Secrets, Volume 4: The Best in Women's Sensual Fiction

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EXCERPT FROM THE LOVE SLAVE

One slave remained to choose. Lily found him in the last cage. Even supposing her last two choices failed to impress her mother, this one surely would. He stood apart, his arms crossed over a powerful chest. He was taller than the others and broader, not a youth verging on manhood but a man in truth. A smokey cross of hair marked his torso. He had the warm, bronzed skin of Ka'arkastan and the slanted eyes of Yskut. A half-breed. Brute strength paired with age-old sophistication.

She shivered, half in fear and half in interest. Did she truly dare choose this slave?

His eyes, as black as his shaggy hair, narrowed when the scryer beckoned him forward. Such a terrible stare, so full of anger. I couldn't, she thought. But then something strange happened. His dark eyes bored into hers, and a hot stab of feeling pierced her heart. You, said a voice in her mind, all joy and trembling. It's you. His glare intensified. She didn't care. She felt as if she had stumbled across a friend she'd been missing for years and had never hoped to see again. It was almost like one of Nurse's stories where the lover comes back from the dead.

Nonsense, she thought. This glowering fellow was no object of romance. Her nerves must have unbalanced her mind..

EXCERPT FROM AN ACT OF LOVE

Shelby crossed the foyer and cast a quick glance at the grandfather clock. Eight on the dot. The acting coach Wes had hired was right on time.

Lucky her.

Stopping just short of the door, she stood with her hand poised over the knob and calmed the flutters in her stomach. The moment of truth had arrived in the form of a stranger, and she was woefully unprepared. No matter how hard shetried to gear herself up, the idea of tackling this problem still made her queasy. Maybe she should just give up acting?

But she couldn't just give up life. With a little luck, if she could learn how to perform a sex scene, she just might be able to perform one in real life, too.

Taking a deep breath, Shelby cleared her thoughts and placed herself in the mindset of cordial hostess. Open the door. Greet the guest. She could do this.

The doorbell chimed again.

Rolling her shoulders to dispel the last of her tension, she settled a smile on her face and turned the knob.

"Hello." Shelby peered out at the powerhouse of a man who stood on her doorstep, faded jeans slung low on trim hips and expensive athletic shoes bracing long legs firmly apart. Her heart dropped to her feet. Jason Gage?

No way. The lengthening twilight cast him in silver and shadow, and she quickly took in his casual but masculine stance, his well-toned body. He radiated intensity, the robust energy of a man in his prime, a self-possession nobody half his age ever quite managed to pull off.

Experience. That's what it was. This was a man who had lived. She could see it in the chiseled planes of his face — a handsome face, an interestingly rough and experienced face. A face she had studied in stark clarity on film. A face she had seen grainy and shadowed on tabloids in the supermarket.

Jason Gage. In the flesh.

"Miss Moran?"

She had heard his voice a thousand times. Deep and strong, like a velvet murmur, his voice conjured up images of dark bedrooms and slick bodies.

Leaning back against the balustrade, he looked terribly roguish, just as he had when he had played Frankie Worth in The Last Rebel. He folded his arms across his chest and scowled before Shelby realized she had missed her cue. Jason Gage apparently was not amused by the way she kept gawking at him. "Are you going to invite me in?"

Heat singed her cheeks with the force of Pepe's Beyond The Border Salsa. "Of course. Please." Striding past her in a burst of masculine grace that trampled what was left of her composure, Shelby suddenly found herself staring at his impossibly wide shoulders. The torchiere lamps illuminated his hair, thick wavy hair that was neither brown nor auburn, but some wonderful russet color in between.

Swinging back around, he sized her up with brilliant black eyes. "Are you coming?"

Shelby nodded. There was no recovering from this one. She'd flopped. Big time. "I'm so sorry. It's just — well, I wasn't expecting you."

"Obviously." His full mouth tightened in a frown.

Get a grip, Shelby. Forcing herself into motion, she pulled the door closed and sailed past him, taking the opportunity to steady her nerves.

Leading him into the living room, she moved as far away as politely possible. "May I take your —" She glanced around for whatever he had brought with him. Coat? Briefcase? Garment bag? Keys. "May I take your keys?"

"No." He hooked them on to his belt loop. "Are you ready to work, Miss Moran?"

"I was. Until I saw you." She brushed an errant strand of hair from her face, then forced her arms to her sides. She didn't know what to do with her hands.

He seemed almost relieved, and she would have bet her bottom dollar that he would rather be anywhere in the world but here.

"How on earth did Wes talk you into this?" she asked bluntly.

"Blackmail." The reply was just as succinct.

EXCERPT FROM ENSLAVED

"I'll do anything to keep my marriage from falling apart, Nick, anything."

Then because she'd held it bottled up all week, the misery and sorrow gave way to hot tears. One by one they trickled down her cheeks.

Nick came out of his chair and closed the short distance between them. He drew her tight in genuine concern. "Don't cry, darling."

He held her closer, murmuring soft praises against her hair that made her throat burn with self-pity. In her weakened state, Crystal gladly accepted his charity. She leaned on his strength, reveled in his warmth, when she had for many weeks been bereft of warmth, of hope. She let Nick be her rock, let him comfort her. She was too weary to worry about convention, about ruining his fine linen shirt with tears. Grateful for what scraps of attention he gave her, she pressed her lips to his chest. In Nick's embrace, she could forget the world, her troubles — the affection they shared for one another brought her no shame.

She drew a ragged breath, felt his hand soothing the tightness from her neck. His fingers were strong, caressing. After going so long without a simple touch, being held by him felt close to heaven. Just like old times. At first she had worried about feeling nervous — but now it was as if all the years since their last kiss had been washed away. He smelled of rain-soaked forests and leather. Under her cheek, his chest was solid. He was the same way she remembered him at seventeen, yet different in remarkable ways. Muscles honed by action rippled beneath his shirt. He towered above her. Tall, powerful, infallible.

She sniffled against him, felt his arms tighten, his compassion reach out to her. "I don't know if I could bear your rejection, too," she whispered, clinging to him in a manner she knew was desperate.

"Shh, darling, I'd never do that to you."

"You don't know yet why I asked you here." She knew him. He'd probably never speak to her again, never hold her like he held her now as though he cherished her. Like Freddy used to cherish her. But then she'd already spent the night crying over Freddy. Worrying about the future. Its complications. Now was not the time to have qualms about her promise.

"Tell me what I can do for you," Nicholas prompted reverently, "and I'll do it."

So trusting, so irresistible, and so gallant. "I want you," she murmured softly, "to give me a child."

EXCERPT FROM THE BODYGUARD

P.S. I think you should know, Alana Manley's drug of choice is men... Ka-say-yo! Lee! Eyes wide, Kaki York read the last line of the fax for the third time. Her eyebrows knit together. She sat in nothing but an old oversized T-shirt with her shapely legs curled beneath her on the couch in her rented beach house in Savannah, Georgia.

For God's sake, what kind of statement was that? It sounded as if Master Lee was trying to tell her this woman was a nymphomaniac. Surely not. The Seoul-born martial art expert was no doubt just having his usual problems with English.

The summer moon hung low in the sky casting a million sparkles on the water, and the evening air smelled sea-fresh coming through the open window. A scent of magnolia blossoms came to her from beyond a weathered white-picket fence. Down the road, lighted shop windows offered an endless variety of treasures that would have fascinated her at another time. But what had arrived earlier today—the request—was all that concerned her now. It was also the reason for her earlier video store run.

So much for a quiet three-month vacation, Kaki thought, as she pointed the remote control at the VCR and pushed play.

The previews of upcoming attractions ran. She took a handful of hot buttered popcorn from the bowl and popped several pieces into her mouth. Only the faintest trace of a smile hovered on her lips as she savored the salty delight.

She watched with interest as Alana Manley's latest box office hit began on the television screen. Still, she could not imagine why Master Lee wanted her to be this woman's bodyguard. If someone was stalking Ms. Manley, it seemed to her that a team of security professionals was in order—not just one black belt.

Taking a deep breath, she stretched. Her thoughts on the matter were unimportant. The man who had taken her in when she was orphaned at seven years old, loved her as his own daughter and taught her everything he knew about Korean Karate, had asked her to come to New York. And she would. It was as simple as that.

Kaki knew of Alana Manley, of course. Who didn't? She had flirted with the camera for most of her twenty-nine years. When the actress received an unprecedented thirteen million dollars for the meaty role in her latest feature film, it had made head-lines across the globe. But Kaki had never seen one of her movies. Until now.

There was a quick flash of Alana's face; the rich auburn hair, the sensual long lashed, chocolate colored eyes, the natural pout of her full red lips as she sat in a straight-backed chair and adjusted herself to a more comfortable position. Kaki shook her head. Alana Manley really was lovely. If only she had looks like