Midnight Craving: Midnight Vice, Book 1 (11 page)
evildoers of the Otherworld?
As if balancing work and newlywed nookie sessions wasn’t hard enough, now she’s been assigned to
find the Bracelet of Invincibility before a high demon lord can claim it. And Blake seems hell-bent on
distracting her at every turn.
Blake Barrington will do anything to regain his mortality and live happily ever after with the woman he
loves. Including delivering to his demon lord the one object that could be his salvation—the Bracelet. Too
bad part of the contract includes killing his wife. Getting around this small glitch might be doable…if his
ghoul-cursed brother wasn’t after the prize, too.
Jenn’s suspicions mount, and finally the evidence is undeniable. Her sexy spouse is a demon.
Great. Now what? Shag her husband? Or shoot him
Warning: Okay, so there’s graphic sexual language. So what? Trust me, if chopping off a few demons’
heads doesn’t bother you, why would the sex? Either way, it’s all good.
Enjoy the following excerpt for
I Married a Demon:
At the exact moment I noticed him, he was only a few feet from me. Mr. Ta-DaH—my nickname for
Mr. Tall and Dark and Handsome—lay sprawled like the King of the World basking in the sun, surveying
his kingdom and the lowly subjects he allowed to share his beach. He held a drink in one hand and
scrutinized me through dark sunglasses, his chiseled face a mask of controlled passivity except for the slight
lift at the corners of his mouth.
I’m good at playing cool. I have to know how to play it cool in my line of work—both of my lines of
work. But this guy’s intense scrutiny was almost more than I could handle. With my sunglasses resting on
the bridge of my nose, I nonchalantly spied on him, trying to appear unaware that he studied me. I tried to
suck in my ass, hoping to make the dimples disappear, but knew the battle was lost before it began. How do
you suck in a bottom, anyway? Is it the same as a butt clench? I sighed and hoped he liked women with
junk in their trunks.
The man was perfect. At least physically, but physical was all I had to go on. His wet hair, silky and
shiny black, slicked away from his forehead and curled around his earlobes. Just the right amount of
matching chest hair glistened with drops of perspiration, drawing my gaze to all the right places. Notice I
said perspiration, not sweat. No one this good-looking ever sweats.
I’m talking the perfect model of a man. The kind of man I’d buy if I could call in my order and have
him delivered to my doorstep in thirty minutes or less. Remember how moviegoers went gaga over
Matthew McConaughey when he started taking off his shirt? Yup, me, too. I was one of the hundreds,
probably thousands of women, who sat through his movies, not caring about the plot. Instead we sat glued
to our seats and waited for him to strip off his shirt and take the heroine to bed. Take M’s sex appeal and
multiply it by a zillion times more heat and that’s what oozed from this guy.
His shoulders, wider than the beach chair he leaned against, mesmerized me and I couldn’t keep from
imagining the way they’d feel. I’d have donated my whole stack of traveler’s checks to charity just to
feather my fingers over them. I could see the strength in his muscular arms and sense the power he could
unleash at any moment. He pressed his mouth to the highball glass, moving his square jaw, and I had to
fight to keep from dashing over and licking off the tiny drop of whiskey left on his upper lip.
His eight-pack abs called to me. Come, Jenn. Come and run your hands over me. I let my gaze glide
down his rock-hard abdomen. Can you blame me when my heart started pounding and my mouth went
dry? Can you understand why the place between my legs overflowed with wetness?
I pondered what to do. Should I say something? Why didn’t he say something? How long could we lie
here and stare at each other? What would I do if he got up and walked away? Or even more frightening,
what would I do if he came over?
Then he smiled at me.
My mouth dropped open. I lifted my head from my beach towel, forgetting to play it nonchalant.
Instead I gaped like a schoolgirl with her first crush. He stood and started toward me, making me oh-so-
aware of his height and brawn. My examination of this spectacular specimen started at the top and moved
slowly downward.
I’d never found men’s legs attractive before—I’m an upper torso kind of gal—but the black hairs on his
legs, the firm tanned skin stretched over his runner’s tendons, converted me to a leg gal right then and
there. My membership in the leg lovers fan club was sealed the minute he squatted next to my blanket and
gave me a front row seat to the hard bulge in his swimsuit.
Granted, his first words weren’t anything particularly clever, but he didn’t need clever. He could have
read me the directions on how to buckle a seat belt and I’d have thought it wonderful, riveting, mysterious
and oh, yes, sexy as hell.
“Hi, there. Why are you watching me?”
Thick as molasses and hotter than the center of the sun, his warm voice traveled over my naked skin
and made me shiver in anticipation of steamy nights and luxurious mornings in bed.
“Uh, no. I mean, no, I’m not watching you.” I rolled off my stomach and onto my side in what I prayed
was a slinky kind of move, and propped my head with my hand.
Sliding his sunglasses to the end of his nose, he arched one thick eyebrow upward and knowing eyes
twinkled the word liar at me. “Oh, I see. My mistake.” His gaze left mine to make a very slow, very
deliberate trek down my thong-clad body, and the tips of his mouth tweaked a bit higher.
Thank you, oh tortuous elliptical machine.
I swallowed, trying to force the liar’s lump in my throat all the way down to my stomach. Since when
had I ever felt guilty about lying? I was proud I could lie with the best of them. In my line of work—both
lines of work—I have to be able to stretch the truth. Otherwise, I might not live very long—or sell a bug-
ridden condo. But something irresistible about him drew the truth out of me. “Okay. Maybe I was. But I
was simply returning the favor, if you know what I mean.”
He reached out to take a wayward strand of my hair off my cheek. Yet instead of putting it behind my
ear to join the rest of my ponytail, he played with it, rubbing the strand between his two fingers as if he’d
never experienced the texture of hair. I found myself wishing I’d spent the extra bucks for a salon-quality
conditioner.
“I do and you’re right. I apologize.”
Huh? “What for?” I suddenly envisioned those fingers playing with my nipple instead of my hair.
Forget the conditioner, think scented body lotion. The image was so intense, I wanted nothing more than to
take his hand and bring it to my breast. How I kept from grabbing his hand, I’ll never know. “Why are you
apologizing?”
“For staring at you. I apologize for my rudeness.”
Unnerved by his words, I sat up and tried to position my body as I’d seen countless swimsuit models
pose in glossy magazines. Yet instead of stretching my torso and legs in an alluring way, I ended up sitting
cross-legged like a big kid. A real turn on—not.
“Oh, were you?” Argh! Stupid comeback, especially since I’d already accused him of staring at me.
“Yes, but you can hardly blame me.”
“I wasn’t blaming you, but I’d be interested in knowing why I can’t. I mean, since you’re apologizing.”
He took off his glasses and, like in all those cliché romance books my mom used to read, our eyes met
and a sizzle passed between us. “The answer is very simple. What man could not look at such a tantalizing
sight?”
Sure it was a corny line, but I fell for him right then and there. Off the deep end, over the cliff, dived in
head first and all those other sayings people use when they fall in love at first sight. As if he could read my
thoughts, he leaned closer and placed a feather-light kiss on my lips. Yet, although his touch barely brushed
against my mouth, the result rivaled the explosion of a nuclear bomb between my legs. My body’s
temperature jumped sky high, matching the burn of the sun on my shoulders.
“What are you doing tonight?”
I knew a leading line when I heard it and I heard this one loud and clear. “The same thing I’m going to
be doing in about fifteen minutes.”
His eyebrows dipped toward his nose and he cocked his head to the side. “And what would that be?”
“Having the best sex of my life.”
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