Here is a sneak peak into Starbound releasing March 14th. I think one of the things I love about this book is it is written from a duel point of view. I hope you enjoy and fall for Katia and Seth as much as I have while writing their story. This is a standalone novel.
Prologue
Katia
I had a hard time understanding why people didn’t believe in magick. It
was everywhere. Who could doubt it when the winds sung, the sky sparkled with
stars, when rainbows appeared after a rainfall, and dewdrops glistened in the
morning? Everyone in some way has been touched by magick. It was just simply a
part of life.
Seth and I were living proof.
Chapter 1
Katia
I caught Seth
Nightingale staring at me for like the umpteenth time, which wasn’t that
unusual really. We kind of had been playing this cat and mouse game since
kindergarten. He would glare—I would grimace and glare back. And so the vicious
cycle went.
What had me so worried was this undeniable pull I’d been feeling toward
him lately. I thought I had gotten rid of my silly childhood crush years
ago—apparently not.
Seth Nightingale?
I do not like Seth, I reminded
myself—again—as if that was going to help curb this insatiable need to be near
him. Ever since the start of our senior year, I noticed a shift inside me. It
wasn’t all centered around Seth, but he was the root of it. There were hundreds
of boys to choose from, and I had dated my fair share of them, so why Seth? Why
now?
What was it about this guy that made me want to throw all caution to the
wind and leap into his arms, right in the middle of English nonetheless? There
was something behind those smoldering green eyes that intrigued me. And no
matter how many years had gone by, that intrigue only intensified.
Seth and I had a complex relationship, a love-hate relationship. We loved
to hate each other, but it hadn’t always been that way.
There had been a time when we had been friends—best friends.
Shocking, I know. I even had a hard time believing it.
Before all the eye glaring, name calling, and general loathing, we had
been inseparable. Now, a span of the ocean stretched between us. Even our
seating arrangements in class were affected—it was that bad. I sat in the first
row; he sat in the last row. One year just for shits and giggles, I sat in the
seat beside him. He had literally gotten up and told the teacher he couldn’t be
subjected to skank.
That burned my ass.
What he really meant was, he needed to be as far away from me as
possible.
Asshole. And I didn’t have a problem saying it to his face. Daily. Or
showing him just how deep my burning hatred rooted. The one-finger salute
became my signature greeting as we passed in the halls.
I had spent the remainder of my freshman year searing him with hateful scowls.
Yet, somehow we co-existed at Vermillion High without bringing it to the
ground, but we’d come pretty close. If I didn’t know better, I’d actually think
he liked pissing me off.
Warped.
So I was back to my original predicament.
Why was Seth looking at me with a spark of interest instead of his
usually irritation? Okay, I admit over the years I’d done my fair share of
gawking. It was not like Seth was a hardship on the eyes. Just the opposite, he
was sinful eye-candy. And the asshat knew it.
How could I find him both drool-worthy and stab-worthy? That was just wrong on so many levels. But for
some unholy reason he both fascinated me and infuriated me. Embarrassingly, I
knew way more about dark and dreamy than I would ever admit.
That’s how screwed up I really was.
Seth was an amazing artist, always doodling in class, sketching instead
of taking notes. He had these breath-stopping green eyes and dark, messy hair
that most guys couldn’t achieve if they tried. It was adorable. But that was
were adorable stopped on Seth. He oozed smexy and had that whole tall, dark,
and dangerous persona going on. To say he made my mouth water was an
understatement. But the real problem was…Seth was off limits. And we couldn’t
have been more of polar opposites if we tried.
As talented as Seth was at art, I was good at…being popular and pretty.
If that wasn’t cliché enough for you, I was also a cheerleader dating the
basketball star. I made myself want
to hurl. There was a time when I had been nothing but the girl in the shadows
with Seth. It was amazing what one summer could do to a young girl’s figure…
and to her popularity.
My life sometimes felt meaningless, blah, except for one small detail.
There was goddess blood running through my veins that gave me power—I was
a nixie. Descendent to Arachne—a greatly skilled warrior princess. Well, before
a goddess turned her into a spider.
Pretty F’d up.
The cincher…Seth was a nixie, too.
It was what initially drew us together, the shared secret of magick.
Actually our town was sort of a magickal haven for nixies. Vermillion had been
were the birthright of nixies was forged. But most importantly, it wasn’t that we
currently ran with completely different crowds that kept Seth and me on opposite
sides of the classroom. It was because he was a Nightingale, and in my family
that was an enormous no-no.
Our families despised each other. That was how it had been since the day
I was born, going back more generations than I could count. A Montgomery and a
Nightingale had always lived in Vermillion, South Dakota, and there had always
been bad blood between our families. We had been forbidden from seeing each
other, but that hadn’t stopped either of us from being curious.
Rules were meant to be broken, and Seth loved to go against the rules.
At one time Seth and I had been best friends, in secret of course, just
as our little sisters were to this day. There was just something appealing
about going against your parents’ direct orders. It was the whole Romeo and Juliet
thing. All through elementary school we had found ways to meet in secrecy. It
had been daring and fun.
Our parents never knew, and if they did, they never said anything. I was
torn in half the day our friendship died. Young, stupid, and naive, I had
thought that Seth felt something for me—a connection. I had made it bluntly
clear how interested I was in him, not having a shy bone in my body. That lout
rejected me our first year in junior high, and the sting of rejection had never
left me. It was the start of our hate relationship, and I wasn’t ready for a
repeat performance of that kind of embarrassment any time soon.
My heart couldn’t take it.
“Katia,” Claudia, my best friend whispered in the desk next to me.
I tore my gaze from Seth and looked at her perfectly raised black brows
and big blue eyes. “What?” I muttered.
The corners of her pink lips turned up. “You’re drooling.”
“I am not,” I snapped, wiping the corner of my mouth with the back of my
hand for good measure. After all, I had been doing some heavy eyeballing. What
was wrong with me?
Biting the end of my pen, I snuck one last quick peek at Seth. He had
stopped scribbling on his English textbook and was looking over at Claudia and me.
By the dark expression on his face he looked irked, as if we were bothering
him. Breaking his concentration or something, which was a total joke, since it
was obvious he wasn’t listening to Ms. Harper lecture about our next written
essay.
“Are you and Matt going to the party Friday night?” Claudia asked as soon
as Ms. Harper turned to the dry erase board.
I dug out my notebook, pretending to take notes. All concentration was
shot for the day, thanks to Seth. “I don’t know, probably.” Out of the corner
of my eyesight, I saw Seth’s hands clench the sides of the desk. What’s got his boxers in a bunch?
“You have to,” Claudia whined. “Everyone is going to be there.”
In her book, that meant anyone who was anyone was going to be there. “I
am sure Matt will want to go,” I conceded.
“Good, we are going to get totally waxed—”
“Miss Jenssen, do you have something to share with the class?” Ms. Harper
interrupted.
I slunk lower in my desk. Claudia, however, faced forward and smiled
sweetly. “I was just telling Katia that we are going to get completely blitzed
on Friday night.”
I ducked my head, trying to cover my smirk. The entire class erupted in
snickers, except of course for Seth, who looked ready to commit murder.
“I have a better idea. How about you spend Friday in detention?” Ms.
Harper countered.
Claudia wasn’t fazed. “Can’t. I have plans.”
“Miss Jenssen, you are trying my patience.”
Luckily Claudia was saved by the bell as everyone shot up in his or her
seat and started filing into the halls. She waved at an exasperated Ms. Harper
on the way out the door. Claudia spent her life skirting the lines of trouble. She
shot me a wink, and I shook my head as we parted ways. “See you at lunch, Katia,”
she called over her shoulder.
Seth
I watched her saucy little butt saunter out of the classroom and had to
bite my lip. I still couldn’t figure out why she hung out with Claudia and her
other uppity friends. Kat wasn’t a snob. At least not the Kat I had known.
Really, I shouldn’t give two shits.
What Kat did—who she hung out with, who she kissed—was none of my
business.
I scoffed at myself. That was all bullshit, because the truth was I
cared.
I cared too damn much.
And that was my problem.
Sitting at my desk another moment, I thought legs like hers should have
been outlawed from high school. She had long, sun-kissed legs that were toned in
just the right places. All her cheerleading practice had paid off, but I was
more of a butt kind of guy anyway, and I could tell you that Kat had a
magnificent ass. She wasn’t extraordinarily tall or short. Her hair was a long,
angelic white with these soft waves that framed her heart-shaped face. And what
a face, but it was her smile that made my heart seize. And the two dimples that
appeared with it were the icing on the cake. Exotic was the first word that
came to mind.
But where she was concerned, I had a hands-off policy.
That didn’t stop me from being aware of her twenty-four seven, or
appreciating what she offered. When Kat walked into a room, everything inside
me became charged, electric. She had that kind of power over my treacherous
body.
I hated the way she made me feel without even trying…and I loved it at
the same time.
I was so screwed in the head.
It was unfair that the one person I wanted was the only person I could
never have. Fate was a bitch.
The longest three months of my life felt like yesterday and had changed
everything. It was the first time Kat and I had spent a summer apart. She had
gone to her Grandma’s beach house in Rhode Island, and I didn’t see her at all.
On our first day back at school, I had gotten a shock that rocked my system,
especially for a pre-adolescent boy. For the first time, I found myself
attracted to her on a whole new level. My body suddenly had a mind of its own.
When I saw her that dreaded Monday morning, all I could think was Oh shit. That’s Kat?
She was the first girl to give me a boner in the school halls. Talk about
awkward and uncomfortable. I had some pretty wild fantasies about her that year—fantasies
were safe. Kat was drop dead hot.
My jaw had hit the ground.
Sweet Jesus. The beach had done
her body good.
I’d been standing at the bottom steps of the school entrance as she
passed me by. The scent of her shampoo teased the air around her, and she gave
me a heart-stopping grin. I watched as she flipped her long curls, giggling
with Claudia Adams and Harper Thompson at her side—her two new besties.
Before she entered the double doors, she had glanced over her shoulder at
me and ours eyes clashed. She flashed her dimples at me, and her light
iridescent blue eyes twinkled. Whether Kat had known it or not, that was the
day our friendship had drastically changed.
Good God. I had been pretty sure Kat had just flirted with me. I had swallowed
hard and slumped against the stair railings, feeling the ground slip out from
under me.
It was no surprise that was the year Kat had shot up in her social status.
She joined the cheerleading squad and was always surrounded by a flock of horny
boys. What no one knew was I had spent that entire year fighting the urge to
plant my fist in their faces. I’d wanted to scream at her groupies that she was
mine. In my head, not one of those guys had the right to touch her, talk to
her, or look at her like a piece of pecan pie.
Because Katia had been destined to be mine.
I’d wanted nothing more than to march up to them and slam their heads
into the concrete block walls. And that was for just looking at her. Imagine
how I’d felt when one of them touched her. I literally lost my shit the first
time I saw her kiss another guy. Let’s just say that the dent on the locker
door was still there, and my poor knuckle had bled like a bitch.
It had done nothing to dull the ache in my chest.
Now, it was our senior year and nothing had really changed, except that I
learned some self-control. I didn’t want to smash Matt’s face every time I
passed him in the halls. I called that progress.
And I became an asshole. It was the only defense I had against her and
the crazy-intense feelings she stirred inside me. It was far better for her to
hate me than to have her love me. I didn’t think I could have restrained myself
if she loved me. Hell, even if she liked me a little, it would have been too
hard.
Getting out of my seat, I trailed behind the group, catching one last
glimpse of Kat before she disappeared into the crowd. The rest of the day was a
breeze after that. Thankfully we only shared two classes this year, which in my
book was two too many. First period and then English, I figured we should be
able to survive our last year without killing each other—literally.
When the final bell of freedom rang, I sighed in sweet relief and trucked
it home. I walked through the front door, and Dad took one look at me with
sympathy filling his hazel eyes. “That bad, huh?” he asked, leaning on the
fridge.
I sunk into the couch, mixed with rage, sadness, loneliness, and longing
so profound it ate at my flesh like a zombie. “You have no idea.”
He offered me a Coke. “It’s for the best, Seth.”
So I’d heard before. I was getting tired of hearing it, the same song and
dance. Popping the top on the can, I took one long swig. My parents meant well
and when you came from a family of magick, you learned to respect what
knowledge they gave.
Dad sat down next to me and stretched his long legs under the coffee
table. We had the same height and build, but I had gotten my coloring from my
mom. There was not a touch of grey in his chocolate hair. “You know that this
is the only way to keep her safe.”
Yada. Yada. Yada. The warnings were etch-o-sketched into my brain, but
that didn’t mean it didn’t suck serious monkey ass. “I know, Dad. You don’t
have to worry. Nothing will happen.” But, for the first time, I didn’t believe those
words.
There had been something different in her silvery-blue eyes today. The
usual scorn had been replaced with interest. I hadn’t seen that glint of
intrigue and possibility since sixth grade, right before I had smashed it to
smithereens. Let’s just say that back then, delicacy hadn’t been one of my
superpowers, and I might have been too harsh, but I hadn’t known how to handle
Kat. Or the feelings she enticed.
I wasn’t sure I could handle them now.
“Harsh” really wasn’t a strong enough word. I had broken her heart and
stomped on it, crushing it with cruel words. I had been an insensitive jerk,
though I think she’d had a few more colorful words for me that day. And who
could have blamed her.
If she suddenly decided to flip the tables, how long would I really be
able to stay away? How long would I be able to deny what my heart and soul
demanded?
One year. One more year.
It wasn’t just resisting Kat. It was giving up the girl who had been destined
to be mine. Normally you don’t mess with fate, being a nixie, you know better
than to muddle with the greater powers, but she wasn’t just fated as mine. She
was my starbound. And that was harder to ignore for nixies than the next hit
for a meth addict. It was impossible. Especially when finding your one true
mate was so rare among us. The fact that I had known she was mine since birth
was a freaking miracle.
But she was one miracle I could never have.
To make matters worse, her parents hadn’t taken the same approach mine
had when it came to the curse. For as long as I could remember, I had heard the
warnings, was told to stay far away, but Kat’s family kept her in the dark. She
knew our families didn’t get along, but she didn’t know the truth.
Why we could never be together.
