Today’s Visitor is Cherie Noel

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Blurb: A spy posing as an assassin finds himself riding the ragged edge of sanity during his latest mission; a frantic search for fabled lost colonists who may have fled his world steps ahead of a devastating plague. In the wake of the disease his species faces extinction. The possibly mythical pre-plague migrants hold the only key to survival for his entire race.

Living in deep cover onboard a space frigate full of slave-running pirates would be difficult enough with reliable intel and some hope of back-up…even if he weren’t slowly losing his ability to separate truth from fiction.

Lewell’yn finds himself in hot water, being deliberately fed false information, light-years from reliable help and saddled with the added complications caused by a fiercely passionate healer, and a sweet, innocently sexy chef.

With the fate of his world resting squarely on his shoulders, Lewell’yn must discover a way thru an ever shifting maze of deception. The bombs are in place. The detonators are set. The chrono is ticking. Caught between two men desperate to escape the clutches pirates and an insidious, hidden enemy, can Lewell’yn find a path to become Tian’s hero?

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Across the intervening years, and all the miles that make up light years of travel there are some things, some emotions which seem to me to remain constant as long as there are folk to feel them. Fear. Bravery. Greed. Passion. Honor. Wanton Lust…and best and brightest of them all, Love. We’ve had those things since people were first people, and frankly, I can’t conceive of a world, a universe, where those things won’t still exist…not as long as there are folk of some sort to muddle their way through the minefields of existence.

It’s on this premise I’ve based the foundation of the opening salvo of my grand space opera series about a group of people known as the Akanti, Tian’s Hero. So, while there’s nothing new under the sun…under any sun, really, there is always the hard truth of simple, ordinary folk picking their path in all of life’s varied and extraordinary choices. The boys of Tian’s Hero are just as simple and complex as you or I. A cook, a nurse, and an orphan, thrown together by fate, or perhaps by the whims of greedy men find in themselves the stark black and white world of madness, the will to fight with unrivaled ferocity to protect what is theirs, and the unlikeliest of heroes. Come meet my boys. I’m sure you’ll fall in love with them as deeply and irrevocably as I have.

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Excerpt:
Lewell’yn ran a hand through his hair, absently noting the fine tremors. He couldn’t remember a time when he’d ever had so little self control. He had to get a hold of himself. He grabbed a vid-link from over one of the other beds. Words tumbled out of his mouth rapidly. He sounded panicked to himself, but to Tian and Kay he most likely just sounded brusque.

“I’m linking this to the monitor above his bed. I have to be able to monitor him, and I want him to stay here tonight, so you can treat his pain. This monitor is coming with me when I leave. He said earlier he wouldn’t be able to sleep…too worked up. Give him something to help him sleep.”

Both men looked up at his harshly spoken words. Kayron’s expressive face clearly showed his disquiet after the abrupt words. Tian had a strange mix of anxiety, trepidation, and unconscious craving playing over his features. The sheen of his eyes contradicted the bold up-tilt of his chin as he bit, again, into his already abused lip.

Plaguing hell.

Lewell’yn spun around, unable to bear looking at either of them. He sat himself at the medic’s comconsole and rapidly hacked into the ship’s mainframe. He rerouted all views from the cameras in sickbay, sending them into an additional loop viewable only here at the medic’s station and in the small monitor he’d acquired from the other patient bed. He knew of the two, Kayron at least was both smart enough and computer savvy enough to understand he shouldn’t have been able to complete such a transaction from the computer he was seated at.

Right in the moment, he didn’t give a damn if he’d blown his cover to both of them.
With his back to them they thankfully could not notice the press of Lewell’yn’s now fully engorged cock against the front of his shipsuit. He surreptitiously thumped the offending organ with his fist. He would not think about how hot he’d found the two of them in the strangely intimate tableau.

Lewell’yn had six more weeks on this stinking tub. He had to be in Tian’s tempting presence for every one of those days. He had to be in the equally tempting medic’s presence at least once a week when he brought the slaves down for their exams. Now was not the time to lose control.

Thankfully, he could leave them both here for tonight, safely out of his reach. He couldn’t stay, not without running the risk of pulling them both down into the Darkness with him. If he tried he risked becoming something he couldn’t live with. He couldn’t complete his mission from the cryotank, but he had enough to manipulate them both into stripping and allowing him to do every filthy fucking enjoyable thing he could think of, in every position imaginable until they both passed out from sheer exhaustion. He’d fuck them without a care for the cost they would pay emotionally when he lost his way irrevocably. No doubt the price stood far higher than either of them could afford.

Fuck and double fuck again.

Damned silver-eyed bastard owed him for tangling him up in this shitestorm. Lewell’yn didn’t even know who he was half the time. Knew who he wouldn’t be though. Not for the Boss, not for the NIS, not for anyone.

Lewell’yn completed his manipulation of the ship’s computer system, locking what he had done so no one else, at least no one on this dilapidated tub, could hack in and change the codes. He eased the chair he sat in back around to face the two men behind him. He let his gaze linger first on Tian, noting the way his auburn hair glinted softly in the dim light of the sickbay at night, and the slightly pleading, slightly defiant look in his intelligent green eyes. He drank in the firm line of his jaw as he spoke to Kay.

“Kayron, I like you. So, know I’ll be watching this monitor all night. If you move him a hair out of the view of those cameras even once I will kill you, and I’ll do you much slower than I did Harvitt.”

Blessed Light—he was such a liar. He didn’t actually think he could harm one beautifully curly hair on Kay’s head—not on purpose, not unless he got permanently lost in the Dark.

“If anyone else comes in here, let them know I’m watching. Tell them, including the captain, no one except you is allowed to touch him until I get back. I trust you. Well, I trust you more than the rest of them. I’ll be back before breakfast to collect him.”

Lewell’yn got up to walk out. Instead, he walked over to the exam table Tian still sat on. The little man’s mouth was parted in astonishment. Lewell’yn placed a hand behind his neck, gently drew him forward, and kissed his forehead. Bending down he whispered directly into the little man’s ear.

“No one on this ship will hurt you again, Peaches. I won’t let them.”

Releasing Tian, he turned, laid his palm against Kayron’s cheek for a moment, and savoured the silky feel of the medic’s skin. Then he turned quickly to the door, not wanting to see what response the two men gave his uncharacteristic actions. Not knowing came easier than dealing what he might see. Easier than reacting to something he might not like without becoming a monster. He held his breath, frightened of what he might do if he caught even a whiff of Tian’s unique scent, slightly musky, slightly salty mixed together with a faint hint of sweetness…just like peaches. Bad enough he could still feel the sensation of Kayron’s smooth skin against his palm. The sickbay doors swooshed shut behind him, and he could breathe again, know himself as a man with reason, breathe without danger of becoming a monster, breathe and keep moving forward.

I will be running a contest on my blog starting on the 10th and running through the 17th…there will be clues left every day and whomever finds the most clues will win a free copy of the book.

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