Haunted Blade
Author: J.C. Daniels
Series: Colbana Files #6
Release Date: October 1,
2017
Haunted, Hunted…*Harassed*.
Never let it be said that Kit Colbana had ever been given the easy road. Or
even the semi-paved road. Only weeks after dealing with the mysterious—and
murderous—being called Puck, she’s got another killer on her hands. Perhaps
even two.
Some of the bodies turning up bring up haunting memories of a past she
longs to forget, but as always, that past is chasing her at her heels, like
a hated shadow.
As the body count racks up, there’s an imbalance of power, particularly
among the vampire population, and Kit must yet again deal with ugly
memories as one of the monsters who tried to break her is set free to deal
with the imbalance of power. Yet while a power struggle rages in East
Orlando, there’s another, more subtle battle taking place and Kit feels
like the center of it all.
Arrogant? Maybe. But the dead bodies don’t bear the mark of her
grandmother’s pet killer by sheer coincidence…and she doubts her nemesis
being released is either.
*****
Excerpt:
“You’re trying to distract me.” I tugged my shirt down only to realize at
some point, he’d already gotten my bra unfastened. Swearing, I adjusted
that and moved so that the table now separated us. “Not funny, Damon.”
“I wasn’t trying to be funny.” He tugged at his jeans and went to stretch
out on the couch, watching me with heavy lidded eyes.
So he was hiding something—and it was a wasted effort because I knew what
it was.
“I already know you met with Malcolm. And apparently, you’re
distracted—that makes me think you’re worried about something,” I said,
pacing closer to him. “Or you’d figure out how I know.”
His nostrils flared and his body tensed.
He didn’t move from that lazy, slumped position, but his lids lifted and
the dark pupils of his eyes flared, darkening his deep gray eyes to near
black. “You’ve talked to him…and Marie. Both in one day. I didn’t know
you even knew them. Ambitious, kitten. You investigating me again?”
I curled my lip at him. “Funny.”
“I’m not laughing.” He reached up and caught the front of my jeans, tugging
hard enough that he pulled me off balance and I ended up falling onto his
lap.
He wrapped both arms around me, holding me tight even when I tried to
wiggle into a less-awkward position.
“Damn it, you’re a caveman, sometimes,” I said, jabbing him into the gut
and twisting around until I was somewhat comfortable. He relented and
loosened his grip, letting me sit straddling his lap. “For the record, *I *am
not laughing either.”
Jabbing him in the chest, I added, “No, I’m not investigating you, you dumb
ass. He’s telling me that he wants me to do a job—says there’s a blade he
wants me to find.”
Damon blinked, the action so slow it was almost comical. He did it a second
time, this just simply closed his eyes and shook his head.
“You’re not taking the job,” he said after almost a full minute of silence.
I gave him a withering look. “You’d do better to reword that, pal, because
if I even *thought* you were trying to dictate how I could work and who I
could work for, the two of us would be having the fight to end all fights,
right before I kicked your ass out of my apartment, for like…*forever*.”
But if I expected those words to bring about any apology, clearly, I was
mistaken.
Slowly, in a move that somehow conveyed all the power in his big body,
Damon rose to his feet. His hands hung loose at his sides as he studied
me, head cocked. “If Marie was here talking to you, and if you’ve been
talking to Malcolm, I’m assuming you’ve already figured out a crucial
detail.”
“Just what detail is that, big guy?” I asked, chin going up.
“The prick is dangerous.”
“Newsflash—I knew that quite some time ago. I didn’t need to talk to
Marie, *or* him, to figure that out. I steer clear of him anyway.”
Stalking close, Damon reached out and hooked his hand around my neck,
drawing me to my toes as he hipped his head. “Then why are we having a
problem here?”
I bit his lower lip, using that as a distraction. It almost worked.
The knee I tried to drive up between his knees worked better.
Still, between the two, I was able to twist away from him and evade his
grasp as I moved farther away. As he turned toward me, blood welling on
his lip, I held up a staying hand. “We’re about to have even bigger
problems if you don’t calm the hell down,” I warned him.
He held his position, watching me with glittering eyes as he swiped the
back of his hand over his mouth. The small smear of blood that remained, he
cleared with a flick of his tongue. “We’re going to have a reckoning about
this soon enough, you got that?”
“I’m scared.” I curled my lip at him, mostly to piss him off—I was plenty
pissed myself. “Do you honestly think I’m stupid enough to work for him?
He’s either fae or an ancient—or both—and you think I’m *that *crazy, even
after what went down with Puck?”
Damon’s brows shot up, then slowly, his face relaxed. “You know what he
is.”
“Please.” Smoothing my shirt down, I tried to settle myself, but the anger
buzzing off him was taking on an erotic edge and that was affecting me in
very, very un*settling* ways. “Give me some credit. I realize I haven’t
been around the block as many times as you have, old man, but I’m not
exactly an idiot.”
He rocked back on his heels, still eying me narrowly. “Since you know what
he is and you’ve already said you don’t plan to work for him…what’s the
problem?”
“You!” Huffing out a breath, I crossed my arms over my chest. “You big
ass, you *don’t* get to tell me what I can and can’t do! You’re not *my*
alpha! You’re not my sugar daddy, my boss or my master. I love you, Damon,
but you don’t get to *control* me—I don’t obey your orders but you think
you can growl and snarl at me and I’ll meekly obey, after all this time?”
