Meant to Be

By Alexandra Isobel

Cross cultural love stories with all the delicious feel goods.

 

TAKE FLIGHT

After finally admitting he loves her, he let himself loose beneath her silk sheets.  Now the embassy is overrun with rebels, and he must get her to safety, but when the time comes can he let her go?

 

FIND HER KEEP HER

He is an ex-Russian gangster. She is his African American queen. When she goes on a rampage to burn down their world, he is desperate to find and stop her.

 

EVER AFTER

Santiago and Katherine have been happily married for the past ten years, until she learns about his plans to marry a Jordanian Princess.   

• Language: English
• Publisher: Alexandra Isobel
• Release date: Jun 24, 2024
• ISBN: 9798201518004

Alexandra Isobel

Canadian romance writer who sees the romance in everyday life, and mixes it into her stories.  She thrives on visual inspiration so is a diehard movie junkie and photography hound - both of which keep her imagination humming.  She's definitely an introvert who secretly lusts after her alpha hero characters!

Book preview

TAKE FLIGHT

Bakarat, Indonesia

Daria Hill's eyes flew open as her bedroom door heaved and crashed open. She bolted upright, a scream dead in her throat as she recognized the dark soldier in her doorway.

Mercury? Thank God it was him, and not the rebels making good on their threat to drive out Canadian nationals who remained in the embassy. What—?

Get down! Get down! Now! Mercury turned and unleashed a thunderous round of bullets from his HK-MP5 down the hallway.

Daria scrambled from within her duvet and darted to the bulletproof closet beside the dresser, her designated place of security while she was a guest. Gunfire blasted on the other side of the wall before a horrible cracking explosion rumbled over the ground. She gripped the doorjamb as her heart smashed against her chest.

What the hell was—

Mercury ripped open the closet door. Move! Move! Move! He leaned down and yanked her out with one hand.

She had a single moment to inhale his familiar scent, indulge the brief sense of security his presence always brought before he kicked through the locked patio doors.

Go! Go! He pushed her into the inky black night. Pandemonium raged everywhere. Terrified embassy staff shoved and screamed as multiple rounds of gunfire blasted into the darkness. Bodies fell down in screams of pain while other horrified people tripped and stumbled over the writhing and sometimes still forms, unable to stop in the panic stampede.

Daria froze, transfixed, her mind overloaded with the rush of bleak stimuli, until gunshots shattered behind her.

Go! Mercury ordered, his big hand suddenly around her bare upper arm, the impact snapping her mind into emergency evacuation mode. She jolted forward as a deafening boom and hurricane force threw her against the patio flagstones. Her view of the yard twisted into a horrific kaleidoscope of bloody colors as pain ripped down her legs and something heavy surrounded her body and anchored her to the ground.

Mercury. The edges of his equipment and gear dug into her sides as he rolled them both to stand. She shook her head, trying to straighten the world as he pulled her around his back.

Stay behind me. Right behind me!

Disoriented, she took off behind him, staying at his booted heels, her right hand within reach of his shoulder, her left clutched into the hem of her nightgown, her bare feet pounding across the wide expanse of the manicured lawn. Explosions of dirt pelted her skin as flashes of orange and yellow light streaked out of the darkness with the continuous machine-gun fire. There was no time to scream or even react as people smashed into her or fell down beside her. Mercury reached back and grabbed her upper arm again, forced her forward, up and over bodies until she flat out ran beside him through the mayhem of the yelling and screaming and death fall cries.

The entrance gate and security house came into view and Mercury slammed shoulder first into the wall. She stopped short against his body, before tucking herself behind his back and against the side of the house. Holding onto his muscled shoulder kept him aware everything was OK with her, and she was good to go. She squinted against the stinging smoke that hung in the air, the acrid substance choking down her throat and into her lungs. She leaned over and coughed.

Don't look down there. Mercury yanked her away from a dead body on the ground.

Vomit pushed into her throat as her mind registered that what she had seen was not a body, only parts, blown from the person who lay beyond her feet. A horrible rush of white noise crashed into her ears.

Daria. Mercury's hands were on her face, his stony features suddenly blocking the view of the twisted figures at her bare toes. Eyes here. On me. He forced her eyes to his. Focus, D. Stay with me. His dark eyes were steady, strangely calm against the nauseating swirl in her mind. Remember the drill. You're fine. He gave her a once-over before he turned back to the corner of the security house.

She was fine. She repeated his words in her head and blocked her mind’s registration against the outline of other still forms in the grass. To think just yesterday she was out here with her notebook and coffee, typing up her latest ideas for the humanitarian work she did for her mother's international corporation. It was obscene that this idyllic space, once beautiful and plush green, was now an above-ground graveyard.

She pulled in a breath that shuddered down her throat, the acrid smoke still heavy in the air. It set her airways on fire all over again. Remember the drill. Treat this like a drill. She repeated the mantra until the sounds of panic, shouts, screams and machine-gun fire faded. She centered her mind and concentrated on Mercury's back, his arrow-straight hairline, and the slight bend to his broad shoulders beneath his gear. When he turned, she focused on the stress lines that slashed across his brow, the way his short black hair dripped with sweat, and the permanent scar on his right temple pulled tight as he assessed her.

This was Mercury. He must have fought hard to get to her bedroom. There was so much gunfire and panic. Embassy staff, soldiers, rebels, civilians shrieking when caught in the deadly crossfire—and the ground kept shaking with volatile eruptions. Everywhere she looked, something was on fire. What the hell had happened? This evening had been so calm after the week-long parliamentary discussions. Military groups, protestors, and politicians had shaken hands and come to well fought for agreements. Her mother had been ecstatic. No more infighting meant she could restart production in her factories.

Daria kept her eyes on Mercury, inhaled and exhaled through her nose as she grit her teeth. She would get through this without becoming a victim or holding him back. She stared at the locked gates and the streets beyond, ominous as they emptied of frantic people chased by rebel warriors with machine guns repeating in the night air.

Where's my mother? She looked back at Mercury, her thoughts falling hard over a load of dismal possibilities. Her mother was always a target: the foreign woman without a husband. She had too much power and position, and they hated her for owing the biggest local factory.

Townsend's got her. He'll get her to the rendezvous. The rest of my team are already on exfil. He pulled a pair of night-vision goggles from his cargo pants and scanned the smoke-filled grounds and dying street. The gunfire faded, but still echoed in the distance.

Daria rubbed her arms and looked at the fires that burned around the embassy. How are we getting out? She looked up, hoping to see a helicopter even though she realized one could never chance landing in the middle of this mayhem, or on the burning roof. The rebels would undoubtedly storm it or use an RPG to bring it down.

Mercury shoved the goggles back into his pants leg pocket. Helo at the north end of the city. We go underground if they haven't closed it off yet. He looked at her nightgown-clad body and tightened his lips. Get ready. Up and over. He gripped her upper arm and knee and tossed her up against the compound's seven-foot stone wall. Grab the rung!

She clawed and grappled for the metal pegs he had installed and made her practice on for this purpose. Her braided ponytail swung across her face as she gripped, and Spider-Man climbed up the posts embedded between the stones. In seconds, he slid up beside her. Stay flat and— He threw his knife into the shadows. A machine gun fired before a body hit the ground. Go—No, wait!

An incoming sound buzzed through the air and Daria's heartbeat ascended to her throat as the wall beneath her exploded and gave way in a clap of thunder. The world let go and her torso flailed before she landed hard on the street with Mercury.

Christ. He looked down at her.

She tried to move, but she couldn't feel anything. She opened her mouth and choked on a pile of dirt. My... arm... Was that her arm? On fire? She turned her head. There were no flames, but she'd ripped her skin against the road.