Total pages in book: 123
Estimated words: 119846 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 599(@200wpm)___ 479(@250wpm)___ 399(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 119846 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 599(@200wpm)___ 479(@250wpm)___ 399(@300wpm)
*This is a PLUS-length novel--over 100,000 words long
Two warriors are desperate to mend their souls--they just need the perfect woman to help them heal.
Twin Kindred Burns Hot and Shines Bright are inseparable—not only are they best friends, but each has lost the sibling half of their natural pair-bond. Haunted by grief, they are determined to forge the rare, coveted Twin-Bond together even though they aren't brothers, and finally call a shared bride to complete their fractured existence.
They find her on the Mother Noelle. A captivating, curvy, mature woman running from a desperate past, she’s there to lecture on various Earth holidays. But when she agrees to accompany them to Therim Five to fulfill a prophecy—one that promises to fuse their bond and bring her into their lives forever—the stakes become lethally high.
Noelle is over 40 and running from a cruel ex. She expected holiday cheer when she planned to spend Christmas on the Kindred Mother Ship. Instead, she got two fiercely possessive alien warriors who long to form a bond with each other...and with her. But as their journey ignites a desire she never imagined, their path is violently derailed. Captured by galactic pirates, all bets are off.
Now, trapped in the darkest corners of the galaxy, the three of them must fight as one. Burns Hot and Shines Bright will have to prove they are worth risking everything for—or lose their chance at the Twin-Bond, their destiny, and the woman who belongs to both of them.
**Author’s Note—since Burn and Bright are NOT related, there is a bit of sword crossing in this plus-length novel. (In other words, there is a tiny bit of MM action in this mostly MFM book.) If that’s not for you, please don’t buy.
Thanks! Evangeline
*************FULL BOOK START HERE*************
1
NOELLE
“Damn it! I can’t…quite…reach.” Noelle Rodriguez stood on her tiptoes on the step ladder, reaching far above her head to try and place the glittering gold star on the Christmas tree. She was almost there…the tip of the tree was in reach. Now if only she could manage to slip the bottom of the star over the spiky topmost branch…
Suddenly her center of gravity shifted and she felt the rickety stepstool she was standing on tilting under her. Before she knew it, she was falling, heading straight for the hard metal floor below.
“Madre de Dios!” she gasped, waving her arms frantically, as though she could suddenly learn to fly.
The ground rushed up to meet her but at the last minute a pair of strong arms scooped her up and she found herself being cradled close to a broad, muscular chest.
“Whoa there, my lady,” a masculine voice murmured, and a pair of hazel-green eyes looked down at her worriedly. “Are you all right?” the huge Kindred warrior asked.
It was Shines Brightly—Bright for short. He was a Twin Kindred—a Light Twin to be exact—and he had the sandy brown hair and easy, open mannerisms to prove it. In fact, truth be told, Bright was kind of a flirt, which always made Noelle’s stomach flutter, even though she was sure he was just being nice.
After all, why would a seven-foot tall, handsome, muscular warrior who was ten years younger than her want anything to do with an over-forty divorcee who wasn’t exactly thin? In fact, she was afraid she must be hurting his back, although he held her as though she weighed next to nothing.
“I…I’m fine. Just clumsy, that’s all.” Noelle tried to laugh but it came out shaky and weak. She couldn’t help thinking she’d never been this close to the Light Twin before and up close, he smelled really good—like clean clothes and cedar and some kind of masculine spice that reminded her of the ocean.
Also, he showed no interest in putting her down.
“You’re not clumsy, that stool is too unstable,” he observed, frowning down at the stepstool, lying on its side on the floor as though it was a disobedient dog. “What were you doing up there, anyway?” he asked her. “You don’t need to stretch to reach the topmost branches—let Burn or I do it for you.”
“Oh, you don’t have to—”
“Burn,” Bright called, before she could even finish her sentence. “Come here—we need you.”
Burns Hot, another Twin Kindred, came over to them. He was a Dark Twin, which was easy to tell by his thick black hair and beard. His eyes were so dark they looked like endless pools of midnight. Noelle had never been close enough to the big Dark Twin to be able to tell if they were black or just really dark blue.
To be honest, she found Burn rather intimidating. Even aboard the Kindred Mother Ship, which was filled with seven-foot-tall alien warriors, he stood out in a crowd. He was a head taller than every other male on the ship, for one thing. And there was something about his eyes—a kind of spark far back in their darkness that hinted at hidden violence. Also, he talked only rarely, in a deep, rumbling voice that seemed to resonate through Noelle’s whole body whenever he spoke to her—which wasn’t often. Burn was something of a silent giant—he also wasn’t Bright’s brother.
Twin Kindred always came in pairs—they were together from womb to tomb, living in the same household all their life, sharing a wife and children, and often dying on the very same day. But neither Bright nor Burn had a twin…which was possibly why the two of them had formed such a close friendship, Noelle speculated. She almost never saw the two of them apart.
She knew that Bright had lost his twin at birth but she wasn’t sure how Burn had lost his…and she was too intimidated by the huge warrior to ask him. Not that he talked much—Bright usually played the interpreter for his enormous best friend. He seemed to know what Burn was thinking and often answered questions for him.
“What happened?” Burn asked now. The words seemed to be pulled out of him, as always, and his voice was a low rumble, like boulders rubbing together at the bottom of a riverbed.
“Noelle nearly fell,” Bright explained. “She was trying to reach the top of the Christmas tree.” He looked down at her. “Why were you doing that, anyway? It looks fine to me.” He nodded at the strings of white twinkle lights and the many colorful ornaments that decorated the tree.
“I was trying to put the star on top,” Noelle explained. She was still somehow clutching the star in one hand and she gestured with it. “It’s the finishing touch.”
She told herself she wished that Bright would put her down…but deep down, she didn’t really want him to. She liked being close to him—he smelled so good. But she was probably hurting his back. “You should put me down,” she said to him. “I’m too heavy for you to keep holding me like this.”