Another snippet…today’s theme is magical. So, one from Locked in Silence…(due out 9.20.2011)
Book 5 in my Grimm series
At first, Vanya thought she might still be dreaming.
Not a nightmare this time, though.
Or maybe she had died…died and gone to heaven. Or some sort of way station. It made sense.
Because there was somebody not too far away who looked too perfect to be real.
He stood by the window, staring outside, giving her a look at his profile, and what a pretty, pretty profile…carved cheekbones, nice nose, a rather biteable-looking mouth. His hair was pulled back, leaving her view of that face unobstructed.
She could have happily looked at him for another ten, twenty minutes.
Hell, another ten, twenty hours. Weeks…months. Even years.
But he noticed her attention, and his eyes, the pale, pale blue of a Siberian Husky’s, cut her way.
Vanya tensed, bracing herself for the typical reaction she got from most men. The way they’d looked her over in that appraising sort of way, right up until they saw her scars.
But he only stared into her eyes.
Slowly, her heart pounding in her chest, she sat up.
Her mouth was dry, too dry. Spying an unopened bottle of water on the bedside table, she grabbed it and opened it. Her hand shook uncontrollably as she lifted it, though, splattering it all over her clothes. Blood rushed to her face.
A shadow fell across her and she looked up, her breath freezing in her lungs as she realized he was there.
He…who was he?
Silence—
His hand closed over hers, steadying it and guiding it to her lips.
Gratitude flooded her, even as the blush deepened.
So weak, she couldn’t even manage to a drink on her own.
The water rushed down her parched throat and she drained the bottle in seconds.
“Ahhh…thank you.”
He nodded and backed away, taking the bottle with him and tossing it away.
Studying him, acutely aware of the damp shirt clinging to her, she shifted on the bed. “So…are you…um…”
He gave her his back for a moment, and she fell silent, staring at him as he crouched down, rummaging around for something. When he stood, she saw that he held a laptop and little velvet pouch.
The pouch he held out to her.
The laptop he held in one big hand.
Still feeling as weak as a kitten, Vanya reached for the pouch and watched as he sat on the bed across from hers. Waiting, it seemed.
She opened the pouch and poured what it held into her hand.
Silver.
It heated in her hand, pulsed…throbbed, like it held a life of its own.
She caught the disc it held in her hand, rubbed her thumb over it. Her breath hitched in her chest as the wings etched into the silver glowed.
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