Getting locked inside a dark coffin isn't Dr. Heidi Cole's idea of a fun evening. But when sexy magician Luke Howard yanks her on stage in the middle of his act and names her his audience "volunteer," Heidi doesn't seem to have much of a choice.
As the casket lid drops down with a final slam, Heidi knows something's wrong. In the all encompassing darkness, she can no longer hear the cheering audience. She's utterly and completely alone.
Her senses may be muddled, but there's no mistaking the carnal touch that creeps up her inner thigh, determined and insistent.
Dark desire wraps Heidi in tendrils of passion, as foreign to her as the shadowy world of magic. And there doesn't seem to be a damn thing she can do to stop it...
Excerpt
"Magic isn't an intangible power that should be feared or avoided. It's powerful, yes, but it's as real as I am."
The magician's low-pitched, sexy drawl sent a shudder down Heidi Cole's spine. A deep-seeded longing started low in her belly and swirled lower still, culminating in a pulsing heat at the apex of her thighs.
Though he wore a silly vampire cape and obviously fake teeth, "handsome" didn't even begin to describe the man. There hadn't been a picture in the local paper, and the journalist who'd written the glowing review of Luke Howard's Too Hot To Handle Magic Show had said nothing about the thick, silky brown hair falling over his forehead and bordering the proud jut of cheekbones, the straight angle of his nose, the beautiful mouth that curved slightly at the corners when he spoke.
As if all that proof of virile masculinity wasn't enough, the man was at least six foot two and built more like a solid, lean cowboy than a willowy magician.
It wasn't fair. The article should have come with a warning to all women who came within a hundred feet of the stage: Warning! Attending this magic show will result in heart palpitations, shortness of breath, and an unmistakable slickness between your thighs.
As it happened, Heidi stood perhaps five feet away, which meant she was definitely in serious danger of creaming her panties.
A peal of thunder echoed from beyond the building's walls, loud enough to shake the ground beneath Heidi's feet. The magician chuckled, the sensual sound of his laugh sliding down her skin like a silky, tantalizing aphrodisiac. Heidi nearly groaned.
"Yes, folks. That is magic you're hearing. And not only can you hear it, but you can smell it, taste it..."
"I'd like to taste a piece of him," Bianca, Heidi's oversexed sister, whispered in her ear. Heidi gritted her teeth to keep from agreeing with her.
"...and of course, you can also see it," Luke finished. He clapped his hands together once, and the resulting boom was louder even than the thunder had been.
A gasp shot up from the audience as a flash of bright light lit the stage, focusing on the elegant and sleek shape of a snake. A darkly golden snake with glittering scales and broad, crimson wings.
The creature rose high up in the air and then swept down over the crowd, its wingspan almost as wide across as the entire room. With a crude, low-pitched hiss, it swerved around and headed back for the stage, where it bore down on Luke.
"Samantha is a little temperamental, but don't let her frighten you." Luke beamed a brilliant smile at those assembled and extended a lean, tanned hand. "Come here, girl."
Instead of coiling around his arm, the snake-thing fluttered its massive wings, gave another screaming hiss that revealed a deep red forked tongue, and then shattered into a million dazzling golden sparkles that floated over the audience.
The silence that drifted down along with the specks of glitter was all-encompassing.
Heidi's hand tightened around the wet material of her sister's soft blue cotton sweater. Although they'd been out of the storm for over ten minutes, their clothes were still drenched, and were likely to remain that way for the rest of the night.
"Are you sure we should be here?" Heidi murmured as softly as she could manage.
Bianca waved her concern away with a flick of her hand. "We bought a ticket just like everyone else."
"Yeah, but I don't think that covered being backstage." She stepped closer to the billowing black curtain that hid her from view of anyone who happened to pass by. So far, she'd only seen one man fiddling with some electronic equipment against the back wall, and a woman carrying an armload of costumes. Neither had spotted them.
"You heard what the ticket guy said. It's a full house tonight. Standing room only."
A violent gust of wind swept through the dark theater, as sudden and unexpected as the rain had been when it began to pour from a clear sky fifteen minutes earlier. The breeze gathered up the sparkling specks of golden dust and whipped them into a frenzy around the magician.
Luke remained standing at the center of the stage, his arms outstretched, as though welcoming the swirling mass of glittering sparkles. He beckoned it closer, then swept his fingertips over the edges of the whirling vortex. Slowly, a figure emerged from within, unmistakably female.
As the last of the breeze quieted and the sparkles disappeared, a woman dressed in a skintight golden bodysuit pirouetted on her toes and took a bow toward the cheering audience.
"Ladies and gentlemen, please give a hand to the lovely Samantha!"
Dark Desire (Prequel to "Darkness" Serial)