Love Triangle Entry #19

Title: HELIACAL RISING

Genre: paranormal romance

Word Count: 75,000

Query:

Trouble doesn't find Tee Sutton, she seeks it out.  For ten years, she's masked the scars of her mother's abandonment with adrenaline.  Being numb is better than being broken.  When Tee gets busted for breaking and entering and underage consumption, her life turns upside down.  With the threat of expulsion and her senior year looming in the distance, Tee’s principal sends her to Destination Exploration, an outdoor camp tucked deep in the Blackfeet territory of Montana, in hopes of mending her broken conscience.  Banished from everything she knows, Tee views camp as her own personal jail… until she meets Keme.

Striking and mysterious, Keme rebuffs Tee from the moment they encounter each other.  Frustrated, yet inextricably drawn to him, she fights to keep her distance.  When Tee's life is put in jeopardy while white water rafting, Keme is forced to intervene and expose a secret the Blackfeet tribe has fought years to protect.  Being a twin, he carries the burden of the Gemini, an ancient ring possessing the healing power of the stars and the immortality of the Sky Country.  But being a Protector means he’s hunted and anyone he loves becomes bait.  Hundreds of miles away from Detroit, Tee finds she’s deeper in trouble than ever before, fighting for her life and a love she’s desperate to keep.

HELIACAL RISING fuses Blackfeet legend with classic Greek mythology to create a mystical story of a young girl discovering what makes her come alive.

In my twenties, I was a high school English teacher in New York City and Boston.  Now in my thirties, I’m a mountain mama living at 8,000 feet and trying to show my kids that having a dream and working hard at it go hand in hand.

First 250:

In the dark, his lips are hard to see as they move toward mine.  It’s always cloudy here.  Even at night.  When I was younger, it didn’t bother me.  Kids can play in the rain.  Now, it’s just depressing. 

His lips look like a full moon.  Round and pouted, dimpled around the edges.  Lips that are rumored to have kissed Meredith Salinger in the bathroom after she barfed at Winter Formal.  Ignore that thought. 

He just licked them.  Are my hands shaking? It’s not like this is my first time kissing a boy, but it’s warm, really warm.  Too warm for spring.  It makes my breath short.

Bottles clink around us.  His foot hits one, sending it rolling off the roof.  Don’t look down.  He might get distracted.  It smashes on the ground and shatters into pieces. 

“This has been cool,” Tim says, brushing my hair behind my ear.  His fingertips are wet and smell like beer.  Ignore that, too.

“Yea,” I say.  A door creeks.  Or maybe it’s the roof buckling under our weight.  I can’t focus with his mouth so close to mine. 

He’s breathing heavy.  In.  Out.  In.  Out.  Probably from the cigarettes.  My grandma died of lung cancer.  She sounded like Jabba the Hut every time she inhaled.  Whatever, cigarettes are sexy.  And taste good. 

“Maybe we can do this again,” he says. 

I nod in the dark, but before I can say anything, his lips touch mine.  They’re soft, coated in Chapstick for optimum moistness.  Butterflies flutter in my stomach, little wings tickling my insides, and I try not to giggle.