In my new paranormal/fantasy romance series, you’ll be introduced to protagonists who represent each of the four elements, Earth, Air, Fire and Water. In WindSinger, we meet Cecy, who meets Brad, and together they start to unravel a mystery that threatens all of humanity – but first, they’ve got to figure each other out. And they will. Enthusiastically.

Here’s a bit of their first real face-to-face meeting, out in the high desert…

Brad made his way across the canyon floor toward the foothills, and had almost begun his ascent when the heavens opened up in sheets of pouring, pounding rain, coming down so hard that it nearly hurt the skin to feel it.

He began climbing in earnest now – the floor of a canyon was no place to be in a severe rainstorm. When the earth was this dry, the water ran instead of soaking in, and you could be swept away in a flash flood in a matter of minutes.

Lightening streaked the sky a second before the boom of thunder followed it, signaling just how close it was, and Brad pulled himself up higher, looking for any kind of shelter. His eyes came to rest on an overhang nearby.

It was barely enough room for a man to stand under, but it would keep him mostly dry and shield him from the worst of the storm. He worked his way across the rain-slicked boulders, slipping a few times and squinting from the rain in his eyes before he finally managed to get out of harm’s way.

He used his fingers to wipe the water off his face and out of his eyes, shaking his arms and squeezing the bottom of his shirt before wiping his face with it. It didn’t do much good, wet as it was. He finally pulled it off over his head, wringing it before blotting at his face and hair.

He was just about to hunker down and find a seat on the ground beneath him when something caught his eye, flashing past. He blinked and rubbed his eyes to make sure he wasn’t imagining what he thought he was seeing.

There was someone dancing – literally dancing across the boulders, skipping on the tops of them, twirling and bobbing and weaving as the rain poured down in waves and the lightening hit precariously close.

He tried to shout a warning, but his voice couldn’t possibly be heard over the howling of the wind and rain and the crash of the thunder as it shook the ground. He blinked once more in amazement as he realized two things:

First, this was a girl.

Second, this was a naked girl. A stark naked girl. Or woman, he should say, from the fullness of those breasts and curve of that behind.

She threw her arms wide, and somehow, her laughter carried to him over the noise of the storm. He watched in wide-eyed fascination as she ran her hand through her hair, shaking it out and lifting it to let the wind take it.

She was goddamned beautiful.

Brad realized his mouth was hanging open and somehow managed to close it, only to have it slide open again as she ran her hands down her body, rain-slick and softly muscled, her limbs lithe and long and as she turned, her breasts were trailing streams of water from the slight upward tilt of her nipples.

She began twirling and dancing in a side-to-side motion, moving closer, as if dodging the path of the lightening. He heard her laugh again, almost as if it were a silly game she was playing, and suddenly she gave an impossible leap that carried her to the ground directly in front of him.

And then she froze.

Brad and Cecy will meet again, of course, and she’ll have some explaining to do. WindSinger will be the first of the Elemental Destiny series. Look for it to break by the end of August!!