Women Under Fire
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#BlackFriday Freebie - Women Under Fire
Treat yourself to this romantic suspense freebie. Women Under Fire, book 2 in my Grayce Walters series, is FREE for Black Friday and Cyber Monday shoppers. Read the excerpt and then one-click!
A hot summer night—perfect for Mariners baseball. Davis gazed over at the empty seat and swallowed against the feelings tightening his throat. These were the same seats he and his dad had shared for years of cold, rainy baseball seasons. His dad should have been here, awaiting Felix Hernandez’s first pitch.
Davis kept scanning the crowd for Grayce as the stadium filled. She had been detained in her veterinarian office to take care of a yellow lab that had indulged in an overdose of chocolate.
He watched Hernandez go through his warm up. Armed with his wicked split finger fastball, Hernandez had the mojo to go up against tonight’s strong Red Sox batting order. The pitcher’s predictable ritual of rubbing down the ball with both hands, smoothing the mound with his right foot, didn’t bring the usual comfort. For Davis, the familiar rituals of baseball were fused with loss.
“Davis, what great seats.” Grayce scrambled over the men in the aisle to get to the center.
What the hell was she wearing? His dad’s cronies, the old lechers, were watching her sashay toward the middle seat in her short shorts and a tight top showcasing her snug yoga body.
He was suddenly hot and irritated. What was she thinking wearing that outfit? Where were her usual blue jeans? And her ponytail? She had pinned her dazzling blonde hair on top of her head and little wisps of hair clung to her graceful neck. Davis took a deep breath. He was in shorts and a t-shirt, but hell, he looked nothing like luscious Grayce.
“Davis, what’s the matter?” Grayce slipped into the seat next to him. She had no clue that she had just heated the entire male fan section.
He pulled her close and pressed a hard, possessive kiss to her lips.
Shouts came from behind. “Davis, you’re killin’ us man.”
There were more hoots and loud laughs. He knew what was on the men’s minds; the same thing that rampaged through his body. Grayce’s face turned red, either from the heat or his demanding kiss.
Her green eyes were rounded in surprise. “I’m glad to see you, too.”
“How’s your patient?” His voice was gruff.
“Recovering. Gus ate half of a Martha Stewart chocolate ganache cake. He had a few tremors, nothing like Mitzi.”
“Mitzi was poisoned.” He still couldn’t believe that bastard had come after his dog during his last investigation.
He looked down at Grayce. His height gave him full view of Grayce’s cleavage. His mind drifted away from criminals.
“Davis, your face is bright red. Is this heat bothering you?”
It took all his control not to comment that it was her exposed body causing the blood to flow in hot rushes through his body. He had learned early from his sisters never to criticize what a woman wore. Never. He was struggling to find a happy balance, somewhere between frustration and lust.
“Do you like my new shoes?” Grayce stretched out her toned leg. “They’re called espadrilles. James talked me into them.”
Davis admired her finely shaped leg. Her shoes tied with a ribbon that wrapped around her delicate ankle. He wanted to untie that ribbon. He took a deep breath, trying not to betray his rapid breathing. How could a woman’s shoe affect him this much? Damn James. It was just like Grayce’s best friend, a cross-dresser, to find the sexiest shoes.
The blood thundered in his head. Oblivious to his friends and the game, Davis stood, pretending interest in Felix’s position at home plate to give himself time to control his need to ravish Grayce. Grayce stood when he did. She pressed her warm woman’s body against his side. He was in trouble.
“Man, Davis, down!”
Davis and Grayce both sat.
“Do you know everyone in this section?” Grayce asked.
“Just the ones you’re driving crazy.”
“What?”
“Your outfit…men like that kind of outfit. And your shoes are…”
Grayce looked at him. “My outfit? I’m in shorts and tank top…just like every other woman here.”
Davis ran his hand along her toned thigh. “But you don’t look like every woman here. You look…you look so damn perfect.” He wrapped his arm around her and pulled her closer. “You make me forget I’m at a baseball game. You make me want to go home.”
ABOUT THE BOOK
Life has heated up for Grayce Walters: thrust into the public eye and hounded by the media after solving an arson case with a critical clue from a French Poodle. When Ewan Davis, the sexy arson investigator Grayce has been steaming things up with, starts talking commitment, she definitely feels the burn.
Then a desperate mother begs Grayce to help find her missing daughter—an Afghanistan war veteran suffering from PTSD, and Grayce reluctantly takes on the case, following a disturbing clue provided by the missing young woman’s cat. Calling once again on the aid of her cross-dressing best friend and her shrewd assistant, Grayce uncovers a terrorist plot with chilling international implications.
Grayce races to rescue the young veteran before the escalating danger explodes. But if she manages to escape the threat, will she find the courage to commit to the fiery passion that awaits her wrapped in Davis’s arms?
Undercover Danger ~ Excerpt from 'Women Under Fire'
Angie stood motionless in the shadow of a misshapen cypress tree. The setting summer sun of Seattle didn’t relieve the cold frisson of danger or the press of her revolver’s cold metal against her skin. Although it had been months since her last reconnaissance mission, her body recognized the drill and tightened into high alert.
Splatters of fading sunlight danced across the sagging house. Official yellow tape was wrapped around the turn of the century beauty like a Christmas bow on a crushed, forgotten present. A “condemned” sign was nailed to the warped door. The crumbling front steps looked like their weight bearing days were a distant memory.
Not sure how to proceed, she waited and watched the abandoned house in the residential Ravenna neighborhood until it got dark. Should she take the squatters unaware? Surprise Maddy before she could run?
She moved from her hiding place to investigate the back of the house. The yard was littered with broken glass, smashed Styrofoam carryout containers, and plastic bags mired in mud from the wet Northwest summer. She stepped over the yellow tape that was haphazardly hung around the back steps, turned the handle, and then pulled open the back door. It was unlocked. The rusting hinges screeched.
“Maddy, it’s Angie from your VA group.” She reverted to her forceful military command voice. “I’m coming in.”
When the door was thrown wide open, small dark bodies—rats—scurried away. Dread raced down her spine into the tips of her toes. God, she hated rats. This rat hole was worse than anything she had seen during her tours of duty in Afghanistan.
She stepped gingerly over the bags of garbage strewn on the uneven linoleum floor. The smell of the years of neglect and black mold hit her sensitive nose. She tried not to breathe. All of her senses heightened in the darkness, an internal radar honed from door-to-door urban combat. She took another two steps, listening for sounds other than the resident rodents.
“It’s Angie from your VA group.” She wasn’t too worried about handling a high Maddy, but handling her companions might get tricky. After eight years as a Marine, she was used to tricky. And after everything Maddy had gone through in Afghanistan, Angie wasn’t about to let her friend descend into another hell.
She reached in the pocket of her jeans for her tiny penlight as she walked into the dark dining room. The light of her flashlight reflected back at her from a cracked mirror hanging over the fireplace, then a sudden, shiny motion. Before she could react, a bright burst of pain exploded in her head. She fought against overpowering blackness.
Gaze into my Crystal Ball - Excerpt from 'Women Under Fire'
Ambushed by Aunt Aideen, Grayce Walters was trapped. The bonds of social pressure gripped tighter around her wrists and ankles, holding her captive in the kitchen chair. She couldn’t escape tonight’s séance.
Dressed in a flowing cobalt-blue caftan, Aunt Aideen ceremoniously placed a scarred, black box on the table and then carefully opened a chest lined in red velvet and raised a glimmering crystal ball into the air. “This Keek-Stane has been passed down through generations of Scottish witches.”
The enormous kitchen suddenly went airless. Grayce gulped for a breath. Mitzi, who had been sleeping under the table, protectively covered Grayce’s feet with her paws.
Grayce knew nothing about tarot cards or witches. Why hadn’t Davis warned her that his aunt considered herself a witch? Grayce had recognized Aunt Aideen as a gifted intuitive, but not a witch, whatever that meant.
Aunt Aideen placed the ball in the center of the table spread with tarot cards. “The Keek-Stane guides me in the reading of the cards.”
A call to a suspicious fire had interrupted the cozy dinner with her boyfriend, his aunt and dog. If Davis had stayed, she’d be eating dessert instead of having a metaphysical experience.
Aunt Aideen’s enormous moonstone ring flickered in the candlelight as her hand hovered over the cards. “We must look to the future.”
Grayce couldn’t see the card. She felt light-headed from the burning sweet flag incense or from the ominous energy swirling from the crystal ball.
As she turned over the first tarot card, the large woman’s usual booming voice grew quiet with a mysterious Gaelic lilt. “The Knight of Swords.”
Prickly sensations lifted the fine hair on Grayce’s neck. Mitzi came from under the table and sat next to Grayce’s chair.
Aunt Aideen opened her massive hand to allow Grayce to see the card—a medieval knight in armor on a powerful white horse rode toward a battle in the distance. The horse’s harness was decorated with butterflies and birds. The sky behind him was filled with storm clouds and the trees, tossed wildly by the wind. The knight resembled St. Michael the Archangel.
“The Knight of Swords is hard to resist,” Aunt Aideen intoned.
Davis obviously fit the Knight of Swords. His commanding presence, physical strength, and his commitment to fight crimes made him the perfect archetypal hero.
Heat moved across Grayce’s cheeks in embarrassment. “Davis was hard to resist.” Grayce knew first hand. As a witness to arson, she had been interviewed by the sexy fire investigator and had fallen in love with the irresistible man.
“My nephew, Ewan Davis, is in no way a Knight of Swords. Davis is an Emperor, a man of the logical world, like his Scottish forebears. The Knight of Swords is a messenger, a call for adventure. He does not see, nor does he care about risks or dangers and instead moves forward with his strong determination and strength to succeed, no matter what.
Grayce wasn’t going to discuss Davis’ ability as an adventurous lover with the aunt who had raised him after his mother’s death.
“The knight will call to you from your dreams.” Aunt Aideen’s solemn voice and the shimmering moonstone known for clairvoyance were doing strange things to Grayce’s perceptions. The images in the room faded in and out. The heightened energy from the ball moved in undulating waves.
“His call will challenge you to leave your present way of being.” Aunt Aideen’s eyes were in the shadows, but Grayce felt her focused stare. “The Knight of Swords can also be seen as a warning.”
With the soft burr of Aunt Aideen’s Scottish inflection, the wavering candlelight and the nutty scent of sweet flag, Grayce was floating into deep relaxation.
Aunt Aideen’s voice lost its soothing rhythm. “And it doesn’t take a seer to predict that Davis will have trouble with the knight’s appearance in your life. Davis needs to be your protector.”
Grayce came immediately out of her meditative state. Davis tried very hard to control his fear of unforeseen disasters by guarding all those he loved.
“Does the knight have to be human? Maybe I’ll have a new patient?” Grayce asked.
Aunt Aideen kept her eyes closed. Her muted voice was firm. “I see a tall, dark man in a uniform. He holds a gun.”
Shivers of fear danced on Grayce’s skin.
Preorder The Grayce Walters Romantic Suspense Series
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THE GRAYCE WALTERS SERIES: Grayce Walters, intuitive animal acupuncturist, finds herself drawn into danger in the name of protecting her animal clients. One extraordinary woman reluctantly battling evil on the streets of Seattle with an unconventional collection of crime-fighting accomplices: Her heart throb, alpha-macho hunk, Fire Investigator Captain Ewan Davis; her best friend James, a gay cross-dressing, karate master who can take bad guys down as long as he doesn’t ruin his hair; her office assistant Hollie, a street wise girl gamer; and Mitzi, a black standard poodle who’s anything but standard.
This four-book anthology from bestselling romantic suspense author Jacki Delecki includes:
An Inner Fire
Women Under Fire
Men Under Fire
Marriage Under Fire
Excerpt: WOMEN UNDER FIRE
If you haven’t picked up my latest release, WOMEN UNDER FIRE, Book 2 in the Grayce Walters series, enjoy this excerpt.
About WOMEN UNDER FIRE:
Life has heated up for Grayce Walters: thrust into the public eye and hounded by the media after solving an arson case with a critical clue from a French Poodle. When Ewan Davis, the sexy arson investigator Grayce has been steaming things up with, starts talking commitment, she definitely feels the burn.
Then a desperate mother begs Grayce to help find her missing daughter—an Afghanistan war veteran suffering from PTSD, and Grayce reluctantly takes on the case, following a disturbing clue provided by the missing young woman’s cat. Calling once again on the aid of her cross-dressing best friend and her shrewd assistant, Grayce uncovers a terrorist plot with chilling international implications.
Grayce races to rescue the young veteran before the escalating danger explodes. But if she manages to escape the threat, will she find the courage to commit to the fiery passion that awaits her wrapped in Davis’s arms?
Click here to read the opening scene of WOMEN UNDER FIRE.