Passionate Hearts 1: Romantic Drama and Mystery Collection Read online

  Passionate Hearts: Romantic Drama & Mystery Collection 1

  By Sandra Ross

  Published by Publications Circulations LLC.

  SmashWords Edition

  All contents copyright (C) 2013 by Publications Circulations LLC. All rights reserved. No part of this document or the related files may be reproduced or transmitted in any form, by any means (electronic, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the publisher.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, companies and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of either the author or the publisher.

  The following story is for entertainment purposes only. This book contains sexually graphic scenes depicting consenting adults above the age of 18 engaging in passionate sexual acts. This story is intended only for persons over the legal adult age. By downloading and opening this document, you are stating that you are of legal age to access and view this work of fiction. Mature readers only. Reader discretion is advised.

  Limit of Liability and Disclaimer of Warranty:

  The publisher has used its best efforts in preparing this book, and the information provided herein is provided "as is." Publications Circulations LLC makes no representation or warranties with respect to the accuracy or completeness of the contents of this book and specifically disclaims any implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for any particular purpose and shall in no event be liable for any loss of profit or any other commercial damage, including but not limited to special, incidental, consequential, or other damages.

  ~ ~ ~ ~

  The Mating

  Hostile Hearts Part 1

  Chapter One

  ILIANA'S HEART POUNDED as she walked towards the man at a table she waitressed. He should have been familiar by now, after all the times she had seen him, yet she still couldn't place his face. She didn't know anyone remotely like him. His soft, enigmatic eyes focused on her face. He wore black clothes: a black blazer, a black tie with a black pin, a black shirt, black pants and shiny, black shoes with black socks. Together with his dark hair, a little longer than Iliana liked it, he looked like a dark, inky blotch fallen upon the fabric of reality.

  His name was Nickolas Benson. Or that's what one of Iliana's co-workers told her after she asked about him. He was supposed to be rich beyond compare. Whenever he came to the coffee shop, the force of his presence overwhelmed the quiet, convivial atmosphere normally present in the shop.

  As Iliana approached him, his posture changed. He pulled his legs inward and sat straight up in his chair.

  "Hello, what can I get you today?" Iliana asked him.

  She suppressed a shiver, trying not to show any outward signs of discomfort. She had to be the always-present, always-smiling nameless woman whose primary job was to refill drinks and ask if everything met with the customer's satisfaction. Her wages depended on that image. Any show of fear might put the customer off; even a customer like Nickolas, who appeared not to care about much of anything.

  He answered her with his usual deep voice, "Coffee. Black."

  She scrawled his order on her pale green notepad. She tried not to look directly in his face when she replied, "Yes, thank you. We'll have it ready for you shortly."

  She felt his stare burning into the middle of her back as she walked to the bar to get the order ready. She wanted to run, even knowing she couldn't. Just how would that look, a waitress rushing out the front door just because one man, no matter how unusual, kept looking at her? She imagined herself taking off her heels and just running, running anywhere. The destination didn't matter as long as she could get away from his eyes, those twin magnifying glasses set deep in his skull which seemed to uncover every fact about her existence. She thought that, just by looking at her, he could tell that she had woken up in the morning with cramps and moon blood. He knew it, just by looking. She would have done anything, grabbed at any excuse to leave.

  Anthony, her co-worker, smiled when Iliana sighed in front of him. "Let me guess," he said. "Coffee. Black. Right? Did we at least get a hello or something more today? Or just the usual silence?"

  A thousand replies sprang into her mind all at once. The words jumbled together in an incoherent babbling from which only a few phrases could be recognized. She opened her mouth to speak and then closed it again when she realized she had absolutely nothing to say about him. Nothing she could say to Anthony, at least. She didn't answer. She couldn't answer. Even while Anthony poured fresh coffee into a cup, Iliana felt Nickolas's eyes on her. She felt as though someone had thrown her into a bonfire.

  Delicious fire, she thought to herself. If only he wasn't so handsome. Too handsome.

  He had the kind of dark magnetism that she could not resist. She could not deny it to herself, much as she wanted to do so. She knew very well that Anthony and the other workers could see what unfolded. Everyone but Iliana enjoyed the hour Nickolas spent in the shop every day, drinking his coffee, watching her struggle with her emotions. They especially enjoyed Nickolas leaving a huge tip afterward.

  It had all started a month ago when Nickolas entered the shop with a man no one at the shop recognized. Iliana remembered his eyes locking onto hers that first day, as well as the rising heat in her own body when he caught her staring back at him, not a single thought in her mind. Since then, he came every afternoon. He ordered coffee and stayed for precisely one hour.

  She wondered about his discipline. She had never seen him look at his watch. This quality of his, the way he somehow knew the time without being told, added to his air of mystery. He never appeared to be off balance in anything he did; not that Iliana noticed. He gave off the aura of panther at rest, stretching out its muscular body.

  Anthony's teasing whisper intruded on her thoughts. "Oh... if I were in your place, love, I would have gotten a date by now. A god like him, coming to the shop every day just for me, sitting for an hour with a coffee he never drinks... starting at me constantly... and then leaving the biggest tip I might expect to see all day long... hell, not just a date. He would already know how big my bed is."

  Iliana said under her breath, "Right, and next morning you will be found in some gutter with your throat cut like a country chicken. Or maybe...?" She frowned. "As far as we know, this guy could be the next Ted Bundy. He's rich and he's good-looking. What could he possibly want with a waitress from a coffee shop at the edge of the city. It's not like I'm some model or famous person."

  Anthony looked her up and down. "Honey... how many times have I told you? You are a piece of candy with that red hair of yours. I mean... that dreadful ponytail you have! And not even a hint of makeup!"

  Iliana straightened her blouse and form-fitting trousers. "I'm fine the way I am, thank you very much," she said.

  This wasn't the whole truth, however. The whole truth proved a great deal more complicated. No matter how much she might feel attraction towards him, she knew very well what he intended. She had been down that path before. She had been able to walk away. She didn't want to go back to that life-not if she could help it. Perhaps more importantly, she didn't want to go back to his table to deliver his coffee, even when Anthony put it into her hands with a whispered admonition.

  A moment passed before she found her legs moving on their own. She brought the coffee to his table, trying not to look at his face. She blushed as she turned away to attend a middle-aged woman who had just walked through the door. Or, at least, she tried
. His eyes bored into her back at every turn. As resolved as she was to ignore him, she still felt nervous. She took orders from customers twice, only to realize that she couldn't understand what she had written down.

  She found herself going back to a table to retake the order. This wasn't like her. She felt irritated. The black heels she wore pained her legs, adding to her irritation. To make matters worse, the shop's owner had picked this day to come to the coffee shop. He considered her with aspersion. Iliana did not know how aware he might be, if at all, of her daily encounters with Nickolas. She noticed, however, how he became sensitive to everyone's actions once he observed the lone man at one of her tables.

  Iliana knew she couldn't afford mistakes with the owner fidgeting about with an unoccupied cash register, frowning as though caught up in a difficult problem. He wasn't above docking her pay, meager though it was, if he suspected her of performing her job poorly. Iliana's stomach twisted at the thought. She couldn't afford a deducted paycheck and neither could she afford to walk off the job right there in that instant with no prospects awaiting her elsewhere. At the same time, though, she found her mind wandering. She didn't want it to wander, yet her consciousness drifted off into realms unknown.

  She felt sure he noticed how Nickolas Benson watched her. If she did lose her job, how much time would she spend scanning the classifieds for jobs with openings? How many interviews would she attend only to receive the cold, polite silence of people who didn't want to hire her? She had been through that rotating door before and she didn't want to go back. Moreover, the thought of leaving people she knew at her job for people she did not know at a new job frightened her, though she did not want to admit it.

  Even so, the tension was just too much to bear. She lost her cool thirty minutes later. A tray with four coffee pots slipped through her fingers onto the floor. Her heart skipped a beat. The glass pots shattered on the tiled floor. Scalding hot brown liquid flowed about her feet. The murmur of conversation ceased. All eyes focused upon her. Iliana suddenly felt like a tiny action figure surrounded by giants whose faces she could barely see. She wanted to run--run anywhere. The destination didn't matter, only that she had to leave at once. Her legs trembled with the thought of bolting out the front door. Her back ached. Her head pounded as though her brain threatened to expand, bursting her skull open.

  Moments passed in which the customers must have returned to whatever they had been doing, forgetting the woman in a drab uniform who wore no makeup on her face. She must have fetched a broom, a dustpan, and a mop because she found herself sweeping up the broken pieces of glass. She blinked back tears when the store's owner approached. She knew what he would say. He knew what he would say. She saw the words etched into his angry scowl; saw his tone of voice in his clenched fists.

  He whispered in her ear, "The cost for that mess will be deducted from your salary, my dear."

  That was the final straw. She knew, just as the owner knew, that the deductions wouldn't reflect the cost of replacing the coffee pots or the cost the business had incurred by purchasing the instant coffee pouches it used. Instead, the owner would calculate how many fluid ounces had been in four full pots of coffee. He would sit down with his graphic calculator and figure out how many cups of coffee he would have sold if all four pots had been given to customers, never mind if any of them had sat about for so long that they had to be poured down the sink next to the smoothie machine. Iliana reasoned she might see a loss of forty dollars or so from her pay-forty dollars in an already stretched-to-the-limit budget. Angry tears flooded her eyes.

  It was his fault. Nickolas Benson.

  She rushed straight to his table as soon as the owner slipped into his office. "Could you please stop staring at me?" she said. "What are you? Some kind of a pervert? Stop this now! Stop staring at me. In fact, stop coming here! You're only getting me in trouble! Go somewhere else to order coffee you don't drink anyway! You are not welcome here!"

  She did not realize her voice had gone up until she noticed how quiet the coffee shop had become. Horror-struck, she turned. Everyone stared at her. She felt her face burning. She heard the wooden legs of a chair scrape against the floor as the man from the table stood up. She turned to him again. She gaped as she adjusted her eyes to his height.

  He seemed impossibly tall to her. She had always seen him sitting at his table. Never once had she observed him standing or walking away. In another situation, she might have stopped to think about that. In another situation, her brain might not be spinning around in her head so that she couldn't put a coherent thought together. She stood in place, sure that he would strike her, sure that this time, she had gone too far. She regretted her outburst at once.

  "I am terribly sorry, Miss Iliana," he said, not looking at her name tag. He already knew her name. That didn't surprise her. His voice was soft, with no hint of anger.

  Then he smiled.

  Iliana lost her breath because it literally brought light to his face.

  Nickolas said, "I never meant to make you nervous. On the contrary-"

  "W-who told you I was nervous?" she replied. "Why should I be? I don't even know you."

  Instead of answering, he reached over and softly held her hand with his. His touch, how her hand looked enclosed in his big ones, gave her a sudden feeling of security that confused her so much it did not even occur to her to pull away. The sensation conflicted so much with her frustration at him that, for a moment, she felt sure that her feelings had become jumbled together in a tangled, messy ball.

  He gave her such a sweet and innocent look that she felt a smile tug at her lips. She managed to suppress it before it got obvious. This was a very dangerous man, she thought to herself. Not just from a physical standpoint. He was a danger to every woman who could see and feel how virile he was. He was a danger to her. In the back of her mind, she had this tiny yet nagging feeling that his virility was just the first glimpse she had of something far more... strong.

  Chapter Two

  SUDDENLY, THE NERVOUS voice of the owner broke her train of thought. He said, "Oh... Mr. Nickolas Benson. What an honor for us to have you in our coffee shop!"

  Iliana jumped, realizing the change in atmosphere she instigated, and slipped her hand out of his to usher herself away.

  The owner continued, "A thousand apologies. My employee shouldn't have spoken to you this way. She will suffer the consequences of her actions..." He snuck a glare in her direction, then added: "...immediately."

  Iliana's heart sputtered to an abrupt stop. She knew exactly what that meant.

  With a forced and almost mechanical twinkle in his eye, he said, "I assure you that this type of behavior is not acceptable in our shop, especially towards a fine member of society as yourself."

  Her boss was now beside her, talking to the man, drawing his attention away from her. Nickolas evinced a wide, false smile.

  Ten minutes from now she would formally get fired, she felt sure of that. Even so, she wanted to see this. As she always believed, if you're going to go out, go out with a bang. Seeing her boss kissing this man's butt was a show she wouldn't miss for the world.

  "Please, Miss Iliana has done nothing reprehensible. The truth is that my approach was clumsy, to say the least. She is totally justified to think I am some kind of pervert-especially since she obviously had no idea who I am. I would never, under any circumstances, wish this insignificant incident be the reason for her getting in trouble. That would be extremely unfair, don't you think, sir?"

  Her boss looked confused. He wasn't the only one. She saw the look on the faces of a few of the coffee shop regulars who had been watching the three of them since the commotion first started. In the corner, her co-workers beheld the scene, transfixed. They all forgot everything they had been doing prior to this. Anthony even gave her a thumbs up sign from his perch at the bar.

  The owner stammered, "Well... yes, of course... since you put it that way... if you really think so. Obviously, it would-"

  Nick
olas interrupted, "Excellent. And now that everything's settled, can I please have Miss Iliana at my disposal for a few minutes? In private?"

  Iliana's face flushed at the idea. She had to ask, "Me? In private?" Being in his presence while other people were around was one thing. But being with him in private? No one else around? Just the two of them? She began to panic. She wasn't even sure what she felt towards him. Attraction? Hatred? Disdain? Lust? What was it she felt? She searched inside herself, and didn't find an answer. Even worse, her mind produced an image of him seducing her while he held a shiny, sharp blade against her throat. She saw a red drop of blood trickle down her neck, saw herself moan with pleasure as he

  A single thought intruded then: What the hell...?!

  She turned to her manager for rescue but he didn't even look at her. He said to Nickolas, "Why certainly! Take as long as you wish. I will serve the tables if necessary."

  She only had time to cast a shocked glance at her boss and catch his threatening look of displeasure before Nickolas grabbed her hand and swiftly pulled her out of the coffee shop, and into the chilly outdoor air. The narrow road outside the shop was empty. He dragged her a little further away from the windows so they wouldn't be observed by curious eyes. He saw how his actions made her feel awkward. When he started talking, his voice was deeper, hoarse, frank.

  "I'm sorry I caused you trouble. That was not my intention. My name is Nickolas Benson, and I am a businessman. I promise you, I am neither a freak nor a psycho." He smiled his magnetic smile again, his white teeth showing. And she gulped. "Well, maybe a freak. Depends on who you ask, I suppose."

  The better to eat you, my dear...

  No, that couldn't be it, could it? She wasn't a helpless child in the forest with a basket of food for an old woman who lived in a cottage. She felt sure she could tell the difference between a grandmother and a hairy, snarling beast whose only interest lay in placing its fangs deep into her flesh.