Sunstruck: The Moon and the Stars #3 (Werewolf Shifter Romance) - Mac Flynn - E-Book

Sunstruck: The Moon and the Stars #3 (Werewolf Shifter Romance) E-Book

Mac Flynn

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Beschreibung

Lilly Edmonds has her work cut out for her as she finds herself protecting more than the werewolf Paul.  On a visit to her old friend, Baxter, she finds that the undead have risen against him and taken him as a slave.  Now her friends and she must find out the who and why of Baxter’s problems before he grows a pair of fangs.

Their search leads them across the city and into the nightlife of the Underground where the living dead have lively parties.  The trail grows as hot and cold as the zombie officer they discover, a man of impeccable duty but with the reporter Pippin on his tail.

Together they find trouble and a deeper, more terrible secret than they could have imagined.  It’s a secret that could expose the world to more than just blackmail, but to a vampiric hunger that won’t be stopped, sunrise or no sunrise.

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SUNSTRUCK

THE MOON AND THE STARS, BOOK 3

MAC FLYNN

Copyright © 2019 by M. Flynn

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

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Wanting to find the rest of the series and check out some of my other books? Hop over to my website for a peek!

CONTENTS

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Continue the adventure

Other series by M. Flynn

1

More than shadows lurk in the darkness of night.

The bright, cheery bakery warded off the darkness as night fell outside. Mr. Baxter wiped his sweaty brow and looked out on his war-torn shop with a broad smile. Most of the pastries were gone, and those that were left would be quickly snatched up by the early birds who got the sale worm.

Baxter untied his apron and walked into the back where another apron hung on the wall. He slipped his cloth over the companion hook and brushed his hand down the other apron.

“I wonder how you are doing, little Lilly,” he mused with a sad smile.

He shook himself. There was work to be done, and it would distract him from his melancholy thoughts. He marched into the front of the shop but paused behind the long counter. A man stood in the center aisle halfway between the counter and the front door. He wore a wide-brimmed hat and overcoat with a collar so tall that all but his narrow chin was covered. The flesh on his chin was horribly pale. His hands were hidden away in his overcoat pockets, but the top of brown gloves showed they, too, were concealed. A pair of black oxfords finished off his attire.

The man stood as stiff as a statue. If he hadn’t been standing Baxter would’ve sworn he wasn’t breathing. That thought chilled him, but the baker rallied his courage and smiled at his late patron. “I’m sorry, sir, but the shop is closed.”

The figure turned its head left and right without revealing any more of its features. He spoke in a low, soft voice that cut through Baxter like a cold knife. “You have a nice shop here. It would be a pity if something were to happen to it.”

Baxter’s eyebrows crashed down. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

The figure returned his gaze to him, and Baxter glimpsed a bright eye underneath the brim of the hat. The eye stared at him with a steady, menacing look. “I only offer protection, my friend.”

Baxter frowned. “Protection from who? You?”

The man chuckled. “Perhaps, and if that is the case you would do wise to accept my offer of protection.”

“Get out!” Baxter shouted as he picked up a silver cake knife and started toward the stranger. “Get out right now!”

The man hissed and retreated so quickly to the door that Baxter could have sworn he floated. The stranger grasped the handle and that evil eye glared at Baxter. “You will regret this, human.” The joyful ring of the bell above the door signified his exit.

Still, Baxter was left with an uneasy feeling and his hand tightly grasped the cake knife. He hurried to the door and locked the handle but paused and glanced out. The front of his bakery gave him a good view of up and down the street on both sides and for the entirety of the block, but the stranger was nowhere to be seen.

Baxter drew down the door curtain and retreated behind the counter where he reluctantly flipped the light switch. His shop was plunged into darkness but for the obligatory lights for the local police. He set the cake knife on the counter and stepped inside the lit kitchen, but his unease made him disregard the stairs that led up to his apartment.

Instead, he opted for some late-night baking to ease his mind. Baxter tossed the ingredients for a cake into a bowl with the skill of an old pro and tucked the bowl under one arm. He stirred the batter with the other as he walked up to the doorway that led to front of the store.

Baxter froze and the bowl clattered to the ground. The man stood there again, in the middle of the aisle. His head was raised slightly higher and beneath the broad brim Baxter could see a pair of red eyes smirk back at him.

“Have you reconsidered my offer?” the stranger asked him.

Baxter glared at the man and brandished his wood spoon. “I don’t know how you got in here, but I’m going to get you out!”

The baker marched around the counter but jerked to a stop when the stranger vanished. Baxter whipped his head to and fro but saw nothing. He started for the far aisle to see if the intruder had slipped over there.

An arm looped around his neck and jerked him hard against the front of a thin frame. Cold, putrid breath wafted over one side of his face as that chilling voice slipped into his ear. “Welcome to my protection.”

Baxter’s eyes widened as he felt a pair of sharp fangs bury themselves into his neck. His mouth opened in a silent scream that only the dark night bore witness to.

2

“I don’t think this is a good idea,” Una objected.

“Fortunately, you don’t have a say in it,” Al quipped.

She scowled at him. “Why not? I’m her friend, too.”

“She’s also a Star, and that comes first,” he insisted.

“Does being a Star also mean being treated in an inhumane manner?” Una snapped.

“She’s being treated perfectly normally,” Al argued.

“You have her caged up!” Una snapped as she gestured to the scene before them.

The pair stood in the dirt-floor basement beneath Paul’s old mansion. Before them was the cell in which Paul had caged himself during his last uncontrollable transformation into a werewolf. Now it was Lilly who stood behind the bars and Paul was on the outside looking in.

Lilly grasped the bars of the cell and smiled at Una. “It’s really no big deal, Una. I don’t feel caged at all.”

Una spun around with her back to the cage and glared at the pair of men. “This is not normal!”

Paul kept his eyes on Lilly as he replied to Una. “For a Star, training is a normal part of their life.”

“Which means cool down and let us do some training,” Al scolded her.

Una opened her mouth, but Lilly’s soft hand on her shoulder gave her pause. She turned to find Lilly’s firm gaze staring into her eyes. “I have to do this.”

Una’s shoulders slumped and her face fell. “But this isn’t right, Lilly. They’re treating you like an animal.”

“She is partially a werewolf,” Al pointed out. “That what makes a Star useful to their Moon.”

Una whipped her head around and glared at him. “That doesn’t mean you have to treat her like one!”

“Una.” Una winced. She knew that tone of voice, and reluctantly glanced over her shoulder. Lilly was giving her the scolding eye. “I’ll be fine. I’m only trying to break out of here, remember?”

Una hung her head. “I remember, but it’s still so... so…”

“Necessary,” Paul insisted as he studied the bars and his new Star. “If she is to have any chance against those that might seek to harm me then she must learn to use her abilities. One of those basic abilities is the great strength that comes with being a Star.”

“Well, I’ve always wanted to bench press a hundred pounds,” Lilly joked.

Al folded his arms across his chest and laughed. “You’ll be able to do a lot more than that if you can get it going.”

Lilly swept her eyes over the cell. “So, what do I need to do?”

“Pry the bars apart with your bare hands,” Paul told her.

Una wrinkled her nose. “Is that it? Couldn’t we have just gotten her a bar upstairs to play with?”

“He’s trying to make this easier on her,” Al explained as he nodded at the cell. “Werewolves don’t like confined spaces, and neither do Stars, so by putting Lilly in here Paul’s hoping to use that instinct in Lilly’s favor.”

“But I’m not claustrophobic,” Lilly revealed.

“The new instinct instilled within you does grant you a certain degree of that phobia,” Paul warned her.

Una snorted. “What a wonderful gift.”

Al grabbed Una’s shoulder and used his own prodigious strength to drag her back to the wall opposite the cell. “How about we just stand back.”

Una frowned up at him. “Why?”

“Because untrained strength sometimes leads to an overuse, and that means the roof of the cell might loudly go from the ceiling to the floor,” Al warned her.

Una’s jaw hit the floor. “But Lilly’s in there!”

“She will be fine,” Paul assured her as he met the worried gaze of Lilly. “You may begin.”

Lilly swallowed the lump in her throat, adjusted her grip on the bars and took a deep breath. “Well, here goes.”

She clenched her teeth and pulled the bars apart. Or, she tried to. There was a slight groan from the metal rods, but nothing more. After a half a minute she stopped and gasped for air.

“I… I don’t think this is working,” she informed her friends.

“Focus on the walls and the ceiling,” Paul suggested. “Pay attention to the stagnant air and the dark, cramped space around you.”

Lilly tried to pull the bars apart again but after a few seconds she stopped and shook her head. “I just don’t feel anything.”

“Maybe we should try pulling apart those cheap chopsticks first,” Una spoke up. “That not only takes a little bit of strength but a whole lot of skill.”

“She can perform this feat,” Paul insisted.

Lilly smiled at her friends. “I just need to try harder.”

Lilly tried again and again, but each attempt ended in failure. Even her initial success wasn’t repeated.

Una pursed her lips as she watched her old friend try again without success. That was an hour of failures. “All right, that’s enough.” She snatched the keys from Paul’s hand and marched over to the locked cell door. “No more fun today, boys,” she told them as she unlocked the entrance.

“I can do this,” Lilly insisted as Una stepped into her cage.

“I know you can, but I don’t think your body knows you can,” Una mused as she took Lilly’s hand and gently pulled her out. “Maybe tomorrow night or the day after, but tonight isn’t that night.”

Paul stepped in front of them. “She will not learn by giving up.”

Una glanced at Lilly. “How about you go upstairs with Al? I need to talk to your boyfriend alone.”

“He’s not my-”

Una gave her a push toward the stairs. “Less arguing and more walking, and no eavesdropping!”

“You’re giving out a lot of orders for being the most useless among us,” Al mused.

Una met his gaze with her own steady one. “For once I know what I’m doing, so just give us a moment, okay?”

Al pursed his lips, but reluctantly led Lilly up the stairs. Una turned to the curious werewolf who stood with a curious and patient look in his eyes.

“I know what Al said was true about being useless, but I know more about Lilly than you do,” Una began as she clasped her hands behind her back. “She wasn’t going to tell you this because she doesn’t want to disappoint you, but she was getting frustrated.”

“That is understandable,” Paul pointed out.

“Not for Lilly,” Una argued. “I’ve known Lilly for a long time, and she doesn’t get frustrated. Even when she nearly burnt down Mr. Baxter’s bakery a half dozen times she never quit. Heck, she didn’t even panic. She just got the fire extinguishers and put out the blaze, but this is different.”

“How does this apply to her abilities?” he wondered.

Una pointed at her chest. “With those abilities Lilly feels like the fire’s inside of her and she doesn’t know how to put that out, or in this case pull them out of her. That’s something she’s never had to do; really look into herself and wonder who she is and where she’s going. She’s led a really normal life not to worry about that stuff, and now you’ve piled it on big time.”

“It was never my intention to choose her,” he reminded her. “Being a Star is a matter of fate.”

“Well, fate throws a hell of a curve ball, so I’m just saying that maybe you should slow things down a bit,” Una suggested as a sly smile slipped onto her lips. “Maybe take her out for a dinner date or something.”

Paul turned to the empty cell and studied the dark interior before he gave a curt nod. “That may be a wise idea. I will go ask her-”

“Not so fast,” Una interrupted as she held up a hand. “My advice isn’t free. I call dibs on taking Lilly out, at least for tonight.”

“Where will you go?” he wondered.

Una swept her eyes over the wet walls and wrinkled her nose at the dank odor. “I think a little bit of fresh air is in order, and maybe a donut or two.”

3

Una and Paul climbed the stairs and found their friends in the entry hall. They turned at their coming, and Al glanced between them. “Well? Do we keep trying?”

“Not tonight,” Paul told him.

Lilly’s eyes widened and she shook her head. “I don’t want to quit. I know I can do this.”

Una slipped up to her and draped an arm over her shoulders. “You know it and we know it, but I don’t think the werewolf in you-” she poked her finger against Lilly’s chest, “-knows it, so why don’t you and I take a break from all this supernatural stuff and go get a bite to eat?”

Lilly bit her lower lip and glanced at Paul. “If Paul doesn’t mind…”

He smiled and shook her head. “Not at all, but I do wish to speak with you when you return.” Lilly nodded before Una led her away to the kitchen.

Al sidled up beside Paul and lowered his voice to a whisper. “You sure it’s a good idea to let them go alone? I mean, Lilly’s kind and all, but the beast inside her isn’t some stuffed teddy bear. I would know. If her strength gets out without her being able to control it then things could get hairy. Literally.”

A sly smile slipped onto Paul’s lips as his eyes flickered to Al. “I never said I would allow them to go alone.”

The unknowing pair of women walked into the kitchen and Una found their target: the ghost formerly known as Origa, now Henry. The ghostly gentleman stood in front of the sink. It wasn’t an uncommon sight, but what was uncommon was that he faced them with an upraised butcher knife in one hand and his unblinking eyes staring at them as they entered.

Una yelped and jumped back, crashing into Lilly who caught her. The young woman gathered herself and glared at the ghost. “Do you have to be so weird all the time?”

The corners of Henry’s lips twitched upward, but his tone was even. “I am merely being myself.”

“Well, stop it!” Una scolded him as Lilly righted her.

Lilly suppressed her snort as she looked to Henry. “We were wondering if you could drive us into town.”

Henry’s eyes flickered to the sink. “At this moment?”

“Do you have something better to do?” Una asked him.

“There is dinner,” Henry reminded her.

Lilly craned her neck and saw fresh fish in the sink. Their heads were chopped off and blood stained the walls. She shuddered. “Maybe you can put it in the freezer for tomorrow?”

Henry pursed his lips but set his knife down in the sink. “Very well. I will take you into town.”

The three walked out into the garage and chose the sedan. Henry drove them out of the garage and down the bumpy driveway to the road. Little did they know that two shadows followed them at a distance.

The bright lights of the city were a happy reminder that the normal world was still around and thriving. Lilly glanced out the window and smiled at the familiar sights.

“You look a little happier,” Una commented as she studied her friend.

Lilly cringed and leaned back against the seat. “Was it that obvious?”

“Only to everyone around you and the legally blind,” Una told her.

Lilly folded her arms over her chest and stared forlornly at her lap. “I guess I was just getting a little overwhelmed back there.”

Una snorted. “Go figure. First you find out your boyfriend is a werewolf, then he bites you and makes you into… well, something, then we fight a ghost that tried to kill you a lot. Now he wants you to bend bars. And that’s just in the last few months!” She threw up her arms and slumped in her seat. “Next week he’ll probably ask you to bend spoons with your mind.”

Lilly snorted. “You’ve been watching too many paranormal movies again, haven’t you?”

“It’s research!” Una protested.

“Paul told me most of it is wrong,” she countered.

“Maybe Mr. Movie Star doesn’t know everything there is to know about the paranormal world,” Una argued.

Lilly’s gaze fell on the ghost in the driver’s seat. “Is most of what the movies show right or wrong, Henry?”

“Wrong,” came the reply.

Una stuck her tongue out at their driver. “Traitor.” Lilly jabbed her elbow into Una’s ribs. She rubbed her bruised side. “How about Benedict Arnold?”

“How about you remember that he’s nice enough to drive us into town,” Lilly suggested.

“We can both drive,” Una reminded her.

“Do you have your license on you?”

“Um, no.”

“Do I?”

“Maybe?”

“No.”

“Oh.”

“Besides-” Lilly added as she jerked her thumb out the window, “-would you want to be driving in rush hour?”

Una followed her friend’s thumb and cringed. The hour was a little past five, meaning that they were navigating through a maze of people desperate to get home and those desperate to get a good seat at their favorite restaurant. It was controlled chaos where every car was at the mercy of fate and the lights. Henry navigated the mess with uncanny timing and an almost supernatural intuition for when to turn onto a side street that was less busy but hardly out of their way.

Una glanced at their driver. “Don’t tell me you’re also psychic.”

“I merely know the streets,” he assured her.

“Are there psychics?” Lilly asked him.

“There are.”

“What about zombies?” Una wondered.

“They do exist.”

Una snorted. “That explains some of my coworkers.”

Henry turned them onto a familiar side street where the shops were small and the streets deserted. Lilly checked her watch. “I don’t remember a lot of businesses closing this early.”

“Maybe they’re having some sort of a business meeting,” Una suggested as she leaned forward to look through the front seats. The comforting glow of lights spread out from the windows of John Baxter’s bakery. “Looks like Mr. Baxter’s still at work.”

Lilly smiled. “He’d have to be dead not to be at work.”

Henry parked the car at the curb. “I will remain here until you return,” he promised.

“This could take a while,” Una warned as Lilly climbed out.

“I have time,” he reminded her.

“And a good book?” she wondered.

Without looking over his shoulder he held up a deck of tarot cards. “These will suffice.”

A little color left Una’s face as she nervously smiled at him. “Uh, yeah. Um, happy reading.” She scooted across the seats and out Lilly’s door.

Lilly stood before the shop and looked up at the quaint building with a soft smile. “You know-” she mused as her friend slammed the door shut and stumbled to her side, “-sometimes I really miss this place.”

Una glanced over her shoulder at the black sedan. “Sometimes I really miss you working at this place, too.”