In this month’s newsletter:

• Last chance to buy MYSTICAL MAGIC set (ever)
• Who wants an ARC of HARD RHYTHM? (Reply!)
• Reviewers needed for The Prince’s Boy box set! Releases this week!
• Why erotica is political (in a good way)
• DGC 7th anniversary (wow)

Reply Now if you want a Hard Rhythm ARC!

Look what just came from my publisher! Advanced Reading Copies (ARCs) of my upcoming BDSM romance novel, Hard Rhythm! They only sent me 10 of these this time, so the first ten people to hit “REPLY” and say you want HARD RHYTHM — and include your mailing address! — I’ll ship these out. I of course would always highly appreciate an honest review on Amazon or Goodreads, but really this is mostly about giving newsletter readers something special.

This is the third in the Secrets of a Rock Star series and tells the story of Chino Garcia and Madison Rofel. I had a great time telling the story of these two kinky souls finding each other. ARCs are pre-releases so they haven’t been proofread yet: the final book will be out in January and will have fixed typos and some smoothed out sentences here and there, but there are no major changes. So if you don’t mind a few typos, this is the only way to get your hands on the book right now!

It’s also up for pre-order, of course:
IndieBound (local independent bookstores!) | Amazon | Walmart (!) | Barnes & Noble | Apple iBooks | Google Play | Kobo

Last Chance to Grab Mystical Magic

The 17-book paranormal ebooks box set known as Mystical Magic (Shades of Prey Book 2) is going away on November 20th! So if you want to grab all 17 novels for one low price of 99 cents, do it right away. My novel MIND GAMES, which I excerpted last newsletter, is in it.

AMAZON: https://bit.ly/MystMagicBox

B & N: https://bit.ly/MystMagicBN

KOBO: https://bit.ly/MystMagicKO

Thinky Thoughts

Did you know that reading and writing erotica and erotic romance is a political act? I truly believe it is, and I’ll tell you why. It doesn’t matter whether you are liberal or conservative, the results of the U.S. presidential election have really shaken people up. Hate crimes here have skyrocketed since Trump’s election, and sexual assault incidents keep happening as a result of Trump’s infamous video where he says he can just “grab them by the pussy,” where women are literally getting grabbed in the crotch by men they know who say “now that Trump’s president, I can do this to you.” To which I say, no, you can’t. “This is okay now.” No, it isn’t.

When Nixon was in office that didn’t give us all license to be crooks, and Bill Clinton having an affair with an intern didn’t mean it was okay for men to cheat on their wives, either. Sorry, guys, that’s not the way it works. Women, it’s up to us to push back, speak up, and be strong. (But we’re not all strong, so those who are need to speak up for those who can’t.) Amazingly, so many women I know have found that strength through erotic fiction, through writing it or reading it (or both!). When women write erotic fiction and erotic romance we’re often telling the story of a woman’s inner strength and about the way a woman learns the importance of passion and her sexuality. It’s not an accident that the heroine learns at the same time how to be strong and how to love with her whole self. When we read a book we live through the experiences of the character, we learn the lessons they learn. It’s not always easy, but the messages do sink in. And just as we have a right to choose our reading pleasure, we have a right to determine our own sexual pleasure: when, with whom, and on what terms.

When we write erotic fiction we claim space in the world, on the bookshelf and in the world of ideas, for women’s fiction, women’s sexuality, and women’s priorities. How often is the story in a romance about a woman bringing out the inherent or buried goodness and nobility in a man? Right now that’s the kind of wish fulfillment I can get behind.

One More Giveaway: Gay Bonus Story/Box Set

The Prince’s Boy Box Set is releasing on November 15th! That’s this week. It includes one new bonus story about Jorin and Kenet (with Sergetten) called “Jorin’s New Spell.”

The box set desperately needs reviews to be posted on November 15th and 16th on Amazon (as well as anywhere else, but especially Amazon). If you’ll promise me an honest review to be posted on the 15th (or at least within the first week – Nov 21st) I’ll send you an ebook review copy (epub or mobi format). Just hit reply and put “The Prince’s Boy reviewer” in your subject line and I’ll send you back the review copy.

IF YOU ALREADY REVIEWED THE PREVIOUS VOLUME(S) of The Prince’s Boy, Amazon won’t transfer the review, unfortunately. BUT, if you’ll copy or summarize your review again on the new box set product page, I’ll happily send you the box set (or just the bonus story if you prefer) as well. The reviews don’t have to be new, just new to the box set page. 🙂

Or just pre-order at:
Amazon | Barnes&Noble | Smashwords

Works in Progress

I’ve been working hard on the final rewrite of Initiates of the Blood, the first book in The Vanished Chronicles, my upcoming urban fantasy/paranormal series from Tor Books. It’s slated for Summer 2017 release, so you’ll hear plenty more about it in upcoming newsletters, I’m sure.

The rewrite has been tricky and trying to make sure I’m completely happy with it is my current goal. This book has a deeply personal strand in it for me and I really want it to be the absolute best it can be. It’ll be out of my hands by Thanksgiving, and in yours  in the summer!

This month’s fiction

Here’s a chapter of The Prince’s Boy! It’s chapter seventeen, so it’s a ways into the story. If you’d like to sample the book without spoilers, you can currently read chapters one through ten online at Circlet.com.

Our heroes here are Kenet, the prince, and Jorin, his whipping boy. They’ve been inseparable since childhood and in recent years discovered the joy of jerking each other off in bed at night.

Jorin is learning to fight from the king’s guards, as he hopes to replace Bear as Kenet’s personal guard as a way to remain close to Kenet, who can’t keep a whipping boy after he has his coming of age ceremony. But Kenet is being secretly trained for the ceremony by the court mage (who wants to enslave him) and has a spell on him that prevents him from telling anyone about the training.

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Chapter 17: Jorin

“Tcha. You just need to suck the heat out of it,” Bear said, drawing up water from the pump behind the stable and soaking my shirt with it, then pressing the wet, wadded cloth against my eye.

I did not flinch from the pressure or the cold. The chill dulled the pain, and in some way I couldn’t explain the feeling of Bear’s other hand, holding my head steady, felt as soothing as the cloth itself. I stayed still, then he pressed my own hand against the cloth and went back to pump up more of the water so cold it was nearly ice.

I had taken a boot heel to the temple and all around my eye was swollen. The king’s guard were not exactly welcoming of me, but then I hadn’t expected them to be. This sort of training was supposed to be difficult. Hand to hand fighting was not supposed to be polite. It was a far cry from the genteel fencing that Kenet had practiced with me a few years ago.

I shivered as a trickle of the chill water ran down my chest when Bear replaced the cloth with another.

“Your face won’t be very nice to look at over the banquet table tonight,” he said gravely. “It might be best if you beg off.”

“Do you think so?” I sat up straighter, as if someone might be evaluating my manners even now. “Kenet will be unhappy without me there.”

Bear just sighed heavily.

I had known him too long to let that pass. “Something the matter?”

“He hasn’t been too happy of late, has he?” Bear asked.

“No.” We had not touched each other again, not in that way, since the night I had sucked him and found his seed to be bitter like poison. “He’s not well,” I finally said, in a low voice. “I don’t know what it is, but he’s definitely ill.”

Bear just looked at me and gave a small nod.

“I don’t know what to do for him. It isn’t like a fever.” I could take the physical punishments his father wanted to hand down, but I could not take the prince’s ailments or injuries for him, though I wished I could. Was that why his seed had tasted the way it had—illness?

“He doesn’t seem to have a pox,” Bear agreed. He shook his head. “Something’s changed, though.” He fixed me with a look then, and opened his mouth to say something, then thought better of it, getting to his feet instead. “Come on. Come up to my quarters and let me put some salve on that.”

I followed him silently back to the castle. Neither of us spoke again until he had shut the door firmly behind us and latched it.

His quarters had a small front room with a carved wooden table far more ornate than one would expect to see in a burly guard’s room. For all I knew, though, this had once been a lady’s maid’s room, and Bear had just never changed the furniture. He sat me on the chair and himself on a footstool as he opened the jar of salve.

“I can do it,” I offered, holding my hand out for the jar.

“You can’t see where the bruise is,” he said.

“I can surely feel it. Besides, have you a mirror?”

“Tcha. Suit yourself, cub.” He handed me the jar and then opened what I had taken for a cabinet above the table, but turned out to be a mirror behind the doors.

He folded his arms and did not speak again until I was done, and had closed the doors over the mirror again.

“Bear,” I said, handing him back the jar, “you’re acting strange.”

“They say spirits can see from the other sides of mirrors,” he said in a low voice.

I frowned. “That’s just a superstition.”

“Hush up. It isn’t ghosts I’m worried about, if you catch my meaning.”

I shook my head. “I don’t. And you’re worrying me.”

“And Kenet is worrying me.” He put the jar into a small chest of drawers. “Listen. Has something changed between you two? Something… physical?”

I hesitated before answering. Up until now, we’d always left everything unsaid, only hinted at, meaning that Bear could always pretend he didn’t know. “Bear…” Telling him meant making him complicit in what we did. “Tell me what you think is wrong with him,” I said, instead.

He took a breath, weighing his own words. “Maybe it’s my fault, for introducing you to the maids downstairs.”

“Oh, Bear…” I slumped a little in the chair. “It’s nothing like that. I mean… well, perhaps it is, but…” My cheeks flushed as I tried to think of how to explain without incriminating myself or him.

“Cub,” he said in a serious whisper, “if you’ve been lovers, and you suddenly stopped…”

I shook my head urgently. “We only… we only touch each other. It’s not…” Not as if we lay together like a man and a woman.

He seemed to understand. “Have you, then? Lately?”

“Touched?” I dropped my gaze. “Not much. He hasn’t wanted to.”

Bear shook his head. “You had best try it, then.”

“But he…”

“If it’s what he’s been missing, then that’s what he needs,” Bear hissed urgently. “You’re the only one who can take care of it. For him. I know it’s not what you’re supposed to…”

“I don’t mind,” I said quickly. “I’d do anything for him, you know.” It wasn’t as if I had any pride to lose or could even feel shame, after I’d spent my childhood bare-arsed in front of most of the court on a regular basis. What I couldn’t explain to Bear was that Kenet had actually begged me not to undress that time, and we had not bared ourselves to each other since.

“Please try,” he urged me. “And tell me how he does. If he doesn’t seem obviously better, that is.”

I put my palm over my swollen eye. “At least my face isn’t what he looks at when we do it,” I half-joked.

Bear hissed, scandalized but amused nonetheless.

That night, at Bear’s advising, I begged off attending banquet, and was not wholly surprised that Kenet did as well. We had a little light food brought to our room, then sent the dishes away quickly, which I thought boded well for my plans for him that evening.

I couldn’t help it when I saw the mirror there, set on the wall by the dressing table. I covered it with a scarf. Bear had made me superstitious.

My heart was hammering in my chest as I contemplated what I was going to do next, though. If he pushed me away or said no, it would be more painful than a boot to the face.

There was no putting it off. I slipped my hands around his waist from behind, my palms finding his flat stomach under the loose tunic he wore. His breath caught, but he said nothing, neither encouraging nor discouraging me.

I ran one hand down the front of his trousers, gently rubbing as I kissed the back of his neck and nibbled on the fine hairs behind his ear. I could feel him swell gradually, finally making a sound of surrender as he came to his full length, the leaking head of his prick pushing up above the edge of his breeches. I continued to rub outside the cloth, until he was rutting into my palm, swiping the thumb of my other hand through the slick issue gathered at the slit.

“It’s not healthy for you to go so many days without release,” I whispered in his ear.

He froze then, and I could just feel it was not like when he went stiff with desire. I nearly pulled back, stung by the thought that he had been giving himself release when we were not together, but then thinking that was exactly what I had been doing. When had I decided that Kenet’s pleasure was mine and mine alone? Just because it had been, or had seemed to be, didn’t mean it always would be, did it?

I ran my lips along his ear and then whispered to him. “Oh, I see, been having it off without me, have you?”

“No, no…” he tried to protest, but feebly.

I clucked my tongue. “Don’t lie to me, my prince. If you’ve been getting your regular release, I cannot fathom why your skin looks so grey, your eyes so dull… unless that it’s my touch you’ve been in need of…”

His breath caught. “Oh yes! Please…” He bucked into my palm. “Jorin… oh, Jorin…”

My name on his lips always inflamed me. I felt my own cock throbbing in my trousers. “Bed,” I said, rubbing against his hip, and then pushing him toward his bed. Before he had even climbed atop the coverlet, I had shed my clothing and soon climbed after him.

He lay back and loosened his laces but had not disrobed. “Lie still,” I told him. “Let me unwrap you like a gift from a faraway court.”

He did, letting me undo his clothes and reveal him bit by bit. I kissed what I found as I uncovered it, his collarbone, his shoulder, his nipple. His belly, his hipbone, his cock.

I lay atop him then, rutting gently in the hollow of his hip and thinking of something the baron had said to his wife, and something one of the soldiers had said to taunt the man whose erection had interrupted practice. “Kenet,” I asked softly. “Do you like how I touch you?”

He propped himself up on his elbows, as if he couldn’t answer that while lying flat on his back. “Jorin, of course. Every… every touch you’ve made, I’ve enjoyed. And I’ve enjoyed doing the same to you.”

“Even when it wasn’t just our hands, but our mouths?” I pressed.

He nodded, solemn. What was going on in his head? Why had these touches and games between us become something that made him so grave? I thought about how just a few weeks ago there had been a night he’d begged me to touch him with an urgency I hadn’t understood. I still didn’t.

“Kenet,” I whispered. “Do you want more from me?”

“What do you mean?” His eyes were silver in the lamplight.

I crawled up him a bit more to kiss him, forcing him to lie back, and then looked down into his eyes while I continued. “I know it’s not easy to speak of. But Kenet, we’re not children anymore.”

He just swallowed and looked up at me, waiting to hear what I would say.

“Do you want me to…” How could I ask this? “There is a way two men can lie together like a man and a maid,” I said, reaching up to stroke the blond silk of his hair. “Do you want me that way, my prince?”

His eyes were wide and for a moment I was certain the word that was forming on his lips was “yes.” But what he said was, “We can’t.”

“That isn’t what I asked,” I said, my heart trying to kick as hard as the soldier who had left me bruised. “I asked if you wanted to.” Just to be clear, I added, “It matters not to me which of us plays the part of the maid.”

He stared, jaw moving as if he were trying to say something but I had shocked the words right out of his mouth. “Jorin…”

“You can say no, my prince. Just please… tell me what you want. Have I done something to displease you?”

“What? No! Jorin, of course not…”

“Then why haven’t you wanted to touch?” I rutted again against him, then shifted so that my cock ran along his, holding myself up on my arms. “I thought you weren’t afraid of us getting caught.”

He shook his head suddenly. “It’s not that.”

“Then what, my prince? You haven’t seemed yourself lately. I know I used to make you happy. I can only assume I’ve been failing to do that lately. Do I make you unhappy?”

“No,” he said softly, pulling me down into a kiss. His tongue was as luxurious as the velvet of his robes. I would never tire of tasting it. “No, it’s not you at all.”

“Someone else then,” I teased, and was shocked to see the truth of that pass through his eyes. I stared incredulously. “Someone else?” I repeated.

“I can’t explain,” he said, almost frantic. “I literally can’t.”

I was trying to figure out what he could mean by that when he slipped his hands over my buttocks, urging me to rut against him harder. My cock slipped into the hollow of his hip again, and as I pushed harder against him I groaned involuntarily. An image leapt suddenly to the fore of my mind: me bending him over the way the baron had his wife, pushing my cock into his body.

“I would be the maid,” he said, voice trembling. “For you. If you wanted.” His hands continued to pull at me, setting me into a rhythm.

I panted softly at his ear. “But you, would you want it, Kenet? I wouldn’t try to…”

“I want it,” he blurted suddenly. “I do. But I can’t.” He moaned, his hips rocking, rubbing his own cock against me with every thrust, too.

“Why?” I asked, without really thinking about the question.

Which was why his answer surprised me so very much. “It would make a hole in my psychic armor,” he said, quite seriously.

“It would?” I was so shocked I nearly stopped moving, which only made him tug at me with an even hungrier desperation.

“It would,” he assured me. “I can’t tell you how I know. I can’t.”

Can’t. He had insisted it more than once now. Had he been sworn not to tell me? I wondered if Sergetten had something to do with it. But Sergetten had been gone for weeks. Had he read it in a book while studying in the archives? They said there were some secrets contained in magical tomes that once learnt could not be spoken without the subject being cursed, but like spirits in mirrors I had thought them just old wives’ tales.

“I shan’t do it, then,” I said, “if it would damage you. I would never hurt you, Kenet. You know that.”

He nodded, eyes suddenly bright with tears.

“Tell me how you want to come, then,” I said. “You do want to come, don’t you?”

He nodded.

“In my mouth?” I asked.

He shook his head. “Either… either just like this, or the old way, with your hand.”

I slipped to one side of him and circled his shaft with my fingers, but he hissed as if the pressure were too much, so I loosened my grip. He moaned with pleasure at that, and I slid the loose skin there up and down his prick.

“You…” He spoke haltingly, breath catching as he got close. “You come too…”

“I will,” I assured him. “But this time you first.”

He didn’t argue—he didn’t have time to. He was spilling in hot spurts into my fingers, then.

And then there was a banging on the door. “Jorin! You’re being summoned.”

Both of our heads jerked up at that, and then we were in a mad scramble for our clothes. “But Bear…!” Kenet was saying.. “I haven’t done anything!”

He pulled open the door once I got my breeches closed over my still quite stiff rod.

Bear’s expression was dark. “The King is insisting on you both. I don’t know what you did, Kenet, but he’s very displeased.”

I had a sinking feeling in my gut. “Are we to meet him in his chambers?”

Bear shook his head. “Banquet hall. I’m sorry, cub.”

I let out a laugh. “Not like they haven’t all seen it before. Well, except for this part.” I gestured at the erection still visible through the cloth.

He growled. “Do what you can to get rid of it, eh? It’s scandalous enough what he’s doing, you both full grown and all.”

“Then why’s he doing it?” I asked.

“Don’t know, cub. But I guarantee it will be considered your fault, not his, if you scandalize the court with that sausage of yours.”

“Bear!” Kenet had finally spoken, a shocked exclamation.

Bear put a hand on his shoulder. “It’s time you were growing up, my prince,” he said. “I think your father’s decided now is the time. That’s what this is really all about.”

“Then I’ll have to take it like a man,” I said, chuckling again and pretending it was nothing. “You know he always feels better after he exerts himself. Come on, Kenet. Everything will be fine after he’s done with me.” I smacked my erection a few times to see if it would flag. It didn’t. Perhaps it would wilt when I was finally faced with our angry monarch.