Fierce Pride (48 page)
Authors: Phoebe Conn
The sweep of Santos’s headlights startled them both. “I’m sorry,” he murmured and set her down.
She’s a dreamer. He’s a realist. Somewhere in the middle is love—and danger.
Where Dreams Begin
© 2011 Phoebe Conn
After her husband’s death, Catherine Brooks is ready to go back to work—almost. She volunteers at a shelter for homeless teens, Lost Angel, thinking it will ease her return to the classroom. There’s nothing easy about irascible shelter manager Luke Starns, though. His cool detachment rubs her the wrong way, especially when he warns her not to get too attached. Still, the soft heart she senses beneath his stern exterior keeps her coming back—and his face pervades her thoughts.
It’s not that Luke finds Catherine’s easy charm and free spirit unappealing—quite the opposite. Life on the streets is hard, and discipline is the only ladder that’ll get and keep these kids out of trouble. He knows what it’s like to care too much, only to have the rug yanked away. He tells himself he’s simply trying to save her the same heartache.
Yet Catherine has him rethinking his approach to life. Just as he lets his guard down, though, a murderer begins stalking the mean streets near the shelter, putting everything they care about at risk. Including their lives.
Warning
:
This book contains a gritty setting, a serial killer in a red satin dress, and a couple who think sizzling sex is the only kind worth having.
Enjoy the following excerpt for
Where Dreams Begin:
On Wednesday, Catherine visited the charity thrift shop and dropped off the clothes and shoes she and Joyce had sorted. By Thursday morning, her garden looked beautiful, and she’d run out of excuses to stay away from Lost Angel. She drove on over to Hollywood, but she was determined to avoid Luke Starns and felt certain he would do his best to avoid her.
Pam again put Catherine to work opening the mail, and when she finished, she carried the stack of new flyers over to the hall to post. She’d nearly completed the task when a slender girl in a fuzzy pink sweater and tight jeans came up to look over her shoulder. Catherine turned to smile and found the girl had the remarkable prettiness of Alice in Wonderland, with startling blue eyes and long, blonde hair.
“Hello,” Catherine greeted her. “I hope if you recognize anyone, you’ll encourage them to call home.”
The girl shrugged and slid her hands into her hip pockets. “I don’t see anyone I know.”
Like so many of the teens Catherine had seen on Friday, the girl looked painfully young. Catherine doubted she would have approached her if she hadn’t wanted to talk, but uncertain how best to initiate a conversation, she adjusted the angle of a bright pink flyer and kept quiet.
“You’re new here, aren’t you?” the girl asked without glancing Catherine’s way.
“Yes, I am.” Catherine offered her name as she posted another flyer, but she had a lengthy wait before the girl responded.
“My name’s Violet. I just come here sometimes to look at the books, but I didn’t find anything good today.”
Catherine had noticed the sagging shelves which contained the center’s paperback library. “I’ve got quite a collection of paperbacks at home,” she said. “What sort of books do you like?”
Violet shrugged again. “The ones with pretty covers.” She reached out to finger the rolled corner on a faded orange flyer that had been on display for several months. “You know, the ones where there’s a couple dancing or just staring into each other’s eyes?”
“Yes. Those are romances. I love to read them too. I’ll bring in some of mine on my next visit. Do you come here often?”
Violet began to inch away. “No. Like I said, I just come by to check out the books.”
Catherine hadn’t meant to frighten Violet away, but as she turned to smile, the girl bolted for the door. When she found Luke blocking the way, she simply turned sideways and slipped by him with a hasty wave.
Luke didn’t look pleased, but as he walked toward Catherine, she couldn’t imagine what she’d done wrong this time. She inhaled deeply and vowed to hang on to her temper, regardless of how easily Luke Starns lost his. Choosing to ignore him, she admired her neat arrangement of new flyers, which was a vast improvement over the last volunteer’s haphazard posting.
Luke stopped so close to Catherine their shoulders were nearly touching. “Thanks for putting up the flyers,” he offered in a hushed whisper. “I hope Violet didn’t give you any trouble.”
It hadn’t even occurred to Catherine that Luke could have been annoyed with Violet rather than her. Feeling very foolish, she forced a smile. “Why no. We merely exchanged a few words about books, and I offered to bring in some of mine.”
“Oh, great. Come on. I’ll walk you back to the office.” Luke grabbed the stapler off the adjacent table and gestured for Catherine to precede him.
Catherine moved toward the door with a purposeful stride, but even then she felt as though Luke were rushing her. “Is there something wrong?” she asked as they moved out into the courtyard.
Luke caught her arm and with a gentle tug pulled her to a halt while they were still out in the open. “I’m positive that during the orientation I stressed that we never make promises we can’t keep. That goes for something as simple as a few used books.”
His chambray shirt had been faded by a hundred washings, but there was nothing soft in his manner, and Catherine found it difficult to look at him. Fortunately, the stone courtyard possessed the tranquility of a cloister, leading her to believe the dull gray granite probably possessed greater warmth than Luke ever did.
“If I tell someone I’ll bring in a few used books, or a bucket of dirt, for that matter, I’ll follow through,” she insisted. “It’s a shame you’ve apparently been disappointed in your other volunteers, but I always keep my word.”
Catherine took pride in how positive she sounded, but in truth, she was deeply offended. “Violet is little more than a lovely child. Do you honestly believe that I’d disappoint her?”
Luke swore under his breath. “You mustn’t allow yourself to become attached to any of the kids, and that goes double for Violet Simms.”
He paused to make certain he had Catherine’s full attention. “Violet’s father abused her sexually while her mother pretended not to know about it. Violet left home as soon as other men began to notice her. Now she’s living with a mechanic who calls himself Ford Dolan. That son of a bitch is as bad as her father, and she comes in here more often than not with a black eye.”
“Can’t you have him arrested?” Catherine asked.
“There’s no point in it when Violet won’t swear out a complaint against him. Don’t encourage her to depend on you for books or anything else, Catherine, because she’ll surely break your heart.”
Catherine’s heart was already broken, but despite the lack of risk, she couldn’t agree. “I’m sorry to argue with you again, but I truly believe it’s imperative for these kids to know someone cares about them.”
Luke kept his voice low, but it failed to disguise his irritation. “I didn’t say I didn’t care. If I didn’t give a damn, I wouldn’t be here, but there’s an enormous difference between a professional offering effective guidance and a misguided volunteer creating more harm than good.”
Catherine didn’t understand how the man could be so incredibly dense. “I’m not trying to challenge your authority here, Dr. Starns. Do you have an objection to volunteers donating paperback books for your library?”
“No,” Luke snorted. “Of course, not.”
Catherine waited for him to realize how senseless their latest argument truly was. With his only child dead and his wife gone, she could easily understand why he’d walled up his heart, but she had no desire to emulate his chilling example.
“Are you seeing a therapist yourself?” she asked.
“That’s none of your damn business, Mrs. Brooks.”
Luke left Catherine standing in the middle of the courtyard and entered the office alone, but she wasn’t ashamed to have asked the question. He might have the professional credentials to run Lost Angel, but she considered him pathetically lacking in empathy.
The cloudless sky was the same vivid blue as Violet’s eyes, and she stood there a long moment simply to enjoy it. The frantic flight of a hummingbird drew her attention to the honeysuckle growing up the side of the granite church. Since Sam’s death, she’d learned to treasure such sweet distractions, and she took it as an omen that any kindness she showed Violet, or anyone else at Lost Angel, would bring only good results.
It wasn’t until that evening when she’d sunk down into a hot bubble bath that she recalled the slight break in Luke’s voice as he’d spoken her first name. There’d been a whisper of hurt in that instant, but if she wasn’t mistaken, there’d also been a husky hint of desire.
Fierce Pride
Phoebe Conn
Seeing red? It could be the cape…or the passion.
Libby Gunderson drops everything—her college classes, her personal trainer job—to fly to Spain. Her mission: convince her sister that marrying a gypsy matador would be a huge mistake.
She finds an unexpected ally in Santos Aragon, one of Spain’s most popular bullfighters. She just never thought she’d end up using her kinesiology skills to help him recover from a knee injury. All that up-close-and-personal time has her looking for a Spanish fan to cool off.
Marriage and a family of his own? Santos is too busy with his career and looking after his father’s other children to consider it. When a mirror flash blinds him in the ring, the resulting injury risks his ability to provide for them—and he suspects someone did it deliberately.
Libby’s hands-on therapy sessions explode into a flash fire of need, bonding them in passion and danger. But Libby’s life is across the sea. And Santos must decide if his true heart is in the ring…or with the woman who must soon board a plane for home.
Warning: Contains hot sex, life-threatening danger, and men who challenge death for sport.
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This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.
Samhain Publishing, Ltd.
11821 Mason Montgomery Road Suite 4B
Cincinnati OH 45249
Fierce Pride
Copyright © 2013 by Phoebe Conn
ISBN: 978-1-61921-386-9
Edited by Linda Ingmanson
Cover by Kanaxa
All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
First
Samhain Publishing, Ltd.
electronic publication: February 2013
