Bespoken
A Nightangel and Daydreamer Novel
Book One
Marie Michelle Coleman
Genre: paranormal romance//urban fantasy
Publisher: Suburban Island Publishing
395 pages on Kindle
368 pages in paperback
Word Count: 92,000
Cover Artist: Doug Pecht
Book Description:
Nobody ever told Casey how dangerous a little daydreaming could be.
Casey Sloane appreciates the power of a good daydream. It’s the perfect antidote to the pressures of her hectic life as an associate attorney at a high-powered Washington, D.C. law firm. When the nightangel Gabriel takes up residence in those dreams, Casey is more delighted than surprised. Gabriel is the perfect mixture of danger, otherworldly beauty, and out-and-out temptation required to throw her daydreams into a state of perpetual overdrive.
But when the nightangel sheds his wings and arrives in the real world for a real-time relationship with Casey, she gets a quick education on the unforeseen consequences of secret daydreams.
EXCERPT #1:
The Gabriel of a thousand shaded daydreams drew her back toward him in one firm, proprietary movement. Hard against soft. Dream against dreamer. He fit himself against her so her breath was his and the pounding of her heart must have echoed in both of their ears. His eyes drank her in as she stood wide-eyed in her wet, black dress, trying to relegate his appearance to nothing more than the hallucinatory aftereffects of too much rolling around on petal-strewn beds with make-believe nightangels when you had sworn off them. She felt like she’d gone on a bender after being in a sort of daydream rehab outpatient program that required total abstinence in order to stay free of nightangel-induced complications.
Where was Dr. Drew when you needed him?
The angel tore his gaze away from her image in the mirror and sought out the smooth cream of her shoulders and neck. He marked the place where they curved together with a single shattering kiss. The power of that kiss rendered her motionless within his hands. He’s not real anyway, she told herself. She was not going to squander what was a pretty fantastic not-real moment by over-examining it.
She dropped her head back against the nightangel’s shoulder instead; her face lifted up and away from him, her neck turned and bared. His cool breath fanned the anticipation that heated her skin. She closed her eyes. She waited. Casey knew the spot where his mouth would touch next. She knew it without looking. He pressed his lips against the sweet spot where her pulse beat so Casey almost cried out and then he rained a brutal storm of soft kisses down upon her. They poured along the places where the damp wisps of hair clung to the nape of her neck, across the heat of her flushed cheeks, against the corners of her open breathless lips—rushing, pausing, traveling forward again. He smoothed her brow with these kisses before releasing another hungry deluge of them along the other side of her neck.
She was soothed and panicked by the frosted, urgent pressure of those lips. She could either scream “stop” and see what happened next, or stay still and silent while he kept making her weak in the knees with this onslaught of kisses. She went with not moving or speaking. She had released herself to the moment. She had given herself over to something that could not be happening anyway.
Soft-eyed vampires, sharp-mouthed angels—these were the things of dreams, not reality.
“It’s only a dream.” She murmured the sentence out loud, some of her fear melting under the icy sweetness of his kisses on her skin and her own reassuring words.
Her imagining lifted his head. He smiled at her in the mirror with a certain new understanding. Casey produced a small, nervous smile in answer without meaning to smile at all. The exquisite illusion—even more dazzling than in any of her daydreams—buried his face in her sable hair. His mouth was parted and sighing as it brushed against the silk of it. She thought he might speak. She did not want him to speak. Because if he spoke, he would be real. And if he was real, she was so screwed.
“Casey,” the vision breathed her name.
She was so totally screwed.
EXCERPT #2:
The music rose in her ears. She turned from it. She let it ebb until all she could hear was its echo. She was drifting toward Gabriel and the flame-light. Where she wanted to be was with him—right or not. She didn’t care if it was perilous. Bring it on, angel. And then let’s call it a night.
She approached the arched window of rough gray stone draped in white. She yanked back the curtain, compelled to have at least one glance into the landscape of the dream before leaving. A cry escaped her lips before she could stop it. She could not believe what was spread out before her. The sky was the color of cold mud. The garden below was barren, as if settled into the dead of winter. The roses were blooming though, on leafless stems, mostly prickle and nothing green about them. The flowers themselves were washed out and papery. The wind was a low moan and it flung itself on her now that it was unrestrained by the heavy draperies. She stood there a long time taking it in. She did not see Gabriel but she knew he was nearby. His closeness made her weak and breathless. She wished she were back under his cold wings now—safe and sound, safe with him—but it was too late for that. She laid her hands on the window ledge. She held it tight. She waited for him.
The rough-hewn stone was jagged beneath her fingers. The sky was darker now—rust-red with no light underneath. Sharp little snowflakes began to fly through the air, they cut at the flesh where they touched and began to cover the garden over. The wind smelled of nothing but the cold heart of winter. The blood began to roar in her veins, her pulse to race. She did not have to look. She knew he was there. Draw back, her reason said. Stay a bit longer, her heart responded.
She closed her eyes as he came beside her and when she opened them again it was to a sky a shade of dark lavender she had never seen before. It faded into a crisp, starless black; the wind grew lower and swept the snow away. Now that the scent of rain, green grass, and roses clung to the air, it was warmer. The roses were in full bloom and calling out to her as flowers do in dreams. She glimpsed Gabriel beside her through the veil of her lowered lashes.
“Just a while longer, Casey,” he murmured through lips of hungry red. “Let us come to an understanding. It is important.” He cast a coaxing smile her way; a white, sharp secret lay behind it. The harsh rustle of his transparent wings reverberated in the quiet room.
Yes, there was definitely more of the bloodangel than dreamangel about Gabriel now.
EXCERPT #3:
His eyes shone like the sun through the treetops on a summer day. Casey thought that was kind of crazy considering he was a nightangel and preferred the darkness. All that light raining down on her was banging against her heart like it was a tin roof in a summer thunderstorm. The curve of his lips told her she would be swimming in the fiery glow of his attention if he had his way.
She couldn’t help but admire him. She gazed up at the nightangel, the way an artist studies her own handiwork with proprietary pleasure. He was handsome, more than handsome; he was the definition of masculine in her personal dictionary. His nature was undiluted by modern convention. Everything about him was unequivocally male—strong, purposeful, and confident. He had a little bit of the knight in shining armor thing going but he played by his own rules. And he was smart as hell. Gabriel was perfect. He was everything she had ever wanted in a man and was afraid to get.
A fan of soothing light stretched behind him and Casey realized it was the radiance of the nightangel’s wings spread out at his back. Yes, he was perfect and it didn’t hurt that he had a Class A set of wings sprouting out of his back either. He was some dream. He beamed down at her. The world tipped on its axis.
The dreamangel was looking more irresistible than she had ever remembered him being—and that was saying something because vampires with the wings of fierce angels had a certain natural tendency to hold a mortal in thrall by virtue of their very presence. She tried to shake herself free of the spell he was casting over her. Doing this was difficult. She could not get enough of her angel. Maybe she was a kind of angel-holic. She shouldn’t like nightangels so much. They tended to take advantage of it.
About the Author:
Marie lives in the Washington D.C. area. She believes in the power of a compelling dream, the therapeutic merits of loud music, and the benefits of always being in the middle of reading a great book. Marie has a soft spot for a good romance and likes to laugh. Jane Austen is her favorite author. She'll probably always be a little in love with Mr. Darcy.
She grows roses in her garden but no matter how hard she tries, they don't look anything like the ones in Casey Sloane's daydreams.
Website: http://www.mariemichellecoleman.com/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/M_M_Coleman
Pinterest: http://www.pinterest.com/MarieMColeman/
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/mmichellecoleman
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2 signed print books
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Thanks so much for the spotlight on Bespoken!
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