Revealing Silver Read online

  Revealing Silver

  By Jamie Craig

  Two couples, crossed in time…

  Nathan Pierce is intent on bringing a hardened criminal to justice, and his lover, Remy Capra, is driven to save the fugitive’s latest captive. But in the process, Remy is thrown back in time—again. The only person who can help her get back to Nathan in the present is the only man they trust, his former partner Isaac McGuire.

  Isaac will do whatever he can to reunite Remy and Nathan, but he has his own problems in the here and now. His beloved Olivia still doesn’t understand her psychic visions or their strange connection to the mysterious Silver Maiden coins. But to save Remy, she must learn to control her visions instead of letting them control her.

  Can these two couples work together across the boundaries of time to find future happiness?

  Book 3 of the Silver Maiden Trilogy.

  78,000 words

  Dear Reader,

  What do you get when you cross summer with lots of beach time, and long hours of traveling? An executive editor who’s too busy to write the Dear Reader letter, but has time for reading. I find both the beach and the plane are excellent places to read, and thanks to plenty of time spent on both this summer (I went to Australia! And New Zealand!) I’m able to tell you with confidence: our fall lineup of books is outstanding.

  We kick off the fall season with seven romantic suspense titles, during our Romantic Suspense celebration the first week of September. We’re pleased to offer novella Fatal Destiny by Marie Force as a free download to get you started with the romantic suspense offerings. Also in September, fans of Eleri Stone’s sexy, hot paranormal romance debut novel, Mercy, can look forward to her follow-up story, Redemption, set in the same world of the Lost City Shifters.

  Looking to dive into a new erotic romance? We have a sizzling trilogy for you. In October, look for Christine D’Abo’s Long Shot trilogy featuring three siblings who share ownership of a coffee shop, and each of whom discover steamy passion within the walls of a local sex club. Christine’s trilogy kicks off with Double Shot.

  In addition to a variety of frontlist titles in historical, paranormal, contemporary, steampunk and erotic romance, we’re also pleased to present two authors releasing backlist titles with us. In October, we’ll re-release four science fiction romance titles from the backlist of CJ Barry, and in November four Western romance titles from the backlist of Susan Edwards.

  Also in November, we’re thrilled to offer our first two chick lit titles from three debut authors, Liar’s Guide to True Love by Wendy Chen and Unscripted by Natalie Aaron and Marla Schwartz. I hope you’ll check out these fun, sometimes laugh-out-loud novels.

  Whether you’re on the beach, on a plane, or sitting in your favorite recliner at home, Carina Press can offer you a diverting read to take you away on your next great adventure this fall!

  We love to hear from readers, and you can email us your thoughts, comments and questions to [email protected]. You can also interact with Carina Press staff and authors on our blog, Twitter stream and Facebook fan page.

  Happy reading!

  ~Angela James

  Executive Editor, Carina Press

  www.carinapress.com

  www.twitter.com/carinapress

  www.facebook.com/carinapress

  This book is dedicated to all our friends who were at the beginning of this journey. I’d also like to dedicate it to Nathan, Remy, Isaac and Olivia because it would have never been finished if it wasn’t for them. They demanded their story be told.

  Contents

  Copyright

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter One

  Every inch of Remy Capra tingled as they approached Gabriel de los Rios’s house. Her mouth from the impromptu kiss she’d laid on Nathan before they got out of the car. Her skin from the adrenaline surging through her body as they approached the darkened house. Her instincts from…well, who knew why they were tingling, but she wasn’t questioning the way they kept her on alert. Nathan, Olivia and Isaac might be interested in bringing Gabriel to justice, but Remy only cared about one thing.

  Save the girl.

  Guards patrolled the front yard of the San Dimas residence, but the unprotected rear offered safer entry. Slivers of moonlight speckled the tall hedges lining the driveway as Detective Isaac McGuire led their party to the kitchen door.

  Every second it took him to jimmy the lock pounded against her brain. Slipping into the kitchen was almost a relief, except the heat made her think she was back in the fucking jungle. It almost smelled like the jungle, too, sour and earthy. It made her gag a little.

  Nathan glanced back at her, his small smile reassuring. How could he do that? Make her feel safe on her way to a probable death. She wanted to kiss him just because she was so damned grateful they were together. It might be the end, but Remy wasn’t afraid of her own death. As long as Nathan was by her side, she could face anything.

  She settled for squeezing his fingers, conveying as much as she could. She wasn’t always the best with words, but Nathan always understood. His answering squeeze reminded her that he believed in her, that he’d never leave her side. His hand also stopped her from reaching for one of the two blades she had strapped to her thigh. Not yet. Not here.

  Patience. Nathan’s favorite lesson. She sucked at it.

  When Isaac finally gestured for them to venture deeper into the kitchen, Nathan nodded at her once and released her hand. She stepped past him but stuck close, leaning against his chest when Isaac brought them to a stop. Each throb of his heart focused her. Guided her with its familiar rhythm, like it guided her through every day in her new life.

  Save the girl.

  Simple enough. They’d already found her, thanks to Olivia. Nathan and Isaac had years of training and experience doing this kind of thing. So did Olivia. Twenty years of living on the streets had taught her all she needed to know about surviving the night. Gabriel was scary, but hardly the scariest thing she’d ever faced. This wasn’t their first rodeo. Isaac stiffened and Remy knew he heard it too. Chanting and a voice she’d know anywhere. It still haunted her dreams, six months after trading a silver coin for Nathan’s life. The voice had a pleasant tenor, surprisingly soft and gently accented with native Spanish. Gabriel never raised his voice, never sounded surprised, angry, or happy. Some people might have found the deep tone soothing, the accent intriguing, but Remy’s blood ran cold in her veins. Her fingers itched for the reassuring weight of her favorite knife, and this time, Nathan didn’t have her hand. When she looked down again, the blade flashed silver.

  On the other side of the closed door, Gabriel de los Rios prepared to destroy another girl. A girl in captivity who’d been held like an animal in a cage for fucking years. If the girl had any power, she didn’t understand it. If she had any power, it might not be enough to protect her as she was banished to a new time and place. She was just about Remy’s age, but Remy thought of her as a much younger woman. Whoever Stacy had been before they found her, she’d lost a huge chunk of her life. She couldn’t lose more. She couldn’t lose another day to Gabriel’s insanity.

  Isaac held up three fingers, and Remy sough
t out Nathan once more. She touched his arm, but there wasn’t time for anything more than that. She absorbed his heat, noted the tension in his muscle, and had one final breath to let her body surge into Nathan’s orbit before Isaac smashed his heel into the door. They broke apart, Nathan going one way, Remy breaking the other. She dropped to one knee, making herself a smaller target, and let her gaze dart from Gabriel long enough to scan the room.

  It wasn’t really a room anymore. More like one fucking altar. Like the one in Argentina, except shaped by modern carpentry from wood and glass rather than hewn into stone by ancient hands. The hardwood floor had been oiled and waxed recently, the polished surface gleaming like gold. A stone circle replaced the standard couch and entertainment center, its surface covered in a fine, ashy grit. The odor of deep, wet jungle was worse here. So much worse. Whispers pounded her eardrums, the firmer tones of Gabriel’s ritual punctuating each ghostly word.

  Gabriel wasn’t in the circle, but he was close to her side, just out of view. She’d see him if she turned her head, but she wasn’t going to do that.

  She couldn’t stop staring at the form trembling in front of her.

  The last time she’d seen Stacy Montenegro, the pretty young Hispanic woman had been recovering from vicious injuries inflicted during her first escape from Gabriel. She’d fought so hard and done her part and what did she get for her trouble? Kidnapped right under the cops’ fucking noses and now she was primped and prepared for Gabriel’s ritual. Her bare skin was covered in oil, her black hair slicked off her face, dark eyes circled in kohl. She wasn’t visibly injured, but that didn’t mean jack. Plenty of ways they could hurt a girl without leaving a visible mark. Their sudden appearance startled her, but her attention instantly landed on Remy.

  Stacy’s lips didn’t move, but Remy heard her like she was shouting.

  Help me.

  Fury ripped through her. What was it with this fucker? Who the fuck did he think he was? What gave him the right to steal these six girls, take their lives in all but the most literal sense? Their families thought they were dead, and they might as well have been. Remy didn’t know how they could get the other girls back, though she knew Olivia thought it was going to happen. Remy was far more pessimistic about their chances, but this girl didn’t have to disappear too. This girl didn’t have to be lost. She didn’t have to be torn away from her family for a second time. They didn’t have to mourn her again. It would be so much worse the second time around because this time they would have hope. Hope they didn’t have before. She’d returned once, she’d come home again. They’d pray for it every night, and she would cry for them, forever out of reach.

  No. No, Stacy wasn’t going to live through that again. One girl would sleep in her own bed that night and wake up to her family. Remy had almost given up on that for herself, but she’d found it once. She’d found Nathan in the most unexpected place and impossible time. It could happen again. She had to believe that, which meant there was really only one thing she could do.

  “You son of a bitch!”

  Her decision was made in an instant, her instincts taking over before her mind fully processed all the information. She had what she needed. No other information mattered. Save the girl. She was there to save the girl. For all she knew, she’d been sent back in time precisely so Stacy wouldn’t be. Remy launched herself for the center of the stone circle, her feet barely touching the floor as she closed the space between them. She didn’t hesitate. She didn’t pause to apologize or look over her shoulder in regret. Save the girl. It wasn’t a matter of doing the right thing. This was the only thing. Her only plan.

  She shoved Stacy out of the way, breaking the seal of grit across the floor. Raw electricity shot from her fingers to her throat, burning everything that got in its way. Her teeth slammed together, driving into her tongue and filling her mouth with blood. She had time to swallow a bit of the thick, coppery liquid, had time to sputter and cough before seeing Stacy stumble outside the circle. They’d done it. They’d saved the—

  Blue light blinded her, severing her awareness of the surrounding room. Thunder blasted her ears—louder than anything she’d heard before. The sudden sensation of being squeezed from every angle, like she was a piece of paper being wadded into a crumpled ball, threw her off balance. She was falling, falling, and, fuck, it felt familiar but there wasn’t room for thought, wasn’t time for contemplation, wasn’t space for anything but hurtling through the deepening chaos, each moment darker than the one previous, each one hotter.

  Crashing eliminated all of it. Except for the pain shooting up her left side and the blood spilling from her mouth.

  Groaning, she blinked her eyes open, squinting against the expected light. Instead she met a soft, muted glow and the fucking temple. Any relief she might have felt at saving Stacy disappeared. She’d been sent to Argentina. How far back? A thousand years? It could be ten thousand years for all she knew. She was tough, but surviving an ancient jungle without the promise of air-conditioning ever? She didn’t think she was tough enough to survive that.

  She was starting to regret her big damn hero act. Stacy didn’t deserve this, but fuck. Remy had been happy. For once in her life, she’d been happy and loved. She woke up in Nathan’s arms every morning, she fell asleep with him buried inside her pussy. He made her breakfast every morning and he teased her because she preferred Pop-Tarts. Now she’d never eat Pop-Tarts or fuck Nathan again. But she’d get to sleep outside every night with the bugs and the snakes and piss in the trees for the rest of her no-doubt short life.

  She clenched her fists at her side, mad enough to drive them both through a wall. That would be satisfying, but not very productive. What would Nathan do if he were here? He’d be mad enough to shatter a few bones, but he wouldn’t. He’d take a deep breath and figure out exactly where they were, and more importantly, when. He wouldn’t waste time either. He’d probably even make a few jokes about finding their way back to Isaac before the idiot got himself killed. Except it wouldn’t really be a joke because neither of them did very well without the other. They were a package deal. A fact that only annoyed Remy once or twice a day.

  The space was large and perfectly square, stone walls rising seamlessly out of the ground. Unlike the small replica in Gabriel’s home, this place did look like it was carved out of the ground. The ceiling was low, the corners dark, but the firelight was steady. There weren’t any drafts whispering through the room, so no hints about where a door might be. An altar ran the length of a far wall, covered in clay bowls.

  Eight in total. Six of them had flames dancing along the surface of whatever they contained. There hadn’t been any bowls on the altar in Argentina, so she had no idea of what could be in them or what they might mean. There wasn’t a hint of their contents in the air, no smell from the fire burning along the top. Her nose quivered, expecting the heavy smell of the jungle, but there was nothing. Nothing out of the ordinary, at any rate.

  She scanned the rest of the area, but nobody else was in the room. She fought through the growing sense of vertigo, pushing herself upright. Not again. Not now. Her greatest fear was now realized. Every second of happiness she’d found with Nathan had been ripped away from her at the flip of a coin.

  Time had been both enemy and ally in the past six months. Now it looked like it had finally picked a side. And it wasn’t hers.

  Wiping her palms off on the seat of her pants, she shuttled away thoughts of Nathan to focus on the here and now. Wherever that was. Standing around feeling sorry for herself accomplished nothing. The other kidnapped girls had to be somewhere nearby. He’d kidnapped seven in total. Stacy had been the only one to escape. Six more were stranded and even if Remy found them, she couldn’t help them. She couldn’t even help herself. But Nathan would look for them.

  Remy lifted a torch from the wall, careful to hold the flame away from her, and circled the room until she found a door. An actual door, with a long bar to push down and a glowing exit sign above it. T
here weren’t any doors like that in the Silver Maiden’s temple, Remy was pretty sure of that. It flew open before she reached it, pushed open by a mountain of a man. He wasn’t much taller than her, but he filled the frame, bigger than Nathan and Isaac put together. A black T-shirt stretched over his muscular torso, faded jeans hugging his squat legs. He looked like he’d never even been to the park, much less a jungle. His head was shaved, but a thick black moustache and goatee encircled his unsmiling mouth. The only other adornment he wore was a tattoo on his wrist, the swirling ink in a familiar pattern.

  Gabriel’s gang tattoo.

  He frowned when he saw her. “Who the fuck are you?”

  Remy folded her arms across her chest, letting one hand slip inside her jacket. “I guess Gabriel’s slipping.”

  “Gabriel sent you?”

  “I hitched a ride here on the starship Silver Maiden.”

  She hoped the name meant something to the lug. Gabriel must have mentioned the coin before he sent his goons back in time to guard the priestesses. Even the most loyal thugs might balk a little at time-travel rituals without a damned good explanation.

  He stiffened, his beady eyes jumping around the room as if somebody else was going to pop up. “Gabriel said I was waiting for the last girl. And you ain’t her.”

  “How do you know?”

  He leered at her. “I happen to know those girls pretty good. Now you’re going to tell me who you are and what you’re doing here one way or the other.”

  As he spoke, her thumb flipped the snap on her hidden shoulder holster, giving her room to get her hand around the gun Nathan had insisted she carry. “Relax. Do you think I could get here if Gabriel didn’t want me to?”