Stroke of Midnight (Nightcreature #1.5)(45)
Reyes felt his breath catch in his throat as Shanara removed the last of her undergarments to stand gloriously naked before him. How beautiful she was, with her hair falling over her shoulders and the lamplight bathing her face with a soft golden glow.
Murmuring her name, he drew her into his lap. "Are you happy here, with me, my beloved?"
She kissed the tip of his nose. "Need you ask, my lord?"
"Indeed, I must. I dare not take a chance on angering Melena. Who knows what evil might befall me should she find you looking displeased?"
Shanara smiled at him, her eyes twinkling. "Then perhaps you should do this." Her hand caressed his chest. "Or this." She kissed the corner of his mouth. "Or this…" Her hand slid down his naked belly, eliciting a groan of pleasure from his lips.
"You have but to command, my lady," he said. And capturing her lips with his, he drew her down on the bed and did his best to make his wife happy that night, and every night for as long as they lived.
Dear Reader:
This is my first foray into the world of werewolves. Granted, Reyes isn't your typical werewolf hut I loved writing his story.
Once again, I'm pleased to thank Joseph Walsh for allowing me to use his poetry. I think we must be connected on some plane of existence, since he always sends me poetry that seems to fit whatever book I happen to be working on at the moment.
I hope you enjoyed "Born of the Night."
Best,
Amanda Ashley, aka Madeline Baker www.madelinebaker.net
MAKE IT LAST FOREVER
L. A. BANKS
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This is for my first love and soul-mate, my husband, who loves me fangs and all… the only one after all these years who I want to make it last forever.
CHAPTER 1
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OKLAHOMA… 1979
Tara took her time boarding the bus, her gaze sweeping the elderly passengers headed for Las Vegas. New Mexico and her grandmother's reservation homestead seemed so far away. So many days, and so many nights away now that the night was something terrible to fear.
But with her dying breath, her mother had told her to go there. It was part of her destiny and her only salvation. One simple mistake had cost her her life, and she was only eighteen. Tara willed away the tears as she clutched her small, square leather suitcase tighter in her grasp, and refused to look back. What was done was done.
The dry, oppressive heat made her feel as if she would crumble into dust. Maybe one day she actually would. The people who were boarding with her smelled like they had already begun to decay, but their vibrant smiles and incessant chatter about a trip to win big and start their lives all over again almost made her weep. If her grandmother's medicine didn't work, there'd be no second chance for her. She wouldn't have a chance to grow old and hopeful. She wouldn't grow old at all.
She found a seat by the window in the middle of the bus and cast her gaze out of it. For as long as she could, she'd savor the beauty of natural light. She'd turn her face up to the clouds and ask the Great Spirit to spare her.
As new tears filled her eyes, she thought of the gravestones that marked her parents' final resting places side by side. That was the natural order of things. Maybe if she were lucky, she'd have that, too; a marker beside someone who'd loved her for years, where they both could be at peace after a long, joy-filled existence.
Part of her had considered going south to her father's people. The blue calico print of her dress blurred in her peripheral vision as she thought of Nana Wainwright. Each of the women in her family had a piece cut from that cloth; her Southern Nana said this was the way it was done, to bind all in like-mindedness, and she had made the dress, had made her mother and her maternal grandmother aprons from it, and Nana kept the scraps for her leg quilt. After her mother died, Nana had told her repeatedly, "Chile of mine, you never too grown to come home and always gots family wit us. Don't you brave this awful world of woe and evil alone."
But to go to Alabama—the Bible Belt—being what she was, and with a dear Nana who knew nothing about reversing curses, would be to visit horror upon those she loved… just like she'd visited it upon her mother. Tara banished the invitation, guilt squeezing her heart and making tears fall in earnest now. Her daddy always said that God-fearing black folks didn't mess with hoodoo. And even though her Cherokee grandmother didn't dabble in "hoodoo," as her father put it, she was a seer. A respected one, at that. And just like her mother had always explained, she would be caught between worlds forever. Perhaps her mother's words were more prophetic than she'd even known. Tara had to get to her grandmother before it was too late, before she didn't wake up with the sun, and before the moonlight would become her dawn.
One bite in the dead of night that hadn't killed her had stolen her life just the same.
MAYFIELD, KENTUCKY… 1979
"Jack Rider, you are not going to leave my bed without telling me where you're going, or when you're coming back."
He kissed Marianne's pout away, pushed himself up with a grunt, and sat on the side of the motel bed, allowing his gaze to travel down her curvaceous form. He chuckled as he rubbed his beard and tried to think of an excuse to extricate himself from her temporary hold. Everything had a price, and sleeping with her meant that she thought she had some claim to his time. Not even. His personal freedom wasn't for sale, that's why he'd bought her dinner, first.