Barbara Hancock - Brimstone Seduction

BETWEEN DESTINY AND DESIRE

Damnation is John Severne’s inheritance, and stalking the accursed his legacy. Kat D’Arcy has her own ill-starred birthright. The strange gift that runs along her maternal line dooms her to a life trapped between daemons and those who pursue them. But Severne is unlike any daemon hunter she’s ever known. The Brimstone in his blood arouses every fiber of her being.

For Severne, Kat is the key to his salvation...until she becomes much more than that. As the ultimate danger closes in on them both, Severne must decide if he can abuse Kat’s trust—and betray his own heart.

She was familiar with temptation and resistance, but surrender?

That was a new possibility for Kat. She was afraid if she spent too long in John Severne’s company her limits might be tested. He was a daemon, but he had taken the guise of a very attractive man. She was drawn to the burn beneath his control. She was drawn to what he might hide beneath the hardness he cultivated for the world. His penchant for sugary kisses and his reaction to her cello music gave her a glimpse at what vulnerabilities he might hide.

He wasn’t a forthright man. He was a daemon.

His every move seemed to scream those truths to her even though his words and demeanor were enigmatic.

BARBARA J. HANCOCK lives in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains where her daily walk takes her to the edge of the wilderness and back again. When Barbara isn’t writing modern gothic romance that embraces the shadows with a unique blend of heat and heart, she can be found wrangling twin boys and spoiling her pets.

Brimstone Seduction

Barbara J. Hancock

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Dear Reader,

Music brings them together. Damnation threatens to tear them apart.

It’s been a decadent pleasure to create the lush, dramatic world of the Théâtre de l’Opéra Severne—from the haunted frieze on its walls to the dance floor of its grand salon where masquerade masks disguise darkly passionate motivations. Against the backdrop of a daemon revolution, the shadowed Baton Rouge opera house echoes its master, John Severne, and the heated mark of Brimstone he carries in his bartered blood—beautiful, cursed, standing the test of time and tide. To save his soul, Severne must betray the ray of light he longs to possess. But Katherine D’Arcy will not be easily betrayed. In fact, she might be the only one who can save him.

Confession: Severne, the man and his dark world, still linger in my imagination long after I typed The End!

In my first full-length Harlequin Nocturne book, my love of music and gothic shadows combine to create a high-stakes Faustian romance where the burn of forbidden desire triumphs over the darkness.

Welcome to l’Opéra Severne... I hope you’ll enjoy a dance with Severne in the pale moonlight.

Barbara

For Lucienne Diver...a hell of an agent and the ultimate finishing kick when the race has been long.

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Introduction

About the Author

Title Page

Dear Reader

Dedication

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Epilogue

Extract

Copyright

Chapter 1

She was used to being followed. Sometimes she lost him. Sometimes she didn’t. It was those times she feared. Father Reynard wasn’t her enemy, but as she cut down the familiar side street that formed an alley between the auditorium and her apartment, she knew what he was to her was more complicated and more frightening than if he was something she could fight.

The Savannah, Georgia, air was muggy in July, and her efforts to evade Reynard had left her damp with a sheen that was more humidity kissing her skin than sweat. But she didn’t pause to set down her cello case so she could mop her forehead with a lace hanky like a flustered Southern belle. Instead, tendrils of her thick chestnut hair curled around her face as strands loosened from the diamanté clips the salon had used when she’d been cool and collected and air-conditioned that morning, preparing for the afternoon’s performance.

She heard his footfalls behind her. She knew his step. Others from his Order often hunted as well, but Reynard considered her his own.

Her faltering steps had brought the sound of his relentless pursuit closer. A desperate instinct to run, to hide, rose up in her chest, squeezing her lungs so that she breathed more quickly than her current exertions required. It was fear, plain and simple and stark.

Because there was no escape.

The soft blanket of gloaming draped the city in a muted haze. The muggy haze had dimmed to purple with the setting of the Georgia sun. In the distance, she could hear the traffic and the hum of people on the sidewalks of the historic district preparing for ghost tours and streetlight-lit carriage rides. But here, on the leftover cobblestones of a distant time, she was alone...except for Father Reynard.

His whistle began as it always did, with a lilting trio of notes that led into song. She recognized it as a Verdi piece she’d played that afternoon. Gooseflesh rose on her arms in spite of the oppressive heat from the summer day trapped in the narrow alley. The whistle meant he had her. It meant there must be a daemon nearby that she’d been drawn to. Her affinity had reliably led Father Reynard right where he most wanted to be. Again.

She did stop then.

Not giving up. Never that. She only paused to brace herself for what might be an ugly, dark and dangerous evening more from the violent monk who dogged her steps than the daemons he hunted. Although there was danger there, too. Certainly.

She was trapped in the middle of a war that would never have a winning side.

Katherine saw the daemon then. A woman. The glow of the horizon narrowly visible at the end of the alley cast her stiff form in stark relief. She stood poised for a fight. Her arms akimbo. Her knees slightly bent. It was going to be one of those times when the daemon didn’t go quietly. This was no hopeless soul longing to be sent back home. Katherine could see determination tense every muscle in the figure she faced.

“A female. Good job, Katarina. It’s so important to banish these before they breed,” Father Reynard said as he came up behind her. She kept her focus on the daemon, but she was totally aware of Reynard’s movements. The same way she would be if she were a hiker who was suddenly forced to skirt a mountain ledge over a steep precipice. Her footing was just as precarious. One wrong move with the deadly daemon hunter and she might be dead herself. She could feel the suck of gravity as if she was on the ledge, inches from death. His steps were slow and steady. Not rushed. He was confident. His voice was already smug with success. She was the one who was in danger. She was the one who might slip and fall.

Kat cringed at the utter contempt Reynard had for the daemon as a living, breathing creature, whether it was human or not. And at his total disregard for her and her disgust for his bloodthirsty quest.