Gena Showalter - Burning Dawn

To Jill Monroe. You’re pretty freaking amazing. You deserve only the best—which is why I hang around you so much. (Yes, I somehow managed to make your awesomeness all about me. I’m THAT good.)

To Emily Ohanjanians. You always go above and beyond the call of duty, and I’ll be forever grateful.

To Kathleen Oudit, Tara Scarcello, Glenn Mackay, and Alan Davey. You guys gave me the cover of my dreams—my sweet, sexy dreams. Thank you!

To Craig Swinwood, Loriana Sacilotto, Brent Lewis, Christina Clifford, Stacy Widdrington, Diana Wong, Ana Luxton, Amy Jones, Melissa Anthony, Erin Craig, Michelle Renaud, Margaret Marbury, Susan Swinwood, Natashya Wilson, Emily Martin, Don Lucey, Lisa Wray, Aideen O’Leary-Chung, Larissa Walker, Arista Guptar, Reka Rubin, Jayne Hoogenberk, Kate Studer and Chris Makimoto (and Emily O, of course—you get it twice!). You guys are an awesome team, and I’m blessed to have you in my corner!

To Deidre Knight and Jia Gayles. I think Hard Work and Dedication are your middle names. Thank you!

HE LIVED SEX. Breathed sex. Ate sex.

He was sex.

Maybe that was his name.

No. That wasn’t what she called him. She—his heart. His reason for being.

She would straddle his waist, feed his aching length into her hungry body, and say, “My slave needs me more than air to breathe, doesn’t he?”

My Slave. Yes. That was his name.

My Slave wanted his woman. Craved her like water to drink.

Must have her.

Only she would do. He couldn’t live without her smoke-and-dreams scent...mmm, or her too-close-to-the-sun heat...or her fiery claws. How deeply those little daggers cut into his bare chest. And her peekaboo fangs...how deliciously they nipped at the vein in his neck.

She was perfect, and only when she was with him, her strong body taking and receiving pleasure, was the gnawing hunger within him finally satisfied.

Must. Have. Her. NOW.

But...he looked around. She wasn’t with him. He tried to rise from the bed. Something bound his wrists and ankles again. Not rope. Not this time. Too cold, too hard. Steel? He didn’t care enough to look.

Problem. Solution. My Slave gritted his teeth and jerked with all his considerable might. Skin tore, muscle ripped, and bone snapped. Pain. Freedom. He grinned. His woman was out there. Soon he would find her. He would thrust inside her and slake his need for her. Again and again and again...

Nothing and no one would stop him.

“HE’S LOOSE AGAIN,” someone grumbled.

At the pond washing clothes and dreaming of salted caramel cupcakes...and frosted brownies...and, oh, oh, oh, peanut butter cookies, Elin Vale lumbered from the over-warm water. Brittle grass covered the small bank provided by the gorgeous desert oasis of Sahel, abrading her bare feet. As the sun glared from the clear morning sky, golden sand dunes undulated on every side; she sought shade under one of the handful of trees. A gentle breeze carried more grit than she was ever able to wash away.

At least there was a silver lining. A free daily body scrub meant her sunburned, freckled skin always glowed.

Yay me.

Now, if only she could accomplish her life goals so easily. 1) Escape the Phoenix warriors holding her captive, 2) make big bank, and 3) open a bakery. She would sell desserts good enough to induce orgasm...except peanut butter cookies because she would single-handedly consume the entire stock.

Life would be over-the-moon crazmazing. She would be doing what she loved and eating what she craved. Except, for one wee problem—she hadn’t yet managed to cross number one off her list. Phoenix were immortals with the ability to flame to ash and rise from the dead, stronger than ever before. They were vicious. And, ironically enough, they were cold-blooded. They enjoyed pillaging and plundering, and killed for grins and giggs.

Elin had seen the worst of their handiwork up close and all too personal, and even now, a year later, the memories were formidable enough to break her down. Memories she couldn’t stop... please, please stop... but there they were, flashing through her mind. Her father’s head rolling across the floor—without his body. Bay’s pain-filled moan echoing in her ears as he sagged to the floor, a sword sticking out of his chest. Silence descending. Such dreaded silence.

Even now her heart rate went full throttle, with enough horsepower to break records. Going to vomit.

“Catch him!”

The frantic shout was a welcome and wonderful distraction, the only life raft in a sea of horror, halting the oncoming breakdown.

Her gaze scanned—there.

Oh, blimey . He’s magnificent.

Because of Elin’s supposedly disrespectful mouth—some people couldn’t tolerate the truth—she had spent the past two weeks stuffed inside a small, dank hole, unable to see the new prisoner “worth toppling an entire empire to possess.”

The quote had come from every female in the village.

For the first time, Elin had to agree with her captors. The princess’s immortal slave was a god among men.

He stomped through the sand, flinging expert soldiers out of his way as if they were stuffed animals. He did this despite the fact that his wrists and ankles looked like raw hamburger meat.

His scowl was dark, frightening, and despite her fascination, she instinctively lowered her gaze.

Oh, wowzer. Hello, massive erection. The beast was in no way concealed by the leather loincloth the slave wore.

The ability to breathe abandoned her. Who knew penises did actually come in size magnum, as romance novels proclaimed? And, sweet fancy, as the scrap of material rose...and rose...and eventually fell to the side, she saw a glint of silver. Was the head of his shaft— It was! It was actually pierced with a long, silver barbell.

Her knees went a bit weak.

Eye-raping the princess’s slave, Vale? Really? Stop!

First, entertaining lustful thoughts for another woman’s man was a crime punishable by death. Second, it was 100 percent skeevy.

That was why she would look away...in a second. A peek at the rest of him, that was all she needed. He was at least six and a half feet of primal male aggression, with the defy-me-at-your-own-peril muscle mass of a dedicated, centuries-old warrior. But what truly snagged her attention—besides the jumbotron, of course—were feathered wings of the most luminous pearl and gold arcing behind wide, bronzed shoulders. Actual, honest-to-goodness wings, fit for the most cherished of angels.

But if the whispers and giggles she’d heard about the male were to be believed, he wasn’t actually an angel, and calling him one would have been an insult, since angels were lower on the totem. He was a Sent One. An adopted son of the Most High, the ruler of the highest realm of the heavens.

Sent Ones were expert trackers and merciless demon slayers. Defenders of the weak and helpless. They were honest to the point of seeming brutality. And, okay, wow, that was like a checklist of awesome. But the things that were supposedly specific to this male’s character: cold, calculated and demented. Not awesome.

Apparently, he laughed when he killed his enemies...and laughed when he killed his friends.

But...that couldn’t be true. Could it? He was too pretty to be so cruel.

Shallow much?

What? She was starved. A mind was mush when a body was hungry .

According to gossip, he was part of the Army of Disgrace, one of the Most High’s seven heavenly defensive forces. Six of those forces were well respected and admired. The AoD, not so much. They were a group of wild, untamable mercenaries in danger of losing their homes, wings and immortality; in other words, permanent time off for wicked behavior.