TODAY, WE ARE DELIGHTED TO WELCOME OUR GUEST AUTHOR, LIZ CAIN. LIZ IS SHARING AN EXCERPT FROM CHAPTER 9 OF HER NOVEL, 'DEALER'S CHOICE' #RWRTeamBlog #ReadWriteRepeat

EXCERPT FROM CHAPTER 9

My blood froze when I rode up to my garage to see the door open. 

My gulp was audible as I eased off on the throttle. 

The metal shutter was swinging awkwardly in the frame, ripped away and bent to show the strength of the person who had torn it down. My garage lay open for all the world to see, as if my soul was on display.  

My bike engine cut out and I drew in a deep breath, dismounting on shaking legs. 

I knew who would be waiting for me.

“Run or fight, run or fight?” I muttered to myself. “Great, now I'm talking to myself.” 

I looked back at my bike and then at my mechanic shop. It was time to stand my ground.  

Shadows greeted me as I approached the hanging shutter, my heart quivering as I walked into the garage with my head held high and my back straight. 

“I didn’t think you’d come,” the masculine voice said, not the scratchy evil one I expected but one filled with a rich tone and intense emotion. I realized in that moment that I had never heard him speak before, not allowing myself to get that close. 

My breath caught when the assassin emerged from the shadows, much taller than I had ever realized now he was up close.

“No longer keeping your distance?” I asked, pulling my hands behind my back so he wouldn’t see them tremble. 

“Normally you have run by now.” My stomach flipped at the sound of his voice, so familiar and yet with a decadence I hadn’t heard before. “Looks like we are both doing things differently.” He waved his hand around the shop. 

“I’m tired of running,” I admitted, lifting my chin. “This is my home.” 

The assassin roamed around the garage, touching tools and sliding his hand across the Harley I had been working on earlier. “Why here?” he asked, sounding genuinely curious. “There have been many places where you have formed attachments but here has held your heart. I would have thought New Orleans was the place you would settle.”

“Not after what you did to Rebecca,” I said coldly. 

He turned to face me again. Or at least, I think he did. The shadows around him shifted in a way that made me think he did. “She wasn’t your friend, she was about to turn you into Alaric, and I wasn't done with you yet.” 

“You lie,” I snarled, my chest tightening. 

The assassin shook his head, the shadows moving around him. “Why would I lie? I killed her, but only after she offered to bring you to me.”

My heart hammered, each beat fracturing my heart. “It can’t be true.” 

“You didn’t answer me, why here?” He moved amongst my belongings again. 

“That’s my business,” I snarled. I crossed my arms over my chest. “Why are you here?” 

His form froze and my brow drew down into a frown at his reaction. 

“For you, always for you,” he said carefully. 

I cocked my head. “You don’t know, do you? You’ve dropped by, invaded my space and you don’t know why you’re here.” My stomach flipped; this was the only conversation we’d had, and it wasn’t going how I expected. “Are you here to kill me?”  

The shadow grunted, positioning himself in the center of the shop and ignoring my question. 

I threw up my hands. “What is the point of all this?” I growled. “You’ve been chasing me for centuries, killed someone I cared about, and scared me beyond anything I could have imagined.” I stopped myself admitting more, not having meant to say that last part. 

The shadow didn’t move. 

“What did I ever do to deserve your, your—” I paused. “Your harassment?” 

“I don’t remember.” 

My mouth pressed into a thin line and my shoulders started to shake. “You don’t remember.” 

The shadow chuckled. “I have a hate for you, one that has devoured my entire being. I have nothing but my hate for you. Without that, I don’t know who I am.” If a shadow could look surprised, then I would say this one did at his own admission.

He moved before I could react. 

Pain lanced up my side as a blade plunged into my abdomen, my pivot ensuring I didn’t sustain a gut wound but the weapon still pierced muscle and drew blood. I had moved too slowly.  

“Shit,” I cried, pushing with my hands and pulling my power by instinct. The assassin was thrown a few feet but not enough to stop him coming at me again. 

A cold hand wrapped around my throat and lifted me from the ground. My boots clattered against each other as I kicked, aiming for him and missing. 

“My entire being is devoted to making your life miserable,” the assassin ground out and for a moment a piercing blue eye was revealed by the shadows before it was quickly swallowed up. 

“But you don’t remember why?” I asked, my voice a rasp as his fingers squeezed. 

If I had been able to breathe my lungs would have seized from the pure hatred I saw when I looked into his eyes. It consumed him, though there was one thing I didn’t see. 

A soul. 

My hands scrabbled at the hold on my throat, prying at his fingers to gain just a trickle of air. This wasn’t his fault, if he had made a deal then he belonged to a demon. Probably Alaric; I didn't believe in coincidences after all. He was being used and I couldn’t condone that. I knew what it was like when your life wasn’t your own and even my worst enemy, this assassin, did not deserve that. 

Sweet air managed to squeeze past his hold, not a lot but enough. I formed one word and drew on a power I normally refused to use. 

My siren song.

“Stop,” I said, putting every ounce of compulsion I could into that one word. 

The assassin stiffened, his fingers loosening and more air filled my lungs. One by one, they came away from my throat. His arms were shaking as if he was trying to fight the command but even a demon couldn’t resist my voice.  

“Remember,” I whispered. 

At least then I would know why he hated me. 

I dropped to the floor as his hand opened to release me. My legs crumpled and a wracking cough overtook me as I gulped cold oxygen into my lungs. 

The assassin screamed, the sound masculine despite its anguish. When I looked up, still trying to draw breath, my head swimming, he was holding his head and what I could see of his body was convulsing. 

I drew in another breath, intending to ask him why he hated me but before I could utter a word the shadows around him thickened. The whole of my shop, every inch was covered in shadow. I blinked a few times, trying to see through it but no shred of light could pierce the abyss of darkness. 

One of my hands lifted and I tried to reach out for any solid object. 

With a whooshing sound, the blackness pulled toward the center of the room to reveal that the assassin had disappeared. 

The shadows had consumed him, and light poured into the shop from the fluorescent lamp in the corner. My breathing was rapid as my eyes darted around the garage, searching for any sign of the shadows. 

The lights flickered and I tensed, crying out at the lance of pain up my side. There was no dagger embedded in my body and the wound was starting to heal but blood still trickled down my side. I pressed a hand to my side, rising slowly and still searching for any sign of my attacker. There was no one here; the only sound came from my raspy breathing.

My steps thudded up the stairs to my apartment, a trail of blood smearing up the wall as I climbed to push open my door.

My apartment wasn’t the tidiest but when I entered it certainly wasn’t in the state that I left it. My clothes were strewn everywhere, some from where I had thrown my duffel when I decided not to leave. But this…

My home had been torn apart. 

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https://books2read.com/DealersChoice

Author Liz Cain

AUTHOR BIO

Liz Cain is a Nuclear Medicine Physicist by day, and an urban fantasy author by night.

She was born in East Yorkshire in the UK and grew up near the sea with her parents and two sisters. She moved to the midlands, which was much too far south for her, and spent 20 years trying to move back to her home town.

She has travelled at every opportunity from Thailand and Australia to touring national parks in North America. Liz has done lots of crazy things for charity, including skydiving, running, swimming, and even cutting off her hair. While out on adventures she finds herself weaving intricate tales in her head which one day she had to write down.

Liz has loved reading her whole life, growing up with Anne McCaffrey, Mary Stewart, and Terry Goodkind. Becoming an author happened by chance when she jumped at the opportunity to help a friend tell a story that deserved to be told. It inspired her to follow her lifelong dream and now she is self-publishing her own kickass, no-nonsense FMCs who you’ll love.

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