Afterlight - Elle Jasper [0]
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Acknowledgements
PREFACE
Epigraph
Part 1 - DISTURBANCES
Part 2 - THE BEGINNING
Part 3 - CHANGES
Part 4 - INTRODUCTIONS
Part 5 - TEMPTATIONS
Part 6 - UNDERGROUND
Part 7 - OBSESSIONS
Part 8 - MARTYR
Part 9 - QUICKENING
Part 10 - TENDENCIES
Teaser chapter
“Sizzling-hot vampires served up Southern style! Elle Jasper is a wicked-cool writer!”
—New York Times bestselling author Kerrelyn Sparks
DON’T TEASE ME. . . .
“The monster in me is still there, just below the surface,” Eli continued, and his lips barely grazed the skin on the side of my neck. I shuddered, and I know he felt it. “Never forget that. Even with your Gullah magic inside you, I can smell your unique blood,” he said, his mouth next to my ear. He inhaled a long, deep breath. “You have no idea how much of a temptation you are to me, Riley Poe,” he said, the slight French accent making his voice erotic. “No . . . idea how much control I truly have not to simply taste what rushes through your veins, with barely more than a paper-thin layer of skin to stop me.” I shivered as his breath rushed over my neck.
With what strength I had, I pushed hard against him to escape; he easily turned me around, and now we were face-to-face, body to body, and panic etched into my brain. Exerting the slightest pressure, he bent me backward until I felt the cool iron handrail press against my back. I felt every hard ridge and muscle Eli possessed pressing into me. And I mean every one. His eyes searched mine, then dropped to my mouth, where they lingered. “Vampiric cravings aren’t the only ones I possess, but they’re the only ones I can halfway control, heightened times a hundred by what I am.” He dropped his head close, his lips a breath away. “Don’t tease me again, Riley, unless you mean it. I can’t promise that kind of control.” He lifted his head and stared, his eyes dark as he searched mine. “I don’t think you could handle me.”
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First published by Signet Eclipse, an imprint of New American Library, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
First Printing, November 2010
Copyright © Elle Jasper, 2010
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