Don't Feed
by Jennifer MartinezMY REVIEW:
Kenna is in a prison in Bora Bora.
Arthur was presumably murdered in front of her. This is a short, fast
paced story. I was liking this one better than the first book. I
think the writing has improved and is more polished. Kenna was
seriously out of control in the first book. She was power hungry,
without mercy and without morality. Now she has to pay for her
mistakes and be reformed. I liked reading about Kenna's
transformation into a caring protector. There is a war brewing
between sirens and vampires. The story has a lot of action and
excitement. There are a lot of interesting side characters but I
liked reading about Kenna. The story jumps from Kenna's plight to the
side plot and side characters and vice versa. Sometimes the
transition was a bit too abrupt. Since the books are getting better,
the third book in the trilogy should be the best of all. I look
forward to reading it. 4 stars.
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BLURB:
What
do you do when the man of your dreams is murdered right in front of
you? For Kenna, vengeance is not an option. Trapped in a
prison on a desolate island, she's forced to endure the promise of an
eternity of pain, mourning the one person she could always count on.
And it gets worse.
The
war is not over. With the threat of the Sirens looming over New
Orleans, the coven is going to have to fight to keep what's theirs.
BIO:
One
day while slaving away at her monotonous day job, Jennifer Martinez
found her true calling. Like a firefly in the night, the pages called
to her. Once she caught the bug there was no stopping it. Her fingers
flew furiously across the keyboard winding tales of love, mystery and
anger. She snapped out of her reverie to find herself still behind
the desk but at least she knew who she was… Author Jennifer
Martinez.
I
like to think of myself as a beautiful conundrum. When I am not
writing, I can be found surrounded by my amazing family and 4 dogs or
volunteering at a local animal rescue. I love who I am and don’t
mind at all when I get strange looks from people. I am a tattoo
covered, child and animal lover who looks forward to destroying
peoples preconceived notions of what “someone like me” would be
interested in. You only live life once… you may as well make it
interesting.
I
love to get lost in a good book and hope that everyone will get lost
in mine.
ONLINE LINKS:
BUY NOW LINK:
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Excerpt
1:
I curse
the dingy ceiling and start to look around my prison when I hear the
damn witch outside the door. I lay back down and wait for her to
enter. When she enters she looks less maniacal and more somber.
“What
did you do to me? Where is Arthur?”
“I be
gettin de darkness outta you. Now hush your face we aren’t done.”
I close my
mouth. She totally ignored my question about Arthur so I know
something must be up. She bends over and reaches into a small mini
fridge pulling out a mason jar filled with blood. My mouth starts to
water as my fangs lower. I am finally going to get some food. She
puts a straw in the jar and walks over to me bringing a bar stool
with her.
“Imma
give you dis on one condition. You hear me? You gotta talk. I ask,
you answer you drink. Agree?”
“Agree.”
She gives
me one small sip of the coppery elixir and asks her next question.
“Why?”
“Why
what?”
“Why you
go takin de law in you own hands child?”
“Because
no one else would. I love humans and I love my people and I saw
horrible things happening to them. No one else would help them, so I
did. I made my city safe.”
“At de
expense of deir lives?” she asked giving me another sip.
“Their
lives were a meaningless plague on a beautiful city. They had no
respect for the lives of others so why should I respect theirs. They
deserved to pay for the things they had done. Their lives gave me the
power to save more people. To do more for those who deserved it.”
“You
were righteous enough to kill but not to take the blame?”
“It was
never about taking the blame, it was about preserving our anonymity.
I had to stay hidden even from my own. I knew they wouldn’t
understand. They wouldn’t see the shades of gray. I had to have the
proof before I could come out and tell them the truth. It was
horrible. I had to keep the secret. I didn’t want to but there was
no other way.”
Excerpt
2:
She closes
her eyes and begins to tune out the world around her. This is a feat
reserved only for the Sefs. No one else can do it. It is hard and
disorienting. It takes years of practice and still some can never do
it. She allows the darkness to take her and focuses on a hut in the
middle of the forest.
It is easy
to picture because she has been there before but it still takes time
to come into focus. She sees Terea talking to a tree and shakes her
head. A sound erupts from inside the hut and takes Ihrin’s
attention away from the tree talking Terea and towards the red head
running and shrieking into the clearing. Kenna looks frail, almost
translucent and totally mortified.
“Snake!”
she screams loudly. “Huge snake! Get it out! I want to go back to
the house.”
Terea
doubles over in a fit of giggles as Kenna bounces up and down
adrenaline coursing through her veins. The priestess takes a few deep
breaths before standing up and heading inside the hut. She enters the
hut shaking her head and comes back out screaming hysterically with
the snake wrapped around her neck. Ihrin almost feels bad for Kenna
but stops the emotion before it can manifest. They may be
rehabilitating her but she still killed a lot of people. Kenna goes
into another freak out session and Terea starts laughing again. She
uncoils the twelve foot python from around her body and walks towards
Kenna.
“Terea,
you keep that evil slimey thing away from me.”
“Oh you
fool. Dis man ain’t slimey. He’s smooth. Maximillion here has
been my best friend goin on thirteen years.” Terea holds out the
gentle giant body to let Kenna get to know him.
“He’s
a pet?! You really are crazy. He’s twice as big as you are.”
“And
twice as nice, so watch who you talkin to girl. Come and touch him.
He don’t bite, often.”
Excerpt
3:
Her mind
is racing, imagining all the amazing things Aurel could do to her. As
if she isn’t worked up enough already, her passion now becomes a
need, fueled by pure animal instinct. She needs Aurel and is going
insane without him inside of her. His eyes zero in on her addiction
and she knows he has something evil planned. His hand moves from her
flat stomach down to her ankles. He grabs one moving it up and hiking
her skirt along with it. His fingers leave trails of fire and ice as
they forge a path from her ankle up to her inner thigh. Her mind no
longer forms coherent thoughts and all she can see is her golden god
driving her mad. She thanks the powers that be for giving her such a
perfect mate in a second of lucidity before he plunges right back
into a passion filled abyss. His fingers finally reach the heat of
her core and skirt along her subject. The feather light touch of his
fingers on her most intimate spot makes her growl in a mix of
pleasure and pain. She can no longer stand to be the mere eight
inches from him. She uses her planted foot to arch into his touch and
is immediately rewarded with a growl from him. She bites her lip
waiting for his control to finally break. Her breathing becomes
deeper entrancing her lover in the rise and fall of her breasts. The
moment comes like a clap of thunder and all control is lost.
Prologue
“I
told you what you wanted to know!” I screamed at
my
captors. “Now kill me or let me go!” I took a deep
breath
and debated my next sentence. Arthur was dead.
Life
wasn’t worth living. Calmly I continued, “I would
suggest
killing me because if you let me go and I find
out
you killed Arthur, I will enjoy playing in your
blood.”
The
clicking of heels was the first inclination of
who
I was dealing with. Now, I knew it was a woman.
Any
woman in her right mind would side with me. “I
promise
to leave New Orleans and never come back.
You
know what I did was for the good of mankind.
Just
let me disappear into the wind.”
A
scratchy island voice graced my ears and said,
“Oh
honey, dey got you good. You aren’t nowhere near
New
Orleans.”
My
whole body clenched. What had they done
to
me, where was I? I was beginning to get nervous.
Ihrin
would do anything to protect her coven. Who had
she
given me to? “Awe dear girl, don’t you be frettin,”
the
island woman responded. “You in Bora Bora. We
gonna
get the dark outta your soul. You just wait.”
Chapter
1
Bora
Bora. Why am I in Bora Bora? Think Kenna. Do we have a colony here?
Am I in some
kind of vampire work camp? No, that wouldn't make sense. Arthur and I
were supposed
to go to Bora Bora. This was supposed to be our trip. FOCUS! Ok, my hands
are bound with silver. Can't get out of that. I am in an oak wooden
chair. My legs
are tied to the chair and... yep, bolted to the ground. Damn, they
really want me tied
down. Ok, smells. Smells, what do I smell? Shellfish, salt, coconuts.
AGH!
Incense.
Oh, god, don’t they know we hate incense. What do I hear? I hear
birds,good
I’m near the ocean. I hear monkeys, ok not too close to the coast.
Drums. Oh shit.
I’m
going to be in some ritual sacrifice or some crap. I have got to get
out of here.
“What
dark? I’m not dark. Please just let me go!”
A
snicker wafts through the air and hits my ears. She’s laughing at
me, uhg.
Stay
calm, you need to keep your wits. I focus on my breathing, slow and
steady.
Hours
pass before I finally hear any movement. I hear the shuffle behind me
and the creaking
of the door. No heartbeats but I smell someone. The anonymous someone throws
a burlap bag over my head and I don’t even fight it. They can kill
me if they want.
Is life really worth living when there is no one to love? I did my
due diligence. I saved
New Orleans. Apparently that doesn’t matter. I feel the magic
surround me and I
embrace the accompanying darkness.
I
wake up groggy. I can still hear the birds chirping and cawing,
reveling in their
freedom. I’m not in the chair any more. I am on a wooden table. The
silver cuffs still
bind my hands and feet and I welcome the searing pain they bring with
them. I finally
get a glimpse of the woman who talked to me. I feel short laying in
front of her towering
frame. She has wild hair littered with shells and feathers. Her dark
coal eyeliner
gives her a twisted look that reminds me of a wild version of Erista.
“Ah,
so you finally awake Kenna.”
“Why
am I here?”
“We
gonna get da dark outta you girl. Der’s an evil in yah soul and I
intend to burn
it.”
“Who
are you?”
“Yah
savior.”
She
turns her back to me and heads towards a wall littered with jars and
herbs.
She
hums and sways side to side as she pulls items from all the jars and
bowls against the
wall. Her hands move meticulously across the surface. No matter how
hard I try cannot
get a glimpse of what she is doing. The incense burns all other
smells from the room
and I finally turn away to avoid frustration. She continues to hum
and scrape away,
stone on stone and metal on wood. She approaches the table again with
black and
white candles. Her face is stoic and almost sad as she places red and
black candles all
around my confined body. She moves back to the far wall and returns
with two jars and
some kind of burlap bagman that reminds me of Little Big Planet. She
begins a low
chant and lets the purple sand flow from the first jar creating a
pentagram that spreads
across my body and the table. She does one final walk around my
supine body before
raising her voice to a normal speaking tone.
“I
am here tah help overcome a bad habit; tah give Kenna full control of
her life and
live it tah da fullest, wit peace, love and enjoyment.” She says
beginning to light the
white candles surrounding my body.
“Dis
is me, who ‘as strength to overcome all that tempts me. Let my
spirit burn as
surely as does dis flame; a symbol of de inner strength dat will
prevail in all things,” she
continues moving on to the black candles.
Her
arms outstretch over the pentagram marking my chest tightly gripping
the burlap
doll, “I name this Poppet Kenna. It is her in every way. Anything I
do to this Poppet
I do to her.”
Finally,
she takes the second jar filled with a nearly black liquid and comes toward
my head while saying, “Here she is as I am now; bound by a force so
strong. As time
passes, the bonds will break away and she will be free.”
Her
thumb and index finger force my mouth open and I can feel the dark
liquid coursing
down my throat. It nearly chokes me and I cough up a little. She uses
the hem
of her long white dress to dab away the extra liquid on my face while
she repeats the
last line.
“Here
she is as I am now; bound by a force so strong. As time passes, the
bonds will
break away and she will be free.” The priestess pauses in a silent
plea to the gods before
looking into my eyes and saying, “Kenna, your journey begins. Hold
onto what you
love. The light will guide you through.”
I
don’t understand what she means at first. I am just a hungry,
pissed off vampire
with no reason to live, until I feel it taking me over. A force comes
from below wrapping
its massive hands around my spine and pulls me into the Nether. I see
the dingy
mold covered ceiling of my prison fade away and I am plunged into
darkness.
I
can hear the drawl of Jimmy Buffett and a dog barking in the
distance. I don’t
know what happened but it sounds like I’m back home in Florida. The
haze starts
to clear and I can see the tall palm trees that surround my family
home. A huge black
lab comes running up to me and I know immediately who it is.
“Beast!”
I yell running up to meet the black ball of fuzz in the middle of the yard.
Beast tackles me and we roll around the soft grass for an eternity
before he vanishes.
I can hear my mothers laugh coming from the back yard. She looks
good, healthy.
She is sitting with my dad on the patio talking about her day. I try
to say hi but
she doesn’t see me. I stand directly in front of the two people who
brought me into this
world and they just ignore me. I feel the hot tears beginning to
stream down my face
when I realize I’m not really there. They aren’t real. I miss my
family so much. I don’t
even know how long its been since Arthur and I visited them in
Florida. Arthur.
I’m
going to find out who killed him and rip their heads off.
“Kenna
don’t. You don’t have to be strong for me.”
A
lump forms in my throat forcing me to choke on my thought. He is not
real, Kenna.
He’s dead. You watched him die. I think to myself.
“Kenna
baby, open your eyes. I am here. We can stay here together. Wouldn’t that
be nice?”
I
shake my head violently, trying to get rid of the memories that shred
my already
broken heart. I feel a hand brush against my face and I am assaulted
with the smell
of strawberries and vanilla. My eyes snap open and there he is in
front of me. His soft
dark hair moving with the breeze, his sapphire eyes peering into my
soul like only he
can. My hot tears become full on sobs of pain and heartbreak as I
stare at the man I loved.
“Kenna,
my love. Why did you do those things? Why did you not trust me?
What
you are doing, I would never have wanted. You are my life, my love,
my everything.
Please don’t stay like this forever. You can fight the urges.
You’ve done it before.
Fight it and make me proud.”
“ARTHUR!”
I scream as his image fades away just like Beast. Everything is dark
and I can hear the rain approaching. I look down and am suddenly
walking on an old
brick road. The buildings start to materialize as I walk and soon I
recognize New Orleans
but it’s not my New Orleans. It’s different, darker. There are no
vendors on the
streets, no tourists snapping pictures. Then, I see men walking
towards me. The one
in the middle is beyond hot. He is over six feet tall with shoulder
length blonde hair
and can I tell you about his shoulders, um yum. I can see his muscles
quiver through
his shirt with every step he takes. My body starts to heat up and I
find myself entranced.
He turns to talk to the brunette male on his right and acts as though
he doesn’t
even see me. I stop walking right before he hits me and he walks
right through me.
It’s like I’m a ghost.
Holy
shit. I’m a ghost. I’m dead. That’s why I could see Arthur. He
was there.
Where
did he go? I turn around to head towards our old house and that’s
when I see it.
The
stunning blonde found someone. He grabs a scared girl with dark brown
ringlet curls
by the throat and his eyes go white. He opens his mouth and you can
see the light leaving
her body. She tries to fight but she is no match for his chiseled,
glistening, perfect,
smokin physique. That’s when I see the light. It looks like that
scene from Harry
Potter when the dementors are trying to take Sirius Black’s soul
only it’s her eyes.
I see the light exit her eyes and he consumes it. Her limp body falls
to the hard cement
and he just leaves her there and walks away. It takes me a second but
finally something
clicks. That is a siren. Damn, that is a siren. The last one hadn’t
affected me but
him, well lets just say I wouldn’t have minded an audience. But
what is he doing in my
afterlife? Why the hell is he in my city? Am I in hell? Did I really
earn hell? I watch
as he and his friends walk into the distance and fade away, then my
world is once
again consumed by darkness.
My
eyes slowly flit open and I see the dingy mold covered ceiling of my
horrid fate.
I’m not dead it was just a nightmare. I breathe in the salty ocean
air and catch a wiff
of strawberries. I shoot up to look around but the restrains on my
wrists and ankles
keep me bound to the table. I look around but don’t see anything. I
will never forget
that smell though. I start screaming and I don’t stop.
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