Kia Ora...

Are you someone binges shows in one sitting? Or do you watch them slowly? I'm someone who tends not to binge, preferring to spread out the enjoyment of watching a show. Maybe that has something to do with my age, more used to shows coming out weekly instead of being available to watch all at once... or it could also be because after one or two episodes I start to tune out and find something else to focus on... yeah, it's probably that last one.

At the moment I'm watching Trese and Arcane on Netflix... and have a Japanese drama/suspense series called The Journalist on my TBW list.

Updates

Currently I'm in the weird period when it comes to my writing. I'm in that period between books where I'm still shaking my mind free from whatever story I was last working on while also dealing with the market side of things for a new release, and trying to get into the headspace for the next book. And while I'm trying to balance all that, new story ideas are becoming noisy...

• I have a 1k words down on Deviation (Nagoya Crimes 2). The first two or three chapters are the slowest to get down as you try to get a handle on the story direction.
• I've already started rewriting Caught (Smoke and Shadows 1) and fixing all the plot holes created by the unexpected plot twist my characters threw at me. This means that once I share the final chapters with you, it won't be long until a polished final edition is published.
• Now that I've decided on what short story I will be working on for an upcoming anthology, the characters have decided that they want more books set in their world.... lol.
• I'm still jotting down short snippets of scenes on several upcoming/or connected books for the House of Bolton Series. The next book in this series will be FF.

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Blast from the Past

Crime Lords Series

Marriage wasn't on the cards for Aidan.

Let alone an arranged one.

With a man...

But now he has two men vying for his hand and the alliance it promises.

And an unexpected attraction to both of them.

The Crime Lords series is a dark MMM romance trilogy filled with sweet angsty moments, and the cruel darkness that only those walking in the shadows can bring to life.

Book One: Kings

Book Two: Dukes

Book Three: Princes

Want something a little less dark?

Then check out Flex (Golden Decks Casino 1) which is set in the same universe as the Crime Lords series... a best friends to lovers, sports romance featuring gymnastics and underground fights.

Caught (Smoke and Shadows 1)

Chapter Twenty-Nine

“You shouldn’t fucking be here!”

Takeshi shrugged, his gaze flickering between the other two men in the room, surprise, anger, and pure hatred blazed in the eyes of Mizawa and Kenta. “Are these two of them? The traitorous shits still hiding in the shadows of my organisation,” he snarled, removing a switchblade from his jacket pocket, and pointing it at the men.

Yoshitake glowered at him, ignoring the question he’d asked. “Why are you here, Keshi? You were supposed to be meeting with the Kurokawa-gum and the Seikawa-gumi again.’

“The meeting was a waste of my time. All they see is my age—”

“And that you ordered the hit on your father,” Yoshitake finished with a frustrated sigh, dropping all pretence that he and Takeshi were enemies. “We always knew that would be a sticking point… many of them were friends with your father after all and had already started working past the issues created by your grandfather.”

Takeshi snorted. “Yeah, issues… the only thing those bastards were keen on solving was how much they need to pay for access to the damn ports! Nothing else would’ve changed.”

“That maybe, Keshi… but that’s how the game is played and why we’d formulated a plan… and your turning up here wasn’t a part of!”

“Don’t really give a fuck about the plan, Take. It’s not like you haven’t altered it countless times without fucking informing me,” he snapped back, twirling the knife in his hands while hoping Mizawa or Kenta gave him a reason to use it. “Right now, I want to work my aggression out… suck a cock or get fucked.”

“And our guests?”

“They can watch if they want,” he said smiling dangerously at the two, chuckling as they leaped from their seats and drew their weapons. “Or join in… it might take more than one cock to work off my anger tonight.”

Mizawa was the first to speak, the colour of his face like that of a tori gate. “What the fuck is going on? We sought you out, Yoshitake, because we believed… were led to believe that your aims were similar to ours. That you wanted this little upstart of an heir dead. And now… and now we learn that you’re working together.”

“Working together?” Takeshi sniggered. “We’re fucking,” he told them, taking great delight in the revulsion that swept over their faces. It only proved further why there was no place for men like them in the Shirokawa-gumi Takeshi wanted to lead. “And as I said… you’re welcome to join us.”

“Keshi…” Yoshitake growled. “Stop toying with them.”

“This meeting is over,” Kenta snapped, striding toward the door.

Takeshi chuckled and moved swiftly to intercept him, ducking as the man struck out wildly. He grabbed Kenta’s arm and pulled it hard behind the man’s back while slamming in face first into the closest wall. “Did you honestly believe that we’d just let you walk out of here?”

A stream of curses tumbled from Kenta’s lips, many of them barely audible as the vowels and constants clashed together under the weight of his anger. His panic too, as Takeshi pressed the man harder against the wall, caging him against and leaving Kenta in no doubt as to how much Takeshi was enjoying his struggles. His cock growing harder as every jerk of the man’s body, every attempt Kenta made to shove himself free forced his body into Takeshi’s…and that only made the man struggle more.

“Suck or fuck? Which do you choose, Kenta?” he asked with a voice imbued with dangerous edge that couldn’t be ignored.

“Fuck…” Yoshitake cursed softly from behind him right before Mizawa’s body connected with a nearby wall or the floor with a heavy thud.

“I choose neither,” Kenta spat back furiously.

“Death then?” He stepped back and spun Kenta around, slamming him backing against the wall and pinning his arms above his head. “Suits me fine too… spilling blood is always enjoyable… and the fucking afterwards is even better.” Takeshi wrapped his fingers around the man’s throat and squeezed hard, grinning as the man gasped for air and kicked at his legs.

“We need them alive, Takeshi,” Yoshitake growled, the reminder a necessary but unwelcome one. “We still need to know who it is pulling their strings.”

Takeshi glanced over his shoulder at Yoshitake who was pressing a knee into Mizawa’s back and trapping him against the floor. “One… we need one of them alive. For now, at least.”

“You know… I had hoped these bastard would lead me back to the Shirokawa-gumi member behind it all.”

“Maybe it was just my turn to fuck up the plans,” he retorted. It wasn’t as though Yoshitake had stuck to their original plan which had left Takeshi unsure if the man was still loyal to him or another one he needed to kill. And he hadn’t wanted to kill Yoshitake. “And neither of them can leave this room.”

“Not now they can’t, you bastard.”

Takeshi chuckled at the lack of heat behind Yoshitake’s words… or was it more a lack of anger chasing after them, because there was definitely heat there, he quickly realised.

“Kenta or Mizawa? Which of them is more likely to talk?” he asked, turning his attention back to Kenta as the man’s body began to slacken. “And decide fast… this one’s almost dead.”

Yoshitake sighed. “Mizawa.”

He grinned and dropped Kenta to the ground. The man wasn’t dead, yet, but he’d be unconscious long enough for them to take him somewhere else… somewhere better suited for what Takeshi had planned.

*

He threw a bucket of cold water over the unconscious men, Yoshitake having decided it would be easier to move both Mizawa and Kenta if they were unable to fight back. Now however, they needed the men awake. They needed them to spill the names of every member of the Shirokawa-gumi who’d sworn false loyalty to Takeshi, so that he could hunt them down and kill them.

Two buckets later and the men were roused from their unplanned sleep, coughing and spluttering. Fury wrapped itself quickly around his guests and dragged bitter curses from their lips as they realised there’d be no easy escape from their predicament. Well, death was an easy escape, but Takeshi was in no hurry to grant it to either man.

“Who are they?” Takeshi demanded as he tossed the bucket aside and circled the men bound in the centre of the room before taking up a position opposite them.

“Why the fuck would I tell you?” Mizawa spat. “Not like it’ll make much difference. We’ll die either way.”

“True… but there are quick deaths, and ones that aren’t.” Takeshi half sat on the table situated against the wall opposite the two men, his knives laid out on it ready to use. “And while I’m all for quick, less messy killing, Yoshitake-” gesturing at the man pacing along the left side of the room while gripping a nasty looking blade “-is more in favour of making you both suffer… you do recall what happened to Fujiata, right?” Mizawa and Kenta nodded slowly. “Yoshitake promises you’ll suffer far worse than that old bastard did…unless you talk that is.”

“Fuck. Off.”

Mizawa’s last ditch attempt at bravado was commendable. A foolish decision, but still commendable.

Takeshi sighed and pinched at the bridge of his nose. “I got to be honest… your being here-” waving his hand at the room “-is just dumb luck. I’d forgotten Keshi was meeting with you until I stepped into the room… and then your presence was several layers of annoying, because all I wanted was to suck Keshi’s cock and then get fucked… I still want all that, but now I have to deal with you fuckers first. So, let’s make it easier on all of us.” He hopped off the table and grabbed one of his knives before striding back across to the men. “Tell me what I want to know… then you can die quickly, and I can get on with sucking and fucking.”

“Go get fucked, Matsumoto!”

“That’s what I’m trying to do!” he snarled, stabbing the knife into Mizawa’s thigh. “But I can’t get fucked until you’re fucking dead… and I can’t kill you until you tell me what I want.”

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Marked by the Gods by Diana Waters

A fellow Kiwi's latest release that you can grab here.