Embracing Lust: The Deadliest Sin Series, #8

By Gwyn McNamee

Some things are inevitable.

The sun rising and setting.

The tide rolling in and out along the shoreline.

Succumbing to sin.

No matter how hard we fight it, sin always creeps into our lives.

Now, it's staring me right in the face.

In this job, hard decisions are inevitable.

Ones that cost lives and eat away at souls.

But there's no use fighting it.

Sometimes embracing what's coming is the only way to survive.

Even if it's the very thing, the very person you've fought against for so long.

Because the war I'm smack dab in the middle of isn't going to just end.

And I need to fuel it if I want to win.

 

***Embracing Lust is the eighth book in The Deadliest Sin Series about organized crime in Chicago. This series is best read in order, as the stories are chronological and each sin builds on the events of the previous one.***

• Language: English
• Publisher: Gwyn McNamee
• Release date: Mar 25, 2021
• ISBN: 9781393780571

Gwyn McNamee

Gwyn McNamee is an attorney, writer, wife, and mother (to one human baby and two fur babies). Originally from the Midwest, Gwyn relocated to her husband’s home town of Las Vegas in 2015 and is enjoying her respite from the cold and snow. Gwyn has been writing down her crazy stories and ideas for years and finally decided to share them with the world. She loves to write stories with a bit of suspense and action mingled with romance and heat. When she isn’t either writing or voraciously devouring any books she can get her hands on, Gwyn is busy adding to her tattoo collection, golfing, and stirring up trouble with her perfect mix of sweetness and sarcasm (usually while wearing heels). Gwyn is the author of The Hawke Family series, The Slip Series, The Deadliest Sin Series, The Inland Seas Series, The Supernatural Love Stories in the Absurd (written as her alter-ego, DP Payne), and several stand-alone novels.

Book preview

Embracing Lust

Embracing Lust

The Deadliest Sin Series - Book 8

Gwyn McNamee

EMBRACING LUST

© 2021 Gwyn McNamee

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All rights reserved. Except as permitted by U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without prior permission of the author.

The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials.

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, establishments, or organizations, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously to give a sense of authenticity. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Contents

Preface

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

About the Author

OTHER WORKS BY GWYN MCNAMEE

To everyone who has ever let lust overpower reason.

Love begins with an image; lust with a sensation.

-Mason Cooley

1

KAT

The ground rushes up at us so fast that it's more like flying into the ground than falling. What starts out as tiny dots quickly becomes a vast forest of trees climbing skyward. And we’re headed right into them.

We're going to die.

Our pilots can’t seem to get control of our descent, and the howling of the wind battering the small plane reaches a deafening roar, a warning of the inevitable impact about to happen.

Rose clutches my hand in his and squeezes. This time, instead of pulling away from his touch, I squeeze back in a vice-like grip. Somehow, clinging to him like a lifeline seems like the right move in this situation despite all my reservations.

At least I'm not dying alone.

Though, this isn’t the way I imagined it would end. I always figured it would be one of Aleksander's enemies or one of the new ones I created who would ultimately take me out in a hail of bullets. Not some stupid plane malfunction. Though, maybe it’s my final judgment. A statement from the big man upstairs that he sees what I’ve been doing and it’s time to pay for my sins.

It certainly would be warranted.

For both the man beside me and me.

I glance over at Rose. His dark eyes meet mine, and he opens his mouth to say something—

The impact comes so hard and so abruptly, it crushes the air from my lungs and sends a jolt of agony through my body so intense, it feels like I’m collapsing in on myself.

A cataclysm of sounds fill my ears—screeching metal, bangs, cries of anguish. And then…everything goes dark.

Darkness envelops me. So dark, it’s not just black, it’s a void of absolutely nothing—no light, no sound, no air. Just nothing.

It seems to go on forever, but then slowly, something returns. Faint at first, then it slams into me.

I groan and try to roll to my side, but pain shoots through every fiber of my being, and something restrains me, holding me back and keeping me prone. Clenching my teeth against the throbbing in my head and ache in my chest, I make another attempt to shift my body. A moan slips from between my lips.

Kat?

My name comes through the din, soft, almost caressing me like a warm touch. I try to inhale a breath, but thick, acrid smoke chokes me, and my cough violently rattles my already-damaged body. Something shifts over me, blocking whatever light was hitting my closed eyelids.

Who is it?

I force my eyes open to find twisted metal and flames. Everything distorts around me, like walking through the mirror room of the funhouse at the county fair. My head swims, blurring my vision, bile rising in my throat. I choke on it and turn my head to the side to retch, the motion only creating more stabbing discomfort.

What happened? Am I even on the plane anymore?

The last thing I remember was going down fast.

I try to focus on what's in front of me, and finally, a face comes into focus.

Michael…

He grins down at me, that same cocky tilt of the lips he always gave me before he shoved his dick inside me. The grin that says I own you and your body and there's no denying it.

Michael? But…how… I squeeze my eyes shut for a second and open them again, hoping the disturbing vision before me will be gone.

But the man who already haunts my waking hours and sleep still stands there. His strong hand wraps around my throat. The pressure of his palm pushing into my windpipe brings back memories of that first night in his condo—the night he tried to get me to come clean about my intentions. The night I gave myself over to him and truly started my plan.

He squeezes hard, his strong hand closing and tightening easily, and I choke and try to inhale, desperate to get any air into my lungs, even the smoke-tainted air around me. My fingers clawing at his do nothing. I try to scream his name, to beg him to stop even though he never did when I was ready to take his life, but all that comes out is a strangled groan that gets swallowed up by the sound of the carnage around me.

How did he get here?

Memories mix with nightmares. What’s real and what’s imagined meld together ‘til they’re inextricable—a tangled, sticky web of past sins and present consequences.

He's dead.

The feel of the gun in my hand as I held it to his head, pressed it into his temple, locked eyes with him, and fired isn’t something I could ever forget. The sound of his brains splattering across the wall behind him, of his body hitting the floor when I pushed it out of the chair to take my seat, will ring in my ears forever…

No.

I shake my head and squeeze my eyes closed, struggling to take a breath against the force trying to wring it out of me.

It's not him. It can't be.

Go back to Hell! This time, I manage to find enough breath to get the words out, and his dark brow furrows as he leans in closer to me.

Kat?

I lash out and strike at him, my fist connecting with