Love Immortal – Exclusive excerpt

As part of my Paranormal Pandemonium 2011 Blog Tour, I’m visiting my own blog today to share an exclusive excerpt from Love Immortal, my epic vampire romance book that was released in January. Feel free to leave any comments. If you’re all particularly nice, I might post a little more of this particular chapter later in my tour.

Love Immortal
Felicity Heaton
Rescued from werewolves by the most breathtaking man she’s ever seen, Lauren is dragged into the fight of her life and a dark world she never knew existed. There, she discovers that she’s the latest reincarnation of a goddess and must drink the blood of her immortal protector, Julian, in order to reawaken and continue her three thousand year old mission to defeat Lycaon, the original werewolf.

With the help of Julian and an organisation of people with supernatural abilities, Lauren fights for her life, their future and the fate of mankind against Lycaon and his deadly army, but can she succeed when Lycaon has killed all of her predecessors?

Can she crack the armour around Julian’s heart and seize her happily forever after with him? And can Julian bring himself to trust Lauren with the fragments of his heart after everything he’s been through?


ebook price: $4.49
paperback price: $12.99
genre: paranormal vampire romance
length: 157000 words

Available in e-book from:
Author’s website: http://www.felicityheaton.com/ebooks.php?title=Love%20Immortal
Amazon Kindle: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B004HYHHME/
Amazon Kindle Germany: http://www.amazon.de/dp/B004HYHHME/
Amazon Kindle UK: http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B004HYHHME/
Barnes and Noble: http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Love-Immortal/Felicity-Heaton/e/2940011179648/
Kobo Books: http://www.kobobooks.com/ebook/Love-Immortal/book-OyQ9CMW5Jkaf0K_UwfVfGw/page1.html
Sony Reader Store: http://ebookstore.sony.com/ebook/felicity-heaton/love-immortal/_/R-400000000000000340123

Available in paperback from:
Amazon.co.uk: http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1456487884/
Amazon.com: http://www.amazon.com/dp/1456487884/
Barnes and Noble: http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Love-Immortal/Felicity-Heaton/e/9781456487881/

EXCLUSIVE EXCERPT

Julian rubbed his thumb over the most recent set of marks on his arm. The hot water pounded down on his back, easing tired muscles but doing little to wake him. Daylight always made him tired, but while Lauren insisted on remaining awake, he couldn’t give in to his need for sleep.

His thumb grazed the marks again. Each sweep sent a tremor through him, an echo of what it had felt like to have Lauren bite him. He had lost all awareness, even when he’d tried to retain his focus in case something happened while Lauren was feeding. It had frightened him to realise just how deeply Lauren affected him.

And it had made him think.

That thinking had brought him to this point, shut in the bathroom under the pretence of taking a shower but in reality needing some time apart from Lauren. He’d traced the progression of his feelings back to when he’d first met her but had found no point at which he’d dropped his guard. He had protected himself against her the moment he’d realised that she was different and that he was in danger of having his heart broken again.

Perhaps even then it had been too late. Maybe she had already worked her way into his heart. She had disarmed him with her shy glances and pretty blushes, with the way she smiled at him, her beautiful face lighting up with each one. Each one had seen her step a little closer, until she’d passed his defences and snatched his fragmented heart.

Now she held it in her hands. Now she had power over him as the others once had. With a single word or action, she could shatter him.

He buried his face in his hands, clawed his hair back, and dug his fingertips into his scalp. How could he be so weak and foolish? How could he believe even for a second that Lauren might love him? She could never love him. No one loved him.

No one but her.

And she was long gone. History itself had forgotten her, so why couldn’t he?

She had cursed him to this life.

No, perhaps she had believed that she would be the same when she came back. Perhaps she hadn’t realised how different she would be each time.

And how she would never love him again.

His hands shook against his scalp. He trembled on the precipice that Lauren had built him up to, pushing him ever onwards. It was still a long way down. Immortality wouldn’t save him if he fell. It hadn’t helped last time. It had only turned a quick death into a long painful torture.

He couldn’t face that again.

But he couldn’t push her away. If he did, she would take what little heart he had left, what spark of life she had ignited in him. He needed her too much. She was his life now. His precious Lauren. If he pushed her away, he would be dead again.


Since she had unmasked him on the rooftop, he had changed by degrees, convincing himself that she liked him. Duke hadn’t helped, giving him a speech about Lauren and her feelings, making him believe that she could grow to love him. That she needed him and wanted to be close to him.

Her own behaviour had backed up Duke’s theory, forcing Julian to face his own feelings and to discover the depth of them. It frightened him. The moment in the living room had been his breaking point. If he allowed things to continue unchecked, he faced an eternity of pain and misery stronger than he had endured before. He had to guard his feelings now before it was too late. He had to obey his orders, reinstating his sense of duty and his loyalty, not continue to push against them. He couldn’t bend them anymore. They would break and so would he.

But he wouldn’t push her away. No. He would distance himself again and guard his heart until he was certain of her feelings.

The water turned cold against his back.

Three thousand years of existence, of facing insurmountable odds and death, and he was scared of facing a woman.

But then death was a release from a painful existence. What Lauren could do to him would torture him for another three thousand years.

Lauren believed she wasn’t strong enough and thought that he was. A mirthless laugh escaped Julian’s lips. Strong? He’d never felt so weak. He had fought his heart, his feelings, and failed. He wasn’t strong enough to overcome his love for Lauren. His heart had defeated him. He needed her. She was his weakness. Not Illia. For Lauren, he would do anything. If she ordered him to, he would leap from the precipice.

He would cut out his own heart and offer it to her.

“Julian?” Her voice was soft through the door, temptation personified. He shut the shower off and focused on her. She was worried.

Stepping out of the cubicle, Julian walked naked to the closed door and studied it. He could feel her on the other side, leaning against it. He placed his hand against the white wood, exactly where hers was on the other side. If only he were brave enough to take her hand like this, to hold it as he had before and let her see what she did to him. Would she understand the things that he’d been through? He’d hidden his pain from the others but each of them had contributed to it. Each of them had shattered his heart a little more. Illia had broken it in two. The next had smashed each of those two pieces into two again. And so it had continued. Each time she was reborn, the broken pieces of his heart doubled. Could Lauren piece it together? Would she do that only to break it all over again?

All he could do now was hold on until he could no longer bear it, until he could find the words and strength to make her understand what he had been through because of her, and until he was certain that she loved him.

“Julian?” she whispered.

Could she sense him standing here, so close but so far away?

Without a word, he stepped back from the door and turned around. He picked up a small white towel and rubbed his hair with it. The finger-length black strands turned fluffy. He ran a hand over them, tousling them back into long spikes that criss-crossed his forehead and stroked his neck. His reflection in the gilt framed oval mirror mocked him. Lauren wouldn’t love him. She would take his heart and toss it into the abyss at his feet. She would make him follow it. She would never love him. No one did.

Julian cursed under his breath.

He would sooner face three hundred werewolves than such a moment.

He stared into his eyes, seeing himself as a commander, the soldier he’d once been. His fear of what a woman could do to him was shameful.

He reminded himself that it was a long time since he’d been human but the events that had occurred then had echoed in eternity with him. His love for Illia had paved the way for his eternal torture and this fear. It was painful enough without him allowing Lauren to make it worse. When you lived for forever, there was no such thing as taking chances and seizing the day. There was no definite end to the hurt if Lauren turned on him, if she didn’t love him. He would carry that pain for centuries. It would be the end of him.

Julian drew a deep breath, wrapped the small towel around his waist, and stared at himself for a few seconds longer. He was stronger than this and he would overcome his fears. He would see if Lauren’s feelings were real and weren’t a figment of his imagination. He would test her and then he would make a decision about what to do.

Until then, he would keep the gates to his heart firmly closed. She might hold it in her hands, but she was still on the outside. Only he could let her in.

He opened the bathroom door and frowned when she wasn’t standing there. She was sitting on edge of the bed facing him, her hands grasping the dark brown covers either side of her thighs. Her gaze immediately fixed on his face, and then steadily dropped to his bare torso. Her pupils dilated. Her cheeks turned crimson.

Aware of his almost nude state, Julian walked around the room, careful to make sure that her gaze was following him.

Available in e-book from:
Author’s website: http://www.felicityheaton.com/ebooks.php?title=Love%20Immortal
Amazon Kindle: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B004HYHHME/
Amazon Kindle Germany: http://www.amazon.de/dp/B004HYHHME/
Amazon Kindle UK: http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B004HYHHME/
Barnes and Noble: http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Love-Immortal/Felicity-Heaton/e/2940011179648/
Kobo Books: http://www.kobobooks.com/ebook/Love-Immortal/book-OyQ9CMW5Jkaf0K_UwfVfGw/page1.html
Sony Reader Store: http://ebookstore.sony.com/ebook/felicity-heaton/love-immortal/_/R-400000000000000340123

Available in paperback from:
Amazon.co.uk: http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1456487884/
Amazon.com: http://www.amazon.com/dp/1456487884/
Barnes and Noble: http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Love-Immortal/Felicity-Heaton/e/9781456487881/

did you all enjoy this exclusive excerpt?

About Felicity Heaton

I'm a NEW YORK TIMES and USA TODAY best-selling author writing passionate paranormal romance books as Felicity Heaton and F E Heaton. In my books I create detailed worlds, twisting plots, mind-blowing action, intense emotion and heart-stopping romances with leading men that vary from dark deadly vampires to sexy shape-shifters and wicked werewolves, to sinful angels and hot demons! If you're a fan of paranormal romance authors Lara Adrian, Larissa Ione, Kresley Cole, J R Ward, Sherrilyn Kenyon, Gena Showalter and Christine Feehan then you will love my books too.

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