Review
PRAISE FOR SHERRILYN KENYON
"Kenyon is the reigning queen of the vampire novel."--Barbara Vey, Publishers Weekly
“An engaging read.”—Entertainment Weekly on Devil May Cry
“Kenyon’s writing is brisk, ironic, sexy, and relentlessly imaginative. These are not your mother’s vampire novels.”—The Boston Globe on Dark Side of the Moon
Susan Krinard, author of Secret of the Wolf
Funny and touching. A compelling story that will make you laugh-out-loud. The gods haven't been this much fun since Xena!
Pinerock Book Reviews
Sherrilyn Kenyon's imagination should be considered a national treasure.
Pinerock Book Reviews
Fantasy Lover is sure to become the standard by which all paranormals will be measured and found wanting.
Pinerock Book Reviews
Not since DaraJoy have we seen so powerful a voice, so imaginative a writer and so steamy a love scene.
Product Description
Dear Reader,
Being trapped in a bedroom with a woman is a grand thing. Being trapped in hundreds of bedrooms over two thousand years isn't. And being cursed into a book as a love-slave for eternity can ruin even a Spartan warrior's day.
As a love-slave, I know everything about women. How to touch them, how to savor them, and most of all, how to pleasure them. But when I was summoned to fulfill Grace Alexander's sexual fantasies, I found the first woman in history who saw me as a man with a tormented past. She alone bothered to take me out of the bedroom and onto the world. She taught me to love again.
But I was not born to love. I was cursed to walk eternity alone. As a general, I had long ago accepted my sentence. Yet now I have found Grace--the one thing my wounded heart cannot survive without. Sure, love can heal all wounds, but can it break a two-thousand-year-old curse?
Julian of Macedon
Being trapped in a bedroom with a woman is a grand thing. Being trapped in hundreds of bedrooms over two thousand years isn't. And being cursed into a book as a love-slave for eternity can ruin even a Spartan warrior's day.
As a love-slave, I know everything about women. How to touch them, how to savor them, and most of all, how to pleasure them. But when I was summoned to fulfill Grace Alexander's sexual fantasies, I found the first woman in history who saw me as a man with a tormented past. She alone bothered to take me out of the bedroom and onto the world. She taught me to love again.
But I was not born to love. I was cursed to walk eternity alone. As a general, I had long ago accepted my sentence. Yet now I have found Grace--the one thing my wounded heart cannot survive without. Sure, love can heal all wounds, but can it break a two-thousand-year-old curse?
Julian of Macedon
About the Author
In the past two years, New York Times bestselling author Sherrilyn Kenyon has claimed the #1 spot twelve times, and since 2004, she has placed more than 50 novels on the New York Times list. This extraordinary bestseller continues to top every genre she writes. With more than 23 million copies of her books in print in over 30 countries, her current series include: The Dark-Hunters, The League, Lords of Avalon, BAD Agency, Chronicles of Nick and Nevermore. A preeminent voice in paranormal fiction, Kenyon helped pioneer and define the current paranormal trend that has captivated the world. She lives with her husband, three sons, a menagerie of animals and a collection of swords.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Chapter One
"Honey, you need to get laid."
Grace Alexander flinched at Selena's overly loud voice in the small New Orleans café where they sat, finishing up their lunch of red beans and rice. Unfortunately for her, Selena's voice possessed a lovely octave that could carry plainly through a hurricane.
And it was followed by a sudden hush in the
crowded room.
Glancing at the nearby tables, Grace noted the men had stopped talking, and turned to stare at them with a lot more interest than she cared for.
Ah jeez! Will Selena ever learn to keep her voice down?
Worse, what will she do next, strip naked, and dance on the tabletops?
Again.
For the millionth time since they had first met, Grace wished Selena could get embarrassed. But her flamboyant, often extravagant pal didn't know the meaning of the word.
Grace covered her face with her hands and did her best to ignore the curious onlookers. An urge to slink beneath the table, followed by an even greater urge to kick her companion, consumed her.
"Why don't you speak a little louder, Lanie?" she whispered. "I don't think the guys in Canada were able to hear you."
"Oh, I don't know," the gorgeous brown-haired waiter said as he stopped by their table. "They're probably headed south even as we speak."
Heat stole up Grace's cheeks as the obviously college-aged waiter gave her a devilish grin. "Is there anything else I can get you ladies?" he asked, then looked pointedly at Grace. "Or more precisely, is there anything I can do for you, ma'am?"
How about a bag for my head, or a stick to beat Lanie with?
"I think we have it," Grace said, her cheeks scalding. She was definitely going to kill Selena for this. "We just need our bill."
"All right, then," he said, pulling their ticket off and scribbling across the top of the paper. He set it down in front of Grace. "Just give me a call if I can be of any further service."
It was only after he left that Grace saw his name and phone number on the top of the bill.
Selena took one look at it and laughed out loud.
"Just you wait," Grace said, suppressing a smile as she totaled her portion of the food on her Palm Pilot. "I will get you back for this."
Selena ignored the threat as she fished in her beaded bag for her money. "Yeah, yeah, so you say. If I were you, I'd hang on to that number. He is a cute little thing."
"Young thing," Grace corrected. "And I think I'll pass. The last thing I need is to be locked up for contributing to the delinquency of a minor."
Selena slid her gaze over to where the waiter leaned with one hip against the bar. "Yeah, but Mr. Brad Pitt look-alike over there might be worth it. I wonder if he has an older brother?"
"I wonder how much Bill would pay to know his wife spent her entire lunch hour ogling a kid?"
Selena snorted as she placed her money on the table. "I'm not ogling him for myself. I'm ogling him for you. It was, after all, your sex life we were discussing."
"Well, my sex life is just hunky-dory, and not the business of the people in this restaurant." Tossing her money on the table, Grace grabbed the last bite of cubed cheese and headed for the door.
"Don't get mad," Selena said, following her out into the busy crowd of tourists and regulars thronging Jackson Square.
A lone saxophone played jazz above the cacophony of voices, horses, and car engines as a wave of Louisiana heat assaulted her.
Trying her best to ignore air so thick it could barely be inhaled, Grace wended her way through the crowd, and vendors' booths that were set in front of the wrought-iron fence surrounding Jackson Square.
"You know it's true," Selena said as she caught up
to her. "I mean, goodness, Grace, it's been what? Two years?"
"Four," she said absently. "But who's counting?"
"Four years with no sex?" Selena repeated loudly in disbelief.
Several onlookers paused to look curiously from Selena to Grace.
Oblivious as usual to the attention they collected, Selena continued without pausing. "Don't tell me that you've forgotten this is the Age of Electronics? I mean, really, do any of your patients know how long you've gone without sex?"
Grace swallowed her cheese and gave Selena a nasty glare. Did Selena intend to shout it out for every human, and every horse for that matter, in the Vieux Carré to hear?
"Keep your voice down," she said, then added dryly, "I don't think it's the business of my patients whether or not I'm a born-again virgin. And as for the Age of Electronics, I really don't want to get personal with something that comes with a warning label and batteries."
Selena snorted. "Yeah, well, to hear you talk, most men should come with warning labels." She lifted her hands up to frame her next statement. "Attention, please, Psycho Alert. Me, he-man, am prone to nasty mood swings, lengthy pouts, and possess the ability to tell a woman the truth about her weight without warning."
Grace laughed. She'd rattled off that spiel about men who needed warning labels countless times.
"Ah, I see, Dr. Sex," Selena said with an imitation Dr. Ruth accent. "You just sit there and listen to them spout off all the intimate details of their sexual encounters while you live like a lifetime member of the Teflon Panty Club."
Dropping her accent, Selena added, "I can't believe after all the stuff you've heard in your sessions that none of it has ever gotten your hormones revved."
Grace gave Selena a droll look. "Yeah, well, I am a sex therapist. It wouldn't do my patients much good for me to have la petite mort while they're in the middle of spewing out their problems. I mean really, Lanie, I'd lose my license."
"Well, I don't see how you can advise them when you won't go anywhere near a man."
Grimacing, Grace led the way back to the other side of the square, across from the Tourist Information Center where Selena's tarot card and palm reading stand was set up.
When Grace reached the small card table draped with a dark purple cloth, she sighed. "You know, I would date if I could ever find a man worth shaving my legs for. But most are such a waste of time that I'd rather sit at home and watch reruns of Hee Haw."
Selena gave her an irritated smirk. "What was wrong with Gerry?"
"Bad breath."
"Jamie?"
"His fondness for mining nose gold. Especially during dinner."
"Tony?"
Grace just looked at her.
Selena threw her hands up. "Okay, so maybe he did have a little gambling problem. But then, everyone needs a hobby."
Grace glared at her.
"Hey, Madam Selene, you back from lunch?" Sunshine asked from the next stand over where she hawked her sketches and pottery.
A few years younger than them, Sunshine had long, black hair and always wore clothes that reminded Grace of a fairy princess.
Her costume today was a wispy white skirt that would have been obscene if not for the pale pink leotard beneath it and a pretty peasant blouse.
"Yeah, I'm back," Selena said as she knelt to unlock the doors on her metal wheeled cart that she secured every morning to the wrought-iron gate with a bicycle chain. "Did I get any interest while I was gone?"
"A couple of guys took your business card and said they'd be back after they ate."
"Thanks." Selena placed her purse inside the cart, then pulled out the dark blue cigar box she used to hold her money, her tarot cards that she kept wrapped in a black silk scarf, and a thin, yet humongous, brown leather book Grace had never seen before.
Selena put her large-brimmed straw hat on her head, then turned and stood.
"Did you get all your pieces marked?" she asked Sunshine.
"Yes," Sunshine said as she grabbed her purse. "I still say it's bad luck. But at least if anyone wants to know the price for anything while I'm gone, it'll be there."
A rough-looking biker pulled up to the curb. "Hey, Sunshine," he shouted, "get your butt over here. I'm hungry."
Sunshine waved her hand dismissively. "Keep your chains on, Harry, and lay off or you'll be eating by yourself," she said as she walked slowly toward him. She climbed up on the back of his motorcycle.
Grace shook her head at the two of them. Sunshine needed dating help a whole lot more than she did.
She watched as they drove past the Café du Monde. "Ooo, I bet a beignet would be good for dessert."
"Food is no substitute for sex," Selena said as she placed the cards and book on her table. "Isn't that what you keep telling--"
"All right, you've made your point. But really, Lanie, why are you suddenly so interested in my sex life? Or more...
