Read Sorcerer: A Loveswept Contemporary Classic Romance for Free Online Page A

conscientious thoroughness he practiced in the rest of his affairs. He’d drawn up a will, and updated it on a quarterly basis. He’d made sure that his technicians and assistants were familiar with the body of his research so that his work would go on. He had no reason to regret the possibility of dying—except for the somewhat unscientific desire to want to go on living.
    As the orc lumbered toward him, Ian began to think about all the things he hadn’t done, the theorieshe hadn’t tried, and the words he hadn’t said to Partridge, the only person he’d allowed himself to care about. Other thoughts came to mind as well, like the seductive innocence of Miss Polanski’s smile, and the tantalizing glimpse he’d gotten of her long, shapely legs. No, he definitely did not want to die at this particular moment.
    As he looked up at the orc’s massive shoulders and his demon-bright eyes, however, Ian conceded he might not have much choice in the matter.
    “Parker, any luck getting rid of this thing?” he called.
    “I’m trying,” Felix answered, sounding harried. “It’s not that easy.”
    It’s a damn sight easier than standing in front of the bloody thing.
“All right, just do your best,” he said as he sent up a silent prayer that Parker’s best would be good enough. And his. Because if he couldn’t stop this creature before Jillian got free of the brambles and power grid, his neck wasn’t going to be the only one on the line.
    “Bloody hell,” he growled, advancing toward the creature with the caution of a dog approaching a baited bull. He drew his sword from its scabbard, taking heart in the clean whisper of steel against steel. Holding it aloft, he tested its balance, instinctively assessing the weight and character of the blade. When Ian was a child, his grandfather had demanded that he be trained in the broadsword, a tradition in the Sinclair family that stretched back to the 1600s. Ian had fought against learning it, just ashe’d fought against learning all the seemingly senseless traditions that added to the suffocating weight of his heritage. But at the moment he was grateful for this one. “All right, you walking garbage scow,” he cried in challenge. “Let’s see how you fair against good English steel.”
    The orc roared, and answered Ian’s challenge with a swipe of his massive paw. Ian ducked, easily avoiding the monster’s slower movements. The creature had size on its side, but Ian had speed, and he intended to use it. He lunged forward in a move that would have made his old fencing master proud, and nicked the orc’s arm above the elbow.
    The beast let out a tremendous howl, knocking Ian backward with the sheer force of the sound.
    “Ian, be careful!” Jillian cried from behind him.
    Unable to resist, he stole a look over his shoulder. She stood arrow-straight in the twisted brambles, her chin held high in a stance of magnificent defiance. Yet her brave posture couldn’t completely hide the quiver in her lips and the fear in her impossibly wide eyes. Once again their gazes locked, and the strange, molten magic began to flow between them. She was the loveliest thing he’d ever seen, a genuine damsel in distress. Only her distress wasn’t for herself, but for him.
    Parker broke the spell. “Doctor, is anything wrong? Your body temperature just jumped ten degrees.”
    Felix boy, you have a beautiful woman look at you like this and see what happens to your temperature.
“I’mfine,” he said curtly, reluctantly pulling his gaze away from Jillian.
    He was still partially turned toward her when the orc’s swipe caught him on the side of his head, toppling him end over end down the slight slope. When he came to rest, his helmet was gone, knocked off by the force of the blow. From the stabbing pain in his neck, Sinclair suspected that his head had tried to go with it.
    He sat up, rubbing his aching temples, and tried to shake some sense back into his thundering skull. Well, he