Tuesday, 3 September, sees the release of Liquid Crystal, the latest Dept. 57 novella. This is one of the short, hot ones, but I love this book for many reasons, one of them being that the book takes place in London.
I don’t live there, but I love it, and I love visiting. I wouldn’t live there unless I couldn’t help it, though, but the heroes of this book, Bryn and Kai, love being there.
Anyway, want a look at the book? This one was out (briefly) at another publisher before they closed. I’m really happy that it’s getting its fair shake now, and take a look at that amazing cover! April Martinez is my girl!
Here’s what it’s about:
An unsuspected enemy rises up to threaten Crystal’s life, until her old friends, Bryn and Kai, rescue her from a nearly fatal plunge into the Thames. When they share the same bed, the passion they wake in each other is as incredible as it is inevitable. Bryn and Kai reveal their secret – they are mermen – and show Crys the secrets of underwater loving, the passion they release steams up the water.
But their enemy still chases them, and now Crys, Bryn and Kai are in mortal danger. Even in a city as busy and modern as London, England, old enemies lurk and old secrets hide.
*** E-X-C-E-R-P-T ***
LIQUID CRYSTAL by Lynne Connolly
Geoff spoke to her as if she were some kind of idiot. Perhaps she was, for trusting him. “Bryn Murchison and Kai Murdoch are mermen. We know it. I showed you the pictures.” Altered by a computer program. She refused to believe, didn’t dare to. But now she had to think again. Could it be true? Her mind worked rapidly. She still had no idea what they planned, and when she tried to think too hard her mind spun. The pictures of Bryn and Kai, frolicking in a swimming pool and then hoisting themselves up onto the side of the pool showed them with beautiful, glimmering tails. Just like in her weirdly erotic dreams. She listened. She couldn’t do anything else. Perhaps she could persuade them, plead with them. Anything. “They like you, Crys, so you’re the bait tonight. You’ll live, we’re sure of it.”
The car stopped, and she was hoisted up. Two men held her, at the top of the sack and the bottom, and then someone hoisted her up onto his shoulder. His grunt of exertion identified him as Geoff. Her head swam with the sudden movement but the chill night air, seeping through the coarsely woven fabric of her prison, revived her a little. She worked to wake up, but the drugs they’d given her made the wooziness impossible to dispel.
Geoff carried her, bumping against his back and although she struggled, they’d bound her too tightly for her to do much about it.
Then fresh air and the sight of Geoff’s face for a brief moment before they stuck tape across her mouth, catching her nose with the end of it, so she only had one nostril through which to breathe. Geoff turned away and someone behind her grabbed the tape and tugged so it covered her nostrils. She couldn’t breathe. Jesus, they wanted her dead. The unknown hand refastened the sack and plunged her back into stifling darkness.
Chains clanked as someone drew them from a bag, and Crys’s stomach fell away. But she couldn’t be sick. If she vomited, she’d choke on it and die. Not that she had much chance of surviving this.
They hoisted her up onto a parapet, or a ledge of some kind, and she knew from the rush of cold, damp air from below that she was balanced on the edge of a bridge, and below the rushing waters of the Thames awaited her.
Just before they tipped her into the cold, killing torrent, Geoff said, “You’re going for a swim, Crys.”
“He was just trying to rile us.” Bryn kicked a stray pebble with far more viciousness than it deserved.
“You think?” Kai’s mouth hardened to a thin line. “He knows more than is good for him. I’m calling on the Department come Monday morning. Let Grady know about him.”
“Hey, boy, I’m the full-time Department 57 agent, not you. Can’t have you part-timers doing the job I should do. We’ve had our eye on him and his cohorts for a while and now I’m as sure as I can be that they’re up to no good, so I’ll do the calling. Anyway, if you contact him, you know Director Grady will put you on to watching Geoff, and you can’t stand the sight of him.” Bryn grinned, knowing how much Kai would hate that.
Kai shrugged. “It won’t be the first time I’ve had to pal up with somebody I don’t like.”
“I hope you don’t mean me, lover.”
“Never.” They exchanged a companionable grin.
They strolled up the Victoria Embankment, leaving the dull party behind them, the music drifting over the churning water, black and seemingly fathomless. Bare armed, Kai hadn’t bothered with a jacket, figuring they’d just order a taxi straight from the party, but both felt the need for fresh air.
Bryn sighed. “Yes, you’re right. We have to tell Grady, just in case Geoff turns out to be more than a stupid drunk with a big mouth. When Crys told us he was prejudiced, I thought she meant the normal thing, you know, an antigay attitude. Not bloody mermen!”
Kai paused and stared up into the star-filled sky. “Makes you wonder how he guessed. I mean, we don’t look like the merpeople in the books, do we?”
Bryn glanced at Kai, giving him the once-over. He was well worth looking at, with his lean, fit body and flowing white-blond hair. It reached almost to the crack in his ass. Bryn should know, and the mental vision of Kai bending over for him made his cock twitch.
Hastily, Bryn turned his mind to other matters. It’d be an hour at least before they got home. He didn’t want to travel the whole way with a raging hard-on. And London was too busy, too well observed, to risk male-male sex on the waterfront. Although he could try fuzzing, that mental technique all Talents used when they wanted to pass unobserved. Kinky, but definitely tempting.
His mind made up, Bryn turned to Kai, to see his partner waiting with a whimsical smile on his sharp-featured face and his arms spread in welcome.
That was when his phone decided to ring.
He bit back a curse as he glanced at the screen before flipping the phone open. Number withheld, but that wasn’t unusual when you worked for Department 57. “Yes?”
“A bit snappy, aren’t we?” came a voice he didn’t recognize. He opened his mind and let Kai in, to share the call telepathically. This could be business, and it would save explanations later if Kai heard the orders as well.
“Get on with it.” His plans disintegrating around him, Bryn couldn’t get enthusiastic about orders at two a.m. He didn’t care if it was Will Grady himself; he couldn’t go willingly on every assignment. What he expected was a code number and an instruction, not what he actually got.
“If you want to see Crystal Miller alive again, you’ll come to Vauxhall Bridge now. You’ve got ten minutes.”
If you want to find out what happens next, the book’s out on Tuesday 3rd September!
Oh yes, and keep checking, once I get my final versions, I’ll give one away here. Any idea of the kind of questions I should ask?
