Rogues, Rakes & Jewels

He went to a side table, retrieved it, and dropped it in her open palm. He didn’t want to touch her, was afraid to touch her, afraid he would not be able to control himself, because at that moment all he could think of doing was tearing off her clothes, laying her down on the wood planking, and ramming into her …

What was wrong with him? He watched her sway as she walked to the door, and then she said over her shoulder, “If you need me … you know where I’ll be, but I don’t start till tomorrow. I have to get settled first.”

He watched from the side window as she got into her car and drove off. He leaned back against the wall and blew out air … What the hell?

One

MEMORIES OF THE Adirondacks’ deep and darkest miles of forest flashed through Roxie’s mind. The delicious feeling of racing through the woods, fully scented with pine. The wind whipping through her fur …

Her mother’s smile—her father’s laughter … For a moment, Roxie was homesick for the life she had left behind.

On her mama’s side she was Patquah Indian, a little-known tribe that inhabited the mountain range known as the Adirondacks in upstate New York.

Her mother had been the chief of the tribe, one that was—always had been—matriarchal, but it wasn’t the only thing that made her small tribe unique. She, like her mother and a few others in the tribe, were shapeshifters.

Centuries ago, the tribe had found it was in mortal danger from a supernatural force, and the elders had enacted a long-forgotten enchantment that allowed them to protect and guard their tribe and land. It was the earth wolf spell embedded within the genes of the elders that allowed their dormant and immortal power to take hold. And thus, the elders became immortal shapeshifters—completing a process that had begun when they had been attacked by a black sorcerer nearly a thousand years past. Once the spell had been enacted and their latent trait developed, the tribe could no longer be damaged by black magic of any kind.

These chosen few—Patquah shapeshifters—were endowed with immeasurable powers, and it was a secret strongly guarded.

Roxie’s mother had never taken a mate in all her hundreds of years, and then she met Nimrod MacBran twenty-two years ago. What’s twenty-two years when compared to hundreds? Roxie smiled.

Nimrod was not Patquah, and he had a secret of his own. He was an immortal who had been on a lonely road to find meaning to his long, black-and-white life when he met Roxie’s mother and suddenly everything took on vibrant color. Her parents’ love story was one Roxie never tired of hearing.

Roxie did not, however, want to stay in the Adirondacks, not even to be with the family she adored and the tribe she loved. She was young; she wanted more—college for one thing. She went off to New York City.

Four years later and with her degree in hand, she was ready to start her life in business, the fashion business. And then she had opened her apartment door, and there they stood …

They had drawn her into this awful mess, but how could she have said no after she went with them to Dublin and saw for herself what was going on in that beautiful city?

So, here she was, not liking the role she had to play. From the start she had known she would have to lie, but knowing it was different than doing it. When she looked into his wary golden eyes and lied, something inside twisted and pained her.

He wasn’t the trusting sort—she could see that—and if he caught her in this lie before she came clean, he would never be approachable again. It was the kind of lie she despised. She had to pretend to be someone she wasn’t. She wasn’t a writer … well at least not a novelist. Maybe a fashion editor one day if she ever made it out of the situation she was in.

Roxie had always taken life head on and believed in facing all truths, even the hardest to deal with, and this didn’t sit well with her. It didn’t feel right; who she really was wanted to just blurt out the real reason she was at MacAdams. She knew in her heart that if it weren’t for the bit about ‘saving the world’ they had laid on her, she would never have agreed to go through with it.

However, now that she had met Chase, she knew there was no way he would easily be persuaded by a stranger. He probably would have just asked her to leave, and that would have been that. Nikki had said this was the only way to get to Chase MacAdams, and although Roxie saw that Nikki was right, a large part of who she was absolutely hated what she was doing.

It wasn’t how she did things, and she’d almost spilled the beans today and just come right out and told him the truth, but then she’d seen that they were correct, that he would have turned her away had she told him why she really was there. He wasn’t ready to join any side, good or bad. He was a world unto himself, and that was the way he wanted it—because he had his own war to deal with.

They needed him. He was a potent and invincible hybrid, and they needed him on their side. Things were about to get complicated and bloody, and Chase MacAdams had powers they could use!

*

Still troubled by all of this, some hours later Roxie sipped her ale and picked at her fish and chips as she looked around the dimly lit and lively pub. She had already turned down a few robust and well-meant flirtatious guys who had tried to keep her company. From the looks of it, she was going to have to turn down yet another.

She sighed to herself as the tall, pleasant-looking, if somewhat lanky, Scotsman approached her table.

She had purposely chosen a small square table at the far end of the pub and situated in the darkest corner in the hopes she might be left alone. No such luck.

“Well now, darlin’ lass,” the lanky Scotsman with the broad smile said in what he undoubtedly thought was a sexy voice, “would ye be liking soom coompany?”

“Not tonight,” she said politely but firmly with the hint of a smile. After all, she didn’t want to make enemies on her first night in town.

He pulled up a chair and sat, and she raised her eyebrows at him. He laughed and settled in, although he took a quick look over his shoulder.

Uncompromisingly, Roxie said, “In English that means no—not wanting any company.”

“Oh, feisty, are we?”