Maureen Child - Nevermore

 He kissed her.

It was the surest way he knew to shut her up fast. His mouth came down on hers and what began as a simple thing to solve an immediate problem quickly became something else entirely.

Her mouth beneath his was pliant, soft, tempting. At first, she tried to pull free, but Santos gave her no room to back away. Every cell in his body demanded that he hold her closer, tighter. He felt the pull of her and knew that there was more at work here than simple need. Simple attraction for a beautiful woman.

He had to taste her. Had to have more of her. Somthing stirred within, hungry, demanding, urging him to claim her. To take her.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Maureen Child is a California native who loves to travel. She and her husband take off for research trips every chance they get. The author of more than sixty books, Maureen loves a happy ending and still swears that she has the best job in the world. She lives in Southern California with her husband, two children and a golden retriever with delusions of grandeur.

Dear Reader,

Writing for the Intrigue Nocturne line is just a magical experience. Being able to turn your imagination loose and explore all of the worlds your daydreams continually visit is a treat for a writer.

In Nevermore you'll meet Santos, an Immortal Guardian, who was once the lover of Queen Isabella of Spain. For those of you who read my first Nocturne story, Eternally , you'll remember Santos and, hopefully, be glad to see him with his own book.

Of course, nothing goes smoothly for an Immortal whose duty it is to protect humanity from the demon worlds populating dimensions sometimes far too close to our own.

And when Santos meets Erin Brady, a psychic running from the demon who has promised to kill her on her birthday, nothing will ever be the same again.

Maureen

MAUREEN CHILD

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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To Diana Ventimiglia, Thanks Diana, for keeping me on my toes and never forgetting when everything is due!

Chapter 1

Her stalker was back.

Heart pounding, breath strangling in her chest, Erin Brady darted through the crowd of tourists on the wharf in Shadow Cove, Maine.

She felt him.

“Where?” she whispered through clenched teeth, her gaze sweeping the blur of faces as she ran. It could be anyone. The teenager leaning against the fence. The old man squinting into the sun. The harried housewife trying to corral a small child.

“God, where do I go?” she muttered, not expecting an answer. All she could do was run.

The air was cold with the bite of fall. The sun was setting, spreading sheets of gold and crimson across the surface of the ocean that stretched out behind her and lapped eagerly at the pylons below the boardwalk. The sun-faded boards beneath her feet groaned and creaked with the ocean’s movement, and sounded like ghosts, keening a warning.

No warning necessary, Erin thought wildly, the heels of her boots clacking against the wood planks as she ran. She knew she was being followed. Again. She felt the power of someone’s stare burrowing into her back even as she bolted for the safety she knew she wouldn’t find.

A fisherman eased back on his pole and took a step backward that had Erin clipping into his shoulder as she ran. He shouted after her, but she could only lift one hand in apology and yell, “I’m sorry. Sorry.” No time. No time to be polite. No time to worry about pissing off the locals. No time for anything but finding somewhere to hide. To get out of sight.

The bucolic fishing village was packed with tourists there to see the autumn foliage. Quaintly decorated shop fronts strived to look as they might have two hundred years ago. Cobblestones paved the main street and every door was propped open, the better to induce spontaneous shopping.

Erin had been in town for a week, looking for a place to escape the crowded, suddenly terrifying streets of New York. Raised in California, she’d lived in Manhattan for years. Erin was more at home with the big-city vibe, but over the last few weeks things had changed.

Let’s face it, she thought, things had changed five years ago. On her twenty-fifth birthday, she’d received a letter from the birth mother she’d never known, warning Erin that on her thirtieth birthday, her biological father was going to find her, steal her psychic abilities and then kill her.

Now, with only three weeks left before she turned the big three-O, life was getting scary. Especially since the day someone had shoved her off a curb in Brooklyn and into the path of an oncoming bus. Erin had survived that, thanks to a quick-moving good Samaritan. But since that day, she’d felt eyes watching her. Following her every movement.

She’d thought she would be safe tucked away in a tiny village just a half hour from the Canadian border.

Clearly, she had been wrong.

She slapped her right hand onto a light post and used it to swing herself around the corner in her blind run. The instant her hand touched the cold, black metal though, her mind filled with the images of everyone who had touched it before her.

Visions raced through her mind so quickly, she could barely separate one from the other. Old men, young women, boys carving their initials into the black paint, drunks leaning into the pole, a young couple nestled against it, lips locked in a hungry kiss —she saw them all in a rapid progression despite trying to close them all out.

Not now , she thought wildly, doing her best to close down the psychic images flooding her mind. Normally, she could deal with the burst of visions erupting in her mind at the simplest touch of an object. She’d learned to pause, let the pictures rise up and fade away in their own time. Today, she couldn’t afford to be distracted. Not even for an instant.

She shook her head, stumbled, waved her arms to steady herself and then raced down the cobblestone street. Erin darted in and out of the crowds as she passed one shop after another. Which one? Where should she go? Where would she be safe?

Then one shop seemed to stand out from all the others. Soft blue paint, gray shutters and a gleaming front window with gold-leaf paint proclaiming The Ancient Sea . Her boots slid, then grabbed the cobblestones as she ducked inside. Her instincts had prompted her to choose this shop above all the others and she was in no shape to argue with them. Besides, all that mattered was that she get off the street, out of sight, before whoever had been watching her on the wharf could find her again.

A bell over the door pealed as she stepped on the welcome mat and the old woman behind the counter gave her a blank stare and a brief nod of greeting. Erin couldn’t blame the woman for not being delighted to see her. She must look half crazed. God knew that’s how she felt. Breathless, terrified, lost.

Where the hell could she go?

What was she supposed to do?

“Welcome,” the woman said, but the single word didn’t hold much warmth. “If I can help you find something, please ask.”