A gift to All my Followers

Thanksgiving, that uniquely American holiday in which we stop to give thanks for what we have before we rush to the TV to watch parades and football followed by a feeding frenzy, is almost here. For us, it's also the start of the Holiday Season.

Every year, The Wild Rose Press offers a free e-cookbook to its authors and readers. I'm thankful I am able to contribute two recipes to this year's edition. I'd like to pass along those recipes, along with all the wonderful ones contributed by my fellow authors. Take a moment to download it, and you'll see there are some super eats included.

I'm not going to give you a sappy list of things for which I'm thankful other than to say -- my thanks to each and every one of you who's supported my efforts as a writer, either by buying my books or offering me your friendship and advice.

Here's to all of you.

Ghosts? You Bet!

Ask my mother. She knows. The house where I spent most of my formative years was haunted. I don’t want to sound all woo-woo, but I believe there are some folks who are wired for the weird, and others who aren’t. My dad was in that latter category.
Parts of the house creeped me out for a long time before I even knew my mother had actually seen an apparition inside it. And that was really kind of strange because it wasn’t like it was an old house, something that just screamed haunted. We moved in when it was brand-spanking new.
The family room was at one end of the house at the end of a long hallway that extended almost to the opposite end. Sometimes, after my parents thought I was old enough, they’d leave me for the evening to visit friends down the street. My brothers, all older, would be off doing whatever, so it would be just me and the dog. Grinner liked to lie on the floor, positioned so she could see down the hall. Not me, not at night. Every now and then, she would lift her head with a jerk and just stare down that long, dark hallway.
“Stop it!” I’d whisper, huddled under a blanket on the couch and not really wanting to see if she actually did see something. The dog would give me that over the shoulder glance before she went back to glaring down the hallway. I peeked one night, and no lie, I saw something smoky and floating at the end of the hall. But did I say anything? Hell no. I still didn’t know Mom had actually seen someone sitting in a chair in our family room! Instead I cowered on the couch and hoped our ancient mutt would keep whatever away. She growled, but I was still more frightened of the teasing I’d get from my brothers than of whatever lurked at the end of the hall.
I was always relieved when my parents came home.
In addition to the long hallway, this house had a full basement. Early on, my parents had hired a guy laid off from the Ford Plant in Louisville to finish the basement. That was okay with me. I’d always been spooked by the wooden stairs where someone could reach through and grab my ankle. I figured once those stairs were closed in, like normal stairs should be, everything would be cool.
The problem was, even after the basement was finished, I still got spooked every time I had to go up or down those stairs. They might be carpeted and paneled and look like any other stairs, but I still ran up them like the hounds of hell were hot on my heels, and I never, ever went up or down unless the lights were on.
There was even a bedroom in the basement. My parents had added that so that every one of us kids could have our own room. My brother, Tom, lived there with his black lights, Jimi Hendrix and long hair. He was into a few other things as well, so when he told me he’d seen a pure white hand flash in front of his face one night when he fell asleep watching TV and then woke up, his credibility was just a bit suspect.
Nevertheless, it reinforced my basement phobia.
Most of the time I was okay if I was down there with someone else, or if I could stay on the far side of the basement near the fireplace and the sliding glass door. It was the stairs and the unfinished part of the basement that made my skin crawl.
I truly tried to get over it. I would force myself to go down there for things, make myself stay there, but every time, when it came time to go back up, I felt like someone hovered right behind me, breathing down my neck as I scrambled up the steps.
I have to admit, this went on into my teenage years…way into them. In fact, I believe it was about the time I was cleaning out my stuff in preparation for going away to college that the final incident happened. My mother was big into us periodically going through our junk and getting rid of what we no longer wanted.
There I sat, by myself, and old enough now to poo-poo that niggling shiver of unease, sorting old books, toys and games. By this time, I knew about the lady in the chair. I knew about the hand flashing in front of Tom’s face, but big deal—I was college ready with a year abroad already behind me. Sophisticated, intelligent, getting ready to take the journalistic world by storm.
Right.
That’s when I found the Ouija Board. Remember those things? Cue the dark creature feature type voice: “Use the pointer on the board to communicate with the other side.” Ooooohhhhhh! I’d gotten it for a birthday or Christmas or something years ago, played it a couple of times with my girlfriends down the street while we asked it stupid questions like, “Will I marry Johnny when I grow up?” then put it away and promptly forgot about it.
With a cynical chuckle, I pulled the board and the pointer out. Since no one but me would be operating it, I figured I could debunk the whole idea of someone else having pushed it. I wasn’t going to. I was simply going to rest my fingers lightly on both sides of the pointer as the instructions said. Sitting there cross-legged with the board in front of me and my fingertips just barely touching it, I inhaled and asked, “Is there anyone else down here with me?”
The damn thing moved. Not some little twitch to one side that could have been caused by a quiver in my finger. No. It jerked across the board to “yes.”
When I could finally make myself go back down to the basement again, I packed up the Ouija Board and gave it away. I have never touched one since then.
But I still wonder. Did the people who’ve lived in that house since we moved ever realize they weren’t really alone?

So, bottom line? As much of a realist as I like to believe I am, I absolutely do believe the souls of the departed are sometimes still walking among us. Leave a comment and let me know what you think. Not only will it help me get rid of the shivers still turning my stomach as I recall those memories, it will enter you in a drawing for a copy of any one of my books that you choose as a pdf. I'll let the winner know on November 1st.
Hey, and while you’re at it? Check out this great Halloween blog hop!

5 Things to Know about Indie Publishing

Join me at Decadent Decisions today where I'm blogging about the 5 things you should know before you decide to Indie publish!

Oh the Places You’ll Go (Researching a Book)!

New writers always hear the caveat: Write what you know. I have to admit, I am uncomfortable writing about things I don’t feel I know enough about. Perhaps that’s the years as a journalist coming out in me, I don’t know. Most of the time, I’m able to draw upon my life experiences to help with that. Let’s face it, the older you get, the more varied experiences you have.

Over the years, I’ve been in car accidents, navigated through forests with a compass and a map, slept in houses built before Columbus sailed to America—I’ve even been airlifted off a mountain in Switzerland.

Sailing appears in a couple of my manuscripts. This is something I’ve only done once, so I had to supplement my scanty knowledge with a lot of research, which included watching a lot of how-to videos (yawn) and studying the types and parts of boats. I’ll freely admit, my knowledge is far from perfect and still not where it should be, but so far no one from the yacht club has come knocking at my door to give me a citation for being a nautical numbskull.

But then I came to a story, as yet unpublished, that follows some of the characters that will be introduced in Bittersweet. The heroine of this particular story is a stripper. Well…not only have I not done that (and be thankful for that because I would probably fall off the stage or tell the first guy who tried to tuck something in my G-string what he could do with his fingers before I ripped them from his knuckles)but I’d never even been in a strip club.

So…I turned to my friend the Internet. I researched laws regarding strip clubs for this particular geographic area, read as much as I could about salaries and pay. I watched videos on the Internet, including how-to videos for pole dancing—yes, they’re out there(yawn)—but I was still not quite comfortable with the results because, unlike my one and only sailing foray, I’d not actually been to a strip club.

That’s where my ever helpful research assistant, and in this instance, highly motivated—my husband, comes in. While his checkered past did include personal experience with strip clubs (gasp!), he was more than willing to make the sacrifice by accompanying me to one because, God knows, I wasn’t going anywhere near one alone.

I learned several things:
There aren’t many women, other than employees, in strip clubs.
Men really will walk right up to strange women on stage hoping to have breasts, or other things, flashed in their faces (very closely, I might add).
After the first couple of dances, bare breasts and butts begin to look alike.
No one should try to walk far in the shoes strippers wear.
The whole pole dancing thing requires an amazing amount of upper body strength. The stripper I talked to has biceps to rival most guys.
If you’re a woman in a strip bar—the dancers will be hitting on you instead of your husband. Okay…that was an eww factor, but funny.
Being inside a strip club is like being inside a Casino—no windows, no clocks and an atmosphere where smiling people want to make sure you’re having a good time while they suck the money out of your pockets.

So, in the end, I also learned that my research had been pretty solid. I might go back and tweak a couple of things in my story in order to paint a more vivid word picture, but overall I’d done okay.

I guess if writers have bucket lists, I can say I just checked one item off it.

Fine-Tune-It Friday: When Spicy Becomes Erotic

Welcome to what I call Fine-tune-it Fridays… a day to look at some of the skills and techniques in writing, and those necessary to writing spicy and erotic romance.
In fact, that’s the first topic I’m going to tackle. When does spicy become erotic? That line’s grown finer and finer over the years. Having cut my romance teeth on stories that always shut the bedroom door right when it started to get good, it’s difficult to imagine some of the books on shelves in stores now.
Deciding exactly where the line rests, though, is a problem I’ve encountered as an author. Having written what I considered to be simply a very spicy story, my editor asked me to remove some scenes because they were too hot. In the end, it didn’t matter. One scene in the book resulted in its move from simply being spicy to becoming erotic.
So, what was the line in the sand? When I asked, a senior editor explained that if the sex scenes moved the plot forward in some way, i.e. through characterization, increasing tension or resolution of the story, as long as we didn’t get into obvious erotica territory, then that was all right, but if the love scene was sex for sex’s sake, designed solely to titillate the reader? That’s erotic.
Another editor draws a more definite line by saying an erotic romance has sex and the development of the relationship through sex at its core. This may be a clearer definition, but isn’t always entirely accurate. Stick in that gratuitous sex scene and find out what happens (see above), sex certainly wasn’t at the core of that novel’s plot.
Author Sylvia Day defines erotic romance as, “stories written about the development of a romantic relationship through sexual interaction. The sex is an inherent part of the story, character growth, and relationship development, and couldn’t be removed without damaging the storyline.”
As with any romance, Happily Ever After is a requirement, although that too has been stretched to “Happily for now.”
Of course, there are still topics that are off limits for anyone hoping to land a contract with a mainstream publisher: rape, incest, bestiality, necrophilia, for example. Hmm, wonder how everyone justified those zombie romances?
Like every other business, romance writing has trends—like zombies—and the trend in terms of sex has been to throw the covers off and come out into the open. I write hot stories. I like seeing how the hero and heroine interact with each other in what is, let’s face it, all of our most vulnerable moments. Truly making love with a partner requires you to lay yourself bare, literally and figuratively, and it can reveal a lot about the characters in your book.
Does it also entertain? I hope so. That’s the point of writing romantic fiction after all, but the important thing to remember is keeping the romance at the forefront.

Meet the Silkie Parents Continues...

Cayden and Ciaran Clifton, the heroes of The Silkie's Call and The Silkie's Salvation, have parents who had to fight their own battles to be together. Last Tuesday, I began the story of Carrick and Catriona. This is the next installment:

Catriona grabbed her gown and drew it on. Just as she belted it, a splash behind her made her spin and see Carrick was no longer there. Her worried gaze scanned the water, but there was no sign of him. Before she could wonder at it, Fiona called to her again.

“Hurry, my lady. He is nearly here. Your father is with him.”

With one last glance at the sea, Catriona hurried up the path. Where had he gone? How could he just disappear? She wondered again what he was. She had certainly revealed herself to him, and if either her father or Camlin realized that, there would be hell to pay.

She crested the top of the bank just as her father and Camlin strolled into the clearing. Hiding her sandy feet beneath the hem of her robe, Catriona summoned a smile.

“Good morning, Father, my lord.”

“You are up and about early Lady Catriona.”

“On such a beautiful morning, my lord, how could I resist watching the sun rise over the inlet?”

He glanced frowningly at the group of seals playing around the rocks on the other side. “Beware. The waters contain many dangerous creatures.”

Catriona forced a light laugh. “My lord! You would have me believe the playful pups on those rocks are a danger?”

Camlin’s expression had narrowed on the seals. “Particularly those. They can be quite vicious.”

Catriona looked over her shoulder where several of the seals were squabbling with each other. Even as she watched, two big males flashed teeth at each other and slammed their heavy bodies together. She shivered. Although she’d often watched the seals from the time she was small until now, she had never seen two of the males go after each other in this way. It was more than play. Something about it made her concerns about Carrick surface once more.

“I sought you out, my lady, to see if you wished to ride with me?” Camlin’s voice was too smooth, its insidiousness jangling her nerves.

Catriona’s gaze shifted to her father. “You will be going with us, father?” she inquired, knowing that Fiona would not. Riding was the one activity in which her companion had never excelled and did not wish to take part.

Her father’s smile was just a little forced. “No, daughter. You will be safe with Lord Camlin, and it will give you both a chance to know one another better.”

But she didn’t want to know him better. Didn’t her father understand that? As much as she longed to blurt it out, she didn’t dare. Instead she smiled. “As you wish.”

Left with little choice, she at least rode out on her favorite mare, a large gray so pale she was nearly white. Camlin’s mount was a bay so dark as to be nearly black until you saw it in bright sunlight. The more she tried to stay in the open, the more he urged her toward trails that would take them deep into the woods.

When she tried yet again to steer back toward the rolling meadows, Camlin grasped hold of her horse’s headstall. The mare shied, but he kept his hold firm. When he turned his pale gaze on Catriona, his eyes glittered like shards of glass.

“No more games, my lady. You know I wish to be private with you, to speak with you and get to know you. Why do you evade me?”

Catriona looked pointedly at the hand he still had on her mare’s bridle. “Please turn loose of my horse, my lord.”

A sly look entered his narrow face. “Walk with me.”

This was the king’s nephew. She couldn’t defy him, yet she feared the sway he held over her people and most of all her. She feared what might happen to her father if she refused. She smiled.

“Of course, my lord Camlin.”

He led the way into the woods at the heart of the peninsula on which they lived. It was quiet in the forest, but Catriona knew the woods were alive with all manner of creatures, most of whom were friends to her people. Here, Camlin was the intruder. It gave her some measure of courage until she dared to glance up.

He watched her with such open avarice and lust in his eyes that she nearly stumbled. When he grabbed her elbow to offer support, it was all she could do not to flinch from him.

“Are you all right, my lady?” He sounded solicitous, and oh so correct, but something lurked beneath the surface. She didn’t dare try to read his thoughts. He was much older than she was and would know immediately what she attempted.

“Yes, thank you.”

He smiled, tucking her hand into his elbow. “You must be aware of why I have come to visit.”

She remained silent.

“My uncle, King Urien, desires an alliance with the people along this part of the coast. A marriage between the two of us would accomplish that purpose.”

“And do you always accede to your uncle’s wishes?” She couldn’t resist the question though she knew she shouldn’t ask it.

She felt a slight tensing of the muscles in his arm before he laughed. “I find it is always better to agree to Urien’s wishes. In this case he’s made them pretty plain, both to me and your father.”

She couldn’t mistake the emphasis he put on her father. Feeling as if she were being backed into a corner, Catriona said, “I see.”

“Then you understand the need for us to announce a betrothal?”

Sickness churned in the pit of her stomach. She knew she had to respond, but she simply could not make one word of agreement pass her lips. She nodded miserably and looked away, slowly blinking her eyes to rid them of the tears welling there.

He covered her hand with his free one. Catriona turned her head, realizing with a spurt of dismay that the horses were somewhere behind them, somewhere she couldn’t easily get to her mare.

“I can’t tell you how pleased I was when your father told me what a sheltered upbringing you’ve had. I find innocence such a seductive quality.”
Catriona gently tried to remove her hand from his arm, but his grip firmed.
“Now that we have agreed on a betrothal, I think it is time you left some of this maidenly reticence behind you. I’d like you to call me Camlin, just as I will call you Catriona.”

“As you wish.”

How could she get out of this? Get away? Her feelings of unease increased with every step they took. He led, or rather nearly pulled her, toward a glade surrounded by thick growth. Other than the sounds of birds and insects at work among the trees, it was quiet and more isolated than she should have allowed.

“What I truly wish,” Camlin purred near her ear, “is to see for myself just how sheltered your father has managed to keep you. Are you truly as pure as he would have me believe? As pure as he thinks? Or have you succumbed to some handsome youngling and allowed him to sip the nectar that should be mine alone?”

Catriona’s mouth thinned. This time she pulled her arm away, making no pretense of trying to be nice. “You take too much for granted, my lord.”

“Camlin,” he reminded silkily. “And I take nothing for granted. Our mating is the king’s wish.”

“Well it is not my wish!”

When she would have spun away, Camlin grabbed her upper arm in a biting grip. “That would be foolish. No one defies Urien without paying a price. In your case, your defiance could well cost you your father’s lands. Urien offers a marriage to me. Without that, he can simply take your father’s lands since there is no male to inherit.”

“You would force me?”

The sudden light of lust in his eyes told her much more than his words. “I prefer to think of it as your wisdom in realizing a strategic alliance.”
His gaze swept over her, lingering overlong on her breasts. “I gain a young, beautiful Faerie maiden for a mate, and your father gets to keep his life and his lands. Now, enough talking Catriona. I wish to sample what my obedience to my uncle buys me.”

He pulled her against him and held her fast while his mouth sought hers. When she tried to turn her face away, Camlin’s long fingers grasped her chin, and his mouth ground the soft flesh of her lips against her teeth.

This couldn’t be happening. Catriona wiggled her hands between them and tried to push him away, but he simply captured her fine-boned wrists and twisted them behind her back, holding her immobile with just one of his hands.

“Stop!” she spat at him. “I don’t want this. I don’t want you.”

“You will.” His teeth gleamed in the shadows of the glade. “And when I’m done we’ll know just how pure you are.”

With his free hand, he grabbed at the front of her gown. Catriona kicked out at him. As he stumbled back, her dress ripped, spilling her breasts to his hot gaze.

“I will have you, and you will say nothing.”

Catriona kicked out again. For just an instant, his grasp loosened enough she was able to spin away. Father forest, Mother earth, help me! She cried out silently. A path opened in front of her. With a lift of her skirts she ran, hearing the rustle and creak of leaves and branches closing behind her and the harsh echo of Camlin’s curses.

She knew the forest couldn’t stand long against Camlin. He was older and more powerful than any magic she might tap, but perhaps he would be delayed enough she might get away. She raced along the path that opened where there had been no tracks before. Breath sobbed in her lungs and her hair streamed behind her. Knowing how vital it was to keep her flight as silent as possible, Catriona stifled the sounds that fought to escape. If she was successful, she promised herself, she would give in to the need to release the fear now strangling her. Farther and farther behind her, she heard the curses and incantations of Camlin’s pursuit.

“Thank you,” she whispered to the woods and its creatures. When weariness forced her to slow down, she realized she had traveled far down the length of the peninsula, away from her father’s home and if she wasn’t careful, to a point where she would run out of options to escape should Camlin continue his pursuit.

She stumbled out of the woods and along a rocky slope. Taking a moment to get her bearings, she whirled in fright as she heard the sounds of horse’s hooves crashing through the forest. He was mounted, and gaining ground. Desperately, she gazed around her, searching for any place to hide she could find.

The crashing grew loud enough, she now heard the frightened blowing and snorting of the animal, no doubt being driven through a forest determined to thwart the pursuit. She stumbled forward and barely suppressed a cry when she tumbled into an opening in the earth in front of her. Her fall ended on dirt with the wind knocked from her. Knowing there was no time to lose, she crawled forward under a heavy lip of earth and curled into the smallest ball she could manage.

“I’m sure she came this way, my lord.”

The horses stopped nearby. Catriona recognized the voice of one of her father’s people.

“Check out that hole.” Camlin’s voice was cold, almost disinterested. “I believe she’s duped us and is even now returning to her father, no doubt with some tale about my cruel treatment of her.”

As footsteps approached, Catriona closed her eyes. It was over. Soft leather booted feet dropped to the earth nearly right next to her. She opened her eyes to find the stable lad who had handed the reins of her mare to her. As their gazes locked for an instant, she silently pleaded with him.

“Anything down there?” Camlin called petulantly.

“No, my lord. It’s nothing but a sink hole. Common enough around here where the limestone beneath is honeycombed.”

“Let’s head back. She is likely already at her father’s dwelling.”

The stable lad looked one more time into Catriona’s eyes as he said, “I’m sure you’re right, my lord.”

Thank you. Catriona mouthed the words, as she clutched the front of her torn gown together. He acknowledged her with the faintest of nods, and then he was clambering up the dirt wall and back out into the sunshine. The sounds of the horses’ hooves thudding on the earth faded, but still she sat curled against the warm, dry earth.

Once she no longer heard any sound, reaction set in. Catriona buried her face on her knees and released a small sob. She felt dirty, inside and out. As slowly as if she were near the end of her life, she crawled to the surface, cautiously peering over the edge. Still afraid he might even now watch her from the woods, she sank back to the bottom of the hole. She would wait until dark.

More to come next Tuesday... Leave a comment and let me know what you think.

Meet the Silkie Parents: A Free Read of their story

“Lady Catriona! Come away from the edge of the sea.”

“In a moment. Oh but look at all the seals.” Catriona clapped her hands, laughing as one seal separated itself from the others, shooting along in the clear water of the inlet. The sleek creature leaped and dived almost as if it were showing off.

“My lady, I must insist. Your father is expecting you there when the guests arrive.”

Catriona looked at her long-time companion. “We will go in just a moment Fiona. I know I must, but I can’t help that I have no wish to be tied to the king’s nephew. He is old and I don’t trust him.”

Fiona looked alarmed, her pale green eyes darting nervously as if she expected Catriona would be overheard. “My lady, you must be careful.”

“Have we really sunk that low, Fiona?”

Catriona gazed at the inlet once more, searching for the seal who had played there a moment before, but it was no longer visible. She sighed and started to turn back, but a figure sitting on a rock across the other side of the inlet caught her eye. Cat glanced quickly over her shoulder to see that Fiona was still gazing worriedly back along the path, so she returned to watching the figure on the rock.

Not a seal, but a man. She stepped nearer the edge. He was beautiful. Long dark hair lifted on the breeze. She blushed as she realized his chest was bare, and then her gaze ate him up from his sun-bronzed skin to the sleek muscles. Cat swallowed, glancing once more over her shoulder to see Fiona idly picking wildflowers. Catriona spun back to the see, but her foot slipped. Arms windmilling, she tried desperately to regain her balance. Even as she cried out, she tumbled over the edge of the steep bank and down into the water. Oh blessed mother. She did not even know how to swim.

The water was shockingly cold, so cold she gasped and then began coughing as she thrashed. Panic swirled as the dark water bubbled and foamed around her. Oh please. She did not want to die. She might not want to marry the king’s nephew, but she didn’t want to die to escape her fate. The heavy material of her dress weighed her down, wrapping around her legs and making it impossible for her to push to the surface.

In the distance, she heard screaming, but as she sank below the surface of the water, the sound became muted and distorted. Panic faded as the certainty of death grew. As one replaced the other, Catriona experienced an odd peace. She even imagined seeing the most beautiful man.

Strong arms pulled at her, dragging her by her hair until her face broke the surface. Someone held tightly to her, towing her through the water and then onto a narrow bank along the inlet from where she had stumbled. She felt so sick. Catriona coughed, trying to free her lungs and stomach of the water she’d swallowed. Again, firm hands rolled her to her side and she heaved up the sea water in her belly.

“Come, little fish, you will survive.” The voice was deep and melodious, a soothing song to her ears.

“Die. I am going to die.”

“No, no. Not this day. Soggy you will be, but dead? Not while I breathe.”

She lay still, even her shivering ceased at the certainty she heard in his voice. Catriona looked at her rescuer. It was the man from the rock. How had he reached her so quickly? His eyes were dark, nearly black, and thickly lashed. Looking into them, she felt almost as if she drowned yet again. But this time she would do so willingly. His gaze was intense and it made her look away, her face flushing in embarrassment. She had seen other Faerie males, but they didn’t look like this man. Their hair was lighter, as were their eyes. He was unlike anything she had ever encountered.

“Who are you?” Her voice sounded like a croak to her own ears.

“Carrick.”

It was a hard name, like rocks. It was also not a Faerie name. Where was he from? She started to ask him when Fiona’s frantic voice called, “My lady! Oh my lady! I thought you were dead. Are you all right? You must come. We must go!”

“Must you really?” her rescuer protested “Can you not stay awhile? I could teach you to swim. ‘Tis dangerous to be so close to the water and not be able to swim.”

Learn to swim? She had always wanted to, but few Faeries knew how and seldom if ever went into the ocean. She looked at Carrick again, imagining his hands holding her, guiding her as he taught her. Oh, but she would love that. She snuck another peek at him. He was even handsomer at close range than he had been across the width of the inlet.

“Lady! We must go. Your father!”

She sat up. Carrick held his hand out to her, and then helped her to her feet.

“Your name,” he whispered as she stood. “What is your name?”

Cat glanced to where Fiona hovered nervously several feet away. “Catriona. I will come tomorrow morning, just after sunrise.”

He smiled, white teeth flashing against the sunlight.

As she and her companion hurried along the path back to her father’s dwelling, Fiona kept up a nonstop stream of worried thoughts. “Your father will have our heads. He will turn us into toadstools.”

“Nonsense,” Catriona laughed. “Wait, Fiona. I cannot show up looking as I do. Stop here in the glade. I need just a moment.”

As soon as her companion came to a halt, Catriona flicked her sodden curls back over her shoulders, adjusted her wet skirts and took a deep breath. “Father sun both warm and high, restore my person clean and dry.”

Fiona laughed. “You do that with such ease, Lady, I envy you.”

Catriona fluffed out her now dry skirts then ran a hand over her soft, curling hair. “You have no idea, Fiona. Do not envy me. I fear what I go to face is more than I can bear.”
****
Carrick wanted to follow her. After watching her for weeks always in his seal form, he had risked showing himself. When she lost her balance and plummeted from the high bank, he thought his heart would stop. He dove in, remaining as a human instead of shifting. He couldn’t risk the other woman seeing the change. He’d very nearly regretted that decision when he found her and realized how close she was to giving in to the sea.

Why would she not know how to swim? He had encountered many humans, and those who lived near the sea all swam almost as well as the Silkie in human form. Why not this girl?

Catriona. It was a beautiful name, and the other woman had called her lady. Was she some sort of noble? Did he dare approach her? Carrick’s heart thudded. She stirred something in him he’d never felt before, but she had not called him, and he knew his destiny would be with another Silkie. Though Silkie women were not easy to come by, his standing would assure him a mate. Still…

He thought of her hair, as red as the coral in the southern seas and her eyes, as green as the moss that waved from the rocks along the northern shores. No, she was very definitely not one of the Silkie, but if she called to him, he would be free to take her. He looked along the path where she’d disappeared then back to the ocean. He had nowhere he had to be. There were no prohibitions against him watching a non-Silkie. He looked down at his attire. A pair of human pants that he had found and kept hidden nearby. No shoes, no shirt. Well, he would just have to remain hidden.
****
Catriona stepped onto the veranda of her father’s home. Nestled into the edge of the forest, it blended so well with its surroundings that it was sometimes easy to miss if you were anything other than Faerie. It had always been a place of refuge, a place of comfort and security. She had lived here all of her life with only her father and her companion. An accident had taken her mother away when Cat was just a baby.

As she moved toward her father and the slender man standing near him, Catriona lowered her eyes to help cloak her thoughts. It would do no one any good if Camlin sensed her reluctance was more than just shyness.

“Catriona,” her father called with obvious relief. She was sure he knew of her hesitation and had probably worried she would disappear, but she dared not. She had heard rumors of what happened to some families when they would not bend to the will of the king and his family. “Come greet our guest.”

Still keeping her gaze lowered so as not to meet Lord Camlin’s eyes, she curtsied and held out her hand. “My lord.”

He brought it to his lips, and the wet, sloppy feeling of his mouth against her skin nearly made her snatch her hand back in revulsion. Instead, she smiled and let her gaze skate away as if overcome with shyness.
His laughter jangled her nerves.

“Such demureness.” Camlin’s voice oozed like oil. “Your daughter is a credit to you.”

“Thank you, my lord,” her father responded. “Come, join us for supper.”

Catriona smiled at all the right places, accepted their guest filling her plate for her, but all the while she cringed inside. How soon could she get away? It couldn’t be soon enough. Camlin made her skin crawl, and she had heard from more than one source that his surface cordiality cloaked innate cruelty.

Fiona had joined them as well for the meal, but as always, she remained so much in the background, she could just as well have been one of the wall sconces. By the time Catriona felt she could sneak away, her face hurt from trying to keep her expression under such rigid control.

All she could think about as she ran on whisper light feet to her chamber at the far end of the house was meeting Carrick at the inlet early in the morning.
****
Carrick loved the summer months. Rather than staying aboard the ship he’d inherited from his father, he chose to spend as much time as possible in seal form. What time he did spend as a human was most often in isolated areas, or coming ashore to answer the call of a human female. Though young, he understood the drive among his kind. They were motivated to give sexual pleasure, but it seemed more and more that Silkie males now sought mates among the humans.

He told himself that wasn’t what he was after. He had reminded himself of that as he watched Catriona smile at another man the previous evening. Yet her smile had looked so different than the one she had flashed at him before spinning away earlier.

Carrick had been fascinated by where she lived too. It was unlike any human settlement he had ever seen. An odd feeling of peace permeated the area around her home, both in the forest and the field. And the people looked different too. Not only were they fairer of hair and eye than what he knew, there was such an unhurried air about everything, as if they had all the time in the world.

He wondered about that now as he morphed from seal to man and strode from the ocean. Moving quickly in the gray of early dawn, he located the cut off trousers he had lifted from a human’s laundry line. He had seen men before, clad in swim attire that seemed ludicrous to him, but he couldn’t bring himself to wear anything so humorous. Were it not for fear of offending Catriona, he would simply have dispensed with any clothing at all.

A sound as soft as the brush of water against the shore made him lift his gaze to the top of the steep bank. She picked her way delicately down from the top. Nervousness made him motionless for a moment. Her gown flowed around her, lifting lightly in the barely discernible breeze.

He wanted to hold her, to gather her close and simply press her against the length of him.

“Good morning.” Her voice was soft, little more than a whisper of sound, and still it tingled along his nerve endings.

Unable to resist, he trailed his fingers along the satin sleeve of her gown. “Surely you don’t mean to go into the water in this. It would ruin it.”

She laughed. “I could fix it, but no. I—I have something else beneath.”

He smiled. She was more approachable this morning than she had looked with the other man yesterday. “May I help?”

The glance she gave him held some shyness, but also a laughing flirtatiousness that aroused need like he’d never experienced. Carrick wasn’t used to exercising control. Normally when he was this close to a female, it was because she had called to him. She was ready and wanting, already willing to accept him sexually.

This was a new game.

Her fingers slipped to the belt of her silk covering and he realized it was styled like a robe. As he watched her slender fingers loosen it, his breathing increased. “Let me.”

His voice was no more than a growl. He slipped the robe from her shoulders and folded it, laying it on a rock where the water wouldn’t reach it.
Carrick cleared his throat. “Do you…can you swim at all?”

“No. My father did not wish me to come to the sea. We have pools where I live, but they are not deep.”

He held his hand out. “Come. I’ll hold onto you while you become accustomed to the water. It will be cooler than what you’re used to, but the salt water also makes it easier for you to float.”

He was amazed how easily she placed her trust in him, even holding onto him while he swam with her riding on his back. When he saw her wide-eyed pleasure, Carrick laughed.

She went instantly still, and the shyness once more had her gaze shifting away from him. Unable to resist any longer, Carrick dipped his head and brushed his lips against hers.

“Catriona.”

Her arms slipped up over his chest and circled the back of his neck. Sensation exploded through him, arousing him to such a degree he feared he would frighten her. But when he started to back away, she whimpered and clutched more tightly against him.

“Don’t. You want more. I see it.” She pulled his hand down to touch the wet material clinging to the mound of her breasts.

“Cat…” The feel of her cupped in the palm of his hand made his throat go dry; he couldn’t tear his gaze from the darker pink of her nipple visible through the thin, wet material.

The sound of someone above them made him still. With a low growl he shifted his gaze up to see the young woman who’d been with her yesterday.
“You have company.”

Releasing his hand, she tilted her head back. “Fiona. What are you doing here?”

“Lord Camlin. He’s coming!”

Now his growl resonated, and as he turned back to Catriona, he saw her eyes widen with wariness.

“What are you?” Her whisper trembled in the air between them. Even though neither of them had moved, he felt the gap between them widen.

A fluttering at the edge of his own mind set off warning bells for him as well. Eyes narrowing, he dropped his hand and stepped back. “What am I? Perhaps I should ask that same question.”

“Lady! He will be here any moment.”

She muttered words in a language that sounded strangely like the old tongue, yet different, and in an instant her clothing and hair were as dry and clean as when she’d first arrived.

“You’re a Faerie.”

The gaze she turned to him for one more instant was now shuttered and sad. “Goodbye, Carrick of the sea.”

“Don’t!” he protested. “Don’t go to him. You don’t even like him.”
“I have no choice.”

She looked for her gown. With a snarl of frustration, Carrick stripped the pants from his body and leaped back into the sea. With a touch to the leather strip around his neck, he morphed back into a seal and dove, anger driving him deep into the inlet.

(more to come...)

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