RETRIBUTION
I began writing my GenTech Chronicles series almost six years ago and this book, Retribution, was actually the very first book I completed. It’s funny how sometimes your books tell a story but the entirety of the saga must be released in the way your characters demand. This series threw me for a loop and the first book I wrote, has become the second book in the series. The GenTech Chronicles revolves around five sisters, four of whom have grown up together and one who was separated before birth.
Yes, I said before birth. The series as a whole deals with an egomaniacal geneticist bent on controlling the world. His ultimate creations are his own children, whom he has genetically tampered with. Four of them grow up together and you meet these amazing women in the first book of the series, Retrieval. The fifth one you get to meet in Retribution.
This book was a labor of love for me. As my very first completed novel, written in the dawn of my writing journey, it was raw. And by raw, I mean RAW. Revisions were difficult because I was so invested in these characters that to change anything in the book seemed an anathema. It was painful, but after the success of Retrieval, I realized I had no choice but to tell the lost one’s, the fifth sister’s, story. So I slaved away, giving my characters free reign but knowing I had to master the story and tell it just like it needed to be told.
And this is it. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing/revising it and I look forward to the rest of the series!
Blurb:
She is a woman lost but now found.
Sasha has spent her life dedicated to the freedoms of others. Used to helping, she isn’t prepared to be the one in need. As she holds the hand of death, alone in a courtyard of suffering, she discovers salvation is but a breath away.
He is a man conveniently at the right place, at the right time.
A battle-hardened spec ops soldier, Dray has been sent on a mission he doesn’t understand. Sitting in the hills above a terrorist’s compound, he discovers a woman who is knocking on death’s door and everything clicks. Rescuing her is never a question. Keeping her safe becomes his number one priority.
Evil has taken form, and hell hath no fury like this madman’s twisted mind.
Dempsey isn’t above using whatever or whoever he can to enact payback for a perceived slight. And he revels in his ability to instill fear and pain on those he deems beneath him. His goal is vengeance and yet he has no idea what he’s set in motion or the lengths Dray and Sasha will go to protect themselves and eliminate him in the process.
They are on a collision course that will change their lives in ways none could anticipate. How much can love take when evil stalks?
Excerpt
Her fear wrapped around his heart and squeezed. He breathed deeply at the strange feeling. Dray cupped her face in one hand stroking her head with the other. Desperation moved under his skin, wicked, painful. He wanted to soothe her but had no real way to accomplish it.
“Dray, her pulse is getting erratic. Move back,” Surrey urged as he stepped forward.
The anxiety in Surrey’s voice led Dray to do just that. In the distance, the whump-whump-whump of the helicopter breaking the sky echoed down the pass.
“Sasha, hello pretty lady. My name is Surrey. The rest of the team is dying to meet you as well, but we’ll have to catch up later, okay? You’re going to be fine, just calm down for me. I’m going to push some more medicine through your IV here and we’ll catch you later, all right?” Surrey’s voice was melodic, calming.
Irrational anger choked Dray as Sasha’s gaze searched Surrey’s face.
“Hey, Surrey. Shame to meet you this way. And no offense really, but I want Dray back, ‘kay?”
Her words slurred and she was rambling in an out-of-her-head way due to the medicine Surrey had placed in her IV. In spite of all that, she continued, and Dray watched the entire team lean in to hear her next words.
“Surrey, don’t be upset, but I really want Dray””you know, I really kind of need Dray”¦” her words ended as she drifted off.
As one, his men turned their gazes to him.
He had a slight smile on his face, which smoothed out immediately as heat rose up his neck. A grown-ass, thirty-two-year-old man, blushing? What. The. Hell? She didn’t even know him.
He grabbed for sanity, felt it slipping a tiny bit, and cleared his throat. “Everybody get ready. Con, Bleak, travel the ridge to make sure no uninvited people come to this little party. Itchy, Surrey, get your asses behind that chopper when it lands. Get her loaded and off before these fuckers realize we’re here.”
Dray walked over after they’d loaded her onto the transport gurney and leaned down close to her ear. The helicopter rotors effectively drowned out the potential for any words, but he had to do one thing before she left.
He leaned in close and inhaled deeply, drawing her scent into him before he lightly touched his tongue to her neck just below her earlobe. Her flavor, that unique scent and taste that could only be her, exploded over his tongue. Damn if she didn’t taste just like she smelled: lemon drops.
“Tǘ ata cheannsa,” he whispered the Gaelic vow before he stood tall to let her go. His heart clicked and it was sound in his soul. The language of his grandfather had been pulled from him.
Hands clenched, body strung tight with worry, he watched the bird lift off, knowing it carried something infinitely precious to him. As the helicopter drifted from site his mind echoed the words he’d spoken to her:
You are mine.
WANT TO WIN A COPY OF RETRIBUTION? It’s simple, tell me your favorite candy AND if you want to tell how it makes you feel to smell or eat it, I’m game. I’ll even tell you mine, lol! It’s those little Dove squares of chocolate-covered caramel. I’m like Pavlov’s dog when I smell them, salivating and panting for just a tiny taste. Now it’s your turn…GO! (make sure to leave me an email addy in case you win ;D)
About Lea
Lea Griffith began sneaking to read her mother’s romance novels at a young age. She cut her teeth on the greats: McNaught, Woodiwiss, and Garwood. A firm believer that love makes the world go round, she still consumes every romance book she can put her hands on, but now she writes her own.
Lea lives with her husband and three teenage daughters in rural Georgia. Two dogs, a cat, and a Betta fish named Coddy George complete a family always in motion. When not working at the EDJ, she’s usually at her keyboard, using every spare second to write. Science fiction, paranormal and contemporary romance, oh my! Nothing is off-limits when it comes to her writing.
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