Rush
Penelope Rivers
Genre: Gay Werewolf, M/M PNR
Publisher: ARe Books
Date of Publication: July 1, 2015
ISBN: 9781943576142
Word Count: 50,000
Cover Artist: Erin Dameron Hill
Book Description:
Out of desperation and danger comes love. What a rush!
Strapped for cash, Dante Kinnaird agrees to sell a sample of his werewolf DNA to the owner of a security company intent on breeding fierce and fearsome dogs. Dr. Crios Mantzaris Karras III, a brilliant but arrogant scientist, creates the serum and gets on Dante’s last nerve. Dante can’t wait to cash his check and get away from this man.
Crios’s ego takes more than a beating when his hybrid were-dogs become uncontrollable and terrorize the countryside. Dante knows he must make things right, and puts aside his feelings for Crios as they team up to stop these bloodthirsty monsters.
In the heat of battle, he never expected those feelings to change.
Excerpt:
Two hours later,
Dante sat strapped in the chair as Crios ran his fingers over his bare arm,
seeking out a vein so he could draw blood. The other man didn't hesitate before
thrusting the needle straight into his inner elbow. Dante barely felt the
needle dipping into his skin. To him, being prodded was nothing.
Crios examined
the dark crimson liquid that filled the syringe, his eyes gleaming.
"Interesting."
"What's
interesting?" Blood was blood, after all.
Crios sighed as
if dealing with the questions of the common man was oh-so-exhausting.
"Werewolf blood looks the same as human blood."
A grin covered
his face before he could stop it. "Did you think that werewolves bleed
blue or something?"
"Don't be
ridiculous. Blue blood? Whoever heard of such a thing? This is reality, not a
comic book." Miffed, Crios shook his head. "I just wasn't sure what to
expect. I've never worked with werewolves before, so for all I knew your blood
could have had a different consistency and color than a human's."
"I take
that to mean you haven't been gene mashing werewolves and animals for
long?"
Crios picked up
the vial of blood and transplanted it into a metal vat beside him. "No, I
haven't. I didn't even know that werewolves existed until Norm shared the truth
with me. And even then, I was skeptical until I did the research myself."
"I wonder
how Norman discovered werewolves." He reminded himself to ask Norman when
he returned from the restroom. Werewolves were a pretty well-kept secret, and
for a good reason. If the human population discovered their existence, then
their kind would never be left alone.
Pulling a white
cotton ball from his pocket, Crios rolled it between his thin fingers.
"Norm told me that he saw a werewolf transform when he was walking home
from a bar. After that, he couldn't get thoughts of werewolves out of his mind.
He dug around and found out all about them."
Well, it looked
like Dante hadn't needed to wait until Norman returned from the restroom to
question the man after all. "The werewolf who was seen should have been
more careful. Most of my kind tries not to transform in the presence of humans.
It'll put us in danger."
"Accidents
happen, I guess." Crios shrugged. "Open."
"What?"
"Open your
mouth." Crios rolled his eyes. "I have to do a swab."
"Oh."
He blinked in surprise before opening his mouth wide. Maybe he was being
ridiculous, but he could only pray that his breath didn't stink.
The man ran the
cotton swab along his cheek and then opened a plastic bag and put it inside. As
Crios laid the bag next to the blood sample, Dante couldn't help but feel
mounting curiosity in regards to this brilliant but socially inept person.
"Have you
always liked science?" He noted how natural Crios appeared floating around
in his lab coat.
"Science
isn't something I like as much as it is something that is in my blood."
Crios pushed the glasses further up his nose. "I come from a family of
scientists. My mother and grandfather were brilliant chemists. I, however,
chose to specialize in a few different scientific fields. I figured that I'm
smart enough to work in several different scientific areas at once."
I love how he
had to add a little self-plug in there…"You just made it sound as though
you don't like science."
"Like I
said, science runs in my blood. That's all there is to it. It's not a matter of
me liking or disliking it."
"But what's
the point spending your life doing something you hate?" He'd rather spend
his life trying his best at something he enjoyed even if he was crappy at it.
"It sounds like you're setting yourself up for years of pain and misery. I
don't know why you'd do that."
"I don't
hate science. I just don't particularly like it." Crios stopped talking as
his face became the color of a freshly plucked plum. "Why on earth am I
talking to you about this? I shouldn't have to defend my life choices to a
perfect stranger."
"Sorry."
Crios huffed and
pulled another cotton ball from his pocket. "This is why I hate dealing
with people. It's always so exhausting."
Other people
were exhausting? Dante had once had to run fifty miles in one go, and that had
tired him out less than this conversation. "Sorry I'm such a trial."
In response to
his jab, Crios said nothing. Zilch. Nada. The guy probably hadn't even noticed
his tone.
"Do you
have any family?" He wanted to know how Crios had ended up so much like,
well, Crios.
"They're
all dead." Not even a smidgeon of emotion crept into Crios's crisp voice.
Dante had heard someone become more emotional about a deceased goldfish.
Still Dante's
stomach twisted. "I'm sorry."
"Don't be.
My parents were non-existent in my life even when they were alive." Once
again, Crios delivered the earth shattering information with emotional
detachment. It was strange that the man blew up over the eggs on his
sandwiches, but spoke without remorse about his own dead family.
"Still, you
have to miss them." It would be impossible for him not to.
"No, I
really don't."
The man had to
miss them a little. "Not at all? Oh, come on."
Annoyance
flickered in Crios's steely eyes. "No, I don't. Not at all. Not even in
the slightest bit."
The words made
Dante fall silent.
"Open,"
Crios snapped, prodding his lips with a cotton ball.
At once, he
opened his mouth.
About the Author:
Penelope Rivers is an erotic novelist of M/M romance novels and short stories. A hopeless dreamer, she spends her day thinking about all things fantasy, romantic and not. It is her view that when you start choking on the occasionally dry bread of life, you need something sinfully delicious to chase it down with. Currently, she lives in Utah with an abnormal amount of pets.
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