A Slave to the Fantasy, Part 3: California Passion: A Slave to the Fantasy, #3

By Rebecca Lee

Besides the story "California Nights" the entire "A Slave to the Fantasy" saga can be purchased in a  collector's box set or you can also get Book 1!

Handsome and successful with the world at his feet, Samuel Roberts can't let go of his obsession for a beautiful woman. His deepest insecurities and fears come alive again in a seemingly chance reunion with the mysterious Tanya Carasco.

To the world and his rabid fan base, dating expert Samuel Roberts has it all: looks, success, money, and fame. In his soul he walks an emotional tight rope of sadness and desire as he pines for the one woman he can't have.

She's an enchanting exotic beauty oceans away whom he knows only through still photographs and internet instant messages. More than a fantasy, Tanya is sexy, stunning, and deeply troubled. Blessed with looks that mesmerizes men everywhere, her passionate but wounded heart belongs not to her cyber lover Samuel Roberts, but to a dangerous uncaring man she callously hides from him. Her erotic romance with this other man dominates her.

Tanya and Samuel are further separated by a dark and elicit plot designed to manipulate Tanya's allure for political domination. Is it the destiny of these gorgeous cyber soul mates to unite amid the chaos of international intrigue, shifting loyalties, and red hot liaisons?Where the burning heart is unchained from the past, there is only freedom and pleasure. This is the best of today's hottest erotic romances from Sylvia Day and EL James."A Slave to the Fantasy" is a hot page turner erotic romance series that will grab you and never let go.

Here it is "California Nights".

Pulse pounding from beginning to exciting end. Another of Rebecca Lee's signature erotic romance stories for women.

• Language: English
• Publisher: John Handy
• Release date: Sep 27, 2014
• ISBN: 9781502211521

Rebecca Lee

Rebecca Lee is a former swimsuit model, and now a successful dating coach for men. She is one of Author John Handy's Attraction Masters and is the author of the Forbidden Attraction Secrets for Men series. Her motto for men having success with her or any other woman they desire: "When we're face to face, if you are bold, fearless, and seek what you want, trust me you have us. Everytime." "A Slave to the Fantasy" is her first fiction series. Rebecca is single and lives in Southern California with her cat  and her beagle.

Book preview

Chapter 1—Southland

The Los Angeles Police Department crime lab has never fully lived it down. The 1994 investigation into the double homicide involving Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman implicating pro football legend O.J. Simpson. It resulted in the highly controversial exoneration of Simpson in a criminal trial.

A large and vital piece of what many have seen as an unholy pie of a prosecution effort, dealt with the purported tampering and physical evidence contamination at the scene of the murders, as well as within the LAPD crime lab itself.

Since then, the LAPD crime lab has been synonymous with corruption and mismanagement every time it’s name is uttered. Unfortunately, perception trumps reality when a supposed mishap occurred in a high-profile case. In such cases, sound bites invariably trump substance. 

In fact, the LAPD crime lab is widely regarded as one of the best of those forensics labs working any of the major metropolitan areas in the U.S.  It has handled the largest volume of homicide cases in the Southland, all of California, and has been near the top nationally, year after year for decades.

Because it works more cases in one of the most heavily populated areas in the country, it will have it’s hits and it’s misses just due to sheer numbers. But like the truism that your best pilots are the ones who take off and land the most, you would be hard pressed to find a crime lab better prepared for whatever kind of case is thrown it’s way.

With that as background, the scene involving the Chinatown murder of terrorist Dagyan Preevo aka Bleedfang, was no normal case for a metropolitan investigative team.  Preevo’s body was found dismembered and in a dumpster area behind the New China restaurant.

He was pulled apart piece by piece. The conclusion was ultimately reached that it likely took place right in that very area near the dumpster.  Odd considering there was no blood or stray DNA found.

No one had seen Preevo in Chinatown near the time of death established by investigators. This time of death had been established by two means. First, advanced vein and blood oxygen analysis techniques. Second, the simple fact that the trash had been taken out inside an hour before the likely 9 pm time of death. No body was there.

The investigative team, led by 26-year veteran Pete Princeton Gallagher, deduced that the body was dismembered in Chinatown because of what they didn’t find. First off, there was no sign of entry into the area. Investigation revealed that the surveillance cameras we’re intentionally obscured during the time frame when the likely attack took place. Black spray paint was apparently used.

Yes but the person could have been doing that to allow for disposal of the body in secrecy, Gallagher’s partner Josina Clarks noted.

However, Gallagher also reviewed a vital piece of non-evidence that cinched it for him that this was done by someone who knew the victim and the area. For Gallagher this also supported the conclusion that the perpetrator specifically chose the dumpster location to complete the crime.

Preevo had been spotted in Santa Monica (10 plus miles away) by a passer by and he had two weapons that looked like machine guns right in plain site. They were ultimately left in a hotel room in the Santa Monica Beachside Inn. There was no sign of any struggle having taken place in any place Preevo haunted in Santa Monica.  He clearly trusted whomever he was meeting.

After all, a man with his background and belief in his right to be prepared with force would not have made the trip to Chinatown without his weaponry. Based on the many pieces of evidence pulled together by Gallagher, he concluded the dumpster area had to be a pre-determined meeting place.

Yeah but something this violent and grisly and we’re not turning up any stray DNA? Detective Clarks noted skeptically. "Plus this guy was a big dude. His records indicate he had all sorts of elite military training and learned to break people in two using his pinky finger. Stuff like that.

Bottom line: He isn’t going down without a struggle.

Gallagher saw something altogether different. Clearly Preevo trusted the person he was meeting, but that the meeting was taking place on that person’s turf. To do this crime, you’d need expertise in quickly subduing a man of this size and you’d need to have intimate knowledge of how to pull his body apart like without creating a ruckus of DNA all over the place.

Gallagher’s hypothesis,  shared by him and him alone, took a major step toward being confirmed when autopsy revealed that Preevo had been frozen and frozen extremely rapidly. This was not possible in the time frames investigators had established without something more than a standard freezer.

Gallagher knew, based on the  background of the victim, there was likely use of advanced nerve gas type weaponry. Therefore, Gallagher knew this case was likely to go Federal, or even bigger at any moment. 

...

Rise and shine young lady! the older but distinguished looking gentleman with a white lab coat said loudly. He meant to shock Tanya Carasco to full lucidity.

It didn’t take him long to reiterate again and again that time was wasting, just as Samuel Roberts had bluntly told her hours before. Tanya blew Roberts off at the time. She didn’t realize he was serious about the need for urgency, as she lazily fell off to sleep right in his face. Or maybe she simply thought she could sucker him like she always had?

Like with Roberts, she again let her eyelids fall closed in the face of this strange, but at least benign appearing man.

No, no my dear, Agent Bill Reston said admonishing her. "You aren’t going to get off soft with me. You are a material witness in two ongoing investigations, both of which go all the way to the highest clearance with the NSC. That’s the National Security Council in case you were wondering. Look it up. It is  the coordinating body that answers to the President on matters that blur the line between international crime and large/scale domestic crime.

Basically if the badness involves huge shit, it involves the NSC.

Nobody is playing games anymore, she thought.

She also wondered how it got this far out of control starting with a simple trip to the US at the behest of Michael Blake. Deep down, she felt Blake would be able to bail her out of this. After all, despite  the involvement in activities that would have surely doomed anyone else in her position being  a poor girl from the slums, she always emerged free from the trouble with the law and basically unscathed. 

If she wasn’t seeing this new situation was way different, it was mostly because she wasn’t seeing things from an experienced eye. Despite the large volume of sex trafficking she was used as bait for, and the deep gravity of that crime, she didn’t grasp enormity. She was more a specialist used for specific actions,  not a leader or choreographer of schemes.

She decided in her mind she was ready to talk but only, she reasoned internally,  because she was trying to buy time.

Her thoughts turned to Roberts and a feeling of respect for him came over her.

At least it looks like he grew some balls finally, she thought.

Alright then, I think it’s time we do talk, she said with forced casualness, but also a smile meant to melt her interrogator. Let’s do that.

We’ll have to see if this is actually going to be worth smiling about maam, Agent Reston said with a stone serious face. I can’t make any promises.

Chapter 2—Return to Simplicity

After the aggressive and frank conversation with Agent Reston, Tanya was given the ability to clean and freshen up. Her room appeared to be like what would be found in any standard hospital, except with no television. But there was a bathroom to the side, and it carried the full arsenal of bath needs. 

Upon agreeing to talk, she was told food would be delivered in one half-hour.  The meeting with Agent Reston and whomever else would take place a half-hour after that.

Tanya