Phoenix Burning Read online

  Table of Contents

  ~ Look for these titles from Kaitlin Maitland ~

  Copyright Warning

  ~ Dedication ~

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Author’s Note

  ~ About the Author ~

  ~ Also by Kaitlin Maitland ~

  ~ More Erotic Romance from Etopia Press ~

  ~ Look for these titles from Kaitlin Maitland ~

  Now Available

  Mr. Wonderful Lies

  Phoenix Rising

  Verifiable Intelligence

  Phoenix Burning

  Kaitlin Maitland

  Copyright Warning

  EBooks are not transferable. They cannot be sold, shared, or given away. The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is a crime punishable by law. No part of this book may be scanned, uploaded to or downloaded from file sharing sites, or distributed in any other way via the Internet or any other means, electronic or print, without the publisher’s permission. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000 (http://www.fbi.gov/ipr/).

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are fictitious or have been used fictitiously, and are not to be construed as real in any way. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales, or organizations is entirely coincidental.

  Published By

  Etopia Press

  1643 Warwick Ave., #124

  Warwick, RI 02889

  http://www.etopia-press.net

  Phoenix Burning

  Copyright © 2013 by Kaitlin Maitland

  ISBN: 978-1-939194-59-6

  Edited by Melinda Fulton

  Cover by Annie Melton

  All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  First Etopia Press electronic publication: January 2013

  ~ Dedication ~

  For all of the girls and boys who refused to carry the burden of other people’s expectations into adulthood. I salute your courage in embracing who you are and never letting anyone tell you who they thought you should be. Hopefully the rest of us will catch up someday.

  Chapter One

  Emory Banks could not come up with one good reason why Donovan MacIntyre would be pushing open the door of her shop. It had been a particularly nice day so far. The weather was clear, the sun was shining, it was Friday, and she was actually making good time on the flower arrangements she was putting together for a fast-approaching weekend wedding.

  “Hello, Mr. MacIntyre,” Emory said with forced cheer, injecting a subtle bit of emphasis on the “mister.” She’d already been out with him—twice. She could say without a doubt that the two of them weren’t compatible. Unfortunately, he didn’t quite see it that way.

  “It’s good to see you again, Emory.” Donovan’s mouth eased into a grin that showed far too many unnaturally white teeth. “Please call me Donovan. ‘Mr. MacIntyre’ is so impersonal, and the two of us are far beyond that.”

  She reached over and selected a fragrant stargazer lily, carefully sliding it into the vase on the counter before her. “What brings you in on a Friday night? I have a few arrangements in the cooler that would be a perfect way to greet a date.” Emory owned Blooming Buds, a small floral shop located on a corner lot of the quaint, cobbled downtown area. If she was lucky, that was what had brought Donovan in to see her.

  A muscle jumped in his jaw as if he were fighting back irritation. She suppressed a laugh, pasting an innocent smile on her face and opening her big brown eyes just a little wider for maximum effect. MacIntyre had continued to hit on her months after she’d told him they were better off as acquaintances. So far she’d been unable to get her point across without being rude. Being rude was definitely a last resort. The guy had too much pull in the downtown business arena.

  “Actually, I’m here on business.”

  The smile faded from her face. This could actually be worse than his hitting on her. “Is that right?”

  “You know I was elected to the board of aldermen six months ago.”

  Of course she knew. That appointment inexplicably coincided with his decision to smother her with cheap pickup lines and empty compliments. “I think I’d heard that somewhere.”

  He leaned against the counter, his expensive cologne overpowering the pleasant scent of the flowers in the vase and turning her stomach. Why men thought they needed to drown their polo shirts and designer khakis in cologne was beyond her. The sight of his gelled dark brown hair, perfectly trimmed beard, and leering expression was bad enough. Adding the unattractive physique and stench of cologne made her want to run the other way.

  “As a member of our local chamber of commerce, I was hoping you’d do me a favor.”

  If this was a new pickup line, she was going to drop the civilized facade and deck him.

  “I’d like your signature on a petition.”

  “A petition?”

  “A few of the downtown business owners are trying to get enough signatures to shut down the Phoenix Rising.”

  She racked her brain, trying to remember if she even knew where or what the Phoenix Rising was. The name was familiar, but she couldn’t place it.

  “It’s a bar,” he supplied.

  “Oh! My brother Chris has mentioned that place. I knew the name sounded familiar.” MacIntyre had succeeded in piquing her curiosity. “Why do you want to shut it down?”

  “There are a lot of rumors about that place that don’t do the downtown area any favors.”

  “Like what?”

  He shifted uncomfortably. He didn’t look as though he’d expected her to ask for any information. He’d just wanted a signature. “For one thing, the owner is an ex-con.”

  She carefully considered her response, reaching for some greenery. “If he’s done his time, I don’t see how that’s an issue.”

  “There are other rumors.”

  Why was he hedging? Emory had been merely curious before, but his evasive behavior was intriguing. There was obviously more to the story than he was telling her. A bar was a bar, right?

  “Some of my other contacts have heard that there’s a lot of lewd conduct that goes on in there. From what we understand, it’s basically an anything-goes atmosphere.”

  She was tired of the verbal fencing. “Are you talking about swinging?”

  “More than that. I mean public displays of sex.”

  Heat curled in her belly. She swallowed a lump in her throat and tried to control her heartbeat. Her breath was quickly becoming ragged with the effort of maintaining her calm mask. The rumors that had MacIntyre up in arms had the opposite effect on Emory. She was fascinated.

  “So this is a couples’ bar?”

  “Not from what I understand.”

  Her fingers latched onto the edge of the countertop, the wood biting deeply into her palm. Warmth began creeping over her, culminating at a point between her legs. Awareness zipped up her spine, and
she was glad her loose outer shirt hid the hardening of her nipples.

  She grasped for a tone that would convey polite curiosity without revealing the depth of her interest. “People hook up and have sex right there in the bar?”

  MacIntyre’s ice-blue gaze narrowed. Emory cleared her throat, aware that her voice had taken on a breathless quality that could be interpreted a multitude of ways. Not that he could guess how big of a fascination public sex was for Emory Banks. She had her own reasons for desiring a trip to a place like Phoenix Rising, things in her past that she had no wish to share with Donovan MacIntyre.

  “Those are rumors.”

  “So it’s probably an outrageous lie anyway.” She turned away on the pretext of choosing a beautiful white magnolia blossom for the arrangement on the counter. “How silly.”

  “Regardless of whether or not a disgusting rumor is true or false, that’s not the sort of image our downtown needs, or the type of clientele we want to encourage. It starts with this, and the next thing you know we have blacks, Asians, and homos moving in.”

  “Hence the petition?” The asshole had pretty well covered his discrimination bases. Didn’t he know her brother was gay?

  He put a yellow envelope on the counter and pulled out a thick sheaf of papers. She could see a smattering of signatures on the page, but not nearly enough to close down a business. An uneasy feeling settled in the pit of her stomach. This wasn’t right.

  “I just need you to sign here at the bottom.” He searched his pockets for a pen.

  “Don’t bother.” Emory swallowed, her mouth suddenly dry. “I’m not going to sign something without checking the facts first.”

  “Emory?”

  “I’m sorry, Mr. MacIntyre…”

  “Call me Donovan, Em—”

  She held up her hand to stop him from repeating his entreaty. “I know how tough it is to operate a business down here. I’m not going to pass judgment on Phoenix Rising without better reasons than some unsubstantiated rumor.”

  He stiffened, shoving the petition back into its envelope with unnecessary force. “I’m sorry to hear that. I’ll be back later. I’m sure with some time to think it over you’ll change your mind.”

  She watched him leave, but her mind was already far away. He had thought her to be a done deal, no more than a formality. And it would’ve been so easy to sign on the line, to keep her head down like a good little business owner and make Captain Downtown happy.

  Donovan MacIntyre was a prick of the first degree. He owned a chain of sports bars scattered across three counties. His bars had a list of prerequisites for waitresses that read like a want ad for Playboy models. Servers wore damp white T-shirts with neon-colored bras and jean shorts cut off at an angle so their ass cheeks hung out. The predominantly male clientele made crass comments about female anatomy and consumed gallons of beer and pounds of hot wings while watching hours upon hours of sporting events. The worst part was that every one of those beer-guzzling men would profess to be an upstanding citizen that toed the line of righteousness. And they’d even believe it.

  Thanks to the popularity of his bars, MacIntyre had the cash flow that usually got him what he wanted. His downtown location was the flagship of his entire operation. Going against him in this petition was the quickest way to make trouble for Blooming Buds. But something inside her balked at the idea of following the crowd on this issue.

  “Something got your knickers in a twist, little sister?”

  Emory made a face at her barely older brother as he entered the shop via her storage area. Chris always parked in the lot out back. If asked, he’d say it was to save the limited street parking for customers, but that wasn’t really why.

  “Hiding from the wife?” she taunted.

  Chris had clear blue eyes; straight, short, reddish-blond hair; and a fair complexion. Emory’s olive-toned skin, brown eyes, and curly black hair didn’t even look like they’d come from the same gene pool. It was hard enough for people to believe they were brother and sister. Trying to convince someone that they were fraternal twins was next to impossible.

  Chris rolled his eyes and stabbed restless fingers through his hair. “Don’t you start, Emmy, he’s been on me all week about flying to Iowa to get married. I’m going to kill him if he doesn’t shut up.”

  She shrugged. “You know how I feel about it.”

  “Yes, your views on same-sex marriage are so encouraging.”

  “I just think you guys have every right to be as miserable as traditional couples. That’s all I’m saying.”

  “I already am miserable.” His cell phone began squealing like a pack of piglets in his pocket.

  “Speak of the devil,” Emory muttered darkly.

  It wasn’t that she didn’t like her brother’s longtime boyfriend. In fact, she’d affectionately dubbed the duo “The Chrises” not long after they’d moved in together, since the two men shared the same first name. The name, however, was where any similarity ended.

  Her elder brother by two minutes and forty-five seconds, Chris was as mellow as the day was long. It was a personality trait he’d acquired at great cost thanks to their conservative upbringing. Almost nothing got a rise out of him. This trait had often contributed to past acquaintances thinking he was sort of slow on the uptake. What people often didn’t realize was that Chris used the waiting game to manipulate people into doing what he wanted. This was one of the things that made him a stellar divorce attorney. And Emory was utterly convinced it was the only reason her twin could stay in a relationship with her unofficial brother-in-law, Chris Fox.

  The other Chris was just as flamboyant as her brother was sedate. A romance novelist with nearly forty titles on his resume and several successful best sellers, Chris Fox was the most high-maintenance individual on the planet. He whined almost constantly about anything not to his liking and shopped like a fiend. Emory would have never warmed up to him if it weren’t for his staunch, unwavering love and loyalty to her brother. Mess with his man, and Foxy grew claws and a set of brass balls.

  “I am not answering that,” Chris muttered. “I refuse to listen to him go off on another rant about me not loving him enough to make him an honest man.”

  She couldn’t help it—a laugh burst forth and continued until tears stung her eyes. Moments later her twin joined in, his chuckles underscoring her loud guffaws. That was pretty much the way it was with them. When one cried, so did the other. They’d done their fair share of sticking up for each other too. All the way through her brother’s decision to come out of the closet his senior year in high school and the disastrous family reaction that had left them on their own not long afterward.

  She finally sighed and slumped onto a stool behind the counter to finish up the last of the wedding arrangements. “Thanks, big brother, I needed that.”

  He opened the ancient fridge and pulled out a bottle of imported beer. “Bad day?”

  “Not until just before you arrived on the scene.”

  He lounged back against the opposite counter. “What happened?”

  “Donovan MacIntyre put in an appearance.”

  “What did he want?”

  She paused in her work, remembering the multiple layers she’d sensed behind the petition. What had MacIntyre really wanted? He wanted her signature, obviously. And he probably wanted to get between her legs. But there were ulterior motives behind his drive to shut down Phoenix Rising.

  “What did he want Emmy Lou?”

  She shot her brother a dirty look. She hated that moniker with a passion, as he well knew. It was the one part of her backwoods upbringing that she’d not managed to leave behind. Emory Louise Banks, dubbed Emmy Lou as a toddler and reminded of it only occasionally, when her brother wanted to piss her off on purpose.

  “Do you know anything about the Phoenix Rising?” she asked abruptly.

  He set the beer on the countertop and crossed his arms, settling into one of his thinking expressions. She began to get the idea that he knew a
lot more about Phoenix Rising than she’d originally thought.

  “Christopher Jeremiah Banks, what have you been hiding from me?”

  The ghost of a grin played at the corners of his mouth. “Tit for tat, Emmy Lou.”

  “Screw that, I’ll call Foxy and tell him where you are right now if you don’t tell me what you know.”

  “That’s playing dirty.” He frowned. “I’m getting to it.”

  She sighed, drumming her fingers impatiently on the countertop, the arrangement on the counter before her forgotten. If he was taking this long to tell her what he knew, it put some credence to the rumors MacIntyre had heard. It would be just like Chris to keep something this interesting a secret.

  “Can I ask what MacIntyre and the Phoenix could possibly have in common?”

  “He wants to shut it down.”

  “Does he now?”

  She could see the lawyer wheels turning in his head and wondered why. “What’s the big deal? MacIntyre was going on about some unproven rumors that customers at the Phoenix can get a side of down-and-dirty sex on the floor with their draft beer.”

  “That’s not exactly how it works, but he’s got the gist of it.”

  Her mouth dropped wide open. “There’s a bar like that right around the corner and you didn’t tell me?”

  “It’s not your kind of scene.”

  Sometimes his big-brother instincts made him almost insufferable. “So do you think it should be shut down?”

  “Of course not. Connor is strict as hell about who gets into the bar. Whatever goes on inside is consensual, and I believe everyone has a right to make their own choices.”

  “Except me, is that it?”

  “A place like that isn’t going to fix things for you, Em.”

  Inhaling deeply, she counted to ten and then exhaled, trying to remember that Chris was her twin and therefore entitled to more than a little brotherly concern. Sometimes though, she wondered if he was convinced she’d be better off in a padded room somewhere. Emory placed the final touches on the arrangement and tied a pink bow around the neck of the vase. It was ready to be put in the cooler with the rest of the flowers for the weekend wedding.