KAREN’S KILLER BOOK BENCH: Welcome to Karen’s Killer Book Bench, where readers can discover talented new authors and take a peek inside their wonderful books. This is not an age-filtered site, so all book peeks are PG-13 or better. Come back and visit often. Happy reading!
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ONE NIGHT WITH THE DRAGON KING
The Moonlight Dragon Book 3
BY DOROTHY MCFALLS
BLURB
Discover the world before the War of Magics in Dorothy McFalls’ latest STANDALONE dark captive romance…
They call me the villain of my story. They call me Princess Death. But I’m simply me, a princess trapped in a life that is trying to kill me. I’m doing what I must to survive.
I need to escape this palace.
My family must suspect my plans to flee. They put a cunning vampire in charge of guarding me. Fen, a vampire who I had tried and failed to slay when we were children, is determined to thwart all my efforts to rescue myself.
By the way he stares at me, I suspect he thirsts for my destruction.
The vampires in the palace tell tales of a Raven King. He’s a mythical figure, who they say will come and free the vampires from the hell we humans have created for them. My stubborn guard doesn’t believe in the tales until someone starts to wreck havoc in the palace, leaving raven feathers as a calling card.
Can the Raven King possibly be real?
And will he save me, a pampered human princess?
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ONE NIGHT WITH THE DRAGON KING
The Moonlight Dragon Book 3
BY DOROTHY MCFALLS
Excerpt
My father’s head advisor, Lord Astley, dressed in long black robes, emerged from the stands. He walked to the middle of the courtyard and held up his hands. The courtyard fell silent.
“This is the last round of competition for the replacement of Beuer, our former Captain of the Royal Guards, who left us too soon.” Astley lowered his head for a moment. Beuer had been more than the Captain of the Royal Guards, he’d also been one of my father’s favorite drinking buddies. “The two remaining contestants for the position, step forward!”
The crowd roared as Grant swaggered out from the troop of guards that had lined up along the courtyard’s perimeter. He pumped his fists in the air.
“Goddess, I love him,” Kessel said with a long sigh.
While everyone was watching Grant as he tore off his tunic and flexed his arm muscles, a slimmer man stepped forward.
No, not a man. The metal collar around his neck marked him as a vampire.
Though he appeared slender when compared to the thickset Grant, he looked strong enough to hold his own when it came to defending the realm. And gods, his chiseled features could give even the handsome dragons a run for the most alluring creature in the land.
He stood a full head taller than Lord Astley. His dark hair was too long and slightly messy. He paused to push a thick lock of it out of his eyes. But his purple leathers looked new and were neatly pressed. And his tall black leather boots had been carefully polished.
The vampire didn’t pump his fist or flex his muscles. He merely stood in the middle of the courtyard and turned his piercing silver gaze toward the royal family.
A startled gasp escaped my mouth when I saw his eyes.
It’s him.
No. That is ridiculous.
It couldn’t be the same boy I’d kicked in the courtyard all those years ago. I’d killed that boy.
Still, I leaned forward, staring hard at the vampire slave who dared put himself in the running for captain. His hair was the same wild mess. His features were similar to the face that haunted my dreams. And those eyes, those haunting silvery pale gray eyes so different from the other vampires’ brown hues, snapped to meet my gaze.
His expression hardened.
“The vampire,” I whispered as I squeezed my friend’s hand even tighter than before. “Is he trustworthy?”
Kessel snorted. “He’s not going to win. Grant is smarter. And stronger. Look at all those muscles on display for me to ogle. That man and his mighty fine body will be the death of me after we’re married.”
I couldn’t force myself to move my gaze away from the vampire to look at where Kessel was pointing. The press of the vampire’s stare had felt like a threat.
I reached into my pocket and rubbed my finger over the swirls etched into the stone I carried. But then I remembered where I’d found the stone, how I’d found the stone. I closed my eyes only to be assaulted by the memory of the crunch of bone and the spray of blood. I yanked my hand out of my pocket as if I’d been scalded.
It’s not the same boy, I chided to myself. It can’t be. He’s dead. You killed him.
Each dead soul I’d created haunted every breathing moment of my life. But they’d never risen up and stood in front of me as a solid entity before.
And that wasn’t what was happening now.
I needed to get a grip.
It was my aborted attempt at escape that was making me see ghosts in the faces of strangers. I released my strangling grasp on Kessel’s hand and straightened my back, trying to fight back the building panic.
Lord Astley continued to speak, laying out the rules of the competition. I barely heard a word because the magic inside me—my magic—had started screaming, screaming, screaming.
The vampire was going to win this contest and then brutally kill us all.
But, damn me, we humans deserved to die.
About Author Dorothy McFalls…
Author Dorothy McFalls was born in New York but raised in South Carolina. She makes her home on an artsy beach community in South Carolina with her husband, neurotic dog, and persnickety cat. Though writing has always been a passion for her, she pursued an undergraduate degree in Wildlife Biology and a graduate degree in Public Administration and Urban Planning. She then put her educational experience to use, having worked in all branches and all levels of government including local, regional, state, and federal. She even spent time during college working for a non-profit environmental watchdog organization.
Switching from government service and community planning to fiction writing wasn’t as big of a change as some might think. Her government work was all about the stories of the people and the places where they live. As an urban planner, Dorothy loved telling the stories of the people she met. And from that, her desire to tell the stories that were so alive in her heart grew until she could not ignore it any longer. In 2001, she took a leap of faith and pursued her dream of writing fiction full-time.
Now an award-winning multi-published author, Dorothy enjoys writing in several different genres. Her works have been nominated for many awards including: Romantic Times Reviewers’ Choice Award, Reviewers International Organization Award, National Reader’s Choice Award, CataRomance Reviewers’ Choice Award, and The Romance Reviews Today Perfect 10! Award. Reviewers have called her work: “amazing”, “perfect”, “filled with emotion”, and “lined with danger.”
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Links to Dorothy’s websites, blogs, books, #ad, etc.:
Amazon: https://amzn.to/4pecvqz
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Special Giveaway: Dorothy will gift one ebook copy of ONE NIGHT WITH THE RAVEN KING and book-related stickers to one lucky reader who comments on her Karen’s Killer Book Bench blog. Good luck!
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Thanks, Dorothy, for sharing your book with us!
Don’t miss the chance to read this book!
This sounds very interesting! Thanks for the spotlight!
Welcome to Karen’s Killer Book Bench, Dorothy. I love the premise of this book and enjoyed the excerpt. Can’t wait to read it. Thanks for sharing your book with us today!
Good morning, Wow, this book sounds like a Great read, very intriguing!! Thank you for sharing the excerpt with us. (not entering this ebook giveaway, but Thank you. I am not tech savvy)
Thank you for sharing your book with us today. It sounds great, and I especially like that it’s stand-alone.
cool