Shiloh Walker's Blog, page 111
May 21, 2012
The Ash Trilogy… Out in Audio
The One
Wwwwwwaaaayyyyy back… I had an idea about psychic-type cops. The bare rough idea started with this book...
It was rough… it is rough, but still. It’s sort of from there that idea for Taige, Jillian, Cullen, all of those ideas emerged.
I think I’m going to start playing with some shorter FBI books in between…
Here’s my first stab…The One. Details coming soon.
“He dumped me because he got tired of washing the blood out of our sheets.”
Destin Mortin swallowed the knot in her throat and lifted her gaze to stare into the unreadable eyes of her boss, Elise Oswald, aka Oz. Although Destin’s heart was racing a mile a minute and her palms were sweating, none of it showed on her face.
She was a master at hiding how she felt. Came in handy—in her line of work. In her job.
It didn’t matter if she was tracking down a rapist, if she’d just connected with one, if she was caught in the middle of his mind while he tracked down his next victim.
Being a psychic, that was something that happened fairly regularly, especially with her. For reasons she couldn’t quite fathom, she usually connected with violent sexual predators. It was a screwed-up ability, but because of it, she knew how to hide what she was thinking, what she was feeling pretty damn well.
And it was definitely coming in handy now, under the eagle eye of her boss, the woman who’d just asked about the man who’d held her heart, and broken it.
With a cool smile, Destin met Oz’s gaze and shrugged. “What does it matter now? We broke up five years ago and he’s still with the Bureau. I’m very much not.”
Oz cocked a silvery-blonde brow, her expression remote. It wasn’t the expression she usually wore here in the office.
Oz smiled. She laughed. She let people know if she was pissed or cranky or if she’d been up too late reading a book. The few times her expression didn’t show was when she felt a need to hold those cards close to her chest…a bad case, troubling one. When one of them was about to get thrown into something they didn’t like.
And she’d just asked about Caleb…shit.
Stop it, she told herself. It couldn’t mean anything. Caleb Durand had left Oz’s group years ago and he was still an agent with the FBI. Oz did private work now.
Nothing to worry about.
But that tight, composed expression on Oz’s face was troubling. Very troubling. Over the past few years, her pale blonde hair had slowly gone silver. There were a few more lines around her green eyes. But other than that, Oz looked pretty much exactly as she had when she’d recruited Destin ten years earlier. She was every bit as inscrutable now as she had been then and that blank expression had Destin’s belly shrinking down into a tight, cold knot.
Why in the hell is she asking about Caleb?
Destin slumped more comfortably in the seat and prepared herself to wait it out. If it had been just anybody else in the group, she might have tried a psychic probe–she didn’t always strike gold with those, but on occasion, she’d pick up something. But she wouldn’t with Oz. The other woman was a blank surface, until she decided she didn’t want to be.
Oz leaned back in her chair absently toying with a Mont Blanc pen. The woman loved them. Loved them, and lost them.
Destin didn’t see why she bothered. A pen was a pen.
As Oz tapped the pen on the arm of her chair, she watched Destin, her eyes close and watchful.
Destin was damned glad she knew how to hide what she was thinking. What she was feeling. Oz was studying her, staring at her with eyes that seemed to see clear through to her soul and Destin felt like curling up into a little ball and hiding, like that would make whatever this was just go away.
Seconds ticked away and then the silence was shattered by Oz’s blunt statement, “You’re full of it, Destin.”
Destin shrugged. “Hey, you can’t blame the guy. It gets disconcerting to wake up and find your girlfriend covered in blood and nearly catatonic once or twice a month.” Destin had gotten caught in odd dream-like visions for more than half of her life and when they came at her unawares, they often came with vicious headaches and heavy nosebleeds. Very attractive stuff.
“Did it happen that often?” Oz’s face softened a little, the blank mask fading away as she leaned forward.
The visions that hit Destin didn’t always happen easily. Sometimes they were a mere figment, just a wisp of a thing. Other times, they came with a brutal, one-two punch that left her reeling, dealing with the physical aftermath.
Bad? Not always. But sometimes? Yeah. And nothing freaked out a boyfriend quite like waking up in the morning to find his woman covered in blood and practically catatonic.
Destin shrugged. “Yes. Sometimes more.” She smirked and hoped it masked the pain she felt. “I got used to it a long time ago, but it’s probably a little disconcerting for others. Probably gets real old, too, after a while. Hell, it gets old for me. But I’m stuck with it. No reason for others to deal with it.”
The nosebleeds came with the visions. They were something she was stuck with and there was nothing she could do but deal with them. Granted, Caleb hadn’t ever acted like they bothered him and more than once, she’d come out of the trance-like state to find him gently cleaning the blood from her face.
He’d never once made her feel like the freak she knew she was. He’d never once made her feel like a monster or like some twisted, perverted thing that should never exist.
She made herself feel like that. Her parents had. One or two of the friends she’d tried to trust with the information.
But Caleb had–
Stop. Caleb walked out, remember? Just like everybody else in her life. He’d walked out.
And just like it was yesterday, she saw it all playing it out. The way he’d looked as he sat across from her and told her he didn’t know if they were heading anywhere or not. Destin had been frozen with terror, because she had known where he was going. Out the door. They all hit the door sooner or later, and that was exactly what happened with him, too.
“You know, Destin,” Oz said, tossing the pen down on the desk and leaning back. “I’m not quite buying that. I’m not buying that Durand dumped you because he didn’t like that you wake up with nosebleeds after having one of your dreams. It just doesn’t click.”
Destin shifted in the chair and crossed her legs. “Look, I don’t know why he dumped me. For all I know he got bored with me—” The rest of the words wanted to stick in her throat, but she forced them out. “Maybe he found somebody that was a little less neurotic to deal with. I don’t know. It doesn’t matter. It’s over. It’s done.”
“Destin, if it didn’t matter, I wouldn’t have you in here. Like you said, it’s been five years. I’m not asking just because I’m bored, or because I’m going to reprimand you for having an affair with a colleague. It’s because—” her eyes cut to the door.
A second later, Destin heard the door open.
The skin on the back of her neck crawled and she squeezed her eyes shut. Her heart started to race and her skin felt too tight, too small. Something that might have been happiness bloomed inside her heart before it withered and died as reality shifted and settled into place.
Even before he spoke, she knew.
Opening her eyes, she glared at Oz.
“Good afternoon, ladies.”
May 20, 2012
Dear Toothfairy
So…
bratlet brings me a sticky note. She’s smiling…this funny little smile she gets and she shows me the sticky note.
I almost died of cuteness.
It was a note baby bratlet wrote.
Read on… (I made the sticky at the sticky note generator)
May 19, 2012
Make-up scene… Saturday Snippets… from my UF project
So this is from the urban fantasy thing… don’t ask what’s up with it, because I can’t tell you yet.
But here’s today’s Saturday snippet…make-up scene!!!
A rather queer look settled over his face as he lifted his head to study me. “So that’s how you do it.”
Was there really any point in responding to that? I twirled my wrist, satisfaction settling inside me. Having somebody else touch this blade was like having somebody combing through my underwear drawer or something. Maybe even worse.
“That’s why you’re always popping your wrist or wiggling it when you’re worked up, isn’t it?”
Staring at him, I held her at ready. “Are you going to leave me alone or not? I’ve still got reports to go through and I’m tired.”
“What’s your range on calling it?” He stood up, still eying the sword. “Are there other weapons or is it just that one?”
As he took a step closer, I lifted her. “Please stay away.”
“I thought we had a truce,” he murmured. A smile tugged at his lips.
If I didn’t know what a bastard he was, I might have almost believed the smile. “Doesn’t mean I want you getting close to me.”
He eyed the sword, then me. “You can’t really hold it like that forever. I can just stand here until you lower it. All I want to do is talk, Kit.”
More authors with snippets…
Megan Hart:Read in bed!
Rhian Cahill
Eliza Gayle
Jody Wallace
Mandy M Roth
Lissa Matthews
Mari Carr
McKenna Jeffries
Myla Jackson
Taige Crenshaw
HelenKay Dimon
Lauren Dane
May 17, 2012
Godspeed, Monica
So I was…ah…wearing that other hat of mine today and when lunch rolled around, I checked in on twitter and I saw some sad, sad news.
Monica Jackson had passed away. I’ve only met Monica online, but everything I knew about her, I respected. She was a nurse, like me…it’s odd how many of us end up writing romance. She was outspoken, she was passionate and it didn’t matter if you hated what she had to say…she wanted to say it and she’d say it without being ugly.
She might not always had kind words for you… she was a black woman who wrote AA romance and very often, the writers of AA romances don’t get treated very fairly. But she spoke her piece fairly, she was passionate about it and she wasn’t afraid of the backlash.
I know Monica hadn’t been doing well the past few years…you didn’t see her online as much and the online community has changed. We’re on twitter almost as, or more than, we are on blogs but I’d still see her around and I always loved seeing her. I loved chatting with her, I loved arguing with her. She would tell you what was on her mind and even if she didn’t always agree with you, she respected your right to voice your opinion. I considered her a friend.
I won’t see her anymore. We lost a wonderful woman and I pray for her family, for her daughter.
I’m going to miss my friend.
I’ve seen her called everything from a powerful voice to a warrior and that sums it all pretty well. She was a wonderful woman. She was definitely a powerful voice. She was a warrior…
If you’re not resting where you are, lady, I know you’re having fun.
Wreck This Life
So my first full length contemporary romance is done, and mailed off to my editor. This was just contracted and the release date, blurb, etc… all of that is still a ways off, but here’s an excerpt.
The breath caught in her lungs as their gazes locked.
Things that she wanted that she couldn’t see…Shit. Right now the problem was that she knew exactly what…no…she knew who she wanted. But it wasn’t a good idea…
He reached up and tugged on her hair. “So what’s the other thing you planned on doing, Abby?”
You—
The word almost jumped out of her. She had to fight to keep it locked inside and not just because it sounded trashier than hell. She wasn’t exactly planning on doing a man. She’d planned an affair. A torrid affair. With a hot guy.
Yet the only guy she could even imagine this with right now was Zach.
“Ah…”
That familiar smile of his, a little devious, a little wicked, curled his lips as he twined one of her curls around his finger. “What is it, Abby? You weren’t planning something really bad, were you? Going to rob a bank? Get a part-time job as a stripper?”
She snorted and eased back away from him, reminding herself that she needed to breathe. She needed to think. That was what she needed to do. “Sure, Zach. I’m going to become the Stripper Bank Robber. I’ll wear a mask and a G-string and pasties.”
“Can I be your get-away driver? I’d love to see this,” he teased, his voice husky.
And the look in his eyes was…
Whoa. Her mouth went dry and again, her skin felt all hot and tight. She couldn’t seem to suck in enough oxygen. “Well, you’ll just have to picture it your dreams. Stripping and bank-robbing weren’t on the list.”
“I dunno…” A wicked light glinted in his eyes and he leaned in closer. “You look awful guilty, sugar. Just what else is on the list?”
Get up. Walk away. You need to think—
That voice, the voice of reason, the voice of sense, the voice she’d listened to her entire adult life, seemed to shriek at her, blaring a warning loud and long as she stared at him.
Another voice, though, softer, sly and seductive, whispered, You said you’d stop worrying. You wanted to live…
Again…I have no info on this, and that’s about as much as I’m willing to share right now.
I’ll post more later on.
May 16, 2012
Get BEG ME … for pennies…
Okay, so this is an experiment and it may not last. Only Indie is a dynamic pricing ebookstore…as demand goes up, the price goes up. When demand drops, there’s a discount.
I’ve got BEG ME up there and I’ll see how it goes for a few weeks.
Now I can’t do books like this indefinitely and this is the only one I’m doing, but for the time being, if you want to get a book for a low, low price? Here is your chance.
My first foreign covers… giggle, squeal, chuckle…
Pardon me while I go have a giddy moment… ahem, okay. I’m ready to be professional now…um, no, I’m not. Giggling again.
Okay. NOW, I’m ready…lookit! LOOKIT! SEE!
These are the German covers for the Ash books, due out from LYX, starting at the end of the year.
May 15, 2012
Randomosity
May 14, 2012
My Mother’s Day
There’s this song… it’s like…ah…nirvana to me. I don’t know why, but I hear it and I just…wow.
That’s it. It’s wow.
It’s Walking in Memphis by Marc Cohn and I found out last week that he was the opening act for Bonnie Raitt here in Louisville on Mother’s Day.
Full confession… Bonnie Raitt’s music is decent, but I went to that concert for one reason. Marc Cohn. I asked my guy if he’d bought me anything yet and he hadn’t, and I asked if maybe he’d be up for a concert…and he was. So that was my mother’s day. He took me to see Marc Cohn.
And…I didn’t know this but he was signing CDs out in the lobby during intermission. I got to meet him.
I even got a picture with him. But no… I’m not posting that.
to my guy… thankyouthankyouthankyouthankyouthankyouthankyou!
and to Lou @ Loueyville… thank you for the headsup! You are awesome.
