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eBook Category: Erotica/Paranormal Erotica/Dark Fantasy
eBook Description: Marissa Blackwell and Devon Eldritch are first cousins, best friends, and heirs to a winery fortune. Before claiming their inheritance, they must survive for two years without their family's money. Street-smart Marissa is up for the challenge. By day, she works in the corporate world while by night, she explores the BDSM lifestyle. Torn between two men--one submissive, the other dominant--she must decide which lover truly fulfills her needs. Meanwhile, rich and spoiled Devon is free to embrace his vampiric tendencies and practice the ancient path of the Magi. When a like-minded fetish model steps into his life, he must learn to control the dark power their mutual passion unleashes. After a set of grisly murders, Devon is tagged primary suspect. As the cousins' unusual legacy unfolds, will they expose the true killer before a third victim is found and Devon is framed? Fates Fulfilled, the "urban noir" finale to Katrina Strauss' Eldritch Legacy, explores the dark side of the underground ... and the darker side of man.

eBook Publisher: Aphrodite's Apples Press/Poison Apples, Published: February 2007, 2007
Fictionwise Release Date: April 2007

This eBook is part of the following series:

• Katrina Strauss' Eldritch Legacy Series

Available eBook Formats [MultiFormat - What's this?]: eReader (PDB) [285 KB] , ePub (EPUB) [293 KB] , Rocket/REB1100 (RB) [253 KB] , Portable Document Format (PDF) [823 KB] , Palm Doc (PDB) [287 KB] , Microsoft Reader (LIT) [268 KB] , Franklin eBookMan (FUB) [302 KB] , hiebook (KML) [637 KB] , Sony Reader (LRF) [363 KB] , iSilo (PDB) [238 KB] , Mobipocket (PRC) [295 KB] , OEBFF Format (IMP) [383 KB]
Words: 81615
Reading time: 233-326 min.
Microsoft Reader (LIT) Format: Printing DISABLED, Read-Aloud ENABLED
Portable Document Format (PDF) Format:  Printing DISABLED, Read-Aloud DISABLED
All Other formats: Printing DISABLED, Read-aloud DISABLED

"Katrina Strauss brings this world of political intrigue, excess, and royalty, mixed with help from generations past, alive in a way that most authors can't pull off ... Run, don't walk to get this series, you will not be disappointed."--Tara Gibbs, TwoLips Reviews

"Edgy, boundary-testing and sometimes just plain testy, [Strauss is] a pure visceral reading pleasure which you'll guiltily devour even as you tell yourself you shouldn't."--Lee M, CK2's Kwips & Kritiques

"I easily see The Eldritch Legacy moving into place next to Anne Rice's classic Sleeping Beauty trilogy ... [Strauss'] voice is different than any other writer's, with a flair for dark, gripping sagas that transcend time."--Adra Steia, Rites of Romance

A black charcoal outline formed a large pentacle upon Devon's bedroom floor. In the center, Celeste knelt naked, her wrists bound to her ankles with rope. She bowed her head in submission toward Devon, who stood fully dressed in a suit of black velvet and white silk. With a long match, he leaned down and lit the first black candle set at the northern point of the star.

"Stravisa," he murmured. Spirit.

Methodically, he made his way clockwise around the circle, his boot heels clicking against the hardwood planks, skipping the second point and stopping at the third to follow the order in which he'd drawn the lines of the inner pentagram. He paused, touching the match to the wick, and glanced wistfully at Celeste's backside. The candlelight lent her hair a preternatural glow as it shimmered down her gracefully curved spine.

"Striju." The ancient Magi name for fire.

Continuing around the circle in the same fashion, alternating between points, he lit the remaining three wicks--satra for air, seintu for water, skrova for earth.

With all five vertices illuminated, he gently waved the match, extinguishing the flame, and returned to the altar. He fished in his jacket pocket and produced a corkscrew, then lifted the sacred bottle of Pinot Noir.

The cork came free with a loud pop. Tipping the bottle, Devon irreverently splashed the first few sips onto the floor to empty the sediment collected in the neck. The garnet liquor puddled on the floorboards and seeped into the cracks in between. The neck cleared, he poured the wine into the pewter chalice, filling it to the brim.

Lifting the chalice with his left hand, he swirled it under his nose and inhaled the heady scent of the vine coupled with an underlying hint of plum and berry. Taking a sip, he was surprised at the unusually sweet taste. For a moment, he lost himself in another man's memories--drunk on liquor, fueled by desire, racing madly through hedges of yew, his lover following behind in a blur of loose curls and flowing skirts, her laughter tinkling merrily against an orchestra of crickets serenading the moonlight...

Willing himself back to the present, reminding himself of the task at hand, he took Celeste's silver athame in his right hand and stirred the blade in the wine. Placing the chalice back down amidst candles and incense, he returned to the pentacle and made his way around Celeste in the same pattern as before, stopping to point the athame at each candle and cast a protective circle.

He stepped between the two lowermost candles and approached Celeste from behind, the wet blade of the athame gleaming red in the light of the flames. Weaving his fingers through her silken mane, he jerked her head back. As he pressed the point of the blade a hairbreadth from her jugular, she peered up at him and emitted a pleasurable sigh. It was she who had suggested weaving her knife play fantasies into their ritual lovemaking.

Suddenly, he grew aware of another presence in the room, both strange yet familiar. He caught a whiff of a floral, feminine scent not unlike ... Celeste's? Yet how could she be in two places at once? She was fully conscious; she couldn't be projecting her spirit into the astral realm.

Puzzled, he stared across the room toward the unseen visitor. A brief whisper murmured through his thoughts.

His eyes...

The spell book had suggested this particular ritual might attract outside spirits; hence one reason for casting the protective circle. Fighting his curiosity, wondering who he had inadvertently lured, Devon shrugged off any distractions and knelt behind Celeste. Pressed against her ass, his cock positively ached through his trousers. Bringing his lips to her arched throat, he darted his tongue across her skin, delighting in her salt and her heat while carefully tracing the sharp tip of the dagger over her collarbone and down the center of her sternum. As his lips drew near her shoulder, his bloodlust set in and his vision darkened. In a moment of pure, wicked mischief, he peered back toward the door. With a dramatic pose worthy of any classic vampire movie, he opened his mouth wide, baring his fangs for the benefit of whoever watched, and then sank his teeth into his lover's flesh.