail? Um, this is Megan. I was wondering… Would it be okay for you to cover my shift in the morning? I just finished watching the weather forecast and they’re calling for a lot of snow to fall tonight. I’m just not sure I’ll be able to make it in.” Damn! She knew this was going to happen. Before she could answer Megan hurriedly said, “I know I’m asking a lot of you. It’s just that I really need this job and you know that if I call Mr. Pascow, he’ll shit a brick. You’d really be doing me a favor.” Gail sighed. Why couldn’t she ever say no? “Sure, Megan. I’ll cover for you.” www.samhainpublishing.com

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“Thanks, Gail, you’re a doll. I owe you big time for this one.” Gail opened her mouth to reply, but heard an ominous click and then nothing. Only dead air. Aggravated, she returned the phone to its cradle. The lines were down. Again. Who knew how long it would be before they were back up. Well, at least she could get back to her book and not have to worry about being interrupted again… She gripped the throbbing staff at the base, holding it in place while she licked him from one end to the other, spending a little longer than necessary tasting the flushed bell on the end. A small drop of pre-come oozed from the slit at the top and she greedily sucked it off. Mmm… He tasted good, a little salty but delicious. She swirled her tongue over him, sucking the full head of his cock into her mouth. He began to move against her, his hips rotating as she bobbed her lips up and down his rigid length, taking him farther and deeper with each succulent pull on his flesh. His cock grew harder and fatter in her mouth as she suctioned him in and out. Lucian made breathy noises in the back of his throat. The sound of his passion pushed her on, made her want to see how crazy she could drive him before he gave in to his primal urges and took her in the hay where she squatted. A noise behind her had her freezing, Lucian’s cock still in her mouth. Someone was in the barn with them. She could feel their eyes on her, boring into her with the intensity of their stare. A man stepped out of the shadows behind Lucian. His face was shrouded in darkness, guarding his identity. Her heart pounded in trepidation until she noticed his bare chest and the thick, ruddy penis he held in his hand, his fist stroking leisurely along its flushed length. Then her heart was pounding for a whole different purpose. Excitement. 14


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Confused, she sat back on her heels. “Lucian?” Lucian laughed, the husky timbre of his voice deep and wicked. “Did I forget to mention the other part of your present, baby?” From beneath lowered lashes, Gail swept a quick look around the lobby. She knew she was alone, but she couldn’t be too careful. Her fingers crept underneath the company polo shirt she wore and wormed their way inside the clinging material of her bra. Pulling and pinching her nipple between her thumb and forefinger, she let her eyes fall shut. God, that felt good. For a fraction of a second, she wished someone else was touching her. A strong, handsome man, like one of the characters in her book. No sense in wishing for something that isn’t going to happen. Replaying the scene from the book in her head, with herself in the starring role, she let her free hand wander down to where it was needed. In her pants. Her hand delved under the drawstring waist of her cargo pants and slipped beneath the elastic band of her panties. Fingers glided over the swollen folds of her sex. Drawing moisture up, she circled her clit lightly, teasing herself with the orgasm lingering just out of reach. With her other hand, she tweaked her nipple, hard, quietly moaning as the pleasure/pain of it radiated all the way down to her womb, making her cunt clench emptily. She slid one and then another finger deep inside, plunging them in and out in a hurried rhythm. As much as she wanted to drag the sweet torture out, she needed to hurry. Get it over with before she let herself succumb to the escalating sense of paranoia that wanted to suck her in and kill the orgasm she could feel rising just over the horizon. As her fingers plunged into her pussy, she ground the heel of her palm down over her clit. She came, and the deep contractions jerked an involuntary whimper from her throat. www.samhainpublishing.com

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Eyes flying open, she quickly scanned the room around her. Still alone. Thank God. The edge of her hunger sated, Gail pulled her hands from her pants and stood. Her panties felt squishy as her thighs brushed together. She turned to walk into the back and clean herself up. The bell above the door jangled. Wind swept into the room along with what had to be two of the sexiest men she’d ever laid eyes on. Both men were tall and broad of shoulder. Each wore a long, black designer trench coat. One alone was probably worth at least as much as she would pay in rent over the next couple of months, however, that was where their similarities ended. In their own way, they were both stunning, but Gail’s gaze was inexplicably drawn to the taller of the two men. He wasn’t classically handsome. With his shaggy auburn hair and square jawline, he wouldn’t have been described by anyone as one of the pretty boys who graced the covers of a magazine or the silver screen. Instead, he possessed a raw masculinity that oozed testosterone. The very way he swaggered into the lobby, his head held high and proud, the shallow cleft in his chin leading the way, made Gail think of handcuffs and rough, sweaty sex. The kind where you had to beg and plead before your partner allowed you to reach an earth-shattering release. The kind of sex she’d only read about in her romance novels. Hypnotic, emerald green eyes, surrounded by black-lace-fringed eyelashes, rose and met hers. Their gazes locked and Gail forgot how to breathe. She felt like he could see into the depths of her soul, scrounge out all the secrets she held. Some unexplainable primal need sprang up inside of her, begged her to lie down at the altar of his lust and slake the sexual thirst he had yet to quench. His gaze broke away from her as he turned to say something to his companion, and just like that she was breathing again. A wiggly tingle 16


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raced down her spine and Gail shivered, pushing away her strange thoughts. With his attention momentarily diverted, it also gave her a chance to check out his companion. The man accompanying Mr. Hot-sex was beautiful. There was no other way to describe him. Shiny, iridescent black hair brushed away from his forehead and hung in a thick braid down his back, ending just short of where she figured his tight, firm bottom was located. High cheekbones, dark chocolate eyes and full pink lips rounded out his angular face. Where his friend screamed of raging testosterone and rough sex, he whispered of long passionate nights filled with soft kisses and endless lovemaking. They complemented each other. One rough and tumble, the other gentle and coaxing. As far as Gail was concerned, that meant neither one of them would give her more than a passing glance. If only she was five inches taller and twenty pounds lighter… While pretending to type something into the computer, she watched the men out of the corner of her eye. They spoke in hushed tones, so she couldn’t make out what was being said, but even without being able to hear, gazing at them was enough of a treat. It wasn’t often she got to see men as hot as these two. Just looking would be plenty to fuel her fantasies for a good, long while. As she looked on, the dark-headed man nodded in her direction. Heat suffused her face at being caught staring and she dropped her gaze to the keyboard just as the men stepped apart, apparently finished with their discussion. Her cheeks on fire, she didn’t dare a glance up until they stood on the other side of the service desk. Mr. Hot-sex, who stood slightly in front of his friend, laid a titanium credit card in front of her. Not platinum, titanium. Even working in the motel, she’d never seen one of those. www.samhainpublishing.com

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She fidgeted as her abnormally strong sense of smell kicked in. As she rubbed the toe of one shoe over the other, the intoxicating aroma of male musk tinged with the strong overlay of scented deodorant invaded her nostrils. “Welcome to the Dew Drop Inn. How may I help you?” “Need a room,” said Mr. Hot-sex, his voice low and husky. Gail shivered, imagining that same voice whispering dirty words to her in the middle of the night while he rammed his stiff cock in and out of her aching pussy. Her body throbbing from the mental picture show in her mind, Gail pasted on a fake work smile and pushed away the urge to whimper. “Sure.” She shot a quick glance at the second man before meeting Mr. Hotsex’s gaze. “Double beds?” “King,” he replied, his gaze combing her face, making her feel like he was daring her to say something about their sleeping arrangements. As if she would. She’d grown accustomed to all the hot ones being gay or married. Though she had absolutely no reason to feel disappointed, she did. “No problem,” Gail muttered. “Just tonight or are y’all planning to stay longer?” “Depends.” She wanted to ask what the length of their stay depended on, but figured she already knew the answer—the weather. “Um, okay. In that case, I’ll just authorize your credit card for the funds and we’ll charge you when you check out. That okay?” He nodded, his long, slim fingers tapping against the white surface of the counter. Gail logged him into the computer and assigned him a room number. She picked up the plastic on the counter and swiped it from end to end in the credit-card machine, biting her lip as she waited for it to go 18


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through. When it was accepted, she turned back to him. “I’ll just need to see an ID then and you’ll be all set, Mr…”—she glanced down at the card she held out to him—“uh, Mr. Long.” Something about his name tickled her and she had to suppress a smile. It was a childish response, but she couldn’t help wondering if he lived up to his name. He traded her one card for another, his calloused fingers rasping over her palm. Electric tingles shot up her arm and zinged straight to her nipples, making them tighten and peak against her shirt. Mr. Long’s attention dropped to her chest and she could’ve sworn she felt his gaze like a touch against her breasts. Flustered, she quickly finished filling in the personal information the computer required for registration. She gave them the room farthest from the lobby, not that the last room was all that far away since there were only twelve rooms. Done, she pushed his room key across the countertop, careful not to touch him. “Here you go. You’re in room twelve. It’s the last one at the end of the hall. Y’all shouldn’t have any problem finding it.” He plucked the key off the counter and turned to his companion, handing it over. “Thanks,” he murmured while bending to pick up their luggage. “Have a good night,” she inanely replied as they walked away. When they disappeared around the corner, she let out a tense breath of relief. Thank God they were gone. With any luck, she wouldn’t have to face either one of them again. The way her body responded to their presence was mortifying. She knew it had been too long since the last time she’d gotten laid but that didn’t mean she wanted to advertise it to the world.


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Glancing down, she saw her nipples poking out of her shirt. Traitors. The horny little sluts were begging for attention and apparently didn’t care if they humiliated her in the process. Gail flopped back in her chair, picked up her novel and sank back into a fantasy world where average women like her saw just as much action as drop-dead-gorgeous supermodels.

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Chapter Two

His gaze scanning the room, Shamus Long yanked off his overcoat and flung it over a small wooden chair by the door. It definitely wasn’t the Ritz, but it was clean and warm. The faux-wood surfaces of the dresser and armoire shone with recent polishing, the bed was neatly made and there were no stains or rips in the burgundy bedspread atop it. Over his shoulder, he said to Ty, “Decent room. Did you check out the rack on the front-desk girl?” Ty skirted around Shame, a scowl on his face, as he made a beeline for the bathroom at the back of the room. After a brief moment, the sound of rushing water from the shower filled the air. Shame scratched his head, wondering what bug crawled up Ty’s ass and died. They were both cranky from being on the road for so long, nerves stretched taut from what they planned to do once they got here, but that was no excuse to be snippy. He had just as much right to be pissed over the weather forestalling their plans as Ty did, but he wasn’t bitching about it. Yet. Lord knew, if the weather didn’t clear up soon, he would be. He walked across the room and flopped back onto the bed. Exhausted from the long drive from Florida to Virginia and their anticlimactic arrival, he yanked a pillow from beneath the cover and smashed it down over his face. It had been an aggravating few days, and if the weather forecast held true, the next couple wouldn’t be any better.


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The time they were going to lose wore on already-taut nerves. Though he tried to keep his morale up, it waned more with each passing day. Vengeance for the murder of his wife and daughter was so close he could almost taste it. It taunted him from right outside the range of his outstretched fingers, near and yet not quite close enough. Each new obstacle that delayed his revenge, even one as inconsequential as the weather, chafed at his patience and made him feel listless, caged and helpless as a zoo animal. During the day he could focus on other things, keep himself busy doing something. At night though, when his defenses were down and he was at his worst, the memories crept in and took over, haunting him. Six months, two weeks and four days had passed since the night he’d arrived home to discover the mutilated bodies of his family. Grief, fresh and sharp, clenched his guts into a tight ball of misery. Images forever burned into his mind surged to the forefront, playing over the back of his closed eyelids like a drive-in movie. His eyes opened and he stared at the underside of the pillow over his face. What he needed was a distraction, something to take his attention off his problems. The only thing that came to mind was sex. Preferably of the hot and sweaty variety. As if his wish traveled straight from his lips to God’s ears, the bathroom door swung open on creaky hinges. Shame slung the pillow off his face in time to watch Ty step out, a billow of steam exiting behind him. His torso was bare. Water gleamed on his naked chest, making his skin shimmer under the fluorescent light. Ebony hair fell in a waterfall of color against the smooth golden bronze canvas of his skin. A miniscule white towel was slung around Ty’s slim hips. Shame stared as Ty vigorously scrubbed a matching towel over his hair and chest, the nubby

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fabric cascading down over firm pecs and the taut muscles of his rippling abdomen. Shame’s cock began to swell inside his jeans. His mouth watered for a taste of what he knew lay beneath the tiny swatch of terrycloth. And yet, some small part of him called out for something different. The gentle give and take of a soft, pliant female body beneath his. He forced the image away. Ty’s firm ass may not have been quite what his dick wanted to sink into, but it would do the job. Had been, in fact, for months. Fucking Ty was safe. They were friends and companions in misery, with added benefits. And, more importantly, there was no chance of him falling in love with Ty. The arrangement they’d had for the last several months—ever since Ty had saved Shame’s bacon by thwarting his dumbass attempt to drunkenly stroll into a well-known supernatural hangout—was a good one. It was fortunate the man had intervened, literally running into Shame and knocking him on his drunk ass on the street right in front of the bar, or else Shame probably wouldn’t have lived through the excursion. At the time, he’d been out of his mind with grief and just drunk enough not to give a shit. The liquor had managed to numb down his body but it hadn’t done a damn thing to soothe the gaping wound in his soul. Though barely able to stand on his own two feet, Shame had come up swinging and picked a fight with the asshole who’d knocked him to the ground. He vaguely remembered getting in a punch, but after that things became a blur. It wasn’t until the next morning when Shame awakened in a strange apartment that he realized the man he’d attacked had taken pity on him and dragged his sorry butt back home with him, instead of leaving him lying in the street to become Lycan chum. www.samhainpublishing.com

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Sober, Shame apologized for being an ass and thanked the man for running interference for him. They sat down to breakfast and talked, oddly finding out they had quite a few things in common. As it so happened, Ty had his own ax to grind with the paranormal community. When he’d bumped into Shame, he’d been scouting for information about his younger sister, Shelby, who had been attacked by a Lycan and died as a result. Since then, they’d met and bounced ideas off one another. Used each other as a sounding board, among other things. And when the mood struck them, they fucked. Neither man had designs on the other beyond a meaningless way to come and that was precisely what Shame was in the mood for—a quick fuck to take his mind off his problems and put him to sleep. It was much like the relationship he’d had with Tristan, before things had changed. He missed T, but he wasn’t about to drag him away from Sara, not when they’d just found each other again. Though he and Tristan still kept in touch, talking occasionally, Shame was always careful not to say too much about what he was doing. It would be just like Tristan to drop everything and come to his aide. Shame reached down and adjusted his suddenly too-tight jeans. “Hey, Ty, you want to come over here and help me out with something that just came up?” Ty paused in the middle of drying off and glanced up. His deep brown gaze followed the line of Shame’s arm down to where his hand rested over the growing bulge of his sex. He scowled and went back to running the towel through his hair. “Not tonight. I’m not in the mood. Besides, I figured you would go back up front and try to worm your way into that cute receptionist’s pants.” Shame sighed and let go of his cock, scrubbing his hands over his stubbled cheeks. Man, he needed to shave. “Nah, too much work.” He 24


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wiggled his fingers. “Guess it’s just going to be me and rosy palm tonight.” Ty laughed and flung his spare towel at him. “You mean to tell me you’re not even going to try? That doesn’t sound like the Shame I know.” Striding over, he laid his palm over Shame’s forehead. “No, you’re not sick. Maybe you’re just getting too old to be running around seducing hot women out of their panties.” Shame sat up. He ran his fingers through his unruly hair. “That almost sounds like a challenge, Ty. You trying to say I couldn’t get in her panties?” “Not even if your life depended on it, man.” Shame rose to his feet. “We’ll just have to see about that, won’t we?” Ty flashed him a smile, his teeth white and even. “Go right ahead and try your hardest, pal. Even if you crash and burn—and I suspect you will—you’ll always have rosy to fall back on.” Shame flung open the door and stormed out of the room. The sound of Ty’s laughter followed him into the hall. His strides long and full of purpose, Shame ate up the hallway between his room and the front desk. Too old, my ass. He’d show Ty a thing or two about how to woo the opposite sex. Just because he occasionally preferred the company of men didn’t mean he’d lost his touch when it came to the ladies. Rounding the corner, Shame saw the front-desk girl sitting behind the counter, her face buried in a novel. Her cute little freckled nose scrunched up at whatever it was she’d read before she sighed and turned the page. With her free hand she shoved an unruly lock of curly blonde hair behind her ear. Moving closer, he could make out the cover of her book. A romance, judging by the half-naked couple embracing on the front. Hell, his job might have just gotten easier. Those novels got women as hopped up for action as porn did men. www.samhainpublishing.com

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Trademark grin in place, he strode confidently up to the counter. Gail’s neck prickled and she glanced up from her novel. Mr. Hotsex… Err… Mr. Long was headed her way, a smile on his handsome face and a wicked gleam in his vivid green eyes. He was dressed in a simple black T-shirt and jeans. Without his coat, she could see the heavily muscled body he’d been hiding earlier. The soft cotton stretched over his broad shoulders, while the snug denim molded to long legs and thick thighs. An image of what it would be like to lay captive under all that tightly leashed strength flashed through her mind. She pictured her nails digging into the wide brawn of his back, her legs wrapped around his trim hips while he plunged the hard length of his cock in and out of her wet pussy. Gail shook her head, trying to knock some common sense back into place. Nope, it wasn’t going to happen. Like a big ole slice of doublechocolate cake, the man looked way too scrumptious to be any good for her. She shoved her novel under the counter and stood just as he reached the desk. “Is there a problem with your room, sir?” He grinned at her. “No. The room’s fine. I just thought you might appreciate a little company. Must get awful lonely when things are as dead up here as they are tonight.” Gail’s eyebrows crinkled. “Yeah, I guess, but I’ve always been very good at entertaining myself.” He braced his thick forearms on the counter and leaned in closer. He licked his lips. “I bet you’d have more fun if you let me do it for you.” Gail fidgeted with the hem of her shirt, unsure of what to say. If it had been anyone else, she would have thought they were trying to pick 26


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her up, but this man couldn’t be doing that…could he? No, men who looked as good as he did, did not hit on someone who looked like her. Besides, he was gay. He’d clearly requested to share a king bed with his male companion. There was no way he was coming on to her. Considering anything else was just wishful thinking. She exhaled. “I appreciate the offer, Mr. Long, but I’m really quite fine by myself. There’s no reason for you to go out of your way.” “Shame, please.” “Huh?” He chuckled. His laugh was low and deep, making her wonder what his voice would sound like in the throes of orgasm. “Call me Shame. Mr. Long makes me sound like an ancient old fart.” Gail smiled. The nickname suited him. “As I said before, Shame, I’m perfectly fine. You needn’t concern yourself with my boredom.” His brilliant green gaze searched her face, lingering on her mouth before once again meeting her eyes. “Not even if I want to? I’m sure I could change your mind, if you gave me a chance.” There was no way in hell she could misinterpret that. He was hitting on her. Her heart beat triple time against her ribs while she thought of what she should say, should do. She didn’t know whether to take him up on his offer and find out exactly how well he could entertain her, or lie and tell him she was involved with someone. After all, he was a complete stranger. For all she knew he could be a serial killer. Shit, she couldn’t take him up on anything, even if she did want to. She was on duty for the rest of the night and the better part of the following day. By the time she got off, he would probably be checking out. What was most likely her only shot at being with someone so damn sexy, and she was stuck working. If it weren’t for bad luck, she wouldn’t have any. www.samhainpublishing.com

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Gail sighed miserably. “I’m flattered, really, but there’s no way I can leave the desk. I would lose my job.” Disappointment crossed his face and disappeared so rapidly that she would have missed it had she blinked. “Are you sure I can’t change your mind, darlin’? It would be good. Damn good.” As if she didn’t already know that. He could lay back on the bed buck naked and do nothing but look at her and it would be the best sex she’d ever had. “I’m sorry, I…I just can’t.” He smiled but this time it fell short of his eyes. “Okay. If you change your mind, you know where to find me.” “I won’t,” she mumbled quietly as he walked away. Something about the way his shoulders slumped ever so slightly made her feel like a jackass. She didn’t know the man and had no reason to feel bad for turning him away. So why did she feel like she just denied a thirsting man a tall, cold glass of ice water?

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Chapter Three

When the phone rang a short while later, Gail startled and jumped, almost falling off her chair. “Guess the phone’s back on,” she said aloud to herself. She reached over and grabbed the receiver, shoving it between her head and shoulder, as her gaze skimmed over the page she’d been reading. “Dew Drop Inn, Gail speaking.” “You forgot to thank me for calling, Gail.” She sat up straight and laid down her book. It was her boss. “Sorry, Mr. Pascow.” “I’ve been trying to get through to you all evening. Is the phone just now coming back on?” As far as she knew. “Yes, sir. Your call is the first to come through.” “How’s business been tonight?” “It’s been pretty dead. I’ve only rented out one room.” Gail winced at the groan echoing from the other end of the line. “Um…Megan called in again. I’ll be covering her shift in the morning.” “Fine. That’s just fine. I’ll be in to check up on you as soon as the state department gets around to scraping the roads in the morning.” “Take your time, sir. I’ve got everything under control.” Another grunt and silence was all she heard. At first she wasn’t sure if her boss had hung up on her or if the phone lines had cut out again. When she repeatedly pushed the hang-up button and still didn’t hear a dial tone, she guessed it was the latter. From previous winter storms she’d been through, she knew the phones would be doing that off and on


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for the next few days or until the snow stopped, whichever came first. Sometimes she dreamed about having the money to relocate to a nicer, warmer climate. Maybe Florida or Texas. She didn’t really care what state, so long as they didn’t have cold winters. Judging by the deathly pallor of her skin, she could definitely use some fun in the sun. A strong gust of wind rattled the front doors. The overhead lights blinked twice and then winked out completely. Great, just what she needed—a power outage. Standing still as a statue, she waited impatiently for the backup generator to turn on. She didn’t mind working the night shift by herself but she did have a thing about the dark. It gave her the heebie-jeebies. Taking deep, calming breaths, she began to count backward from a hundred in her head. As she reached fifty, the generator kicked in and the lights stuttered to life. Thank you, God. While the generator would keep the lights on, run the hot water heater so the pipes wouldn’t freeze and keep minimal heat running in the lobby, it was not powerful enough to run the heaters in each room. That meant no heat for the two guests in residence. Luckily, they were the only customers she had in-house, so at least she wouldn’t have to worry about placating a mob of angry people. Just two sexy men, one of whom she was sure wanted to get in her pants. She contemplated not taking them one of the kerosene heaters the motel kept stored away for just such a situation. It was going to be awkward, showing up at their door at three in the morning. They were probably fast asleep—maybe even naked and curled around each other in the king-sized bed they’d requested—and she had to wake them up. That or let them freeze.

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She shuddered. There was no way she could do that. As low as the temperature was outside, they’d both be popsicles before morning. She was just going to have to suck up the embarrassment and do the right thing. Just as she always did. Good ole dependable Gail to the rescue. Gail bent and snatched her oversized black purse from underneath the counter. She riffled through it, searching for her keys. Her hands shook as she pulled them out and walked over to lock the front doors. It was probably a waste of time to lock the doors—she only planned to be gone a minute—but these days a girl could never be too careful. She twisted the silver key in the lock and gave the doors a tug to make sure they were secure before exiting the lobby by the back and heading down the indoor hallway. She stopped at the first door on her left, room number one, and unlocked it. For some reason, the owner had gutted that room in particular and designated it as the junk room. It’d been that way since long before she’d started working there. In fact, little had changed in the few years she’d been employed at the motel. Other than a yearly raise of a quarter an hour, her job remained exactly the same. If the hotel received anything new, like the carpet last spring, it was always the same style as before. It was a bit like being in a permanent time warp. Things moved on in the outside world, but inside the hotel, things always remained the same. Which was almost certainly why she was still there, when she should have quit the dead-end position as soon as the cancer had taken her mom. Instead, she’d just continued on, too complacent to change anything about her life. Comfortable in her routine, she’d let one boring day blur into the next and before she knew it, three years had gone by and she had nothing to show for it. Keeping her foot in the open door, she leaned into the room and grabbed one of the heavy heaters by the metal handle attached to each www.samhainpublishing.com

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side and tugged it out. She yanked the door closed behind her and started dragging the thing down the hall. With each shuffling step, her heart beat faster. She hoped Shame—even his name seemed wicked— wouldn’t take her arrival the wrong way and think she was giving him an open invitation to sin. Not that she would’ve minded indulging in a few carnal acts with the man. He was yummy, no doubt about it—and it wasn’t as if she had to worry about catching anything from him, not when she was immune to most diseases—but the morals instilled in her from birth kept her from jumping into his arms since she’d only just met him. Another, deeper part of her hoped he would, longed for him to take the decision out of her hands and give her what they both wanted, even if she didn’t quite know what that was. She stopped in front of room number twelve and let go of the heavy heater. Adrenaline coursed through her veins as she raised her shaking fist to knock. Restless, Shame paced back and forth in front of the bed. Trying to sleep was futile. Too much energy coursed through his body, his mind too busy running in circles to allow his body any rest. It didn’t help matters that Ty had been absent upon his return from striking out in the lobby. Ty never let the opportunity to rib him about anything slide, so his departure was strange to say the least. Then again, maybe he hadn’t expected Shame to strike out with the front-desk girl, and was trying to give him some privacy. Also unlike him. Whether he wanted to admit it or not, Shame was worried. While it wasn’t unusual for Ty to run off in the middle of the night to commune with nature, or whatever the hell it was he did when he disappeared, he usually came back and crawled into bed shortly thereafter. It didn’t make

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sense for him to be out so long, especially when it was so damn frigid outside. Hell, since the power shut off, it was beginning to feel about the same way inside. Being naked certainly didn’t help keep him warm, but putting on clothes would mean he’d given up on sleep. Fuck it, he might as well admit rest wasn’t going to happen tonight and get dressed. He pulled open the suitcase at the foot of the bed and rummaged through it, yanking out the first pair of clean boxers he found. Since he didn’t normally wear any, they were Ty’s, not his. He was about to slip into them when a knock sounded on the door. The idiot must have locked himself out. Breathing a sigh of relief, Shame reached for the doorknob. The white door swung inward before Gail’s knuckles could rap on it a second time. What she saw made her lips gape open and her mouth water. For once, her heightened senses came in damn handy, allowing her to see every detail of the man who stood buck-ass naked in front of her. Positioned in the doorway, Shame was seemingly unconcerned about his state of undress. At eye level with his firm, pecs and the taut caramel-colored nipples that perched atop them, her gaze swooped lower, past his washboard stomach and the smooth jut of his hipbones, to the heavy penis and tightly drawn sac hanging between his muscular thighs. Jesus, he was gorgeous. Gail licked her lips, catching the drool she feared would escape from the corners of her mouth. This was what she had turned down. More the pity for her. Swallowing over the lump in her throat, Gail slowly raised her eyes and met his gaze. It was a mistake. The heat and sinful need she saw in


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his expression was enough to make her melt faster than an ice cube in the microwave. It also made her about as wet. She opened her mouth. A second went by and then two. No sound came out. Two words sat on the tip of her tongue—take me—and she wasn’t about to say them no matter how badly she wanted him to do that very thing. Then again, if he kept looking at her like she was a hot-fudge sundae he couldn’t wait to devour, she might change her mind. He reached out to her, his calloused fingers wrapping around her wrist and yanking her toward him. In the space of a single heartbeat he had her inside with her back pressed against the cold door. His hard body anchored her from the front, a firm cushion for her breasts. Time slowed to a crawl as his head began to lower. Their mouths inches apart, his hot breath fanned the moist expanse of her bottom lip and he stopped. “Is this what you want?” Unable to form words, her heartbeat pounding in her ears, Gail could only nod. The downward movement of her head brushed her lips lightly over his. Tingles, like static electricity, shocked her. Caused her to whimper and shift closer. Tapered fingers wound their way into the thick mass of her curly hair and tilted her jaw up, angling her face to receive his kiss. And then he was there, his firm lips slanting over hers. Her mouth parted on a silent moan and his tongue slipped inside, flicked over her teeth and twined with hers in one scalding openmouthed kiss after another that took her breath and set her thighs aflame. Her sex flowered, lubricating and fluttering to welcome him inside. With the little cognizant thought she could manage, she wished her clothes would disappear, that the thin layers of fabric between them didn’t exist. Her hands moved to his chest and kneaded the solid muscle she found there, reveled in the sharp stab of his nipples in the center of her 34


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palms. Gone were any doubts about the rightness of what she was doing. She couldn’t remember why she’d resisted in the first place. How could anything that felt so good—so sublime—be wrong? His tongue jabbed deeper, twirling like a cyclone around hers. Damn, he could kiss. She moaned. Her clit pulsed greedily as she wondered what else he could do with that long, prehensile tongue of his. Strong arms enveloped her. His hands zeroed in on her buttocks and squeezed, kneading her flesh. Her thighs parted, allowing one of his to slide between them and push against her apex. “Oh,” she breathed at the pressure against her aching sex. Shame captured her sigh and swallowed it, deepening their kiss, taking it to an entirely different level of heat. Supernova. Gail burned for him. She longed to be able to form the words to tell him what she needed, but couldn’t force herself to stop kissing him long enough to speak. Instead she let her hands do the talking. She wound them around his waist and gripped the steely mounds of his buttocks, pressing down on them until she could feel the hard length of his erection prod her belly. Shame groaned, the sound low and husky. His muscles tensed beneath her fingertips, and then she was being lifted up and carried across the room to the big bed awaiting them. Gail wrapped her arms around his neck, her legs squeezing his hips, and locked her ankles securely behind his back. Shame ran hot, wet kisses down her neck and jaw with every step. She arched her back, pushing her breasts into his chest and angling her throat to give him more room to kiss her. He obliged, nipping at the curve of her neck and then running his tongue over the sharp sting his teeth left behind. “I’m so glad you changed your mind about tonight, darlin’. I


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needed this. Need you. I’m gonna fuck you so good you’re going to feel it next week.” Her spine stiffened. Thoughts she’d rather not have infiltrated her brain and wouldn’t be dislodged. She couldn’t help it. His use of the endearment, darling, reminded her that he probably didn’t even know her name. To him she was just a nameless, faceless body to slake his lust on. Even though it shouldn’t, the thought hurt. Was that what she’d allowed herself to become—a willing receptacle for his huge penis? Her pride reared its ugly head and demanded she say or do something, even if it meant tarnishing the moment and her chances of being with him. For once in her damn life though, she didn’t want to be a responsible person. She wanted to feel, not think and overanalyze every little thing that happened. No. She wouldn’t say anything. She wouldn’t. “Gail,” she murmured. His lips paused at the collar of her shirt. “Huh?” “My name. It’s Gail, not darling,” she said a tad louder, a slight waver in her voice. Please, let him say something smooth, something I actually want to hear, instead of something that will ruin this for me. He sucked her earlobe into his mouth, bathing it in wet heat before speaking. “I know your name’s Gail. If the pet names bother you, I won’t use them. It’s just a habit.” He pulled back and met her gaze. “Whatever you want. I want to make this as memorable for you as it’s going to be for me.” Looking up into his green eyes, seeing the sincerity in his gaze, Gail felt herself relax, the tension in her muscles easing away. She could happily spend the rest of her life looking into their depths, drowning in them. He was so damn sexy.

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She sighed and yanked his head down, softly brushing her lips over his. “It’s okay. I like the way you say darlin’. I just wanted to make sure…” His lips pressed against her forehead, then her temple and finally the corner of her lips, hushing her. “I understand. That you don’t normally do this kind of thing makes me even more grateful you came.” He swept her bangs out of her eyes and kissed her. “I’m going to make you glad you did. Promise.” She opened her mouth, intent on telling him she hadn’t come for this. That she’d only come to give him the heater still sitting out in the hallway. But then he was laying her on the bed and following her down, his powerful body settling between her thighs and pressing against her achingly empty core. His welcome weight pushed her into the mattress and his lips slanted over hers, sealing their mouths together, and all cognizant thought fled to be replaced by the searing need to have him inside her. Something about the virile man above her called out to her like no other and made her feel things she’d never felt before. Shame’s head was going to explode. Both of them. As soon as he’d opened the door and seen her standing in front of him, her shoulders tilted inward and her bottom lip held in a death grip between her teeth, his cock had woken up and pointed right at her, like a divining rod in search of her sweet, wet center. He didn’t mean to damn near ravish her against the door, but he hadn’t been able to control himself. All he’d wanted to do was wipe the insecurity off her face and stake his claim on her before she changed her mind about being with him and fled back to the front desk. Though he couldn’t put his finger on quite what it was about her, she was irresistible. He couldn’t think about anything besides getting her naked www.samhainpublishing.com

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and burying himself to the balls inside her tight, gripping heat. It might have been the aura of innocence that surrounded her like a cloak, though he doubted it. He usually went for experienced partners. Women who knew the score and didn’t expect vows of everlasting love before they let someone fuck them. And yet, instead of making him run in the other direction, the innocence he recognized in Gail’s eyes brought out the beast in him and kicked all his primal, base desires into overdrive. He wanted to claim her, fuck her and protect her all at the same time. His response made no sense—he’d just met the chick—but he wasn’t about to overthink it. Not with his cock as hard as a spike. He was simply going to roll with it and see what happened. Tasting her sweet lips, capturing the kittenish whimpers he was sure she didn’t know she made had snapped the thin fiber of his control. As fun as it would’ve been to take her against the wall, he stopped himself from doing it. Instead, he dropped them both onto the hard mattress and kissed her, gorging himself on the sweet ambrosia of her lips. Shame nibbled on her soft, succulent lips and sucked on her tongue until his lungs ached and he had to break the kiss or risk brain damage from lack of oxygen. Shame relinquished her mouth and shifted above her, staring down into her passion-glazed baby blues. In that moment she was more than the pretty girl he’d been attracted to earlier, she was beautiful. Her eyes were heavily lidded and framed by the thick veil of dark blonde lashes, cheeks flushed a deep rose, while her lips were wet and swollen from his kisses. Something in his chest tugged—hard—and gave him pause. He shoved the foreign sensation away without giving it any thought and took in her heaving chest, felt her long legs clamp around him. A vivid image of her naked and spread out before him flashed through his mind’s eye 38


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and he groaned, wanting her that way immediately, before he expired from want. He skimmed his hands under the nubby fabric of her shirt and ran them over the creamy expanse of her belly. It felt softly rounded and supple. He almost felt bad about using his rough hands to touch her, afraid to mar the silken perfection of her with the sandpapery calluses on his palms. She raised her arms, seeming as anxious as he to be naked, and he pulled the polo up and over her head. His hands grappled with the waistband of her pants, fighting the drawstring closure. Her small hands covered his and took over, undoing the knot and shoving the pants over her hips. He took it from there and scooted back, peeling them down her legs and flinging them over his shoulder. When he next looked at her, only two thin scraps of pale pink cotton stood between him and paradise. With shaky fingers, he traced the burgeoning swell of her breasts above the bra, ran the pads of his thumbs into the valley between and latched onto the front clasp that would release her tits into his waiting palms. He flicked the snap open, the cups loosening over her breasts, and Gail stilled, her chest rapidly rising and falling. The overburdened cups parted and slid to the side, revealing bountiful breasts topped with bubblegum pink nipples already hard and eager for his touch. His breath stilled as he took in her beauty, his pulse galloping. Reverently, he massaged one and then the other, in awe as her nipples drew up into tight little buds under his ministrations. His fingertips whispered over her flesh, plucking each nipple, and she moaned, arching her back. He pressed harder, using the rough edge of his thumbs to circle around and around the taut areolas.


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Her thighs vised around his waist, squeezing him. Her hips gyrated against him, rotating harder and faster. “Please, Shame.” He wasn’t sure if she was asking him to touch her harder or take her, and at that point he didn’t much care. If he didn’t bury himself in her heat soon, he wasn’t going to be of any use to anyone. He wouldn’t be sane. With shaky hands, Shame reached down and grabbed the slender straps on either side of her hips. He gave them a yank and ripped the tissue-thin panties from her body. Finally naked, she lay trembling beneath him, her thighs open and welcoming. Soft hands fluttered up and over his chest and cupped his face, pulling him down into her embrace. She pressed her lips to his chest, right between his pecs and spoke, her breath whispering over his skin. “Now, Shame. Take me. Please.” Her legs twined tighter around his hips and she wiggled until his cock fell into position between the lips of her pussy. She mewled, her frustration palpable as she tried to get him where she wanted him. Shame had had enough teasing. He reached between their bodies and grabbed hold of his cock, lowering the bulbous tip to her gateway, and thrust into her. Her pussy was hot and wet. The slick tissues of her cunt gripped his cockhead and compressed, surrounding him in divine pressure even as they fought to keep him from entering any farther. Jesus, she was tight. He moaned, pushing against her, gaining ground as his cock sliced through her channel one inch at a time. The slow progress was hell on his libido, but he was determined to take things easy, not hurt her by barreling forward at the fast clip he wanted to take. After what felt like an eternity, Gail took the choice out of his hands and arched up, her hips pushing against him and impaling herself on the

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last few remaining inches of his dick. Shame grunted at the impact, while Gail cried out, her hands fisting around his biceps. Damn, she felt good. Tight. Wet. Hot. He shut his eyes and recited the multiplication table in his head, trying to stave off his climax. When he’d regained control of his body, he shifted his hips forward and back, luxuriating in the feel of her cunt suctioning him in. He could feel every inch of her channel, the walls snug and rippling around his cock. She felt so damn good. Too fucking good. “Goddamn it.” He yanked his hips backward, pulling his dick out of her with a wet squelch. Gail moaned and dug her fingers into his ass, preventing him from going anywhere. “No! God, don’t stop now. Please.” “I have to, darlin’. I forgot the condom.” Her hands eased up on his behind, but she didn’t let him go. “Screw it. You’re already there and you feel so good. Please. I’m on the pill, so you don’t have to worry about getting me pregnant.” Her fingertips caressed over his behind and into the hollow between, running over his anus. Shame growled, thought about taking her up on her offer and decided against it. He may have been guilty of getting a late start putting it on, a first for him, but he knew better than to continue without a rubber, no matter how tempted he was or how fucking good she felt around him without the damn latex. People always said things they didn’t mean in the heat of the moment and he didn’t want her to have anything to be sorry about when she looked back on their night together. With regret, he reached back and pried her fingers off his ass. “Stay right here. I’ll be right back.” She sighed, dropping her hands to the bed, but didn’t argue with him. www.samhainpublishing.com

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Struggling to calm his raging libido, Shame hopped off the bed and crossed the room. He rummaged through his bag until he found a box of rubbers. Pulling one from the box, he dropped the rest on the floor and turned around, looking over Gail, naked and spread out across the bed, as he tore into the foil wrapper and slid the aggravating piece of latex down his shaft. Now that he’d had a chance to catch his breath he thought of all the things he hadn’t done to her and couldn’t live without doing. He crawled up the bottom of the bed and grabbed her ankles. Gail squeaked, but didn’t fight him as he spread her thighs wide. The sight of her small, pink slit, open and waiting for him, had his mouth watering, hankering for a taste of her. Shame stretched out between her thighs. He slid his hands between her ass and the bed and angled her hips up to meet his mouth. He extended his tongue and gave a slow swipe through the plump, wet folds of her sex. He groaned, the bittersweet flavor of her bursting over his taste buds, and dove back in for more, flicking the tip of his tongue over the hard kernel of her clit. She cried out, her hips shifting restlessly, and he traveled farther down, jabbing at the tight gate of her vagina and lapping up the cream he found there before moving past it to lave over the wrinkled pucker of her anus. Gail mewled and bucked her hips. He shifted his attention up and stabbed his tongue in and out of her pussy, tasting her, swallowing the sweet broth she released for him. The lips of her sex fluttered. Her clit grew harder, longer, poking out from underneath its hood to wink at him. Unable to resist his urge to feel her come against his mouth, he pulled the bundle of nerves into his mouth and suckled. She cried out, her fingers digging into his scalp and tugging at his hair. “Oh! Oh God. Please, Shame, don’t stop.” 42


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Shame growled against the folds of her sex and devoured her with renewed purpose. His tongue a whirlwind against her clit, he alternated fast and short jabs with long, slow licks. Her hips rotated, her pelvis thrusting at his face faster and faster, while the thighs at each side of his face began to tremble. Beneath his tongue, her clit throbbed and pulsed, swelling like a tiny cock. He sucked, applying pressure to the tiny bud, and she went off in his mouth. A rush of moisture coated his chin and mouth as she shivered and shook, screaming out her release. One last long lick, from clit to anus, and Shame retreated, rising up above her. On his knees, he pulled her thighs wide and brought her knees up and over his elbows, opening her for his thrust home. In one desperate lunge he buried himself to the hilt, his balls slapping against her bottom. Shame groaned and Gail whimpered. He began to move, rhythmically driving in and out of her with slow, deep thrusts. Over and again, his hips arched, pounding the thick length of his cock into her. Grabbing the only thing she could reach, Gail’s nails bit into his forearms, holding on to him. Shame’s grip on her thighs tightened, his thrusts coming faster as he felt the slick walls around his sex ripple and begin to pulse. “Oh yeah. Fuck, darlin’, come on my cock. Come for me. Let me feel you.” Gail whimpered again and threw her hips back at him. “I can’t.” Shame picked up the speed of his thrusts, lunging into her. He let go of one of her thighs and reached between them to massage her clit between his fingers. “You can. You will.”


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Gail moaned, her head thrashing from side to side. A long, low wail erupted from her mouth and she came, her pussy clamping down on him like a vise. It was too much for him. His body went into sensory overload and shut down. Shame buried himself inside her with one long, deep thrust and began to spasm, his release pumping into the condom. Gail’s name slipped from his lips as his orgasm crashed over him. XW Damn, she was warm. That was the first thought that registered as Gail slowly grew aware of her surroundings. She felt snuggly and comfortable and…there was a dick poking her in the ass. What the—? The events from the night before hit her with the force of a bag of bricks. Gail jerked upright, the covers slipping out of her grip to fall around her waist, and frantically looked around her. What she was looking for she couldn’t have said. The sun was up, though how high couldn’t be determined through the thick drapes. Nevertheless, it was morning and she was in deep shit. Her boss was supposed to be in and she’d spent the night fucking a stranger instead of doing her job. Gail groaned. She was toast. A firm arm flopped over her lap, drawing her attention to the sinfully naked man beside her. He was dead to the world, fast asleep. All she could see was the broad width of his shoulders, one muscled arm and lots of thick, wavy auburn hair shielding his ruggedly handsome face. The night before, her nervousness, the mind-numbing pleasure he gave her, had her nipples peaking and her libido revving up for another round.

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Unfortunately, with her livelihood on the line, a steamy round of morning sex wasn’t an option. It was a shame she hadn’t taken that into consideration before she’d agreed to put her responsibilities on the back burner for an orgasm. Make that two orgasms. Even if they had been the best she’d ever had. Focus, Gail, focus. Gail eased out from underneath Shame’s arm and slipped from the bed, careful not to wake the man beside her. The last thing she needed was an awkward goodbye. And it would be. She didn’t have the first clue what someone said after a one-night stand and frankly, she didn’t want to. They’d had sex, mind-numbingly good sex, but that’s all it was and she wasn’t sure how to deal with the aftereffects. One-nighters were not her thing, though she was confident the man she’d slept with had probably indulged in plenty. A kernel of guilt over leaving without a word ate at her, but she dismissed it. He would probably be relieved to find her gone when he awoke. Taking a deep breath, she found all her clothes, except for her underwear, as they seemed to have vanished without a trace, and pulled them on. As quietly as she could, she inched open the door, wincing as the old hinges squeaked a little, and slipped out into the hallway. Maybe if she was lucky, her boss wouldn’t be in yet. Scratch that, when the hell had she ever been lucky a day in her life? Hmm, let’s see, how about never? Heartbeat thundering in her ears, Gail hurried up the hallway when what she really wanted to do was turn around and run in the other direction. Each step brought her closer to whatever was in store for her. Her brain spun in circles as she frantically tried to come up with an explanation for why she hadn’t been at her post. Nothing plausible came to mind. www.samhainpublishing.com

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Well, she’d wanted some excitement. She was getting it in spades now. Opening the door, Gail entered the employee-only room that allowed one into the area behind the counter. It was quiet. Looking around she saw everything was just the way she’d left it. Maybe… The door opened and slammed shut behind her. Turning around, she came face-to-face with her boss. The expensive black suit and white dress shirt he wore was pristine. His round face was flushed a deep red. His beady black eyes bore through her skull, like he was trying to read her mind. He spoke, his high voice brittle. “Gail.” “Mr. Pascow.” “I’d like to have a word with you.” Gail sighed. She was so busted. XW Shame woke up cold and alone. Shivering, he yanked the comforter over his head and buried his face in the pillow. Outside of the covers, the room was the temperature of a freezer. He was also sporting a boner hard enough to hammer nails. He lowered his hand and adjusted himself, his palm lingering over the blunt tip of his cock, stroking it. Damn, it was hell waking up horny without someone there to help take care of it. You could only beat off so many times before you gave yourself carpal tunnel syndrome. It rankled that Gail had snuck out without saying goodbye. Shame rolled over onto his back and raked a hand through his disheveled hair, wondering why he even cared that she wasn’t there to wake up to. The

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chick was just a one-time thing, a warm body for the night. So why did her absence gnaw at him? Something else suddenly occurred to him, stopping his thoughts of Gail and her odd effect on him. Even without her in the room, he shouldn’t have been alone. Where the hell was Ty?


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Chapter Four

As she entered the living room, Gail kicked off the black flats she wore and discarded the constricting black blazer. She draped it over the back of the chair and flopped down on the blue recliner. Scrubbing her hands over her face, she blew out a disgruntled breath of hot air. It had been the week from hell. First she’d been fired, then she’d bombed at the only two job interviews she’d been called in for, and last but not least, someone had broken into her car and stolen her stereo. If anything else bad happened, she planned to crawl into the closet and hide. Enough was enough already. What she needed was a vacation. Since she was no longer gainfully employed, it could be a vacation from life. Unfortunately, she was also flat broke, so that wasn’t going to happen. Which was a catch-twentytwo. Now that she was jobless, she had all the time in the world to do whatever she wanted but she didn’t have any money to do it with. To her disgust, there was a single place she really yearned to be— Shame’s arms—and the only thing required to make it a reality was a miracle. Since he and his buddy were long gone by now, it wasn’t going to happen. Shoot, even if they were still at the motel, there was no guarantee he would be interested in being with her again. While their time together had been hands down the best sex she’d ever had, for him it was probably nothing special. Having replayed it in her head, over and over, she was embarrassed to realize that she hadn’t

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done the first thing to make it good for him. She’d just lain there, like she was paralyzed from the neck down, and let him do all the work. She was ashamed of her behavior. It was usually her that gave and gave, receiving nothing in return. She could hardly believe she’d done something so out of character. Not that she was complaining; the pleasure he gave her was worth being a tad selfish. She just wished she could do a few things differently. Like take a turn going down on him. Her blood heated a few degrees higher at the mere thought of taking him into her mouth. Sucking on his long, hard cock until he moaned and writhed, spilling his salty-sweet essence down her throat. The thought of tasting him had kept her awake more than one night that week. Only after she felt the tug on her nipple through her plain cotton tee, did she realize that one of her hands had migrated north of its own free will and was plucking at the stiff peak. Jesus, she needed to get a life. How sad was it that she sat in her living room at five o’clock in the evening thinking about the only real sex she’d had in the last—she didn’t even know how long—and was playing with herself? Gail pulled her hand away from her chest and glowered down at it. Did she have no self-control anymore? Wiping her damp palms over her jeans, she stood and headed into the kitchen to find something to eat. Entering the tiny eat-in kitchen made her feel closer to her mom. This room, with its sunny yellow walls and bright sunflower drapes, had been her mother’s favorite. If she tried hard enough, she could almost picture her sitting there at the small wooden table for two, a deck of worn cards laid out on its surface, playing solitaire. Of course, that was before she’d been diagnosed with the big C, cervical cancer. After the diagnosis, she’d not had the energy to so much as lift her head, let alone play games.


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God, she missed her. She’d never realized how truly alone the two of them were until the night she’d learned she was going to lose her mom. She’d never forget that awful night for as long as she lived. She’d just come home from community college and found her mom sitting on the sofa, her eyes glittering with unshed tears. Gail dropped her things onto the floor and rushed across the room, pleading with her mom to tell her what was wrong, never expecting to hear what she had. The grim prognosis crumbled the floor right out from under Gail’s feet. Mothers weren’t supposed to die. Especially not hers. Against her mom’s wishes, she’d quit college and took a job working nights at the motel, so that she could take care of her. Working late allowed her to transport her mom back and forth to her many doctors’ appointments and spend time with her. Then later, after the cancer grew beyond help, she’d been able to sit vigil by her mom’s hospital bed so she wouldn’t ever be alone. Nothing had been more important to her during those final months than being there for her mom. In the end, it turned out that she was wrong. Mothers did die and hers wasn’t any more invincible than the next. She’d fought the disease ravaging her body, underwent the recommended chemotherapy and radiation that left her body more damaged than the cancer, but it wasn’t enough. She passed away quietly in her sleep. Gail was forced to pick up the pieces of her life and move on without her mom. She’d let everything fall to the wayside, too worried about her mom’s health to exert the energy needed to keep up with friendships or the dating scene. What few fair-weather friends she did have had disappeared with Gail’s good spirits. Gail shook her head, trying to pull herself away from her morbid thoughts, and tugged open the refrigerator. Staring at nothing in specific, she strived to figure out what to eat. She was starving, her stomach 50


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practically gnawing on her backbone, but nothing looked appetizing. She tried to bring to mind the last thing she’d eaten and drew a blank. Could it have possibly been the cream-cheese bagel she’d devoured while standing at the sink the night before? God, it probably was. Real nutritious. She had to start taking better care of herself. Eat better. Exercise. Maybe even talk herself into going out and attempting to meet new people. How was she ever going to find Mr. Right if she continued to hide herself away like a hermit? Battery-operated boyfriends aside, she couldn’t remember the last time she’d had a date. The kind where the guy picked her up and took her out somewhere other than his bed for the night. It’d been over a week since she’d had any human contact, besides the two uptight toads who’d interviewed her and the busy customer-service reps she’d requested applications from. As lonely and desperate as she felt, she’d settle for a date including McDonald’s drive-thru and a DVD, if it meant being able to cuddle up next to someone warm and have an adult conversation. Disgusted with her train of thought, she shut the fridge and selected an apple from the wicker bowl in the middle of the kitchen table. Sinking her teeth into the tart green fruit, she walked into the living room and sank back down on her recliner. Maybe she should get a cat. Or a dog. No, she was more of a cat person. Weren’t all single women supposed to have a feline? She grabbed for the remote on the end table beside her. Her fingers froze, hovering over it, as she cocked her head to the side and listened closely. Someone was pulling into her driveway. She could hear the unmistakable crunch of ice and gravel beneath the vehicle’s tires as it started up the steep incline leading to her small house on the hill. www.samhainpublishing.com

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The remote forgotten, she rose to her feet and hurried over to the picture window, pulling back the gauzy white sheers covering it. A large, black crew-cab truck was coming up her driveway. Who in the world was that? Must be someone lost. It was easy to lose your bearings if you weren’t familiar with the rural area in which she lived. Gail let the curtains fall shut and hurried over to the front door. She stepped out onto the porch as the truck rolled to a stop. The cab windows had a mirrored finish, so even with it parked right in front of her face, she couldn’t make out who was inside. Shame stared at the woman he’d only known for one night. His gaze started at her head, memorizing the way her golden hair caught the setting sun, and then moved on to the startling baby blue color of her eyes and her small upturned nose and full pink lips. No longer did she wear the frumpy work uniform she’d had on the night they met. Instead, she wore a thin cotton T-shirt that clung to her breasts, the tips of her nipples clearly visible against the soft fabric, and faded blue jeans that hugged her long legs like a second skin. Even her bare feet, with chipped pink nail polish, were sexy. Damn, she was a knockout. For some reason, he’d expected her to be plainer, less gorgeous than he’d pictured countless times in his head since the few short hours they’d spent together. His body’s response to this one woman was a frightening thing. The touch of possessiveness he felt toward her was beyond scary. It was downright mind-numbing. He couldn’t afford to develop feelings for her, and more importantly, he didn’t want to. He didn’t plan to ever open himself up to caring about someone again. He wouldn’t survive losing another loved one.

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If he’d had any other choice, knew anyone else in town that he could turn to, he wouldn’t be there. He would’ve stayed as far away from her as possible. She seemed like a good woman. One who didn’t deserve to get mixed up in the shit he and Ty were involved in. Sadly, he didn’t have any other options. Ty was missing. No amount of searching during the last week had turned up the first clue as to where he was. Assuming that their presence in town had been discovered and that Ty had either been taken against his will or was deep in hiding, Shame had been forced to leave the one motel in town. For the last two nights, what little sleep he’d gotten had taken place in the cab of his truck. What he needed now was a safe place to hole up. Somewhere no one would think to look for him as he continued to search for Ty and tried to figure out his next move. Gaining Gail’s cooperation, while keeping her in the dark about his plans, was paramount. She stepped down off the porch as he slid out of the truck. The dumbstruck look on her face clearly told him that she’d never expected to lay eyes on him again. “Shame?” “Miss me, darlin’?” he asked with a teasing grin. Now was not the time to lose his charm. Her mouth floundered open, then curved into an uncertain smile. “What are you doing here? How…how did you even find out where I live?” Good question. It wouldn’t do for him to tell her the truth; that he was a hell of a computer hacker and could pretty much figure out anything he wanted to about her, with little effort—from last year’s tax return to which online stores she shopped at. “You’re in the phone book, right?”


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She looked confused for a minute, a cute frown popping up between her arched brows, before what he said seemed to dawn on her. “Oh, um…yeah, I guess so. That still doesn’t explain why you’re here though.” In two steps Shame stood in front of her. He wrapped his arms around her narrow waist and pulled her close against his body. “I missed you. Wanted to see you again.” That, at least, was the truth. Her eyes heated, the baby blue of her retinas went smoky and he realized that she must’ve been able to feel the thick ridge of his erection pressing into her stomach. His cock woke up and saluted the instant she’d stepped out onto the covered porch and had yet to go down. If anything, the damn thing was barking to be petted. Her curvaceous body was

temptation

personified.

While

he

could

control

his

actions

somewhat, he couldn’t control his body’s strong reaction to her presence. “Come on, darlin’, admit you’ve been thinking about me just as much as I’ve been thinking about you.” Her lashes lowered and a pretty pink blush slashed across her cheekbones before she nodded ever so slightly. Her eyes remained downcast, focused on his chest. “And if I have?” When he didn’t answer right away she glanced up, her tongue darting out to moisten her dry lips. Shame groaned, imagining that tongue moistening the head of his cock, flicking over the slit and swallowing his come. He leaned in, unable to resist the lure her lips presented, and kissed her. As gentle as butterfly wings, he brushed his mouth over hers, felt a shaky puff of air come from between her parted lips and allowed himself to sink in deeper, slide his tongue over her bottom lip and the rough edge of her teeth. He heard a moan, was unsure if it came from him or her, and decided he didn’t really give a damn.

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The sun beat down on his shoulders, warming him, as he tasted her and explored the recesses of her mouth, the smooth enamel of her teeth, the sandpapery texture of her tongue. She tasted like apple pie, warm and tartly sweet. He couldn’t get enough. Angling his head to the side, he took the kiss deeper, his tongue pillaging the tender depths of her mouth. He dragged the kiss out, on and on, reluctant to break away. Their mouths fused together, and he kissed her until his head spun and his balls ached. Until he was forced to stop or chance going off inside his pants like a horny teenage boy. Shame pulled back. A few scant centimeters of separation stood between his lips and hers. He gazed into her heavily lidded eyes and forced himself to drag oxygen into his lungs while at the same time dipping into hard-won reserves of self-control to keep from laying her down in the snow and taking her right there for God and all else to see. Gail shivered, her compact body trembling in his arms, and Shame knew without a doubt that he was lost. Stupid, shitty timing or not, he wanted this woman. Wanted her for a hell of a lot more than a quick fuck, and he intended to have her. He didn’t know the how or why of it, but it was the plain, unvarnished truth. Gail closed her eyes and sighed. Her forehead fell to rest against the curve of his neck and her arms snaked around his throat, holding him. It gave him exactly the opening he was waiting for. Bending, he tightened one arm around her lower back and used the other to swoop behind her knees, lifting her off the ground and into the cradle of his arms. She squealed and clung to his neck. “What are you doing? Put me down! I’m too heavy. You’ll give yourself a hernia.” Shame chuckled. “You’re not too heavy.” He jostled her around in his arms. “I’d say you’re just right.”


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He pressed a quick kiss on the top of her head, climbed up the porch stairs and walked through the open front door, kicking it closed behind him. His gaze scanned the first room he came to, searching for a soft place to lay her down. As tight as his balls felt, he didn’t even consider looking for her bedroom. He had to have her. Now. The living room was odd. He’d never seen one without at least a couch or a love seat, but hers only consisted of an entertainment center covered in knickknacks and an older-model television. Two velour recliners and a pair of cherry end tables beside each were the only other furniture. That wouldn’t work for what he had in mind. They probably could get busy on one of the recliners, but damned if it wouldn’t be uncomfortable. Since the living room was out, he ignored the minuscule kitchen that sat off to his left through an open partition and headed toward the back of the house. Striding down the short hallway, he had three closed doors to choose from. He figured two bedrooms and a bathroom. “Which one?” “That one,” she said, pointing toward the single door on the right side of the hall. She’d just let a stranger into her home. What the hell was she thinking? Sure, she’d already let him into a lot more personal an area than her bedroom, but still. Had she gone completely bonkers? He could tie her down, steal what few possessions she owned and kill her without a single thought if he wanted to and there wouldn’t be a damn thing she could do to stop him. Her gut, however misguided, urged her to trust him. Told her he was safe and wouldn’t do anything to hurt her. At least not on purpose. If her fragile heart was crushed when he left, it would be

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her fault for deluding herself into thinking he wanted more from her than a quick fuck, not his. She decided to listen to her heart instead of her brain. The same brain that yelled warnings and dire predictions at her as he carried her into her bedroom and set her down on the cream-colored duvet. Gail didn’t move an inch. She was too busy watching as Shame began to strip off his clothes. The black sweater went first, coming off over his head. Muscles rippled across his smooth, bronzed chest as he unbuckled his belt and pulled it through the loops in his dark denim jeans. Folding the belt in half, he stopped stripping long enough to look her square in the eye and snap the leather belt between his hands. The loud crack startled her, making her jump, but it also made her wonder if he intended to use it on her. She shuddered in dread and also in anticipation, which surprised the hell out of her. She wasn’t into bondage, never had been, but the thought of his calloused palm, or even the belt that had hugged his lean waist, spanking her bottom, had her already-damp

panties

inundated

with

a

fresh

surge

of

moist,

uncontrollable lust. There wasn’t much this one sexy man could do to her that she would refuse or fail to be turned-on by. There was just something about him…some indefinable quality that made her inhibitions drop, right along with her panties. Shame let go of his belt, his tapered fingers quickly working the metal buttons of his fly open, one at a time. As he shoved the denim over his trim hips and down the long length of his thighs, Gail’s eyes were drawn to his stomach and the upraised scar that bisected his abdomen. Thin and white, it ended above his innie bellybutton, fell into the indent between his ab muscles and stopped a couple of inches shy of his www.samhainpublishing.com

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nipples. If not for the odd placement, she would have thought it was a stretch mark. That was exactly what it looked like—an old, faded stretch mark. His pants hit the floor, stealing her attention. She watched him kick them away and then he was standing in front of her, gloriously naked. Soft light filtered in through her bedroom window, enabling her to see every golden inch of his perfect body, from the wide breadth of his shoulders to the high arch of each of his narrow feet. What drew her attention the most, however, was directly in between. Riveted, she stared at his erect cock. Like the rest of his body, his groin was smooth, making his penis appear larger, more alive, as it bobbed under the strain of its own weight. Oddly enough, just beneath the wide flare of his helmet, there was a tiny navy blue tattoo. She leaned forward, trying to make it out, but it was too small. “See something you like?” Gail swallowed and her gaze traveled the lean lines of his body back up to the mischievous gleam in his eyes. Hell, yes, she liked what she saw. More than liked it, but she wasn’t about to tell him that. He was conceited enough as it was. She shrugged nonchalantly. “Well, you know what they say—if you’ve seen one, you’ve pretty much seen them all.” He stepped toward her, his penis jutting out in front of his body. “Really now?” She licked her lips, wondering what his velvety skin would taste like, feel like sliding past her lips and over her tongue. Would he be salty or sweet? “Yep.” “Ah, come on, you’re not even a little bit impressed?” Gail resisted the grin trying to fight its way to the surface. “Nope.”

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Shame stopped in front of her, his tempting erection no more than a hairsbreadth away from her face. God, she really wanted to lick him, make him moan and beg for her. She stared at the weeping tip of his cock for a moment, pretended to give it a clinical once-over—and in the process noticed that the tattoo appeared to be an S and a lowercase L, though she couldn’t be sure. His initials?—before meeting his eyes once again. “Sorry, it’s pretty, but not anything special.” He put his hand over his heart and gasped. “Now you’ve done it. Broke my heart and hurt my poor prick’s feelings too. Shame on you.” The goofy look on his face made her giggle. Actually giggle, like the stupid schoolgirl she’d never really let herself be. Jesus, he was dangerous. A killer body he knew how to use, and he made her laugh too. If she wasn’t careful it would be all too easy to fall for him. He was there for fun, a quick roll in the hay and nothing more. If she wanted to keep her heart whole, she needed to remember that. And then he pushed her back on the mattress and she wasn’t able to think at all. Nothing other than how good he tasted as his lips crushed over hers, or how hot and hard his shoulders felt under her hands when she wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled his body down on top of her. One hot, openmouthed kiss descended into another. Their tongues dueled, rubbing and teasing each other, making Gail drag air into her lungs in short and choppy breaths through her nose. Her fingers delved into the coarse hair at the nape of his neck and smoothed down his back to cup his tight ass. She felt his cheeks hollow out as his hips arched into her. His hands slipped under her T-shirt, his palms brushing her stomach as he worked it up over her breasts. Gail raised her arms and allowed www.samhainpublishing.com

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him to pull it the rest of the way off, leaving her bare-chested and a little insecure about how her body looked in the light of day. Before she could give it much thought, he kissed her again and wiped away all of her concerns about her form. Her lips clung to his as his hands arrowed down her sides and fumbled with the snap on her jeans. Anxious to feel his skin against hers, she reached down to help and jerked open the button closure. He groaned his appreciation into her mouth and his hands sank into her pants, palming her bottom. She wiggled, trying to help him scoot the denim down over her hips and legs. When her jeans hung around her ankles, she kicked out and slung them the rest of the way off. Left in thin white cotton panties, she shivered. Not from the cold but from the anticipation of what was to come. She wanted…needed to feel Shame inside her, making love to her. Shame pulled back, coming up to his knees beside her. He stared down at her, his eyes full of desire—for her—and she thought she would come on the spot. Each place his gaze landed, her mouth, breasts, the indent of her waist, the wet cotton that covered her aching sex, tingled and burned as if he’d struck a match on it. A tinge of self-consciousness hit her. She wished she’d worn something besides her usual white cotton underwear. He deserved better, something sexy like black lace or red silk, not drab white granny panties. This sexy, rugged, virile man wanted her. Plain old, slightly chunky Gail Wright. He thought she was beautiful, had said as much when they were together before, at the motel, and even now she liked to think she could see it reflected in his eyes. Damn if he didn’t make her feel pretty too. She felt like a sunflower that’d just discovered basking in the sun. As if she’d woken up from a long, cold winter and could feel the suns

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loving rays shining down on her. It was a heady sensation, to know that she was so wanted, even if only for sex. Gail pushed Shame down on the bed and flipped onto her hands and knees over him. She desperately wanted to return the pleasure he’d bestowed on her. Wanted to show him that this time would be different and that she wasn’t always so selfish or needy. That she wanted to please him too. She scooted closer and the light scent of his male musk greeted her nose. Looking up at him, she extended her tongue and swiped it over the fat, bulbous head of his cock, tasting the droplets of pre-come that clung to the tip. His essence burst over her tongue, salt and some indescribable tangy flavor that was his alone and made her yearn for more. She ran the flat of her tongue up and down his length, moistening his prick with her saliva. She paid special attention to the sensitive dip underneath the head, the tip of her tongue laving it repeatedly as he growled and bucked his hips ever so slightly toward her face, as if he couldn’t control his body’s reaction to her touch. Gail took the spongy crown between her lips and suckled, her palm fondling his heavy balls at the same time. Relaxing her jaw, she strived to accept as much of his shaft as she could manage, loving the feel of his hard, malleable flesh filling her mouth and rubbing over her tongue. He was too long for her to take him all in, but damn if she didn’t want to try. His desire, his pleasure was in her hands and she relished the power it gave her. She bobbed her head, taking him deeper by tiny increments until he hit the back of her throat and could go no farther. Seeming to sense her limits, he fisted his large hand around the base of his cock and began to slowly thrust, fucking her mouth.


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His pleasure fed hers and fanned the flames of her desire higher. Each swipe of her tongue, each nibble of her teeth on him, kicked her need up another notch. The sultry moans that spilled from his mouth caused her womb to fist and weep. She wanted to stop, to throw him down on the bed and impale herself on him, but part of her yearned to keep going and suck his juicy cock until he came down her throat. In the end, Shame made the choice for her. His hands clenched in her hair, making her whimper as he forced her to quit sucking him. He rotated his hips with a groan and pulled his erection from her mouth with a damp pop. She only had time to swipe her tongue over the glistening tip of his cock before Shame rolled her onto her back, spreading her legs wide as he moved. He jerked her panties down her legs and flipped himself around, turning his body backwards atop her, and buried his face between her thighs. His tongue burrowed through the slick, swollen folds of her pussy, feasting on her with a ravenous hunger that made her burn. She lowered her eyelids and shut out everything but the sweet sensations he caused. His hot, wet tongue swirled through each crevice and fold, leaving a maelstrom of need in his wake. Blunt teeth nibbled at her labia and sucked. On and on, he continued to lick and tease, no part of her pussy left untouched. He searched out all the spots that made her mewl and used them to his advantage. All but the one she needed him to touch the most. He went out of his way to avoid her clit. Rotating her hips, she tried to get his tongue where she wanted it. He sidestepped, flicking his tongue all around her clit, never touching it once. “Damn it, Shame, please,” she begged.

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He chuckled, the hot puff of breath coming from his mouth bathing her pussy in added heat, making her clit pulse harder in horny anticipation. Gail opened her eyes. Like ripe fruit, ready to be plucked and savored, his cock and balls dangled temptingly over her face. Fine, if he wanted to drive her out of her mind with his teasing, she was more than happy to return the favor. She licked her palm, getting it good and wet, and gripped his stiff cock, stroking her closed fist up and down his length before pulling him closer to her waiting mouth and his punishment for denying her release. Up and over, she fisted his ruddy stalk, her fingers squeezing the weeping tip on each upstroke. Her tongue extended, flicked softly over the taut sac encasing his balls, teasing him. He groaned into her pussy, his tongue moving faster, harder over her flesh. Oh, yes. That was the response she was looking for. Desperate to come, suddenly desperate to make him come with her, her mouth covered one of his swollen testicles and pulled it into her mouth. Her tongue worked a tight figure eight over the succulent orb, laved it and applied gentle pressure. She switched back and forth, from one ball to the other, lapping at the wrinkled sac while her hand pumped hard and fast over his penis. With each pass, her fingers swirled over his wet crown, collecting the moisture he provided, and spread it over his flesh for a smooth glide. Still, he refused to give her what she wanted. Refused to touch her where she needed him to. What did she have to do to get him to lick her clit, damn it? If her brain hadn’t been short-circuiting on pleasure overload, she would be able to figure it out. As it was, she wouldn’t be able to tell anyone her full name if they asked it of her.


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What turned guys on? A naked and willing woman, check. Having their cock sucked, check. Licking their balls, check. What else was there? Prostate. That one scary, forbidden little word popped into her brain and lodged there, jumping up and down waiting for her to pay attention to it. Could she find it? She’d never thought of doing that with the couple of lovers she’d been with prior to him. Did she dare try? What if all the descriptions she’d read in romance novels were wrong and she ended up not being able to find it? Or if she inadvertently scratched something and hurt him? Hell, what if she did find it and he was repulsed? Shit. Only one way to find out. With shaky fingers wet from her saliva, she massaged the space between his balls and anus. Beneath the fragile skin, she could feel the hard root of his cock where it disappeared into his core. When he didn’t stiffen up or yell for her to stop, she moved a little higher. Her fingertips glanced off the puckered ring of flesh guarding his rectum, testing his response, before quickly jumping back to his perineum. When all that garnered was an encouraging groan and not a single pause in his ministrations to her sex, she began to feel braver, more daring. Spitting on both of her hands, she resumed her pumping on his cock, this time pulling the flared rim down to lick and suckle. Her other hand moved back to massage the pink flesh she was preparing to violate. The more she rubbed, the more his tightly clenched muscles relaxed. Slick and ready, she eased the tip of one finger into his bottom. He groaned. Tensed. She stopped, her fingertip lodged in his ass, and waited for him to say or do something to stop her from going any further. Instead of the rebuttal she expected, she got a low, husky sound of pleasure and felt 64


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his tongue move marginally closer to her clit. The vigor with which he ate her pussy increased. So did her need to come. Emboldened, she pressed on, sinking her finger deeper inside him. His chute clamped down on the digit, squeezing it, the inside of his body hot and softer than she expected. It felt like live silk. With one finger lodged to the webbing, she started to slip in another. Slowly, she twisted her wrist around trying to find the most comfortable position while she rubbed the walls of his rectum, searching for the small walnut-shaped protrusion she knew should be on the side closest to his belly and near the tips of her fingers. Shame growled into her pussy and she felt the vibrations rocket through her body. God, she was so close. All he’d have to do was breathe hard on her clit and she would shoot off like a rocket. She was determined to take him with her when she did go over. She angled her head back and swallowed as much of his cock as she could in her awkward position. Her tongue, teeth and palate all worked in concert together to get him off. She pushed up with her fingers and pressed forward, straining to reach…and then she felt it—the small, soft mound of flesh that could and would send him over the edge. She brushed it, just barely, and the hot, silken walls around her fingers clenched down, resisting her movements. Shame’s hips bucked, pushing his cock farther into her mouth, butting up against the back of her throat and gagging her. “Mmm, yeah, baby. Right there. Make me come.” His moist breath puffed over her aching clit. His tongue followed, swiping the tiny bundle of nerves before his lips settled around it and suckled. Gail’s back arched, pushing her sex harder against his face. Her mouth sealed around his cock, tongue circumnavigating the swollen tip. Slender fingers pushed higher, putting more pressure on his prostate. www.samhainpublishing.com

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Even in her passionate stupor, she was careful not to press too hard and hurt him. He growled, sucking harder, feasting on her as if her pussy was the last thing he’d ever be allowed to taste, and Gail’s world rocked on its axis. Her stomach muscles tightened. Time froze. All she knew, felt, was his mouth and the coil of tension inside her that wound tighter and tighter with every pass of his tongue over her flesh. She wanted to beg, plead with him to finish her off, but refused to let go of him long enough to voice her desires. Instead, she sucked harder, pressed her fingers deeper and pumped her fist faster along his length, suddenly desperate to taste his essence, have it fill her mouth. His ass clamped down on her fingers right before the first blast of semen hit her tongue and exploded over her taste buds. Salty. Addictive. And then she was coming, his climax setting off her own. The fierce contractions of her orgasm barreled over her, sweeping her away with the bittersweet pleasure of release.

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Chapter Five

While he recovered from what had to be the world’s best orgasm, Shame studied Gail’s bedroom. A woman’s room could say a lot about her personality and he found that he wanted to know more about the little minx who currently lay sprawled in a satiated heap over his chest. Gail’s bedroom was simple. Not a lot of clutter like he’d seen in the rest of the house. Off-white walls with a pale mint green border. A single white mirrored dresser and matching nightstand. A few perfume bottles and a small oak jewelry box sat on one corner of the dresser. On her nightstand was an alarm clock and two picture frames. The larger frame housed a picture of Gail and an older woman, both smiling happily into the camera with an arm wrapped around each other’s shoulders. They looked so much alike that they had to be family. Maybe an older sister, or possibly her mother? The smaller of the two held a photo of two children caught in the awkward stages right before puberty, a darkheaded boy pushed a smaller girl—probably Gail, judging by the wild mop of blonde hair—and smirked into the camera. The face stirred a familiarity within Shame, but he couldn’t place it. He dismissed it, figuring the boy just resembled someone he’d seen during his travels, and moved his attention on. The large canopied bed dominated the room with its immense size. Instead of letting the sheer pink curtains at each corner of the bed down like they were supposed to be, she’d wrapped them around the white cast-iron poles, making him think that her bed, maybe she herself,


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hadn’t seen any action for quite some time. Otherwise, wouldn’t the curtains have been down, blocking out the rest of the world, swathing them with the notion that nothing existed outside of the bed and the passion they found in each other’s arms? Soft fingertips ran absently over his breastbone, alerting him to the fact that the woman in question was awake. He glanced down at her and noticed that her eyes were dreamy, like she was a million miles away. Judging by the slight upward tilt at the corners of her lips, her thoughts, whatever they might be, were of something pleasant. He wondered what she thought about that would put such an angelic smile on her beautiful face. Curiosity got the better of him. “What are you thinking about?” “Hmm…” She looked up at him. “Oh, well, I just remembered what I was thinking about right before you showed up. I was sitting in the living room, feeling sorry for myself and wishing that I had someone special to spend the evening with.” She blushed, her gaze sliding back down toward his chest. “It’s kind of ironic that you’d show up right when I really needed someone.” Shame didn’t know what to say. His windpipe felt stuffed with wet cotton. He also felt incredibly guilty. She thought he was there solely for her and he’d let her believe that, thinking it would be easier than explaining the truth and having her kick him out on his ass. Was that what he’d turned into—a user? “Gail, I’m glad I’m here. Even more pleased that you’re happy to see me, but I have to tell you that part of the reason I’m here is because I checked out of the motel. I thought, maybe, if it was all right with you, I would stay here for a few days while I take care of things. If you don’t want me to, all you have to do is say so and I’ll leave. No pressure. No hard feelings, I promise.” 68


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Gail blinked up at him and then smiled. “Of course you can stay here. I’d be happy to have the company.” She reached down, her hand fisting around his semi-erect penis. “And I’m already thinking up ways for you to earn your keep.” Shame caught her hands and pulled them up over her head. Laughing, he rolled her onto her back. “Oh you are, are you?” he teased. “Mm hm.” Her eyes glittered up at him. “My mind’s spinning with all the possibilities.” He brushed his lips softly over hers. “I just bet. You want to share some of those ideas with me?” She wrapped her legs around his waist and squeezed. “Nope. I think I’ll keep them all to myself for now.” Shame nipped her earlobe with his teeth. “Know what I think?” “What?” she panted, her thighs tightening around him and her hips wiggling to find the right angle for penetration. “I think you’re a little tease.” His cock rubbed over and between her swollen folds. Both of them sighed as the tip cruised right down to where they both wanted it to be, the mouth of her pussy. “You’re wrong,” Gail whispered, her hips arching, her pussy swallowing the first couple inches of his cock. “A tease doesn’t finish what she starts. I fully intend to start it”—her wet flesh glided over his tumescent stalk, punctuating her words—“and finish it.” Shame groaned. His hips shot forward, burying the remaining inches of his stiff member inside the tight grip of her pussy. His balls hit the soft skin of her bottom and it was all he could do to keep from losing control. Sweat beaded on his forehead as he held still, not yet ready to move. He wanted to savor the hot, moist clasp of her body around him for a moment before he tore into her and sent them both into the stratosphere. www.samhainpublishing.com

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Gail moaned beneath him and her nails dug into his ass, urging him to move, to thrust. He gritted his teeth, stalling, wanting this time to last, but she wasn’t making it easy on him. Leveraging herself up on her elbows, she licked the underside of his jaw and nipped at his chin. She ducked her head and flicked his nipple with the tip of her tongue and then sank her teeth into it, biting down. An involuntary grunt slipped from between his clenched teeth. God, she was going to kill him. Too many orgasms like the first one and he was a goner. Death by sexual overload—hell of a way to go, but it worked for him. Her tongue moved across his chest, bathing his other nipple in wet heat. Most women didn’t truly appreciate a man’s nipples. His were extraordinarily sensitive. Did Gail know what she was doing to him by sucking on him that way? Her lips tightened around the small bud of his nipple and he lost his ability to think of anything but plowing into her tight and willing cunt. His fingers twined with hers and he began to lunge into her, over and over, each swivel of his hips harder than the one that came before. “Oh, yes! Shame. Harder.” He felt the hot liquid pull of her sex spasm around his cock and clamp down on him, contracting in rhythmic waves. He thrust once and then again, burying his dick to the root, and let himself fall over the edge of orgasm with her. Lightning shot from his perineum to the head of his cock, his come following right behind it. Thick jets of semen exploded from the tip and filled her, marking her as his. Shame rolled onto his back, taking her with him. His shrinking erection still inside her, she laid on top of his chest, her head brushing against his chin. The only sound in the room was the ragged inhalations as they tried to catch their breath. 70


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Shame smoothed his hands over her back, his fingers leisurely exploring the crease of her spine and the indent at the top of her bottom. “Mmm…that feels good,” she whispered into his chest, the air from her words billowing over his nipples. She moved her body a little to the right and his semi-erect penis slipped out of her and flopped against his thigh, wet from their joint release. Fuck. His fingers stilled on her waist. She rubbed her face into his chest. Kissed his collarbone. “Don’t stop now. You keep massaging my back like that and you’re going to put me to sleep.” “Gail?” “Hmm?” she whispered drowsily. “I forgot to use protection.” Her muscles stiffened underneath his fingertips. She didn’t say anything for a long time. Long enough for Shame to start to sweat, wondering what was going through her mind. Finally, she pulled up and looked him in the eye. “Don’t worry about it. I’m on the pill, remember?” Her cheeks blossomed a pretty shade of pink and he realized they always did that when she was embarrassed or felt bashful. “Besides, I’m supposed to start in a few days, so even if I wasn’t, I’m sure your little soldiers wouldn’t find anything to fertilize.” She sighed and laid her head back on his shoulder. Shame turned her words over in his head, thinking about what she’d said. His hand toyed with her hair where it was spread out over his chest. “For what it’s worth, I’m clean. I know you can’t just take someone’s word for it but—” Soft fingers covered his mouth, stopping him. “I know. It’s okay. I’m clean too. We’ll just have to be more careful in the future.” A vivid picture of Gail’s stomach rounded with his child popped into his head. It was quickly replaced with another one of a little boy with his www.samhainpublishing.com

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auburn hair and Gail’s beautiful blue eyes. He swallowed, uncomfortable with the images and how clear they appeared in his mind. Where the hell did those thoughts come from? He barely knew her. He sure as hell didn’t want to knock her up. He’d had a family, a wife and daughter he’d loved. They were gone. Dead. He didn’t want another one. He opened his mouth, ready to tell her as much. To let her know that he wasn’t interested in more than a fling, but his stomach growled, interrupting him. Gail rose up on one elbow, her eyes full of laughter, and patted his abdomen. “I made you work up an appetite, huh?” He smiled back at her and leaned up to press a kiss to her lips, his previous thoughts squelched. “Guess so.” She scrambled off the bed and walked naked across the room, his eyes trailing her every move, and yanked an old white terrycloth robe off the back of the bedroom door. She turned back to him as she pulled it over her shoulders and tied it around her waist. The graceful dip over her naked breasts peeked out at him from beneath the robe. “Come on. Follow me to the kitchen. I think the least I can do is feed you after all the hard manual labor you’ve done,” she teased with a smile and a come-hither wave before she turned and walked through the door. Shame wondered how her teasing and easy manner could so easily shift his mood. She was good for him, his Gail. Whoa! Wait just a damn minute. She wasn’t his anything. A vision of her body, flushed with arousal and straining toward completion—the completion he’d given her—popped into his head. Okay, so maybe he had a soft spot for the woman. He would admit that much, but it wasn’t anything more than hot sex. He wouldn’t let it be.

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Gail puttered around in the kitchen, trying to figure out what she could cook for Shame. There wasn’t much in the fridge and besides that, she had no idea what the man even liked. Staring blankly into the halfempty cupboard, she wondered what was taking him so long in the bedroom. She’d been standing in the kitchen waiting on him for a good ten minutes. It would be easier for her to figure out what to make if she could ask him about his likes and dislikes. Impatient, Gail turned to go find him, only to see him standing in the doorway, lean hip propped against the wall and one leg casually draped over the other. His chest was gloriously bare above tight, faded blue jeans and though he’d taken the time to pull them on, he’d left them unbuttoned, allowing her a tantalizing glimpse of soft skin beneath his ridged abs. When she finally forced her gaze up to his face, she realized he was staring at her with a weird expression on his handsome face, as if she had snot running out of her nose or something. “What?” Gail asked, her hand flying to cover the lower portion of her face, worried that maybe she really did have a booger showing. Shame smiled, twin dimples popping out on either side of his full, supple lips. “Nothing. I was just watching you. Has anyone ever told you that you look damn cute when you’re concentrating on something? You start gnawing on your bottom lip and you get this adorable little wrinkle in the middle of your forehead.” She felt her face morph into a scowl but her brain was doing a happy dance. He thought she was adorable. “Um, thanks,” she muttered, not knowing what else to say. Compliments always made her uncomfortable. She’d never quite mastered the art of accepting one gracefully. “So,” she said, changing the subject. “What do you like?” She pulled open the fridge and stared at the meager contents for the umpteenth time. “I can do omelets. Would that be—?” www.samhainpublishing.com

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Hard, muscular arms snaked around her waist and yanked her back against Shame’s rock-solid chest. Impossibly, she felt a renewed erection pressing against her bottom through the thick fabric of her robe. Though she knew full well what he was up to, she asked anyway. “What are you doing?” Soft lips brushed over the curve of her shoulder. “You asked me what I was in the mood for.” His hands toyed with the belt around her waist, untying it. One calloused palm slipped inside to cup her breast, manipulating her nipple. With a sigh, she leaned into him, the back of her head coming to rest on his shoulder. “I guess I should have been more clear about what was on the menu.” He squeezed her nipple, sending a bolt of heat to her core. “I’m glad you didn’t.” “Me too,” she whispered, before twisting and wrapping her arms around his neck. She stretched up to kiss him. As her lips pressed to his, his stomach growled loudly, reminding her why they’d come into the kitchen to begin with. She snickered. “You want to rethink skipping dinner?” Shame smiled, his eyes twinkling down at her. “Yeah, maybe eating first isn’t such a bad idea after all.” He let her go and stepped back. “Do you need help with anything?” She turned away and opened the fridge before she gave in to her body’s demand that she jump back into his arms to insist he finish what he’d started. “Sure. You any good with a grater? You can grate cheese and crack the eggs, while I cut up some veggies.” “I’ve never used one, but I’ll give it a shot, as long as you don’t mind if I accidentally grate some of my fingers in with the cheese.”

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Gail laughed and began to pull out the ingredients they would need for the omelets. With her arms laden down, she turned back to him and handed him the carton of eggs. “Why do you think I don’t want to do it?” Shame accepted the eggs and carried them over to the table where she’d set out a bowl and the cheese grater. With his back turned, she noticed another small tattoo on his left shoulder blade. It was a little pink teddy bear. Across its chubby tummy, the name Sophie was written in cursive. “Who’s Sophie?” she blurted out before she could think better of it. Shame’s spine stiffened and she didn’t need for him to turn around and show her his face to know the polite mask of barely leashed civility had slipped over his features. She bit into her lip, cursing herself for asking. Gail resolved to change the subject before he said something to ruin her good mood. Like for her to mind her own business. She turned away from him and busied herself with chopping vegetables. “I hope you like mushrooms. I always have to have a lot of mushrooms and cheese in mine. It just doesn’t seem like an omelet without them.” Could she sound any more lame? After several tense moments, during which time she grew sure he wasn’t ever going to speak to her again, he finally broke the silence. “Whatever you want to throw in is fine with me. I’m not all that picky about what I eat.” The rest of their late-night meal was prepared in virtual silence, only the banging of implements and the hiss of butter on the skillet to fill the quiet void. It wasn’t until they sat across the table from each other, no longer busy, that the silence began to grow uncomfortable. Frantically, she racked her brain, trying to come up with some menial small talk to fill in the chasm growing ever larger between them by the second. Thinking of things to say to him shouldn’t have been so www.samhainpublishing.com

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hard. She imagined that if they had gone about things the normal way— forced themselves through an awkward couple of dates before they’d jumped into bed together—then it wouldn’t take such a stretch of the imagination to come up with something to talk about. Though she’d been more intimate with him than any other, she found herself at an intellectual loss for conversation. The little details one usually knew about someone they’d slept with were missing. While she knew all about his body, his sexual wants and needs, she didn’t know the first thing about his life. And judging by his reaction to her asking about his tattoo, he didn’t want to share any of those details with her. The silence was palpable. She opened her mouth to say something, anything, and drew a blank. To cover her verbal floundering, she quickly stuffed a forkful of eggs into her mouth. After chewing mechanically, she swallowed. Glancing up from her plate, her eyes met Shame’s. He sat back in his chair, watching her. Unlike hers, his plate was empty. Apparently while she’d been woolgathering, he’d wolfed down his food. She pushed what was left of her food around on her plate and grasped the only opening she could think of. “Are you still hungry? I could whip you up another omelet.” “No thanks, I’m good.” Yes, yes he was. Very good. When nothing more was said and silence reigned supreme yet again, she gave up and carried her plate over to the sink. She shoveled over half of her dinner down the garbage disposal and turned on the water to let it heat before starting the dishes. Elbow-deep in suds, she jumped when Shame’s voice rang out behind her. “My daughter.” 76


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She glanced back at him over her shoulder. “Huh?” “You asked who Sophie was. She was my daughter.” She couldn’t help but ask, “Was?” Shame nodded, the fierce expression on his face clearly saying he didn’t want to elaborate. Though her curiosity was killing her, she turned back to the dishes. “I understand if you don’t want to talk about it, but…” She couldn’t help but leave that “but” dangling on the end. If there was any chance he wanted to tell her more, she wanted to give him the opening. If not, she would let it go and try not to pester him into telling her something he obviously wasn’t comfortable discussing. After all, she could understand secrets. She had a few of her own she wasn’t willing to share. “I’d really rather not get into it right now.” Gail shrugged like it didn’t matter and decided to cut him a break. She pulled the stopper from the drain and turned around to face him. “So, if you don’t want to talk, what do you want to do?” Before he could answer, she untied her robe and let it fall to the floor.


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Chapter Six

Morning light filtered in through the window, rudely shining down in Gail’s face. She awoke slowly and groggily flung her arm across the bed, yearning to feel Shame’s warm body beside her. Her arm slapped the cold pillow instead. Shame was gone. Again. It had been the same thing each morning. Over the last four days he’d been staying with her, she had yet to wake up with him next to her in the morning. He always disappeared before she woke up. Or maybe it was during the night. She wasn’t really sure. All she knew was that she fell asleep with him and woke up alone. For such a small thing, awakening alone was beginning to get to her. She longed to wake up in Shame’s arms, snuggled up safe and content at his side, just as she fell asleep every night. Shame had a way about him, nothing concrete but more of a quiet presence, that made her feel entirely too connected to him, too at peace in his company. Almost as if they’d been together for years. The first morning she’d woken up to a cold and empty bed her heart seized in her chest, thinking he was gone for good. She’d spent the rest of the day moping around the house, feeling sorry for herself. Hating him for leaving without saying goodbye. Hating herself for being so needy. When he’d shown up in time for dinner that evening, she’d been shocked. Unwanted tears had surged into her eyes at the sound of his truck pulling into her drive. She’d run into the bathroom and splashed cold water on her face, hoping it would take away the puffiness and ugly

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red blotches from crying. As she’d looked at her reflection in the mirror, she’d given herself a nice, long lecture about the perils of letting herself get attached to Shame. Just because he’d come back this time didn’t mean he planned to stay. He wouldn’t and had already told her as much himself, though not in those exact words. Shame was only staying long enough to take care of whatever business had brought him into town in the first place and then he would move on and leave her behind. That thought brought on a fresh round of tears and she’d had to redunk her face in icy water. She swallowed the lump in her throat and forced herself to get a grip on her wonky emotions. He was a temporary lover. A mere speed bump on her way to improving her self-esteem and enabling herself with enough courage to get out there and meet new people, meet Mr. Right. Shamus Long was Mr. Right-now, nothing more. Then what’s with the tears? That one burning question repeated, unanswered in her mind. And so the next few days passed. Each day she came home and started a dinner for two, hoping he would show up to help her eat it, a part of her brain telling her that this would be the day that he didn’t come back. Gail allowed herself to settle into a routine she had no business getting used to and lectured herself about it constantly, to no avail. Today was no different. She spent her day fruitlessly searching through the want ads. Few companies in the area were hiring and those that were only had positions way out of her league. She wound up going to a temporary agency, the last refuge of the jobless. There she spent three miserable hours filling out forms and taking mundane computer tests, only to hear the usual “We’ll call you www.samhainpublishing.com

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when we have an opening” line as she left. They may as well have said “Don’t let the door hit you in the ass on the way out” for all the hope she felt toward landing a position there. When she got home, she showered and shaved, and slathered perfumed lotion from head to toe. Just because she was down in the dumps about work, or lack thereof, didn’t mean she wanted to be a grump when Shame showed up. Their time together was limited enough and she wanted to enjoy each moment they shared, for it to be special. In truth, she just wanted him to look back years down the road and remember her as the catch he’d let get away. Tonight she planned to cement the memory of her into his brain. Which was why she spent so much time carefully choosing what she would wear. She wished she could’ve gone shopping and bought something frivolous and naughty, perfect for the night of seduction she had planned. But with no job and few prospects on the horizon, she couldn’t afford to blow the cash, so she scrounged through what she had in her closet and made do. The best she could come up with was a short black skirt, with a hem that billowed out around her knees, and a long-sleeved pink blouse thats plunging-V neckline showed off a bit of cleavage. What she wore underneath was a no-brainer. Sexy lingerie just so happened to be one of her personal weaknesses. Some people hoarded shoes or purses. She collected panties and bras. Lingerie was her equivalent of most women’s chocolate binges, though she only pulled out the good stuff when she really needed it. Like tonight. After serious consideration she decided that less really was more and settled on black, lace-top thigh highs with a matching black garter belt and nothing else. The garter belt disguised the slight roundness of her belly, while highlighting her newly denuded mound. She wasn’t sure 80


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what had prompted her to shave off her pubic hair while in the shower but she’d gone through with the impulse. Her fingers skimmed over the baby-smooth flesh between her legs. It was strange not having the blonde curls she’d grown used to seeing between her thighs. Her pussy looked so different. And the sensations— Wow. Barely touching her outer lips caused a shiver to skate down her spine and her womb to clench in anticipation. She couldn’t wait to see the expression on Shame’s face when he got a load of what she’d done. Couldn’t wait to see how much better his touch felt on her sensitive skin. Over most of the next hour she primped and preened in front of the bathroom mirror, trying to make herself presentable. She rolled her long hair in curlers and left it lying in loose waves over her shoulders. She even applied a little extra makeup. Gail added mascara and a touch of bronzer over her cheekbones, in addition to her usual face powder and raspberry lip gloss. Satisfied that she looked the best she could, Gail hightailed it into the kitchen to start dinner. XW The overcast sky spat out random spurts of snow and hail, casting an eerie pallor over what looked to be a beautiful landscape of rolling knolls and wide-open plains. Shame crouched with his knees bent at an uncomfortable angle and his back pressed against one of two frozen cement pillars. Each pillar framed one side of the heavy iron gate, monitoring who came and went from Master Vampire Lucian Tremaine’s palatial country estate. There he waited. And what an estate it was. From his vantage point, smashed between the pillar and a bushy hedge, Shame had a great view of the huge house


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that looked like a gothic version of Gone with the Wind’s Tara. With its sprawling layout and six tall columns holding up the massive covered porch, it could have been an identical replica of the film house had it been white instead of a sickly gunmetal grey. To either side of the house, land stretched as far as the eye could see. There were no trees to provide cover for him if…when he made it through the gate. It was going to be dicey getting from where he was to the house without being seen by the flunkies on watch or the cameras he’d spotted strategically placed around the grounds. Dicey, but doable. He’d been in tighter spots and come out ahead. All he needed was the perfect opportunity to fall into his lap and he would be in. Unfortunately, if something didn’t happen soon it would have to be put off until another day. It was getting late, somewhere around five, and the sun would set soon, taking with it his chance of doing any reconnaissance that day. He didn’t dare make a move to enter the vampire’s dwelling after sunset. During the day the vampire’s powers would be slightly beyond that of a humans, but after the sun went down and the moon rose high in the night sky, they became damn near indestructible. Entering after dark would be as good as signing his own death certificate. Shame heard a car approaching over the rise. Even before he spotted it, he knew it would be a sports car. The seductive purr of the engine was too mellow, too strong to be anything else. Sure enough, less than a blink later, a candy apple red Lamborghini Diablo rumbled up to the gate. As it rolled to a stop, the driver-side window whirred down a bit and the man behind the wheel spoke into the box, seeking admission. The near-black windows prevented Shame from being able to make out who was behind the wheel, but he knew it must be someone 82


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important. Perhaps even Tremaine himself. No flunky would be entrusted with a machine that easily sold for well over three hundred grand. His pulse beat double time as he moved, quick and silent, from his hiding spot to stay in line with the car as the gate swung open. When the car began to inch forward on the bumpy, snow-covered ground, Shame walked hunched over beside it and slipped undetected through the gate. Bent at the waist, he hustled alongside the car into the attached three-bay garage beside the house. Vehicles filled all but the bay closest to the house—a Ford truck in one, two ski mobiles in the other. Before the owner shut the engine down Shame was falling to the floor, his body tucking and rolling underneath the 4x4 truck. He lay still beneath the truck. A pool of liquid, which smelled like transmission fluid, soaked into the back of his jacket, masking his scent better than the deer piss he’d sprayed on his boots earlier for that very purpose. He held his breath as the driver crawled from behind the wheel and exited the vehicle. The voices inside grew louder, closer, and then the door leading into the house was flung open. The force from behind sent it slamming into the wall with a loud bang that ricocheted through the room like a gunshot. Two pairs of sneakers appeared in the doorway, along with the glossy black dress shoes belonging to the person who’d exited the car a moment before. Their voices rose, their tones furious. Shame idly wished he’d paid closer attention in high school, when he’d had the displeasure of taking French, as that was the language they appeared to be speaking. Unless one of them asked the other for a romp in the sack—Voulez-vous coucher avec moi?—the only phrase he’d ever memorized in the language, then he had no hope of understanding a word they uttered.


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As they argued and fought—about what he didn’t know—Shame took a moment to collect himself, taking the time to regroup and prepare for what was to come. He was going into the house, of that he was certain. What he would find once he was deep into the interior of Tremaine’s nefarious world was impossible to guess. With slow, controlled breaths he stilled his thumping heart and calmed himself. It wouldn’t do to hyperventilate while he was in the vipers nest. Even in their pre-vampire forms their hearing was superb and they would notice the unsteady wheezing of someone in hiding trying to force air into their over-expanding lungs. Shutting his eyes, he pushed everything from his mind and tried to concentrate on his reasons for being there. Maria. Sophie. Possibly even Ty, though he prayed there was still hope for his lost friend. That somehow, someway, he was still alive and fighting. If anyone could face a horde of creatures as evil as these and come out swinging, it was Ty. For once it wasn’t the image of his sweet wife’s face he pictured to calm his raging nerves. It wasn’t even Sophie’s face he saw. It was Gail’s. He saw her as she looked the night before, her luminous blue eyes staring up at him over his cock as he forced it inch by swollen inch into her hot little mouth. The trust that she placed in his hands when he’d breached the tight seal of her throat and moved deeper, the bulbous head of his cock slipping into her throat and cutting off her air for those few precious seconds. When he left Gail, lying warm and snug in bed that morning, he hadn’t thought that today would be the day he’d hit pay dirt in his search. If he had, he would’ve taken the time to treasure her, give her one last kiss and snuggle, before he forced himself out of the warm cocoon of her embrace. He was always careful, using his extensive training to his advantage, but only God knew the outcome of skirmishes. 84


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Living in the moment, appreciating each day to its fullest, had been his personal motto at one time, but was something he’d let fall to the wayside after losing his family. Being near Gail—basking in her care and sunny disposition—resurrected all those old feelings and made him want to grip life by the horns again. He was sorry he hadn’t put forth a little extra effort to show her his appreciation. It was too late now, but as soon as he made it out of this in one piece, he vowed to do something nice for her that didn’t involve the two of them getting sweaty and horizontal. That was the best he could do right then. Being so close, only to turn back, wasn’t an option. Reconnaissance was dangerous and sometimes messy, but it had to be done. The chance of being discovered was one he would have to take in order to get the information he sought. Being good at what he did didn’t make him invincible. The three men retreated into the house, the door slamming shut behind them. Shame heard a click and a whirr and the garage door began to descend, sealing him in. He moved with animal grace and rolled from beneath the truck and climbed to his feet. He grabbed the first thing he could find, a wooden step stool, and wedged it between the garage door and the floor, preventing it from reaching the ground. He didn’t want to eliminate any possible escape routes for when the time came to boogie out of the place. If he was in a hurry, and he had no doubt that he probably would be, it was going to be important to save time. Having to open that metal monstrosity would cost him precious seconds he might not be able to afford to lose. Since the only entrance into the house from inside the garage was the one the three thugs just entered, Shame had no choice but to wait them out, give them a few minutes to get to wherever it was they were headed and clear the way for him to sneak in. Waiting grated on his already www.samhainpublishing.com

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overextended nerves, but it was preferable to going back outside and making himself vulnerable to any security cameras on the property while he scouted for another way in. Shadows were growing longer under the door, the sun lowering over the horizon. He only had so much time before the sun set completely and he was royally fucked. There was no way he could make himself sit back on his thumbs and chill. It was now or never. He approached the door and eased it open a few inches, peering around the edge. A small mudroom, approximately the size of a large walk-in closet, was deserted. Shame slipped inside, leaving the door behind him ajar. A handful of steps brought him to the other side of the room and the open doorway that led into a wide foyer with white walls and even whiter marble flooring. Beyond that he could make out what looked like a sunken living room to the left and a huge state-of-the-art kitchen on the right. Everything he saw was in shades of white and chrome. An odd color scheme for creatures who thrived on darkness. A tinkling noise that favored someone twirling keys sounded to his left, from the direction of the living room. Shame darted into the empty kitchen and ducked behind the center island. There he held his breath and waited. The keys rattled closer, accompanied by the sound of heavy footsteps echoing through the hall. A short, stubby man passed the open door leading into the kitchen. As wide as he was tall, with straggly, greasy brown hair, the man was a sight to behold. Though it was obvious that he didn’t take care of his body, the clothes he wore—a perfectly tailored black pinstripe suit—were pressed and clean. He wasn’t one of the two flunkies Shame followed to the house. Nor was he the man who’d been behind the wheel of the Lamborghini. Shame wasn’t sure who he was. 86


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A business associate, maybe? The man bypassed the kitchen and headed into the mudroom Shame had just vacated. Damn good thing he’d gotten out of there when he did. Now he just hoped the guy didn’t head into the stall where he’d propped open the garage door. He heard the loud rumble of a vehicle starting up, what was clearly the truck’s big block engine, and felt his tense muscles relax a fraction. So far so good. Slipping from behind the center island, Shame slunk across the room and stopped to listen closely as he approached the door. Hearing nothing, he eased around the corner and was met by a choice. A double set of stairs. He could go upstairs or down. Taking into account that people usually hid their dirty laundry in the basement, Shame chose the latter and began the slow, dark descent into the basement. He paused at the bottom landing, his eyes scanning the darkness in all directions. There were three hallways branching off from the foot of the stairs—one to his left, right and directly in front of him. Two of the hallways were dark and appeared to open into a single room at the end. The hall in front of him was dimly lit by antique wall sconces and had several closed doors on each side. Shame stepped off the landing, ready to explore the various doors down the long hallway in front when he heard something that sounded like chains rattling. He stopped moving and listened. More clanking, followed by the echo of low, pain-filled grunts reached his ears. The sounds seemed to be coming from the hallway to his left. Following the noise, he inched down the unlit corridor, carefully keeping his back to the wall lest someone try to get the jump on him from behind. His night vision was good, but a supernatural’s was undoubtedly better.


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An arc of dimmed light spilled from the opening, not enough to illuminate his journey, but enough to guide him in like a homing beacon to whatever reprehensible goings-on took place within. Each step, each heartbeat, drew him closer to his goal. As he crept nearer, the sounds grew louder—the whirr of a piece of leather slicing through the air, the resounding slap against soft flesh, the sickening rattle of chains and subsequent groan of the person being tortured. Shame stilled outside the ring of light and molded his back to the wall. Through years of practice, he was able to slow his respiration to an even keel, the better to improve his hearing and keep his presence undetected while he tried to figure out what was happening inside. From his vantage point he could see very little inside the room. What he could make out confused him. He’d expected a torture chamber— doom and gloom. What he got was—exercise equipment? That made no sense. He could see a weight bench and the corner of a treadmill. He stood against the wrong side of the hallway to see into the other side of the room. The side where all the action was taking place. Was it possible that the room was half gym, half dungeon? Jesus, that thought sounded stupid, even in his head. The men inside the room—two of them, by his guess—the one performing the torture and the one taking it, started to talk and Shame’s thoughts ceased as he eavesdropped. “You had enough yet, fucker? You ready to talk now?” a low, scratchy voice taunted. Chains rattled and then a hoarse, almost sexless voice whispered, “Fuck you.” “I’ll take that as a no. You know—” The sharp sound of something cutting through the air reached Shame’s ear a second before he heard the loud, wet slap of leather hitting flesh. “—the boss is getting a might 88


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testy that you haven’t spilled your guts yet.” Another sickening slap followed by a ragged, long-suffered grunt. “I’m thinking maybe you like the way this whip cuts into your pretty skin. Maybe you get off on the pain.” The man wielding the whip laughed, the sound hollow and emotionless. The person being tormented moaned, low and broken, as he was repeatedly hit, the slick slap of flesh echoing loudly. Shame gritted his teeth, forcing himself to stay put and listen, not go charging into the room like he wanted to. Time was running short and he needed to learn everything he could before the sun set and he was forced to leave. In consolation, he promised himself that he would help this person before that time came. His conscience wouldn’t let him live in peace if he left without doing what he could. His muscles tensed, locked up as he heard the man being struck again, crying out in agony. Something about the sound, the first one he’d clearly heard that was more than a broken whisper, sent chills of recognition down his spine. The taunts began anew, cutting off Shame’s ability to think of anything besides his mounting anger and the need to thrash the sadistic bastard with his fists until there was nothing left of him but a bloody stump. See how he liked fighting someone who wasn’t bound and unable to defend themselves. A soulless cackle echoed around him. His muscles bunched, urging him to surge into action. “What’s a matter, boy, you don’t like the cat-o’-nine tails as well as you do the whip? That’s a real shame, since you’re going to be tasting a lot of it until you give us the location of that good-for-nothing slayer you’ve been traveling with. The boss will have his ass one way or the www.samhainpublishing.com

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other, with or without your help. You could make this easy on yourself. Give in. Tell us what we want to know and I’ll finish you off real quick. A bullet to the brain, instead of the slow draining you’re begging for by keeping silent.” The low, gravelly voice answered back. “Never.” The one word was loud enough for him to recognize the voice. Ty. Joy filled his chest at the realization that his friend was alive. It was quickly followed by the knowledge that he had also spent the past weeks undergoing God knew what kind of torture. If he was going to make a move, and he damn sure planned to, then now was the time to do it. Man-to-man he could kick the flunky’s ass, no matter how big he was. Shame was a firm believer in the old saying—the bigger the man, the harder he fell, but timing was imperative. Once the sky darkened and the thug’s powers increased, underling or not, Shame wouldn’t stand a chance. And if they got their hands on him, neither would Ty. Once they had him, they’d have no reason to keep Ty alive. He had to move and he had to do it now. “Why do you want to be like that after I was trying to be nice to you? Tell you what—how about I start cutting off limbs? Maybe start with your toes and work my way up. I’ll get the master’s dogs down here and feed the little pieces of you I cut off to them for supper. We’ll see how long it takes you to start singing like a canary once you see the Rots chomping down on your shit.” A sharp gasp of outrage and fury filled the room. “I’ll kill you first, you bastard.” Shame couldn’t stand to listen anymore. He sprung around the corner and burst into the room, his Glock in his outstretched hand. “Freeze, fucker, or I’ll splatter your head all over the wall.”

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A tall, reed-thin man stood over the bloody form of his friend. Shame knew that it was Ty lying there, chained to the floor, but if he hadn’t recognized his voice he most certainly wouldn’t have known it was him by looking at him. Not a single inch of skin on his body remained unmarred. Blood covered him from head to toe. The long fall of black hair the man had prided himself on was shorn off, small uneven clumps puffing in random spurts around his head. Always slender, now his ribs protruded grossly from his chest, like he hadn’t eaten a single bite in all the time he’d been gone. Shame figured he probably hadn’t. The human body could go a long while without food before it shut down from neglect. Shame wanted to close his eyes, block out the visual proof of what his friend had endured, but couldn’t. Even as the desire crossed his mind, the thug with the cat-o’-nine tails moved a fraction closer, an evil gleam of deadly intent in his black eyes. “Stop.” “Fuck you. You and I both know a bullet won’t kill me. Slow me down for a minute, maybe. Besides, you shoot that thing and you’ll alert the entire house. You won’t stand a chance.” An evil, toothy grin spread across his face. “Not that you’re going to make it out of here in one piece anyway.” And then he was moving, quick as lightning across the room in Shame’s direction. Shame didn’t think. He pulled the trigger. The recoil shimmied up his arm as he watched the look of surprise register on the vampire’s ugly face an instant before he crumpled to the ground, a mound of ash where his body should have been. Regular bullets might not do much damage but the special-made, UV-gel-filled ones he’d purchased did the trick real nice. Vampires may have been able to go out into the sunlight during the day, but having a concentrated infusion of ultraviolet rays introduced directly into their bloodstream was another matter. www.samhainpublishing.com

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Shame withdrew his pocketknife and dropped to his knees beside Ty. “Hold on, buddy. I’ll have you out of these in no time.” Ty’s deep brown eyes looked up at him. They were glazed and unfocused as if he didn’t know who Shame was or what was going on around him. The excruciating pain he must’ve been in had obviously pushed him deep inside himself, where he could hide from the damage being done to his body. Shame’s heart clenched, going out to his friend, while at the same time anger coursed through his veins. If only he’d been able to get to Ty a little sooner, maybe… Shame shook his head and leaned down to work on Ty’s bonds. He wouldn’t do anyone any good by kicking himself over this right now. They weren’t out of danger yet. He needed to stay focused on getting Ty and himself out of there and then he could worry about making amends to his friend. In less than thirty seconds, Shame had the locked shackles around Ty’s arms and legs open. He picked his friend up off the floor, careful not to hurt him any more than he had to and slung him over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry, running toward the stairs. XW Gail’s gaze strayed to the white enamel clock above the kitchen door. Eight-oh-five. Exactly three minutes since the last time she’d glanced at it. Her vision wavered, falling down to her short, unpolished fingernails that beat an unsteady rhythm on the red-checkered tablecloth. He wasn’t coming. The meal she’d so painstakingly perfected sat untouched in the middle of the table. The pasta noodles were no longer just the right consistency, more like mush amid the thick marinara that surrounded

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them. The two long white pillar candles she’d set on either side of their meal were burned down to extinguished nubs in their crystal holders. She could sympathize. Her heart felt much the same way. Cold and extinguished inside her rib cage. Numb from the neck up, the sharp, agonizing sting in the middle of her chest was the only thing that registered. She rose and walked from the room, flipping lights off left and right as she headed for the sanctuary of her bedroom. Standing at the threshold into her bedroom, Gail stopped. Her breath hitched in her chest. Her bed, usually so peaceful and comforting when she was upset, now stared at her in contempt. Like it was her fault only one body would be sleeping in it instead of two. Hell, maybe it was. Maybe he’d caught the needy vibes rolling off her and bolted before he otherwise would have. The rest of the house was peppered with memories of meals eaten and quiet chats, peaceful time spent lounging and relaxing at the end of the day, but it was in her bedroom that the most powerful of their moments had been shared. For the last four nights she and Shame had slept in her bed, talked and teased there, made love. The thought of crawling in it now, when the shape of his head was still etched in one of the pillows and his mesmerizing scent still clung to the sheets was not an option. Then she realized that what little of him remained in her house was all she’d ever have of him. Shame was gone. This time he wasn’t coming back. She’d foolishly thought she’d steeled herself for the eventuality, but obviously she hadn’t. What an idiot she was. She’d done the one thing she’d sworn to herself that she wouldn’t do—she’d fallen in love with him. Gail turned and raced for the bathroom. She made it to the sink before her stomach gave a great heave into the ceramic basin. www.samhainpublishing.com

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Chapter Seven

Wired up, his muscles vibrating from the excess of adrenaline coursing through his veins, Shame pulled into the driveway and threw the truck into park. Beside him, in the passenger seat, Ty sat slumped over, his face resting against the window. The worry and fear that they wouldn’t be able to escape, that Tremaine or one of his flunkies would catch up with them, began to fade away as he stared at the darkened windows of Gail’s house. Home. Glancing over at his friend, Shame was dismayed to realize that it wasn’t the first time he’d thought of Gail’s place as home. He’d only been staying there for a few days, less than a week really, but being there, with her, did make it feel very much like home. Uncomfortably, he tried to figure out whether it was the house itself that spelled out home for him, or Gail. Somehow the blonde spitfire had managed to worm her way under his skin and right into his heart. Reluctant to put an actual name on his feelings, he knew what he felt for her was deeper than friendship, deeper than like. Shrugging the caustic meanderings away, he wondered how she would react to seeing Ty, as hurt and banged up as he was. Would she freak out, or lend a helping hand? It was hard to tell how someone would react to stress until they were right in the thick of it. He felt bad about bringing Ty back here with him, but what other choice did he really have? It wasn’t like he could take him to the nearest

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emergency room. Doctors asked too many questions he couldn’t answer without putting them at even greater risk, forcing him into a corner. He had to take care of Ty himself. After taking up precious time circling through back roads in a zigzag pattern to discern whether or not they were being followed, Shame had risked stopping and pulled off the road into a copse of trees. There he’d done his best to examine Ty in the watery light from the overhead bulb and patch up the more serious, life-threatening wounds—sterilizing the deepest slashes with rubbing alcohol and sewing them with stitching thread to prevent his friend from losing any more blood. It wasn’t the neatest or most sanitary work, way less than Ty deserved, but it was the best he could offer under the circumstances. Shame exhaled and threw open the door. He hopped down from the cab, his boots biting into the hard-packed snow under his feet. Though he wanted to carry Ty in, out of the cold, he needed to prepare Gail for what she was about to see. It wouldn’t be fair to throw her in the middle of what was happening without some sort of explanation. Leaving Ty in the idling truck, he walked up the front porch steps and reached for the door. His hand wrapped around the brass doorknob and turned. The knob didn’t budge; it was locked. Odd. Why would Gail lock the door? It wasn’t that late, only about half past eight, so she shouldn’t have gone to bed yet. He was used to her waiting up for him. Of course he hadn’t been getting in quite this late, but still. Pulling out his trusty pocketknife, he jimmied the lock and slipped quietly into the dark interior of the house, already beginning to secondguess himself. Maybe she had gone to bed. If so, it was probably for the best. He would be able to get Ty into the house and cleaned up before


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she awoke and started asking questions. A pang of disappointment hit him, knowing she’d gone to bed without him. Shame made his way easily through the unlit rooms until he stood in the open doorway of Gail’s bedroom. The bed was empty, the cover’s still mussed from the night before. If she wasn’t in bed, where was she? The house was as dark as a tomb, not a single light on. Was it possible that she’d gone out for the evening? No, he thought he remembered seeing her vehicle in the driveway. He walked back to the front of the house to make sure it was there. Sure enough, when he pulled back the drapes in the living room, there was her car. His brow broke out in a nervous sweat as he retraced his steps through the house, looking for some clue as to where she was. He flipped on the light in the kitchen. An untouched meal sat on the table. The candles for what was obviously a romantic dinner for two had burnt out long before. Both plates on either side of the table were clean, unused. He quickly went back to her bedroom and turned on the light, hoping she’d left a note on the bed where he was sure to find it. She hadn’t. Panic clawed at his gut as his feet ate up the rest of the small house. Had Tremaine figured out where he was staying? Had he sent someone after Gail while Shame had been out conducting surveillance on his house? What the fuck would he do if he couldn’t find her? Shame entered the last room in the house, one he hadn’t been inside before and had assumed was a guest bedroom. He let out the breath he’d been holding as soon as he saw Gail. Sound asleep, she was curled on top of a large oak sleigh bed, her arms wrapped tightly around a silly yellow duck-shaped pillow. Relief surged over him in waves. She was

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okay. Gail was here, safe and secure. The bands around his heart eased up, no longer trying to squeeze the breath out of him. God, he didn’t know what he would have done if… No. He wouldn’t think about the what-ifs. Nothing had happened and she was fine. There was no sense in borrowing trouble when he already had enough on his plate. He strode up to the bed and sat upon the edge, content just to stare at her. She appeared so sweet and innocent when she slept. Not a night he’d stayed with her had passed without him taking the time to watch her in repose. It was a fanciful waste of time, but he couldn’t help himself. This one small woman was beginning to be an addiction he feared he’d never get his fill of. Leaving her to sleep, Shame trudged back outside to get Ty. He didn’t want to leave his friend for any longer than he had to. It was cold, and though Gail had few neighbors, he didn’t want to take the chance on anyone spotting Ty in his truck. The last thing they needed was for their temporary hideaway to be discovered. Not to mention that being caught there would put Gail in danger as well. Though he hated the thought of leaving her and the safe haven her home had come to represent, it was exactly what he was going to have to do as soon as Ty was up and about. They would have to find somewhere else to stay until Ty recovered and they could finish what they’d come to town for in the first place. Shame could take care of things himself, and would if it came down to it, but he knew his friend would be chomping at the bit for payback as soon as he felt like himself again. Knowing from personal experience how much vengeance meant to someone, Shame didn’t want to take the chance to avenge his sister’s death away from his friend unless worse came to worse and he had to.


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Shame gingerly carried Ty into the house. Not knowing where else to put him, he took him into Gail’s bedroom and laid him out on the bed while he went into her bathroom to dig up some first-aid supplies. He’d gone through everything he kept in the truck, and was still in need of antibiotic ointment and dressings to put over what he’d already sutured. With the most grave of Ty’s injuries taken care of, Shame’s biggest worry was infection setting in to the wounds. When he came back, less than a minute later, he found Gail standing over Ty, the look on her face a mixture of compassion and horror. He cleared his throat, catching her attention, and she looked his way, her luminous blue eyes full of questions. He nodded toward the kitchen, silently asking her to follow him. Gail stared at Shame’s back as she trailed behind him into the kitchen. She had a brief moment to wonder who the man in her bedroom was, before they entered the kitchen and she was faced with her own stupidity. Seeing the evidence of her pathetic attempt at seduction still lying out on the table for all to see made her insides jump and writhe in discomfort. Did he see how pitiful she was? Realize what she’d had in mind for the evening he’d just stood her up for? Shame pulled out one of the chairs and straddled it, his mesmerizing green eyes watching her closely. She followed suit. So many questions floated around unanswered in her head. Since she didn’t know where to begin or what to ask first, she chose to remain quiet. He could start the conversation and she would go from there. “Do you remember the guy I checked in with at the motel?” Oh, yeah. She remembered the sexy Indian guy he’d checked in with. There was no way she could forget anyone that attractive. “Yeah. Why?” 98


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“That’s who’s in your bed. Ty. The same man you saw me with at the motel.” Gail frowned. “But how can that be the same man. He looks twenty pounds lighter and he’s almost bald. The guy you checked in with…” Gail’s mind wrapped around what he was saying. Her gaze darted in the direction of her room before swinging back to Shame. “Sweet Jesus, Shame, what happened to him? He looks like someone put him through a meat grinder.” She noticed him swallow and take a deep breath, as if he was preparing for her to get hysterical. “Do you believe in the paranormal?” If he only knew… “What do you mean, like little green men and flying saucers?” Shame’s lips tilted up at the corners in a wry grin. “No, not exactly. I just mean, do you believe that there are some things that exist that people don’t readily know or accept as being fact?” She tapped her fingernail against the table. She chewed on her bottom lip, trying to figure out where he was going with his spiel. Had he found out about her? Was that where this was going? “What does that have to do with anything?” “In a word, everything. The paranormal has everything to do with why Ty’s in the shape he’s in.” He took an exasperated, deep breath and blew it out. He leaned forward, his serious gaze meeting hers. The look on his face was so severe it made her nervous about what he had to say. “There are things I need to tell you. Things you need to know. Before I do, though, I need to know that I can trust you, that what I tell you won’t leave this room.” Gail nodded. “Of course, Shame, you can trust me. You should already know that.”


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“I know, darlin’, it’s just that I need you to understand how important it is that none of what I tell you slips out, to anyone. Your safety depends on it.” He looked at her hard, his gaze burning into hers as if he could see right into her soul. After a moment he looked away, his hands raking through his tousled hair. “Shit. I don’t know where to start.” “How about at the beginning?” Shame shook his head. “It’s a long story, Gail.” “That’s all right. It’s not like I’m going anywhere.” And she wanted to learn all she could about the man she was head over heels in love with, she silently added. “Okay. I’ll try to make this as short as I can. I really need to take care of Ty and see if I can’t get him to eat or drink a little something.” His jaw tightened and the expression on his face turned grim. “God only knows the last time he had anything in his stomach.” “Guess you had better get to it then, huh?” Shame’s head snapped around at the firm tone of her voice. “Yeah. I guess so.” Gail didn’t want to sound so adamant that he get on with it, but her patience was running short and from the look of the man in her bed, he needed attention now, not in a little while. She waited while Shame seemed to collect his thoughts. He squirmed around on his chair for a minute before finally speaking, his attention glued on a spot above her head. “You know I had a daughter. Sophie.” She nodded, afraid that if she spoke he would clam up like he had every other time she’d tried to talk to him about anything involving his life. Over the few days they’d spent together—what time they weren’t busy in bed—he’d been very closemouthed about his past. All she’d managed to garner was that at some point he’d been in the army, he had 100


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a daughter who’d passed away, and he was apparently in town investigating something or someone. The last tidbit made her assume he was a private investigator or possibly a bounty hunter. She hadn’t asked and he hadn’t offered to explain himself when he’d made an offhand comment about being close to locating some man he was looking for. It wasn’t much, but it was all she knew. Shame took another deep breath and exhaled. “My daughter Sophie and Maria, my wife, were murdered about seven months ago.” Gail gasped. “Oh my God, Shame. I’m so sorry.” He waved away her concern before continuing. “I hadn’t seen them for close to seven years when they died. I stayed away from them, and let them think I was dead.” Confused, she shook her head. “But, why would they…?” “I’m sorry, I’m confusing you. Let me try to start at the beginning, okay? I’ll try to give you just the bare bones so that we won’t be in here talking all night.” She gave a slight nod. “At eighteen, I enlisted in the army. My home life was a crapshoot and I was determined to make something of myself, so I thought going into the service would be the way to do that. “In the second year of my first tour I met Maria. I was on leave down in Florida, which is where she’s from. We met in a nightclub and hit it off right away. It wasn’t long until we were spending all my breaks together. “Before long she got pregnant and I proposed. Even though I wasn’t really ready for marriage or fatherhood, I was happy about the baby and so was Maria. We decided that I would commit to one more tour of service, the enlistment bonus would be used to put a down payment on a small house for us, and then after the second tour I would retire and


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maybe go into law enforcement like a lot of other retired military men do.” He sighed and ran a big palm over his face. “So, I signed up for the second tour and we bought the house. Maria had the baby, a little girl we named Sophie Marie and life was good. Near the end of the tour, about a month or two into my last six-month stint, my troop was out patrolling the area and was ambushed by local renegades. I was shot twice in the stomach and pretty much left to rot on the ground while the gunfire roared all around me. “When I came to, I was in what I thought was a hospital. It wasn’t. I learned later on that while I was technically still alive, I’d been classified as legally dead and shipped to a scientific research lab instead of home like I should have been. “The lab was under some secret government jurisdiction. The scientists there replaced my damaged organs—my liver, stomach, spleen—with cloned human organs. That’s what they specialized in, that and the shitload of chemicals they pumped into me to make me stronger and faster than normal. Requirements I was going to need for what they had in store for me.” Her mind spinning, Gail forgot she hadn’t wanted to interrupt and said what was on her mind. “Wait a minute, I think you lost me at the being dead part.” Shame cocked an eyebrow at her. “I said I was legally dead, not really dead. I’m sure if I’d been left much longer without medical treatment I would’ve been though.” “Oh…um, okay.” Her gaze drifted down to his chest, lingering there as she watched the way it rose and fell with each breath he took. He cleared his throat and she pulled her gaze back up to his, embarrassed to have been caught ogling him when he was in the middle of telling her 102


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something so important. “Sorry,” she muttered, “finish what you were saying.” “So anyway, for the next six years I worked for the SCS and was forced to let Maria and Sophie believe I was killed in action. You can’t imagine what it was like to…” Shame’s voice trailed off and he seemed to withdraw into himself before he rose his head and his haunted gaze met her concerned one. “I would still be under their control, no better than a damn puppet, if my partner, Tristan, hadn’t included me in his plans to escape. We faked our deaths a second time, with the help of our commander, and managed to regain our freedom. As soon as the deed was done, and the SCS believed we were both dead, I stole a car and headed south, back to Florida and my family.” Gail raised her hand, her palm facing up. “Stop for just a second, Shame. I think I need a drink before you say anymore.” She stood and walked over to the fridge, opening the door. “I have some beer, if you want one,” she said, pulling out one longneck for herself. Shame nodded, so she grabbed another for him before shutting the door and joining him back at the table. After taking a long pull on her beer, she looked back at him expectantly. “So you were on your way home…?” “Yeah. I, um, reached the house in the middle of the night. I had thought about waiting until morning—it was only a few hours away—but decided against it. I rang the bell and waited. After a while, when no one came to the door, I started to get nervous and let myself into the house.” Shame shuddered, like he was reliving what happened right in front of her. “I found them both in the living room, on the floor.” He swallowed. “Their throats were ripped out.”


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His tormented green eyes met hers. “I asked you if you believed in the paranormal because a vampire killed my wife and daughter, Gail.” She felt her eyes go wide in response to what he’d said and the flat way he’d blurted it out. “I’m sorry, Shame, I’m confused. A vampire? How do you know it was a vampire?” Equal measures of sympathy and impatience crossed over his rugged features. “I’m sorry, I’m explaining this ass-backwards. SCS, the agency I worked for, is short for Supernatural Control Squad. My job was to hunt down the bad elements—the ones that thought of humans as their own personal Happy Meal—in the supernatural culture and take them out.” “Take them out?” she squeaked. “You know—take them out, kill ’em. It stands to reason that I’ve made quite a few enemies over the years. What I don’t know is how they connected me with my family. I’ve never been able to figure out that part of the equation.” He sighed, the deep exhalation sounded tired and sorrowful. “I’ve spent the last six months interrogating one deviant after another, beating information out of people, so that I could hunt down the bastard responsible, and today I finally found him.” Dread crept down Gail’s spine and insinuated itself into the pit of her stomach. The light behind Shame’s eyes had grown hard, fanatical. “What do you mean you found him today? You mean here, in town?” “Yeah. He owns a big-ass house on the outskirts of town.” She sat forward, trying her hardest to project a calm, bland interest. It was a small town. Chances were good that she knew exactly who he was talking about. If that were the case, she was in trouble. Big trouble. “Who is he?” Shame leaned forward and patted her hand where it laid on top of the table. She knew he meant to be comforting. There was no way he could know that he’d just managed to turn her world upside down. 104


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“Lucian Tremaine. Do you know him?” “No,” she answered, casting a glance down at his hand atop hers. It wasn’t technically a lie. She’d never met the man, though she’d heard his name more than once. It was impossible not to hear about someone as feared as Tremaine while they shared the same small town. “Good. That’s good. I’ve placed you in enough danger as it is just by staying here. I made sure that I wasn’t being followed before I came back tonight, but I’m going to have to move on soon. The longer we’re here, the more jeopardy is being placed on you.” She opened her mouth to tell him he didn’t have to leave, that she wanted him to stay, but he shushed her before she could get the words out. “Don’t worry, darlin’, as soon as Ty’s able to get around on his own, we’ll get out of your hair. If you think I’m insane and want me to leave now, I will. All you have to do is say the word and I’m gone.” She shook her head. Before she had a chance to think about the ramifications of what she was going to say, the words tumbled out of her mouth. “Don’t be silly. Of course I’m not going to kick you out.” “Thanks, Gail. I appreciate your letting me keep Ty here until he’s recuperated a little. It would have been impossible to be inconspicuous with his being banged up the way he is.” “That’s me, good ole reliable Gail,” she whispered under her breath, more to herself than to him. “What?” “Nothing,” she stalled while she tried to think of something to ask. “I’m just wondering what Ty has to do with any of this.” “Sorry, I guess I left out that part.” He took a deep breath, his chest slowly rising and then falling. “After I found Maria and Sophie I guess I kind of snapped. I don’t remember a whole lot about the days right www.samhainpublishing.com

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afterward. Actually, I don’t remember anything. Not until I was standing outside of this club in Miami. Jazzer’s. One of the better-known hotspots for the creatures out looking for their next bite. “So, there I’m standing, piss drunk, getting ready to go into this bar, when this tall, skinny Native American comes barreling into me and knocks me off my feet. My ass hit the pavement, and then just nothing. I guess I blacked out. When I came to I was lying on a couch and he was standing over me, just kind of looking down at me all curious-like. “I didn’t know what the hell was going on, so I jumped up and attacked him. He retaliated—the bastard has a hell of a left hook—and managed to knock my ass out.” Shame smiled. “When I woke up, I figured out where I was and decided to repay the favor by slugging him back. After beating up on each other, and realizing neither one of us planned to back down, we gave up and called it a draw. I demanded to know what the hell was going on, and he told me. Said that he’d seen me stumbling around outside the club, a hell-bent expression on my face, and knew that if he didn’t step in and do something that he was going to be seeing my ugly mug on the six o’clock news the next night. He was right. Nothing good would have come from my entering that place in the state I was in. I would have wound up dead or wishing that I was. Either way, I figured I owed him. “We had a good, long conversation and it turned out we had a lot in common. His sister was attacked by a lycan. She came home, out-of-hermind crazy and attacked the rest of his family. Before he knew what was happening she’d killed half the family. He had to kill his own sister to keep her from murdering the surviving half.” “Jesus,” she muttered. What would it be like to be forced into killing someone you love in order to prevent the deaths of more of your loved ones? It was too terrible a thought to contemplate. 106


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“Since we were both trying to do the same thing, and we’d hit it off pretty well by that time, we decided to stick together and help each other out. We’ve been together ever since. “Until about a month ago we were drawing a dead end on both our suspects. Mine was nowhere to be found. No matter how many favors I called in, or how many snitches I beat information out of, we couldn’t get a bead on where he was. It was like he’d disappeared into thin air. Ty’s was another story. We had a good idea of the general vicinity of where to look but hit a brick wall every time we tried to pinpoint the location down to a specific area. Then we came across an Internet trail. Seems our guy was stupid enough to set up an email account in his real name. We tracked it to a small town in Virginia, this town. “Not sure what to do next, but unwilling to sit around with our thumbs up our butt doing nothing, we got in the truck and drove up here. We figured that once we were here we could scout the town, keep our eyes and ears open and eventually be led right to him. Unfortunately, that damn snowstorm hit and we had to postpone our search until it broke. So, as you already know, we stopped and got a room at the motel. Ty disappeared right after I came up to the lobby to talk to you. At first I thought that he was giving me some space in case I scored with you.” She couldn’t help but smile at the way he phrased his words. “In case you scored, huh?” “Yeah.” He grinned, but the smile quickly slid off his face as he continued. “When Ty didn’t show up the next day it became clear that he wasn’t going to. I stuck around for a little longer, praying that I was wrong and that he was off on his own doing something and would show up. After it sunk in that he wasn’t coming back, I checked out of the motel and started looking for him.”


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She frowned. “You told me the name of the vampire you’re looking for, but who is Ty searching for?” “That’s the best part. From the look of things, we may be able to get both of them in one fell swoop. Turns out the guy Ty’s looking for is working for the man I’m after.” Exasperated, she sighed. “Yeah, I got that part, but what’s his name?” “Oh, um, sorry… The lycan who attacked Ty’s sister is named Kenze, Kenze Wright. Does that name ring a bell to you?” Gail pasted a smile on her face. Underneath it, her heart, her very soul, was being crushed to smithereens. “Nope, sure doesn’t.”

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Chapter Eight

Gail was on information overload. She’d long since schooled her features into a polite mask and the skin over her cheeks was beginning to feel stiff and uncomfortable from holding the same expression. How did he expect her to react to what he was saying? Was he able to see beneath her facade to the mass of raw nerves underneath? No. Looking at him, seeing the haunted quality in his eyes, the fanatical glow of promised retribution, she was sure he didn’t see anything beyond his own thoughts and feelings at the moment. Should she pretend not to believe him? Someone who didn’t already know about the supernatural population may have reacted that way. She, however, already knew plenty. Hell, she was one of them. Albeit more of a latent member than a full-fledged one. Thankfully, Shame had no idea about her connection to Kenze. If he’d known that she was his twin sister then he obviously wouldn’t be spilling his guts to her about wanting to kill him, even if they had been estranged for over eight years. For that matter, her home was the last place he would have come for safe harbor while he planned the best way to slaughter her only living relative. That would just be stupid and the one thing she could say about Shame Long was that he was a smart man. Being such a smart man, it was only a matter of time before he put two and two together and figured out the connection. Wright was a


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common last name, but it wasn’t that common. Shoot, maybe the man didn’t even remember what her last name was. A tremble ran down her spine and echoed out through her arms and legs. What should she do? She couldn’t sit by and let him kill her brother, no matter what he was being accused of. The truth was, she wasn’t entirely sure Kenze would even see her, much less take her warning seriously. When he left home, Kenze swore he was washing his hands of both her and their mom. He couldn’t understand why they didn’t embrace the culture that could have been theirs. What they never could get him to see was that they were happy with the quiet life they led. Gail had inherited very few traits from their lycan father and their mom was one hundred percent human. Neither one of them felt their supernatural connections were all that strong. Kenze was a full shifter. Though he was her twin, they couldn’t have been any more opposite. Other than their father’s blue eyes, they looked nothing alike. Kenze was dark headed, his hair almost blue black, and tall, while she was short and blonde. Their personalities were even more divided. Where she was shy and reserved, he was wild and daring. Gail swallowed another sip of her beer, the foam in the bottom leaving a nasty taste in her mouth, and got up to get a soda instead. Manners ingrained since birth, she turned and asked Shame if he cared for another as well. He just shook his head and stared out the window behind her, lost in whatever it was he was thinking. She was glad for the reprieve. Being under his scrutiny, faking a blasé attitude that was as far from how she really felt as you could get, was tiring. Attempting to figure out what he was thinking, without even taking into consideration her own choppy thought process, was exhausting.

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He honestly thought that all supernatural beings were evil and up to no good. That would have been funny if it weren’t so sad. Just like any other species, the lycan community possessed good and bad. They weren’t inherently evil, only different. She wondered if she should try to explain that to him, then dismissed the notion. After what he’d seen, the crime perpetrated against his family, he wouldn’t be willing to hear her out. In his quest for blood, there wasn’t any way she could entrust him with her secret. That left only one option; she had to contact Kenze. Even without Shame’s divulgation, she knew where he was. She’d sensed him as soon as he’d come back to town a little over a year before. At the time, the only thing that had kept her from going to him and rebuilding the bonds of family was his acceptance of a position under Lucian Tremaine. That and his not coming home when their mom was sick and dying. She loved Kenze, but she didn’t think she would ever be able to forgive him for that. The position with Tremaine was easily rectified. She would just explain to him what had happened, the extent of Tremaine’s corruption, and he would resign. The Kenze she knew, though misguided, would never work for such a ruthless tyrant if he was aware of what the man was doing. As far as the other, Shame’s claim that Kenze had attacked an innocent woman, she didn’t buy it. There must have been a mistake. She couldn’t believe that Kenze would have succumbed to his darker nature. Shame was confusing him with someone else. He had to be. She felt like banging her head against the wall. Maybe if she did it hard enough, she would be able to knock some sense into herself, find the answers she needed. Jesus, why couldn’t she ever do anything the easy way? It seemed like everything she tried to do ended up getting screwed up. “Shame?” www.samhainpublishing.com

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He glanced back at her. “Hmm?” “How did you find Ty?” “He was at Tremaine’s mansion. I snuck in to see what I could find out and found him in the basement, being tortured.” She didn’t want to ask, yet knew she had to. “Who was doing the torturing?” “I don’t know, some vampire flunky. It doesn’t really matter. I dusted his ass before I left.” Well, at least it hadn’t been her brother. That small tidbit gave her a strong sense of relief. “Oh.” Shame turned, facing her head-on. “The sick bastards were torturing him, trying to get information out of him. Information about me—where I was, what I was doing.” His voice grew deathly quiet, all the more intense for its soft quality. “They want me, they’re going to get me. They’ll pay for what they’ve done to our families and to Ty. By the time I’m done with them, they’ll wish their soulless, filthy asses were already in hell where they fuckin’ belong.” She winced. She couldn’t help it, couldn’t hide the response from him. With his big hands cupped into fists and his eyes blazing with retribution, he scared her. She wanted to believe that he wouldn’t hurt her, that he cared, but when it came down to it, she knew better. He was on a mission to eradicate those of her kind, and once he found out, if he found out, that would include her as well. Shame walked across the room and took her in his arms, trying to comfort her. Selfishly, she wallowed in his embrace, let him try to soothe away the ache she felt knowing she’d already lost him. “I’m sorry, darlin’. I didn’t mean to scare you. Sometimes I forget that not everyone knows about all the things I’ve divulged to you today. Thank you for listening, for believing me. Your trust means more to me 112


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than I could ever say.” He kissed her forehead, his lips gently brushing over her skin. Guilt rushed over her, fast and heavy. “Shame, I…” Her words tapered off when she realized that she couldn’t tell him. He would hate her. “Don’t worry, darlin’, as soon as Ty is up and moving around, we’ll leave. I probably wouldn’t have been able to stay much longer anyway. Now that I know what we’re up against, I want to get out of here faster. There’s no way I would stick around and put you in any more danger than I already have.” He pulled away from her and she felt the band around her heart squeeze tight. Of all the people for her to fall for, why did it have to be him? A man who would despise her once he found out about her heritage? Forcing herself to move, she shrugged out of his arms. “You should probably go take care of Ty.” “Yeah,” he said with a nod. “You’re right. The sooner we get him well, the sooner we can hit the pavement.” He patted her on the shoulder and stepped past her, like she was his good buddy instead of the woman he’d spent the last week making love to, and walked out of the room. She blinked back the tears threatening to escape and took several slow, deep breaths. She wasn’t going to cry, damn it! When she managed to regain her composure, she hurried to the bathroom and pulled the door shut, locking it. If he was in such a hurry to be away from her, then she would see to it that he was on his way as fast as possible. The sooner he was gone, the faster she could begin mending her bruised heart and put him behind her.


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She wiped her damp palms off on the slick fabric of her skirt. She may not have inherited the full shape-shifter gene from her father like Kenze had, but she did possess some of the perks that being a lycan engendered. An unnaturally good sense of smell and sight, the ability to sense others of her kinds, plus advanced regeneration, made her slightly more than human. It was the latter trait that would come in handy for her tonight. Yanking open one drawer after another beneath the sink, Gail dug up a small container and tube of antibiotic salve. After dumping the cotton balls out of the flip-top container, she squeezed the entire tube of milkylooking cream into it. Casting a glance around the room, she searched for something to cut herself with. She wasn’t about to go back into the kitchen to get a knife. There was no way she could explain taking a knife into the bathroom with her if she was caught on her way back with it. The pink razor in the shower caught her eye. It would have to do. Grabbing it off the shelf, she glanced down at the triple-blade end and shuddered. This was going to hurt. Holding her breath, she held out her finger over the sink and—before she could change her mind—arched the razor over the tip of her index finger. It sliced into the meaty pad. With a muffled grunt of pain, she looked down at what she’d done. Blood welled up from the cut, spilling over the sides. Crimson dots littered the white sink like morbid, gruesome confetti. Before the wound could heal, she dipped her finger into the salve and stirred. The milky salve turned a faint pink color. Pulling her finger free, she saw that the minor cut had already finished knitting itself shut. Satisfied, she closed the lid on the container.

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She washed and dried her hands, scrubbing the sink of any wayward crimson drops, before opening the locked door and walking out into the hallway. XW Leaning over Ty, Shame wiped away the last of the blood and muck from his gaunt face. Usually thin and razor sharp, the angles of his face looked even more severe with his bones jutting unnaturally through his olive-toned skin. Red-tinted, puffy bags of flesh ringed Ty’s eyes, giving them a sunken appearance. Shame knew without having to see them that his eyes would be bloodshot as well, a side effect of being severely dehydrated. Since it was virtually impossible for the body to survive without water for more than a few days, they must have given him something to keep his organs functioning. Shame was sure that what little water Ty had received had been few and far between. His fingers balled into fists of their own volition. Unholy rage pumped through Shame’s system, making him want to punch something, tear something apart with his bare hands. It was obvious Ty hadn’t been fed the entire time he’d been held captive. Ty cried out in his sleep, his dreams tormented by God only knew what. Shame perched on the side of the bed, hoping Ty could feel his presence beside him. “Don’t worry, buddy. Everything is going to be okay now. We’ll make the bastards pay for what they did to you…” He ran his hand over Ty’s shorn scalp, then glanced down at the festering welts covering his torso and upper thighs. “…for everything they’ve done.” A scuttling noise had him pulling his head up and glancing at the door. Gail stood on the threshold, her eyes wide as her gaze raked over


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the havoc that had been wrought to Ty’s body. “My God,” she whispered, walking over to his side. “What would leave marks like that on someone?” Shame chose not to answer her question. He figured she didn’t really want to hear the answer anyway. “So”—he nodded toward the small pot of pink goop she held in her hand—“what have you got there?” “Oh, this?” She held the container out to him. “This is just some salve for his wounds. It’s an old family remedy. I thought you might be able to use it.” Warmth bloomed inside his chest at her thoughtful gesture. “Thank you.” He accepted it from her and popped back the lid, sniffing the contents. It just smelled like regular old ointment to him. “What’s in it?” “Not much, really. A little of this and that.” She smiled at him. “I could tell you the exact ingredients, but then it wouldn’t be a secret family remedy anymore, would it?” Something about her smile didn’t sit well with him. It didn’t quite reach her eyes. Assuming that she was just trying to hold herself together in light of everything he’d told her and seeing Ty as he was, Shame shoved away his suspicions and smiled back at her. “I guess I’ll just have to trust that you didn’t put anything poisonous in this stuff,” he joked. Gail blanched. “No, of course not.” She reached out and jerked the container out of his hands, backing up into the doorway. “I only wanted to help.” “Jeez, Gail, calm down.” Shame stood and walked toward her, pulling her to him. She trembled in his arms. “I was only picking at you, darlin’. I know I can trust you.” He rubbed his cheek against her hair, inhaling the light floral fragrance of her shampoo. “I would never intentionally hurt either one of you, Shame. You have to believe that.” 116


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“I do, darlin’. Now, how about you give me back that special family remedy of yours for Ty, and go get yourself some rest.” He pressed a quick kiss to her lips and stepped away, the temptation to deepen it, take it further, riding hard on his back. “I’m going to stay here and watch over Ty, maybe see if I can get him to eat or drink something in a little while. I don’t want him to wake up later and freak out when he doesn’t recognize his surroundings.” “Oh, I thought you would… I guess I hadn’t really thought of that.” She sucked her bottom lip into her mouth and bit on it. His cock lifted its head, anxious for her to nibble on him like she was doing to that full lip of hers. Shame reminded himself that he was leaving, he’d already told Gail. It wouldn’t be fair to tell her he was leaving in one breath and ask her to fuck him with the next. There would be no more sex. Besides, he consoled himself, there were much more important things that needed his attention. Like Ty and how they were going to advance with their plans now that the element of surprise was gone. Though the long night ahead would be well spent, by taking care of his friend and plotting revenge, it was cold comfort to his horny dick. “I guess I’ll go sleep in the other room then. Um…if you want to—” Shame cut her off. If she was going to offer what he thought she was, namely him joining her in bed later, he wasn’t sure he could turn her down. Hell, he knew he couldn’t. “I’ll be fine in here. If I get too sleepy, I can always bunk down on the floor. It’s not a big deal.” He watched her walk down the hall, her hips swaying slightly with each step. He didn’t know if she was trying to torment him or if he’d just never noticed how sexy her ass was before. It could have been the slinky black skirt she wore that made him want to rip off all her clothes and


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ram his dick into her, but he doubted it. It was the woman beneath the clothes that did it for him. His mind quickly assimilated a few different things at once. She now wore a skirt, when he’d never seen her in anything other than pants and there were candles and an untouched dinner sitting in the middle of the kitchen table. Shit. She’d made them a romantic dinner, had even dressed up for him, and he had stood her up. It may not have been entirely his fault but he still felt like an ass. He hadn’t even noticed anything different until just then. He took two steps toward her closed door and stopped. What the hell was he doing? Like an apology would make up for all the trouble he’d caused her. He made a sharp one-eighty in the hallway and marched back into the room with Ty. She was a good woman, with a big heart. She deserved better than him and all the baggage he carried. He would be doing her a favor by leaving.

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Chapter Nine

Gail huddled under the covers atop her mom’s bed, her knees pulled up toward her stomach. After many hours of speculation, she’d finally made peace with what she planned to do come morning. Only one other thing kept her awake. Shame. Lingering guilt over betraying his trust ate at her, and not in a good way. She felt terrible, but what could she do? She couldn’t let them murder Kenze. Even if he was the man Shame made him out to be, though she couldn’t fathom her twin being capable of such evil, he was still her flesh and blood. She had to do what she could to protect him. In exchange for the warning, she planned to extract a promise from Kenze that no harm would come to Shame or Ty. It would be easiest for everyone involved if Kenze took her advice and skipped town. After all, it wasn’t like he hadn’t done it before. Gail flopped over onto her back and stared up at the ceiling. Who was she kidding? Not having Shame in bed beside her, as she’d grown accustomed to, was half the reason she couldn’t fall asleep. While his decision to stay with Ty was the responsible one, and made her love him all the more for his kind heart, it nagged at her. He was leaving. He knew it. She knew it. Unlike him, she just knew the exact date and time. As soon as he awoke in the morning and went to check on Ty, noticed that his friend’s wounds were completely healed, they would be gone. Her not being there to answer their questions after the discovery would cement it.


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Though she would’ve liked to have been a fly on the wall to see their reaction, she couldn’t afford to stick around and face his wrath when he discovered what she’d done. Telling him who she was, what she was, would make him despise her. Seeing the hatred and suspicion grow behind his beautiful green eyes, the same set that had looked at her all week with passion and tenderness, would be too much. She couldn’t face it. Running was the coward’s way out, and she was ashamed of herself for it, but she had to save some minuscule part of her battered heart for later. Facing Shame’s disgust would kill what little of it remained intact. It was going to be a struggle readjusting to the loneliness she’d grown accustomed to over the last few years, but she would manage. Much like everything else happening to her, the choice would be out of her hands. This was their last night under the same roof together. In a few short hours, the sun would rise above the horizon, and her time with Shame would be over. He was going to leave and never look back. If he did take the time to think back to the week they shared, it would be with anger, not the budding love she would carry with her. If only… She sat up, threw the covers off and swung her legs over the side of the bed. Was it asking too much to make one more memory to carry her through the lonely nights ahead? She didn’t think so. Her feet hit the icy wood floor and sent a cold shiver up her legs. She could go to him and they could make love one last time, before her fate was sealed. It wouldn’t mean anything to him. One more fuck in a random string of them. But to her it would mean everything. She crept down the hall and entered her bedroom. Although the room was dark, her enhanced vision had little trouble making out what was

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what. She wove her way around furniture, searching for Shame’s outline amid the other shadows. Stepping deeper into the room, she stubbed her toe on the corner of the bed. A whimper escaped her lips but she swallowed back the four letter word that wanted to follow. Hopping on one foot, she lost her balance and tipped forward. Her arms flailed out in front of her, trying to regain her equilibrium. She fell face first onto a firm body laying on the floor beside the bed. She inhaled the unmistakable aroma of male heat and spicy cologne. Shame’s hard chest was beneath her head, the rest of her body spread akimbo over his. Being that close to him, feeling his body heat through the thin blanket covering him, made her hormones go wild and her nerve endings tingle in anticipation. Powerful, muscled forearms wrapped around her waist and leveraged her up higher until her weight was centered on his torso, her legs in between his. “Shame,” she whispered, her lips a fraction away from his stubbled jaw. “Shh,” he quietly replied, his hot and humid breath fanning over the shell of her ear. “You don’t want to wake Ty.” Wet heat circled her ear, swirling over the edge. Teeth nipped at the lobe. “What are you doing in here, darlin’?” Lips pressed against her nape and his tongue flicked lightly over her skin. She shivered, imagining that skillful tongue at work, and felt her nipples tighten in anticipation. “I couldn’t sleep,” she murmured, unable to come up with a better excuse now that his arms were holding her close and he was busy inflicting such a delicious assault on her neck. Hands slid from her waist to her behind and fingers dug into her


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buttocks, pressing her down against the tumescent length of his erection. His need for her made her blood boil and her sex flutter with the desire to feel him deep inside her, loving her. At the same time, her brain urged her to take things slow. To drag the pleasure out for as long as possible. “Shame,” she whispered again. “Stop. Let’s go in the other room.” His grip on her grew tighter. The edge of his fingers dipped beneath the short nightshirt she wore and slid right into the crease of her naked buttocks. She heard his breath catch. Since Shame had taken over her bedroom and, at the time, she hadn’t wanted him to see the garter belt and thigh highs she’d still worn from earlier, she’d dug through the old box of her mom’s stuff that she hadn’t yet managed to take to the Goodwill. She’d found a nightshirt to wear to bed, but lacking panties, she had to continue going commando. If the extra inch in length he gained after discovering her pantyless and newly bare mound were any indication, she would say he definitely didn’t seem to mind her lack of underwear in the least. “We’re going to stay right here, darlin’. Ty’s a sound sleeper. If you’re quiet, he’ll never notice a thing.” She lifted her head to look at him, shocked at his suggestion that they make love right there on the floor beside his sleeping friend. “But…” Supple lips feathered over her cheek and the corner of her mouth, teasing her. “Unless you don’t think you’ll be able to control yourself.” He kissed her, quick and gentle. “Maybe you’re worried that you won’t be able to stifle those sexy little whimpers and gasps you make when I’m fucking you.” A devious smile tugged at the corners of her lips. “You sound awfully sure of your abilities, Shame.” She lifted herself up, one hand on either 122


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side of his head, and ground her naked pussy against the granite jut of his penis. His groan egged her on, made her feel brave. “What would you say to a little wager?” Shame came up on his elbows. His mouth strung a line of kisses down the side of her neck. The last one fell into the hollow of her throat. “Like what?” “Simple.” She kissed the tip of his nose and then pulled back before he could take her lips and make her forget what she was saying. “Whoever can make the other moan first gets to choose the way the loser gets them off.” He grinned. Even in the dark, she could see the evil tilt to his sexy lips. “Any way we want?” Gail nodded, forgetting that he couldn’t see as easily in the dark as she could. He moved closer, pulling his body up until she was sitting in his lap, her legs open and wrapped around either side of his waist. His face sank into the valley between her cotton-covered breasts and nuzzled. When his stubbled cheek rubbed over her, abrading her nipple, it sent sparks of fire through her breast. She bit her tongue to keep from moaning. Arms hugged her waist and tugged her up against the solid contours of his body. Since that was exactly where she wanted to be, she let him move her where he wanted without complaint. Only the thin blanket bunched over his lap and her nightshirt separated their bodies. Even that little material was too much. Reaching down, she grasped the hem of her shirt and yanked it up and over her head. Cold air splashed against her feverish skin, sending goose bumps racing up and down her naked body. Seeking his touch as well as his heat, she wound her arms around Shame’s neck and guided his face


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back to her breasts. She wanted his mouth on her nipples, his cock inside her, fucking her. Shame chuckled, resisting her pull on his hair. His hands gripped her bottom, forcing apart her cheeks. She tensed when his fingertips skimmed over the nerve-rich entrance to her ass. “About this game of yours,” he said quietly. “What if I said that I wanted my prize to be fucking your tight little ass? Would you let me?” Her mind said no, but her body was saying a definite maybe. She’d never really considered anal sex. It had always sounded so dirty and sordid. Now, with Shame, she found the idea intriguing. Images of him behind her, his cock slipping in and out of her ass, filled her mind and taunted her with possibilities. Her nipples peaked and began to ache. A fresh rush of moisture slipped from her vagina to coat the lips of her sex. Who better than Shame, the man she loved, to initiate her into such an intimate sexual experience. She trusted him not to hurt her, to make sure it was as good for her as it was for him. The more she thought about it, the better it sounded. She may not have been able to give him her vaginal virginity, but she could give him this. He could be the one and only person to take her anally. Her cheeks heated. Once again, she was thankful for the cover of darkness that masked her responses. “I would stand by our bet, no matter what you wanted. I expect you to do the same.” “Darlin’, there isn’t anything you could ask me to do that I wouldn’t find pleasure in.” “I guess we’ll see about that, when I win,” she teased. “Mm hmm,” he muttered, his mouth trailing over the delicate outer curve of her breast. “We’ll see who starts moaning first. I can guarantee it isn’t going to be me.” 124


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He moved inward, his mouth circling around and around her nipple but never quite touching the taut peak. She squirmed in his lap. Her legs squeezed his hips tighter, trying to relieve the insistent, itchy ache he was causing in her cunt. The scratchy blanket between them abraded the tender lips of her sex, frustrating her more. His tongue traced over the edges of her areola, followed by the wrinkled skin directly around her needy nipple. Almost at the point of begging him to get on with it, she bit her lip and held on longer. She arched her back, lifting her breasts higher. Come on, damn it! Suck them. Shame continued to lick and tease, skirting her nipple. When she was ready to yell, couldn’t hold her silence a second longer, he looked up at her from underneath his heavy lids, flicked the tip of his tongue over her nipple and winked at her. Conceited ass. His cockiness made her that much more determined to torture him every bit as much as he was her. Oh, she knew it was only a matter of time before she forgot all about their stupid bet, gave in and started moaning, but in the meantime, she wanted to give as good as she got. Make Shame earn his reward for winning. While he set about trying to drive her insane with slow, short tongue laps over one swollen nipple and then the other, she thought up a good way to return the favor. Gail grabbed hold of the blanket and tugged. Since she was sitting on it, it didn’t budge an inch. Wiggling from side to side, she worked it out from underneath her and slung it away.


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Before she could work her hand between them and fist his cock the way she wanted, Shame’s hands tightened on her ass and hiked her up, plastering her against his chest. His mouth swooped down and covered hers in a kiss that stole her reason and incinerated her lungs. She threw herself into his kiss. Gave him everything she had. All the love she felt swelled and spilled over into her kiss. Wordlessly, she tried to convey her regrets to him through the press of their lips, through the slow glide of her tongue over his. Shame was the first to pull away. She would have happily spent the rest of her life where she was, in his arms, kissing him like there was no tomorrow. She realized, watching the way his chest rose and fell under the force of his heavy breathing, that for them and their relationship, there really wasn’t a tomorrow. All they had was this. It was with that thought that she finally squeezed a hand between their bodies and fisted the top few inches of his penis. Wanting to stroke him, but unable to manage it, she settled for running her thumb over the sensitive mushroom-shaped cap. A bead of pre-come escaped the slit and wet her thumb. In circles, she swirled it over his head, slicking the wide flare with moisture. Seeing him that way, his cock long and thick, ready between their bodies, made her empty passage beg for her to align their bodies and let him sink inside, fill her, love her once more. It wasn’t easy, but she denied herself. Rather than taking him inside her, she released his cock for a moment, separated her swollen labia and guided his shaft between the wet folds. Satisfied that she had him where she wanted him, Gail wrapped her arms around Shame’s neck. She pressed her lips to his, greedy for the taste of his kiss, and began to rock against him, seeking friction. 126


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Each swivel of her hips sent his penis through her folds and bumped the flared ridge over her clit. She didn’t know who she was torturing more, him or her. To make sure it was the former instead of the latter, she started flexing her kegel muscles. With each flex, the mouth of her vagina fluttered, giving his shaft a wet kiss of its own. Above, Shame took their kiss deeper, his tongue dueling with hers. Their mouths moved in concert, stealing her breath and the ability to think. The grip on her ass tightened. His fingers held still, the tips lingering over her anus, teasing it, as he separated her cheeks and stretched the surrounding skin taut. With a curse that could have been counted as a moan, he ripped his head away from her. In a husky voice that sounded much deeper and ragged than his usual smoky tenor, he said, “Have you ever taken a man back here, darlin’?” “No,” she replied breathlessly, too busy concentrating on the strange sensations shooting through her bottom and the delicious press of his shaft rubbing over her clit to say anything more. One hand let go of her bottom. Fingers dipped down and rimmed her pussy from behind, saturating themselves in moisture. Slowly, he dragged his fingers back up and began to coat her anus with her own wetness. Nervous about what he was going to do, she tensed. “Shame, I…” He kissed the side of her neck. “Don’t worry, darlin’, you’ll like this. I promise.” All of a sudden, she wasn’t so sure. Panting, she closed her eyes and rested her forehead on his shoulder. Shame wouldn’t hurt her. Of that she was sure, but it didn’t ease her trepidation. The tip of one blunt finger massaged her opening, exerting pressure. It bumped against her, and then rubbed over and again, with each pass www.samhainpublishing.com

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growing firmer, more bold. She realized that it was his way of letting her get used to his touching her there. One fingertip breached her anus and slipped the tiniest bit inside. It didn’t hurt like she’d feared, but burned in an odd, foreign way that didn’t quite feel good or bad. It just was. Before she could grow completely comfortable, he slipped it in a little farther, paused, and then pushed it home, stretching her muscles until they ached and tingled. She tried to figure out whether or not she liked the sensation, and came to the conclusion that she didn’t not like it. And then his finger moved, wiggling back and forth in and out of her ass, and she loved it. The tiny bite of pain shot her desire up another notch and reminded her of how empty her pussy felt without him buried inside it. She bit her lip to keep from moaning. Though she enjoyed what he was doing to her with his finger, she wasn’t so sure she was ready to take his huge cock into her the same way. Not when his finger alone had her stretched full to bursting. Shame wouldn’t force her to keep her end of the deal, no matter what they’d agreed on. He wasn’t that kind of man. However, she had no intention of backing down. She would let him fuck her ass, hopefully even be able to enjoy it, but not quite yet. He shifted to the left, in just the right way, and the full length of his cock slid home inside her pussy, filling the emptiness inside her core and stretching the delicate tissues of her sex so good that tears blurred her vision. He took one of her nipples into his mouth, suckled it, and she lost her mind. All she could do was feel. Shame’s mouth at her breast. Shame’s arms around her. Shame’s finger gliding in and out of her ass, while his cock stayed stationary inside her pussy. Her entire world consisted of one man and what he made her feel. Nothing else mattered. 128


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She closed her eyes and gave in to the sensations bombarding her. There were too many. He was coming at her from all sides and directions. One of his hands clutched her bottom, holding her still while he fingered her ass. She felt surrounded by his heat and musk. Everything being done to her felt so good, too good. The hot coil in her stomach began to build. With every stroke, every touch, it wound tighter and tighter. It was too much. She couldn’t hold back. Couldn’t wait any longer. Her head snapped back and she thrust her breasts forward. Shame bit down on her nipple and the dam burst. Her orgasm flashed over her, washing her away on a tide of ecstasy so strong that all she knew, all she felt, were the powerful contractions racking her body and the man she loved holding her tight, keeping her centered so that she didn’t fly apart under the strain of her climax. The first thing she noticed, after her brain stopped spinning and her head cleared, was that Shame was still rigid inside her. “Mmm,” she purred, laying her head on his chest. “That was, without a doubt, the best orgasm I’ve ever had. But you didn’t…?” His hand ran up and down the moist line of her spine. “It’s okay, darlin’. I was enjoying watching you too much to think about myself. You’re so damn beautiful when you come apart in my arms like that.” Gail kissed his shoulder, rubbing her face over the lean line of muscle. She rocked her hips, gyrating on his penis. “Let me help you out with that.” “As good as that feels, I had something a little different in mind.” He wanted her ass. How could she have forgotten that? “All right,” she whispered, “but you have to go slow, okay? And you have to promise to stop if it hurts too much.”


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“Don’t worry, darlin’, I won’t hurt you. You’ll have to trust that I’ll take care of you.” “I trust you, Shame.” She took a nervous swallow. “How do you… What position do you need me in?” His fingers brushed through her hair, combing the wild curls away from her face. “You know, it’s okay if you don’t want to go through with this. We can stay right here, like we are, and have sex the regular way. In fact, now that I’m thinking about it, I kind of like the idea of you riding me like a pogo stick.” He grinned at her and flexed his penis deep inside of her. “We can always get into the kinky stuff next time.” She wanted to laugh and cry all at once. There wasn’t going to be a next time. “No,” she said with a shake of her head. “I want to do it. I want you to take me that way.” Shame’s chest vibrated against hers. “You want me to take you that way, huh? Darlin’, if you can’t even say it, how are you going to do it?” “I can say anything I want to. I choose not to.” “You’re not getting bashful on me all of a sudden, are you, darlin’?” Gail snickered and swatted him on the arm. “Oh, shut up. Quit teasing me.” “But it’s so much fun.” “I’ll show you fun,” she replied, tightening her inner walls around his cock. Shame’s lids lowered. His lips parted as he sucked in air. A grimace crossed his handsome face. “Oh, that was dirty. You’re going to pay for that.” She barely had time to grin before Shame surged up from underneath her, his cock still lodged deep inside, and flipped her effortlessly onto her back.

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The new angle forced his cock deeper, made him feel larger and harder inside her channel, and she couldn’t hold back the breathless moan that escaped her lips at how good he felt. His heavy weight, the chiseled planes of his chest and torso, pressing down into her soft curves felt so good, so right. Their fit was perfect, like he was the missing half of her incomplete body puzzle. Shame buried his face in the curve of her neck. His hips pulled back slowly, dragging the cumbersome length of his cock partway out of her clinging pussy, before plunging back inside her with one long, slow glide. Her hips arched up into his thrust, seeking more. More friction, more of Shame. His hot breath fanned over her skin as he spoke. “I’m sorry, darlin’…” His hips rotated, grinding into her mound. “Can’t wait. Need you…too much…” Snaking her arms around his back, she gripped his tight ass and squeezed, urging him on. “Oh, yes! Take me, Shame. Fuck me.” Firm lips covered hers. His tongue thrust into her mouth at the same time his cock plunged back into her receptive body. Beneath her fingertips his ass hollowed, tensed, and he began a slow and steady rhythm that made her body burn and her heart sing. Every stroke and drag of his rigid cock in her swollen, sensitive cunt fanned the flames of her desire higher, made her soar ever closer to the pinnacle her body struggled to reach. Legs vised tight around his hips, head thrown back, eyes pinched shut, she mouthed the words that rang over and over in her soul, I love you, and prayed for the moment to last forever. As with all good things, she knew their time was rapidly coming to an end. The ball of flames in her stomach expanded, hit supernova and exploded through her body like a shot of liquid ecstasy. Her back bowed and her thighs trembled as her climax ravaged her body. www.samhainpublishing.com

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Above her, as though from far away, she heard Shame cry out, felt the throb of his cock expanding, and the warm, wet splash of his release inside her. Blinking back tears, she opened her eyes and watched the last of his climax roll over him, the final shudders passing through his body as his shoulders slumped in relief. He opened his eyes and looked down at her. For a brief, all-too-short second, she imagined she saw love reflected in his gaze instead of the sexual satiation she knew it to be. Warmth encircled her, filling her heart with joy. He rolled off of her, pulling her up against his side, and reality, like the cold fingers of winter, reclaimed her heart. Beside him, she lay still, listening to the slowing of his pulse until she was sure he was asleep. After one last, long searching glance at his face, she whispered, “I love you,” so silently that even she herself wasn’t sure if she had said the words or merely thought them, and got up and left the room. XW Jesus, his back hurt. It was the first coherent thought Shame had as he woke up on the cold, hard wood floor. He cracked his eyes open and cast a quick glance around him to remind himself where he was. The cream-colored dust ruffle beside his head brought it all back. He was in Gail’s house, in her bedroom, on the floor. The area beside him was empty. Gail must’ve gotten up after he fell asleep and went back to her bed in the other room. He couldn’t blame her for that. He’d bet his left nut that she woke up feeling a damn sight better than he did.

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He, on the other hand, was still laying in the same spot and position where he’d fallen asleep after making love—scratch that—after fucking her the night before. There had been no lovemaking, just good oldfashioned sex. No love involved in that. He cared about the girl, but he most assuredly did not love her. He didn’t have it in him to love anyone again. Reluctant to get up and face the arduous day ahead of him, he buried his face back in the pillow under his head and closed his eyes. Visions of Gail on her knees and begging for more as he fucked his cock slow and deep in and out of her ass, played over his closed lids like an amateur porno flick. Damn, she was one hot woman. If he was capable of loving anyone again, Gail would be the one. She was everything he could have hoped for in a woman. Kind, caring, generous to a fault and a firecracker in bed to boot. It was just as well that he would be leaving soon. She was too good for him anyway. She deserved someone capable of giving her his whole heart, not a man with a shady past and a battered, inoperable heart. The only thing he could offer her was sex and the thrill of that would wear off quick for someone like Gail. The woman practically screamed marriage and babies. He couldn’t give her that. Couldn’t give it to anyone. What he could do was fuck her like no other. He felt juvenile for admitting it, even if only to himself, but when Gail gave her body to another, he wanted it to be his face she saw when she closed her eyes. He wanted nothing more than to imprint his image, his touch, so deep within her she could never forget him. Rustling bedclothes alerted him to Ty’s movement on the mattress above him. Whether he was awake or just restless, Shame needed to get up and check on him. www.samhainpublishing.com

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Ty had slept soundly through the night, not waking once after Shame cleaned him up and made sure he was as comfortable as possible. That in itself was a mixed blessing. Ty needed the rest, but it also meant that other than the drop or two of sugar water Shame had splashed across his parched lips, Ty hadn’t ingested any liquid. As dehydrated as he was, he needed all the water he could stomach without making himself sick. If he was finally awake, Shame hoped he would feel up to taking a sip or two. Maybe even drink a little soup before he conked back out. The next few days were going to be touch and go with Ty while he began the slow journey toward regaining his strength and recuperating. Shame looked forward to being able to talk with his friend. Find out what he’d been through and if he’d learned anything during his captivity. He felt a little guilty for thinking of things that way, but he couldn’t help it. Though he’d tracked down and dealt with the flunky responsible for carrying out the wet work months earlier, he hadn’t been able to get any more information out of him other than the name of the man who had ordered the hit. The possible motives for why were endless. He knew it wouldn’t change things, wouldn’t bring Maria and Sophie back to him, but he had to know why they were killed. He couldn’t let them go, let them rest in peace, until he found out. The squeak of the bedsprings drew him back into the present and his current responsibilities. Shame sat up, stretched his arms above his head and yawned. He climbed to his feet and glanced at Ty. His friend was lying on his side, facing away from him, with the pillow-top quilt pulled up to his neck. He was still asleep. Picking up his jeans off the floor, Shame held them out in front of him and slipped them on. He worked the zipper while walking around the bed. His hands on the button snap, Shame froze, his gaze going wide as it landed on Ty’s face. 134


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Chapter Ten

“What the hell?” Shame hurried to Ty’s side and flung back the comforter. He blinked. There was no way… His hands shaking, he traced the bronzed skin of Ty’s chest. Touching Ty was the only way Shame could make himself believe what he saw. Ty, whole and well, in front of him. “Jeez, man, if you’re horny enough to molest me when I look this scary, I hate to see how you’ll act when I’m back to a hundred percent.” Shame’s eyes shot up to Ty’s face. His friend was pale but looked good. Too damn good for a man who only the day before had appeared as if he’d been run over by a steam engine. What the hell was going on? “Uh, Ty, buddy, you notice anything different about yourself this morning?” “No shit. I would have to be brain-dead not to. While you were getting your beauty rest, I got up, took a shower and tried to figure out where the heck you’ve brought me.” He ran a long-fingered hand over his shorn head. “Whose place is this, anyway? And how long have I been unconscious since you got me out of that dive? I don’t remember much, but by the looks of me I’d hate to guess how long I’ve been out of it.” Shame flinched. No wonder Ty wasn’t freaking out. The man thought he’d been comatose during his recuperation. He didn’t realize it had happened overnight. “Are you sure you should be up out of the bed yet? I mean, how are you feeling? Do you feel okay?”


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Ty yawned. “I’m fine. A little tired and weak, but otherwise good.” Wait a minute. Did Ty just say he had been up wandering around in the house? “Ty, while you were up, you didn’t happen to run into anyone, did you?” Ty tilted his head to the side, his brow creased. “No, why?” “Well, do you remember the cute blonde receptionist from back at the motel?” “Yeah.” “This is her house. I was just wondering if you ran into her. I don’t want her to get freaked out or anything.” Ty pushed himself up against the pillows behind him. “No offense, bud, but you aren’t making much sense. If I’ve been here long enough to heal up, she’s bound to have seen me before now.” Shame shrugged and sat on the side of the bed. “That’s the thing, Ty.” There wasn’t any gentle way to say what he needed to, so he was just going to have to spit it out and hope Ty didn’t spaz. “I just got you out yesterday. You haven’t even been here a full twelve hours yet.” Ty’s deep brown eyes widened for an instant before he shook his head and smiled. “Yeah, right. And next you’ll be telling me that you have a real nifty bridge to sell me.” Shame laid his hand on Ty’s shoulder and looked him square in the eye. “I’m not pulling your leg, Ty. I just brought you here last night. I swear.” Ty searched his face, no doubt looking for deception, for some glimmer that Shame was joking. His shoulders slumped and he exhaled. “That doesn’t make any sense, Shame. The only way I could’ve healed overnight is if the people holding me had used their unique abilities to heal me, and we both know that didn’t happen. So how do you explain

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my miraculous overnight healing? Did a magic fairy come in while we were sleeping and sprinkle me with fairy dust?” Shame snickered; he couldn’t help it. “Damn, you’re a smartass. I don’t know how this happened. All I know is that I carried you in here last night, cleaned the gook off of you—” Ty interrupted him, his voice laced with sarcasm. “Nice, man, real nice.” Shame scowled at his friend. “Shut up, will you? I’m trying to think here.” He scrubbed a fist over his eyes. “I cleaned you up, talked to Gail, put some salve— Shit, that’s it!” He hopped off the bed and crossed the room. The damn antibiotic cream Gail gave him to use on Ty. That had to be it. Short of Ty’s damn magic-fairy reasoning, there was nothing else that he could think of. “Hey,” Ty shouted. “What salve? What are you talking about? Don’t leave me hanging here. Let me know what’s going through that thick skull of yours.” He glanced back at his friend lounging on the bed. “In a minute, Ty. I need to talk to Gail.” “Who’s Gail?” Ty screamed after him as he hurried out of the room. With a house as tiny as Gail’s, it didn’t take him long to realize that she wasn’t there. A quick glance out the window confirmed that her car was gone. His heart a numb lump of coal in his chest, he trudged back toward the bedroom where Ty awaited answers he didn’t have. All he knew for sure was that Gail’s special salve must have been what cured Ty. The why and how of it was lost on him. As he entered the room, Shame’s attention fell on the empty container sitting by the bed. He’d used all the concoction she’d given him on Ty the night before. There wasn’t even any of it left for a test sample.


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Ignoring Ty’s questioning gaze, he crossed to the nightstand and snatched it up. A little residue remained on the inside, not much else. “You gonna tell me what’s on your mind, or what?” “This,” Shame said, waving the container in front of him. Ty lifted one brow. “An empty plastic dish is what had you up and running out of the room?” “No, damn it.” Shame sighed, his patience wearing thin. “This is what’s left of the stuff Gail gave me to put on your wounds. It’s the only thing I can think of that may be responsible for your rapid healing.” Ty took the container out of his hand. Shame watched as he eyeballed the contents, or lack thereof. He lifted it up to his nose and sniffed. “Well, what was in it?” “How the hell should I know? Do I look like a chemist to you?” Shame sucked in a deep gulp of air and counted to ten. He really needed to calm down. It wasn’t Ty’s fault that his emotions were spinning like a damn top. It was Gail’s. How could she do something like this and not even tell him? And for that matter, where had she disappeared to this morning? He had an endless list of questions and not a single answer was forthcoming. “Sorry for snapping at you, man. I’ve just got a lot on my mind. I didn’t mean to take it out on you.” “No problem, bud.” “Yeah, well, I asked Gail what was in it last night before I rubbed it on you. She said that it was a secret family remedy and wouldn’t tell me any more than that.” Ty’s long, tapered fingers ran over the flawless skin covering his chest. “I can certainly see why they would want to keep it a secret.” He glanced up. “I’m not complaining here, but maybe we should find this Gail of yours and ask her again.”

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“She’s not my anything. And she’s not here to ask. I looked outside and her car’s gone.” A muscle ticked in the corner of Ty’s eye. “Exactly how well do you know this woman, Shame?” “Well enough.” “What does that mean?” “Shit, I don’t know. Well enough means well enough. Why?” Ty’s forehead wrinkled. “It just doesn’t make sense. Why would she give you something that she knew would cure me, and not tell you about it? I don’t get it.” Shame massaged his temples, trying to alleviate the dull ache rapidly spreading over the front of his head. “That makes two of us, pal. I don’t know what’s going on but I don’t like it.” Ty’s stomach growled loudly, interrupting their silent consternation. He glanced over at Shame and smiled, but his eyes were filled with worry. “How about we get a bite to eat while we try to sort this shit out? I’m starving.” Shame smiled back at him, but he had to force his cheek muscles into the expression. “Yeah. Let’s get some food. We can talk while I try to fatten you back up.” “Fuck you,” Ty replied good-naturedly. Shame tried to muster up a snappy comeback but as the seconds ticked by he couldn’t think of one. Just when he needed it the most, his sense of humor seemed to have abandoned him. He put a companionable arm around Ty in the off chance that he needed it, and led him from the room and into the kitchen. XW


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Gail sat alone in a creaky booth at the back of the only all-night diner in town, Lou’s Pancake Shack, and stared down into her fifth cup of bad coffee. She lifted it to her lips and sipped, wincing as the hot liquid seared her mouth and the sweet rush of sugar coated her tongue. Above the rim of her cup, she glanced around her. Besides one other patron, a drunk slumped over his table on the opposite end of the small establishment, and a haggard-looking waitress who was sixty if she was a day, Gail was the only person in the place. Ten filthy yellow booths lined one wall. On the reverse side, a bar complete with wobbly stools stood before a long open grill. The heavy scent of grease and smoke permeated the air. Gail was procrastinating. It certainly wasn’t the good food and superb service that had kept her sitting in the stained and dirty booth for the last two hours. She knew she was only putting off the inevitable but that didn’t change anything. The sun rose over the horizon, giving her no excuse to keep lingering in the diner. Now that it was daybreak, she could safely drive to Lucian Tremaine’s house out in the country and confront her brother. And yet she continued to sit where she was, all but frozen to the seat. What was she afraid of? Surely not her brother. He would never do anything to hurt her. Nor his associates, really, since she was sure Kenze wouldn’t let them lay a finger on her. She was being ridiculous. She set her chipped coffee cup down on the table and scooted out of the booth. It was time to go. She pulled a ten-dollar bill out of her pocket and threw it on the table. Her decision had been made and there was no turning back now. XW

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“Okay, so let me get this straight,” Ty said a short time later, after they’d finished off a breakfast of fruit and cold cereal. “You stayed at the hotel for a while, when you knew damn well I wouldn’t have just up and disappeared without letting you know where I was going. And then you came out here and practically moved in with a woman you didn’t know from Eve so that you could stay in town and look for me with no one being the wiser. But you never once even asked her last name?” Ty flung a magazine at him. Gail’s full name, Gail Ann Wright, was stamped on the back of it. “What’s wrong with you, man?” Shame paced back and forth in front of the fridge. “How the hell was I supposed to know who she was? I don’t even remember you telling me that Wright had a sister, much less what her name was. I’m not a damn mind reader.” “You wouldn’t have to be psychic if you would clean out your damn ears and listen when I’m talking to you every now and then.” “Fuck you, Ty. You’re not my mother or my wife, so quit harping at me.” “You’re lucky you’re still alive to listen to me harp at you. After the way you spilled your guts to her last night, I’m surprised the woman didn’t call up her brother and have us both killed while we slept.” Shame hung his head in his hands. “She wouldn’t do that.” How could he feel like defending her and throttling her at the same time? Was Ty right, had she run to her shape-shifting brother the moment he fell asleep? He couldn’t believe that she would do that. Gail wasn’t the type of woman who could give him her body with such abandon and then turn right around and stab him in the back as soon as his eyes were closed. She wasn’t like that. She couldn’t be. He didn’t think he would survive it if he found out differently.


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“I think she would. You came right out and told her we were planning to kill her brother. What the hell did you expect her to do—jump up and down for joy?” “I didn’t know he was her brother. How many damn times do I have to tell you that?” “Like it matters or changes anything that you didn’t know who she was. All I know now is that your little girlfriend has run off to warn her brother about what we’ve planned and they’re going to come after us with everything they have. Frankly, I’m surprised you were able to get me out of there to begin with. The only reason I was still alive when you found me was because they couldn’t find you and you’re the one they really wanted.” Ty dropped into the high-back chair beside Shame. “I don’t know what the hell you did to Tremaine, but he’s after your head on a pike. That’s one pissed-off, scary vamp. The one time I saw him was in broad daylight, and the man just stood there, staring at me, while his little thug took swings at me trying to get me to spill my guts about where you were hiding. When they didn’t get anything more than a big ‘fuck you’ out of me, he turned, cool as an icicle and strolled out of the room. That’s one intimidating bastard, Shame.” “So? I’ve faced bigger and badder and still come out on top. We’ll manage. Good always kicks evil’s ass.” Ty snorted. “I think you’ve been watching too many action movies. Rarely does the good guy win in real life. He just gets smashed like a bug.” Shame frowned. “What are you saying, Ty?” “Maybe I’m just not as fucking convinced that we can do this and survive. You don’t know what they’re like.” His voice dropped. “They’re ruthless.” 142


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“So, what? You want to give up and run away like a pussy?” Shame shook his head. “That’s fucked up, man. What about getting even with Wright, paying him back for what he did to your sister? Are you just going to let that go?” Ty looked down at his hands, which were clasped tightly together in his lap. “I’m not saying I want to run away. I’m just thinking that maybe we should put a little more thought into how we’re going about things, that’s all.” His dark chocolate gaze climbed up to meet Shame’s. Behind his eyes, Shame could read all of Ty’s anguish and fear. “So what do you want to do?” “I don’t know,” Ty whispered. “You have no idea what it was like in there. The pain, the humiliation, the damn hunger gnawing at my insides while their taunts and the constant sleep deprivation fucked with my head. I can’t go back there, Shame. What if…” He hung his head. “God forgive me, I just can’t.” Shame looked at his friend, took in the whipped-dog demeanor, and felt his stomach turn. He wanted to believe that his reaction was due to sympathy for what Ty must be feeling but he wasn’t so sure that’s what it was. If Ty was right, and Gail had gone to her brother, then she would be facing the same thing Ty had gone through. He had to believe that he knew her well enough to trust that she wasn’t a part of the evil being perpetrated by the men—the things—that lived out in that damn mansion. And if that were the case, then she also wouldn’t know that her brother was up to his eyes in all of it. With her big heart, she probably felt duty-bound to warn her brother, no matter what he was involved in. Instead of the anger he expected to feel toward her, all he felt was warmth and a profound concern for her wellbeing. A small part of him respected her more for standing by her beliefs and doing what she www.samhainpublishing.com

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must’ve thought was the right thing, even if it was misguided and damn naive. He worried that her love would quickly beat down the thick wall he’d built around his bruised heart and resurrect feelings he’d do better off without. However, at the moment, he didn’t have time to think about his girly emotions. He needed to make sure Gail didn’t sacrifice her life in her bid to save her brother’s. He would have plenty of time to scrutinize his feelings after he made sure she was safe and got his revenge on Tremaine. If Ty was too traumatized to help, then he would seek revenge on both their families’ behalf. Someone had to make them pay for what they’d done and it might as well be him. Shame rose to his feet and strode over to the sink to look out the small curtained window. The sun was rising, filling the sky with misty swirls of pink and blue. “I have to find Gail,” he said, his back turned to Ty. “I understand if you can’t or won’t come with me, but I have to finish what we’ve started. I couldn’t turn back now even if I wanted to. I need to finish it, for Maria and Sophie, for all the people they’ve hurt and the people they’ll continue to tear apart if someone doesn’t step in and do something to stop them.” Ty’s chair scratched against the floor behind him. Shame stood still and waited for him to respond. When he didn’t, Shame turned to find the room behind him empty. He found Ty in Gail’s bedroom. He was sitting on the side of the bed, his shoulders slumped and his head in his hands. The muscles in his back tensed when Shame approached. He looked up, his eyes filled with self-loathing. “I’m sorry. I can’t help you. Getting myself killed isn’t going to bring my family back. I wish you luck. You’ll be in my prayers. But I’m done. I’m going home.”

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Mute, Shame nodded. He didn’t know what to say to Ty. They’d only been friends for a short time, a few months at most, but he’d thought he knew him. At the moment, as he looked at his friend, Shame didn’t feel as if he knew Ty at all. Maybe he hadn’t. Maybe the only thing they’d shared was their drive for revenge. Shame turned, grabbed his shirt and shoes off the dresser, and strode from the room. He had a woman to save and a slew of supernatural thugs to slaughter. Frowning, he walked out into the sunshine. As the chill morning air swept around him and light washed away the shadows clinging to the land, Shame strolled over to his truck’s bed and pressed a small button on the inside of the tailgate. The bed floor lifted, revealing a secret compartment. Hidden inside was a cache of weapons specifically designed to take out the supernatural crime element with as little fuss and muss as possible. He quickly strapped on both leather ankle holsters and the matching shoulder harness. Into the shoulder harness went his trusted pair of Glocks, loaded with UV bullets. In the ankle holsters, he placed a smallcaliber .32 and a sterling-silver Bowie knife he’d had commissioned several years back. He slid behind the wheel and turned over the ignition. His foot hit the gas, revving up the engine. His hands steady, belying the rush of nervous adrenaline coursing through his veins, he threw the truck into first gear. Dirty snow and gravel spinning behind him, he sped out of the driveway.


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Chapter Eleven

Gail felt like she was going to puke. The steep drop off to either side of the blacktop and sharp curves on the two-lane country road had her nerves shot and her stomach rolling. Thoughts of what she would say and do once Kenze stood in front of her played like a broken record in her mind. With every mile she drove, her gut clenched and her conscience urged her to turn back. She began to wonder if it wouldn’t be easier to speak to Shame and try to talk him out of his goal instead of going to Kenze. Remembering the look of condemnation on his face when he told her of his plans squelched that idea before it could take root and blossom. She turned onto the bumpy dirt track leading to Tremaine’s estate. As she crept along the road, careful of ice and washboard ruts that could send her car spinning into the ditch, she spied the top of a massive house in the distance. That must be it. Her foot eased off the gas, buying her a few extra minutes before she reached the huge black iron gate that blocked the entrance. Fearing that the rancid coffee she’d ingested earlier would taste ten times worse coming up than it had going down, she swallowed the rising lump of acid crawling up her throat and guided her car up to the gate. A black speaker box sat atop a thick black pole on her side of the entrance. She pulled her car alongside it and cranked her window halfway down. She tucked her arm out the window to press the speak

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button but discovered there wasn’t one. Not a single button was anywhere on the box, only tiny circular holes in the metal to protect the speaker inside. That’s weird. She glanced around and spotted a camera at the top of the column to her left. Why would they need so much security unless they were up to no good? Crossing her arms over her chest, she waited for someone to notice that she was there and respond. She didn’t have to wait long. Before her tapping foot hit the floor for the third time, the box squeaked and fuzzy white noise came over the line, followed by a gravelly voice she knew well, though it had been years since she’d last heard it. “What are you doing here?” “Nice to talk to you, too, Kenze,” she replied dryly. Leave it to her brother to be surly even with the sister he hadn’t seen in ages. “Are you going to let me in, or are we going to talk through this damn contraption all day?” “Whatever,” he said a millisecond before she heard the gate creak. She glanced up to see it slowly pull open. She wanted to be hurt by his terse welcome, but couldn’t work up the extra emotion. Too many disjointed thoughts and feelings were already taking up residence in her head to make room for any new ones. Kenze and his lack of care for her would have to get in line and take a number. When the gate finished swinging open, she pulled up to the house and parked right in front of the door. She saw a garage at the side, but opted to keep her walk from her car to the door as short as possible. In her frame of mind, she wanted to have as much control as she could get. Parking in a garage, where someone would no doubt have to open and close the sliding door to allow her to come and go, was unacceptable. She might trust her brother, but she wasn’t dumb enough to extend that trust to anyone else who lived in the house with him. www.samhainpublishing.com

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Gail climbed out of her car and walked up the short stoop to the front door. Before she could ring the bell, the door swung inward. She stepped over the threshold and the door was shut behind her, all without her seeing the first glimpse of Kenze. Her eyes slowly adjusted to the dark interior as she turned to face her brother. Only it wasn’t Kenze who stood behind her. A man, tall and broad as a mountain, blocked her way to the door. His shoulders spanned the width of the doorframe and extended past it by several inches. His bald head fell short of the seven-foot door by mere centimeters. Seeing him, the snarl on his square face, the obscene tattoo of a swastika etched into his forehead with dark blue prison-issue ink, had Gail backing up a step, her heart thumping wildly. Her senses kicked in, warning her that the man in front of her was a lycan. From the way her synapses flared, releasing endorphins into her system at an alarming rate, he was a powerful one at that. He advanced on her, his nostrils ballooning as he took in her scent. “Mmm, you smell good, whore.” He reached down and adjusted the bulge beneath his fly. “You’ll smell even better after I come all over you.” One backward step after another, she scurried away from him. Her back collided with something solid, something that moved and breathed. Someone was behind her, right up against her back. Whoever it was inhaled loudly and then blew out through their mouth. The wind from it ruffled her hair. She opened her mouth to scream. “Back off, Dempsey. Keep your foul mouth and your filthy fucking hands to yourself. She isn’t here to see your ugly ass. Go find something to do while I chat with my visitor.” Gail’s heart rate returned to normal as the voice coming from behind her registered. Kenze. Thank God. There for a second… 148


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She twisted around, careful to keep her eyes on the man named Dempsey as he stalked from the room, and faced the brother she hadn’t seen since they were teenagers. As her attention settled on his face, she had to try hard not to gasp. The man in front of her looked nothing like the Kenze who’d left home. He appeared hard and haggard. His dark brown hair was pulled back into a short ponytail behind his head. A thick beard shagged out around his hollow cheeks. The clothes he wore had seen better days. And if she wasn’t mistaken, the plaid shirt and faded blue jeans could use a good wash as well. Gail wrinkled her nose, the scent of stale body odor appalling. Unable to speak and ask him what the hell had happened to make him let himself go so much, she remained mute. Needing to take her eyes off Kenze, needing something to look at besides her twin whose appearance distressed her in ways she didn’t want to think about, her gaze wandered over the room to the left of the foyer they stood in. It was a large, sunken living room with a high, cathedral-like ceiling. The walls were painted a dull eggshell color. Thick carpet the color of bread covered the floor. A huge white leather sectional sofa took up one entire side of the room. Chrome and glass tables sat here and there. It took her a moment to figure out what was missing. There weren’t any lamps. No lights in the ceiling and no lamps to illuminate the room at night. “What are you doing here, Gail?” She pulled her gaze away from the strange room and directed it at Kenze. “Thanks for the warm welcome, Kenze. If I didn’t know better I’d almost think you weren’t happy to see me.” Kenze humphed and turned away without speaking. He strode into the living room and perched his ass on the edge of the sofa, his elbows www.samhainpublishing.com

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propped on his knees. His icy blue eyes watched her cross the room and join him on the couch. She chose to sit beside him, though his response to her presence told her he was less than happy to be near her. “So, I guess congratulations are in order.” Gail snorted. “Congratulations for what—being the first person to piss you off today?” A brief spark of the old Kenze, the one she remembered and loved, flashed behind his eyes and then quickly disappeared to be replaced with a scowl. “On the baby.” A frown creased her brow. God, she was already getting a headache and she hadn’t even been in the same room with him for more than five minutes. How could she have forgotten how nerve-wracking he was? “What baby? What the hell are you talking about?” “Jesus, you really have lost touch with all your roots, haven’t you? Your baby, you little idiot.” “Kenze, I hate to break this to you, since you think you know everything, but I don’t have a baby. Whoever told you otherwise was full of shit. And what the hell does that have to do with our ancestry?” “You may not have a kid now, but you’re going to. You’re pregnant, genius.” “Huh?” “Have you forgotten everything about our kind, Gail? You know that a full lycan can detect when a female of our species is in heat or breeding.” He shook his head at her sadly. “You…are…pregnant.” He sounded out each word like she was a little slow on the uptake. Gail’s mind rebelled. That wasn’t possible. She couldn’t be pregnant. Could she? She knew they’d forgotten a condom a time or two, but she was on the pill. It was ninety-nine percent accurate at preventing pregnancy, wasn’t it? Everything she knew about contraceptives flew 150


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through her head at the speed of light. An article she’d read in one of the magazines at work jumped out in her memory and screamed for attention. It had claimed that antibiotics could affect the reliability of certain birth-control pills. Since she wasn’t having sex, she hadn’t paid much attention to it at the time. Thinking back now, she recalled a bout of strep throat she’d had shortly before meeting Shame. Could that have negated her pills? Was Kenze fucking with her? She looked at his face. Not a glimmer of humor marred his features. He was dead serious. Shit. She was pregnant. She was going to have a baby. Shame’s baby. A fast shot of happiness, followed quickly by the letdown of reality overcame her. Shame wouldn’t accept her for what she was; he sure as hell wouldn’t accept a half-breed child that resulted from their all-toobrief union. Not only was she going to be a single mother, she was going to be an unemployed single mother if she didn’t get her ass on the ball and find work right away. Once she started to show, she’d never find a job. No employer that she knew of would hire an obviously pregnant woman. Despair, hot and heavy, washed over, dragging her down into the bog of muck she’d created for herself by falling for a man she knew she couldn’t keep. She groaned. A baby didn’t change her reason for being there. Her newfound knowledge would have to be shoved to the farthest recesses of her mind until later, when she would have time to deal with it. For the moment she had enough to think about. Gail swiped a hand through her hair, pushing it out of her face. “Listen, Kenze, I came here for a reason.”


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“Oh yeah? I was hoping you would get to that sometime in this millennium.” She was beginning to rethink the whole save-Kenze-from-beingmurdered thing. “Will you just quit with the smartass routine and listen to me? As soon as I’ve said what I came for, I’ll leave and you’ll never have to see my face again, okay? Until then, shut the hell up and hear me out.” “Yes, ma’am.” Gail sighed, impatience and aggravation warring within her. “Kenze.” His mouth twisted into a smirk. “Gail.” The amused look on his face disappeared as fast as it had appeared. It was replaced by a look so stern, so downright scary, she would’ve been afraid of him had she not already known he would never lay a finger on her, no matter how pissed he was. “Say what you’re going to, Gail, and then get the hell out. I have a plane to catch and you’re making me late.” A glimmer of hope began to burn inside her. If he was leaving town then maybe she wouldn’t have to say anything after all. “What do you mean, you have a plane to catch? Are you skipping town again, without so much as a goodbye or a ‘kiss my ass’ to me?” “What I’m doing and where are none of your business, Gail. But just so you can rest easy, I’ll be back in a few days. I’m not leaving town for good.” That wasn’t long enough, damn it. They would just wait around the extra few days and kill him when he got back. She was going to have to tell him what she’d learned. “Kenze, there isn’t really any easy way to say this so I’m just going to blurt it out, okay?” “Yeah. Sometime today, princess.” Princess. That one word took her back to when they were children and he referred to her as momma’s little princess because of the way 152


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she’d followed their mom around like she was her shadow. The bridge of her nose began to sting and she squeezed it between her thumb and index finger to squelch the tears threatening to rise. She straightened her back and took a deep breath. “I recently met a man and I—” “Obviously. The last time I checked, it took two people to make a kid. Hell, Gail, I can smell the human all over you. The least you could have done was take a damn shower before you came out here.” “Shut up, Kenze.” Her patience snapped. “I’m trying to warn you that someone wants your ass dead. The least you could do is quit with the damn diatribe long enough for me get it out.” The tension between them shot up another notch, making her want to squirm under his scrutiny. Kenze sat forward. So little of his bottom remained on the couch that he almost levitated over it instead of sitting on it. “What? What are you talking about, Gail? Who wants to kill me and how exactly did you find out about it?” “A few weeks ago, I met a man at the motel where I used to work. We sort of…” Oh, how to put things without making herself look like a complete slut. “…fell in together. Yesterday, he came to the house late and had a friend with him. His friend was hurt.” She shook her head, remembering what Ty had looked like. “Anyway, he told me that Ty, his friend, had been held here and beaten. He claimed that you were responsible and that you”—she swallowed, her eyes searching Kenze’s face for his response to what she was saying—“that you attacked and killed Ty’s sister.” A slight widening of his pupils and a visible tension in his whipcordlean frame was all the response she got. It was anticlimactic as hell. She’d expected anger and denial, or, as much as she hated to believe it, a guilty flush. She didn’t know what to think by his lack of response. The www.samhainpublishing.com

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desperate need for him to react in some way and clue her in to his guilt or innocence made her continue. “They plan to kill you for whatever it is they think you did to his sister. Don’t you have anything to say, Kenze?” Still no response. “Say something, damn it!” Kenze shot to his feet and paced the floor in front of where she sat on the couch. “What do you want to hear, Gail? I’m sure you came out here with the assumption that they’re mistaken about what you were told. That there was no way your brother could be responsible for killing anyone, let alone a woman.” He stopped right in front of her and put his big hands on her shoulders. “I wish I could tell you what you want to hear, but I can’t. I can tell you that I didn’t have any part in torturing any man in this house, but no more. Do you understand me, Gail? I can’t tell you that I’m innocent of any wrongdoing.” He walked into the foyer. Not wanting to be left alone for an instant in that house, she stood and followed behind him. Kenze stopped and picked up a black duffle bag she hadn’t noticed sitting against the wall. Slinging it over his shoulder, he turned and pulled open the front door. “I think it’s time you leave. Don’t come back. You never should have come out here in the first place.” Gail opened her mouth. “But…” “No buts, Gail. I need to get going and you don’t want to be here without me.” One hand on her elbow, he ushered her out and smoothly maneuvered her straight to her car. He jerked the door open and held it, waiting for her to slip inside. She stalled beside the open door, looking up into her twin’s tired face. She searched his gaze for any answers she could find. God knew, he wouldn’t ever confide anything to her. She refused to believe Kenze would

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have attacked and killed a woman in cold blood. There had to be more to the story than either he or Shame had let on. “Tell me what’s going on, Kenze. Maybe I can help.” He pressed a kiss to her forehead, his lips barely skimming her hairline before he pulled back and stepped away from her. “You can’t help me, Gail. Go home.” “Kenze…?” “What, Gail? Look, I need to be on my way or I’m going to miss my flight.” “It’s just that—the men I told you about—one of them, Shame, he means a lot to me. He’s… I love him and I wouldn’t want to see any harm come to him or his friend.” He studied her. “Your man, this Shame fellow, he’s the baby’s father, right?” Gail nodded. She couldn’t say “the baby” out loud yet. That would make it real and she had other, more pressing things to think about. Kenze was silent for a moment and then nodded. “I promise that no harm will come to your friends by my hand.” That was the best she could ask for. She knew that Kenze wouldn’t go back on his word. It was a matter of honor. She felt tears build in her eyes. “Thank you.” “You’re welcome.” He patted her on the rump. “Now, scoot. Get in and lock the doors. I’ll open the gate and you can follow me out.” He turned and walked away before she could speak. Gail slipped into the driver’s seat and locked her doors the way he’d asked her to. With that done and her windows rolled tightly up, she felt a measure of safety while waiting on Kenze to lead the way out. She heard the loud purr of the motorcycle before she saw it. She craned her neck and saw Kenze coming around the side of the house on www.samhainpublishing.com

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a flame red crotch rocket. He slowed as he passed her car and waved for her to follow behind him. When they reached the gate he stopped and took a small black remote out of his jacket and pointed it toward the gate. It creaked opened, allowing them to drive through. Gail pulled alongside her brother and rolled down her window. “Kenze,” she yelled over the loud rumble of his motor. She wanted to tell him to be careful. He waved and pulled off before she had to chance to speak. She watched as his cycle disappeared over the hill, disgusted with herself, him and the whole situation. She sat still, glancing around her. Now that she’d warned him, she didn’t know what to do. She couldn’t very well go back to her house; Shame and Ty were both still there. She reached for her pocketbook on the passenger seat to see how much money she had on her. Maybe she could afford to get a hotel room for the night. Surely Shame and Ty would be gone by the following morning. A tremble shot through her arms and hands at that thought, knocking her purse to the floorboard. Shame would be gone. Unwanted tears surged to the surface and clouded her eyes. She’d brought this on herself, but knowing she was pregnant made it too painful to bear. He was going to leave, never knowing that he left behind a small part of him with her. Sniffling, she leaned over the console, one arm extended, trying to grasp the strap on her pocketbook. Her fingertips skimmed the edge and she stretched a little farther, reaching…reaching… The passenger-side window exploded inward. Glass rained down on her, scratching her face and neck. Gail screamed and pulled back, her hands flying to her face.

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The big tattooed face of the bruiser who’d answered the front door earlier appeared in front of her. He leaned into the busted window and grabbed her by her hair. “There’s been a change of plans, pretty,” he all but growled as he dragged her across the seat toward him. “You’re not going anywhere.”


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Chapter Twelve

Not for the first time that week, Shame wished his old friend and former partner, Tristan, was with him. Having a little backup would have made his predicament easier to stomach. It sure as shit would’ve made him feel more confident about the outcome of today’s rendezvous. Nearly four months had passed since he’d been in touch with Tristan and his wife Sara. The last phone call he’d taken the time to make had been hard—too hard—and he hadn’t called back since. Hearing Tristan happy, very much in love with his wife and son, set off a pang of envy that Shame couldn’t deal with. It wasn’t that he didn’t wish his friend well—he did. It was knowing that his partner was so…domesticated and at peace. As much as he wanted that for Tristan, he wanted it for himself as well. Shame resolved that if—scratch that—when he got out of this jam, he would visit Tristan and Sara. It’d been too long, and he didn’t want the wall of silence to grow any bigger between them. Tristan was the only person he felt he could trust and he valued their friendship too much to keep letting his petty feelings stop him from staying in touch. Several miles from his goal, Shame pulled off the road. He drove his truck into a dense copse of pine trees and parked, satisfied that it was out of sight from anyone who would pass on the main road. After spraying scent neutralizer all over his body and deer piss on his boots to camouflage any remaining personal smell, he began to hike through the woods.

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Half an hour later, he stood at the back of the property. Standing still, he watched for signs of life in and around the house. When he was sure it was safe to cross the field, he took off at a dead run. Even at a fast gallop, his eyes scanned around him in all directions, his feet avoided twigs and branches that would cause disruptions to the quiet air around him, and he made sure he stayed downwind of the house at all times. Reaching the gate, he searched for cameras and immediately found two. One was to his right on top of the gate, and the other was above the back door. Both were mounted to pedestals that allowed them to swivel at timed intervals. Watching the cameras, he established their pattern and waited until they were on a northbound swing away from him to move. Quickly, he scaled the high wrought-iron fence, and dropped down on the other side onto Tremaine’s property. Shame’s feet hit the snow and skidded out from under him. His ass smacked the ground with enough force to jar his teeth. He was hardpressed not to curse at his sore ass and his own stupidity for not foreseeing that was going to happen. Spitting out a few good four-letter words might have made him feel better but it damn sure would have given away his position and that wouldn’t be such a smart thing to do. They expected him to show up sooner or later, of that he had little doubt, but the exact time when he was going to appear, well, that they didn’t know. Even a small window of surprise was better than none at all. He dragged his ass up off the ground and checked the cameras. They hadn’t made the full rotation yet. Stealthily, he covered the ground between where he’d landed and the back door.


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Stopping underneath the camera, where its lens wouldn’t be able to catch his image, Shame pressed his back to the wall and tried to bring his pulse down to normal. He needed to be able to hear the drop of a pin and it wouldn’t be possible with his heartbeat thundering in his ears. He slipped his hand into the pocket of his jeans and drew out a small pouch containing the picks he needed to jimmy the lock on the door. He could do it with his knife, but having the right instruments would save him time. After waiting until the cameras began a new rotation, Shame jumped onto the porch stoop. A small window in the door allowed him to glimpse a bit of the back hallway. It wasn’t enough to see much, just part of one wall and the linoleum-covered floor, but he was relatively sure that no one was standing guard. He maneuvered the picks into place and set to work on the lock. A small muffled click signaled the release of the latch and his ticket inside. His hand clenched the doorknob, intent on turning it, when the sound of footsteps crunching on the icy ground reached his ears. Someone was on the right side of the house and coming up on him fast. Shame let go of the door. His attention flew to both cameras, assessing, and then he was moving over the land, his feet barely skimming the frozen earth as he made his way around the house. He stopped on the opposite side from where he’d heard the noise and held his breath, listening intently for any sign of movement. Hearing nothing, Shame peered around the corner. Two men made their way to the back door. One was tall and wiry, the other of medium height and build. The slim one had a thin cigarillo hanging out of his mouth. Mr. Average reached for the door Shame had just unlocked. He faced his buddy as the doorknob turned in his hand. “Fuck. You trying to get us killed, bro? You left the door unlocked. You know how Tremaine 160


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is about his security. He’d shit a goose if he knew you were leaving his damn back door wide open every time you stepped out to take a smoke.” “Listen,” the thin man replied, “I didn’t leave the damn door unlocked this time. You must’ve done it.” “Whatever,” Mr. Average said, slapping the thin man on the back of the head as he passed him on his way into the house. The door closed behind them, allowing Shame to suck in the oxygen he needed. That was close. He wondered exactly how many men Tremaine had in his employ at the moment. His plan was to take them out, incapacitate them one at a time, before going after Tremaine. However, that plan depended on his being able to get them alone. He was ill-prepared to deal with the whole lot of them at once. It was possible that he could face three, maybe four tops head-on and win. If they were human. Any more than that and his ass would be Lycan chow. Shame turned, intent on going around to the front of the house and slipping in through the garage, like he’d done the day before. There were extra cameras to avoid in the front, but going in through the back door was now out of the question. He crept around the side of the house, his ears peeled for any sound that seemed out of place, and his gaze darting all around him. A single glance assured him that no one was outside, and luckily enough, one of the garage bays was open. His muscles tensed, readying themselves to spring him around the corner at the precise second the cameras aligned the way he wanted. One…two… Go. In a quick burst of movement, he exploded around the corner. Shame slipped into the open bay and crouched down behind two snowmobiles. Confident he was alone, Shame stood. From above the


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snowmobiles he saw Gail’s car parked in one of the other bays. The one closest to the door. So, she was there. Approaching it, he noticed one of windows was missing. He leaned over and peered inside, saw shards of glass littering the passenger seat. Deep splotches of crimson marred the vinyl seat amid the glass. Blood? If she had come there of her own free will, why was her window broken and blood inside the car? Were he and Ty wrong? Had she been kidnapped from the house while they’d lain sleeping? He straightened and moved toward the door. Possible explanations for Gail’s car being in the state it was in rushed through his head, taking a measure of his concentration away from his surroundings. One step away from the door, a low rustle sounded from behind him. He started to turn. A sharp blow caught him on the side of the head and echoed through the back of his skull. Pain brought him to his knees. His vision blurred around the edges and grew fuzzy. As darkness rapidly swallowed him up, Shame caught a glimpse of a man’s silhouette above him, and then he saw no more. XW Gail’s gaze explored her surroundings. The huge cavernous room she’d been dumped in was filled with treadmills, weight benches and other big hulking machines she couldn’t identify by name. “How does it feel to be at the mercy of a real man, bitch? I bet your little human fuck can’t make you squeal like I can.” She gave Dempsey, the tattooed freak who’d hauled her into the house over his shoulder an hour earlier, the dirtiest look she could manage in her current position. It was hard to accomplish an effective

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one while on her knees, her hands tied behind her back and a ball gag shoved in her mouth. She certainly didn’t feel menacing and from the way tattoo head towered over her, a smirk on his ugly inked face, she didn’t think he was feeling any fear. “Fuck you,” she sputtered around the gag. The rubber impeded her speech and her words came out garbled, sounding more like “uuh oo”, than “fuck you”. “Oh, you should be nice to me, baby. Maybe if you play real nice I’ll let you keep that half-breed bastard you’re carrying as a pet, instead of feeding it to the vamps as an appetizer right after you spit it out.” Gail growled, the sound startling even her. She couldn’t remember the last time that had happened. Dempsey sneered at her. “You should be licking my boots for keeping you around this long. Feel lucky that I want to use your tight little pussy, otherwise you’d be nothing more than a big bag of O positive by now.” He laughed, amused by his own disgusting attempt at a joke. His endless taunts were beginning to piss her off more than scare her. For the last hour she’d been on her knees, listening to his shit, and she was starting to think that’s exactly what it was. Bullshit. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to carry out his threats. The hard line of flesh behind his fly told her exactly how much he’d like to follow through with one of them in particular, but she didn’t think it was his call to make. As long as the big boss wanted her alive and unharmed, she would stay that way. Dempsey was just a puppy following his master’s orders. During one of his rants, he’d let it slip that they were using her for bait in the hopes that Shame would run right into their hands. She’d tried to tell him that Shame wouldn’t show up. That having her there was a mistake. Shame didn’t care enough about her to come after her, but he www.samhainpublishing.com

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wouldn’t listen. Instead of hearing her out, he’d threatened to give her something to occupy her mouth with. He quickly changed his mind when she smiled at him and told him to go ahead, if he wanted to lose his dick. He paled and stuffed the ball gag into her mouth. Fat stubby fingers pulled her out of her reverie. They skimmed her cheek and then brutally shoved her head to one side. “Not so high and mighty now that Kenze isn’t around, are you, whore?” One meaty paw grabbed a fistful of her hair and yanked her head back, forcing her to look up. Her scalp stung from the tension on her hair, and her eyes began to water. She swallowed the whimper building in her throat, determined not to make a sound, not to show any weakness to the huge lycan tormenting her. To do so would be the equivalent of wearing a red dress while running with the bulls in Pamplona. She wasn’t that stupid. He leaned above her, the hot fetid stench of his breath blowing over her face. She tried to twist, to get away from the foul smell before she retched, but was pulled up short by his hand in her hair. “The boss said I couldn’t fuck you up.” He leered down at her breasts. Right away it felt like her D cups tried to shrink and crawl inside her chest cavity to get away from his lecherous gaze. She hunched her shoulders, but it didn’t help. The nasty, dirty feeling his scrutiny left on her remained. A thick, sandpaper-rough finger slid under her bra strap, where it was visible between her neck and shoulder. He twisted the narrow strap around his finger and jerked. “The boss didn’t say nothing about me not being able to fuck you.” The material pulled tight and broke with a quiet little snap. She shook her head, and tried to scream, “No!” It came out more like “oo”. His hand dropped to the neck of her thin cashmere sweater. The back of his fingers brushed over her collarbone as he fisted it and yanked. The 164


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material held for a second, biting into the back of her neck, but then began to tear under the rough pull. The sound of rending fabric filled her ears as the seams along both shoulders separated and gave away. The front of her sweater fell down, exposing her collarbone and the tops of her breasts, one concealed by her plain white cotton bra and the other not. Her bra strap torn in two, one cup lay clinging at half mast over her breast. Greedy, bloodshot eyes devoured the exposed skin. He licked his pale, thin lips and lifted his hand to grope her. A sharp retort of static filled the air. His hand flew to his waistband and the walkie-talkie attached at his hip. His gaze lingered on her breasts for another second before he spit out a vile mouthful of obscenities and turned away from her to answer the summons. Gail sucked in a deep breath and let it out slowly. She hurt all over. Her head ached, arms and hands stung from lingering cuts that refused to heal while shards of glass were still imbedded in her skin. Her shoulders throbbed from being tied in the same position for so long. Most of all, her heart was sore, tired and battered. It would be so easy to give in, say to hell with it and stop fighting but the thought of the small life growing inside her kept her determination to survive going. If she wanted to stay alive and protect her unborn baby, she was going to have to keep her wits and find her own way out of this. Exacerbating the situation by pissing her captors off wasn’t going to help her any. The only person she could rely on for help was herself. Her ace in the hole was a jagged piece of glass she’d managed to work out of the fleshy part of her palm. Mr. Tattoo hadn’t noticed her struggle to unearth her hidden weapon, he’d been too busy staring at her chest and palming his crotch to pay any attention to the small grunts of pain


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she hadn’t been able to hide as she worked it out of her flesh and into her fingers. She may not have been strong enough to break through the zip tie binding her hands—she’d tried that and failed—but with a little persistence, she could cut through it. If she kept up the weak-female routine for long enough, he would eventually lose interest in tormenting her and lose interest. That’s when she’d be able to break free and make her move. A tremor ran down her arm as she twisted, trying to align it the way she needed. Blood-slick fingers slowly maneuvered the glass into position against the hard plastic of her bonds. She had to be careful. One slip and she would drop it. One shake and she would lose her only chance of escaping. If she lost the glass, she would be up shit creek without a paddle. Short, concise arm movements propelled the makeshift knife back and forth over the zip tie while not attracting unwanted attention to what she was doing. With Mr. Tattoo’s back turned and his focus on whatever was being squawked at him through his radio, Gail set to work sawing on her cuffs. Her concentration on the task at hand, she didn’t notice many of the static-ridden words that passed between Dempsey and whoever was on the other end of the walkie-talkie. That is, until one word caught her attention. Captured. Were they talking about her? Her hands froze and she perked her ears, listening, but nothing else was said. Dempsey turned, his hands hooking the transmitter back onto his belt, and shot her an evil smile. “Looks like we’re going to get some company.” He strutted over to where she kneeled and patted her on the head. “You sit tight, now. I’ll be right back to finish what I started.” His laughter followed him past her and out of the room. 166


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Company? Did that mean more thugs were on their way? Gail waited until he was out of sight, then resumed sawing. This was it. Possibly the only time she would be left alone; it could be her only shot at getting out of there. She shut her eyes and concentrated, focusing all her energy on cutting through her restraints without cutting into one of her wrists in the process. A cramp in her hand made her pause. She twisted her arms, checking for any play in the zip tie. There was a little, very little, but it gave her hope. Ignoring the soreness in her arms and the cramping in her fingers, she pushed on. The same litany of the words played over and over in her head. Have to hurry. Have to get out. Every few minutes she flexed her wrists, testing how much she’d accomplished. Finally, she tugged her bonds and felt a significant amount of improvement in the play of the plastic. She was almost there. Just a little more and she would be loose. She was so close. Her hands began to shake; nervous energy made them unsteady and anxious. She could almost taste the sweet ambrosia of freedom. A groan and the rustle of chains had her eyes flying open and her head swiveling around to stare in astonishment. Shame was being carried into the room by Dempsey and another goon she hadn’t yet seen. Her hands stilled. Behind the goons dragging Shame was the big man himself. The air of self-confidence surrounding the man, his manner of dress and the very way he commanded attention, hinted at who he was long before anyone bothered to confirm his identity. Lucian Tremaine swaggered into the room, his presence lending a more powerful menace


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to the air than the goons could ever hope to accomplish with all their big talk and bolstering. Tremaine was a handsome man. Thick black hair waved back from his high forehead and mesmerizing chocolate eyes. His skin was pale, the color of fine bone china. He stood tall, a head above the other men. The sleek lines of his black suit accentuated the broad width of his chest and the trim dimensions of his waist and hips. Long legs carried him confidently across the room to where his thugs dropped Shame like a pile of refuse on the cold cement floor. She tore her eyes from the Master Vampire who held her life in the palm of his hand and looked instead at the man she loved with every fiber of her being. Shame lay unconscious, his body limp and sprawled out over the floor in the exact position they dropped him in. Not a single muscle twitched as Tremaine came closer and kicked him in the ribs. Dempsey and the tall, scarecrow-looking thug stood on either side of Tremaine and cheered him on, yelling obscenities and telling him to “kill the fucker”. “No! Stop it!” she screamed, knowing that even if they could understand what she was saying, he wouldn’t stop. Again and again he kicked until Shame finally came to. Tears streamed down her cheeks, intensifying with every jab, every heart-wrenching grunt Shame issued. When his eyes opened and met hers around Tremaine, something snapped inside her. One minute she was sitting on her knees, bound and gagged, crying. The next, she was ripping through what remained of her bindings and rising to her feet. One hand yanked out the ball gag, while the other gripped the small piece of glass in her fist. No one looked her way as she launched herself into the air. It wasn’t until she landed on Tremaine’s back that they paid her any mind. By then it was too late. She struck, burying the glass in Tremaine’s neck, 168


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dragging it across his throat and laying him open. Blood gushed from the wound, spraying wildly. It coated everything around them in a sheet of deep red gore. No more than thirty seconds elapsed between when she jumped and when she slit the vampire’s throat. Tremaine gurgled, attempting to speak. His hands swished through the air around her head in an endeavor to dislodge her from his back. He quickly gave up, his hands going to his throat and holding it tight, frantically trying to staunch the flow of blood. Strong hands gripped her around the waist and ripped her off him. Her back slammed against the floor and knocked the breath out of her in a great whoosh of air. She looked up and found Dempsey above her. He was in partial wolven form, his snout extended, mangy patches of fur covering the exposed skin of his face and neck. Gulping, she crawled on her hands and ass away from him. He advanced toward her, one slow step at a time. With nowhere to go, she backed into the wall and shut her eyes, praying for her end to be a fast and painless one. A deep growl above her and the absence of the blow she expected caused her to open her eyes. It was then she noticed what was going on around her. While she’d been blinded by her aggression toward Tremaine, Shame had risen. He currently had the gangly thug down on the floor and was using the chain between his cuffed hands to strangle him. One violent twist and the deviant’s neck snapped with a sickening crunch. Shame straightened and looked her way. His face was flushed a deep red. A small trickle of blood oozed from a cut near his temple. His eyes flashed in anger. Whether toward her or Dempsey, she couldn’t be sure.


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She had no reason to believe his anger didn’t extend to her as much as the others. In her quest to help Kenze, she’d betrayed the man she loved and ended up putting the life of the child she hadn’t known she carried in jeopardy. Now, when she needed help, where was Kenze to return the favor? Dempsey, who stood with his back to her, jolted into action when Shame stepped closer. Shame wheeled around as he approached. His leg flew through the air, jabbing a brutal roundhouse kick to the side of Dempsey’s head. Dempsey’s head jerked back, spittle flying from his open mouth as he grunted at impact. Gail scrambled to her feet, her back pressed tight against the wall. She was torn between wanting to stay, to make sure Shame was okay, and fleeing in case he planned to come after her next.

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Chapter Thirteen

Shame’s feet hit the floor at the same time the thug’s ass did. Shame’s gaze immediately landed on Gail. Relief, sweet and thankful, rushed over him when he saw that she hadn’t moved. She was still right there, against the wall, and though she appeared rattled and upset, physically, she was okay. When he’d seen the shape her car was in, he’d been so worried that he was going to be too late. That he’d lost her. Gail had come to warn her brother, but he didn’t care. Could he really say that he wouldn’t have done the same thing if he was in her shoes? That she had helped Ty, even after she’d been told what they planned to do as soon as he was well, endeared him to her all the more. Seeing her beautiful face so pale, the blood drying on her fingers, made his blood boil and an intense rage surge within him. She came there to help Kenze, but where the hell was her brother now? If he had anything to do with hurting his sister, Shame was going to take immense pleasure in ripping his nuts from his body. What kind of man left his sister in the hands of men he knew to be vicious killers? His eyes met hers from across the room. Insidious fear registered in Gail’s limpid blue eyes before she turned and ran from the room. Shame stopped, confused. Why did he feel like her fear was directed at him, more than the partially shifted lycan between them? His brief pause to consider Gail’s response cost him. While he was watching Gail flee, the thug he’d just dropkicked was regaining his senses.


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Teeth sank into his ankle. Shame winced, biting down on his lip to refrain from crying out. He looked down to see Tremaine’s flunky smiling up at him around a mouthful of his flesh. Shit. With his other foot, Shame reared back and kicked the thug in the neck. His ankle was released as his opponent’s head ricocheted back on his neck. As the man struggled to draw air in through his damaged windpipe, Shame leaned down and wrapped his hands around his assailant’s neck. Beneath his fingers he could feel the fast rat-a-tat-tat of the man’s pulse. Red-rimmed black irises stared up at him, willing him to finish it. One fast, sharp twist and his spinal cord was severed. Shame stood and ran for the stairs. Tremaine was gone. During all the confusion, the man had slipped from the room unnoticed. Vampires healed fast. Thanks to it being the middle of the afternoon, instead of night, it would take longer, but would still happen too soon for comfort. When the wound healed he would disappear, relocate to a new town and Shame would have to start searching for him all over again. Whatever was going to happen, it was going to happen now. One way or the other, things would be finished before the sun went down. Shame vowed it. Concern for Gail propelled him through the house and out into the yard. As bright sunshine reflected off the snow and into his eyes, Shame realized one of Tremaine’s men hadn’t been accounted for. The thickwitted man he’d seen outside, the one who had been accused of leaving the back door unlocked, had yet to make an appearance. When his eyes adjusted to the change in light, he noticed the two empty bays in the garage. Gail’s car was gone, as was the red Lamborghini. Only the four-wheel-drive truck remained in the last 172


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compartment. Seeing both vehicles missing gave him a measure of relief, but didn’t convince him of her safety. Luck was on his side for a change when he climbed up into the big truck. Whoever had driven it last had left the key in the ignition. His heart heavy with concern over Gail’s whereabouts and his conscience anxious to mete out the justice his family deserved, Shame cranked the ignition and let the tires eat asphalt. Due

in

part

to

the

heavy-tread

all-terrain

tires

and

tight

maneuverability of the truck around the sharp, slick curves, it didn’t take him long to catch up. He moved in behind Gail’s small compact car. Several miles up the road he could barely make out the shiny red paint job on the Lamborghini. When he saw that Gail was the only person in her vehicle, his mind let go of the incessant worry he’d been harboring. She was most likely on her way home. He could catch up with her later and straighten out whatever had given her the silly impression that she needed to be afraid of him. He didn’t know what had caused her to look at him with such trepidation but he would change it. On the first straight stretch, Shame revved up the RPMs on the truck and sped around her car, passing her with little effort. As he went by, he glanced over and saw her red-rimmed eyes, the tears coursing down her face. Then and there he promised that he would make things right with her. Just as soon as he took care of Tremaine. Once old business was finished, he could get on with living in the present and try to let go of the past. He pressed harder against the accelerator, rocketing the truck forward past Gail. The roads were slick, but he didn’t give their condition


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much thought as he hurried to shorten the gap between him and his nemesis. For the longest time he drove, the gas pedal glued to the floor, and still made no headway. Several times he lost sight of the faster Lamborghini only to regain sight of it a couple of miles later when it had to slow because of ice. The truck was built to handle the icy terrain better than the flashy import. That was the only advantage Shame’s truck had on the faster foreign sports car. The higher they proceeded up the mountain, the more ice was left on the road. Shame began to close in. The distance between the two vehicles shortened with every mile until the truck’s grill was right up on the bumper of the Lamborghini. Shame accelerated a little more, nudging the car from behind. Brake lights flashed. Before Shame could brace himself, the car began to fishtail and spun a sharp one-eighty right in front of him. With no time to respond, he plowed into the driver’s side door and front fender, crushing it in like a soda can. The impact threw Shame forward, knocking his head into the glass and his chest over the steering wheel. The sides of his vision wavered and began to blur. Darkness tried to take him under. Shame shook his head, fighting the desire to lay his face down on the steering wheel and close his eyes. Slightly dazed, he jumped down from the pickup and approached the crumpled sports car. Behind the wheel sat the missing thug, a long blade of glass skewered through one eye. One down, one to go. Shame circled the back end of the car. In the distance he heard the whisper of approaching police sirens. Undaunted, he continued on his course. Before he could reach the other side, the passenger door creaked 174


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open and Tremaine rolled out and hit the slushy pavement. Crimson liquid seeped down his face from several deep cuts along his forehead. Rusty dried blood was all that remained as evidence of Gail’s attack. One of his legs was twisted in an unnatural angle. Sickly white bone poked through his trousers above his backwards knee. Wide, soulless black eyes darted in Shame’s direction and then he began to drag himself away from the wreckage. Shame could almost feel sorry for the bastard, if he didn’t already know what a heartless monster he was. A few meager steps later, Shame stood above him. With his right leg, Shame kicked Tremaine over onto his back. Tremaine grunted but didn’t make any other sound as Shame kneeled beside him and lifted his head up off the ground. “Why?” Shame rumbled, shaking the large, broken vampire. “Why my family?” Tremaine coughed. Blood leaked from the corner of his mouth. “Morgan,” he sputtered. Shame shook him harder. “What? What the hell are you talking about? Speak up!” Tremaine’s chest rattled as he tried to draw air to speak. He coughed again,

and

foamy

“You…killed…Lester

blood

splattered

Morgan.”

He

Shame’s

wheezed,

face

and

drawing

in

neck. air.

“My…brother.” Realization of what he said hit Shame like a thunderbolt. Worry for his former partner clouded his mind, before he remembered that Tristan and his family were safely ensconced in a compound they’d set up in Georgia, a facility that rivaled Fort Knox for security. Lester Morgan was the last vampire he and Tristan had been sent in to neutralize before they’d faked their deaths and made a clean break www.samhainpublishing.com

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with the SCS. The psychotic vampire had gone on a murderous rampage, killing untold number of young women, before kidnapping Sara, Tristan’s then-estranged fiancée. When Tristan had been unable to resist Sara, as their superiors had dictated, they’d set it up so that when they rescued Sara, by setting off an explosion in the monster’s lair it would look like they were killed right along with Morgan. There had only been a scant few days between when he’d escaped the SCS, and when he’d shown up on his wife’s doorstep. How Tremaine had learned of Morgan’s death so quickly and been able to put out a hit on Maria and Sophie, Shame would never know. He’d found out the why, the how was irrelevant. He pulled his custom-made Bowie knife from his ankle holster and plunged it into Tremaine’s chest, trying not to gloat as the monster writhed in pain and then dissolved into a pile of insubstantial ash. The sirens he’d heard in the distance grew closer, filling the air around him as he slipped his knife back into its holster and climbed to his feet. Over the hood of the car he saw two police cars and an ambulance come to a fast stop on either side of his truck. This was going to be tricky. He didn’t like dealing with the police, for good reason. Thanks to the SCS and their secrecy bullshit, there was no record of his existence. Shamus Long may as well have never been born. Unfortunately, if things progressed far enough, the police would try to have him identified through other channels, using his scars and tattoos for reference. That could open a huge frickin’ can of worms he would just as soon avoid. Especially since his ass wouldn’t be the only one on the line if the SCS found out he was still alive. That would put Tristan at risk as well. He couldn’t afford to let that happen. Police officers and paramedics swarmed onto the scene. The EMTs rushed to the man behind the wheel, while the cops branched off, some 176


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going to the car, three surrounding him. Their hands on their weapons, they shouted simultaneously for him to put his hands behind his head. Careful not to make a sudden move, lest he be shot, Shame followed their directions, bringing both hands up to rest on the back of his head. One officer circled around behind him and clasped his wrists, twisting them down behind his back, and slapped on handcuffs tight enough to cut off his circulation. “Want to tell me just what in hell happened here, boy?” the older, more distinguished of the three questioned him. Not wanting to incriminate himself, Shame remained silent. As soon as they saw the long red smear of paint from the Lamborghini on his bumper, they would know what happened. Until then, Shame wasn’t saying a word. “Fine then, boy. You stay all clammed up. We’ll straighten this out down at the station.” With that they ushered him into the back of one of the police cruisers and hauled him away from the scene. XW Two days later, Shame sat behind bars in the smallest, Mayberryestlooking jail he’d ever had the pleasure of being held in. He was cold and grungy feeling, but otherwise fine and counting the minutes until he was a free man again. Other than requesting his one phone call, he had yet to speak a word to any one of the cops who’d questioned him about the accident. Let them think what they wanted. As soon as Tristan arranged for his bail, he was going to disappear and none of their opinions would matter. One thing he’d learned quickly in the time he’d been with the SCS was how to


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blend in and stay beneath police radar. Once you knew what you were doing, it was surprisingly simple. While he’d been there, Shame had spent a lot of time reflecting on his life. One thing, above all else, was crystal clear. He wanted Gail. Not just for a quick tumble between the sheets or short trysts, but for good. He was in love with the woman and he meant to keep her. Now all he had to do was convince her of it.

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Shameful

Chapter Fourteen

Gail rubbed her rounded belly and sighed in appreciation. If someone had told her a week before that she would crave a thick, rare T-bone steak covered in extra-crunchy peanut butter, she would have told them they were crazy. Today the combo made a scrumptious snack. She’d eaten more in the last few weeks than she had in the previous several months combined. So much so she was starting to think her baby was going to be an overeater right from the womb. She knew enough about her physiology to expect an advanced pregnancy, but she hadn’t expected it to proceed as fast as it had. A wolf’s gestation was two months; a human’s nine. She’d thought hers would fall somewhere in the middle. By her calculations, she was just over five weeks pregnant, but the baby grew at an extraordinary speed. According to the books she’d read, a human fetus around five months gestation was where her child figured into the pregnancy hierarchy. At the rate her son or daughter was growing, she would give birth around three months, instead of nine. Already, she could feel her baby shift and move inside her womb. The weird little flutter kicks came at all hours of the day and night. Each one made her stop in the middle of whatever she was doing and marvel at the precious gift of life Shame helped her create. Gail glanced down at the last bite of peanut-butter steak on her plate, considering it for a second before she shoved it away without


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finishing. It’d been a month since she’d seen Shame and he still had the ability to ruin her appetite and twist her emotions into a jangled knot she had no hope of ever untying. Life in a small town was predictable if nothing else. She’d known the minute Shame was arrested and the exact second he’d been released from jail. For days afterward, she paced the floor, expecting him to show up at any time. When a week passed and she hadn’t heard from him, she didn’t know whether to be relieved, depressed or pissed off. After the second week, depression won. Since then, she divided her time between work, sleep and daydreaming. Now, she mostly dreamed of her baby and what it would feel like to hold her child in her arms. Before she was forced to accept reality for what it was, she had dreamed of Shame and the family they could have had if things were different. Oh, she wasn’t completely naive. She knew that even if she hadn’t betrayed Shame, chances were better than good that he still would’ve walked out on her. But a woman could dream, and late at night, snuggled up beneath her covers, that was exactly what she’d done. At first. But then, upon repeated mornings of awaking with a pillow in a death grip between her arms, her face streaked with clammy tears, and a heart-wrenching sense of loss cloying the air around her, she gave up the midnight musings and faced reality. She was alone and, in a short amount of time, she was going to have a baby that would be dependant on her for everything. There was no better incentive for her to get up off her ass and get her crap together than that. Too much to do before she gave birth, and too little time in which to do it, meant that she couldn’t sit around any longer mourning a lover who clearly didn’t want her or—if he had known about it—the child they’d created together. It was past time for her to grow up, get over it and move on. 180


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Faced with oncoming motherhood and the mountain of debt that would accompany it, she tucked her tail between her legs and scurried off to beg for her job back at the motel. Surprisingly, Mr. Pascow agreed to give her another chance before she was forced to pull out the heavy groveling. His only concession was that she would have to accept a fourweek maternity leave instead of the prerequisite six. Either way it was unpaid. She agreed, without telling him that she wouldn’t have been able to afford the extra weeks off anyway. Though he didn’t say anything, it was clear by the layer of dust on his desk and splotches on the glass doors that his other employees weren’t cutting muster. All the small things she’d done without having to be told appeared to be going undone in her absence. Gail yawned, bored with her train of thought. She folded her arms atop the table and laid her head down on them. No matter how much sleep she got each night, she was always tired. Nauseous, exhausted and fat summed her up to a T these days. She was beginning to resemble a half-inflated inner tube. The inflated half being her gut. The baby sucked up all her energy and left tread marks across her stomach. At that depressing thought, she felt a flutter kick inside her womb and took the hint. Smiling, she rubbed a hand over her tummy, where she’d felt the blow, and imagined that her child could feel her loving touch. “Momma’s sorry, baby. You take all the energy you need, so that you’ll grow big and strong.” A sappy smile stretching her lips almost from ear to ear, she looked up from the table and gasped. Shame stood in the doorway between the kitchen and living room. Hip propped against the frame, muscular arms across his chest, his hungry green eyes locked her breath in her chest and wouldn’t let go. www.samhainpublishing.com

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“Miss me, darlin’?” His words broke the trance she was under and allowed her to think of something other than how devastatingly sexy he was. Of their own will, her fingers wrapped around the wooden handle on the steak knife to the left of her plate and tightened. While her heart was overjoyed to see him again, her mind wouldn’t allow her to let down her guard. It was all too possible that he was there to pay her back for her betrayal and not to initiate the happy reunion her fanciful emotions wanted. She scooted closer to the table, hiding her protruding stomach beneath the high surface. She didn’t want him to know about the baby just yet, not until the reason behind his visit was abundantly clear. “Aren’t you glad to see me?” he drawled, his voice as smooth and sinful as chocolate mousse. The baby shifted, poking at her, as if it had heard and recognized its father’s voice and wanted to get closer to him. Gail schooled her features into an emotionless mask before she spoke with as much careful indifference as she could manage. “That depends, Shame. Why are you here?” He took a step toward her. “Gail—” She cut him off. “Don’t come any closer, Shame.” She held the knife out in front of her, the business end pointed right at him. “Whatever you have to say can be said right where you’re standing.” “Or what?” he said, stepping closer. “You’ll slit my throat, like you did to Tremaine?” He pulled out a chair on the opposite side of the small table and straddled it. Her heart thumped in her ears. Her hand around the knife began to grow moist. She feverishly prayed she wouldn’t have to use it against him, because she wasn’t sure that she could. 182


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He laid his hand palm-up on the table. “Give me the knife, Gail. You know you aren’t going to use it.” Her hand extended outward, ready to do as he asked. At the last second she yanked it back, unwilling to relinquish what little security she had. “No.” He sighed and ran a hand through his shaggy auburn hair. Upon closer examination of his handsome face, she noticed the lines around his eyes looked slightly deeper and the tan shade of his skin had faded. He looked tired and maybe, her heart jumped, a little sad. Could he have missed her? He held both hands up in mock surrender. “Fine. Keep the knife. You aren’t going to need it for anything. I didn’t come here to hurt you, Gail. I swear it.” She set the knife down in front of her, a short width away from her hand, just in case. She didn’t want to believe that Shame would hurt her, but for her child’s sake she couldn’t afford to take any chances. “Why are you here, Shame? I haven’t heard anything from you in a month or more. Why show up out of the blue now?” Shame smiled, his lips quirked up in a sardonic twist. “Did you really have so little faith in me that you thought I wouldn’t come back for you, not even for the birth of our child?” Gail felt the warmth flow out of her face and drain out the tips of her toes. He knew about the baby. How was that possible? He’d left town long before she’d started to show. “How—” She swallowed. “Just because I wasn’t here doesn’t mean I don’t know everything you’ve been doing. Darlin’, I have eyes and ears everywhere.” “Shame…” Gail said in exasperation.


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“Not going to let me keep any secrets, are you?” He winked. “Ty’s still around. He’s staying in a motel in the next town over, under an alias. Apparently, he was feeling guilty about bailing on me and was still lurking around town when the shit hit the fan and I got arrested. He didn’t have the power to get me out, but he’s a good-enough friend that he stuck around to protect you while I had someone else pull the right strings for me. I asked him to stay in the area and keep me up to date on how you were and what you were doing, until I could come back for you. Imagine my surprise when he told me you’d gotten your old job back and were obviously pregnant.” That took her a few minutes to process. The entire time he’d been gone he’d had someone watching her. She wasn’t sure if she should be touched that he cared enough to go to the trouble to make sure she was okay or be creeped out. She settled for pissed off. How dare he have someone watch her every move when she didn’t even know where the hell he went, much less what he was doing. She struck back in the only way she could think of. “How do you know the baby’s even yours?” He laughed. The cocky bastard had the gall to laugh at her. “Who else would it belong to?” Gail pushed out of her chair and rose awkwardly to her feet. Anger coursed through her veins, hot and heavy. “Get out!” She raised her hand and pointed toward the door. “I don’t need you. Just get the fuck out!” The

expression

on

Shame’s

face

morphed

from

amused

contemplation to concerned sympathy an instant before she realized that a) she’d stood up and given him an unsightly view of her fat belly, and b) tears were streaming down her cheeks.

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She turned away, her hands frantically wiping off the evidence of her foolishness. It was the hormones. They made her an overemotional mess. Sniffling, she spun around, ready to wave away her show of emotion as hormone-induced insanity, and ran nose-first into the hard wall of Shame’s chest. His strong arms wrapped around her shoulders, pulling her in close, and the dam broke. A flood of held-in tears cascaded down, wetting his shirt as ragged sobs exploded unchecked from her chest. Once they started, she couldn’t stop them. All the loneliness, all the worry, burst forth onto Shame’s broad shoulders. He patted her back and whispered nonsensical words to soothe her as she cried against him. “It’s okay, darlin’. I’m here now. I’m sorry I left you without saying goodbye. I had to tie up some loose ends, liquidate some of my assets, before I could come back for you. The police here know my face, it isn’t safe for me. I had to make some arrangements, find a home for us. There’s some bad shit getting ready to go down—I can’t really talk about it now—but I want to take you away from here and start our life somewhere safe, somewhere we can be together and raise the baby without being forced to look over our shoulders every minute of the day. I have the start of a new life all set up and waiting for us. Everything’s going to be just fine now. I promise.” Over and over again, he repeated sweet nothings in her ear, his hands carding through her tangled hair, his breath sweet against her forehead. When the tears slowed and she hiccupped her remaining emotions out, he tipped her face up and wiped the wetness away. Firm, moist lips brushed over her face, kissing her eyelids and the tip of her nose, then her mouth. His kiss, though tender and as sweet as they came, sparked her dormant passion like a match to dry timber. Her breasts beaded and www.samhainpublishing.com

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ached, her cunt flexed and throbbed on the emptiness only Shame could fill. She raised up on the tips of her toes and pressed her lips more firmly over his. Her tongue peeked out to swipe the full curve of his bottom lip. He moaned and pulled her tighter against him, his arms like steel bands around her. Instead of feeling trapped, she reveled in his hold, wallowed in the love and security his embrace instilled. Shame skimmed her lips for a moment, seemingly content to allow her control over the depth of their kiss. And then, little by little, he began to take over. His velvety tongue ran over the crease between her lips, parted them and delved inside to frolic against her own. Against her stomach, she felt the hard ridge of Shame’s thick penis through his pants. She pressed back harder against the evidence of his need for her and was rewarded with the involuntary flex of his hips in response. Untouched, her clit swelled and ached, begging shamefully for attention. With her stomach out in front of her body like it now was, she wasn’t able to touch herself, stimulating her pussy like she once had. That frustrated her. Made her impatient to feel his hard, naked body against hers, the sensuous rub of his smooth skin over her overheating flesh. What she wanted to do was rip the clothes off their backs and throw him to the floor and hop on. Ride him until they both lost themselves in orgasmic bliss. A remarkably unsexy image of her large, round body grinding atop his lean, chiseled contours, broke through the mist of her passionate stupor and calmed her raging libido. How could he be attracted to her as she was? She’d never been a particularly slender person, bordering more on curvaceous than thin, but now she looked like a fat hippo. 186


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Gail pulled back, breaking the seal of their joined lips. “I’m sorry. I can’t. I—” She couldn’t let him see her naked. Her disfigured pregnant body would send him screaming from the room in repulsion. Glancing up, she expected to see disappointment and maybe even a touch of irritation for leading him on the way she had. All she saw behind his mesmerizing eyes was calm understanding and a tenderness that made her love for him swell. “It’s okay, darlin’. I understand if you don’t want to make love. Some women don’t while they’re pregnant.” Gail shook her head. He had it all wrong. “It’s not that I don’t want to. It’s just that…with the baby and…” She stumbled over how to explain herself without coming right out and saying that she felt about as desirable as a Macy’s Day Parade float. “Is that what this is about?” He pressed a chaste kiss to her temple. “You think it would hurt the baby?” “No. I…” “Making love wouldn’t hurt the baby, darlin’. As long as everything feels comfortable for you, it’s fine.” “But—” His arms swooped down under her knees and swept her off her feet, making her forget what she’d been about to say. He carried her across the room and deposited her bottom on the cold counter. She shivered, goose bumps popping up on her arms and legs. “Shame.” “I’m right here, darlin’. I’m not going anywhere.” And then he was kissing her again, his lips warm and beguiling against hers. She wrapped her arms around his neck and hung on while he stole every reasonable thought out of her head.


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His hands were warm and rough as he popped her blouse open button by button and pushed it over her shoulders and down her arms. Her bra quickly followed, leaving her completely exposed from the waist up. Or was that immense belly up? She no longer had much of a waist. He stepped back and stared at her. This was it. Any minute now, his boner would shrivel up and he would back away, horrified by the changes in her figure. Instead he moved closer, back into the V of her thighs, one hand poised over the curve of her stomach. He looked back up at her, his eyes reflecting moisture in the fading twilight. “Thank you,” he whispered, his palm reverently smoothing over her bump. “For what?” “For this.” He rubbed her stomach. “For giving me a chance to be a father again and a husband, if you’ll have me.” Gail’s breath caught in the back of her throat. Was he—? “Shame?” “I love you, Gail.” He reached inside his shirt and pulled a small chain from around his neck. On it was a ring. As he slipped it off the chain and onto her finger, she saw that it was a perfect heart-shaped solitaire, two smaller but equally perfect hearts surrounded it, one a sapphire the color of her eyes and the other an emerald the exact shade of his. “Marry me, and let me spend the rest of my life proving to you how much.” Gail squealed and threw her arms around him. “Yes! Oh God, yes, Shame. I love you so much.” “Say that again.” She stared up into his handsome face, overcome by a joy so strong it was indescribable. “I love you, Shamus Long. More than anything else in the world.”

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And then his lips were crashing back over hers. His tongue was in her mouth and they were clumsily tearing at each other’s clothes. Any insecurity she had about her body was dismissed in the wake of his declaration of love. Naked, they came together. Two souls united in their love as one, connected at mouth and groin as they were meant to be. She wrapped her legs around his waist, opening herself to his possession. In turn, he held her tighter and kissed her with a wealth of emotion that branded his name into her heart. Long, slow strokes drove her passion skyward, made her pant and whimper before he twisted his hips and hit a spot deep inside that sent her soaring. As her climax ripped through her, contracting her channel around the thick breadth of his marauding flesh, she threw her head back and screamed out her love for him. The hot pulse of his penis expanding, shooting inside her, sent her higher until stars swam behind her eyes right along with the tears of happiness that she could no longer contain. Shame loved her. And he was right. Now that he was home where he belonged, everything was going to be just fine.


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Epilogue

Kenze Wright sat in a small sports bar in downtown Miami and drowned his emotions in a bottomless mug of beer. His long legs straddled a wobbly stool at the bar, the tips of his black leather cowboy boots shoved under a rung on either side. If and when the damn thing decided to give out under the two– hundred-plus pounds of lean muscle he carried, he hoped he would be too hammered to notice. Raucous laughter, mixed with the stale scent of beer and cigarettes, filled the air around him. Underneath that, his sensitive lycan sense of smell could detect the thick aroma of too much testosterone and hot, aroused male bodies. The latter wasn’t much of a surprise since he’d chosen a well-known gay pick-up bar to frequent while in town on business. His cock talked him into coming out for companionship. Otherwise, he would have stayed ensconced in the flophouse where he’d rented a room for the week, unhappily stroking his cock to completion, instead of out looking to score a hot and slick hole to fuck himself unconscious in. Tonight, he intended to find a willing and able body to knock the edge off his hunger. It’d been much too long since his cock had seen the inside of anything other than his fist. Male or female, didn’t much matter. He’d always been attracted to both sexes. He chose men tonight, because he wanted it rough, dirty and anonymous. Say what you would about gay men being sensitive, but

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here, among the other men trolling for ass, it wasn’t apparent. They took what they wanted from whoever was willing to give it and didn’t expect the prerequisite dinner and small talk that most women desired beforehand. Besides, he couldn’t trust himself with the gentler sex anymore. Never again after what happened with Shelby, the woman he’d mistakenly thought was his mate. Shelby Flynt had proven to be anything but the delicate flower he’d thought her to be. Not that that excused what he’d done. She was still female and he was still a hell of a lot bigger and stronger than she’d been. He had been raised to never lay a hand on a woman, no matter what the circumstances. If his mother somehow knew what he’d done, that he’d killed a woman, she would probably be rolling over in her grave. Even if he hadn’t truly been the one to put her down, he’d been the cause of her death, and as far as he was concerned, that was enough. Shelby had been dead for almost a year. In the time since, he’d denied himself the touch of a woman’s gentle hand. Denied himself the touch of anyone or anything that wanted to know more than the size of his dick and whether or not he was clean. A firm hand landed on his shoulder, jarring him. He twisted around and looked up into an expressive set of deep chocolate eyes. The expression behind them was lust. Nothing more, nothing less. Some things only changed if you really wanted them to. And as he followed his new friend into the john, where they would undoubtedly swap blow jobs in one of the stalls, he couldn’t remember why he should want them to.


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About the Author

Amanda Young spends her days basking in the sun by the seashore and her nights surrounded by dozens of serenading male strippers whose only desire is to make her happy. Yeah, right. In real life, my husband would chase away all the hot men, right before asking me what I’m going to fix him for dinner and reminding me to do the dishes for the umpteenth time. Always an avid reader of romance, I was thrilled when I discovered erotic romance. For a long while I toyed with the idea of writing my own but could never find the time. When I found myself unemployed, I decided that it was high time I gave it a shot. I sat down at my trusty computer and, according to my very patient husband, haven’t moved since. To

learn

more

www.amandayoung.org.

about Send

[email protected].

Amanda an

email

Young, to

please

Amanda

Young

visit at

Look for these titles by Amanda Young Now Available: Missing in Action Shameful

Coming Soon: Taboo Desires A Child’s Love

When all else fails, what’s a girl to do? Conjure your own man, of course!

How to Conjure a Man

© 2006 Nancy Lindquist Available now at Samhain Publishing Becky Blake is through with vibrators. Well, to be honest, her vibrator’s through with her. The damn thing actually conked out, midfantasy. Time for desperate measures. Armed with thirty pounds of candles and a spell created by her best friend and strip mall witch, she heads into the desert to conjure a man. It’s freezing, dark and more than a little creepy. On top of that there’s a coyote hanging around howling loud enough to scare her to bits. Please, let this spell work. Rick Frazier’s done with manipulative women. His ex-wife is bleeding him dry. His wallet is almost as hungry as he is. It’s time to get a second job, as a bartender at ‘The Buckin’ Bronco All Male Review’. At least it will pay the bills until he sells his software program. Back in the real world of work and lonely routine, Becky has nothing to show for her desert efforts except an erotic dream that leaves her more frustrated than fulfilled. That is until her new employee shows up. It doesn’t take long to put two and two together. Rick, her new bartender, is the man she conjured in the desert. Their chemistry is magnetic, drawing them together in a lightning blast of hot passion and incredible sex. Is this true love or the result of a magic spell cast on a cold dark night? Enjoy the following excerpt for How to Conjure a Man:

Holy shit. Scratch that. Holy fucking shit! His hands moved to his eyes to rub away the remnants of sleep. He needed to be sure the image his brain processed was really there. Yep, Becky still rode the pole, spinning like a top to the throbbing beat of heavy metal. Hot damn, she looked amazing. Where the hell had she learned to strip like that? He’d almost come in his jeans when she’d ripped her dress off her tight curvy body. Now she was a goddess in sinful red, long hair flying behind her, a feral half-aware look on her beautiful face. He had the vague notion that he should return to the couch in the dressing room. Just slip quietly back to sleep and stop invading her privacy. Clearly she had no idea he’d slept there to keep an eye on her. He doubted she’d be dancing almost nude if she knew he ogled her, a voyeur in the dark bar. Maybe he should cough, let on that he was standing not five feet from the stage, staring at one of her nipples as it escaped the confines of her bra? Screw it. Watching her dance so provocatively mesmerized him. He couldn’t speak if his life depended on it, let alone suck in enough air in to cough. She dropped to her hands and knees, all stalking animal and sex as she clawed her way across the stage. Her tight body showed off sleek muscle beneath tanned skin. Her breasts, full and high under the lace of her bra, begged to be freed. Damn, his cock was hard. If she took off that bra he was done for. Laying, back she V’d her legs in the air, giving him a glorious display of bunched muscle filled out with soft curves. She pulled her legs beneath her and, rising gracefully, danced to the pole once again. While her legs wrapped around the shining length like a pro, he envisioned them encircling his body. He’d made her promises. Meant every word of them. But right now, sitting on the edge of a table not far from the stage, his cock filling out the front of sweats, he questioned every damn one of

them. He was in pain and not sure how much more he her. The red lace and satin landed smack in Rick’s hands. Did she know he was there? Could she feel his presence in the room? No, the stage lights prevented anyone from seeing into the audience more than a few feet. She had no clue what she was doing to him, how hard she’d made his cock. How much he wanted to thrust it into her aching cunt over and over again. That she was unaware she had an audience made her show all the hotter. Bending over once more, her thumbs hooked the elastic sides of her thong. Exposing her ass, she pulled them down her legs in one smooth motion. Her nether lips were now visible at the apex of her thighs. A glorious pink pouting display. He’d not had time to admire her pretty bare pussy the night before, now then rubbed over it as her mouth formed in a needy “O”. Rick’s hand moved to the front of his sweats. He intended to just shift his cock to make it more comfortable, but his rebellious hand stroked it several times through the soft fabric as he watched her touch herself. His member ached and his mouth watered at the self-inflicted assault on her damp pink flesh. He must have made some small sound, groaned his desire loud enough to be heard over the music, because her slender fingers stilled and her eyes widened. Blindly, she searched the bright wash of light for the source of the noise. “Is there someone there?” There was fear in her voice. He thought about sneaking out, pretending he’d never been there, but that would have been cruel. Standing up now, she reached for her dress and shielded her gorgeous body from his view.

“Hello? Is anybody there?” This time a note of panic crept in at the end of her sentence.He was caught. The best course of action was to speak up. Tell her he was there and allay her fears. “Sorry, Becky, it’s just me. I didn’t mean to scare you, sweetheart.” “Rick? Is that you?” He could be wrong, but he could swear he heard hope in her tone.

Is their passion real, or only a mirage?

La Mirage

© 2007 Jennifer Colgan Available now at Samhain Publishing On a lonely stretch of I-95 in the middle of the Nevada desert, journalist

Savanna

Blaine

and

photographer

Ben

Lantano

find

themselves stranded by engine trouble on their way back from an assignment. Their quest for a gas station leads them to La Mirage, a beautiful resort nestled in a secluded canyon where they are the only guests. Invited to spend the night in lush accommodations, passion flares between Savanna and Ben who have suppressed their hidden desires long enough. A single touch ignites an unforgettable night in each other’s arms, but the next day, when La Mirage mysteriously disappears, they’re left to wonder, is their newfound intimacy real or nothing more than a trick of the summer heat? Warning, this title contains the following: explicit sex, oral sex and sexual games with confectionary food delights. Enjoy the following excerpt for La Mirage: Savanna sat by the pool. She was leaning back, hands behind her on the shale tiles of the landscaped patio. Her shoes sat beside her and she scissored her legs back and forth in the dark blue water. Damn. She looked magnificent. All lush curves, wavy curls and porcelain skin. She looked like a 1940s pinup girl from the wartime calendars his grandfather always hung up in the garage.

With a low wolf whistle that he hoped she couldn’t hear, he placed the bags at the foot of the bed and hurriedly removed his digital camera from its pack. He’d tell her about it later, but right now, he wanted that shot because she was so beautiful, he had to have her on film. From just within the doorway, he snapped half a dozen quick pictures, including one in a soft focus that made her look like something out of a dream. Hopefully, she wouldn’t mind that he’d taken the candid shots. He already had a place picked out on his office wall to hang the best of them. Silently, he replaced the camera in its case and joined her outside. The heat hit him like a wall after those few minutes in the airconditioned suite. “How’s the water?” He crouched down beside her and trailed his fingers in the pool, then scooped up a palm full of water and slapped it on the back of his neck. “Beautiful.” Her voice sounded dreamy. She glanced up at him through her thick lashes. “How’s Delilah?” “She’ll be fine. I feel kind of bad. They won’t let me pay for anything.” “We probably couldn’t afford it anyway. Imagine what a night in a place like this goes for.” Savanna grinned and climbed to her feet. “I’m going to be bad. Since no one’s around, I’m going swimming. What about you?” Ben coughed. The skinny-dipping battle had raged on while he’d been engaged in retrieving their bags. Visions of Savanna’s naked body stretched out across the water, arms and legs reaching, skin glistening, had battled with his professional decorum and won. Now, he sat in Savanna’s slim shadow, drooling while she peeled off her blouse and skirt to reveal the delicious powder blue panties that matched her bra.

Good Lord, he couldn’t look away. His gaze traveled up from her ankles to her bellybutton, pausing briefly on the delicious, heart-shaped birthmark above her right knee. “Come on,” she said with a wink that went straight to his burgeoning hard-on. “What the hell.” He stripped off his shirt and she dove in, slicing the water in a perfect, splash-less dive. Wicked thoughts assailed him while he watched her glide beneath the glassy surface of the water from one side of the pool to the other. The first rumble of thunder stopped him at the top button of his jeans. The ominous sound traveled up through the soles of his shoes and drew his attention over to the dark silhouette of the rock that blocked La Mirage from the highway. The clouds gathered there were the thickest, blackest thunderheads Ben had ever seen. The son of a salesman, he’d lived in every part of the U.S. and he’d seen storms come up out of nowhere and disappear just as fast. While he watched, the shadow of the thunderheads crept toward the pool, and a flash of blue lightning cleaved toward the distant horizon. When Savanna’s sleek form broke the surface at the far side of the pool, he pointed to the sky. “You’d better get out of there.” Her smile turned to an alluring little pout, but she dutifully hoisted herself out of the water. Fat raindrops splattered a trail behind her as she ran across the patio, bra and panties transparent now and clinging suggestively to every curve. Ben’s mouth went bone dry. He didn’t breathe at all until the next lightning bolt illuminated the darkening sky. The accompanying thunder shook the ground. Savanna’s damp body slid past him through the patio door before the third flash and rumble, and a sheet of silver rain swept across the pool area thick as liquid mercury in her wake.

“Holy cow, it’s cold in here!” Gooseflesh rose all over her shivering body the moment the air conditioning hit her. She crossed her arms over her chest and jumped up and down as she peered out at the sudden deluge. When lightning arced across the sky a fourth time, the accompanying thunder sounded like the splintering of dry wood. With a squeak, Savanna jumped back, away from the open door and right into Ben’s arms. He never would have figured holding her wet, trembling body in his arms would turn him on so fast. She clung to him, her nipples rubbing against his bare chest through the sodden, see-through fabric of her bra. “You’re not afraid of a little lightning, are you?” He looked down at her, perversely hoping her answer would be yes. He liked having her cling to him, her hips pressed against his. Holding her all night while the storm raged didn’t sound like a bad way to spend an evening at all. “Me? No, I’m not—” Another crack of thunder made her jump again. He pulled her tight against him, reveling in her rising heat. “I don’t like loud noises. Thunder, cars backfiring, starter pistols…” She laughed self-consciously, but there was apprehension in her eyes when she looked up at him. It obviously bothered her to admit her weakness. “You’re safe,” he said, lowering his face toward her as a tide of feeling welled up in him. He could protect her. He wanted nothing more than to keep her safe and warm in his capable arms. In fact, he wanted to love her until she wasn’t afraid of anything.

Samhain Publishing, Ltd. It’s all about the story… Action/Adventure Fantasy Historical Horror Mainstream Mystery/Suspense Non-Fiction Paranormal Red Hots! Romance Science Fiction Western Young Adult www.samhainpublishing.com

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