The final story in the “Embrace the Future” series is out now

At last my futuristic series in complete!

“Raw Future” blurb:

Adena is determined to marry both Arthur and Ghedi. Not because Arthur will be leader one day, and he and Ghedi are friends with benefits, but because they’re the only men she could ever love. She’s also determined to go on a journey and find more food for their village. Arthur and Ghedi are hot to marry Adena, but agreeing to her going on the journey with them takes them longer to accept.

With Koby, Pagan, and Ruby, plus Zuri, Tau, and Udo, they set off to find where the food manufacturing site is to provide for their village. They circumnavigate the city but find no fresh food stocks.

Then they’re captured by the Prince of the South and his people. Left with almost no food, they have to decide whether to attempt to go home, or to remain with the prince. Oh, and stay alive, too.

STORY EXCERPT

Adena took out her tiny hoard of chocolate powder, and her day’s allowance of milk, which she’d saved for this evening. She had little enough to offer Ghedi and Arthur, as all foodstuffs were stored centrally and all meals were cooked and eaten communally. But she hoped offering them a hot chocolate drink would tempt them. It wasn’t as though she could announce in public she planned to seduce them and ask them to marry her. Although she hoped once she was naked, they’d get the message fast enough.

She’d also said she needed to talk to them, which was true. She’d let them think it was about the food resources though, which was important to her. But getting them to mate with her was more important right now. She knew they were interested in her, but the big question was, just how interested were they? A bit of fun for one night, or something longer lasting?

Ghedi and Arthur arrived together, which told her they’d talked about her with each other. That was fine by her. She wanted this to be a three-way partnership, so sharing was fine by her.

A little nervously, she brought out the thermos of hot chocolate she’d made and three of the cups from the RV’s shelf. They had to sit on the mattress on the floor as the table and benches were used for storage, but the floor was very comfortable. Much nicer than in the hut she shared, which had a floor of hard-packed dirt. Besides, being on the mattress was a good start to the seduction she planned.

“Thank you, Adena. But hot chocolate, although absolutely delicious, wasn’t why you asked us to come here, was it?” said Ghedi.

“When Ruby and her two men arrive, we need to plan a journey to find a new source of food. Foods produced more recently. Basically we need to find where the source is so we can go there,” she replied.

“Andy and I know this. Andy is already planning it, but we need to wait for Koby and Pagan to get here because they may have more information to share with us,” said Arthur.

“Koby, and Pagan, and Ruby. Ruby is a part of that team. Just as Zuri is part of the group with Tau and Udo. It was Zuri who found the food. Women think differently from men,” Adena said firmly.

Ghedi nodded soberly. Arthur looked torn. “I know that women think differently, which is why Zuri found the food supply, not a man. But the danger is extreme. Gangs roam the world looking to rape and murder people, and steal anything we may find.”

“And possibly it’s also why Tom and George never told Andy what they were doing. And never brought back the milk powder our children needed so desperately,” she added tartly.

Ghedi nodded again. This time Arthur nodded, too. “So maybe just a few women who can be well protected, like Ruby and Zuri, to remind the men of women and children’s needs,” he said slowly.

“I’m going, too. I can drive as well as any man—better than most of them. I went last time, so I’m experienced.”

“But the danger. How can we protect you?” argued Arthur.

“The answer’s obvious. You and Ghedi will marry me. As a triad, there are two of you to protect me if I need help. Not that I needed you last time, and I may not need you this time either. But with two of you I’d be amply protected.”

Adena kept her gaze on the men’s faces. Neither of them looked very surprised. She wondered if they’d been thinking along similar lines to her all along.

Carefully, Ghedi placed his empty cup on the bench. “That’d work,” he said.

“If we married you, it wouldn’t be just for the trip. It’d be a permanent, life-long union. You’d belong to us forever,” said Arthur.

“You would belong to me, too. We’d be three equal partners,” Adena replied.

“Yes,” said Ghedi.

“I agree, too.”

Buy link: http://www.bookstrand.com/raw-future 

Berengaria

Blogging here, blogging there, blogging everywhere

I’m at Sizzling Hot Summer today  with a screaming hot excerpt from my hot summer story “Turning Up the Heat”.

Bring an icy-cold drink and drop by:

http://sommermarsden.blogspot.com.au/2012/06/sizzling.html

 

And if you missed me yesterday….

The awesome Kayelle Allen has interviewed me at the Romance Lives Forever blog. Basically you can sum it up with the word, “chocolate”. Find out about my favorite authors, and my new medieval historical series.

http://romancelivesforever.blogspot.com.au/2012/06/interview-with-berengaria-brown.html

Berengaria

Half-naked warriors with long swords

I’m visiting Catriana today talking about my medieval ménage series, “Elinor’s Stronghold”.

Ever wondered about beautiful women, half-naked warriors with long swords, and even Robin Hood?

Come on by and find out my view of how these mesh together.

http://catrianasmuse.blogspot.com.au/2012/06/112-special-guest-berengaria-brown.html

Berengaria

Future Revealed is out today

“Future Revealed” blurb:

Ruby, Pagan, and Koby are lonely, missing the community they left and the friendship of the people from the valley. As they collect supplies for winter, they decide to get extra and visit the valley, taking them some food and maybe animals to help them.

But first they have to hide from a group of motorcyclists looking to raid settlements for food and women. The trio’s next stop is an abandoned farm, where they find some useful things, including some animals and a truck to transport them back to their warehouse home.

They stay in the warehouse during winter, but once the weather becomes warm again they finish planning their trip to the village, adding a high-sided utility trailer to their vehicles to transport fuel for the people.

Danger is everywhere in this lawless world with food so scarce. Will they even survive the journey?

STORY EXCERPT

Ruby rested on her heels, her hands on her hips, stretching her back, then sank onto her butt and extended her legs out in front of her, lifting her arms to the ceiling and rolling her shoulders. Hell she was stiff. Deliberately she clenched and released the muscles in her legs, arms, and shoulders, rolling her head from side to side, and curling and stretching her back. Caring for the vegetables was back-breaking work, but if she wanted to eat, she didn’t have any other choice than to do the hard yards.

If we were living in a community, there’d be more people to do the work.

Yeah, smart-ass, but they’d eat the food, too, so we’d have more work to do.

But at least I could talk to them while I was working!

Sure she had Koby and Pagan to talk to, and she loved them both with all her heart, but the truth was, she was lonely. She craved other people the way she craved chocolate. Koby and Pagan were wonderful and caring, but they were only two, and she needed a community around her. Her loneliness was made worse because for a few brief days she’d had the group from the village to talk to, and she’d loved talking girl stuff with Adena and Zuri. Also, she knew the men had enjoyed sharing with the village men. The evenings around the fire just chatting about anything and everything had been the highlight of the past month. Hell, the past year! Apart from the awesome orgasms Pagan and Koby gave her night after night. They were spectacular, too. If only she could have the two men and a community, life would be perfect.

But their own community had hated it when the three of them bonded, and the only solution was to leave. The spiteful comments and hateful looks were unending and soul destroying. Especially from people she’d always thought of as her friends, women she’d grown up with. Plus they’d found this huge building and had all their crops under the one roof instead of having to move from apartment to apartment or plant outdoors and wonder if the winds would come again and poison everything. Although Zuri’s people grew all their crops outside in the ground and had no trouble with illness. Zuri had said no one had died from the bad winds in a decade or longer. So could they live with Zuri? After all, she was part of a threesome arrangement with Tau and Udo.

Ruby stood up and shrugged. She’d talk to Koby and Pagan again. They’d discussed the idea in general terms. Likely it was time now to consider it seriously. She really was lonely, and the work was hard. Although the crops here grew very well, and the ones at Zuri’s village weren’t so good, which was why her people were scavenging for food and how they’d come to meet. Dammit, there was always a negative to consider!

Buy link: http://www.bookstrand.com/future-revealed

Berengaria

Forbidden Future. Is there hope? Will they starve and die?

“Forbidden Future: Blurb:

More than fifty years ago, wicked winds, carrying deadly diseases, swept across the land, and their ancestors fled to a protected valley. But now the easy-to-gather food and fuel are used up, and the people struggle to feed themselves. The goods their ancestors had brought with them are worn out, and life is hard trying to feed and provide for themselves.

Zuri, Udo, and Tau love each other, but have to meet in the forest to make love. The people decide to go to the city to look for food and fuel. It’s Zuri who finds the ancestors’ truck and asks for a gift in return—that she, Tau, and Udo could be together. Their request is granted. Then everyone plans for the trip to the city. It’ll be very dangerous, but the three of them will be together. But will they find any food? Will they even survive?

STORY EXCERPT 

He limped slowly up the long hill, leaning heavily on his cane. From time to time he stopped, breathing heavily, but he always began walking again, a little slower perhaps, the cane digging deeper into the grass as he leaned harder on it, but he persisted all the way until he finally reached the top.

When he arrived there, he rested both hands on the walking stick then lowered himself to the grass, dropping the last nine or ten inches onto his ass with a slight thump and an expletive.

Dammit, I don’t know why I come here. It always makes my knees ache and I always have to rest. Yeah and getting up is always a bitch. Gonna be a helluva bitch again today.

He smiled. He knew why he came. It was the only connection left to his childhood. A world long gone that almost no one else could remember. He was only fifty-eight years old. Not so old perhaps, but these days few people lived past forty. Life was just too damn hard. He had a dim memory of attending an eightieth birthday party. For his grandmother? Or likely his great-grandmother. Who knew anymore? But what he did know, what he still saw clearly in his mind, was the crowd of really old people, people in their eighties, nineties even, who’d been at that party.

Ah yes, it was more than fifty years ago though. Before everything had changed. Before…

He looked around him, taking in the panoramic view he’d expended so much pain and energy to see. Every time he came here, he was aware it might be the last time. The last time he could look into the distance and see the high buildings of what had once been a city. It was crumbled now, ruined, with wild grasses growing up in the cracked buildings. With houses and apartment blocks fallen down over what had once been freeways.

The people he lived with—or more accurately, the parents and grandparents of the people he lived with—had escaped from that big city and made their home here, next to a fresh-flowing river, in a lush valley where crops grew well. Where they were protected from the wicked winds that raced across the land, destroying houses and pushing down trees. Winds that for the first ten years had carried diseases that killed anyone exposed to them for too long. Winds that even now sent everyone scurrying indoors to shelter until they blew themselves out, even though no one had died from wind-borne diseases for many years now.

No one knew exactly what had happened. He was much too young then to understand more than the desperate scramble to leave the city and travel as far and as fast as they could. Until they came to the valley and there they stopped and hid and sheltered and stayed, building a new home.

But he remembered the city and yearned for its conveniences. For lights that went on when he flicked a switch. For foods that stayed cold on hot days, and for the ability to heat and cook food in moments, instead of it taking hours. The young children thought his stories about his childhood were just stories since almost no one alive had lived in the city. But although he’d only been a child then, his mind was not deranged. His memories were clear. However, he’d learned not to speak of them anymore. So here he came to look, to remember, to wonder what the children growing up in the valley would have for their future. So much hard work to produce food and fuel,and so little time to appreciate anything of beauty. No time for joy or learning. What would their lives hold?

As he sat there he came to a decision. He would insist on all the children being taught to read and write, would teach them himself maybe. Even though everyone’s days were full of the hard work needed just to stay alive, and fuel was much too scarce to be wasted lighting the village after dark, he would find a way to instill basic literacy in the newest generation. If they were ever to have time for leisure, ever to be able to provide more than the basic necessities, it would only happen through people trained to think of more than mere survival. People trained to appreciate beauty and learning. It was up to him. He would rise to this new challenge.

Buy Link: http://www.bookstrand.com/forbidden-future

Berengaria