PHANTASM FRIDAY

Today we have a special guest author with us, Linda Nightingale. I had the pleasure of reviewing her book, Black Swan, and posted it here last Saturday.

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After 15 years of writing and submitting, I contracted a short story with The Wild Rose Press, so writers hang in there. I have since been asked for rewrites on two erotic pieces. My latest effort I, Lucifer took third in the Launch a Star Contest and finalled in the SARA Merritt Contest, and since it is rather controversial, I’m delighted!

I had been published in on-line magazines and, once when I bred and showed Andalusian horses, the national magazine Equus bought an article on my stallion Bonito.

A snippet about me: I’m a Legal Assistant at a world-famous cancer hospital. I love sports cars, pianos (I own a self-player baby grand but can’t play a note myself), travel and reading. I have two wonderful sons, one of whom lives in Jolly Old England. I tend to be a pantster when it comes to writing, letting my characters introduce themselves and tell me the story. I admit I do sometimes throw away a lot of pages spent in getting to know the characters.

Since the erotic stories are just that—erotic—I’d like to introduce you to the hero in Black Swan.

Black Swan is a story about mortals who willingly submit to the vampire in order to experience the euphoria and sexual ecstasy of the Kiss.

EXCERPT:

The fact that the man she loved was in bed with another woman ceased to be important when Holly saw the blood.

Her heart, which had been running on empty until she met Tristan, stuttered and stalled. Horror freeze-framed time—the shutter snaps of images flooding her brain almost audible. She couldn’t breathe or move, knew she hadn’t made a sound, but Tristan's head snapped up. Wild red eyes honed in on her. Blood smeared his mouth, drizzled from two wounds on his partner's throat. The woman he'd been screwing was deathly pale and deadly still.

She should run before he shouted, "What the hell are you doing here?" but fear had turned her to ice. Holly hadn't blinked but Tristan stood on his feet. Her heart tripped over a beat. No one could move that fast. He shook back his mane of black hair and, holding her prisoner in his gaze, and glided toward her. The last rays of the dying sun bronzed his body. How incredibly beautiful he was. How she loved him. How dare he do this to her?

She wanted to scream, “You SOB! Saturday you said you loved me. Monday you're banging another woman!"

Humiliation, jealousy and grief burned like fire beneath her skin. She tried, but failed to tear her gaze from his. Tristan's eyes were luminous azure not scarlet. The blood on his mouth had somehow disappeared, or, please, God maybe she’d imagined it.. His naked body blocked Holly's view of the bed but she knew the woman still lay there. Why hadn't she said something, jumped up or grabbed her clothes and slammed the door? Blood.

Her heard gave a dizzy spin. Maybe the woman was dead. Fear broke Holly’s paralysis.

Black Swan is available from The Wild Rose Press. http://thewildrosepress.com/

Please visit my web site for a continuing story, Vampire Hunt. http://www.lindanightingale.com/

Leave a comment to be entered in a drawing for a Black Swan coffee mug!