Electra Rex
April C. Griffith

General Release Date: 9th March 2021

Word Count:  68,269
Book Length: NOVEL
Pages: 269

Genres:

ACTION AND ADVENTURE
COMEDY AND HUMOUR
EROTIC ROMANCE
FUTURISTIC
FUTURISTIC AND SCIENCE FICTION
GLBTQI
MULTICULTURAL
TRANSGENDER

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Book Description

Electra Rex, self-appointed ‘galaxy’s greatest starship captain’ and last known human, is going to save humanity or get rich trying!

Electra Rex, the last human in known space, is broke—worse than broke, deeply in debt and out of options. After a desperate, drunken attempt to fix her faltering life, she finds herself in a deeper hole after stealing the most stylish starship she’s ever seen, but it comes with a massive lien.

She’s left with a fast ship, a nearly indestructible debt-enforcement robot named Letterman watching her every move and a lead on a lucrative job with the mysterious organization known as Bi-MARP, which is set to rebuild Earth on the two-thousand-year anniversary of its destruction.

Across two galaxies, she struggles to stay one step ahead of space pirates and creditors, all while trying to catch the eye of a beautiful, vivacious bisexual clone named Treasure, who was recently rescued from a top-secret university lab run by academic squids.

She succeeds in seducing Treasure—or perhaps it’s the other way around—while they run scams to find earthling relics like the original formula for Coca-Cola, a 1968 Volkswagen Beatle, a mostly complete Monopoly board game and a largely accurate, if not small and green, clone of an elephant. All the while, Electra has to hide the fact that Treasure is actually the most valuable item on the Bi-MARP list—a fertile human female.

When the truth of humanity’s demise and the goals of Bi-MARP are uncovered, Electra, the galaxy’s foremost transgender hero, decides that the riches and fame aren’t worth the sacrifices, and she turns on her former employer to rescue Treasure a third time, completing her search for money, what it means to be human without the rest of humanity and, most of all, love.

Excerpt

“I am the last of my kind, and I suck,” Electra mumbled to herself, throwing back another drink. On the first night of a planetary holiday, Electra Rex was drunk, scorned and looking to buy a gun. She couldn’t recall exactly which holiday it was, though, since there were so many. The planet took time off constantly to celebrate a googolplex of different accomplishments, important figures and momentous occasions across hundreds of alien species. It was a wonder anyone did anything but observe holidays. She sat in a window booth, watching ships both large and small land at the valet pad while she waited.

Little of her Embarker pedigree remained after years away from the flotilla. Endless toil and nomadic life marked her people’s existence, even if it didn’t describe her life. She’d lived in an apartment in Authrillia’s largest northern city for more than a year, which should have made her itchy to get back to spacefaring, but she wasn’t. In fact, she wasn’t much of anything. Apathy had settled heavily over her and it had made her careless—at least, more careless than she’d already known herself to be. To pay the bills, she engaged in the least Embarker type of work she could find—being a professional party guest. ‘Come see the last known human woman, drink with her, maybe even…’ But that was over. She’d frittered away too much money on fleeting things, another Embarker no-no. A job meant to replenish her account at the last moment and save her apartment, her precious creature comforts and allow her reckless lifestyle to continue for another month hadn’t paid out. Now she had only the clothes on her back and the cash in her pocket. Enough to buy a gun, she hoped.

She’d given the DJ of the club a copy of Margaritaville, promising a transcendent experience. Jimmy Buffet sang while a dozen different species of aliens attempted to dance on the multi-tiered dance floor to the ancient Earthling music. Electra’s dad had loved Jimmy Buffet. ‘The finest music in the galaxy,’ he’d said. Even with great effort and a good deal of booze in her system, she couldn’t hear what he’d heard. She must not have inherited his ear for classical music. What the hell is a flip-flop anyway?

Normally leering over spacecraft cheered her up, which was why she’d selected a window booth near the landing pad. She wasn’t into the functional caravan freighters that comprised Embarker fleets. She liked the chic, silky, beautiful spaceships that focused on form over function. The bleak, unrepentantly crappy mood that had clung to her throughout the day lightened an iota at the arrival of her dream ship in the valet station directly below her window. An oval saucer body, three hundred feet long, sleek and stylish, with three classic fins off the back, it was—it had to be—a Cadillux 1959 Dorado edition. And it was pink, the brightest, most beautiful pearlescent pink trimmed in the shiniest of chrome. Electra stood on her knees on the booth’s bench and pressed her face drunkenly against the glass. She wanted to lick it. She didn’t care that the thought was absurd. That ship was so gorgeous that it deserved to be licked.

The transparent arrival tube extended to the ventral port while a valet-bot lowered onto the dorsal spine above the cockpit that sat directly in the middle of the oval. Electra wanted to see what wondrous creature possessed such a magnificent spaceship. After several agonizing moments, the owner of the ship passed from beneath the edge within the arrival tube and Electra’s elation turned to fury—Weisella. Fucking Weisella. Her need to buy a gun redoubled, not to begin a life of mercenary work—which was the Embarker way after going bust—but for murder, satisfying revenge on the woman who had thoroughly screwed her. The fact that such a heinous, underhanded creature could own such a glorious ship was a crime on par with regicide in Electra’s inebriated mind.

Weisella was a Panaeus, a vaguely humanoid alien species with advanced telekinetic and telepathic powers. She was only a little taller than Electra’s five-and-a-half feet. Her heart-shaped face had two enormous black, almond-shaped eyes, no nose or mouth. Frilled spines replaced what could be called hair. A cluster of five ephemeral tentacles stood in the place of an arm on each side, and instead of legs, she had what looked like a jumbo, curved shrimp tail. Indeed, the only attractive features Electra saw in Weisella were her money and her strangely perfect breasts—three of them across the center of her chest, prominently displayed since Panaeus didn’t wear clothes. Weisella liked jewelry, though, and she was sporting a shiny new metal ring on her tail that was probably just brimming with expensive tech.

Electra’s memory of the night before was fragmented at best. She’d been hired to attend Weisella’s gala for the Panaeus New Year, partially as the spectacle of having a human in attendance and partially as Weisella’s date. Electra didn’t mind the escort portion of the work. Weisella was rich, enchanting, well-traveled and she’d paid extra for the pleasure. Except she hadn’t actually paid. The transfer had bounced back in the morning when Electra had tried to use the money to get the foreclosure lock off her apartment door. The timer on her lien had expired and everything in her apartment had gotten incinerated while she watched through the little glass window on the door. Everything her parents had ever given her, every keepsake from Transition Island, every souvenir she’d collected in her travels was gone in a flash of white fire and a quickly ventilated puff of smoke, all because Weisella had ripped her off.

Electra had done her part. She’d danced, charmed and been better than presentable in her skin-tight Utopalex pants, knee-high go-go boots and a black corset that made the most of what she had. The Panaeus guests had loved her. Weisella had loved her. By every measurement, Electra had performed perfectly. They’d retired to Weisella’s bedroom at the end of the night to continue the festivities. Things hadn’t gone as smoothly behind closed doors. Electra had been intoxicated from drinks, a few drugs she wasn’t familiar with and the high oxygen environment created in the penthouse, plus she’d never slept with a Panaeus before. The swell of Weisella’s backside, what looked like a delightfully curvaceous butt? Nope, that was a nose and ‘Please stop fondling it.’ Okay, the breasts were breasts, right? Close enough. Fondle those, lick them and fall asleep face-first in them. Was that why Weisella had bounced back the payment? Failure to consummate? It was explicitly stated in Electra’s contract that sex was not a guaranteed part of any escort arrangement. It was her prerogative. Besides, she’d tried. There simply weren’t obvious sex organs on a Panaeus—at least none Electra could find in her sloppy groping.

The valet-bot guided the Cadillux away after Weisella entered the club a couple of floors beneath Electra’s booth. The little bot was flying the beautiful ship toward the stacks. Not the stacks! That was where someone parked a junker that nobody would want to steal. The stacks were for heaps with so many scratches and dents that a few more might go completely unnoticed. The Cadillux could be scraped, dinged, stolen or breathed on wrong in the stacks. Only the worst kind of philistine would park such a beautiful vessel in the holding pen for pig ships!

“That tight little butt could only belong to the Electra Rex,” a gravelly voice sounded behind her.

Electra sat back down and glared at Fizan. Her underworld contact was a Gromphra, essentially an eight-foot-tall cockroach in every despicable sense. Fizan was too large and inflexible to actually sit in the booth, so she stood at the end of the table, inspecting Electra with her dead bug eyes. It wasn’t that Fizan was a particularly vile example of the species—all Gromphra were lecherous and blunt. It was considered a badge of honor to gross out other species—at least, that was what Fizan claimed.

The seemingly transparent shell on the front of Fizan’s torso opened up like a flasher’s raincoat. It was clothing and body armor mixed and wasn’t actually transparent. Within the shell, guns, knives and a dozen other nefarious items were concealed behind the projected image of her chitinous trunk.

“See anything you like?” Fizan asked.

Electra had enough cash on hand to afford a decent gun. A carbine worked best for mercenary work, although a small pistol would be ideal to assassinate Weisella on a crowded dance floor. Shooting anyone or anything wasn’t really her style, and the reality of what she was doing rolled over her in an unpleasant manner, accompanied by a wave of nausea. Electra scrunched her nose while she considered the weapons until she spied something entirely different.

“How much for the ID-clone?”

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About the Author

April C. Griffith

April Griffith is a lesbian, a rogue academic, and a giant nerd. She’s from Oregon, but calls San Diego her home. Her passions include LGBTQ+ political activism, creating safe places for women in Dungeons & Dragons, and writing the books she wanted to read when she was a kid. April worked on the Amazon Gladiator series (Anaxilea: Amazon Princess and Anaxilea: Gladiatrix) under a pen name.

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One Motion More
L.A. Tavares

General Release Date: 9th March 2021

Word Count: 83,762
Book Length: SUPER NOVEL
Pages: 314

GENRES:

CELEBRITIES
CHICK LIT
ROMANCE
SWEET ROMANCE

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Book Description

Actions speak louder than words.

Long-haired bad-boy guitarist Xander has skeletons in his closest that refuse to stay dead. After a series of setbacks, Xander hits new lows, almost costing himself his reputation and career. While trying to take steps in the right direction toward better decisions and good choices, he meets Natalie, and for the first time—maybe ever—Xander sees past himself and past the music his rock band is famous for.

Their relationship is an unlikely one, with outside factors creating obstacles the two would have to tackle to make their love work.

He is reckless while she responsible.

He thrives in the spotlight while she will do anything to avoid it.

He speaks fluent profanity while she doesn’t speak at all.

He works to win her heart, despite having to overcome the communication barrier, while she tries to look past the intensity of the spotlight they find themselves in.

Excerpt

The locked, guarded door and shiny new mark on my already scarred record are laughable penalties. The real punishment is the smell in these small quarters—body odors, stale alcohol. One thing is for sure… There are no VIP suites in New York police stations.

More like a bench than a bed, the slab of flat ceramic I lay on is uncomfortable and determined to punish me with back problems that will last longer than this overnight hold.

My eyes snap shut each time I try to open them—an involuntary response to block out the outdated fluorescent light overhead. I press the palms of my hands into my eye sockets and run my fingers through my overgrown hair. Sure, the lights don’t help my already throbbing head and the sleeping arrangement is a far cry from comfortable, but the atmosphere is ‘welcoming’. I purposely bent the rules just far enough to win myself a one-night, all-inclusive stay at the nearest precinct.

Quiet. No crowds. No screaming fans. Nowhere for me to be, no way for me to screw up. Most people would find the locked doors, silence and lack of company alarming. Not me. For me, it’s tranquil. A vacation. Maybe that’s why I frequent the sin-bin so often.

“Hey there, sunshine,” a plump guard says, opening the thick-paned glass door so it swings into the hallway. He leans into the metal door frame, holding a large stick of beef jerky in one hand, tearing off a chunk between his teeth and chewing so I can hear it.

“The doors are a nice upgrade,” I say through a yawn as I knock on the glass. “They were bars when I was here last.”

He gnaws on the dried meat, unamused. “There’s someone here to pick you up,” he says as he chews, spewing small chunks of meat and saliva as he speaks.

“Aw, so soon?” I bring myself to my feet and stretch—every muscle protests. “Guess I’m not twenty-one anymore, eh?” I ask.

“Maybe you should stop trying to be,” he says. His stone expression remains as such.

“Noted,” I add, and salute him as I step away from the cell, turn around and head toward the station’s lobby to retrieve my sunglasses and cell phone before heading out of the doors.

Blake—my bass guitarist and lifelong best friend—leans against a car I’ve never seen before, opens the back door and gets in without waiting for me to approach him. He slides to the opposite side of the hired car and I slide in next to him, closing the door as the driver pulls away from the curb.

“How bad this time?” I ask, one side of my mouth lifting at the corner.

“You really don’t remember?” he asks.

“No. That was the whole point.” I drop my phone into the breast pocket of my shirt and place my sunglasses over my eyes.

Blake tilts back the top of a box of Marlboro Reds, a flagrant disregard of the No Smoking sticker adhered to the car’s dash. The lingering tobacco smell of the car tells me he’s already broken that rule.

“Never fear,” I say, elbowing him in the arm. “Social media and the news will remind me, I’m sure.”

“If Cooper doesn’t kill you first,” Blake adds, cracking the window and fishing for a Bic in his breast pocket. His words come out draped in a mix of his slightly faded South African accent and the dialect he has picked up during his years in the States.

Blake moved into my house at a time when his mother couldn’t provide for him anymore—right as we started tenth grade and, truthfully, his appearance hasn’t changed much since I met him in junior high. He looks almost the same way now as he did then, down to his stupid blond-tipped faux hawk and slightly spaced teeth. Only now, the tall, slender physique he boasted back then has morphed into a ‘definitely enjoys beer’-type body. Though, the same could be said for me.

The car arrives back at the venue where we are set to have our second show in a back-to-back schedule.

We enter the building and Blake walks ahead of me by about five strides. I am in no condition to keep up. He turns a corner, disappearing from view. As I turn the same corner, Cooper, our band’s manager, is standing there waiting for me. Startled, I jump out of my boots and my stomach takes a drop it can barely handle. I swallow back whatever threatens to make a reappearance.

“Jeez—” I start, but he has no intention of letting me talk.

“Leave,” he says, his eyes an even deeper brown than they usually are, enhanced by the dark bags beneath them. “Go find food, water and a shower. Whatever it is you need to do to clean up and be ready for today.”

“I’ll be ready, Coop. I always am.”

“You should be grateful we have a show today because I can tell you—no, I can promise you—if I didn’t need you today, you would still be sitting in that cell.” Cooper paces the width of the hallway, pausing every few moments to make a hand gesture my direction, as if he can’t walk and shake his fist all at the same time. “You’re lucky the cops here are fans of yours, you know. There will come a day where just being Xander Varro doesn’t get you what you want. Your status won’t get you out of everything forever. The sooner you understand that the better.”

“I had a few drinks. I was having a good time—”

“Drunk and disorderly, disturbing the peace, resisting arrest.” Cooper starts listing off, using his fingers to keep track of all the misdemeanors. “This band can’t keep a publicist because they’re tired of covering for you. You can’t keep yourself out of the negativity and the spotlight. You’re dependent on drama. You’re going to be a father, for crying out loud. When do you plan to grow up, Xander? When is enough, enough?”

He’s right, but I’m too proud to admit it. Cooper’s growl shifts to a hushed pause, allowing me to say my piece or apologize, but I don’t do either, so he continues, filling the silent void.

“This isn’t just about you, you know. Your band counts on you. Your fans count on you. I count on you. Someday your kid will count on you, and you are becoming the kind of guy who can’t be counted on.” His pacing comes to a halt and his eyes soften. His voice quiets, falling so calm that I would almost prefer the yelling. “You have it all, Xander. Everything. Stop trying to throw it all away.”

I nod, a silent response, even though I know Cooper wants more from me. It’s all I have to offer.

“Just go, Xander,” he says. “Come back when you’re ready to be on that stage and not a second sooner.”

“Can you send a car to take me back to the hotel?”

“You can walk.”

I laugh at his joke, but the sound becomes a scoff when I realize he’s serious. I nod without enthusiasm and turn toward the door, slamming my bodyweight into the metal push bar though the signs clearly indicate Emergency Exit Only.

The hotel is only just over a mile away, but I’m still annoyed. These boots definitely were not made for walking. My feet are throbbing by the time I arrive at the lavish hotel doors. The lock clicks as I hold the key card to the door of the hotel room that I was supposed to be long-checked-out of. I lay on the bed longer than I should, ignoring the clothes and other items strewn across it. A red light blinks at the base of the landline phone the hotel provides, most likely a wakeup call ordered by Cooper or a message about the late fees incurred as a result of the ignored check-out. I almost delete it without listening, figuring whatever message it holds is either now irrelevant or I just don’t care what it has to say.

But I click it, and my girlfriend’s voice is on the other end. I smile at first, listening to her words.

“Hey, it’s Mariah.”

But the smile fades to a flatline. Why would she call the hotel and not my cell phone?

“I have something to tell you.”

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About the Author

L. A. Tavares

When it comes to romance, L A doesn’t have a type. Sometimes it’s dark and devastating, sometimes it’s soft and simple – truly, it just depends what her imaginary friends are doing at the time she starts writing about them.

L A has moved to various parts of the country over the last ten years but her heart has never left Boston.

And no, the “A” does not stand for Anne.

Follow LA on Facebook and Twitter.

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Silk
Aurelia T. Evans

Book 10 in the Arcanium series

General Release Date: 2nd March 2021

Word Count: 87,767
Book Length: SUPER NOVEL
Pages: 305

GENRES:

ANGELS AND DEMONS
CONTEMPORARY
EROTIC ROMANCE
FANTASY
FANTASY AND FAIRYTALES
MÉNAGE AND MULTIPLE PARTNERS

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Book Description

Beauty in Arcanium has always been in the eyes of strange beholders…

After her husband-to-be destroys half her face because she refuses to marry him, faerie princess Sera flees to Arcanium for sanctuary.

Fae royalty are defined by their usefulness and beauty. In Arcanium, Sera has some usefulness, frivolous though a silk aerialist is. But with the sex demons’ magic rousing all the desires she was never permitted to indulge in before marriage, she is all too aware that her disfigurement repels any hope for relief.

Except a certain legless Torso can’t take his eyes off of Sera, and the Horned God of Arcanium still bows before her.

Arcanium protects her, as it protects all the circus cast, but it has been breached before, and her desperate betrothed continues to pursue her within it. He and her family’s fae army are willing to do anything, even take Arcanium again, to get Sera back.

Reader advisory: This book contains scenes of public sex, domestic violence, arranged marriage, gay and ménage sexual interactions, references to past torture, PTSD and consensual coercion.

Excerpt

When Sera emerged from the woods, the cacophony from the circus assaulted her. So did the light. Squinting didn’t help, but still she stepped out into the sun, half afraid that she’d start smoking.

An iron fence lined the circus’s borders. Arcanium was now secure enough in its own offerings that it no longer had to attach itself to another event or park. Rumors continued to flit about that Bell had lost his nerve, that the empathic, empathetic, pathetic self-styled leader of Arcanium had finally tasted humble pie—humility that edged awfully close to mortality. But the gradual return of Arcanium to its former glory suggested that if Bell had been spooked by the demonic theft, he had since regained confidence.

Sera could scale the fence, but there were too many people who might see her doing it, and climbing it physically in a more innocuous way would hurt her hands.

She followed the fence to the entrance, an iconic, elaborate iron gate more theater than security. A place like Arcanium didn’t need iron for security.

She hesitated to enter. Too many people were coming and going, and they all stared at her, but she forced herself to press forward. She didn’t have time to waste fearing the stares or letting them bother her. She could suffer self-consciousness and question her decision later, when she was safe.

If necessary, Sera could have fooled the ticket-takers into letting her in free of charge, but the golems took one look at her and assumed she was just another member of Arcanium. That the soulless automatons of Arcanium used their limited deductive skills to conclude she was an oddity ached in her chest, but she passed the ticket booths with the fool’s gold coins in her purse untouched.

As she strode through Arcanium, some of the adults she maneuvered around turned to admonish her as they would any child in a brightly-colored, multilayered chiffon skirt and faerie wings. The sight of her face drew their sharp words up short, and her determination ensured that she didn’t have to see their shock for too long. Like the ticket-takers, once people got a good look, they assumed she belonged there.

She knew exactly where she wanted to go but not exactly where it was, because Bell changed the arrangement of the circus at every location, more to suit his ever-changing whims than to disorient. Her gait was resolute, her footsteps quick. The uneven ground couldn’t unsettle someone accustomed to soil, stone and bark rather than slats of wood or concrete. A few of the glances intended for her face or her dress dipped down to her heels—sturdy heels, yes, but her people liked to give themselves a little height for special occasions, like weddings or going out among the ungainly people who had taken over the wild places and made them barren for their less steady feet to walk. It took more than a stray stone or clump of grass to slip her to the ground.

Urgency finally rose in her chest when she’d searched the entire circus with no trace of the tent she was looking for. She’d found many tents, from those in Oddity Row to the big top, but not the tent she was trying to find. Fear—bright, unkind and rare as lightning splitting a tree—quickened her heart and her step.

If she had been there for sightseeing, oh, the sights she might have seen. She might have even enjoyed herself. Arcanium wasn’t the average carnival or circus, although those had sometimes been pleasant, too, on the occasions her kind hadn’t been forcefully kept out. Magic made for far more convincing illusions, and none of the Arcanium oddities were disappointments, enhanced and enchanted and real as they were. But Sera couldn’t dwell on them, even when they noticed her and tried to stop her—perhaps simply to talk or make sure she was all right. She avoided their attempts, brushed by them without a word. She couldn’t afford to stop looking.

After the third circuit through Arcanium, tears like seawater slipping down her cheek, she understood. She couldn’t find the fortune teller tent because he didn’t want it to be found. Bell had let her into Arcanium, but he had no intention of letting her stay, no intention of giving her a chance to stand in front of him to make her case. He’d let her in so she could see what she was not allowed to have, to torment her with her last bit of failed hope.

Sera swiped at her eye and ducked behind a midway booth, leaning back against the wood. The structure was flimsy, intended for transport and easy assemblage, but, like most temporary structures, it would stand most stress short of a tornado, even without magic. It shifted a little when she leaned against it, but she had no concern that it would topple, any more than the tents would fly away in a powerful breeze. The flimsiness here was as much an illusion as the cheap material.

She closed her eye to surround herself in far more comforting darkness. “I’m here in peace.”

The purr of his voice arose in the darkness she had given herself. “You do not bring peace with you.”

She opened her eye, expecting him in front of her. But there was only her. “I need your help.”

Contempt surrounded her like incense smoke. “And why should I help you?”

“I didn’t hurt your circus.”

“You watched and did nothing. I’m not accepting new recruits, darling. Go back home.”

“I can’t go back there. Please…” Just saying the word was like swallowing needles. “Help me.”

Silence followed her plea. But the contempt, too, dissipated, and she still sensed his presence around her, inside her. Had he been a demon, such presence would have been unbearably intrusive. But jinn, though hot as fever, were not the danger that those who called themselves demons could be.

When he said nothing more, Sera took a deep breath and rounded the booth again to search, desperately, for the fortune-teller tent once more.

This time, it was next to the entrance of the big top. It hadn’t been there before—or rather, Bell had kept it from her and only her, based on the number of people standing in line outside the closed tent flap.

It went against her training—and her principles, even for those who showed her people less consideration—but she couldn’t afford to wait. She superseded the line, billowing the closed flap open. Any protests from the people waiting died as soon as they saw her more clearly.

When the people to whom Bell was giving a reading took in the sight of her—with her opalescent dress, faerie wings, pink braids and half her face smashed into nothing—the couple stepped out. Maybe they thought, based on her grim half-expression, that she had come to tell Bell some kind of terrible news—a fire in the big top tent, an injured member of the cast, a fight among guests or perhaps that someone in his family was hurt or dying or dead.

Sera spared them a moment’s gratitude. Then she gave the whole of her attention to the man slouched in the parlor chair. He didn’t try to stop the couple from leaving nor did he demand that she leave, intended for paying customers only.

He said nothing, stroking his lip as he took in the sight of her. His posture remained deliberately casual—his legs spread, chest bare, spine curved—as though he couldn’t destroy her in less than a second if she tried anything against him.

Unlike the guests and his cast, she didn’t startle him—no recoil, no automatic disgust, no double-take. He considered her as any arrogant ass might consider a woman for his bed, although if he thought he’d have her in his in return for any favor, he would learn better quickly.

“I seek sanctuary,” she said.

“Does this look like a sanctuary to you?”

“Yes.” Sera crossed her arms, her face heating with his regard, with the prodding of his magic. It was nothing like the magic she was used to among her own. That was kindling sparks in comparison with the forest blaze of him, though he appeared as innocuous as any delicate human being, his human disguise more seamless than any other she had seen. He would be confused for human by even the keenest demon or god if he held his magic secret, rather than the way he made it known to her.

Sera lowered her eyes. It would be a mistake to believe that she could stand against him if he intended to make her kneel. But she didn’t kneel. Not yet. “If I wish myself in, what would you do to me?”

Bell didn’t move and blinked only once, more like a feline in derision than a sign of weakness or weakening. “I told you I’m not accepting recruits. As much of a headache as the humans have been, I am not taking in a stray faerie, especially not a member of the royal family—not when that same royal family availed itself of Locke’s Arcanium all too often. I know every single instance one of your brothers or cousins—and even your father—reveled in the downfall of my circus. In fact, I have one of your brothers here with me now.”

The lid to a chest next to the display sideboard swung open. Bell conjured a cluster of spirit quartz onto the parlor table. It gleamed against the dark velvet, shone different rainbow colors from different angles as she slowly approached the prison of her brother Falconell. He had been given up for dead, like all of the demons, monsters and immortals from the night Bell had taken back Arcanium. Sera reached for the crystal but Bell clicked his tongue, gathering the spirit quartz in both hands to rest on his lap.

“He’s mine now. He isn’t suffering. He isn’t anything. But when I release him from this prison, it will not be to save him. It will be to make my people stronger, not to give your people closure. All of you should know better than to step foot in Arcanium.”

“That’s why I came. They’d never think to look here first.” The fear that had cracked her chest had since warmed and melted away, leaving mere wariness in its wake. He had given her a chance to find his tent, to argue her case, and he hadn’t spirited her away into her own spirit quartz prison. That was something. “Look at me.”

Bell straightened, shifting his entire demeanor. Just like that, he became a coiled predator, his golden eyes gleaming, although she doubted the humans in his employ had ever seen them like this. They might have interpreted his change in posture as attention and concern, but Sera knew better. He had been at his most dangerous when most casual, but that didn’t mean showing her his claws meant she was safe—only that he respected her enough to cast off the mask and present his cards in anticipation of her own.

“I see you.” He held out a hand like a king to his subject.

After a beat, she allowed him to pull her in, close enough for him to take her chin and lift it.

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About the Author

Aurelia T. Evans

Aurelia T. Evans is an up-and-coming erotica author with a penchant for horror and the supernatural.

She’s the twisted mind behind the werewolf/shifter Sanctuary trilogy, demonic circus series Arcanium, and vampire serial Bloodbound. She’s also had short stories featured in various erotic anthologies.

Aurelia presently lives in Dallas, Texas (although she doesn’t ride horses or wear hats). She loves cats and enjoys baking as much as she dislikes cooking. She’s a walker, not a runner, and she writes outside as often as possible.

You can follow Aurelia on Facebook here and on her blog here.

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Going The Distance
Alexandra Alan

General Release Date: 2nd March 2021

Word Count:  23,100
Book Length: NOVELLA
Pages: 88

GENRES:

COMEDY AND HUMOUR
CONTEMPORARY
EROTIC ROMANCE

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Book Description

Will one ride convince her to go the distance?

Hitchhiking is easy, right? Stick out a thumb, hop in an old jalopy and see the country from behind someone else’s bug-splattered window. But even hitching from Boston to Los Angeles was a lot trickier than Cara had imagined.

Enter the semi-truck.

Cara never expected to hitch a ride in a vehicle larger than a minivan, yet when Nate Hayes offers her a lift, something urges her to leap into the passenger seat. He’s handsome and taciturn, and she’s sure there’s more depth to this man than he initially reveals.

On the road from one side of the country to the other, her intrigue quickly turns into attraction, then into something she really doesn’t want to feel for a man who’s going to disappear in less than a week.

As Cara’s destination looms, she realizes that she wants to go the distance with Nate…but will it be possible?

Reader advisory: This book contains references to infidelity, overwork leading to serious mental health problems, and corporate corruption. There are mentions of parental abandonment and a scene involving semi-public sex.

Excerpt

This isn’t a great idea.

It’s not that it’s bad, really. It wasn’t brought about by too much alcohol or having a friend say, “I’m not peer-pressuring you…it’s just your turn.” Nothing she’s currently doing will end with an underground drug ring in Singapore, missing half of her finger, or a tattoo of Twerkalicious in a swirling script stamped over her ass.

Still though, it’s not great. Cara will admit this.

There’s inherent risk to hitchhiking, especially hitchhiking across the country. Cara, however, has been supremely safe the entire time, and although it’s only been one day—during which she’s hopped into two sedans and an old pickup, and crossed the distance from Boston to Pittsburgh—there hasn’t been a single moment she’s feared for her life.

Not yet, a little voice says in her head.

Cara shuts it up by beginning to loudly hum More Than a Feeling and smiles at a Subaru that passes without even a wave.

She’s been standing on the side of the road for over an hour with both her thumb and her smile out so hard that it’s making her muscles ache. Maybe if a driver sees a happy hitchhiker, they won’t think she’s planning to murder them. Her friends say she has a nice smile, that it brings out the apples in her cheeks—whatever the fuck that means.

A scrappy-looking sedan with only one side mirror flies past.

It crosses Cara’s mind then that perhaps her grin could be taken as a sneaky attempt to con someone into giving her a ride so she could then murder them. She lowers the wattage of it and tries not to feel the encroaching despair when a lifted truck blasts its engine as it passes her.

Last year, she’d listened to an audiobook about hitchhiking across the country. It had planted a little seed in her mind—she could do that. She could hold out her thumb, hop in a vehicle and see the country from someone else’s passenger-side window. After many trips to the library and a few memoirs filled with grand soliloquies and out-of-date gas prices, the plan had solidified.

She would do it.

In her back pocket, her phone buzzes and she pulls it out. There’s a new message in the group chat she’d started with her friends.

Get a ride yet?

Cara taps out a quick response in the negative. A minivan seems to slow and she shoves her phone into her jeans, jerking her arm out and even going so far as to waggle her thumb, because maybe they’d have air conditioning, and snacks, but the van continues on down the ramp and returns to the freeway.

Shit.

She should have made a sign. Wasn’t that what everyone in the memoirs had done? If she’d scrounged a scrap of cardboard and written out Boston to L.A., maybe more people would have stopped. She’s done everything else right—hitching for rides on freeway on-ramps, staying clean so as to not look like a transient, taking pictures of the license plates of each car she gets in and texting the photo to the group chat before she slides into the passenger seat. She’s even carrying one of those neat GPS things that sends her location to a handful of email addresses. And she’s been taking self-defense classes for the past three months.

Cara is ready.

The same can’t be said for the drivers of Pennsylvania, apparently.

With a sigh, she lets her arm drop to her side and walks to where she’s set her pack against a tree, then crouches and pulls her water bottle from the elasticized side pouch. The air is hot and muggy against her exposed skin, and it’s not even noon yet. Her hair is in a loose, low ponytail, and it’s clinging to her neck like some sort of little blonde octopus. She’ll fix it in a minute.

Cara takes a long drink and pretends she was able to find ice cubes this morning. They would rattle against the plastic and bump against her teeth, and maybe one would slip between her lips and she could suck on it, and she would feel the cold through the roof of her mouth until she winced.

She takes another drink and, this time, pretends the water doesn’t taste like old rest-stop plumbing and chlorine.

From the on-ramp intersection, there comes the sound of a semi. Cara spins around to see it make the wide turn onto the on-ramp. Hurling her water bottle to the grass, she sprints to the side of the road and holds out her thumb. The cab’s silver paint is chipped and fading, and Hayes Moving is printed in a retro script on the side of the trailer. The engine roars and a thick plume of black smoke belches from the pipe.

Cara hates that black smoke. She hates the whole idea of semis, especially since she read an article about how much less efficient they are than trains, and every single time she’s been tailgated for going the speed limit, it’s been by a semi.

But she’s hot, desperate, and more than a little frustrated, so she holds her thumb out anyway and smiles.

As the smoking behemoth rumbles past her, the horn blasts a few times and the engine brake lets out a sound that, if she were feeling vindictive, she would call a fart. The whole thing pulls onto the shoulder.

Cara stands in the grass for a second, hand still outstretched in disbelief, before she runs to her pack and hefts it onto her shoulder with a grunt. Since she hadn’t planned on doing much walking, she hadn’t worried about packing light when she’d shoved her gear into it, and the pack must be close to fifty pounds.

A quick photo of the license plate and she begins to walk toward the cab.

This could be great.

The group chat is still an active window. She navigates to it, uploads the picture and taps Send.

This could be great. Or it could be terrible.

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About the Author

Alexandra Alan

Alexandra lives in Colorado with her partner and two very strange cats. Her nerdiest experience was when she had a heated discussion about Star Wars during a game of Dungeons & Dragons. Though she’s always on the lookout for more hobbies, some of her favorites are drawing, knitting, archery, rock climbing, brewing mead, and scrimshaw. The most badass she has ever felt was when she took jousting lessons for a year. She has never met a bad pun she hasn’t adored, and loves to read books that make her heart race. Follow Alexandra on Twitter.

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Destined Prey
Bailey Bradford

Book 1 in the Wild Ones series

General Release Date: 2nd March 2021

Word Count: 43,119
Book Length: SHORT NOVEL
Pages: 178

GENRES:

CONTEMPORARY
EROTIC ROMANCE
GAY
GLBTQI
PARANORMAL
WERESHIFTERS

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Book Description

The call of the wild has never been so hot.

All Jack Tucker wanted was to come home for a little while and try to figure out where his life had gone wrong. Moving from Wyoming to New York didn’t turn out the way he’d thought it would, and a bad breakup has left him bruised—emotionally and otherwise.

He doesn’t expect to be glad he’s back on the Double T Ranch with his brother, Rhett, and he sure doesn’t expect to find the place crawling with coywolves, wolves and coyotes. There seems to be some kind of animal warfare going on, and he and Rhett are caught in the middle of it.

Coywolves—the hybrid of wolves and coyotes, hated by both, and more predatory than either. Add in the fact that all the battling species are shifters, and there’s bound to be trouble.

Ben Akers is part of his brother’s pack. The only coywolf shifters in existence, they find themselves under constant attack from wolf and coyote packs determined to make the Akers pack extinct. But coywolves don’t die out so easy, and when Ben’s life takes a surprising turn in the form of one sexy human named Jack Tucker, they’re both in for surprises, danger and the chance at the kind of love most people—and shifters—can only dream of…

Reader advisory: This book contains references to the main character’s abusive relationship, scenes of fighting and death in shifted form.

Publisher’s Note: This book was previously released elsewhere. It has been revised and reedited for release with Pride Publishing.

Excerpt

Jack Tucker watched his brother retrieve the rifle from the gun cabinet in the office. “Um. Rhett? What’re you doing?”

Rhett didn’t even glance back at him as he loaded the gun. “What does it look like I’m doing? You been living in the city so long you forgot how a Wyoming rancher lives?” Then he did look over his shoulder at Jack, and Jack kind of wished he hadn’t.

He hated seeing that judgment in his brother’s eyes, and knowing he’d never be good enough for Rhett, never be the man Rhett was. “No,” Jack mumbled, “I didn’t forget.”

Rhett sighed and turned until he faced Jack. “Look, that was uncalled for. I’m… I’m sorry, okay?”

Jack was so startled by the apology that he gulped and couldn’t think of a word to say.

Rhett grimaced. “Yeah. Well, okay. Gotta check on some tracks Eddie said he found leading from his property to ours. I’ll be back in a few hours.” He left, striding from the room without seeming to hesitate.

Jack groaned and closed his eyes. Of course Rhett didn’t hesitate—he never had. Rhett always knew what to do, and how to do it, and who he was and that he was right… Except, he apologized to me, and it screwed my head right up.

“Worse than it already is,” he muttered. Jack couldn’t stop himself from touching his left side, where his bruised ribs throbbed as the pain meds wore off. He was lucky, very lucky, that Rhett hadn’t pushed him on the accident that had sent Jack running home from New York, and possibly into the unemployment line. His boss hadn’t been happy with Jack taking off, even with a medical note as an excuse. Jack hadn’t told Rhett much about any of that. As far as Rhett knew, Jack had fallen down some icy steps, and that was all he was going to ever know about the incident.

Jack replayed his brother’s apology in his head and somehow it mingled in with Alex’s. Cold fear trickled down Jack’s spine and his gut cramped hard enough to make him worry about the dinner he’d just eaten.

After several minutes of trying to calm himself down, Jack stood and left. He’d wanted to sit and talk with Rhett about finances and try to decide if he should offer to let Rhett buy him out. Jack wasn’t made to be a rancher. He wasn’t made to be a New Yorker, either.

Jack didn’t know what he was supposed to do in life, and at the age of twenty-seven, he kind of thought he should have an inkling.

His cell phone rang as he stepped into his bedroom. Without looking, he knew it was Alex calling. “Who else would it be?” he huffed. It wasn’t like he had any friends left.

Rather than check to see how many times Alex had called and how many texts he’d sent, Jack turned the phone off, then stuck it in the nightstand. He eased himself onto the bed, then took a couple of pain pills and washed them down with the rest of the water he’d brought in earlier.

The glass was old and familiar, and he felt a pang of regret as he looked it over after he set it down. Green glass, nothing special about it, yet it brought back so many memories.

He could see his mom in the kitchen, fixing a pitcher of tea, talking to him and listening as he told her about his day at school or the chores he’d had to do around the ranch. She’d always been so kind and understanding that Jack had to believe she’d have been fine about him being gay. He’d spent many afternoons in the kitchen, helping her prepare meals or just basking in her presence. Losing her had almost broken him.

For a few more minutes, he let his mind go back to happy childhood days. His dad wasn’t in nearly as many of those good memories, but Chauncey Tucker hadn’t been a bad man. His dad had been more like Rhett—stoic, focused on the ranch and less on the people around him.

Jack ran one finger around the rim of the glass. He was surprised, really, that there were any of the old things left.

The sound of gunshot startled him so badly he jerked and nearly sent the glass flying.

“Shit!” He winced, then stood as quickly as he could manage.

Another shot rang out, then a third, and fear quickly overtook every other sensation he’d felt until then.

Rhett had always been an ace shot. If he’d had to use three bullets, then there was something bad outside—a bear or a whole pack of wolves.

Jack didn’t like guns, but he went and got one from the gun cabinet anyway. He loaded it as he walked to the front door, and hoped like hell Rhett wasn’t hurt.

As soon as he stepped outside, the fine hairs at his nape seemed to stand up and vibrate, like some kind of primitive survival instinct. Jack froze, his back to the door and his heart slamming hard against his ribs.

Another shot sounded, and it jolted Jack into action. “Rhett! Rhett!” He rushed down the steps and toward the direction the shots had come from. “Rhett! Are you okay?”

When Rhett didn’t immediately answer, Jack ran, aware that he was being careless with his gun but had all his attention on finding his brother as soon as possible.

“Rhett!” He stumbled over something on the ground and almost fell before he managed to flail enough to keep himself upright.

Pain tore down his injured side, but he ignored it, calling out for his brother yet again. He cursed himself for not thinking to grab a flashlight. The sky was overcast and there was no moonlight to assist him in his search, and once he was past the barns there was no light coming from the house or other structures, either.

The cattle in the closest field were making enough noise to drown out his voice or Rhett’s, making it impossible for them to hear each other—the sounds of the gunshots must have scared them. Jack worried about a stampede, but he’d never seen any of the critters take out a fence, so he dismissed the idea.

“Rhett!” His throat burned as he hollered again.

Lightning streaked across the sky, blinding Jack for a moment, then thunder followed and he couldn’t contain his startled yelp as his ears rang from the sound.

Or his shriek when six pairs of glowing yellow eyes appeared between him and the fence line.

“Shit!” Jack skidded to a halt, hoping he could steady his hands, and force himself to do what he had to do.

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About the Author

Bailey Bradford

A native Texan, Bailey spends her days spinning stories around in her head, which has contributed to more than one incident of tripping over her own feet. Evenings are reserved for pounding away at the keyboard, as are early morning hours. Sleep? Doesn’t happen much. Writing is too much fun, and there are too many characters bouncing about, tapping on Bailey’s brain demanding to be let out.

Caffeine and chocolate are permanent fixtures in Bailey’s office and are never far from hand at any given time. Removing either of those necessities from Bailey’s presence can result in what is known as A Very, Very Scary Bailey and is not advised under any circumstances.

You can follow Bailey on Facebook here and Twitter here.

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At His Mercy
Elvira Bell

General Release Date: 2nd March 2021

Word Count: 22,321
Book Length: NOVELLA
Pages: 90
Genres:  EROTIC ROMANCE, FANTASY, GAY, GLBTQI, HISTORICAL

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Book Description

A thief and his captor… A spicy demand in exchange for freedom. Will Lio give in to the lord of the manor?

Young thief Lio should have known better than to steal from the mighty Lord Callen. After he’s been locked up in a cold cell in Callen’s manor, he’s told that he’ll be set free on one condition—that he agrees to share Callen’s bed for one night. Lio refuses, but can’t help wondering what sleeping with Callen might be like. Callen, on the other hand, takes the rejection badly and thinks Lio finds him old and unattractive. He can’t stop thinking about the pretty boy with the white hair though, and they’re about to overcome their hostility toward one another when something happens that brutally cuts off their budding friendship and causes Callen to throw Lio out headfirst.

For months they are apart. Callen isolates himself in his chamber, enraged and bitter, while Lio struggles to make it through the winter. In the end, starvation forces him to seek out the last man he wants to see—Lord Callen. Callen, who resents him and does nothing to hide it. Will Lio be able to get through to him? Will they ever have what they both want—each other?

Reader advisory: This book contains scenes of violence, threats of sexual harrassment, captivity and homophobia.

Excerpt

They never should have taken the forest road at night.

“We could go back,” Lio said, stumbling after his father on the muddy path. “That cottage we passed a mile back, maybe we could…”

Athos grunted, his boots leaving large, wet prints in the sludge. Almost doubled over from the weight of the burlap bag, he looked like a hunchback. “You’ll walk until I tell you to stop.”

Lio drew his hand over his eyes to wipe the icy rain away. “But…” He racked his brains for words that might make his father see reason. They were far away from the manor by now, and they had merely taken some tools and iron from the smithy, after the smith and his apprentice had left for the day. With luck, the theft wouldn’t be noticed until morning. Lord Callen certainly had enough gold to replace the tongs and hammers he’d lost. To Lio’s family, though, the stolen goods meant they could repair the hole in the roof, and his father could forge nails and horseshoes the villagers would be only too happy to pay for. Athos had been a blacksmith once, in his youth, but Lio had never dared ask why he had left such a good profession. His work was fine, and although there were some people who’d never buy anything made by his hands, he could make enough money this way to see them through the winter.

Athos coughed, a nasty, hollow sound Lio was all too familiar with.

“Father, you’re not well. Let me carry it.”

“No!” Athos spun around to give him a wild look. He towered over Lio, the way he always had. “I don’t take orders from a whelp like you, understand? While you’re living in my house, lad, you do as I tell you.” He coughed again, but pressed on through the darkness. The lantern swinging in his hand wasn’t strong enough to light up much of the surroundings, and a shiver ran down Lio’s spine at the thought of packs of wolves out on the hunt, or trolls and monsters eager to lure wanderers into their lairs. Traveling through the woods in daytime wasn’t so bad, though he wouldn’t like doing it without company, but everyone knew that one shouldn’t be out after dark. His mother would scold them when they got home—if they did. Lio had accompanied his father on similar business before, but they had been closer to home then and back by the hearth before midnight. Athos didn’t steal unless there were no other options, and before this he had only taken the odd bread loaf or piece of meat from those of the nearby farmers who spat after him and his family. ‘Only steal from those who deserve it,’ he had told Lio often. Lio didn’t know much about Lord Callen, but if he owned half as much land and gold as people said he did, he deserved it more than most. It wasn’t fair that someone like him had everything, while others starved.

“I can carry the lantern, at least,” he tried, uneasy at the sound of his father’s labored breathing.

“The lantern?” Athos scoffed. “It weighs nothing. Now be quiet, all right? I brought you as a lookout. Wouldn’t expect a wisp of a thing like you to carry anything, would I?”

Lio bit back an angered reply. He was small compared to his father, it was true, closer in height to his mother and with her slender build, too. From her he had his ghostly pale hair as well, that made the villagers hiss ‘Devil-child’ and other such nonsense after him. The one thing he had from his father was the dark color of his eyes. His little brother and sisters had those eyes, too, but their hair was dark as coal. He often wished his own was, too.

Wrapping his arms around himself in a futile attempt to get warm, he wondered how far they had left. Their cottage was on the other side of the woods, in a clearing out of sight from any other people. The nearest farm was only a short walk away, but Lio and his family had never been counted among the villagers who were their neighbors. Young women sought out his mother secretly, when her herbs were the only thing that might help them end unwanted pregnancies or cure their sick babies. His father was the one the villagers called for when they needed shameful or dangerous tasks done, like gelding foals or burying disease-spreading corpses. Shame, filth—that was all they were associated with. They always had been.

A strange sound pierced through the roaring of the rain. The neighing of a horse? He stopped, throwing anxious looks around him. “Father, did you—”

“Quiet!” Athos trudged on, muttering to himself. The rain streamed down Lio’s face, plastering his hair to his skin. He shivered, not sure if it was from the cold or from fear. Another sound came through the darkness—a voice? Several voices?

“Father, run!” But he hadn’t taken more than a step forward before someone grabbed him by the neck, pulling him back. In front of him he saw his father stop as a rider blocked his path. A dark-clad man on a black steed, carrying a torch in his hand. His hair was obscured by a helmet. There were four men in total, including the one with the forceful grip on Lio’s neck. Lio struggled in vain to free himself, and the man chuckled in a low, raspy voice.

“Well,” said the rider in black, as two of his henchmen closed in on Athos with their swords drawn. “We found our prey at last. Did you really think I’d allow anyone to steal from me?” His voice was smooth but cold. It was difficult to tell his age—Lord Callen was hardly a young man, but he was well-built and tall, with broad shoulders and a straight, proud posture. His eyes were just as icy as his voice.

Athos dropped the burlap sack, rising to his full height and taking a step closer to Callen, as if to challenge him. “You’ve got enough for a whole village, but we ain’t got a thing!”

“Oh, is that so?” Callen curled his lip. “While I applaud your courage, I really can’t let a thing like this slide. You understand, surely? Men, how should we punish this pitiful crime?”

“Their right hands,” said one of the henchmen, giving Athos a nudge with the blunt side of his sword. “Off with them.”

“Death,” suggested another man with an ugly grin. “That’d stop them from doing it again, my lord.”

Callen nodded. “Why, certainly, but I personally feel it’s a tad…boring?” His cool gaze landed on Lio’s face. He scrutinized him for a few moments before turning away. “Seize them,” he said. “We bring them with us.”

“I’ve got little ones at home, sir!” Athos called out. “They’ve had nothing to eat for the last week, and me and my wife—”

“What a pity,” Callen said.

Athos roared, trying to make a run for it, but one of Callen’s men stabbed his sword into his shoulder before he’d gotten away. Callen snorted as Athos was tied up and thrown over the back of one of the horses as if he were a sack of flour. Lio stared, his eyes fixed on his father’s shape. That wound… How bad is it?

“Now the boy,” said Callen.

“Yes,” murmured the man who held Lio captive. He jumped to the ground and pulled Lio toward him, his breath hot and revolting against Lio’s neck. “I’ll take care of you.”

“Let me go!” Lio squirmed, but the man quickly tied his wrists together and put him face down in front of the saddle before mounting the horse again. Lio’s breath hitched in his throat as the man put a big, gloved hand on the back of his thigh.

“Keep still now,” he said, voice low. “Filthy little thief. You’re going to regret what you’ve done.”

Yes. As the riders started retracing their tracks through the woods, back to Lord Callen’s manor, Lio thought bitterly that he regretted everything. He couldn’t see his father, but he heard his pained groans and whimpers, and the men shouting at him to keep quiet. If only he could do something! What would happen to them once they reached the manor? His father’s injury—how bad was it? His mother would have been able to stop the blood—she would have healed him in no time. But Lio didn’t have any of her knowledge. He couldn’t do anything but hope, in spite of everything, that they would make it out of this alive.

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About the Author

Elvira Bell

Elvira Bell lives in Sweden and spends most of her time writing, reading or watching movies. Her weaknesses include, but are not limited to: vintage jazz, musicals, kittens, oversized tea cups, men in suits, the 18th century, and anything sparkly.

Elvira writes m/m romance and has a penchant for historical settings. She adores all things gothic and will put her characters through hell from time to time because she just loves watching them suffer. It makes the happy endings so much sweeter, after all.

Find out more at Elvira’s website.

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