Guns and Roses Read online
Murder She Writes Presents:
Guns and Roses
“Dead Flowers” © 2012 LJLA, LLC
“Above Reproach” © 2012 Allison Brennan
“The Housewife Assassin's Bloody Valentine”
© 2012 Josie Brown
“Bobbie Faye’s Whacked Out, No Good, Really Sucky, Hot Mess of a Wedding” © 2012 Cajun Ink, LLC
“Blood and Roses” © 2012 Sylvia Day
“Nightfall” © 2012 Laura Griffin
“King of Hearts” © 2012 LJLA, LLC
“A Punishing Night” © 2012 Sophie Littlefield
“Pick Your Poison” © 2012 by Roxanne St. Claire
“Rebel Rose” © 2012 Karin Tabke
ISBN: 978-0-615-60479-4
Editor: Charlotte Herscher
Copy Editor: Debi Murray
Proofreader: Amy Eye
Cover Design: Kim Killion
This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is coincidental. All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without prior written permission from every copyright owner of the individual stories included in this anthology.
This book is dedicated to Debra Webb, our beloved Murder She Writes sister, and the only member of our team who had to sit this one on the bench. Debra's words might not be in this collection, but her indomitable spirit has inspired all of us to write fearless, fierce, fabulous heroines... just like her.
FOREWORD
Synergy is a remarkable phenomenon. From the Greek synergia, meaning to work together, synergy is one of the most powerful forces on earth, driving chemical interactions at the molecular level, taking sports teams to world championships and keeping the kitchen of a five-star restaurant cooking with fire.
On a personal level, the book you are about to read is a quintessential example of synergy, a product greater than the sum of its parts, when ten like-minded, but completely different, creative brains work in partnership toward a single goal. In this case, our goal was simple: to entertain the hell out of you.
We are the authors behind the long-running (and, we say humbly and happily) quite popular MurderSheWrites blog. Started in 2005, the MSW blog has always enjoyed a large and lively audience of readers, writers, and publishing industry experts.
All of us are primarily, but not exclusively, writers of romance and suspense, enjoying a wide spectrum along both those popular bands. Among us, we have over 150 published novels, numerous appearances on the New York Times Bestseller lists, dozens of industry awards, and, yeah, over twenty kids. Thanks to amazing and palpable synergy, we are also close friends who love, respect, admire, and depend upon one another.
So, it was through the marvel of that synergy that the anthology Murder She Writes Presents: Guns and Roses was born.
This is a collection of ten never-before published short stories and novellas, each penned by one of the Murder She Writes bloggers exclusively for this collection, all inspired by our mutual love of suspense and romance. Some of them are dark and tense; others are light and wild and might give you a few new laugh lines. Most are loosely connected to existing popular series, yet all stand entirely alone. Many will make you chuckle, one or two might make you cry, and there are a few that will require the use of a fan and cold water.
We couldn’t be more excited about this groundbreaking project, hoping to give a treat to our loyal readers and open the door to new ones. At the end of each story, you’ll find the author’s bio, with a link to their website, and in the back of the book, there’s a list of each author’s books, should you want to explore more of their works.
The synergy that created this project is alive and thriving every weekday at www.murdershewrites.com —come on by and say hello. Stay to laugh, learn, sigh or cry... we all have a different perspective, but one very special voice.
And now, sit back, click to the next page, and behold the synergy of romance and suspense.
All the best,
Lori, Allison, Josie, Toni, Sylvia, Laura, Sophie, Rocki, and Karin
LORI ARMSTRONG
“With a gutsy heroine, sharp humor, and a strong sense of place, Armstrong has created a winning series…Highly recommended." — Library Journal, starred review
“Dead Flowers”
PI Julie Collins trails cheating lovers, which leads to questions about her relationship with Tony Martinez.
ALLISON BRENNAN
"Fast becoming a master at delivering complex, layered plots and characters that erupt from the page." — RT Book Reviews
“Above Reproach”
Sex crimes detective Selena Black puts her career and life at risk to prove that high-profile attorney Greg Keller is the brutal River City Rapist before he strikes again.
JOSIE BROWN
"…The tone is confessional, the writing laced with venomous humor..." — The Wall Street Journal
“The Housewife Assassin’s Bloody Valentine”
CIA contract assassin Donna Stone’s idea of Valentine's Day?A couple’s massage with her mission’s leader Jack Craig—not breaking out of a Mexican prison, then stopping a massacre by an international terrorist cell.
TONI McGEE CAUSEY
"Toni McGee Causey doesn't just write. She takes prisoners. She grabs you by the heart and the funny bone and carries you off into a world of captivating characters that are a whole bunch of crazy and twice as much fun. Don't try to sleep—you'll be laughing too loud."
— Marshall Karp, NYT bestselling author of Kill Me If You Can, Bloodthirsty and The Rabbit Factory
“Bobbie Faye’s Whacked Out, No Good, Really Sucky, Hot Mess of a Wedding”
Bobbie Faye Sumrall, Cajun Contraband Days Queen, gun expert, and ultimate professional in being in the wrong place at the wrong time, absolutely, positively does not want to go through with the wedding that Trevor's forcing her to agree to, but she soon finds out she has more important things to worry about—like surviving the plot to make her disappear when she's set up as a fall guy for the theft of a priceless religious icon.
SYLVIA DAY
"Wickedly entertaining." — Booklist
“Blood and Roses”
When insurance investigator Anastasia Miller sets out to retrieve the rose-hued pink diamonds stolen in a recent heist, she finds herself working alongside former flame, deputy U.S. Marshal Jake Monroe—the man she loved enough to leave behind.
LAURA GRIFFIN
“The perfect mix of suspense and romance.” — Booklist
“Nightfall”
Alone on an icy road at nightfall, Holly Henriksen puts her trust in a charming stranger and soon discovers he is keeping a dangerous secret.
LORELEI JAMES
“…one of the best parts of these books is the hot cowboys and fantastic sex…but wrapped throughout this amazing series is some of the best erotica that you can read. It’s real, it’s raw and it’s all out there.” — Night Owl Reviews
“King of Hearts,” a Rough Riders short story
Deputy Cam McKay deals with a murder/suicide case on Valentine’s Day.
SOPHIE LITTLEFIELD
"Fans of
quirky mysteries need to grab a Littlefield pronto." — Kirkus
“A Punishing Night”
While investigating the stabbing death of a student at his own alma mater, Detective Joe Bashir confronts painful memories and makes an intriguing new acquaintance.
ROXANNE ST. CLAIRE
“Rip-roaring fun, gripping intensity, and sizzling passion make Roxanne St. Claire the go-to gal for romantic suspense.” — RT Book Reviews
“Pick Your Poison,” A Bullet Catcher Novella
When Bullet Catcher Benjamin Youngblood sets out to track and trap an assassin, he's forced to trust a sexy flower farmer who could be as dangerous as her homegrown poison.
KARIN TABKE
"Tabke masterfully creates sexual tension..." — RT Book Reviews
“Reble Rose”
For Detective Cash Cantrell, hunting down a University serial killer is as routine as strapping on his gun each morning. Until he comes face to face with meddlesome coed, Rebel Yell Culpepper. He doesn't know if he should arrest her or kiss her, but one thing Cash knows for sure, Rebel is key to finding the murderer, and the killer knows it too...
Table of Contents
1. Pick Your Poison - Roxanne St. Claire
2. Nightfall - Laura Griffin
3. Above Reproach - Allison Brennan
4. Dead Flowers - Lori Armstrong
5. Blood and Roses - Sylvia Day
6. Rebel Rose - Karin Tabke
7. A Punishing Night — Sophie Littlefield
8. The Housewife Assassin’s Bloody Valentine - Josie Brown
9. King of Hearts - Lorelei James
10. Bobbie Faye’s Whacked Out, No Good, Really Sucky, Hot Mess of a Wedding
- Toni McGee Causey
Roxanne St. Claire
PICK YOUR POISON
A Bullet Catcher Novella
Chapter One
“You’re firing me?” Benjamin Youngblood looked up from the paperwork his boss had just slid across a polished mahogany table and started to laugh. “Are you fu—”
“Don’t.” Lucy’s hand shot up, silencing him. She cut a glance toward her adjacent office, the door between that sanctuary and this war room wide open. “Little ears. And, yes, this time I’m serious.”
He blew out a breath and stabbed his fingers into his hair to drag back the locks, way too smart to defy Lucy Sharpe and drop an F-bomb within hearing distance of her toddler daughter. Also way too stunned to tease her about how much motherhood had changed the Bullet Catcher’s fierce and fearless leader.
Because it sure as hell hadn’t softened her.
“Lucy, this is ridiculous. I saved that son of a…” He caught himself, pausing to choose each word carefully. “I made the only decision I could make under the circumstances and I’m very sorry if that… that…” How could he describe Governor Roy McManus in childproofed words? “That self-involved, ego-maniacal, hypocritical blow-hard missed a photo op.”
“That blow-hard was our client. Was.”
“And there was a breach in security and a credible threat to the principal, so I called the shots the way I have been trained since the day I walked into this place.” He gestured to include not just the war room, but Lucy’s whole Hudson River valley mansion and the international security firm it housed.
“You made a very costly decision, Ben.”
“To hold him on the tarmac while we assessed the situation, and not allow him near the fence-line where I believed an assassin was waiting? Would have been a helluva lot costlier if he got off that plane and got a bullet in his chest.”
Lucy crossed her arms and regarded him silently, the dramatic upward sweep of eyes that hinted at her Polynesian ancestry only adding to the air of Zen calm that always settled over the woman who’d built the Bullet Catchers into the most elite protection organization in the world.
“What?” he asked when the silence lasted a beat too long.
“You know why you’re in this office at least twice a year having to convince me not to let you go?”
He grinned. “You love to see my pretty face?”
“Your face isn’t your problem, your gut is.”
Like hell it was. “The same gut that’s kept me alive on a daily basis?” He leaned forward, determined to make his point before she cut him off. “The gut that’s kept a few high-powered ambassadors, senators, and European princes alive, too? The gut that screamed ‘trouble’ when Governor McManus landed in Tampa and that last threat came through my private phone line, untraceable and containing personal information about the travel schedule that no one but his damn wife could know? That gut, Lucy? The one I need to do my goddamn job?”
“Your gut and your short fuse.” All the Zen evaporated as she pushed back from the conference table and power-strode across the room. At the entrance to her private office, she peeked in and then closed the door without making a sound.
“They help me do my job,” he said. “And you are the queen of instinct calls.”
“Your job and an ‘instinct call’ have to be done without interfering with our client’s work. That’s why politicians and CEO’s and legions of other world-beaters hire the Bullet Catchers—because we don’t hinder their success or stop their campaigns while we keep them alive.”
“McManus’s re-election campaign would have come to a screeching halt if the bastard was dead.”
She didn’t answer, slowly crossing the war room, a sea of computer monitors blinking non-stop behind her, all broadcasting the whereabouts and assignment status of every Bullet Catcher on the planet. Those screens tracked easily over forty bodyguards, investigators, weapons experts, and the occasional reformed thief.
His light, he noticed, had been snuffed out. Shit. Ben had been with this company for almost six years, taken off the mean streets of L.A. at twenty-two, a little Comanche, a little Cree, and a lot of trouble. He’d been saved by one of Lucy’s top men and trained to be a key player in her organization.
His life had purpose now, and he’d do anything, absolutely anything, to keep this job. But when Lucy made up her mind, Heaven and Hell had to move to change it.
Then he’d move Heaven and Hell, damn it. He just wasn’t entirely sure how.
Lucy let out a slow sigh, sinking into the leather chair across from him and resting her elbows on the table. “We lost the client, Ben. Even you have never cost me a paying account before.”
“McManus is a loose cannon.”
“Don’t make excuses,” she fired back at him. “He’s the governor of Florida, well-connected, vocal, and pays a small fortune for private protection on his campaign. A small fortune that is now being paid to a far-less capable competitor, I might add.” She shook her head. “I can’t imagine why he’d settle for that operation.”
“Well, they’d better be on their game because someone’s gunning for that guy.”
He expected an argument, but Lucy drew her brows together. “I trust you’ve triple checked every lead to the incoming threats?”
“Quadruple checked, and the bitch of it is they have to be coming from someone close to him. They know too much.”
She glanced down at the files spread out before her. “But you didn’t find a weapon at the fence-line, and you were certain there would be one, based on the content of the text.”
“I did find some things.”
She arched a brow. “Yes, I saw the unaccounted for items after you cleared the area. Let’s see…” She fluttered a piece of paper, pretending to read. “We have a jar of homemade pepper jelly, a notebook of handwritten poetry, and a bouquet of roses. Not exactly the tools of a trained killer, or does your gut think the assassin makes jelly and pens poetry?”
He ignored the sarcasm. “All those items are in the lab now, being broken down to their last molecule. It might interest you to know that the poetry book had been wiped clean of fingerprints.”
She nodded, obviously appreciating how unusual that was. “And the jelly?”
“A little spicy
, but not toxic,” he admitted. “However, the roses intrigue me.”
“How so?”
“They were black, symbolizing death if you follow those kinds of things. I happen to think that’s a very strange thing to give a politician on the fence-line of a rally.”
“Black roses? Dyed or natural?”
“According to the lab, they were a rare genetically engineered breed of red so deep, they appear black. They’re known in the trade as Black Cherries, and only a few horticulturalists in the country grow them. The closest grower in four states happens to be in the governor’s backyard, not an hour from the state capitol.” He let his tone make it clear that couldn’t be a coincidence. “If that grower can supply the names of every florist who purchased those roses in the last week, we could trace those sales records and, maybe match one of the rally attendees.”
“That’s a long shot.”
“The best kind.”
“He’s not even our client anymore, Ben.”
As if he needed to be reminded of that. “Look, I don’t want to lose this job. I know my decision cost us this client, but…” But what? He couldn’t bring McManus’s business back, could he? “I’d like another chance.”
Inhaling slowly, she divided her gaze between his face and the termination paperwork. After a moment, she pushed the papers closer to him. “I’m sorry.”
Shit. Desperation squeezed his chest. He would not pick up that pen and sign. “Let’s make a deal, Lucy.”