Here's my newest cover from Ellora's Cave, for my October 24th release:
Isn't it gorgeous?!?
Book 1 in the Sassy Devils series:
Urian Vakidis loves his job. Not many demons get to make their living--and gain their strength--by invoking sex dreams in women. Well, there were quite a few incubus around, but with all the other demons, relatively speaking he was in a minority. One woman in particular has touched him in ways he'd never dreamed--Hailey Kovac.
But she's off limits. Until she's made a target by the Brotherhood of the Red Claw. It's up to Urian to protect her and find out who's behind the Brotherhood. Because if the delicate balance of good versus evil is upset, chaos would reign. With a little help from his father, the Prince of Darkness himself, he might just be able to save the day.
~ * ~Urian Vakidis settled into a seat in the back and watched as beings of every description filed into the room. This was the meeting of the Brotherhood where the assignments would be handed out--he hoped someone would make mention of the top dog who was doing the handing. After all, that was what he was here to discover.
He straightened his legs, crossing his ankles under the row in front of him, and stretched his arms across the backs of the chairs on either side of him. Maintaining an air of nonchalance, he gazed out over the crowded meeting room, making mental notes of which divisions of Sassy Devils were represented.
There were two werewolves over in a corner eyeing a leprechaun, who edged away from them nervously. A hairy, grayish-green chupacabra sat a few seats away from the wolves, chewing on what looked like a rib bone. Urian peered a little closer... Yep. Rib bone. Probably from some homeless guy no one would miss.
At the front of the room, just taking her seat, was a harpy, wearing some sort of diaphanous purple thing that barely covered…anything. When a sasquatch leaned toward her, a leer on its face, she snarled, showing two-inch canines. To drive home her point, she curled her claws toward the Bigfoot, showing off nails as sharp and pointed as ice picks. The sasquatch backed off and, after fluffing her feathers a bit, the harpy settled into her seat.
Catching movement out of the corner of his eye, Urian glanced toward the right. Just coming into the room was a violet-haired pixie trailing glittering faerie dust in her wake. Her skin had that translucent quality many of the older faes had, indicating this one had probably been around a very long time, indeed.
A lone vampire sat three chairs down and, as if feeling Urian's gaze on him, he turned his head.
Urian tilted his chin in greeting and looked away. Vampires were ordinarily solitary creatures, and for one of them to be a member of the Brotherhood--mingling with all these other beings--meant he had some major anger issues.
Issues Urian didn't have time to get tangled up with. All he wanted to do was prove to his father he could carry out this assignment successfully so he could go back to his real job as a sex demon.
There was nothing like it--easing into women's dreams, arousing them, feeding on that arousal. The psychic energy generated from sex was spectacular and he missed it. With one woman in particular.
Hailey. He remembered her clearly--sea blue eyes, high cheekbones and a dimple in her chin, all framed by short, dark hair. She'd been a sophomore in college when he'd first visited her dreams and he'd watched her grow into a lovely young woman over the years.
Damn, but he wanted to be back in her dreams, bringing her to a fever pitch, drawing out her arousal until she begged him to take her. It had been months. When he had allegedly defected to the Brotherhood, he'd heard that someone else had been assigned to her, a nightmare that had begun to terrorize her.
As soon as he'd heard it, he'd wondered if the nightmare was secretly working for the Brotherhood. Like vampires, nightmares were beings that preferred to be left alone, but could prove to be valuable allies. Or formidable enemies.
And so here
he was, sitting on this damned uncomfortable chair like a bump on an ogre's nose, playing at being a spy.
He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees as he tried to unobtrusively ease the numbness out of his ass. A muscle flexed in his jaw. Lucifer was just trying to get back at him for his continued refusal to take on management responsibilities. The old devil just wouldn't accept that Urian liked his job. He had no desire to sit behind a desk.
He needed to be out in the field. Back in Hailey's dreams.
Get the job done and you're there, he reminded himself. Just get the fucking job done.
His gaze roamed over a group standing near the doorway. He raised his eyebrows as he realized one of them was a guardian angel. Well, he supposed the being was a
former guardian angel, since he was part of this disenfranchised group of misfits.
Urian shook his head. When he'd woken up this morning, he sure didn't think he'd be in a room later on where a goody-two-shoes angel talked amiably with a satyr.
Nearly every subdivision in the Other realm was represented. This just might be worse than they'd thought--and they'd thought it was plenty bad.
Copyright ©2007 Sherrill Quinn. All Rights Reserved.
