The Manhattan Ten Series by Lola Dodge ~ JeanBookNerd

Print Length: 110 pages
Publisher: Samhain Publishing, Ltd. (February 4, 2014)
Sold by: Amazon Digital Services, Inc.
Language: English
ASIN: B00HF8X4DU

Product Warning: Contains one lightning-hot hero and a not-so-blushing ballerina. May cause third-degree burns and spontaneous tango

EXCERPT

The responsible thing would be to surrender. I owed it to the few hundred people I’d just freaked out, and probably to the public in general, but when I peeked out of the market, a lot of guns came out of holsters.“Please stay inside, ma’am.” A policeman’s voice crackled over his megaphone. “We’re sending someone in.”

I retreated to the bakery and licked the frosting off a few cupcakes before a wave of nausea ended my binge. Who were they going to send? A SWAT team? Or maybe a bomb robot?

I kept waiting for whatever this was to stop, but every time I twitched, something got destroyed. Whatever the power was, it had to be temporary, and if I were patient enough, it would disappear as quickly as it showed up to ruin everything.

Any minute now.

“Hello?”

I jumped at the voice. I’d known it was coming, but my landing shook the building.

Expecting to see a team of big, burly men in Kevlar, I peered past a bushel of baguettes. Just one guy.

I craned my neck and…sweet Jesus.

He wore a leather jacket that fit like sin. Tanned, but not a Guido. Dark, styled hair, but not douchey. Like an actual person instead of the cover model-stereotype he should’ve been.

Someone was obviously using pheromones to take me down easy. Good thing I was covered in chicken drippings, frosting and powdered cheese. I always did know how to impress a man.

“Belle?” He stepped into the store.

“Unfortunately.” This was so not my shining moment. I should never have run. “In the bakery section.” And it was too late to hide all of the cupcakes I’d licked.

He approached with his hands open, like I was some startled animal. He couldn’t be a cop in those civilian clothes, but he had to be someone important. He was tailored in that understated money kind of way, and I got the vague sense I’d seen him somewhere before. A billboard?

“My name’s Ryan Lamborne.” He stepped forward again, all sincerity. “Most people know me as Red Ruin. I’m with the Manhattan Ten.”

Didn’t they sell upscale real estate? Or… “Wait. That superhero group?”

“That one.” He leaned against one of the bread racks. “We’d like to help you deal with what happened earlier.”

With what happened?

“You mean the part where I destroyed a landmark and blew the performance of my life?” It was Giselle for Christ’s sake. And who knew how many other dancers I’d taken down? It wasn’t enough to ruin my own career. I had to shatter a few other people’s lives while I was at it.

No one would hire me again. Might as well become a stripper, or a call girl, or a sample pusher at the Food Lion.

“I know you’re upset,” Ryan, or Red Ruin, said. What kind of name was that? “You had no reason to think you’d develop powers, especially so la—”

Powers? “Not possible.” Obviously, the market hadn’t destroyed itself, but this was a temporary thing. Maybe a curse from the dance gods.

“Why not?” He moved closer and held out his hand. Rings of red lightning jolted around his fingertips. “My power’s electrical.”

The color was the purest scarlet. “Can I touch it?”

“Go ahead.”

I brushed a fingertip against Ryan’s hand. It was warm and tingly, but more like a first kiss than an electric shock.

“On the tape it looked like you were manipulating kinetic energy while you danced. That’s why we need to—”

“But no one in my family—”

“Listen.” Ryan’s lightning cut and he set his hand on my shoulder. “No one in my family had powers either, so I know how you feel. You might not want to believe it, but there’s no other explanation, is there?”

I squinted up at him. Those stellar hazel eyes were the last straw. “I’m almost positive you’re a hallucination.”

Expression flat, he picked up a cupcake and mushed it into my forehead. “Would you hallucinate that?”

My jaw dropped. “You did not just…” Scraping the mess away with one hand, I grabbed for a cupcake with the other, but as soon as the cake neared him, it evaporated in a puff of red lightning.

Ryan tsked. “You think it would be that easy?”

TEMPTRESS (Manhattan Ten #1)

Kiss your powers goodbye.

Kidnapping a super-powered suspected felon from a Vegas bachelor party is another day at the office for Jenny Ray, alias Temptress. With one kiss, any naughty supe’s powers are hers. Except this time she’s caught by her mark’s boss, who’s no ordinary superhero.

It’s Thinktank, leader of the toughest hero crew around. One destroyed men’s room and near-toilet-drowning later, Jenny’s forced to steal an innocent hero’s powers.

For a super brain, Tank’s feeling pretty idiotic. First, he let Jenny close enough to get to him. Second, he’s helpless against the tide of desire that rises in him every time he kisses her. Which he’s doing a lot, since she’s trying to give him back his power—only it’s not working. As he shadows her on her various freelance casino security jobs, he realizes she’s no she-demon—she’s a time bomb. Her acquired powers are shredding her, body and soul.

As they give in to desire, a shadowy figure from Jenny’s past surfaces with a kidnapping plan of his own. Jenny will do anything—even level Las Vegas—to rescue the man she loves. But there may not be anything left of her when the dust settles.

Product Warnings
Contains high-stakes poker, high-end cocktails, and high-flying over Las Vegas skies. Never drink and fly!

IVORY (Manhattan Ten #2)

That cold day in hell? It’s here…

If Ivory’s fellow flight attendants whisper that she has ice in her veins, they’d be right. She’s spent years ruthlessly suppressing her dangerous ice powers, pretending she didn’t grow up wild on the tundra.

Her legendary coolness has held solid—until a crazed attacker snaps her composure, unleashing her ice beast and blowing her cover. And she’s not sure if the man who defuses the situation is any less dangerous.

When Panther’s trans-Atlantic catnap is interrupted by Ivory’s ice spear through his mark’s gut, he doesn’t hesitate to claim her as one of the Manhattan Ten. It’s the only way to shield her from prosecution. It doesn’t hurt that the Nordic beauty puts his inner cat on the prowl.

Panther tempts Ivory in every smoldering way, but to let him melt her resistance is a risk she can’t afford. But when her past rises up to claim her, Pan is caught in the crossfire…and the only way to save him is to let the beast claim her, body and soul.

Product Warnings
Contains one smoldering ice vixen and the sexy beast man who wants to get his claws all over her. Make sure your icemaker is in tip-top shape before reading. Mukluks optional.

BELLE FURY (Manhattan The #3)

This is one diva with killer moves…

Belle Fabian has worked her toes to the bone to become an internationally renowned ballerina. When the curtains rise on her career-making performance of Giselle, she brings down the house—literally.

Mid-dance, she manifests a superpower that nearly destroys the Metropolitan Opera House, wiping out a line of chorus girls and sending the audience dashing for the exits. As she flees the theater, she assumes the worst. Her hard-won career is over.

The Manhattan Ten’s leader is playing hooky with his new lady, so it falls to Red Ruin to round up the super-powered danseur. It’s just one small, bird-boned woman hiding in a convenience store. How hard could it be?

Their first encounter generates sparks that border nuclear and their chemistry sends Belle’s powers into overdrive, but their perfect storm of passion is marred by her suspicion that Ruin is holding back. That secret that could turn the sweet burn of Ruin’s lightning into a permanent scar on her heart.

Warning: Contains one lightning-hot hero and a not-so-blushing ballerina. May cause third-degree burns and spontaneous tango

Book Nerd Spotlight

Lola Dodge was forged in the suburbs, tested in the retail wastelands and reborn as a romance writer after several strong cocktails. Armed with her M.F.A. in Writing Popular Fiction, she travels the world in search of story fodder and men with accents.

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