Contemporary

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Title: Fierce
Larger work: Shame
Author: Harper Kingsley
Genre: mm contemporary
Warning: Possible triggers for mention of past non-con.

A/N: Fierce and Conflagration will be added to the original Shame. There will be a non-Shame version called “Without Shame” too if you want to stay away from the unpleasant.

Summary: Simon Peters is dealing with the aftermath of the events in Shame. It’s a long slow road, but he refuses to give up.

*

There were moments in the stillness where Simon found himself afraid. He would close his eyes only to have to open them again, his every sense quivering alert, sure the boogeyman was going to get him. Again.

He hated being so scared all the time. He hated that there were marks on him he couldn’t see. He hated that someone as sick and twisted as Damien Prince had left such a permanent scar on his mind.

Okay, so there’s been stuff happening with me. Sorry I haven’t kept you up-to-date, but I’ve been in one of my moods, though I seem to be coming out of it fast 🙂 So that’s good.

small-HeroesVillainsHeroes & Villains is releasing August 14th (tomorrow!) from Less Than Three Press. You can pre-order it now if you don’t already have a copy. Or if you want to try and win yourself a copy, follow the blog tour. A winner will be drawn August 19th, and since there’s five stops, you have five chances to win. Awesome.

And if you don’t know Heroes & Villains, it’s the first full-length novel in my superhero series chronicling the life of Vereint and Warrick.

Set in a semi-dystopian world where everyone can have superpowers if they’re lucky in the genetic lottery or they have enough money to buy some, Vereint starts off wanting to be a superhero like his idol Blue Ice. He was lucky enough to be born with metabilities, so he set off to build himself a secret identity and became the superhero Starburst.

Quickly nicknamed Candy Ass for being so lame.

Everyone seems against him, especially the man he spent his teenaged years admiring, Blue Ice. It feels as though nothing he does is every enough, he needs to break out of his humdrum life where he has an office job for money and is mercilessly mocked every time he goes out to help people. Nothing he does seems to alleviate the public’s opinion and he feels like he can’t take it anymore…

So he doesn’t. He sheds his superhero skin and becomes the supervillain Darkstar.

He’s no Lex Luthor plotting and planning world domination. He’s out to have some fun and make some money. He’s not interested in atrocities, especially when they’re done in his name. He’s got no interest in minions or followers and he’s a little creeped out by all the fanfic. He’s just a guy with superpowers having a good time and committing some crimes.

Though it’s kind of cool that Blue Ice is his arch-nemesis. There’s nothing like making the guy that bullied you squirm.

Darkstar x Blue Ice.

(And suddenly I started sounding like a commercial for toys. Unfortunately, I talk like that in real life too. Never ask me to describe a stirling engine. It gets real weird real fast.)


A2D-ArcOnePlus there’s this 🙂

Across Two Divides: Arc One comprises Chapters 1-10 and is available now from Amazon and Smashwords for $2.99.

You can still catch up with the free version at FictionPress. But look, I made such a nice cover! I’m so proud of myself.

This is my soap opera romance novel family life story. I’m already planning out all these story arcs that these people can go through. The assassination attempts, the killer allergies, the grief for a cousin that’s gone… This is totally my soothing brain story.

And this is the same world as The Panic Pure and From Diamond to Coal, so there might be crossings with Arianetta and his creepiness, or William with his giant robots.

EXCERPT:

-FRANKIE-

Sitting broody on his couch wasn’t something that Frankie did very often, though he’d caught himself drinking more and more until he was starting to get vaguely concerned. It was one thing to be a social drinker, and something completely different for him to need a drink in his hand to be able to even think about facing his day.

Looking around his living room, his accomplishments hanging from every wall, he should have felt proud but it was just empty accolades from people he didn’t care about.

He looked down at the magazine still held in his hand and tossed it away with a grimace before taking another swallow from his tumbler of scotch.

It was just a stupid magazine and he shouldn’t let it get to him, but it was the little things that always ended up cutting him the most. He’d had a lot of respect for Hester Mann, but it looked like that feeling wasn’t returned, to the point that she’d written such an awful article about him. It was like a straight stab to the heart.

Frankie let himself flop sideways on the couch, resting his head on a fat red decorative pillow, the rich brocade probably leaving marks against his cheek.

As a kid he’d believed that fame would bring happiness and everything that he wanted out of life. Instead, he’d found himself emptier than ever.

“I’ve got a black hole heart,” he muttered, then barked a laugh that sounded more like the start to tears.

He held his arm up in front of his face, making the medical alert bracelet dance and sparkle against his wrist bone. He could see the reflected light hitting the opposing wall and that entertained him for a while. Anything not to think about Hester Mann and her strange vendetta against him.

His thoughts were broken by the vibrating buzz of his phone in his front pocket and he had to fumble around to get it out. “Hello?” He was proud that the word came out clearly and not the slurred mess it might have been.

“Francis? This is Christian.” There was something dark in the man’s voice that had Frankie forcing himself upright on the couch. He didn’t even care that Christian had used his real name.

“What’s wrong?” he demanded.

There was the sound of a heavy sigh. “Do you think you could come and see Nicholas?”

“Why? Is he all right?” Frankie was worried, more worried than he’d thought he could be. There was just something so fragile about Nicholas, a brokenness that no one had ever been able to completely fix.

“I don’t know,” Christian said. “He was fine at work, then there was a bit of an accident with some spilled coffee and now he’s crawled into bed and I just don’t know what’s going on with him.”

“I’ll be there as soon as I can,” Frankie said. “You still at that one hotel?”

“Yeah, the same one we always stay at,” Christian said, then gave the room number. “Hurry.”

“I’ll be there.”

Hanging up his phone, Frankie wasn’t sure he would be able to make it there as easily as he’d thought. He’d already drunk more than enough scotch and he wasn’t sure just how steady his legs were going to be, but it wasn’t like he had a lot of choice. Nicholas needed him to be there for him.

He’d failed before, but never again.

/EXCERPT

Title: The Panic Pure
Author: Harper Kingsley
Genre: mm suspense thriller
Rating: mature

Summary: Daniel Worth, billionaire and CEO of Worth Enterprises is questioned by FBI agent Marshal Newman about the disappearance of one of his employees. They strike up a conversation and soon are regularly meeting and begin dating. However neither realizes just how close danger is lurking.


CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Some part of him had insisted that having Marshal move in would be a disaster. There would be fighting and despair and he would run away to join Arthur in the guesthouse. Everything would degenerate into something from a soap opera and he would get the crazy idea of wanting someone in his life out of his system once and for all. He would settle into the idea of being a lonely hermit and it would be fine.

Danny was happy to be proven wrong. He couldn’t help feeling a touch grateful that he’d met Marshal. He didn’t think there was anyone else that could have fit so perfectly into his world as Marshal had.

It almost made him start believing in predestination. He and Marshal had always been meant to meet and fall for each other. They slotted into each other’s lives so easily that Danny barely even noticed the changes that appeared in his routine. It was strangely natural.

The first week passed with admirable smoothness as everything clicked together. And he was happy.

“What’s with that smile?”

Danny twitched and sat up straight, trying to school his face into blankness. Arthur didn’t seem to buy it from his raised eyebrows in the rearview mirror.

I appreciate how much better my Kindle has made my life.

I will never give up having at least a laptop, but I’m not chained to it anymore. I have something that more easily fits my hand. I can work outside or thanks to Swype write while I’m walking somewhere.

I use ColorNote to write posts, then email them either to myself or directly to my blog. I’ve nearly completed a novel with it.

And for proofing … The Kindle has become my hero.

I make a mobi file, then use notes to tell myself where changes should be, and the dictionary has saved me a few headaches. I bookmark the page where I left off so I never lose my place. And when I’m all done, I see where changes need to be made and I do a Find & Replace on my document.

Maybe I’ll upgrade to a better and fancier tablet, but the Kindle has been a great introduction for me. It’s given me a taste for what I want a tablet to do and I didn’t have to sell my soul to afford it.

***

Read slashy stories at Kimichee.

***

Have an excerpt of “Fierce,” by Harper Kingsley. mm contemporary.

EXCERPT:
Rating: teen+ to be safe

Being on location was one of those things Simon used to love but that now made his stomach churn nervously. He didn’t really like being out of his safety zone, but it was something he felt had to be done.

Looking over and being able to see Byron Hughes standing with the rest of the crew made him feel better. His bodyguard had a gun and was willing to use it. He was perfectly safe.

“All right, Simon, in this scene you and Colby are entering the Dragon’s Tomb,” the director, Paul Bleek, said. “Just like in practice, you bring the gun up and it’s just ‘bang-bang-bang.’ Colby, you get hit and fall down, knocking over the Orb. We all good?”

Colby nodded and Simon said, “We good.”

They were standing in front of the archway leading to the “Dragon’s Tomb,” a temple built by the set designers in the middle of the desert. It was already hot and Simon could feel the sweat trickling down his forehead and sticking his clothes to his skin.

Waiting for the cue, he flashed a smile at Colby. “So what’s it like being the male Lara Croft?”

Colby Jackson gave his world famous grin. He really was amazingly good looking, a tall African-American with a leanly muscled body and a perfectly trimmed beard. “I feel very pretty.”

They’d never worked together though they’d known each other for years. It had only been because Colby asked so nicely that Simon had even accepted the role of “Percy Walden,” assistant and sidekick to itinerant explorer “Nicholas Blaine.”

“Places!”

“Let’s Indiana Jones this bitch up,” Simon said, earning himself a laugh.

Dressed in black pants, a long-sleeved black shirt, and a flak vest jangling with all kinds of faux-weaponry, Simon already felt like he needed a break and they hadn’t really even started yet.

“All right… Action!” Bleek called.

Simon drew in a deep breath and hurtled forward and kicked the stone door down with a grunt. He had a gun in his hand and he didn’t hesitate to run forward into the tomb. His head moved back and forth alertly and it seemed natural to bring his gun up and start shooting.

An Asian-looking tomb all shining with gold and jade. Dangerous looking men in lots of brown and gray clothing toting machine guns as they worked at stripping the place bare of treasure. They dropped what they were doing when he started shooting them and brought their own weapons up.

There were screams and shouts and the plink-plink of misses near his head and feet as he jumped, rolled, and dodged until every one of them was dead.

He stood from his crouch and turned to Colby. “It’s clear, sir.”

Colby sauntered in, his lips forming a disappointed moue. “Really, Percy, did you have to come charging through like a bull in a china shop? Perhaps some of these gentlemen would have liked the chance to surrender before you shot them in the face?”

Simon holstered his gun with a shrug. “We’ll never know now, will we?”

Colby smiled and started to say something, then hesitated. His expression congealed, his brows coming together, and he raised his right hand to his left shoulder.

“Sir?” Simon took a step toward him.

Colby pulled his hand away and there was blood on his fingers. He half-turned and there was a giant, bleeding wound in his back. “I think I’ve been shot,” he said calmly, then his legs wobbled and he stumbled sideways before collapsing. His flailing arm knocked against the pedestal and the glass Orb trembled and fell with a crash against the floor.

There was a puff of glittery dust that obscured everything.

/EXCERPT