SFR Brigade Showcase: A Contest and an Excerpt

Discover more Science Fiction Romance authors at the 
​Science Fiction Romance Brigade's website.

Happy holidays to one and all! This is my husband's favorite time of year, after Halloween and Thanksgiving, that is. We've put up our tree and we're getting ready to wrap up this year's crop of presents. I'm more of a Nightmare Before Christmas gal myself and love Halloween best of all holidays, but I do enjoy the good company and tasty food of the holiday season. I also like giving gifts that make people smile. So below I've got a few gifts for you just for stopping by. Then let me know what's the best gift you've ever given or received.

 ~ Holiday Contest ~
​Enter to win a Haunted Hollow Themed Pendant*
plus a copy of Before My World Turned Blue, book two in the Haunted Hollow series (ebook).
All you have to do to enter is join the mailing list for my monthly newsletter, The Life Romantic. I'll send periodic news about my latest books and adventures and you can unsubcribe at any time.

After that, keep scrolling down to read an excerpt from my current work in progress, Howling for You, book three of the Haunted Hollow .

*Pendant prize is open to US residents only. eBook prize is open worldwide.

Join Mailing List

~ Excerpt ~
​A sneak peak at the Haunted Hollow Book III

Here's an excerpt from the first draft of my newest novel, HOWLING FOR YOU, book 3 in the Haunted Hollow series. It has not yet gone through editing, so please forgive any mistakes. Tell me what you think.

November 2147 —The Haunted Hollow, Old California

“Pinche cabron, they can’t take the surge of energy!” Ava heaved at the lever with all her might, trying to decrease the output from the omni-dimensional energy relay. With Cole’s recent illness and sudden miraculous recovery, the machines had been through hell, and so had Ava. Now, with Cole at his full powers again, his energy feed had overloaded the conduits and relays and sent the motors into overdrive. Up above, day was turning to night and back to day. Sun turned to rain turned to wind turned to sun. Thank the goddess most everyone was still inside the winery celebrating their incredible victory over the necro-virus and Scheherazade. The witch wasn’t dead, not yet, but they’d struck her a vicious blow. 

Ava wasn’t in there celebrating, though, because the machines had gone on high alert. She’d been on her way with Tempe to see Cole before Tempe went back in time on an important mission. Instead she was here, fighting with all her might to keep her machines from exploding. 

She shouted orders at the lackeys she’d been assigned a year or so ago, but they didn’t have the depth of knowledge she did regarding the machines. She knew every piece of scrap metal, every bolt and wire and fan blade. She knew how every motor came apart and went together. She could literally hear the parts talking to her. On a level only she could understand, the cooling unit for the seasonal regulator told her it was seconds from blowing. 

“You, take this lever and keep pulling. Do not let the relay switch back to full power, understand?” she shouted at the nearest lackey, Paul, Preston, something with a P, and then raced to the cooling unit over on the other side of the yard. 

But she was too late. Just as she reached it, the metal housing buckled and then blew apart into a million pieces of deadly shrapnel. It all registered in the split second before the blast wave hit her. 

A force more powerful than the explosion propelled her out of the way of the blast zone. Arms like steel bands wrapped around her, a body like an impenetrable shield curled around her and they went rolling into the open yard, away from the fire and shock wave. 

Sound disappeared, only ringing in her ears. Her heartbeat thundered in her head. Completely cocooned and numb. The numbness didn’t last. Soon the body surrounding hers burned through the shock, the intense heat, so familiar and yet forcibly forgotten, immediately making her relax and then come alive.

“Let. Go. Of. Me,” Ava said with a growl.

The man holding her instantly let her go. They rolled apart on the dusty ground. The ringing in her ears persisted. She blinked up at the sky, still hurling through its daily and seasonal rotations at a dizzying speed. Slowly, the crackle of fire registered, then shouts and the hiss of water meeting flame.

“Ava, are you all right?” Rick shook her, staring down into her face.

She blinked again and glared, then softened the glare to polite neutrality. “I’m fine. Thank you.”

The burning look in his eyes immediately went out. He straightened up and offered her a hand. Ignoring it, Ava got to her feet and surveyed the situation.

In that split second, the machine yard had gone to hell in a hand basket. The cooling unit blazed like a five alarm fire. The lackeys had hoses turned on it, water spraying at the angry flames. The other machines’ alarms now jangled to high heaven, making the pounding in Ava’s head get worse. 

“Fuck.” The chaos shimmered before her eyes. She hadn’t slept in days. It all started earlier that month with the arrival of Tempe’s niece, Thea Maloney. Cole’s illness. The machines breaking down. The discovery that their beloved repo-tech was built on fundamentally flawed tech. The witch of the haunted hollow had been burrowed deep inside the League for years. The General himself had been her unwitting spy, ever since Battle 686 three years ago.

“Ava.” Rick was at her side, standing far too close for comfort. “You’re green. You’d better lie down.”

Ava waved him away and staggered into the smoke and chaos.

“Ava!” Hands clamped around her arms and forcibly hauled her backwards. He flipped her around to face him and seemed to have to restrain himself from shaking her like a rag doll. “I know you haven’t seen a bed for days. You’re a danger to yourself and others now. Get some sleep. I’ll handle things here.”

His fierce blue stare brooked no argument.

So, naturally, she had to argue. “This is my yard. I’ll handle—”

A fury lit in Rick’s eyes. “This is our yard. I’ve been right here by your side, only you don’t want to admit it. When a part breaks, who makes it for you? When you need fabrication work done, who does that for you? When you’re stuck on a problem and need to work it out, who talks it out with you?”

“Gah!” Ava threw up her hands. “I don’t have time for this. Rick—”

“Get to bed. Now. You are only going to hurt someone in the state you’re in. You know that.”

Ava dragged the back of her hand across her eyes. They were bleary, probably bloodshot, and the smoke from the fire wasn’t helping. But she couldn’t leave her lackeys to battle this alone.

Like he’d heard her thoughts, Rick’s expression turned thundercloud mad. 

They weren’t alone. He was standing right there and she didn’t want to acknowledge his existence. He was right about everything he’d said. He had been right there by her side for the past few years, close and completely untouchable. Whatever fire had once burned between them had been extinguished. He’d seen to that.

“Fine. I’ll sleep for a couple hours, max. Come wake me up or I will be so pissed.” Ava shook a finger at him. 

He just jerked his head towards the shop and her apartment that had been added when it was clear the machines needed constant attention. Ava  jogged through the smoke and dodged the running lackeys. 

Rick’s voice boomed over the crackled of fire and panicked voices. He barked instructions. “Get the floodlights out here and light this place up. We can’t see when it’s night every other minute. I want a tech on each machine. Give me status updates in five minutes. You two, get the leaf blowers out of the gardening shed and blow this smoke out of here.”

The mood all changed. The confused lackeys stopped, took their instructions and went about dealing with the crisis in efficient, directed teams. Ava stood in the door of the shop and watched Rick work his magic. Unlike her, the man had a talent for leadership. Damn him. So confident. He waved his arms like an orchestra conductor, pointing, shouting, getting results. A man used to getting his way. Over the three years since Rick first arrived at the League, damaged, traumatized and still feral, he’d shed that outer skin and the man he’d always been began to emerge. Damn him. She’d been rawly attracted to the first Rick. Knowing that creature was still somewhere inside him, she found she was even more attracted to the man underneath. 

Ava frowned. Pinche cabron, he looked so good she could eat him up, too. That hadn’t changed. He’d just gotten stronger, more powerful, and more dangerous. He stood with his hands on his hips, his chest expanded with alpha confidence, and exuded complete control. She could rest for a few hours and not worry things would fall apart.
​
But she did worry. She worried she’d come to rely on him too much. She worried that for as much as she’d put up a frosty front, she was still a puddle of mush inside when it came to Rick Radley. 
​
“Go to sleep, Ava!” Rick shouted without even turning around. He knew she was still there, looking on like a nervous mother hen.

Ava grumbled. Then surrendered. She staggered into the shop, bumped her foot on the leg of a work bench, and barely made it to her bed before she was out like a light.

Books I & II of the Haunted Hollow
​are available at all major eBook stores.

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