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Here is a snip from Wolf’s Prize, featuring some secondary characters who will be featured in a collection of short stories. Ellie and her friends Sara and Melissa are watching some of the men of the Clan just after they’ve changed from wolf to man and haven’t put their clothes on yet. Just a hint: Stone Wolf is Jelly’s adult name.
Sara nudged her horse to join them. She took one foot out of a stirrup and hooked her leg over the saddle horn with an ease that Ellie envied. Sara’s cheeks were flushed and a smile played with her lips. “I wish all men looked that good naked,” she said with loud enthusiasm.
Ellie winced. Several of the men looked at her, and one wolf, who must be Stone, raised his hackles and growled.
“Oh, please.” Sara rolled her eyes. “Like you don’t know you’re just as gorgeous as the rest of them.”
The wolf’s face wrinkled in an almost human frown, before his tail went tick-tock once. Then he turned and trotted away.
Mel took off her cowboy hat and waved it in front of her face. “That is just plain weird.”
Stone, human now and dressed in only jeans, walked back to them. His face still held a frown as he stared up at Sara. “You think I’m handsome?” he demanded of her.
“Are you kidding?”
Stone blinked at the wealth of sarcasm drenching Sara’s voice. “Is that a “Yes, I “think you’re handsome” or a “No, I don’t think you’re handsome” sort of are-you-kidding?”
Sara rolled her eyes again. “You are so male.”
After a moment of consideration, Stone puffed out his chest. “You think I’m handsome,” he announced and strutted away.
I suppose I should save this for next Tuesday, but I’m in the mood to celebrate and share my joy. I sent Wolf’s Prize to the publisher tonight. So I’m free to work on the collection of short stories I’ll be putting out in early 2014. The first of these will be about Connie Mondale, the crashed plane’s co-pilot, and Des, Taye’s Beta. This takes place at the Plane Women’s House.
Des walked down the dim hallway on silent feet. A sound caught his attention, and something perilously close to panic surged through him. Crying. Almost soundless crying, coming from the apartment Miss Connie shared with two other women. Panic was followed swiftly by rage. Without hesitation he opened the door and flung himself inside, gaze sweeping the room to find whatever had reduced his strong, unclaimed mate to tears. There was nothing to see but Connie, sitting at a table, her pale blond hair untidy as if she had raked her hands through it. She jerked her head up from the cradle of her hands to stare at him.
“What the hell?” she began.
“Who hurt you?” he snarled.
She rose from the chair to face him, chin up and mouth firm. “I’m not hurt.”
“Then what made you cry?”
Red bloomed over her pale face. “I’m not crying.”
Tenderness, a feeling utterly alien to his nature before he’d seen this brave woman, swamped him. “Okay,” he said, attempting to sound calmly reasonable. “I can pretend there’s no tears on your cheeks if you want. Tell me what upset you.”
She folded her arms with a glare that aroused him. Instead of answering his question, she attacked. “What are you doing upstairs? Men aren’t allowed up here.”
Did she have any idea what her strength did to him?
Today about all I can think of is that I hurt. The side of my face is swollen. The ear isn’t swollen, but all around it is swollen. I would psot a pic, but I don’t want to gross you out. Went to the doc. Turns out I have an infected saliva gland.
I’ve never HEARD of a saliva gland.
But I have one. It might have a stone. Wait, you mean like a kidney stone? Do I have to pass it???
No, if there’s a stone it will have to be removed. But first we’ll try an antibiotic, drinking lots of water, hot compresses and eating sour candy.
This is fun. Not.
In the light of the rising sun, Ellie looked down at her folded hands, noticing the grime under the nails with resignation. Keeping clean while traveling on horseback was so hard. She glanced quickly at Quill’s hand where it rested on her knee and saw that it was amazingly clean. Perhaps all dirt disappeared when he transformed from wolf back to human? How unfair was that? But that wasn’t the topic of conversation.
“All I want is to never be far away from my family ever again. I loved Neal, but we argued about moving so far away from everyone and everything we knew.” She drew a deep trembling breath. “I’m ashamed to admit it, but when he died and left us alone I was angry with him. So angry.”
“I will always protect you.” The sun had peeked over the horizon and shot rosy golden rays to gleam in Quill’s tawny curls. He ducked his head to look deeply into her eyes. “The entire Clan is your family now, and they will care for you and Connor and Tommy. You’ll never be alone again.”
His words made her dream come true. Greatly daring, she put a hand on the back of his neck to pull him down to her lips. His eyes widened. She felt his heart thundering against her breast. She closed her eyes and kissed him. She had meant to give him a quick peck of gratitude, but when he sighed against her lips she couldn’t help but open her mouth to catch his breath. She forgot her teeth needed brushing and her hair was tangled mess and her clothes were crumpled and dew damp. He smelled so good and his body was so warm against her she forgot everything but the taste of his mouth when she slid her tongue over his.
Quill lifted his head to look down at her and her breasts protested the absence of his mouth. “Better stop,” he said in a rough tone.
“Stop?” Ellie echoed, drowning in the desperate heat he roused in her.
It was too dark to make out his expression, but she could see him nod. “I’m not going to take advantage of you.”
She almost cried, “Why not?” before swallowing the words unspoken. He had agreed to wait for their wedding night, and the darned honorable man was going to keep his promise. That should have made her happy, right? Right?
Mind you that is only the first step in getting the book completed. I need to:
1. Go back and do some revisions. There’s a fairly lengthy scene I want to add, and some details I need to remove, and a plot point I need to play up a bit more. I may do some re-writing of the last few pages.
2. But before I do all that I want the story to sit for a few days so I can come at it fresh.
3. Revisions should take about a week.
4. Then it gets sent to the beta readers for them to read it and let me know if it works forthem or if there are some scenes or dialogue that needs work.
5. I take all the commetns and suggestions into consideration and do a final revision.
6. Submit to the publisher.
After that is a whole nother sent of revisions, then editing, then line editing, then Release Date. Geez, it’s like giving birth!