Elsie's Secret

His secrets tore them apart. Hers might get them killed.

A PSI agent, Sebastian Alexander has secrets that once came between him and the woman he still loves. Finding her prowling around where she doesn’t belong turns his simple reconnaissance into a rescue mission threatening to blow everything apart. Is he willing to risk his secrets to save her life?

Elsie Quartermaine has one goal. Save her nephew from a sadistic kidnapper. Sebastian is the one man who can help her. But divulging her secret puts more than her life in jeopardy. Can she trust Sebastian with her nephew’s life? Her own? What about her heart?

As dawn creeps over the horizon, can they find enough trust in each other to stay alive?

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Elsie's Secret

Read an Excerpt

A MUSCLED ARM SNAKED around Elsie Quartermaine’s waist, yanking her back against a solid male chest. She gasped and he clamped his other hand over her mouth. Gloved fingers dug into her cheek.
Adrenaline poured through her veins, pounded in her head. She twisted her body, fisted her hands and beat on the forearm tightening around her like a vise.
“What the hell are you doing here?” The man’s harsh voice rasped in her ear. He lifted her off her feet, pressed her head tight to his chest, making it hard for her to fight.
Held this close to him, the exotic, woodsy scent of the man filled her. The deep timbre of his voice registered. Heat that had nothing to do with the humid warmth of a Southern Carolina night surged through the entire length of her body. Crap. Cursing her traitorous response, she stopped her struggle.
His movements slow, he released her mouth with a light caress across her bottom lip. Liquid flames ignited low in her belly. He turned her towards him and released her. In the near pitch blackness she could barely see him, but her nerves were on fire, a blaze hotter than the brief contact warranted.
Dammit. She didn’t want to be able to feel Sebastian Alexander, not this way. Not now. Not ever again.
Liar.
No.
She couldn’t, just couldn’t feel him, need him, want him.
Not anymore. That was a fast drop on a narrow switch-backed road, destination a pain worse than heartache.
How could she possibly survive another tangle with Bastian?
Right now, anger was her only defense.
“I could ask you the same thing.” Her voice low and sharp, she lifted her chin.
She wanted that answer, but lurking in the bushes, in the dead of night, in one of Charleston’s finest – and wealthiest – neighborhoods didn’t seem to be the best time to calmly, or even rationally, discuss her reasons for trespassing.
Especially with her ex.
An ex whose occupation was questionable during the best of times. This wasn’t anywhere near that kind of time. Still, she couldn’t stop herself. Her hands fisted at her waist, she stood with her legs shoulder width apart and her chin tilted.
Hyper-awareness prickled along her spine. Of her nephew, Ryan, behind those walls, in terrible pain. Of Bastian in front of her, his mere presence threatening to blow everything apart.
Ryan … why he was here, she had no clue. She’d managed to follow the heightened blood link she shared with him, forged back in the shadowy history of their family.
Shivers chased across her skin. The cloying scent of gardenias wafted through the still, humid air and Elsie swallowed hard at the tightness closing her throat, at the sudden ache twisting low in her chest.
“I asked you first.” Bastian’s clipped words fueled the sparks flying between them. “Elsie, whatever you’re doing here, now is not the time.” He wrapped his long fingers around her upper arms, pulled her closer.
She nearly melted at his touch, damning her treasonous body for responding to him.
“Really? More secrets, Mr. Alexander?” God, she couldn’t believe she was so nasty. He was right. This wasn’t the time, at least
not for this tired, old argument. She had to save Ryan. Bastian needed to leave or she’d lose this one desperate opportunity.
A guttural groan came from Bastian’s direction. In the darkness he leaned his head against her forehead, his big hands rubbing up and down her arms. “Elsie, please.”