Evermine: Daughters of Askara, Book 2 (28 page)

Each breath Blake took stretched the burned skin of his chest, sending sparks of energy along every nerve ending in his body. He wanted to crawl away and nurse these temporary wounds, but the misery of his injuries paled next to the prospect of spending the rest of his life in thrall to the Witch Hunter’s curse.

Instead of giving in to it, he ignored the pain, just as he’d trained himself over the past decade to ignore all the other hardships of this unwanted existence.

This young woman had the Cabochon, his only ticket back to the land of the fully alive, and all he had to do was take it from her. The chance to finally end the curse was worth a little discomfort. Or a lot.

As he leaned into the next turn in hot pursuit of Van Houten’s Wrangler, he pictured her face. Waves of chestnut hair framed unblemished porcelain skin. Eyes the color of rich chocolate had assessed him as a threat. More than his burns did, it pained him to recall the terror in her expression when he’d reached for her. Thanks to Van Houten, she probably believed he was nothing more than a soulless monster, and she’d run from him, making his task all the more difficult when it didn’t need to be.

The Wrangler increased speed, and Blake cursed. He’d burned up most of a tank of gas following the Gogmar, and now he was riding on fumes. He couldn’t afford to be stranded in the open at dawn, so, reluctantly, he veered off when his prey took a sharp turn around the corner of the Sure-Shop.

He might have to suspend his search, but it wasn’t over by a long shot. The woman obviously worked at the bakery. That meant he could locate her again when he had more time to convince her to cooperate.

With his nerves on fire and his tortured skin aching, he gave up the chase.

Temporarily.

Evermine

Hailey Edwards

He can be a slave to his past…or allow her love to free him.

Daughters of Askara, Book 2

There’s such a thing as too much change. Emma’s sister is mated. Revolution is brewing in her home realm. The last straw: her would-be mate is back from the dead and back under her skin—yet when it comes to the last five years, he’s not talking.

Desperate for a chance to start her own life, she answers the queen’s call to ensure equality for all of Askara’s newly freed slaves. It’s the perfect opportunity to escape a heartbreak in the making named Harper.

Harper loses a piece of his fractured soul when Emma walks away. His lies were meant to protect her from torturous years that drove him to the point of madness. Instead, when he comes to her a year later to help avert a crisis in a freed-slave community, the wedge those lies drove between them is firmly in place.

As their new lives collide with old wounds, they race to stop a threat that could not only destroy the queen, but send Harper back to the hell he escaped. Emma must decide if the man she still loves deserves equal rights to her heart.

Warning: This title contains torn pants, ripped gowns, and sand in uncomfortable places. It also includes one overcompensating villain, one gnarly priest, and two battered hearts willing to give this thing called love one last chance.

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This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.

Samhain Publishing, Ltd.

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Evermine

ISBN: 978-1-60928-722-1

Edited by Sasha Knight

Cover by Angela Waters

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First
Samhain Publishing, Ltd.
electronic publication: February 2012

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