Lisabet Sarai is my guest today with a new shapeshifter erotic romance called THE EYES OF BAST. This 27,500 word novella was previously published by Totally E-Bound and this new edition has been revised and re-edited. Welcome Lisabet!
Plausible Enchantment
The notion of finding one’s soul mate—the one individual in the universe whom you’re destined to love—is possibly the most fundamental romance trope. I can understand the appeal of this concept. It’s both reassuring and thrilling to imagine a lover perfectly attuned to your needs, your ideal complement and companion, a person who makes you whole and vice versa.
I find it hard to write stories about soul mates, though. I’m always aware that reality is much messier than romantic fantasy. Mostly I create contemporary stories where the relationships are realistically complicated. My heroines are frequently unsure about their own feelings. Sometimes they’re attracted to more than one person, in different ways. That’s one reason my back list contains so many ménage tales, I think, to save my heroines from having to choose whom they should love!
But paranormal romance frees me from the constraints of realism. In a world infused with magic, I can suspend disbelief about forever-after perfect matings. Magic imposes structure and symmetry on the tale. Perfect love may be kindled by enchantment, or may reflect age-old connections. Old souls, old lovers, may meet again in a new life. A quest, a struggle against evil forces, may bind two characters together for eternity.
In paranormal erotic romance, you can recognize your soul mate by the transcendent and irrational lust he inspires. That’s certainly true in my shapeshifter paranormal romance The Eyes of Bast. The instant Tom touches her, Shaina is overcome by irresistible desire. The connection is instantaneous, taking over both her body and her heart.
I don’t explain why Tom and Shaina are soul mates. I don’t need to. It’s obvious that magic is involved. They are under one another’s spell, an enchantment that can’t be broken. That’s enough to allow me, and hopefully my readers, to believe that these two belong together.
.jpg)
Blurb:
When instinct tells Shaina to visit the feral cat trap she’s set in Central Park, she listens to that inner voice. She discovers she’s caged a magnificent black tom, but the cat inexplicably vanishes after she tends to his wounds. Seeking the missing feline, Shaina encounters instead a handsome stranger whose slightest touch sets her body on fire. As the day dawns after a night of ferocious passion, her mysterious lover is forced back into his true shape—the tomcat she rescued.
Born a cat, Tom was transformed into an unwilling shape shifter by a sorceress who craved a human plaything to satisfy her perverse lusts. Centuries old and irresistibly powerful, Delphine Montserrat will stop at nothing to find her runaway familiar. Shaina vows to do whatever is necessary to defeat the vicious but seductive witch and save the man she believes is her soul mate—even though it might mean losing him forever.
The Eyes of Bast was previously published by Totally E-Bound. This new edition has been revised and re-edited.
“Hey there, kitty.” I crouched down on the grass beside the steel-mesh cage, my straight skirt riding up my thighs. “Are you all right?”
The massive black tom in the cage bared his teeth and hissed. I felt his rage and frustration. I wanted to reach into the trap, scratch behind those huge ears and comfort him, but I knew better.
“Shh! I won’t hurt you, kitty. It’s going to be okay. Tomorrow I’ll take you to a nice, warm place where you can have plenty of food.” I played my light over his body, which was lean but not emaciated. Although his fur bristled, overall he looked clean and healthy. Then I noticed a wound on his left flank. It gleamed, wet and oozing, in the beam from my torch.
“Oh, dear! What happened to you? That’s a nasty gash.” I stuck the light into my jacket pocket. I only had two hands, and the mace was more critical. The cat’s menacing growl turned into a whimper as I picked up the trap, jostling him against the mesh. “Sorry, kitty. We have to get you home and dress that. That will make you feel better.”
The combination of the cage and my quarry must have weighed at least twenty pounds. “You’re a big guy,” I commented as I picked my way along the tree-hung path back to the street. Once my eyes adjusted to the dark, it wasn’t too difficult. I glanced into the cage a few times. The tom’s eyes glowed as though lit from within.
Getting him up five flights of stairs was another story. I paused to catch my breath on the fourth story landing, resolving yet again to find a better paying job.
Finally, I wrestled the cage into my studio apartment and set it on the floor near the window. My feline guest huddled in a corner of the trap, watching me with wary eyes as I stripped off my work clothes, donned an old sweatsuit, and went to fetch antiseptic, antibiotic ointment, cotton balls, gauze, tape and a towel from the bathroom. I sat cross-legged on the worn carpet next to the cage. Now came the hard part.
“Pussycat, I need to take you out now. I know you’re scared and upset, but please, don’t fight me. This is for your own good.”
The cat’s solemn expression suggested that he understood me. Slowly, trying not to alarm him, I unlatched the door of the trap. I wrapped the towel around both my hands and reached in to grab him. I expected him to yowl, hiss or scratch. However, he didn’t resist at all. I pulled him out, cradling him in my lap. Normally, I’d swathe a feral’s body in the towel to immobilize him. This guy seemed so calm and quiet, though, I wasn’t sure it was necessary.
I soaked some cotton in betadine. “Sorry, but this is going to hurt,” I told him, holding his forelegs in my left hand while dabbing at his lacerated hip with my right. He winced but didn’t try to escape. In fact, he lay completely still in the hollow of my folded legs while I doctored him. In no time, I’d bandaged the injury, wrapping the gauze around his upper leg and securing it with surgical tape. The snow-white stripe across his haunches was a stark contrast to his jet-black fur.
He gazed up at me, his eyes glittering like paired jewels. I ventured a scratch behind his ears and was rewarded by a low purr. “You’re going to be fine, puss. But now I have to put you back into the cage.”
“Rowrr!” His sudden growl startled me. I managed to capture him in the towel before he could run. “Pfftt! Rrr-owl…!” He raised his voice in obvious protest as I tried to bundle him back into the trap.
“Hush, puss! Shh! Do you want to get me evicted?” My lease said no pets. I reasoned that the ferals I occasionally kept here overnight didn’t qualify as pets, but I wasn’t eager to test this theory.
“Rowrr!” my guest insisted. I scratched his ears again then smoothed the fur under his chin. He settled into my arms.
“You really don’t want to go back in, do you?”
“Mrrow.” His meaning was obvious.
I was so tempted to agree to his wordless plea for freedom. I could imagine how awful it must be, to be locked up when you were used to roaming free. Of course, given his willingness to let me touch him, he might not be feral at all. He wasn’t wearing a collar and it was clear he hadn’t been neutered, but still, the shelter should check to see if he’d been microchipped.
He rubbed his cheek against my arm. His hefty body vibrated with his purr. Then he stretched out his neck so he could lick the back of my hand. His warm, rough tongue sent a delicious little shiver up my spine.
“You’re very hard to resist. Do you know that?”
“Meeow.” I could have sworn he was smiling.
“Okay, you win.” After all, it was one room. The doors and windows were locked. Where could he go?
.jpg)
Buy Links:
Kinky Literature – https://www.kinkyliterature.com/book/4072-the-eyes-of-bast-/
Amazon US – https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0C4LVYDLH
Amazon UK – https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0C4LVYDLH
Smashwords – https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/1390042
Barnes and Noble – https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-eyes-of-bast-lisabet-sarai/1121761796?ean=2940166056207
Kobo - https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/the-eyes-of-bast-2
Apple Books - https://books.apple.com/us/book/x/id6448929321
Add on Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/150375804-the-eyes-of-bast
About Lisabet:
Lisabet Sarai became addicted to words at an early age. She began reading when she was four. She wrote her first story at five years old and her first poem at seven. Since then, she has written plays, tutorials, scholarly articles, marketing brochures, software specifications, self-help books, press releases, a five-hundred page dissertation, and lots of erotica and erotic romance – over one hundred titles, and counting, in nearly every sub-genre—paranormal, scifi, ménage, BDSM, GLBT, and more. Regardless of the genre, every one of her stories illustrates her motto: Imagination is the ultimate aphrodisiac.
You’ll find information and excerpts from all Lisabet’s books on her website (http://www.lisabetsarai.com/books.html), along with more than fifty free stories and lots more. At her blog Beyond Romance (http://lisabetsarai.blogspot.com), she shares her philosophy and her news and hosts lots of other great authors. She’s also on Goodreads, BookBub and Twitter. Join her VIP email list here: https://btn.ymlp.com/xgjjhmhugmgh
Hello, Jana! Thanks so much for sharing my latest release with your readers.
ReplyDelete