When Darkness Comes (Darkness Shorts Book 2)

By J. Dawn Light

Bad timing and hurt feelings started a heated ani-mosity between Samara Reynolds and Trake Cun-ningham in their teenage years. Now, Trake is back home, investigating the strange disappearance of several fairies around the lake and he and Sam are clashing once again.

Samara loves to hate her best friend’s gorgeous, older brother. Every time she is within spitting dis-tance of her long time crush, her defenses go up and her mouth goes off. It doesn’t help that the man knows just what buttons to push to send her spiral-ing into violent fits of anger.

Trake has a job to do. He doesn’t have time to ob-sess over a mean, mouthy, beautiful cat-shifter who will never do anything but push him to say mean things he always regrets.

When family is threatened, these two will have to suck it up if they want to find the answers they need to save the people they love.

• Language: English
• Publisher: J. Dawn Light
• Release date: Dec 7, 2015
• ISBN: 9781311920478

J. Dawn Light

There's not much to know about me personally. I'm extremely boring. But I'm completely in love with my life, so it works for me. I've been married for over 13 years now to a man that still gives me butterflies and I have 3 amazing children that are obviously the best children ever!Writing wise, I'm all about the paranormal romance. Mostly adult, but have something in mind for a YA. We'll see how that goes.I think in my advancing age, I've managed to contract adult ADD, so I have a really hard time reading something that doesn't keep me completely entertained, which is why I write the way I write. I'm not big on romanticizing the appearance of a wall or putting scenes in my books that don't either lend something to the romance of the two main characters, or the story in general. Unless it makes me laugh. I do a lot of stuff because it makes me laugh.

Book preview

When Darkness Comes

J. Dawn Light

Copyright © 2015 Jessica D. Lightfoot

Smashwords Edition

Bad timing and hurt feelings started a heated animosity between Samara Reynolds and Trake Cunningham in their teenage years. Now, Trake is back home, investigating the strange disappearance of several fairies around the lake and he and Sam are clashing once again.

Samara loves to hate her best friend’s gorgeous, older brother. Every time she is within spitting distance of her long time crush, her defenses go up and her mouth goes off. It doesn’t help that the man knows just what buttons to push to send her spiraling into violent fits of anger.

Trake has a job to do. He doesn’t have time to obsess over a mean, mouthy, beautiful cat-shifter who will never do anything but push him to say mean things he always regrets.

When family is threatened, these two will have to suck it up if they want to find the answers they need to save the people they love.

Chapter One

What are you doing Samara?

Sam squeaked, nearly jumping out of her skin…and the tree she was—oh so ungracefully—standing in. She managed to grab the branch above her before she completely tumbled out, but not before she ended up getting poked in the ass by a bastard limb.

The comfort level in such a position is absolutely zero.

She didn't look down at Trake. Couldn't look at him. Of course she would make a fool of herself in front of him. Just like old times.

Well, she said dryly, trying to move away from the rudest limb ever without falling and further making an ass out of herself. I'm currently getting goosed in the ass by a branch.

I think you know I meant what are you doing in the tree? But a diversionary tactic? Thank you for basically telling me, that whatever it was, you weren't supposed to be doing it. So, to be clear. What. Are. You. Doing. In that tree?

She'd known Trake forever. Their families had been friends since before she could remember and did nearly everything together. Thanksgiving, Christmas, picking drunken uncles up off the ground and dragging then back to the house after the New Year’s Eve Bash...everything. Her uncle had even married his aunt and had little shifter/fairy babies that were actually related to both of them.

Unfortunately, that meant Trake treated her like a little sister or cousin, or some other annoying family member you try to avoid when everyone is under the same roof.

As was evident by the bored, annoyed look he was giving her when she finally looked down and met his eyes.

The man had a face so freaking gorgeous, she'd known full-grown women to openly weep at the sight of it. And she found that to be the root of all their problems. She was convinced if he wasn't so perfect to look at, she wouldn't get all stupid when he was around. This unfortunate, longtime reality was known—at least in Sam’s mind—as the Trake effect.

And if he didn't know how perfect he was, he wouldn't act like such a stuck-up prick and she wouldn't have to tell him that he was a stuck-up prick and therefore, irritate him.

Well, you suck at being an investigator. Obviously I'm a Willow-Shifter, so I'm kinda known for hanging out in trees.

See! This was the thing. He walked around acting like he was better than her, so she spent her time being a total bitch to him. She even knew she was being a bitch and just couldn't seem to keep from saying something flat-out, freaking rude!

In human form?

It doesn't matter what form I'm in when I protect and draw energy from the willow, Trake.

You're in a maple, Samara.

Doh! She looked at the leaf currently fluttering against her forehead. Yep. Definitely a maple.

Trake-effect.

Growling at the injustice of the man being...alive, Samara decided the branch taking up residence in her crack had to go, unfortunately...she was an idiot.

Motherfu... Her eloquent speech was cut off by the fact that the ground always wins when put up against lungs. She wanted to cuss. Wanted to say every dirty word she'd ever heard––like toe-jam and Sooner fan––but it's really hard to talk when your diaphragm is wrapped around your spine.

Don't ask her why. She'd totally given up on the doctor thing at seven when she discovered her extreme dislike for people whining like little babies. It wasn't like that little girl’s ear wouldn't grow back. She was a werewolf. If she couldn't handle a friendly wrestling match then she definitely shouldn't have started it by calling Daneeka tiny.

She'd been completely normal sized...for a fairy.

Samara?

She glared at the beautiful face lack of oxygen had started to convince her was and angel directing her to the heavenly gates. You could have caught me. Protect and serve? Ring any bells?

Trake shrugged. You're a cat. I figured you'd land on your feet.

Trake-effect.

I wish I would have landed on your face. Not entirely mature, but as described before, she wasn't at her best around this man.

Noticing now that she was on the ground and no longer being sodomized by a maple — freaking maple—that the man was wearing nothing more than a towel, she remembered with great embarrassment how she'd managed to get herself in this predicament in the first place.

She'd been minding her own business, jogging along the path to the lake, when she'd seen him come up out of the water, completely naked. It wasn't like she'd known he was going to be there. Sure, this was the spot almost everyone came to swim au naturel because of the privacy factor, but really, when Vivianna had mentioned that he was back in town, she hadn't come here in hopes of seeing him. It was all accidental. For real!

She would admit however, that when he'd come out of the water and all she could see was his muscular back and amazing ass, the cat's natural curiosity took over.

And if it wouldn't have been for that bastard maple, it wouldn't have taken her so long to climb the mother, so that when she finally got in a good position, she'd lost sight of Trake, only to have him startle her into awkward positions.

She simply could not let him see her eyeballing his body. She drew the line at letting the man know just how much she lusted after his arrogant ass.

She used the time she spent climbing to her big clumsy feet to look the man up and down under her hair and lashes, hoping he couldn't see her eyes and the way they caressed his flawless form.

Well, you obviously feel well enough to start with the childish wit, so why don't you tell me what you were doing in that tree.

Don't do it! Don't you dare tell him what you were doing in that tree.

Watching the lake.

Oh, yeah. The other symptom of the Trake-effect. Blurting the most ridiculous things at the most ridiculous times.

His eyes narrowed on her, making her squirm. Why?

She squared her shoulders, meeting his eyes so she could lie with dignity. It's always so pretty at night when the moon shines off the water.

A golden brown brow rose and Trake—the smug prick—crossed his arms over his chest, leaning against the effing maple. It's a new moon.

Shit! Was it? She didn't even try to be subtle as she looked at the sky, trying to find the elusive sphere that could save her from this potential embarrassment.

Sure enough. No moon.

Crossing her own arms, she glared at the bane of her existence. I don't have to explain myself to you Cunningham! You're just here to find out what is happening to your fellow lake fairies, not to question me about astronomy.

Maybe the fact that you’re here, at the lake, acting weird and clearly lying to me, makes you a suspect.

She rolled her eyes and turned back to the path. I'm not.

What makes you so sure?

What would I want with fairies? She smiled sarcastically over her shoulder at him as she walked away. They don't even taste that good.

***

Okayokayokay wait! You actually climbed the tree so you could get a look at his—

We'll call it dimensions.

We'll call you an idiot. Vivianna shook her head. What is it about Trake that makes you so...not you?

Oh, you mean the Trake-effect? I think it's the chemical combination of him being a far too sexy asshat and me having that fiery red-headed temperament.

Sam, you're of Egyptian decent. I'm pretty sure the only way you could get further from being red-headed, is if you were from Nigeria.

Samara pulled her long black hair forward over her shoulder, examining it. There has to be at least one in here, right? I fly off the handle about everything.

I think it has more to do with you being a black cat. Us Tabbies are notoriously sweet tempered.

Brent Simmons, you bigot!

Vivianna gave an exasperated sigh. You would bring that up, you bitchy, bad-luck bringer. I had a good reason to break his arm. Is it my fault his mother doesn't believe in doctors? It's not even that much of a disfigurement.

Either way, I know tabbies are evil. Just look at my mother.

Vivianna smiled sweetly at the waitress as she put a huge plate of bacon down in the middle of them. This was their normal. The equivalent of like sixteen sides of bacon every morning to share. That and a good four cups of coffee each and they were set to go.

Are you on call today? Samara asked after finishing her half of the bacon. There was never any talk during the consumption of pig. It was an unspoken rule between them. The first and only time had resorted in the two of them getting on the table and hissing at each other. Looking back, the last straw for the owner of the diner had been when he'd had to squirt them with a water bottle to break them apart when Vivianna had gotten Samaras scruff in her teeth and Sam had started stabbing her in the face with a fork. Blood spatter was frowned upon.

Yep, all weekend actually. Dr. Obese went on vacay with his twenty year-old girlfriend. Does the girl have absolutely no self-respect? How does she not gag every time she has to ride that shit? Because you know he doesn't take top. Too much work...and last I checked, she hasn't been brought into the morgue due to suffocation via fat-ass.

Dr. Obeso was the head of the Cardiology department at Vivianna's hospital, which held a great amount of irony considering Vivianna's nickname for the man wasn't off base in the least.

In fact on more than one occasion, she'd changed the o to e on