Embrace Me At Dawn (55 page)

STRICTLY FORBIDDEN

CONTEMPORARY ROMANCE (as Shelley Bradley)

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A PERFECT MATCH

Continue reading for a brief excerpt for

“Tempt Me With Darkness”- Doomsday Brethren, Book 1

Chapter One

Present day England

Beside the lush banks of a pond, a woman beckoned, familiar. Yet Marrok of Cadbury had never seen her face in his life.

Vivid grass and multicolored flowers rioted around her. A cityscape towered in the background. None of that held his gaze rapt. Her bare-to-the-skin nakedness and dangerous beauty did.

The woman’s sable hair swept over one pale shoulder, curling under the swell of a generous breast topped by a berry nipple—and framing a birthmark he knew well.

She no longer possessed the platinum tresses into which he’d once thrust his hands. Her new face was delicate—higher cheekbones, pert nose, pillowy mouth—but the siren could not disguise herself from him. Black lashes fluttered over violet eyes that had long haunted his nightmares.

Morganna
.

Lust crashed into him, a battering ram to the gut. Need stiffened his cock. He wanted her as he never had, with a frightening desperation. Bollocks! Was he daft enough to let her lure him to further doom?

Acid hatred mixed with clawing desire. He tried to look away, but his gaze caressed her small waist, her curved hips, the moist flesh between her thighs glistening. Luminous, her smile coaxed him to touch her, challenged him to walk away.

Marrok didn’t—couldn’t— do either.

Morganna bewitched him more now than she had on their wind-drenched night of shared pleasure an eon ago.

The strawberry mark low between her breasts brought back memories of pale moonlight surrounding them as he’d succumbed to temptation and tupped her senseless. For that mistake, he’d paid dearly.

With the last fifteen centuries.

Mist swirled around her like the mystical fog of legend, as if caressing her. Though she was deadly, Morganna in this new form captivated him. Today, society had clinical terms for his obsession. He cared not. Getting the treacherous bitch to release him from his hell . . . nothing else mattered.

With an alluring curl of her fingers, she summoned him. Marrok gritted his teeth. To yield would only mean further torture. But his body betrayed him, inching closer, his cock swelling painfully. Cursing, he closed his eyes.

If he must resist her to be free, he feared he was doomed.

Marrok opened his eyes as a fresh rush of desire slammed him. Want was a luxury; this woman he
needed
. The feeling was as new as a baby’s first breath . . . and as welcome as the plague. And likely illusory, merely one of Morganna’s tricks.

Though he dug his fingers into his thighs, her haunting eyes pleaded with him. Marrok very nearly surrendered to the urge to touch her.

Then she waved her hand. Suddenly, she clutched to her naked breasts the ornate red book he knew meant the difference between his life and death, and she backed away.

Nay!

Marrok launched himself at her. They fell to the ground in a tangle of breaths, arms, and legs. The book fell beside them, its maddening lock still firmly closed.

Before he could grab it, she latched slender arms around his neck and arched, distracting him with her lush curves.

“
Marrok, love me.”

Her plea spiked his fevered lust. He ached to sink deep into her. But he had to resist this fatal woman. Somehow.

“
Release me,” he growled.

She clung tighter, then writhed against his erection. By God, she was wet. He was on fire for her. A heartbeat from explosion. A mere moment from forgetting how treacherous she was.

“
Open the book!”

“
You want me.” Her whisper made him shiver.

Why deny that? A waste of time and breath.

As she wriggled under him, lightning chased across his skin. Like a fool, he thrust against her and groaned. The need to utterly possess her screamed through him. Later, he’d remember all the reasons he could not.

Marrok dropped his hands to her thighs and pried them wider. “If you tempt me thus, you will take what I give you. All I give you.”

“
Anything.”

Morganna’s nipples burned his chest as he lifted her legs over his arms. From one instant to the next, his clothes melted away and he poised himself at her entrance.

Groaning, he buried his face in her fragrant neck. Incredible. Inevitable. More intoxicating than ever. Marrok had sworn never to touch Morganna again—a promise he had kept for centuries—but now . . . he
had
to be inside her.

“
Everything . . .” she encouraged.

As he surged forward, Morganna grabbed the book. Desire chained him; he could not move, not even to snatch it from her grasp.

With a wave of her pale hand, Morganna unlocked the volume. The cover fell open, revealing a hint of its pages, as she faded away.

“
Give it to me!”

He shouted at fog. She—and
the book—were
gone.

Again, she’d used her power against him. Desire sizzled
deep but he was, as ever, cursed. Desolation slashed him,
leaving his soul to bleed.

His anguish made no sense. He’d never mourn Morganna’s
loss. He would, in fact, spit on her grave if she had one.

“
I am the key.” Her soft entreaty swept through the wind.

“
Find me.”

Marrok dragged himself to his feet, suppressing a primal
scream. He must hunt her. That cityscape behind the pond
he recognized as London. There, he could find her. His torment
would never end without that book—and
without a
taste of her flesh.

Around him, something rattled. Marrok sat up with
a startled gasp, his bed rumpled, eyes wide. Panting, he
scanned his surroundings. Bare walls, carved bed. A sword
beside his hand. Glock under his pillow.

His cottage, not a mist-draped
clearing. No Morganna.

The book!
Marrok whipped his gaze around. On his bedside
table rested the leather-bound
tome. The vehicle of his
never-ending
torment, the key to his freedom, was still here
and still locked.

It had been but a dream.

Or perhaps a message? Though it had been centuries,
Morganna had once enjoyed reaching from her exile to taunt
him in sleep. He dared not disregard the message—she
had
returned to this mortal realm as an ethereal brunette, able to
unlock the volume and intent on thieving it.

He rose, determined to find the sorceress in her new
disguise. She alone could end the torture of his ages-old
existence. Shadow and torment her he would, until she
granted him what he wanted most in life.

Death.

A sharp rap against the cottage’s front window startled
Marrok—the
same sound that had awakened him. He hadn’t
had a visitor in a decade, and preferred it that way. Guests
were both unexpected and unwelcome.

Marrok slid the book into the safe hidden beneath loose
floorboards in his bedroom, then took up his sword and
stalked down the hall. As he slid around the corner, his
heart raced with the anticipation of impending battle.
Morning sunlight seeped through the window, illuminating
dust motes and casting a human shadow onto the gleaming
wooden floor.

If someone had come to take the book from him, he would
greet them with bloodshed.

Marrok crept forward, crouched for attack. The shadow
disappeared. A faint crunch of footsteps outside replaced
the silhouette. He slipped toward the door silently, weapon
in hand.

Hey, freak of nature,” a familiar male voice called from
outside, punctuated by another knock. “Are you in there?”

Heaving an annoyed sigh, Marrok yanked the door open
to find a nightmare nearly as bad as the one that had awakened
him. Golden hair spiked above sleek brows and wicked
blue eyes. A glittery Hollywood smile belied the gifted wizard’s
immense power. Bram Rion. Marrok groaned. Now he
would never have any peace.

“
Are you calling
me
a freak of nature? Coming from you,
that is rich.”

“
If today is your day to conduct beheadings, count me
out.” Bram flashed the million-dollar
smile that had seduced
magickind into seeing things his way for four hundred years.
Marrok frowned and propped his sword against a nearby
wall.

Bram paused outside. “Are you going to invite me past the
magic circle guarding your place, or must I continue to stand
on the mat?”

“
If I do not?” Marrok challenged, raising a dark brow. He
was heartily tempted not to. The magical coxcomb amused
him at times . . . but Marrok didn’t dare trust him.

“
If you don’t let me past, I can’t tell you something
juicy . . .”

Bram would not go away until he spilled his secret,
though Marrok cared little what the wizard had to say. He
must find Morganna in her new guise, then force, coerce, or
beg her into unlocking that accursed book and setting him
free.

“
Enter,” he huffed.

Bram stepped inside and shut the door behind him. “You
look like hell. Did you sleep in yesterday’s trousers?”

Marrok stared at his rumpled chinos. “Did you come all
this way to be my mum?”

“
If you need one . . . ’’ Bram shrugged, mischief lurking
in his eyes.