Back to Lark's Pages …Back to Dangerous Lovers.
Below are the openings of the stories in DANGEROUS LOVERS.
If
you like what you read, maybe you’ll buy the book!
TEN.
Falling in love
with ones trading stock is not encouraged…It’s almost as bad as falling for
ones importer.
The
latest shipment was bound to be weedy--again. Jaelle knew that, but was only
mildly disappointed. She liked to import the best stock in the sector, but she
had to accept the fact that some noble femmes preferred the goods to be weedy. It helped them to feel superior,
she supposed.
‘Weedy is as weedy does,’ she muttered philosophically. ‘One femme’s weed is another femme’s stalwart stud.’ Jaelle sighed, because most hommes looked weedy to her. Some were weedier than others, that was all. She supposed it came of being so stalwart herself. She sighed again, knowing it had been her size that had brought her career as an appraiser to an early, ignominious halt. So many hommes had shriveled when faced with her generous naked self that she had had to turn to importing instead, and hire smaller femmes to work as her appraisers.
Valentine’s Day
was made for love, but what if it comes too late?
The girl was passing down an alleyway. It was a foggy night, and the occasional gleams of headlights made little impression on the general air of chill and damp. She wore black shoes with stiletto heels, sheer black stockings and a little black cocktail dress that hugged her tight bottom and curved around her thighs. A black feather boa provided a skimpy wrap, and she had black curly hair, languorous black eyes, high cheekbones and a mouth that was red as a poppy. She sauntered along, picking her way past cardboard cartons and flotsam in the gutter, slim, young and alone.
She was a working girl. …….
It’s hard having elder
sisters. They won’t let you stay out late, and some nights they say you can’t
go out at all…
Raffina was restless. The moon was
rising and her sisters Kes and Fili had already retired with their mates. Only
Fawnie and Raffina were left by the fire in the outer cavern, and Fawnie was
blinking as if her eyes were heavy.
Raffina wasn’t sleepy. For the past
hour, she had been gazing into the fire with yellow eyes that folk said were as
bright as the moon itself. Her black hair, with its disconcerting gloss of
silver, hung over one shoulder and she was slowly untwining its braid, winding
the strands around her fingers as if making herself a ring. ‘I want that hermit,’
she said.
Fawnie sighed, patiently. ‘What
hermit is that, Raff?’
‘The one in the
clearing down through the forest,’ said Raffina. ‘I’ve been watching him for
days and now I want him.’
It’s all very well to be an indulgent
husband, but sometimes it pays to have a closer look at your wife.
When she
was very young, Sidhe’s mother gave her advice on men.
‘The human male,’ said Adelyse Rhuadh, ‘thinks he is the
master. He likes you to be a blank page to impress with his own reflection. He
may talk about the Eternal Mystery of
Woman, but he wants his wife to be an open book.’
Sidhe
wrinkled her nose. ‘Then I’ll have none of him.’
‘You
will have him, my darling Sidhe. You won’t be able to help yourself.’
‘Why
not?’
Adelyse
shrugged, and her long hair swirled about her. ‘Let’s just say human men are a habit in our family? You’ve only to look
at your father...’
‘I never
saw him,’ said Sidhe. ‘You don’t mean he
was a human man?’
Adelyse
sighed. ‘Of course he was, and of course I couldn’t stay with him. We never can
stay for long. In the end, they begin to notice.’
LADY
VALENTINE
Vampire lovers are
dangerous, but sometimes they’re the only answer to the problem.
The Viking’s breath
smelt of spirits, and his fingernails were dirty. Bella turned her face away,
but his thick mouth closed over her lips like a plunger and his tongue invaded
her mouth. She pushed him, hard.
‘Get out!’
‘’ullo little
wench,’ he said, in a ludicrous fake Norse accent. ‘I’m going to fuck with you.’
He lunged for her breasts, revealed in silhouette by the sheer white
nightdress; present from Phil. Phil the joker, whose laughing boisterous ways
could quickly turn to coarseness and vulgarity.
‘Fancy-dress night
for St Valentine,’ Phil had said. ‘I’ll get your costume.’ His eyes had sparked
with devilry, and she should have been warned. She had been warned, but it paid to go along with Phil. Sober and
humored, he was fun. Pissed or crossed, he could get ugly.
Fancy-dress night, was right, but where did St Valentine come in? Where were the hearts and flowers, the sugar candy sweetness? Phil was togged up in a toga, with sandals and a laurel wreath.
A man’s gotta
have a fallback plan when his fingers are in danger—
‘So,’
said Dickinson, as he entered the tapster’s haven. ‘What news is there since I
have been away? I heard some stir in the marketplace.’
The youth with
the blond quiff was puffed with vainglory as he answered. ‘Great news, Master
Dickinson. A Procurator Royal is come to town.’ His voice tripped over the
unfamiliar word and his legs, in their carrot-colored hose, trembled like those
of a colt that has scented its first heat mare. His name was Drinkwater, and
usually he went about bent over with the shame of that appellation. Tonight he
was sparkling with excitement, and Dickinson raised a lazy brow in enquiry. His
speedwell eyes were bland, and his brain was spinning fast.
“Any job’s better than none.” Believe that, and
you’ll believe anything.
Wanted; discreet P.A. for diverse duties.
Afternoons only, penalty rates apply.
Reply, Rammon, Floor 25, Transil Towers.
A
NEW BROOM.
You should always read the fine print before you sign on the
dotted line, because sometimes deals aren’t as good as they seem. Sometimes,
they are better.
‘New Broom,’ said the salesman solemnly,
‘sweeps clean.’
Freddie
stared. Not because his line of patter had begun with a proverb so tired it had
bags under its eyes, but at the salesman himself.
He had dark
brown hair, blue eyes, a gold earring and finely arched brows. He was tall and
broad-shouldered, dressed in a blue shirt and dark gray trousers, and he was
holding a small gray briefcase. He wore no rings, no chains, no dandruff, no
aftershave, no perspiration stains under the arms, no grease spots on the
collar and his teeth were small and white. He might have been in his early
thirties. A slight quirk at the corner of his mouth relieved his face of any
suggestion of toothpaste-advert-perfection. This salesman was pure magic. A man
to die for, as her eldest niece might have said. And he was selling vacuum cleaners?