April in Atlantis
Alyssa Day
(Poseidon’s Warriors #4)
Publication date: November 5th 2018
Genres: Adult, Romance, Suspense
She’s Poseidon’s first and only female warrior…When April, Poseidon’s first-ever female warrior, meets Pine–“don’t call me a werewolf” — prince of the European wolf shifters, she saves his life and then gives him the finger, because the sound of his sexy Scottish accent when he said “I think I’m in love, lass” gave her shivers in places shivers had no right to be. She’s a warrior, not a werewolf groupie. But now she’s trapped between the werewolf who wants her and the werewolf who wants her dead.He’s Europe’s werewolf prince…Pine wanted April the moment he saw her, just before she saved his life. Then he knew he must make her his. But the appearance of his long-lost and presumed-dead twin complicates Pine’s plans, and this time it’s April’s life at stake. Together, April and Pine are so much stronger than they are apart, but the heat between them may be enough to burn down the world.Can two such unlikely allies find their way past danger to love? Or will mutual seduction be the beginning of the end?Warning: This book contains magic, Atlantis, Poseidon, warriors, a wolf shifter, an evil twin, archery, wolf cubs, Europe, Scotland, Scottish accents, a king and queen, sibling rivalry, a black sheep, bad boys, paranormal romance, fantasy, matchmaking, laughter, danger, kisses, and a happily ever after. Read at your own risk!
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EXCERPT:
For April's first-ever mission as the newest of Poseidon's warriors, she walked through the portal from Atlantis straight into hell.
Or, at least, it felt like hell. Actually, it was someplace called Florida. But it was as hot as any of the nine levels of hell, and she, Denal, and the palace guards who had come with them had materialized directly on a roof top overlooking a huge battle.
April was glad the sound of the fighting masked the sound she must have made when she swallowed, hard. She looked to her team leader and was proud of how steady her voice was. “How do we know who's on our side?”
Denal glanced back over his shoulder at her and laughed. “They’re the ones who're not trying to kill us."
April heard a shout and saw Jake--one of her new team who'd been assigned to this mission earlier--waving at them from across the courtyard of the giant stone building to where she and the others stood on a structure like an old castle keep.
“About time you joined the party!"
Dan didn’t answer him, but grinned and leapt off the roof and landed on his feet in the middle of a group of fierce combatants. The palace guards, who were not part of the elite group named Poseidon's Warriors, but strong fighters, all, followed him down to join the fight, but April stayed where she was. Her specialty was the bow, and it was a distance weapon. She took a deep breath and started doing what she did best, although this time she aimed her arrows at living targets instead of wooden ones. She flinched every time one of her arrows struck a man.
One.
Two.
Three.
By the fourth, she no longer flinched, but set her jaw and continued searching out any of the humans who were threatening members of her team or the innocent children and even adults who scurried around below, trying to hide. She scanned the courtyard, but most of the fighting was hand-to-hand—many of the attackers must be shifters, from their battle tactics. When she glanced back down at the staircase leading up to her position, two large and heavily muscled men were battling the Atlantean guards, clearly intent on getting to her. She narrowed her eyes and pulled two arrows from her quiver, snapped them against her leg once for luck, and drew both at once.
She'd fired two at once successfully many, many times before, on targets and on game birds,
and she had it in mind to teach these shifters a lesson. Denal had told them the context of this raid. A group of rogue shifters planned to force the Transition onto unsuspecting humans against their wishes and without their consent. Even if any of the humans survived the horribly dangerous first shift, the person they'd become would be changed forever—considered to have been murdered, under human law.
Not that April gave much of a crap about human law. But for once, this one had right on its side. Nobody deserved to be forced into the shift. She shuddered at the idea of being forced to turn into an animal once a month, like it or no. Not for her. She preferred controlling her own life, thank Poseidon.
Four more shifters suddenly charged the group at the base of the stairs and two of them hurled their bodies over the men there, landing halfway up the stairs. April aimed both her arrows, but before she could release them another shifter bounded up from the side of the staircase, clearing the shifters and placing his body between them and April, with his back to her. He laughed and motioned to the shifters to come for him but didn't try to threaten April in any way.
Huh. He must be on her side.
Well, that pissed her off.
"I don't need your help," she called out. "Get out of my way. You're blocking my shot."
"And from what I've seen, lass, you're death herself with that bow, but I'm too much of a gentleman to allow you to take them on all alone," he returned, with a deep, honey-rough Scottish burr to his voice that sent unwelcome tingles through her body.
When he turned to look at her, the tingles turned into lightning strikes. He was beautiful. Not in a perfect, untouchable, man-in-a-painting way, but in a seriously hot, totally masculine, virile, primal, oh dear Goddess kind of way.
He also had one blue eye and one green eye, both of which widened noticeably when he looked at her.
And he was still blocking her shot.
The shifters took advantage of his momentary distraction and lunged forward.
"Duck!" April shouted, pulling her bow string, and the Scot immediately dropped. April aimed, breathed, and released.
The Scot stood and watched the shifters fall off the stairs to crash onto the ground below, and then he whistled.
"Nice shot, Red."
Two more of the shifters made it to the stairs and rushed them before April could shoot the man for the "Red" comment, but this time the Scot took them out so fast that she didn't see what weapon he used, only that their throats were cut.
And they were dead. Like the two she'd slain.
The sight of the blood and the slashed throats suddenly cut through April's fierce bravado like a hot knife through a mound of Atlantean butter. She'd killed a man.
She'd killed…people.
Several lay dead in the courtyard with her arrows in them.
The sound and motion of the battle went silent in her brain, drowned out by the ringing in her head. She'd killed.
She was a killer.
A killer who was finding it hard to breathe.
She fell back against the stone wall, throwing her bow to the ground, and tried to suck air into her burning lungs, finally succeeding just as the Scot ran up the stairs and stopped in front of her.
"Are you all right then, lass? A battle can be a fearsome thing for one as young as you, no matter how courageous and skilled you are. My sister—"
"Don't," she cut him off, before inhaling and exhaling deeply.
"Don't?"
"Don’t call me lass. Or Red. Or compare me to your sister. I'm one of Poseidon's Warriors, and my job is to protect your pathetic human ass. So, don't condescend—"
He held up his hands, and those fascinating eyes of his warmed. "No condescension here. I'm Pine. You saved my life. Thank you."
"I—" she began hotly, but then stopped. He'd thanked her. He'd thanked her? The whirl in her mind couldn't keep up with any of this. "You're welcome," she muttered, but then the wicked grin that instantly lit up his face told her that she'd fallen into some kind of trap.
"I saved your life, too," he said smugly. "You should at least tell me your name."
She looked at him for a long moment and then glanced over his shoulder to be sure nobody else was trying to sneak up and kill them. "April," she finally said, only because he had kind of done so, even if she hadn't needed him to. "Now get out of my way. We have a battle to win."
His sharp eyes narrowed, and she had the feeling that he missed nothing, and in fact had been continually scanning their surroundings. "Of course, lass. But first, you owe me a forfeit, don't you think?"
That seductively wicked smile slowly spread across his face. "I'll settle for a kiss."
Her mouth fell open and then she snapped it shut. "Settle for this."
And then she punched him right in his beautiful mouth.
Author Bio:
Alyssa Day is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of more than forty novels filled with kissing, laughter, mystery and magic. Alyssa's paranormal series include the Poseidon's Warriors and Cardinal Witches paranormal romances and the Tiger's Eye Mysteries paranormal mysteries. In an Alyssa Day book, the good guys (and gals!) always win and happily ever after always prevails!
Alyssa's many awards include Romance Writers of America's prestigious RITA award for outstanding romance fiction, and the RT Reviewer's Choice Award for Best Paranormal Romance novel of 2012. Her books have been translated into a zillion languages but she's still holding out for Klingon.
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