Overview
Bad boy demon. Seductive fallen angel. Oh, what's a girl to do?
After a nasty divorce, Emmaline St. James is ready to start a new chapter in her life. She moves into a new building and would be quite happy with her new digs—if it weren't for her neighbours.
One is Lucian Lucca, a tall, dark, brooding hunk. When he smiles, he looks so devilishly wicked that Emma could swear he sprouts demon wings. The other is Brennan Adair, also tall and mysterious, but otherworldly handsome. He makes her horny every time he ogles her. Emma's new life would be perfect if it wasn't for the fact that Lucian and Brennan are constantly bickering. So she invites them over to discuss their differences.
Inviting a demon of lust over might not be a good idea when someone's lonely and emotionally vulnerable. And inviting a fallen angel is a recipe for disaster—especially when the source of their bickering is Emma. Both Lucian and Brennan want her. Bad. But why should she have to choose?
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781781849835 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Totally Entwined Group |
| Publication date: | 03/14/2014 |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 65 |
| File size: | 450 KB |
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Read an Excerpt
CHAPTER 1
Emmaline St. James realized her dinner guests weren't human when the big bowl of spaghetti and meatballs flew from the table and crashed upward to the ceiling. She was pretty darn sure about it. How could someone levitate an inanimate object with a flick of a finger, unless he wasn't human? And besides, Lucian Lucca, Mr Hot Guy and her next-door neighbor, wasn't like any man she'd ever met.
He fit the description of that tall, dark and handsome stranger cliché, and more. At almost seven feet tall with a body like a Greek god and black, shoulder-length hair, Lucian looked like someone from the cover of a fitness magazine. He brooded a lot. But when he smiled, Lucian made her breathless. And horny. So aroused that she couldn't resist masturbating every time she fantasized about him. No man she'd ever met had been able to make her blood boil like that. It was unnatural.
Brennan Adair was another story. He was her next-door neighbor and Mr Handsome. His beauty was so otherworldly, Emma was sure he could turn a straight man gay. She noticed how everybody gaped whenever he strolled by — women went nuts about him. Almost every day, Emma saw someone lurking by his front door to slip in a note for him or to leave him goodies. Brennan ignored all his admirers, but for some reason he was nice to Emma. He continually ogled her with a look that could melt arctic ice. He made her burn. Hot and horny as hell.
Having two hot hunks as her next-door neighbors wasn't something Emma would usually complain about. And since she'd moved into the Sunshine Tower eight weeks ago, Lucian and Brennan had always been nice to her. Too nice, in fact. It was just that they seemed to have a bone to pick with each other. Emma worried she would go home one day and find a gruesome murder scene. That was why she'd decided to invite them over for dinner to discuss their problems. A good neighbor should do that, right? Well, her plan had backfired, and Emma was now convinced the dinner party was a bad idea after all.
They'd started out nice and civil. They'd drunk wine and enjoyed her cooking until Lucian and Brennan had started to bicker again. It had ended up with Lucian bolting from his seat and the bowl of her prized spaghetti and meatballs flying to the ceiling where it was now. It stayed there for a few seconds before crashing down to the table. Tomato sauce splattered everywhere. A big juicy meatball landed in her cleavage. Emma was so stunned, she couldn't find anything to say for a long moment.
"Holy shit." Emma finally found her voice, but she still couldn't believe what she had seen. "How did you do that?"
Brennan cut his gaze to her. "Look what you did, idiot. You made her dress dirty." He took a napkin to clean the sauce and the meatball from her.
"Don't touch her, you pervert. She's mine," Lucian barked.
I'm what? Emma was startled. Did he just say I was his?
Brennan ignored Lucian's threat and plucked the meatball from her chest, causing Lucian to spew some very offensive curses. All of a sudden, the dessert plate with the neatly arranged tiramisu squares zoomed in Brennan's direction. Brennan waved his hand and everything on the table flew. In a blink, her dining room was a mess, as if a tornado had paid a surprise visit.
Emma jumped from her chair and shrank to the wall when Brennan reached for her sleeve to clean the sauce. "W-what are you?" Brennan paused. His face turned solemn. Lucian's did too. Maybe they'd noticed Emma referred to them as 'what' instead of 'who'.
Lucian glared at Brennan and Brennan gave him an equally evil look.
"I guess there's no point hiding our true nature anymore." Lucian straightened his imposing posture, folding his arms across his chest. "I'm Asmodai." He threw Brennan a contemptuous sidelong glance. "And this dunce is Belial." Brennan looked as if he wanted to choke Lucian but refrained when he saw her expression.
Emma's brain imploded. Asmodai? Belial? Like that was supposed to mean something. Were they fugitives who needed to live under aliases? But that didn't explain how they could wreck her dining room with simple hand gestures. She tried to calm herself and couldn't. She had a hunch they wouldn't hurt her but she couldn't shake the feeling she'd encountered something extraordinary. Something supernatural.
"I asked, what are you? Psychics?"
Brennan rose from his seat. He was as tall as Lucian with the bulk to match. His golden eyes narrowed, flooding her with a gaze so intense that Emma felt the air around her thinning. "We aren't your kind, if that's what you mean."
"My kind?"
"You know ... human."
Emma swallowed hard. Not human. Can I freak out now? "So ... you're aliens?"
A smile hovered on the corners of Brennan's lips. "Do you see any spaceships around?"
Okay, not alien. "Then why are you here? What are you?" Lucian answered this time. "Isn't it obvious? We want you."
"Me? Why?"
"Why?" Brennan echoed, looking amused. "We just do. I want you. But this asshole here has the same idea."
Lucian cast him a murderous glare.
"Well, I saw her first."
Brennan turned back to Emma. "So. Which one of us do you like better?"
"That's not the way you woo mortal women," Lucian blurted. "You seduce them. Compliment them. Capture their heart."
They started bickering again while Emma puzzled over the fact Lucian and Brennan wanted her. Freaked out as she was, she couldn't help but feel flattered. After her nasty divorce from her ex-husband, Joe, her self-esteem had reached an all-time low. She didn't feel either pretty or dateable. Her skin was too dark. Her figure wasn't the type that Prince Charming could easily carry around in his arms like on cheesy romance covers.
It didn't help either that Joe had often reminded her about her womanly curves in the past few years of their marriage. And last spring, when Joe had decided it was time for him to update his lifestyle, he'd decided to upgrade to the skinny model he'd been seeing behind Emma's back.
Emma had seen it coming — still, it was painful. Joe had been her high school sweetheart, the first boy she'd had a real crush on — the man she'd thought she'd spend the rest of her life with. She had worked two jobs to put Joe through law school. Every now and then she'd sought a little indulgence in chocolates and sweets to offset her stress. Over the years, those guilty pleasures had been unkind to her girth.
She no longer fit Joe's image of a trophy wife to flaunt around his colleagues, not that she'd been one to begin with.
Now, hearing that Lucian and Brennan both wanted her, Emma couldn't shake the feeling that this was only a joke. If Joe hadn't wanted her, why on earth would these two smolderingly hot hunks be interested in her? Really. This had to be a joke. Emma cleared her throat. "I think you two are out of your minds."
Lucian narrowed his eyes as if to ask, "How so?"
"I don't understand what you see in me."
Lucian smiled, so devilishly wicked that for a moment Emma thought the room had suddenly dimmed and she saw a pair of black majestic wings spread behind his back. "I see a lot in you, Emmaline. We have to work on your self-perception problem. You can't keep this up."
"I agree," Brennan added.
Emma threw her hands up desperately. "Then you are nuts."
"Are we?" Brennan stepped closer. "We usually aren't this fond of a mortal, but you're special, Emma."
Her, special? Yeah, right. If she were special, Joe wouldn't have ridiculed her for the last few years of their marriage about how she looked and everything she did. His words had cut deeply into her heart, shattering her confidence to pieces. "It's getting late. I think you had better leave."
"You're scared of us?" Brennan seemed to see right through her.
"We would never hurt you, you know that, don't you?"
"I ..."
"This is not fair, Emma. At least give us a chance to prove ourselves," Lucian said.
Emma shook her head. "I'm not ready for ..."
"Just because your ex is an asshole doesn't mean all men are cut from the same cloth," Lucian interjected.
She turned to him. "But you're not ordinary men."
That earned her another devilish smile. "Touché. See, this is why I like you. Tell you what, I think we should go on a date. Each of us. Then you can choose whether you like me, or this dunce better."
"Quit calling me a dunce." Brennan frowned. "But, yeah, what this asshole said."
A date? With each of them? Whoa. "What if I don't want to go out with either of you?"
"But you want us. You fantasize about me and this jackass all the time." Brennan flashed an all-knowing smile.
Her heart skipped a beat at the revelation. "How do you know?"
"Do you really want to know? Being what we are gives us a few perks. You want us. You can't deny it."
"That was before I realized you're not ..." Emma couldn't bring herself to finish her sentence. To think about it, did it really make a difference if they were human or not? Hot guys were still hot guys. Christ. She'd never been this confused in her life. "Did either of you use your powers to make me like you?"
Brennan and Lucian traded a glance.
"Nah," Lucian answered. "We could if we wanted. But all in all, we're naturally irresistible."
"Jackass." Brennan rolled his eyes. "Listen, Emma, I would never interfere with free will. I would never hurt you, trust me, you have my word."
Emma hesitated. "I ..."
Lucian clasped his hands, beaming. "Then it's settled. The game is on. You're going on a date with me tomorrow and with him the next day. After that, you can choose which one of us you like best. Honestly, I'm tired of fighting with this dunce. It gets me nowhere."
Brennan lifted his hands in exasperation. "If you call me dunce one more time, I swear I'll smite you back to the Pit."
Lucian ignored his threat. "Seven o'clock sound good, Emma dear?"
Emma wanted to say she would think about it, but instead she found herself nodding.
"Excellent." Lucian turned to Brennan. "I think we should give Emma ample time to rest."
"I'm sincerely looking forward to our date." Brennan bowed his head.
In a flash, the two of them vanished before her eyes. Emma let out a surprised gasp. Her dining room had returned to normal, as it had been before her dinner guests had ruined it. She shambled toward the table, pinching herself on the arm to see if she was dreaming. Ouch. That hurt. She wasn't dreaming. The wine bottle was uncorked and half-full. Her food was eaten, except for her tiramisu. Other than that, everything else looked clean. No tomato sauce plastered the ceilings and walls. No mess whatsoever.
She pulled out a chair and sank into it. Christ, she wasn't dreaming. It was all real. And the dates with Brennan and Lucian too. She snatched her glass of wine and drained it in several large gulps. Dates with them. Lucian Lucca and Brennan Adair. Yowza. What have I gotten myself into this time?
CHAPTER 2By morning, Emma had chickened out.
She tried to call Lucian to cancel their date, but his numbers weren't in service anymore. At first, she thought it was strange since his phone had worked last night. Then it dawned on her that Lucian had anticipated her balking. If she couldn't reach him, she wouldn't be able to cancel their date.
Another strange thing happened right after she tried to call Lucian. Her boss, McCrane, thought she looked unwell and ordered her to go home early. Emma had worked as an ER nurse in the community hospital for the past five years, and McCrane had never been this caring or generous to anybody. She suspected Lucian had something to do with it too. When Emma was hesitant, McCrane gave her a half-day at work. He literally pushed Emma to the door and asked her not to come back until she felt better. As she trudged to the parking lot, she realized she couldn't refuse Lucian or Brennan. It seemed they had supernatural powers to make things happen. Like one's date with death. A person could kick and scream all they wanted, but it was going to happen anyway.
Sighing heavily, Emma decided they were, indeed, dunces. She still didn't understand what they saw in her anyway. She was afraid they were going to be disappointed dating a plain woman.
When she got home, she marched to her closet and felt depressed again. She didn't have anything decent to wear tonight. She could go downtown to buy a dress, but after a brief consideration, she saw no point of doing so. When Lucian got to know the real her, she was sure he wouldn't be interested in her anymore.
She loaded a pint-worth of ice cream into a bowl and kicked back on her sofa to watch a soap opera. She had barely shoveled the first spoon into her mouth when the doorbell rang. Emma peeked through the viewing hole and saw a gorgeous lady in tight black latex clothes standing in front of her apartment's door. Who the hell is she? Emma opened the door.
"Emmaline?" The woman eyed her from head to toe.
"Yes?"
"Lucian sent me. May I come in?"
"Oh." Emma's hope blossomed. "Let me guess, he's busy and can't make it tonight, right?"
The woman burst out laughing. "You wish. Nobody can ditch a date with Lucian. I've been sent to make sure you're ready for the party."
"Party?"
"A date with Lucian is a party, darling. I'm Sasha, Lucian's on and off errand girl." The woman fidgeted with the heavy shopping bags in her hands. "Well? Are you going to invite me in or not?"
Emma stepped back to let her pass, but Sasha threw her an annoyed look. "You have to invite me in, Emma dear."
"What are you? A vampire?"
Sasha smiled, a wicked smile that matched Lucian's.
"Jesus Christ, whatever." Emma gestured. "Would you please come in?"
"That's better." Sasha glided in like a ghost. Her four-inch stiletto heels didn't make any sound on the tiled floor. With a cursory glance at her living room, Sasha gave Emma an approving nod. "I like what you did with your place. Shabby chic?"
"Yeah." Emma wondered if Sasha wasn't human either. If she were, she could easily become a model with a face and killer body like that. The clothes she wore left nothing to the imagination. Perfect perky breasts. Small waist. Narrow hips. Long legs. Watching her made Emma self-conscious about her full figure again. "So." She shifted her gaze to the shopping bags by Sasha's feet. "What've you got in there?"
Sasha winked. "You're going to love it. Where's your bedroom?"
"Over there. What exactly does Lucian want you to do?"
"Aren't you a curious cat?" Sasha grabbed the bags and flounced to Emma's room as if she were the owner of the house. Emma followed her. Her eyes widened when Sasha dumped the contents of one of the bags on her bed. Boxes with designer logos fell out with a soft thud. Sasha snatched the biggest box and took out the contents. "Ta-dah." Sasha dangled a beautiful gown. "Do you love it?"
"Wow."
The little black dress was breathtakingly gorgeous. Definitely a designer piece. Haute couture. How could Lucian afford luxury goods like that? Or, for that matter, employ a sexy errand girl? People who lived in Sunshine Tower weren't blessed with deep pockets. Joe hadn't been exactly keen to split their assets in half, so he had given her a hard time with the divorce settlement. He'd taken most of their assets, leaving her only a small amount to live on.
"That's a really beautiful gown."
"I knew you'd love it. It's from Oscar de la Renta's spring collection. It hasn't hit the shelf yet, but I know some people in the business. When Lucian told me he'd got a date, I knew I must get you a haute piece. Only the best for Lucian's special girl."
Hot damn. Oscar de la Renta. Emma's mouth opened wide when Sasha rummaged in another bag and took out a big box with the name Manolo Blahnik printed on it. Sasha proffered a pair of elegant pumps that matched the gown.
"Cute, yes?" Sasha's eyes sparkled like the diamonds on the pumps' buckles. "I'm such a good shopper."
"How could Lucian afford those?" Emma blurted out.
Lucian had once told her he was a photographer for a travel Internet site. She was sure that kind of job wouldn't pay ridiculously big bucks for him to be able to afford luxury goods.
"You're a silly girl, you know that?" Sasha waved her hand carelessly. "You don't really know about him, do you?"
"He told me his real name is Asmodai."
"His Highness Asmodai."
"What?"
"But you've got it right."
"Okay. So I Googled him last night and the search result came up with a bunch of occultism sites, myths and demonology. Who is he?"
Sasha wiggled her finger, reprimanding her. "Now, now, it's not my place to tell you about stuff like that. My job is to make you ready for the party."
"Are you ... human?"
"What do you think?" Sasha giggled.
"I think you aren't. Normal people don't fuss about being invited in to someone's house. Can you poof into thin air as well?"
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "The Girl in the Middle"
by .
Copyright © 2014 Lizzie Lynn Lee.
Excerpted by permission of Totally Entwined Group Limited.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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