The Outliers

  thought of Richard steal another happy moment or another happy thought from me. He’d already taken so much. He wasn’t getting anymore. Not a single thought. Not from me.

  The only exception was when I couldn’t sleep at night. Then my thoughts would drift to him. I’d lie awake with my arms wrapped around Caroline and I’d think of how Richard met his end. After a short while it would solve my lack of sleep problem and I’d drift off like a baby drunk on his mama’s milk.

  Richard’s death was the new counting sheep.

  Who knew?

  Bonus Scene 2

  Sawyer

  “What’s that?” I asked, turning my head to better hear the music being played behind the doors of the ordinary looking office building in an old strip mall.

  “That?” Finn smiled and raised my hand to his mouth to place a chaste kiss over my knuckles. “Is the sound of religion number nine.”

  “Religion number nine sounds amazing,” I admitted, moving toward the door like the music was drawing me inside.

  “Wait until you hear how it sounds from the inside,” Finn said, opening the double doors. The melody exploded all around us and immediately I had goosebumps on my skin and a feeling of pure joy in my heart. We sat in the back row so as not to disturb the two dozen or so other people in attendance.

  The inside of the church wasn’t very church like at all. It was void of stained glass or depictions of the stations of the cross or the Virgin Mary. This was a simple yellow room with several rows of white folding chairs on each side of the makeshift aisle. The walls were decorated with brightly colored children finger paints along with bulletin birds with various flyers pinned to it.

  The music was coming from a small band set up in the front corner of the room. A young woman wearing ripped jeans and a Guns-N-Roses tank top, who looked to be about my age, was the one singing into a microphone on a stand. Her voice was melodic but haunting all at the same time. We sat in the back row and listened. I was immediately mesmerized by her voice and by her words.

  We sing for love and love alone.

  Love is what will always bring us home.

  We live for light but darkness still looms.

  It’s our light within that will chase away the feeling of doom.

  “Wow,” I whispered, feeling goosebumps on my skin as well as on my soul.

  Finn squeezed my hand.

  When the song was over the pastor spoke about love and loss to the crowd. He was probably in his forties and he delivered his message with such compassion that my heart swelled in my chest. He also never stood at the front of the crowd or behind a podium. He surprised me by walking up and down the aisle making eye-contact with each person in attendance including myself and Finn.

  When the service concluded Finn brought me up to meet Pastor Dave. “I’m going to let you two talk,” Finn said, excusing himself to go say hello to an older woman I’d seen before who he’d introduced to me a while back as an old friend of his mother's.

  We sat in the front row in the now empty room. Pastor Dave was the first one to speak. “Finn told me about your situation and a little about your background. He also says that you’re between faiths right now.”

  I laughed at his phrase. “I guess I never thought of it that way, but yes, in a way. I’m writing a blog, about different religions, their history, and what faith really is. I think maybe I’ll learn what it is along the way. I figured the best way to write about them is to experience them for myself.”

  His smile was kind, showcasing the fine lines around his mouth. “I think that’s fantastic. Well, the CliffsNotes on us are that we are an interfaith church which means that we don’t accept any one faith is the ‘right’ faith or the one ‘true’ faith. What we do here is recognize that we are all brothers and sisters on this earth and that we are all in this together. That’s what we celebrate. People are too busy with the ‘right and wrongs’ of religion. They’re too caught up on the details. We focus on the goodness in our hearts because God lives in our hearts, not in the details.”

  I thanked him for his time and contemplated his words as Finn joined me at the door. “Pastor Dave?” I asked.

  He turned back around. “Yes?”

  “Do you think it would be okay if I came to the service again next week?”

  “We’d like nothing more than to have you Miss Sawyer.”

  I smiled and Finn grabbed my hand. “That went well, huh?”

  “Yes, yes it did.”

  I didn’t know if I’d become a member of the church for the long term. All I knew was that Pastor Dave was right. God is the love in our hearts. And my heart? I looked up to Finn.

  My heart was overflowing with all the stuff.

  “Did I tell you that I decided on a name for the blog?” I asked Finn as we walked hand in hand.

  “No, what did you decide.”

  I stopped and turned to face him, craning my neck to look in his beautiful blue eyes.

  “The religious adventures of Sawyer and Finn.”

  Up in Smoke

  A KING SEREIS NOVEL

  Frankie

  I steal my nerves by taking a deep breath.

  “What the fuck are you doing?” Smoke bellows angrily as I appear before him wearing practically nothing.

  “What?” I ask, using my most innocent voice. I glance down at my sheer black bra and matching panties. “You don’t like what you see?” I sway my hips as I speak and press my teeth into my bottom lip.

  Smoke scoffs, although I can see from the way his nostrils flare that I’m affecting him. “You're…cute," he says. The way he says cute is meant as an insult. "But I like women, not little girls like you." He waves his hand up and down my body, dismissively.

  And while his words say one thing, his eyes say something completely different, because he gives my body another look, licking me up and down with his gaze, lingering on the scrap of fabric between my legs then up to the sheer triangles doing nothing to hide my nipples which rebel against me. Smoke watches them as they harden under his glare. He tries to hide his smirk but I see it before he can cover it.

  “I’m not a little girl,” I argue. I take another step closer gathering my long silky hair over one shoulder. “And you’re lying, because if you didn’t like what you see, you wouldn’t be eye fucking me right now.” I try to remain confident, keeping up the façade of the seductress. , I was terrified that he was late to call my bluff at any moment.

  “Such big words for such a little girl,” Smoke said flippantly. He shifted on the couch spreading his long-sculpted legs just a bit wider, adjusting the tight denim at his knees.

  “I’m not a little girl!” I shouted, taking a step forward in challenge before I stopped, reminding myself that I wasn’t supposed to be fighting with him. I was supposed to be seducing this man, and in turn, possibly saving my own life.

  At least, that’s what the plan was.

  Smoke’s perfect thick lips turn upward on the ends. He looks smug and infuriates me. Because, if this was a fight, he knows he just won the first round. My confidence waivers and suddenly standing in front of him feels more like exposure than seduction. But I can’t let him see my hesitation.

  My life depends on it.

  “What game are you playing at here?” he asks. I hate the amusement in his voice. More than that, I hate how my body responds to that voice.

  The need to press my thighs together as my core clenches is overwhelming. I attempt to do it subtly, trying to cover the movement was what I think is a sexy sway of my hips. It doesn’t work. Smoke notices. His chest lately shakes with silent laughter. He leans his elbow on the armrest of the couch and rests his head on the tips of the fingers. The other arm resting I’m one of his thighs, his hand falling just below the enormous bulge in his jeans. ‘Cause, no matter what happens, Princess” he lowers his voice will whisper. “You’re gonna lose.”

  “That’s what you think,” I say in my most sultry sounding voice. I’m not sure what game I’m
playing. No, I do know. I’m playing a game where the prize is my freedom.

  My life.

  “This won’t change anything. I mean it.” he repeated. There is no trace of humor in his tone.

  I don’t answer. Smoke could tell me he didn’t want me all night long but his dilated pupils and his darkening eyes told another story. One of lust. I had to do this. I had no choice and I was running out of time.

  All he needed was a little push.

  I unhooked my bra, dropping it to the floor. He watched intently. His nostrils flared. He ran his tongue over his lower lip as he drank me in.

  He’s quiet for a moment. Fear spikes through me at the thought that I’ve lost my only chance. He glances back up to meet my eyes like he has come to some sort of conclusion. “Alright, Princess.” Smoke’s wicked smirk is back. I broke with the scar raises when he says, “You think you can handle a man like me?”

  The way he says it drips with the challenge. With promise.

  With a warning.

  I take another step toward him and make no move to cover my naked breasts. I’m calling his bluff, just like he’s calling mine. A thrill shimmies its way to my very core, no doubt a result of both the thrill and terrifying fear warring within me.

  “Then come on, Princess.” Smoke unzips his jeans and lifts his hips slightly off the couch. He pushes them down far enough to reveal the defined V underneath. The fabric of his tight black boxers is stretched so thin over his straining erection I can see the color I’ll his flesh beneath.

  He extends one last warning. “A fuck won’t buy your freedom. I’m a lot of things, but a liar isn’t one of them. You wanna fuck me?” The way he says the word fuck sends shivers up my spine. My nipples harden further and I pretend it’s because of the air skating across my naked flash. “You want me to bend you across this couch and show you how real man fucks?” He nods like he’s agreeing to something in his head. “Then let’s go. But you’re going to regret it, because as I’ve said it changes nothing.”

  I smile like his words didn’t send spasms of fear pulsating in my chest. Whether they were true or not didn’t matter. It was my last chance.

  My only chance.

  I approach the couch and kneel before him, spreading my fingers over his jean covered thighs like I’d done this a million times before.

  I hope you can’t feel me shaking.

  Smoke grabbed my wrist roughly, lifting it off his leg. He snarled. “This isn’t a fucking joke, little girl. I know you think you’re smart, and I know there are a lot of motherfuckers out there that will fall for your bullshit, but in case you haven’t noticed, I ain’t like other guys. I see right through this act of yours. I ain’t buying it.” He leaned forward his face inches from mine. He smells like a leather and fresh soap. “You can’t buy your freedom with pussy, because your freedom ain’t for sale.”

  “It’s not an act,” I lie, defensively with my teeth gnashed together. I try to yank my wrist from his grip, but he squeezes tighter, his fingernails biting into my flesh.

  I gasp when a bolt of heat passes between us. We both lower our eyes and stare at where his hand has my wrist trapped and I wonder if he fell it too. The electric like current still running across our skin and deeper.

  Smoke growls, releasing me so suddenly I fall back onto the floor. “Have it your way, Princess.” He says. His eyes are dangerously dark. His eyes are heavily lidded. There’s a crackle in the air that wasn’t there a moment ago. “Take off my pants and ride me,” he orders, leaning back on the couch he glances from me to his open jeans then back again.

  Shit.

  I swallowed hard and raised to my knees again, I pushed down my panties and stepped out, kicking them off to the side. I was now completely naked. Exposed to my enemy. The nakedness wouldn’t have bothered me before because my intentions were still hidden. Now I felt more vulnerable than ever, because Smoke knew of my intentions and was find out all there was to know about my body.

  I hook my fingers into the waistband of his jeans and start to snake them down over his hips. Smoke may be able to see through me in some ways, but I still have secrets he doesn’t know. Secrets he will never know. It’s my turn to look up at him and smile, knowingly. My turn to look smug as he watches my every movement with laser like interest.

  Smoke doesn’t know that everything I’ve told him since the day we met has been a lie.

  The day he abducted me.

  Up in Smoke is available for preorder and coming soon

  Acknowledgments

  Becca, we did it!!! Thank you so much.

  Thank you to Ellie from Love-N-Books.

  Thank you to Kimberly Brower, my agent.

  Thank you so much to all my amazing readers and the fab people in Frazierland.

  Thank you to Wander Photography for this amazing cover picture and for being an all around amazing person.