Spotlight: Ill Fated by Rachel Rawlings
Title: Ill Fated
Author: Rachel Rawlings
Series: Maurin Kincaide #6
Genre: Dark Urban Fantasy
Publisher: R Squared Publishing
Release Date: Feb 11 2015
Edition/Format Available In: eBook &
Print
Some things are destined to end in
death. After the first attempt on her life Maurin wasn’t scared.
Hell, she was almost flattered. But someone put a price on her head
and things are getting complicated. Trouble is brewing in the fae
courts and it’s spilling over into Salem. The UnSeelie Dark Guard
have answered the call for her head on a platter and people closest
to her are disappearing.
Can Maurin master court politics and
find her missing men before someone claims the bounty on her head?
Book
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Excerpt
No one should be awake at four in the
morning. Especially me. I ripped the plug for my alarm clock out of
the wall around three-thirty.
I forgot about the batteries.
The numbers on the clock taunted me
like a green-eyed devil until I finally got out of bed. I fumbled in
the dark to make a pot of coffee, refusing to turn on the kitchen
light and formally acknowledge the day. I pulled my favorite mug out
of the cabinet and filled it before settling at my table.
The dream came every night -
technically morning - at three o'clock. I was used to running on
little-to-no sleep, this bordered on ridiculous. Yesterday at the
range I shot a target in the lane on my left. Fortunately, it had
been Mason's and I played everything off by exaggerating my
sharp-shooting skills. Someone else could have had me banned. As it
was, Mason thought I was being a competitive brat.
I wasn't sure I preferred that to being
a sleep-deprived danger to others.
I scratched my neck, pausing when I
felt the delicate silver chain. I followed it down to the apple
branch charm which rested on my chest. Weird. I could have sworn I
took it off last night. I slid the charm back and forth as I went
over the dream. Again.
After the first week, I’d broken down
and started analyzing it. According to Freud, I had mommy issues. No
surprise there. I seriously doubted my relationship - or lack thereof
- with my adoptive mother was the cause of the recurring dream.
I fired up the laptop, unwilling to
cease my search for answers. Instead of the trippy New Age sites I
checked out last night, I went back to my trusty Google. I nodded off
twice as I scanned the results.
What the hell did an old woman washing
clothes in a river have to do with me? I might have written it off as
paranoia or a side effect of all the spicy food I'd been eating, if
not for the haggard old woman crooking her bony finger at me and
called my name - every time.
I finally got a hit on an obscure
mythology website. Bean Nighe, the washer woman of the Highlands. She
scrubbed the bloody linens of those doomed to die. Knowing she was
fae bothered me more than the knowledge the clothes she washed every
night were mine. Impending death I could handle. Hell, I'd slipped
through the Reaper's grasp more than once. The Fae on the other hand,
well they could be tricky
The phone rang just as I got up for a
refill. The fact someone else was not only awake at this ungodly
hour,but calling me, meant it was bad news. No one who valued their
life called me before noon unless it was an emergency - one of the
perks of my new position as Regulator.
I was now in charge of one
investigator, two trackers and a team of cleaners. It was a lot like
it sounds. We investigate, we track and we clean up. We clean up
everything, no loose ends. You don't ever want to find yourself in
need of a cleaner. Late hours came with the new job, hence the “no
calls before noon” rule.
I glanced at the screen before
answering and recognized the number immediately. It helped I had been
dialing it for the last four years - it used to belong to Captain
Matthison. Of course Mason, my fae boyfriend and member of the Wild
Hunt, was the captain of SPTF now.
We'd been officially dating for a
couple months, moved well past first base. Hell, I had a key to his
apartment. Granted I hadn’t used it since the night he gave it to
me. I'd been dragging my feet, leaving deep ruts in my wake where our
relationship was concerned. My track record wasn't all that great.
I'd rushed in before, once because I was spelled and once because I
wanted to.
Neither ended well.
Things were going great. I was afraid
if I labeled it, changed it in anyway, the change would be
catastrophic. Thankfully, Mason was a patient man.
Except when it came to a four a.m.
phone call. My phone stopped then immediately started ringing again.
My answer was short and to the point.
"Morning."
"You're awake?" He sounded
more than a little surprised.
"I'm not really sure the state I'm
in qualifies as awake."
"Here I was, terrified to poke the
dragon, and you're already drinking coffee and talking in complete
sentences."
I snorted and took a sip of the
aforementioned liquid gold. "Are you always like this in the
morning?"
"If you'd let me sleep over you'd
already know the answer to that question. Why aren't you asleep?"
In general or just tonight, I silently
wondered. "Bad dream. I've been tossing and turning all night. I
finally gave in and got out of bed."
Papers rustled in the background and
when he spoke again, his voice was lower, intimate, "You want to
talk about it?"
"Something tells me my nightmares
are the least of our problems."
"You have no idea. I need you to
come down to my office."
I sighed. "Can it at least wait
until after sunrise?"
"Would I be breaking the ‘no
phone calls before noon’policy if it could wait?"
“There really is no rest for the
wicked, is there?”
He laughed and the sound warmed me more
than a hundred cups of coffee. "Apparently not, in your case.
Now, there's a dirty chai latte and a croissant for you if you're
here before Amalie. I can't promise real coffee and pastries will
survive beyond five minutes of her arrival."
"It's four-thirty in the morning,
Mas. If you know what's good for you, you'll make sure at least
one dirty chai and croissant remain unmolested."
"I'll see you soon." He was
laughing as he hung up the phone.
Three hours ago, I’d practically
crawled through the doorway, exhausted from cleaning up after a
newbie vamp who’d broken the Jus Sanguinis Intergentes when she
killed her donor. The blood pact between people and vampires had a
clear ‘no killing, no exceptions’ clause.
It was up to the maker to ensure their
child was ready to feed unsupervised. If something went wrong and the
Council found out about it, we cleaned up the mess and the sire was
subject to heavy fines and possible revocation of their rights to
expand their blood lines. She’d been quite literally a bitch to
track and take down.
It had been a long night and it was
shaping up to be an even longer day.
I wasted little time getting dressed,
opting for a slip-on black jersey dress, eighteen hole Docs and a
leather jacket. Jewelry was a hindrance in my line of work. My
meeting with Mason could easily turn into a run. Choked with my own
chain? No, thank you. Unclasping the necklace, I set it in a glass
dish on my bathroom counter. I ran a brush through my hair, a
toothbrush over my teeth and slipped into the Between. I stepped out
of the alley two buildings down from the station and walked the last
block and a half.
Amalie was swarmed by detectives trying
to get at the goodies she brought over from the Daily Grind. She
greeted me with a warm smile, shaking her head when I offered to pull
her out of the fray. She had managed to endear herself to the entire
department in record time. All it took was real coffee and fresh
pastries. I pointed to Mason's office. She'd make her way over once
the starving masses had their fill.
Mason was so engrossed in the file on
his desk he didn't hear me come in. He looked as tired as I felt -
too many double shifts. Despite an uptick in activity, SPTF was
short-staffed due to budget cuts. Without enough man power to staff
the shifts properly, overtime was mandatory.
"Is that for me?" I pointed
at the to-go cup and white paper bag on his desk.
He finally looked up and gave me a
smile which lit up his whole face. "As promised."
I stole a quick kiss, grabbed the
coffee and croissant, and settled in the chair across from him. I
took a long sip of my latte, savoring the delicious mix of tea and
espresso. "Man, I needed this. Is that the case you're working
on?"
"Yeah, we've got a real problem on
our hands."
"Don't we always." I tried to
peek at the file.
Mason closed the manila folder. "I'd
rather wait until everyone is here."
"Who else is coming besides
Amalie?" My curiosity was definitely peaked now. I reached
across his desk, hoping to grab the file.
"You look exhausted. Tell me about
your dream while we wait."
I narrowed my eyes and glared at him.
"I see this for the obvious distraction it is.” Sighing, I
rubbed my temple. “However, I'm exhausted, too exhausted to argue.
So I'll tell you. Prepare to be confounded."
He listened intently as I filled him in
on the nightly visits from the weathered old woman who washed my
clothes and hauntingly called my name. I expected him to laugh and
tell me it was just a dream, that I had nothing to worry about.
I didn't expect him to look so
stricken.
"Bean Nighe." He whispered
the name.
"You've heard of her?"
"Of course I've heard of her. How
long has she been coming to you?"
I stared at him curiously. "A few
weeks. Why?"
When I agreed to give this thing with
Mason a chance I also agreed to some conditions. No more flying solo,
no more rash decisions or rushing off to play the hero. We were a
team, in everything. This was just one of many setbacks.
"A few weeks and this is the first
I'm hearing of it?” He closed his eyes and took a deep breath,
obviously struggling to control his temper. “We talked about this.
No holding things back, remember?"
"I thought it was just a dream.”
I shrugged. “Honestly, I didn't think it was a big deal."
"It was a big enough deal for you
to research it." Agitation rolled off him in waves.
"I got curious, did a little
digging. Until tonight, everything I found pointed to deep-seated
family issues, particularly with a mother figure. I've told you about
my childhood, does that dream analysis surprise you?"
His growl told me he wasn’t in the
mood for reasonable explanations. "When did you discover the
true meaning of the dream? How long have you known about the Bean
Nighe?"
"Tonight. This morning. Before you
called me." I held up a hand to stop the tongue lashing I knew
he wanted to give me. "I would have told you. I got the
impression on the phone there were more pressing matters than my
insomnia."
"Is this why you won't let me stay
at your place?” His gaze roamed over my face, searching. “Why you
never stay at mine?"
"Is that the real reason why
you're so upset?" I arched my brows. “Because we’re not
having sleepovers?”
"I stayed at your lovely apartment
the first night we met."
I turned to watch Aidan glide into the
room, stopping behind my chair. Rolling my eyes, I snorted and
muttered, “In the closet.”
Mason's jaw twitched, but he didn't
take the bait. "Aidan."
"It's almost sunrise. Shouldn't
you be hunkered down for the day?" I sighed, wondering what he
was doing here. I was too tired to deal with Aidan and Mason and
their combined testosterone.
I was born and raised in the Baltimore
Metropolitan area but my family is originally from Rhode Island. I
spent summers in New England with my grandparents, which probably
sparked my fascination with Salem, MA. I started writing fictional
stories and poems in middle school. In fact I had notebooks and
notebooks full of incomplete stories and poems. One of which I
managed to hold on to and is safely stashed in a box under my bed.
When I was in seventh grade I entered a poetry contest in the back of
an Archie comic and won, after that I was hooked on writing after
that. Amazingly it took almost two decades to find a voice for my
snarky, ass kicking heroine Maurin Kincaide and complete my first
length novel. Meeting the love of your life and raising three amazing
children together must have caused a rift in time because I still
can't believe it's gone by so quickly. I'm fortunate to have a loving
and supportive family who don't mind sharing me with all the other
people in my head.
Author Links
Other Books by Rachel Rawlings
Maurin
Kincaide Series
The
Morrigna #1
Witch
Hunt #2
Wolfsbane
#3 Novella
Blood
Bath #4
Mistletoe
Meltdown #5 Short Story
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