Private Performance
Publication Date: October 13, 2014
Synopsis:
Ellaine Greene has simple desires. She just wants to do her best as the event coordinator for the local aquarium, to support environmental conservation efforts, and to keep immature man-children out of her life.
So when a major donor to the aquarium demands Ellaine find a magician for her granddaughter's birthday party, all she can imagine is a long line of card chuckers and coin flippers wearing cheesy sequined vests.
Instead, she gets Xander Hollatz, a sophisticated, powerful man in a crisp suit, with nimble fingers and a warm smile.
He's the man for the job, no doubt. And, to her surprise, she realizes he might be the man for her, too. Will she let her doubts get in the way of their feelings for each other?
And when everything goes wrong at the birthday party, will he be able to perform a miracle to save the day?Sleight of Hand #1: Private Performance is a 17,000-word novella, introducing readers to Ellaine and Xander's passionate and tender romance, to the fascinating wildlife inhabiting the aquarium, and to the mysterious world of professional magicians.
Excerpt:
She hovered by the door
as he started unpacking. She could not take her eyes off his body, particularly
his pressed trousers as he leaned over and bent to reach into his trunk.
“I’m… I’ll be in my
office,” she said. “Just down the hall. Come and get me when you’re done.”
He raised his eyes from
his work. “Sure. I’ll come find you when I’m ready.”
She felt hot underneath
her clothes. She retreated to her office. If she’d been wearing layers she’d
strip down now, but all she had on was a skirt and a thin blouse. She helped
herself to a bottle of water from the mini-fridge she shared with Brissa.
She’d just begun to
regain her composure when he entered the room.
“Ready when you are.”
I’m ready.
But why? Why was she so
ready? More to the point, why was her body so ready for him? He’d said a few
nice things to her, and looked real good. That just about summed up their
relationship. So why was her skin humming for him? Was she that lonely? Ready
and willing for the first good-looking guy to come along and treat her well?
Ellaine got mad at
herself. She did not like that self-image.
But she did like the
image where he slowly lowered himself into her. She liked that one very much.
All these thoughts
crowding her head, she sat down in the front row as he took his place in front
of a plush black curtain he’d set up, his signature embossed on it in silver
thread. In front of him sat an elegant wooden folding table, with a rich dark
polish. She wondered if he’d made it himself.
“Hello, everyone.”
His voice filled the
room. A Performance Voice. It grabbed her attention without startling her,
soothed her without lulling her to sleep. She even sat up a bit straighter.
Then he dropped back to
his normal speaking voice and said, directly to her, “’Everyone’ meaning
‘everyone at the party, of course.’”
“Maybe I have multiple personalities,”
she suggested.
“Don’t we all?” Before
she could ponder that, he added, “Should I perform as though everyone’s here,
for the party? Or would you prefer if I didn’t pretend? If I performed just for
you?”
She knew the correct,
professional choice.
But she said, “Just me.”
His eyes twinkled. He
said, “Hello, Ellaine.” She gave him a small wave. He grinned. “I’m glad you
could be here tonight. I have a few things to show you. The first one is this
coin.” He held up a large coin — a half-dollar — between his thumb and
forefinger. He showed her his other hand, empty. Then he reached up and —
twisted the coin. She saw it bend, just for an instant, then in its place,
between forefinger and thumb — a strawberry.
He let the berry drop
into his cupped hands and held it out to her.
She leaned out of her
chair. He let her take it. It wasn’t made of rubber or sponge, no. It was real.
Or felt real, anyway.
“Take a bite, if you
want,” he told her, as though reading her mind. “Don’t worry, I washed my
hands.”
She smiled. “Did you wash
the coin too?”
He laughed. “Actually I
did. They look better on stage when they’re clean.” Then he plucked the coin
out of the air. It shone between his fingers.
“Is it real?”
“Very.” He tossed it to her.
It vanished in midair.
She gasped, dropping the
strawberry on the floor.
“Now it’s definitely
dirty,” he said, a little sadly.
“How did you…?” She shook
her head, as if waking up from a dream. “Sorry about your strawberry,” she
said, feeling foolish.
He chuckled. “No
problem.”
“I was actually looking
forward to eating it.”
“Hmm… I’m going to… do something magicians aren’t
supposed to do. I’m going to show you that trick again.”
“You are?”
“Only if you’re serious
about wanting another strawberry.”
She smiled. “I am.”
He came closer. He
crouched in front of her, bringing his face level with hers. He held up the
coin.
She fixed her eyes on his
fingers.
He reached up. Twisted
the coin.
Revealed the berry.
He held it out for her
again. She took it, gingerly. Nibbled the tip.
“It’s real,” she
whispered. “How — how did you know I’d drop the first one? Wait, you didn’t
just give me the one that fell on the floor, did you?” She looked down. No. The
first one was still there.
He was laughing. “I would
never give you a floor berry.”
“You wouldn’t?”
“No. Never.”
He held her gaze. Her
mouth watered.
“Let’s see some more,” she said.
Repeat Performance
Publication Date: October 27, 2014
Synopsis:
Ellaine Greene has a new man in her life, the famous magician Xander Hollatz. He's ripped, kind, and mysterious -- nothing like her ex-husband. He has even volunteered to perform at her aquarium's annual fundraising gala. But she's still having trouble leaving the past behind, especially when her ex shows up to beg for money. Before the new couple knows it, someone's trying to break into Xander's mansion to steal the secrets of his many famous illusions. Ellaine's ex becomes their prime suspect. But maybe it's actually the up-and-coming street magician they've befriended. Or maybe it's even someone from Xander's mysterious past. Whoever the thief is, if he uncovers and reveals the secret of Xander's newest illusion for the fundraiser, the event will be a disaster. Ellaine may lose her job. And there's a still greater question: Is this feeling they share together just lust -- or is it something more? Find out in this 74,000-word book, the second volume in the Sleight of Hand series.Excerpt:
That was the week the
billboards went up. Her boyfriend’s face was all over downtown, beside the
words:
Xander Hollatz Returns
ONE NIGHT ONLY
The ads had only been up
a day. Ellaine didn’t realize how quickly they’d take effect. They were out to
dinner when she noticed a woman at a nearby table do a double take when she
spotted Xander. That wasn’t necessarily new. He was magnetic, and turned heads
everywhere they went. But this woman’s double take wasn’t just a “check out the
hotness” look. She spent the next ten minutes stealing furtive glances, trying
to decide whether or not this man was the same guy as the one on the
billboards.
Ellaine gave Xander a
heads-up. “The woman sitting behind you, over there. Don’t turn around and
look, though.”
“I don’t want to look,”
he replied, never taking his eyes off Ellaine.
She glowed. “Still. If
she comes over here and says something, you might have to.”
He nodded. “I’ve done the
fame thing. I’ll manage.”
“Have you got something
to show them?”
“Always.”
“What will you do?”
“Hopefully I can make
them all disappear. Then I could strip you naked and take you right here on
this booth.”
She licked her lips. But
before she could respond the woman stood, having gathered up her courage, and
approached Xander. “Excuse me,” she said, “but are you…?”
Xander tore his eyes from
Ellaine and looked up. He smiled and nodded.
“Oh my God! It’s him!” She
called her friends from the table over, and suddenly there were five strangers
towering over their meal.
“I loved your show!”
“Can you do a trick for
us?”
Ellaine couldn’t bear
their presumptuousness. She wanted to bark at them, “Didn’t your mother teach
you any manners?”
But as Xander had said,
he’d done the fame thing before.
“Well, I’m under an
exclusive contract with the aquarium at the moment,” he demurred, “but I
suppose I could show you a little something. We’ll call it free advertising.”
A pack of cards
materialized in his hands. The routine he showed them was one she’d seen
before. In fact, he’d revealed its secrets to her, and as he performed it she
was watching all the hidden moments while the others watched only what Xander
intended them to see. It was as if he were performing two separate shows: one
for them and one just for her. During one moment, he crooked a finger under the
cover of his other hand, at an angle only visible to her, and waggled it at
her. She giggled.
Of course, at the end of
the effect, the spectators’ applause drew more attention from other tables.
Xander performed another effect to include all these new eyes. And after that
came requests for autographs and selfies, which he was too gracious to reject.
Ellaine began to feel invisible, trapped in her chair as others crowded around
for their turn to speak with the celebrity in their midst.
The mass of people
interfered with restaurant business, blocking lanes of traffic as servers tried
to wade through them, delivering platters and refills. One of them even glared
at Ellaine. She reacted with guilt, then anger. What was she supposed to do
about it? The injustice of that glare galled her.
Suddenly she saw herself,
huddled and alone amid all these laughing, smiling people, letting bitterness
fill her heart. She refused to give in to self-pity. But how could she join in?
She pulled out her own
cell phone, jumped in front of the next person in line to have their picture
taken with Xander, and took a selfie of her own. “Cheese!”
He surprised her by
kissing her on the mouth. Later, she’d study the picture: the carefree smile on
his face as he drew her to his lips; the shocked little O of her own lips; and
the cartoonish scowl of the server photobombing them in the background.
Giddy and satisfied, she
sat down again, relishing all the crestfallen faces of all the women (and one
or two of the men) in the throng.
After that there were
only a few more autographs to give out, and then normalcy returned to their
evening.
“We made them disappear,”
she said.
“Finally. Thank God.”
“Really? You looked like
you were having fun.”
“I was having more fun
before they interrupted us. But I do like performing. And it’s bad business to
disappoint the fans.”
“I think you may have
broken a few hearts when you kissed me like that.”
“It’s like they say. You
can’t make everyone happy all of the time. And if I had to choose only one
person to make happy, it’d be you.”
“Me?”
“You.” He took her hand and kissed it. “Every time.”
Play List:
About the Author
Reese Galloway loves great magic tricks, animals and bars of fancy soaps. Actually, his soap obsession is getting a little out of control.
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