The first chapter of my new book, Enforcer

If you haven't seen much of me lately, it's because I'm hard at work on my new novella, "Enforcer," which will be published in March by Berkley.

Enforcer is the long-awaited climax of the TIME HUNTERS series that so many of you have been demanding. I hope you find it worth the wait. In the meantime, I'd like to share the following chapter, just to give you a little taste of my futuristic world.

Enforcer

Chapter One

The one thing Dona had always hated about time travel was the smell. All those romantic temporal trids never mentioned the reek of horse manure and non-existent sanitation. But after three years as a Temporal Enforcer, Dona barely noticed the stench anymore.

This odor was an order of magnitude worse, a nauseating sensory assault blended with an overlay of human waste and the copper reek of blood. It seemed to coat the back of her throat until every breath, every swallow made her stomach roil.

Decomp was a smell you never got used to, no matter how many murders you worked.

Some of the bodies had spent hours ripening in the July heat of this dark, silent house before a courier ‘bot had arrived at the North American Temporal Outpost. The ‘bot’s report of a tour group under attack had every available agent scrambling.

Two and a half minutes after the ‘bot left eighteenth century Philadelphia, a team of ten Enforcers Jumped into the house’s parlor, weapons drawn. The smell told them they were too late.

It was soon obvious no frantic temporal tourist had sent the courier. Every one of the poor bastards was already dead when it made its initial Jump through time.

The killers themselves had sent the ‘bot. The question, of course, was why.

Now reasonably sure she had her rebellious stomach under control, Dona stepped through the open bedroom door. Her Enforcer’s gaze automatically tracked the arching patterns of blood-splatter across the wall to her left. The small oval rug felt sticky under her booted feet, saturated with drying blood.

She scanned the room warily. There wasn’t a hell of a lot to see, since there was barely enough space for the oak four-poster bed canopied in rose-patterned fabric, an armoire, and a wash stand. A china pitcher stood beside a matching washbowl on the stand, both painted with a delicate pattern of twining red roses that matched the canopy.

Beyond the bed’s canopy curtains lay a still lump so covered with dried blood, it appeared to have been dipped in brown paint.

Scan and identify victim, Dona ordered her internal computer.

She was perfectly suited to this kind of computer forensics. A nanocrystal computer wound through her brain, its artificial synapses linked to her neurons. More nanocrystal formed a lacy network of sensors just beneath her skin, designed to detect everything from DNA structure to the presence of tachyon weaponry. Deep within her bones and muscles lay still more nanobot filaments, making her far stronger than her long, lean build would suggest. All of which made her ideally suited for her job as a Temporal Enforcer.

DNA scan confirms there is a ninety-eight-point-five percent chance the victim in Lolai Hardin, the comp announced a moment later in its light, androgynous voice.

Dona muttered, “Yeah, that’s what I figured you’d say.”

Lolai had been the licensed temporal guide who owned Hardin's Independence Tours; this house was her Philadelphia base of operations. She’d been playing host to a group of tourists here to watch the signing of the Declaration of Independence.

Until a gang of murderers gave them all a guided tour of hell.

Since the Enforcers had already determined Lolai wasn’t one of the victims downstairs, odds were she was this one.

But you couldn’t make assumptions. Not with these bastards; they were fully capable of killing a temporal native and putting her in Lolai’s bed. Though it was hard to imagine that dark lump had ever been human...

Play the file of Lolai's commercial trid again. Sometimes looking into the victim's face helped Dona see her as a human being. Helped her see evidence that wouldn't come into focus as long as she kept seeing the victim as a chunk of meat.

The comp made that little mental chirp that said it was acting on her last order. An instant later, the woman's three-dimensional image faded into view like a ghost.

The trid appeared perfectly solid, though Lolai seemed to be standing hip-deep in the bed, roughly where the corpse’s legs should be. There was a bit of nauseating irony Dona could have done without.

The temporal guide had been delicately beautiful, despite the fine lines that radiated from the corner of her blue eyes. According to her dossier, she was eighty-two, though someone from this time would have believed her no older than twenty.

Hardin wore an eighteenth-century walking dress in deep green silk, with a delicate lace apron and a matching kerchief tucked in the gown's low square neckline. A jaunty hat decorated with flowers tilted rakishly over one eye. She looked as comfortable in the historical garb as if she wore it every day.

Which she probably did. When not ferrying tour groups back and forth through time, most guides lived wherever they conducted their tours. It helped them blend in with the temporal natives and build relationships they could use to create more interesting historical trips for their clients.

"I’m Lolai Hardin,” Hardin said in Galactic Standard with a faint Colonial Philadelphia accent. “I have thirty-four years of experience as a temporal guide specializing in Colonial America, particularly Philadelphia, Boston, and New York. Before that, I was a guide in Civil War Charleston, South Carolina.” Hardin’s smile was bright, her manner calm and confident. Dona tried not to wonder how she’d looked when she’d realized she was about to die. Had she sensed the horror her last hours would be? “If you'd like to experience life as our ancestors did, Hardin's Independence Tours will give you a taste of the past you'll never forget."

"I certainly won’t be forgetting this any time soon -- whether I like it or not," Dona muttered. She’d be having nightmares about this one.

She desperately wanted a bath.

"Goddess Mother, this is worse than the butchery downstairs," Chief Alerio Dyami rumbled as he strode into the room. Dona's far-too vulnerable heart leaped in reaction, though she managed to keep the pleasure off her face.

You weren't supposed to be that damned happy to see your commanding officer walk in.

He was a big man, tall and broad in his dark blue temporal jump armor. A Vardonese tattoo swirled down the left side of his face in vivid shades of green and gold, emphasizing the angular strength of his features. As he scanned Lolai’s pitiful corpse, glacial rage burned in those dark pupils, flecking them with crimson light.

Dyami wasn’t just Chief Temporal Enforcer for the North America Temporal Outpost -- he was a Vardonese Warlord. A genetically engineered warrior born and bred to protect civilians, Dyami had the superhuman strength and speed to do the job. His eyes glowed whenever his emotions grew especially strong, probably as a warning to the unwary. Everyone assigned to the Outpost soon learned that when the chief’s eyes went red, you’d better duck.

“Fourteen people dead,” he growled, looming at her shoulder, eyes blazing like laser sights. “And there’s not a single fucking thing we can do about it. Sometimes it drives me insane. God, I'd love to go back in time and just slaughter those bastards. Except it wouldn't do any fucking good because...”

“...You can’t change history,” Dona echoed his snarl.

Lolai would die because she had died. Somewhere she was still dying. Thirty years of time travel had proved that all time is simultaneous. Past, present and future were an illusion, which made the concepts of predestination and time paradoxes equally meaningless.

“So we’ll just damned well make sure we catch the bastards before they kill anyone else.” A muscle jerked in his broad, square jaw.

Dona rocked back on one booted heel. “With Lolai, that makes all fourteen victims accounted for. Hardin, the ten tourists downstairs -- one of whom is a fourteen-year-old boy -- and the three support staff who posed as Hardin's house servants."

The chief grunted, his brooding gaze drifting to what was left of the tour guide. "At least the bastards didn't kidnap anybody."

“No, you definitely wouldn’t want to be a victim they could take their time with.” Dona grimaced. “It was bad enough as it is.”

The woman's wrists were bound to the canopy posts with mag cables. Loops of the metallic rope-like restraints circled the posts at the foot of the bed, but the ankles they'd bound had vanished.

Dona's comp helpfully informed her that Hardin’s right leg was that red lump under the bed, while the left one had somehow ended up beside the washstand. She swallowed hard and told her comp, Do not let me toss in front of the Chief.

Beginning anti-nausea treatment. Her stomach stopped bucking. “You think the killers were priests?”

He shrugged. "Hard to say, though they were definitely Xeran, based on the DNA scans." Several of them had gang-raped one of the staff and a female tourist, leaving plenty of DNA behind in the process. They hadn’t even bothered to destroy the genetic evidence, as if they’d wanted the Enforcers to know who they were.

Dona didn’t much care for the implications. "This isn't normal behavior even for Xerans. I had my comp run a simulation based on the scene downstairs. The comp says the killers hacked at those people in some kind of frenzy. Maybe religious, maybe sexual. Either way, it was ugly.”

He nodded, only to stiffen abruptly, his head whipping around toward the form on the bed. "Seven hells!"

"What?" Her hand dropped to the shard pistol on her hip. He'd gone so pale, his facial tatt looked almost gaudy against his pallor.

What the hell could be bad enough to make Alerio Dyami go white?

"I just had my comp run a DNA scan on this woman's rapist. It says he was human.” He actually looked sick, an expression that looked utterly alien on a man who was usually so coolly professional.

Dona stared at him, feeling her stomach drop to her boots as she instantly realized why he'd reacted so strongly.

Technically the Xerans were human, being descended from the human colonists of Xer. But over the past couple of centuries, genetic engineering had changed them into something…else. Something faster and stronger and light-years meaner.

To the Xerans, humans were inferior primitives, heretics who refused to worship their "god," a lunatic they called the Victor. Dona could think of only one human they’d trust to help them slaughter a houseful of human civilians. “Ivar Terje.”

“Yeah, Ivar. Again.” The chief curled a lip. “I told my comp to rerun the scan. It got the same results. There's a ninety-nine-point-eight percent chance Terje raped and murdered Lolai Hardin.”

“Gods.” Dona’s eyes slid back to the dismembered torso. “How could he have done something like this?” And why in the name of all the hells didn’t I know he was capable of it? "I slept with him. Oh, Gods...."

"I didn't know what he was either.” Dyami shook his head, the beads of his combat decorations clicking among his long black braids. “I still can’t believe he sold us out for a handful of galactors."

Well, it was hardly a handful. The chief’s own investigation of Ivar’s finances had determined the Xerans paid him 1.3 million galactors. But Dyami wasn't the kind of man to turn traitor for any amount of money.

Ironically, it was that bedrock honor that had made Dona turn to Ivar to begin with. If Dyami hadn't been so relentlessly honorable--not to mention inhumanly handsome in that Vardonese way of his, all height and muscle and hard black eyes--she wouldn't have felt driven to seek a lover in self-defense. She’d known Alerio was every bit as attracted to her as she was to him. If he’d made a concentrated attempt to seduce her, she’d never be able to resist. And she was damned if she’d get involved with another CO.

So instead she’d become lover to a traitor and a murderer.

Oh, beefershit, Dona thought, suddenly impatient with herself. I wanted to believe I was in love with the sociopathic bastard because he knew just how to play me. I was willfully stupid.

Her sensors had warned her Ivar used his comp almost continuously, controlling his body's normal emotional reactions at all times. If he'd been a suspect, she'd have recognized that elaborate control as an indication he was lying every time he opened his mouth. But because he was her partner – and her shield against the temptation Alerio posed --she'd ignored the warning signs.

She hadn't seen the truth until his fist hit her face.

Her gaze slid back to his victim. And apparently I got off lucky. The thought of what he’d done to Lolai tied her guts in rolling acidic knots.

"Would these people be dead if we'd managed to capture Ivar six months ago?" She caught herself rubbing her belly. With an effort, she forced her hand to drop.

Dyami snorted. "I hate to interrupt your wallow in guilt, but Ivar is nothing to the Xerans." Despite his tart words, there was sympathy in his dark gaze. "They don't think much of traitors. These poor bastards would be dead whether or not they’d let the fucker come along for the ride."

"I'm not very fond of the dickhole myself," Dona muttered.

Dyami suddenly lifted his head and half turned away. Probably listening to a private com message. The dim light from the evidence bot rolled over the dark blue scales of his armored T-suit, making its silver piping gleam. Her eyes helplessly followed the rolling line of light as it played over powerful muscle barely concealed by the tight-fitting suit.

"Dr. Chogan just commed me. They’ve completed the evidence collection. Let’s take care of this poor fem and Jump for home." Turning his head, he caught her staring at his ass. One black brow rose.

If not for her computer, her cheeks would be blazing beet red. "Uh, yes sir."

"Good." He gave her a decisive nod, beads clinking. "We need to finish the cleanup before one of the temporals decides to investigate."

No, they definitely didn't want some eighteenth century good Samaritan walking in on an Enforcer team in all its armored glory. "I checked before we left the Outpost, but I didn't see any record of a mass slaying on this date,” Dona told him. “If somebody’d found this mess, they’d have talked about it.”

Dyami snorted. "Assuming any reports survived the ensuing five hundred years."

That was the trouble with time travel. You might think you knew what happened, but you really didn't. Records were lost, to fire or mold or other ravages of time. Those who reported the events at the time could have lied to protect their reputations, to make a political point, or just for the hell of it. Ever since temporal exploration began thirty years ago, humanity had been shocked to learn how much "history" was pure beefershit.

You never really knew what had happened during historical events until you went back and watched them occur. Otherwise, the past might as well be the surface of an alien planet.

"Make way. Body tube coming in." The stasis cylinder floated through the door, the blue glow of its antigrav field lighting up the room. Dr. Sakuri Chogan followed, her face grim and pale under her topknot of iridescent green hair. A swarm of evidence bots trailed her, ready to process the scene.

Chogan stopped in the doorway and stared around at the arching patterns of blood splatter. "Seven hells!"

Dona automatically took a step closer, concerned by her friend’s sickened expression.

"Oh, back off." The Outpost’s doctor shot her an impatient glower. "I do autopsies for a living.” Then, as if against her will, her gaze drifted around the room again. “Though judging by the scene, I can already tell you this bastard’s crystal is seriously cracked."

“DNA scans say it was Ivar,” Dona told her.

“Oh.” Wincing on her behalf, Chogan promptly changed the subject. "We’d better get this poor woman tubed." Revulsion crossed the human’s expressive face. "As soon as we can find all of her…”

###

Grim, unspeaking, Dona, Chogan and Dyami went to work at the gory task. Luckily temporal armor was as effective at blocking biological contaminants as it was at protecting the body from time travel.

As they worked, faint slurps and thumps signaled that the evidence bots were equally busy, removing every last blood cell from the plastered walls, every hair and bone fragment and stray bit of tissue from the bed and floor. Every last alien anything that didn't belong in the eighteenth century. By the time they were through, you’d never know anyone had died here.

Dona lifted the stiff brown pillow that had lain under Hardin’s head. A courier bot popped out from beneath it, darting into the air in a blaze of blue anti-grav light. She jumped, barely managing to bite back a startled yelp.

"Alerio Dyami!" the bot thundered in a surprisingly deep voice. "I seek Alerio Dyami, Chief Temporal Enforcer of the North American Outpost."

"I'm Dyami." Alerio studied the device with narrow-eyed intensity. “My sensors say it’s a Xeran ‘bot,” he murmured to Dona.

She backed off, one hand falling to the shard pistol holstered at her hip. Luckily, the fact that the courier had traveled in time meant it was unlikely to be armed with any really interesting energy weapons. Anybody or anything attempting a temporal jump armed with a tachyon beamer would blow itself straight to the seven hells.

Unfortunately, there were a lot of other ways to kill, even a target as formidable as Alerio Dyami. Dona locked her sensors on the ‘bot, ready to fire if it tried to power up a weapon.

"I have a message for you," the courier announced. "Would you like to take it privately?"

"Chief, don't!" Chogan began urgently.

Dyami shot her a cool look. "Give me a little credit, Doctor. I'm not stupid enough to smear anything from that thing on my skin." To the bot, he said, "I'm not concerned with privacy. If you've got a message, play it."

"As you wish," the bot said cheerfully.

And just like that, Ivar Terje stood in the middle of the room.

Dona damned near drew her pistol before logic kicked in. It’s just a trid, idiot.

"Don't shoot the 'bot, Dyami," the three-dimensional recording said with a smirk. Being genetically engineered, Ivar was inhumanly handsome—at least until you realized his eyes were as cold and gray as the ice on a frozen planet.

And why didn’t I notice that when it could have done me some good?

He’d cut his hair since she’d seen him last, buzzing it so short it covered his head in a red bristle. The style was apparently designed to call attention to the silver implants jutting from his skull.

"Look who's wearing horns!" Chogan curled a lip. "Terje’s pretending to be a priest of the Victor now."

"What do you think of my handiwork, Chief?" Ivar's image flashed a vicious white grin. "Hells, that Lolai was a squealer. If not for the mute field, every primitive for miles would have come running." The grin widened still more. "It'll take a lot more work to get a scream out of Dona, but I'll manage--eventually."

To Dona’s surprise, Dyami stiffened, his eyes going solid red, his lips pulling back in a snarl. "You won't get the chance, ‘botfucker.” He took a gliding step closer, as if he’d forgotten it was only a recording.

Ivar chuckled, almost as if he'd heard the chief. "I'm sure you're growling manly Warlord threats right now. I'd be impressed —if I were there. Instead I'll just give you a choice. Surrender yourself to the Victor’s...justice. Along with Dona, Galar Arvid, Jessica, Nick Wyatt, and his whore Riane."

Every trace of humor vanished from his face, leaving nothing but vicious intent. "Otherwise, my team and I are going to butcher every temporal historian, every trid crew, every tourist and guide we can get our hands on. And that's a long list. Your choice, Dyami. Surrender now like the hero you are, or let innocents pay for your cowardice."

The image winked out.

Dyami lunged for the 'bot in a blurring surge of Warlord muscle, but before his fingers could close over it, the thing darted away. A flare of blinding light and a thunderclap sonic boom signaled the ‘bot’s Jump back to the Xeran home world.

When Dona's ears quit ringing, Alerio was still pacing and cursing. "Courier probably recorded our reactions to Ivar's little ultimatum. He'll want to gloat." He bared his teeth in something light years from a smile. "Glaciers will claim the Seven Hells before I surrender any of my people to those Xeran dickholes."

That reaction didn't surprise Dona in the least. "He meant it about the civilians, sir. They'll slaughter every tourist and historian they can."

"Then we'll just have to make sure they don’t get the chance." His eyes were solid sheets of flame now, damn near bright enough to cast a shadow.

And she was staring at him again. Her longing was probably written all over her face. Fool, Dona thought, dragging her eyes away. Never mind what happened with Ivar – what about Kagan? Wasn’t it enough getting your heart ripped out by one commanding officer? Do you really need Dyami to repeat the lesson?

###

The temporal journey back to the North American Outpost was as grueling as always. The Enforcers Jumped from the house's great room in teams of two, accompanied by body tubes.

Alerio kept watch as was his habit, covering his team's retreat. As much as he could, anyway, having gone half-blind and deaf from the temporal flares and their accompanying sonic booms. Luckily the suits' dampening field kept anyone more than ten meters away from feeling the effects. No temporal natives would wonder why there was a thunderstorm inside the house next door.

Finally only he and Dona were left. For a moment, Alerio let his gaze linger on the cool purity of her profile, with its high cheekbones, striking violet eyes, and the mouth that seemed gene-gineered for sin.

He looked away just before she Jumped. His ears were still ringing as his comp started reciting the familiar string of coordinates back to the Outpost.

Coordinates confirmed. Engage temporal warp, he told it.

Engaging temporal warp in three...two...one.

It felt like being hit by lightning. His mind blinked out…

…And… he was back again.

Temporal warp to the Outpost successful, his comp announced.

Alerio made no answer, half-blind, stomach knotting in violent rebellion, his muscles jerking from the temporal warp. Bracing his knees, he stayed upright by will alone until his comp could compensate. My team?

All members of the investigation team present and accounted for.

Alerio breathed a silent prayer of thanks to whatever Vardonese goddess happened to be listening.

He'd lost a Jumper once. Riane Arvid's sabotaged T-suit had bounced her back and forth across Terran temporal space before finally dumping her in the twentieth century. Her suit was dead as a stone by then, unable to Jump at all. Unfortunately, a team of Xeran assassins appeared minutes later. She’d have died then and there if not for a timely rescue by Nick Wyatt, half-breed Xeran and superhuman guardian of an alien race called the Sela

Nick and Riane had returned to the Outpost desperately in love.

Still, almost losing an Enforcer was an experience Alerio had no desire to repeat. Especially considering Ivar's threats.

It'll take a lot more work to get a scream out of Dona, but I'll manage—eventually.

Like hell, ‘botfucker.

Blinking the spots from his eyes, Alerio glanced around the cavernous room that was Mission Staging. Heavily shielded for Jump traffic, it was lined evidence and equipment lockers as well as regeneration tubes for treating the injured. Most temporal missions began and ended here, especially those featuring a large Jump team.

Alerio spotted Dona deep in an animated conversation with Riane. The young Warfem and her cyborg wolf partner had been with the crew working the house's ground floor. His gaze drifted slowly down Dona’s clean, lovely profile, then along the curving contours of her body. There was something about her that had the power to stop him in his tracks every time.

Enough mooning, Alerio thought. I’ve got killers to catch.

Romance Fiction: Feminist?

I’ve always had a suspicion that romance novels are actually underground feminist literature. After all, the writers are women, the readers are women – even the editors at Big Six publishers are women, as are the vast majority of e-publishers.

And romance is the 800 pound gorilla of the book market. As Marla Bustillos notes in her article at the Awl.com, “romance is by far the most popular and lucrative genre in American publishing, with over $1.35 billion in revenues estimated in 2010. That is a little less than twice the size of the mystery genre, almost exactly twice that of science fiction/fantasy, and nearly three times the size of the market for classic/literary fiction, according to Simba Information data published at the Romance Writers of America website."

(This is a great article, by the way. She seemed to view romance the same way I always have. Which is what inspired me to write this blog.)

Yet despite the undeniable popularity of romance, everybody absolutely SNEERS at the genre. Why? That’s simple.

Anything involving so many women must suck.

Especially if it deals with subjects like how women perceive men and themselves; how they feel about men, how they experience sex, and how they manage their lives and children.

We romance authors use historical and fantasy settings to examine, in an metaphorical way, how women deal with social pressures such as the mother who demands “Why aren’t you married?”

Or how it feels to be a woman in a society which insists that women are inferior to men. Period.

Look at some of today's political discussions of women in combat roles. One female television commentator this week discussed the 60 percent increase in rape in the military. Her basic point was, Of course they’re being raped. What do they expect?

The subtext is, if you’re in the service and you get raped by a fellow soldier, you were asking for it.

Now, as a romance novelist, this is the kind of thing that makes me want to write something. Thing is, I can’t come right out and say what I really think about this commentator; that might offend a large segment of my readership.

What I can do is set a novel in, say, 1823, show a woman of the period who is raped, and then examine her experiences of both the rape itself and the reaction of Society matrons who are quick to say she must have asked for it.

I would then use the story to ask why a woman might say another women asked to be raped. Perhaps the society matron believes that since her own precious daughter doesn't wear revealing clothing or break social rules, she'll be safe from this horrific crime. (Perhaps the Fox commentator believes that as long as you don't serve in the military, you, too, will be forever safe.)

I could show the mind of the rapist, who really doesn’t give a damn what the woman was wearing. He just saw an opportunity and took it. His whole focus is on the sense of power raping this woman gives him, when in his ordinary life, he’s basically a weakling at the bottom of the male status chain. (This actually is closer to the psychological reality of serial rapists than the view of them as mysterious, all-powerful monsters.)

Using these characters, I can really look at the crime and explore it in a way that makes the reader experience ALL sides of rape: the victim’s, the offender's, the society matrons', and the judge’s.

I could show you how the law at the time viewed rape as basically a property crime: the woman’s father “owned” a virgin he could have married off for financial advantage, but who is now no longer valuable because she’s been raped. So the thief -- or rapist -- must be punished for his crime. Which is not really against the woman at all in this social view: it's against her father.

I could also give you a hero who comes to love the woman despite social attitudes that she no longer has value. I could examine how the two of them work to overcome her emotional scars.

And it would take BOTH of them. He couldn’t save her from the rape, but his willingness to love her helps her realize that she’s not a wounded, worthless object, but a human being who deserved far better from society than she got.

I could thus show you rape and its emotional effects, even make you experience those effects through my characters. I could examine the egregious way all societies treat rape. (In some countries, female victims are jailed for being raped, which makes no damned sense whatsoever.)

In so doing, I could create an argument against blaming the rape victim with considerable emotional power, without actively preaching to the reader.

This would have far greater impact on the reader than a ranting blog post talking about how a certain Fox commentator is a f****ing moron. If you happen to be a Fox fan, that’s not going to change your mind one bit.

But reading my novel just might.

Feeling the emotions of all those involved might make you think. Might make you reassess what you believe and why you believe it. (As long as I don’t overtly preach, and all my points are made in subtext rather than coming out of the heroine’s mouth.)

That’s the power of the romance novel. That’s why women write them, and that’s why women read them. It lets us talk about these things without having to worry about how men are going to react to what we have to say.

Unfortunately, said male reaction is likely to be: What IS this shit?”

Neurological studies have shown men and women have very different brains which process emotion in very different ways. So when a man reads a romance novel, the emotional experiences the book describes are not how he experiences the same things. So he just doesn't get it.

A man reads a romance and thinks, “This is not how I perceive reality. This is just smut for women.”

As a result, romance is viewed as unworthy, stupid, purple, florid….I could go on, but I’m getting depressed. Anyway, the end result is that only 9 percent of the romance readership is male, according to the Romance Writers of America.

Feminist critics are just as likely to deplore our fiction as men are. I suspect few of these women have read a romance published after, say, 1990. For one thing, many feminist literary critics proclaim our heroes are all rapists, something that has been unacceptable in romance fiction since 1988 or so.

Today we tell our readers that making a violent assault on a helpless person is not heroic. Today's romance heroes are far more likely to kill a rapist than BE one.

Then again, perhaps feminist critics decry romance for more pragmatic reasons. They have sense enough to know that if they defend the romance genre in the literary establishment, men will laugh at them. Which does not bode well for one’s academic career.

I, happily, am not a critic. I'm a romance novelist, and I'm damned happy to be one.

And I have this great idea for a book...

Car chases blog

Dear ladies from Savy Authors -Yes, I realize that I was supposed to post my car chase blog, and I do intend to do it. I will interview my husband and post the answers tonight. I just haven't had a chance to get to it before now. I am sorry. Look for it tonight.

The First Chapter of Master of Darkness

Here's Chapter One of my new novel, MASTER OF DARKNESS, which will be out May, 2012. Please let me know what you think, folks. :)


Chapter One


Normally, William Justice found gardening about as exciting as watching paint peel. He got a hell of a lot more interested when the gardener was Miranda.

Lovely Miranda Drake, wearing a pair of snug jeans that made the most of her long, strong legs and heart-shaped ass, a Black Eyed Peas T-shirt cuddling round, delightful breasts in soft cotton…

Ohhhh, baby. Plant one on me.

Besides, it wasn’t every day you got to watch a werewolf garden. Especially when she was also a witch.

Miranda sent another wave of magic rolling across the lawn like summer fireflies, cool blue sparks drifting down to sink into the soil. Everywhere the sparks touched, violets and peonies thrust eagerly up into the air, vivid petals unfurling in the space of seconds.

There was something hypnotic about the way magic illuminated the striking curves and hollows of Miranda’s clever face and the elegant, narrow line of her nose. Her eyes glowed soft amber as she cast her spells, and her full lips parted as if for the kiss he'd ached to give her for weeks.

The soft blue-white sparks of werewolf magic faded. Miranda cocked her head as she looked across the sweep of lawn, considering the effect of her new flower beds in their sweeping curves of color. "What do you think, Justice?"

He shook his head. "Randi, I'm a cop and a werewolf. Ask me who killed who with what, that I can tell you. But when it comes to gardening, I don't know carnations from kudzu."

Miranda eyed him over her shoulder, gleaming curls sliding around her shoulders with the movement of her head. "Could you get any more male?"

“Hey, if you’re gonna do it, do it right.” His gaze drifted down to her butt in wicked appreciation. Want to find out how right I can do it?

He managed not to ask. That would really be pushing it.

Apparently deciding to ignore both Justice and his growing obsession with her ass, Miranda returned her attention to her garden. "I think it needs some rose bushes." An offhand flick of her fingers brought them bursting from the earth in shades of yellow and red and soft peach, surrounding the two-story cream stone cottage in pretty blooms. “And … there. Finished.”

“Nice job,” Justice told her, letting the sincere admiration show in his voice.

The little house looked snug and homey with its rosewood shutters and peaked roof. The sturdy door was carved with an image of a wolf peering through leaves, and curving front steps led up to the wide porch supported by wooden rosewood posts. Stained glass windows glowed bright with the house’s interior lights, depicting yet more wolves running through moonlit forests or serenading the full moon.

Yet lovely as it was, the house was dwarfed by the elaborate castles, chateaus and villas that surrounded it, towering walls of marble and granite shimmering with magic in the moonlight.

Avalon. Enchanted city in the magical universe that existed alongside dull mortal Earth, invisible and unknown to humanity. Here magic was a natural force, like gravity or electro-magnetism. A power you could use to build a house – or turn into a werewolf.

God, my life is getting weird, Justice thought. And it was pretty damned weird to begin with.

Miranda had spent the last week building her new home with all that energy, condensing magic into cream stone walls and stained glass. The furniture had come next: imaginative creations in exotic Mageverse woods, carved in Celtic designs, upholstered in impossibly soft fabrics. Rugs covered the shining hardwood floors, and piles of pillows lay here and there, all in jewel-bright shades of red and green and blue that seemed to shimmer as brightly as the stained glass.

Justice had watched her conjure every bit of it, shaping raw energy with the power of her will, intellect and talent. She’d gloried in the act of creation, her smile wondering, her eyes lit from within by flashes of magic.

That sheer sensual pleasure grabbed him right by the balls, awakening his Wolf to growl in possessive need. Not that his animal nature was ever that deeply buried to begin with.

Never mind that Miranda Drake had no interest in belonging to anybody. Particularly not a certain werewolf she seemed to view mainly as a pain in the ass.

So he wasn’t the least surprised when Miranda turned her attention from her new house to look at him with narrow, determined eyes. As if he was the next thing on her mental checklist of things she planned to fix. She headed for him with a long-legged stride, determination in every step.

Here it comes.

She’d probably been planning this for a while now, but she’d been either too busy or flat on her ass with exhaustion.

Now she was neither. He got ready to fight.

Miranda stopped just inside kissing range and looked up to meet his eyes, her amber gaze flat with cool challenge.

He rocked back on his heels and folded his arms, silently telling her he was ready for whatever she wanted to dish out. “You have something to say?”

“This isn’t working.”

“What’s not working?”

“You know perfectly well. You. Here. With me.”

He lifted a brow. “That’s not what you said when I was waiting on you hand and foot.”

She’d been immobilized with exhaustion after creating enough potion to vaccinate the Magekind against werewolf Bites.

Something about the magic in those bites triggered an anaphylactic reaction that was invariably fatal, since the Magekind’s healing magic had no effect on it.

However, Miranda discovered her own werewolf magic could treat the Bites. She’d then created a vaccine to prevent the reaction altogether.

Unfortunately, the magical drain of brewing enough potion to treat the entire city had kicked her ass so thoroughly, she’d barely been able to move. Since Belle was off on a mission, Justice had taken care of Miranda himself, cooking for her, making sure she ate, even helping her to and from the bathroom.

Being who and what she was, she felt she owed him a debt. And she hated that.

Now Miranda glanced away, flushing, despite the stubborn jut of her jaw. “I didn’t ask you to do any of that.”

“No, but you needed it. You needed me. And you need me now.”

Her eyes flicked back to his, and she bared those pretty white teeth. “No. I don’t.”

“You do. Or have you forgotten that Warlock wants you dead?”

“This is Avalon, Justice. There’s a magical shield around this place you couldn’t blow a hole in with a nuclear bomb. Warlock can’t get to me.”

“No, he can’t.” She looked a bit surprised at his easy agreement. “Assuming you never leave.” He lifted a brow. “This city makes a really pretty prison, doesn’t it?”

“Dammit, Bill, I can take care of myself!”

“Like you did when Tanner tried to gut you like a rabbit?”

“At the time,” she gritted, “I was a little busy saving Guinevere’s life!”

“Good thing I was there to save yours.”

“And believe me, I’m grateful.” Her red brows drew down, and she took a challenging step forward until they were nose to nose. “But I don’t need a bodyguard anymore, Justice.”

“Too bad.” He gave her a deliberately pleasant smile. “You’ve got one.”

“If you think you’re moving in with me…”

“You want me to pitch a tent among the azaleas?”

She bared her teeth. “I want you to go home.”

He bared his teeth right back. They were starting to feel a little sharp, a sign he was just a bit too close to Changing. He tightened his control over his inner werewolf. “I don’t have a home anymore, sweetheart. Not since I saved your ass. Warlock and the Council of Clans have declared me a traitor.”

“Then you can stay with Tristan and Belle, just the way we’ve been doing. She won’t care.”

“Oh, hell yes, she will. She’ll be too polite to say so, but she’ll care. She and Tristan are Truebonded now, remember? Living with those too is like being trapped in an episode of Knights of the Round Table gone Wild.”

Even as pissed as she was, Miranda’s lips twitched in an aborted smile. It really had gotten damned uncomfortable staying with the couple, whose psychic bond made them newlyweds in all but name. “Yeah, well, Avalon is a big city, Justice. Find somewhere else. Hell, ask Belle. She’ll find somebody to put you up.”

“No. I’m your bodyguard, Miranda. I’m not leaving you until Warlock’s dead. Or I am.” Protecting people was what he did. It was what he was. Even becoming a werewolf hadn’t changed that.

He damned well wouldn’t let it.

“I. Don’t. Need. A. Bodyguard!” Her soft upper lip curled into a lupine snarl, and her eyes sparked with temper.

Justice looked at that pretty mouth – and his temper Shifted, transforming like a werewolf into raw, hot lust. God, he burned to know how that mouth tasted. Just keep snarling, baby, and we’ll find out.


Miranda wished to hell Bill Justice wasn't so damned hot.

There he stood, long-legs braced wide in faded jeans and worn black boots, brawny arms folded in a way that made his biceps look the size of grapefruit. His hair was black and glossy in the moonlight, just long enough to curl, and sparks of werewolf magic flickered in his black eyes when he angled his head to snarl at her.

She liked to tell herself he had a thug's face, what with the broad cheekbones, square jaw and Roman nose, his brows thick slashes over his narrow, deep-set eyes. Cop's eyes, watchful, accessing, more than a little paranoid.

Miranda could resist all that. Really. She'd be just fine if it wasn't for his mouth. Wide, curled in a wicked grin more often than not, with a full lower lip she really wanted to bite. Just hard enough to make those ebony eyes go all hot.

The trick was to keep him the hell out of her house. If she was dumb enough to let him move in, he'd be in her bed the next time she turned around. That was just the way Alpha Males were. Pushy bastards, each and every one. And God knew Justice was as Alpha as they came.


Just like my psycho father.

Only Justice was nothing like Warlock. She knew that. But he was still a dominant son of a bitch, and eventually, he’d want to prove just how dominant he really was.

Just like Warlock. Just like the stepfather she’d had to kill because he’d finally murdered her mother after years of abuse. Miranda didn’t need another dominant son of a bitch in her life, good guy ex-cop or not.

I don’t want to have to kill him too, a tiny voice whispered in the back of her mind.

She told it to shut up. I’m not going to kill Justice. But he’s still not moving in.

His eyes fixed on hers in a hot predator stare that made her nipples harden, and his wide mouth flattened in a determined line. "I'm not leaving, Miranda. Deal with it."

"You're not staying, either." She braced her hands on her hips and tried to ignore the nipples. It wasn't like she was in her Burning Moon, dammit. This stupid attraction would be understandable then, a natural product of magical werewolf hormones driving her to mate. Anything male would do.

But she wasn't in her Burning Moon. This was all Justice. And she had no idea how he was doing it to her. If she didn't know better, she'd think it was a spell.

"What happens the next time Warlock sends one of his killers, Miranda?" He was tall enough to look down at her at just the perfect masculine angle. Bastard.

Miranda glowered up into those seductive eyes. "I can handle anything he throws at me." A bald-faced lie, but never mind. She just needed to get Justice out of her hair. She's figure out the assassin thing later.

"I don't want your death on my conscience."

“I’m not going to die, dammit. And either way, it’s not your problem.”

Temper flared in those midnight eyes as he spoke through gritted teeth. “By God, it is. I’ve made you my responsibility, so you’re my responsibility.”

“Why?” she growled back, so damned frustrated she wanted to pull her hair. Or his. “What the hell difference does my life make to you?”

“This!” Big hands closed over her shoulders and snatched her right off her feet as if she was a three-year-old. His mouth covered hers in a kiss that flooded her brain with pure need.

Oh, my God, Miranda thought, his lips are as soft as they look.


And then she couldn’t think anything at all.

His body crushed into hers, broad firm muscle under soft cotton, arms wrapping around her in a powerful grip that dragged her close and drowned her in his hot male animal strength. His tongue stroked between her lips, drugging her with the taste of masculine hunger and Direwolf magic. The blend of wild wolf heat and pure male desire hit her brain like a shot of Kentucky bourbon in strong black coffee. It jolted and dizzied, making the world swim and stealing her will to resist.

As if sensing that weakness, he dropped one hand from her waist, found the curve of her ass with a warm, possessive grip. Tightened and lifted as if she weighed no more than a child. Her feet left the ground and the world spun as he carried her toward the cottage. Still kissing her.

The door banged open and he swept her inside like something out of a fairy tale.

Except Miranda had quit believing in fairy tales when she was four years old -- the day she’d realized her magical daddy was more devil dog than Prince Charming.
But God, there was a different kind of magic in Justice’s skillful mouth and strong, steady grip, and Miranda let herself believe.

For the moment.


Justice lost himself in the sheer sensual feast that was Miranda’s mouth – the velvety warmth of her lips, the curl and flick of her wet little tongue, her teeth tugging his lip in hungry demand. Her body felt warm in the cradle of his arms. Deliciously soft in all the perfect places, firm and strong in others. Her scent flooded his head, sensual musk and the fresh green tang of deep forest. All of it spelled Direkind female to his growling libido.

His sexual need had grown stronger, darker, since he’d become a werewolf three years ago, and Miranda brought that hunger to quivering attention. But then, she could arouse a plaster saint in a church niche with those soft, soft lips…

Justice tore himself away from her mouth just long enough to scan the house for a place to make love to her. He knew damned well if he paused too long, she’d start thinking about all the reasons this was a bad idea. He needed his hands and mouth on her now if he meant to keep them there.

Off to the left of the foyer lay the living room, with its fireplace and the semi-circular conversation pit that curved around it. He carried her into the room and down the steps into the pit, where jewel-tone pillows lay in a tempting pile.

Justice looked down into her vivid eyes as he lowered her into the inviting little nest. “God, I want you.” He ached to see that pretty body spread for him in long-legged, exquisite nudity.

But as he reached for the hem of her T-shirt, he froze.

She watched him as she lay sprawled across the pillows, her copper hair spilling in bright curls around her head. Her chest rose and fell in the quick rhythms of arousal, but cynicism had begun to cool the heat in her eyes.

Justice rose to his feet, grabbed the hem of his black polo shirt and dragged it off over his head. Her eyes widened, the cynicism drowning in surprised arousal. The tip of her pink tongue flicked over her lips.

He concealed a smile of satisfaction. During his human days, he’d logged a lot of hours running and lifting weights, but not out of the usual gym-rat vanity. For a cop, building strength and muscle was a survival strategy. If you got into a chase or a fight with some asshole, you wanted to make damn sure you won. Becoming a werewolf had only added to the size and density of the muscle he’d worked for years to build.

Judging from her dilating eyes, Miranda approved of the results.

His cock bucked against the fly of his jeans. Justice reached down to free it. His zipper whispered, erotically loud to his wolf senses.

Toeing off his running shoes, he caught the waistbands of both jeans and cotton boxers, dragging them down his thighs in one ruthless motion. Stepping free of the tangle of fabric, he kicked them away and straightened. His cock jutted from his groin, his balls heavy and tight below it.

Then he just stood there, letting her look. A bead of sweat ran down his spine.

By stripping first, he’d put all the power in her hands. Justice had come to read Miranda pretty damned well over the past month, and he knew if he didn’t give her this moment of control, she’d never trust him.

Jesus, the men she knew before me must have been real bastards.

Miranda stared at him in helpless, aroused amazement. Alphas didn’t do things like that: display themselves to a woman, let her make the choice. They seduced, they demanded, they overwhelmed with sheer erotic skill. Just as Justice had been doing to her from the minute he’d grabbed her shoulders.

When he’d put her down on the pillows, she’d figured she was in for a dominance fuck – hot, arousing as hell, but still designed to put her in her place: that of a female who knew who her master was, and obeyed accordingly.

But now he just stood there, magnificent in his nudity, and waited. Waited to find out if she wanted him.

As if she could do anything else. Justice was armored in delicious male muscle from wide shoulders to tight waist, down long runner’s legs to the big feet he’d planted wide. Yet the brawn wasn’t beefy or overdone, like that of some steroid-shooting professional gorilla. His was a knife-fighter’s body, the perfect balance between mass, agility and speed. It was a musculature that shouted of aggression, yet his powerful hands hung open and easy, not balled in threatening fists. And his cock…

Sweet Mother Mary.

It jutted at her, rosy and thick from the heart-shaped head to the broad base and heavy balls. She felt a rush of heat deep in her belly as she imagined him pumping it in and out of her with the all power of that muscular ass.

Miranda licked her lips and lifted her eyes from that meat shaft. And got caught in his hungry black gaze. He stared at her as if she was everything he’d ever wanted in a woman.

Nothing like the Alpha Warlock had sent to breed her. That one’s stare had reduced her to the hole between her thighs. If she hadn’t killed him, he’d have raped her. Warlock had wanted her pregnant rather than dead then, and Harold Worthington had meant to do the job.

Worthington had been old enough to be her father, and she’d been a virgin. He’d threatened to beat her mother if she didn’t submit.

Instead Miranda conjured a blade and drove it into his brain. Not to save herself, but because Joelle Drake had been beaten enough.

Barely a week later, her mother was dead, murdered by her abusive husband. Miranda burned down her stepfather’s beloved mansion around his corpse and fled.

Two nights later in some one-stoplight town, she’d picked up a twenty-year-old human in a bar, just to make sure her first time wasn’t rape at the hands of another of Warlock’s thugs. The boy had been sweet and surprisingly tender despite his clumsy inexperience, and Miranda had decided on the spot to stick to human lovers.

She’d sworn then that no werewolf would ever occupy her bed.

But here was Justice, looking at her with those dark, hot, patient eyes. And waiting.
Miranda caught the hem of her T-shirt and pulled it off over her head.

As she tossed the shirt aside, he seemed to quit breathing. Freezing like a predator, he stared at the round curves of her breasts cupped in the black lace of her bra.

She’d have expected the eager wolf heat in Justice’s gaze to make her feel vulnerable. Instead she felt powerful – and more profoundly female than she’d ever been in her life.

The front clasp sprang open under her fingers, and Miranda shrugged the bra off with a roll of her shoulders.

His tongue flicked over his full lower lip.

She dragged her boots off and threw them one by one across the room. The thump and skidding clatter as they landed on the hardwood floor sounded loud to her sensitized hearing.

Justice’s gaze didn’t falter.

Miranda tugged off her socks and sent them flying over the semi-circular couch. Her heart hammered.

Her zipper hissed. His powerful shoulders coiled.

She took her time pulling off her jeans, adding some gratuitous hip wiggle just to make a muscle twitch in his square jaw. The jeans sailed off after the socks.

Miranda rolled to her feet with the easy strength of her Direwolf blood. She watched him watch her as she slowly slid the thin black silk panties down her thighs. Spinning it out, making them both wait.

Until she straightened, toed the panties aside, and stepped up to him, as naked as he was. Justice still didn’t move, though those big hands had coiled into fists, as if he was fighting the need to grab and take.

He must be six-three or four, tall enough that she had to tilt her head to meet his gaze. The wolf inside him flickered deep in his eyes, its feral hunger caged by Justice’s iron control.

That control gave her the courage to touch his chest, run her fingers over the curves and hollows of firm muscle under warm, tanned skin. His dark chest hair felt as soft and fine as fur. His heart thumped against her fingertips in a drumbeat of sexual need.

God, he was big. Even bigger than her stepfather...

The flashback hit.

Miranda started to snatch her mother’s limp body into her arms, only to freeze, afraid to touch her and hurt her even more. “Call 911!” she yelled at her stepfather.

“It’s too late.” Gerald Drake sounded utterly indifferent for a man who’d just murdered his wife with one blow of his fist. Easy enough to do, since he was in Direwolf form, and Joelle had not even dared to transform. “She broke her neck. She’s dead.”

He bared his teeth, stalking toward Miranda on clawed feet. Grabbing her by a fistful of mane, he hauled her up away from Joelle’s body, drawing back for another open-handed swipe of his claws. “And I’m not done with you.”

He didn’t notice the short sword shimmering into her hand, but he did when she rammed it into his chest. Miranda’s lips peeled off her teeth. “Well, I’m done with you!”


The memory disappeared back into the depths of her mind like a hit-and-run eighteen wheeler, leaving Miranda dazed in its wake. What the fuck am I doing? Justice is an Alpha Direwolf, just like Gerald, just like Worthington. He…

Justice lowered his head. Before she could obey a howling instinct to jerk away, his mouth touched hers, tender, soft, a bare brush of lip on lip. He didn’t grab her, didn’t shove himself against her to make her aware of how he dwarfed her with all that muscle. Only his lips touched hers, the contact tender, questioning, reassuring.

Hunger carefully tamped down, though she could smell it in his scent, a dark male perfume growing stronger with each second.

Inside her soul, her werewolf nature stilled, protective rage draining. Sensing Justice meant her no harm.

A thought flashed through her mind, hard and sharp as a blade. I can let Warlock and his bastards make a sexual cripple out of me, or I can prove I’m not a victim.

She opened her mouth and let Justice in. Besides, I’m a werewolf. I can heal anything he does to me. I’ve done it before.

His tongue swirled around hers in sweet temptation, silently inviting her to play. She pursued it back into his mouth, letting his mint-and-male taste flood her brain and drown her ghosts.

Passion began to heat her blood like a pot slowly coming to a boil.

Warm fingers found the stiff peak of one breast and traced a slow, tempting circle over the sensitive nipple. Pleasure curled through her, lazy as sun-warmed honey. And just as sweet.

Miranda leaned into Justice with a soft, helpless little moan. And tried not to think about all the reasons this was a really bad idea.


Hope you liked that little taste. I will post more latter.

Angela Knight
www.angelasknights.com

A sample of Chain of Kisses

My new e-book, book, Chain of Kisses, is out now from Changeling. It's available in Kindle and Nook format, among others. I just wanted to share a little sample of it.

You will find it here:
Chain of Kisses

Be aware, though-- this is short, but it's really, really kinky. There's a wide streak of BDSM in it, so if you don't like that, you won't like this book. In fact, I had to hunt some to find a section of it clean enough to post. As it is, don't read any further if you are under 18. I MEAN IT!!! I'm a momma, so don't make me come over there....

Twenty members of Arles’s crew sat around the octagonal serving tables in the Mjölnir’s mess. As we walked in, their voices filled the room with a cheerful babble of jokes, tech talk, and the usual playful taunts, reminding me of happier days aboard the Valkyrie.

But as they spotted Arles leading me toward the officer’s table, all conversation died away. Men and women alike turned to stare.

No wonder. A length of gold chain led from my jeweled collar to the prince’s big hand, and manacles bound my wrists. My bonds were as finely crafted and gem-studded as any jewelry I’d ever worn, but no one would mistake them for anything but symbols of my sexual captivity.

I lifted my chin and met the curious gazes, freezing my expression into one of cool disdain. I might wear chains, but I was still a royal princess of Swanhilde.

Still, the walk to the captain’s table stung. Women smirked in satisfaction at seeing an enemy so shamed. Men leered at the nipples visible through my filmy thrall tunic. One spacer made a comment that triggered barks of crude laughter.

My hands curled into fists. I wanted to rage at them, but I muzzled my fury and reminded myself of my bargain with Arles. A little shame was a small price to pay for the lives of my crew.

Even as I drew my shoulders back and stiffened my spine, eyes widened all across the room. Everyone promptly found something else to look at. The snap of heads turning to gaze elsewhere looked almost synchronized. What the hell…

Which was when I noticed the tension in Arles’s broad shoulders and his white-knuckled grip on my leash. I couldn’t see his expression -- I walked at his heels -- yet I could almost feel the radiating heat of his anger -- directed, for once, at someone other than me.

I stared at his stiff spine in speculation. Perhaps he was simply a jealous man, yet some naïve part of me hoped he’d felt my shame and silently defended me with a glare.

Ridiculous thought. Why would he care? Especially given that shaming me was obviously the intention behind the sex-thrall tunic and chains.

But as I trailed him across the gleaming faux marble floor to the table reserved for senior officers, I remembered the boy I’d loved. Arles had been an idealist then, devoted to his father’s vision of imperial honor and responsibility.

I’d been five years old the summer my mother had hand-fasted me to Prince Arles. Even then, the tall, handsome fifteen-year-old had fascinated me. He’d been kind, showing me the model starcraft he’d built, even teaching me to fly the little toy around the palace.

I’d proceeded to break one of my mother’s priceless Elderkind vases with a particularly ill-aimed dive. To my astonishment, Arles told our parents he was to blame. Though he suffered his mortified father’s thundering wrath, he didn’t reveal I was the true culprit. And I was deeply grateful.

Queen Zerelda expected her daughters to be worthy representatives of our royal House. Had Arles not claimed responsibility, Mother would have ordered the captain of the Royal Guard to flog me with his sword belt.

It would not have been the first time, nor the last.

From then on I’d worshipped my prince. And that was how I thought of him, My Prince, as though he were a hero from some ancient tale.

We spent hours together in the years that followed, arguing ancient battles and plotting wild strategies to defeat the Fafnar. I came to adore Arles with all the passion in my young heart. Not even Galon had been able to dislodge him.

But Arles was no longer that boy, as I was no longer the foolish girl trembling before her mother’s anger. It was past time I took responsibility for my actions.

I had indeed shamed the royal House of Vanda and voided the treaty that had been in place since our parents had hand-fasted us. It was a good thing Emperor Ragnar had not abandoned Swanhilde to its fate, or the Fafnar would have enslaved my people and wiped out my royal House. They’d done as much on the other worlds they’d preyed upon.

We wouldn’t have had any hope of defending ourselves. Swanhilde’s people were artisans and poets, farmers and philosophers. The Torreans, on the other hand, were the finest warriors in human space, which was why my mother had sought the treaty with Emperor Ragnar to begin with.

My stomach clenched as I considered the fate I’d almost brought down on my world. I deserve anything Arles wants to do to me.

The prince sat down at the server and waved me to the high-backed seat next to his. I settled into the chair, feeling its warm, dark blue padding shift and move around me until it cuddled my body like a living thing. I glanced over the room, lifting my brows. Every seat in the mess was of the same expensive type. “You pamper your crew, Captain.”

He shrugged. “Small comforts are the brick and mortar of crew loyalty. My people are well paid, and I treat them with respect. In return, they never hesitate to follow me wherever I lead.” Arles grimaced. “Including more than one hand-to-hand brawl with the lizards.”

“That couldn’t have been much fun.” Fafnarian warriors are built like biped tanks, more than two and a half meters tall, with armored black hides and claws like daggers. “I’ve had a scuffle or two with them myself. I killed one, but I damned near bled to death doing it.”

That particular lizard had slain Galon, which was why I went after the reptilian fucker with a quark-splitter’s axe. I’d been so blind with rage and grief, it was a wonder I lived through the fight at all.

Galon had been dead two years now, but I still missed him.

Blue brows lifted. Arles eyed me as if he saw far more than I wanted him to. With his sensor implants, he probably did. Finally he nodded shortly and turned his attention to the tabletop menu display.

I watched his clever fingers tap meal choices for both of us. I was not surprised he didn’t ask my preferences. I was his thrall, not a guest, and he wanted to make sure I knew it.

While we waited for the server to produce our plates, the prince propped his elbows on the table and studied me. I decided it was time to own up to my mistakes.

“I was a stupid girl ten years ago, Arles.” I had to force my gaze not to drop. “I know you may not believe me, but I’ve rued my flight every day since. It was cowardly, and I was not raised to be a coward. I have spent the last decade trying to become a woman who could meet her own eyes in the mirror.”

Arles bared even white teeth, not sympathetic in the least. “While my House endured the shit-storm of rumor you left behind -- rumors my enemies used against me to erode my reputation and stain my honor.”

I swallowed. “Yes, I’ve seen the news vids.” The galactic news coverage had been vicious. Reporters brought up my jilting him in every story about his victories.

“And we won’t even mention your sister’s antics once she became my brother’s wife.” The prince grimaced. “Had I not redeemed myself in the Fafnar war, our nobility would have refused to acknowledge me as my father’s heir. You damned near wrecked my career before it even began.”

“I know.”

“Meals are served,” the table announced before I could say any more. Panels in its gleaming surface opened, and the server lifted our food into place.

I picked up my fork, only to put it down again, unable to eat for the tension knotting my belly. “I wish there was a way to make up for my actions.”

“There is.” Arles studied me with a gambler’s cool calculation. “My tour of duty here is done. I’m returning to Tor. If you truly mean to make up for your transgressions, serve as my thrall until I find a wife.”

I gaped at him. It was one thing to parade around his ship on a leash, playing sex games. To do so on Tor, where the news services would beam every juicy detail to Swanhilde… ”But my mother…”

“Yes, I imagine it will be quite the scandal. A Swanhilde princess in bondage to her former betrothed.”

Another woman might have mistaken the nasty curve of his mouth for a smile. “Fortunately, you’ve seen to it that I’m inured to scandal. You, however, will experience the same depths of shame I knew when you jilted me before the whole of my father’s empire.”

I hope you'll enjoy "Chain of Kisses" as much as I did writing it. Thanks for reading!

Best,

Angela Knight

The First Chapter of Hope's Kiss

My new e-book, "Hope's Kiss," is now available from Red Sage. Here's the first chapter. If you're interested in buying the book you'll find it here: Hope's Kiss.

In the meantime, enjoy the sample...


He was naked, covered in blood, and lying in the floor of a steel cage.

She’d still know Mark Wilder anywhere.

Detective Hope Barton scanned the room from the bottom step, eyes flicking from the cage to the bloody wooden table beside it, to the shackles that hung from blood-splattered cement walls.

The big, dimly lit basement reeked of murder: body fluids, rotting gore, and helpless suffering. Her stomach heaved, but Hope had been a violent crimes detective for two years, and she’d stood over her share of slaughter. Swallowing hard, she forced her dinner back where it belonged and did her job.

“Mark.” Hope strode toward the cage, ignoring the sticky puddles drying on the cement underfoot. She was too busy scanning the room for the key to his cell. There was no sign of one, dammit. “What the hell happened to you?” When he didn’t move, she raised her voice in a cop’s bark. “Mark!”

He stirred and lifted his head from the cage’s dirty floor. One dazed green eye met hers under a shock of matted blond hair. Blood and filth streaked his face, his lips were cut and bruised, and his left eye was swollen shut.

Somebody had beaten the crap out of him. And judging from his bloody knuckles, he’d fought back hard. Which was no surprise. Mark never took anything lying down.

Her gut twisted. How was she going to get him out of here? She grabbed the thick iron bars in both hands. “Mark…” “Mark, it’s Hope.”

For a suspended instant, he stared at her without any recognition at all.

Until he roared with a tortured animal howl and leaped at her in an impossible eight-foot bound. Pure reflex had her jolting back, barely dodging his hand as it shot through the bars.
How did he do that? Nobody could jump like that!

Mark’s lips peeled off snapping teeth, his powerful body straining to reach her with fingers curled into claws. His bare, bloody feet thudded on the bars as he kicked them savagely, trying to bend the steel. His one good eye glittered in frenzy.

He has fangs. She froze, staring at his sharply pointed canine teeth. Sweet God, Mark has fangs!

He sure as hell hadn’t had them in high school. She’d put her tongue in his mouth often enough to know.

As he bellowed and clawed, Hope damn near drew down on him. She managed to drag her hand away from the grip of her shoulder-holstered 9mil. Glock, but it took an effort. I’m not going to shoot Mark Wilder.

God, she ached to call for backup, but she no longer trusted anyone in the department.

Mark finally stopped howling. Clinging to the bars, he stared at her, his good eye feral and desperate, like a wolf’s with one leg in a bear trap. Recognition flickered in his gaze. “Hope?”

His voice sounded broken, raspy, as if he’d been screaming. Screaming for a very long time.

Pity raked at her heart, along with a certain tense relief. At least he’d recognized her. “Yeah, it’s me.” She gave him a twisted smile. “Guess you were right. There is a vampire in Reede County.”

“Told you.” He closed his eyes and gritted his teeth as if fighting some powerful urge. “I warned you…what he was.”

Yeah, but she’d thought he’d lost his mind. The story he’d told her last week had certainly sounded crazy.

* * * *

They’d been working their way through a pizza in his den as Blade Trinity roared away on the big flat-screen television, Wesley Snipes killing vampires with a fanged snarl and flashing arcs of his sword.

It was a DVD choice Hope later realized was deliberate.

She’d folded a slice of the pizza and was about to take a healthy bite when Mark said, “I know who killed Joy.”

Hope dropped the slice back on her plate. He’d said he had something to tell her when he’d invited her over, but she’d had no idea he’d meant anything like this. He looked tense, as if he dreaded telling her whatever he had in mind, his green eyes narrow and wary. “I’m listening.”

“Patrick Stone came to my folks’ house the night after Joy died.”

“The tent revival preacher? You think he killed your sister?” Sexual predators often assumed religious covers that gave them access to victims, and they moved around a lot to keep from getting caught.

“Yeah. We thought Stone was going to offer to pray with us or something, like my folks’ pastor had.” Mark braced his elbows on his knees. A muscle in his jaw flexed as he bit off the next words. “Instead, the fucker told us all to forget about her, that she was nothing but a little slut.”

“Oh, my God. He said that to your parents? So how hard did you kick his ass? And how many punches did your daddy get in?” She grinned, imagining Ted Wilder’s reaction to anybody saying something like that about his little girl. Preacher or no, Ted would have taken the guy apart.

“None. Dad believed the bastard. They both did.” Mark’s big hands flexed between his knees.

“What? That makes no sense. What did you do?”

“Invited Stone outside and tried to knock his teeth down his throat. He blocked every punch, tossed me on my ass…” Mark stopped and took a deep breath. “And then he told me he was a vampire. Showed me his fangs and told me exactly what he did to Joy. In sickening detail.”

“He actually had false teeth made to look like fangs?” That would explain the puncture marks in the victims’ bite wounds.

“No, Hope. He really is a vampire. He said that’s how he made my parents believe him -- he’s got psychic abilities no human can resist.”

A chill raced over her skin, and Hope had to work to keep her face expressionless. On the screen, Wesley showed his fangs in a flash of white against his dark skin. “Let me get this straight. You believe your sister was murdered by a vampire?”

He didn’t look away. “I know how crazy it sounds, but yeah, that’s exactly what I believe.”

* * * *

It had to be Post Traumatic Stress. Mark had just left the Marines after ten years in Afghanistan and Iraq as a demolition specialist. A decade of that would give anybody PTSD.

Except it hadn't been the trauma talking. Every word of his wild story had been true.

“Talk to me, Hope,” Mark begged in a ragged voice, leaning against the bars as if all his furious energy had abandoned him. “Help me hang on, or I’m going to lose it again.”

She studied him, frowning. His face was white and bloodless, his lips pale.
“What do you want me to say?”

“Anything. Just talk to me.” He closed his good eye and pressed his forehead against the bars. “How did you find me?”

“Your parents came by the Sheriff’s Office yesterday.” The Wilders had known Hope for years, so they asked for her whenever they needed a cop. “They told me they hadn’t seen you in a week. At first they’d thought you’d just forgotten to call, but when your father kept checking your house and you never came home, they got worried.”

He grimaced. “I’ll bet they’re going out of their minds, after what happened to Joy.”

“Pretty much. Which is when I decided to question Stone after last night’s revival, something I damn well should have done when you said he killed Joy.”

“Hell, I wouldn’t have believed me either.”

Hope turned and began to pace, trying to work off her outraged energy. “You know, Stone actually ordered me to forget those women, as if he expected me to obey him.”

“He did. And you would have, if you’d been an ordinary human.”

She decided not to ask what the hell he meant by that. She wasn’t sure she wanted to know. “So I started asking questions. One of the women from the church hosting the revival told me she’d loaned Stone her mother’s house. The mother’s been dead a year or so, and this lady hasn’t been able to sell the place.”

“And she never will when word gets out about this.” He gestured at the blood-smeared cement.

“Then this morning, Sheriff Williams called me into his office. Said to quit wasting my time with animal kills and get back to work on my caseload. But animals don’t leave finger shaped bruises, and those were human bites, no matter what the coroner said.” Hope turned to face Mark, her hands curling into fists. “Thing is, I’d discussed the cases with the sheriff just the day before, and he’d agreed they were homicides. It was just like you said -- Stone had done something to his mind.”

“Bastard’s got a lot of power.” Mark straightened abruptly, as if someone had goosed him with a Taser. His good eye widened in panic. “What time is it? Is Stone here? You’ve got to get the hell out, Hope, or he’ll…”

“Relax, tonight’s service just started. Which is why I decided to drop by and check out the house, even though I didn’t have a warrant.” She curled a lip at the blood splatter that painted the cinderblock walls. “I smelled the stench of this dungeon of his all the way out on the porch. Instant probable cause. I kicked in the door and followed the reek.”

“For all the good it does either of us.” Mark wrapped his bruised hands around the bars and stared at her with desperate intensity. At least he seemed to be tracking now. “Hope, you can’t touch Stone. Even if you managed to arrest him, all he has to do is use his powers on the sheriff and he’s out the door. Given his strength, I doubt you could bring him in at all. And I don’t want him to get his claws into you too.”

She moved back over to the cage, staying just out of reach in case he tried to grab her again. “How did you end up like this?”

“I was dumb enough to challenge him at my folks’ house.” A bitter grimace twisted Mark’s mouth, and the knuckles of his fists went white from his grip on the bars. “He told me later that’s how he knew I’m Kith. He almost grabbed me that night, but he decided to wait, think it over. Then like a moron, I showed up here and got myself caught.”

“Wait.” Hope frowned. “What the hell’s a Kith?”

“That’s what vamps call people with the psychic strength to survive becoming a vampire.” Mark leaned his forehead against the bars and closed his eyes. The hollows beneath his striking cheekbones looked deeper, as if he was growing gaunter before her eyes. “The same strength makes us immune to a vampire’s orders, so that’s how they recognize us. Which is how I became a monster.” His good eye opened, meeting her gaze in a blaze of urgent green. “And that’s why you need to stay the hell away from him.”

“And let him go on killing?” She snorted. “Not very damned likely.”

“Hope, Stone thinks you’re Kith too because you refused to back off the case. He’s thinking of turning you. And you don’t want to become that bastard’s toy.”

“Fuck.”

“Yeah.”

Hope reached for the cell phone clipped to her belt. No matter what, Mark needed medical attention. He was in shock, suffering from blood loss and God knew what else.

He straightened in alarm. “What are you doing?”

“Calling dispatch for an ambulance.” She started thumbing buttons. “You need treatment. The Rescue Squad carries equipment that can cut into a car. They can slice open those bars.”

“I’d kill them, Hope. I’d kill them all. And you too.” His gaze haunted and urgent, Mark stared desperately into her eyes. Even his tongue looked dry as he licked his lips. “Stone hasn’t given me enough blood. I’m starving. I wouldn’t be able to control myself.”

Hope froze with the phone halfway to her mouth as she stared at him. And finally started to think through the implications. Even if the team managed to subdue Mark -- maybe by drugging him -- what then? He was a fucking vampire. Half an hour after he went to the hospital, he’d be on CNN.

Somebody would shoot cell phone video of his fangs and a few choice shots of this chamber of horrors. And he’d be screwed.

Meanwhile Stone would return from his tent revival, where he was probably choosing a sixth blonde from among the worshipers. Another woman to rape and murder.

That bastard needs to die. It wasn’t the first time in Hope’s law enforcement career she’d had that thought, but it was the first time she intended to carry it out.

She clipped the phone back on her belt with a hand that shook. It had been too damn long since she’d slept, or had anything to eat beyond stale cop coffee and candy bars. Being the lead investigator on five serial murder cases would do that to you. Especially when the killer’s a fucking vampire.
“All right. What do you think I should do?”

His good eye lit with hope, and he stepped closer to the bars. “Go to my house. Look in the garage, under the blue tarp. There are eight pipe bombs and a detonator I built to look like a ball point pen…”

“Wait -- bombs? Pipe bombs?” She stared at him, incredulous. “Do I look like a suicide bomber to you?”

“I’m not talking about blowing yourself up. I sure as hell don’t want you dead. Just Stone.” Mark’s bruised hands wrapped around the bars, and he stared at her with desperate intensity, as if willing her to listen. “I’ve already built everything you need. All you have to do is position the devices, get the hell away, and press the detonator.”

“What if somebody sees me, Mark? They’d think I was some kind of psycho, killing a preacher for giggles. They’d never believe he was a vampire. I’d go to jail for the rest of my life.”

“I know, I thought of all that too. Thing is, it’s the only way to be sure of killing him.”

“What about a stake through the heart? It’d be a hell of a lot less complicated.”

“And a lot more risky.” Mark released the bars and started to pace in long, urgent strides. “What if he woke up before you finished? Hell, we don’t know whether a stake would even work. It could be a myth, like the one about crosses. Holy objects obviously don’t bother him, or he couldn’t be hanging out in churches, waving a Bible.”

Hope grimaced. “Good point.”

“But I’m damned sure those bombs would do the job. That’s why I took the risk of telling you what he was. I knew you wouldn’t believe me, but I wanted you to know why I’d blown the house. Unfortunately, I made the dumbass mistake of casing the house at night, and Stone caught me.” He stopped pacing to rest his forehead against the steel and closed his good eye. His normally healthy tan had leached away, leaving him pale beneath the bruises that spotted his broad shoulders. “Next thing I knew, I was in this cage, slowly starving to death. You and those bombs are the only hope we have of stopping him now.”

Well, at least it was a plan. A crazy plan, but a plan. Hope scrubbed her hands over her face. They were trembling hard now. “So what do I do?”