Anika Jones has her future carefully plotted out and is checking the boxes, one by one, despite the bumps thrown in her path. This last one is a challenge, but she manages to stay on track; her salon is thriving, and she just bought a house. Unfortunately, when one of her employees runs into trouble, she inevitably gets sucked in, throwing her carefully paced life off-balance. It doesn’t help a friend, who’s been ghosting her for a year, suddenly makes an appearance.
He was born to pig farming, but for Noah (Hog) Hodgekins fighting fires is his calling. He wasted too many years honoring a legacy he wants no part of. But now that he’s finally free from family obligations, there’s nothing holding him back from pursuing the life he’s been dreaming of. The first step is mending bridges with the one person who is central to that future, but she comes with her own challenges, family and otherwise.
Instead of treading carefully to gain her heart, he ends up throwing caution to the wind when her recent string of bad luck lands the FBI on her doorstep.
USA Today bestselling author Freya Barker loves writing about ordinary people with extraordinary stories.
With forty-plus books already published, she continues to create characters who are perhaps less than perfect, each struggling to find their own slice of happy.
Recipient of the ReadFREE.ly 2019 Best Book We've Read All Year Award for "Covering Ollie, the 2015 RomCon “Reader’s Choice” Award for Best First Book, “Slim To None”, Finalist for the 2017 Kindle Book Award with “From Dust”, and Finalist for the 2020 Kindle Book Award with “When Hope Ends”, Freya spins story after story with an endless supply of bruised and dented characters, vying for attention!
Thanks so much for reading today's post. Hope
you enjoyed it!
L. L. Ash and Pax Sinclair are here to tell us about their contemporary romance Riot, Hard Rock Girls series #1.
They're also hosting a great giveaway.
____________________
Riot
L. L. Ash, Pax Sinclair
(Hard Rock Girls Series, #1)
Publication date: May 12th 2024
Genres: Adult, Contemporary, Romance
“He saved me in that group home when everything I’d ever loved was stripped away. He saved me with his smile, his kindness, and his guitar.”
Tayler
I’m the leftovers that nobody wanted; a casualty of the foster system. Now that I’m 18, I have nowhere to go. No job, no home, but I have my bestie Haze by my side, and together we’re going to make it. I love music. Yeah, everybody says that, but I know I have what it takes. We’re going to find a way to reach the top. Kind of like Dakota, the front man for Kings of Ash, except not as a-hole-ish and muscley as him. Ugh, the muscles. We were in foster care together, me, Dakota, and Haze. That’s where I fell in love with him. But, he was older than me and got kicked out of the group home when I was only fifteen. The guy ripped my effing heart out as he walked out that door. It’s a shame, really. He’s the only person in the world who ever really understood my love and need for music. He saved me in that group home when everything I’d ever loved was stripped away. He saved me with his smile, his kindness, and with his guitar. Since then, Dakota has changed and hardened in more ways than one. I’ve been trying my best to avoid him, but our paths have crossed and now he’s back, famous and hotter than ever.
Dakota
I gaze at Tayler for the last time while my mind repeats the same mantra: she’s your foster sister, you can’t be in love with her. But every part of me screams otherwise as I walk out of that group home. Aging out of the foster system at 18, I left behind a 15-year-old girl who knew I couldn’t stay. It broke her heart, but it’s better to be hated than to be in jail for loving her. Letting go of her was the toughest thing I’ve ever done, but I had to chase my music and put her behind me. Plenty of women came and went in my life, but none could fill the void that she left behind. It was always the music that drove me forward, pushing me to become a part of the punk Seattle music scene as the front man for Kings of Ash. Just when I thought I had moved on from Tayler for good, she blows back into my life–smoking hot and determined to make her mark. Even though she despises me for abandoning her all those years ago, I can’t help but admit to myself that I still want her. No, I don’t just want. I need.
I fell in love with a girl who’s way too young for me, and now that I’m eighteen, she’s my ticket to jail if I ever tried following through with any of the twisted debauchery I really want to do.
When she’s eighteen though? All bets are fucking off.
When the song she’s singing for me is over, I listen to her husky, alto voice trail off and close my eyes. I can’t even explain what it does to me, other than it feels kind of the same as cool aloe over a sunburn. I can’t get enough of it.
The sun is setting and we’ve got to go inside. Dinner is over and curfew will set in pretty soon, so I walk her into the house and to the room she shares with Haze.
“Will I get to see you tomorrow before you leave?” she asks.
I shrug.
“I don’t know. I’ll be leaving pretty early. Got the first shift.”
She frowns, a lone tear sliding down her cheek.
“I’ll wake up early to say goodbye. I really want you to have this. So, when you’re lonely, you still have a little piece of me with you.”
Tayler presses her locket into my hand and my heart fucking breaks.
I can’t take it.
This piece of nickel and tin is her most precious possession in the world. The pictures inside are all she has left of her family after her asshole aunt sent her to rot in foster care while she took in her other, younger two siblings. I still can’t get that to make sense to me. What kind of a selfish prick would you have to be to abandon your niece because she’s ‘too old’ and take in her siblings because they’re, what, cuter? Easier to mold?
I’m angry for her.
It’s too late. She puts the locket in my hand and closes my fist around it, then pulls me in for another hug.
“I’m going to get a job so I can have a cell phone, then we can talk at night and stuff even if we can’t see each other every day.”
I nod, squeezing her hard because I know I won’t be able to see her much. Not often enough anyway.
I press a kiss to the top of her head and take in the generic scent of something chemically and fruity in her hair. She might smell like all the other girls in the place, but there’s something special about the scent on her.
She pulls back and looks me in the face.
“I love you,” she whispers.
I smile, even though those words mean something completely different to her than they do to me. She loves me like a brother, I love her like a woman.
“Take care, kid,” I tell her, unable to reciprocate the words through my suddenly swollen throat.
She nods, tears pooling in her eyes before they go crashing down her cheeks.
I need to leave her soon, or I won’t be able to at all.
Tearing myself away, I feel a legitimate piece of me going with her as I turn my back, heading straight to my shared room.
The next couple years are going to be some of the hardest of my life, waiting for her. Then again, which is harder, having her but not being able to have her, or not having her at all?
I lay on my bed for a few hours, watching time slip by, knowing she’s just in the other room. It would be so much easier to just curl up with her and spend my last hours cuddling, but I can’t.I fucking can’t!
Four o’clock approaches and I growl, giving up on sleep. Ain’t no rest for the wicked, they say.
I gather my duffel bag and the paperwork that my advocate gave me days ago, including my Social Security card and a birth certificate.
Holy shit, I’m on my own.
I heft my bag over my shoulder, positive that I won’t be able to last another goodbye with Tayler without breaking down and sobbing like a baby, telling her all the things I’m fucking scared of. I need to be strong for her and, right now, that means leaving.
Looking at the locket that I’d kept in my hand as I laid there, unable to sleep, I press a kiss to it the same way Tayler had so many times when she was missing her family more than usual.
With one last surge of strength, I drop the necklace on my pillow and turn, leaving it all behind.
My future awaits me, and as scary as it is, I have to face it head-on if I’m going to make something of myself. My parents fucked up their chance at life, but I’m not going to. I’m going to work hard, make a name for myself, and eventually, I’m going to be on a stage, playing and singing for tens of thousands of people.
First things first… I have to put one foot in front of the other, until I’m walking out of this group home’s front door forever.
Author Bio:
L.L. Ash is a Washington-born writer who has traveled and lived across the western coast of the US. Ash has been writing fiction since she was a pre-teen, and while her writing has improved since then, her love for literature has not changed.
Oftentimes you can find Ash reading an indie romance or enjoying a historical fiction. Dabbling in culinary arts and music, Ash has been an artist for decades but found her true love and passion in romances.
Pax is a contemporary romance author who writes the kind of hot, twisty, drama-filled romances that she loves to read. Her novels are about biracial women in interracial relationships that will have you turning pages until the end.
Her current series, Love@work, takes you into the world of Silicon Valley’s billionaire tech moguls. These are powerful men and women who are driven by the changing landscape of business and their seductions in the bedroom.
Come along for a ride in Pax’s world, where it’s always steamy, captivating, and sometimes erotic.
Pax lives and works in Silicon Valley. She’s a California native.
Willow Rose is here to tell us about Rest in Peace, an Eva Rae Thomas mystery #15. suspense-thriller-mystery.
There's also a great giveaway.
_____________________
Lies and secrets pile up in this
chilling next installment of Willow Rose’s bestselling series about
FBI profiler Eva Rae Thomas.
Rest in Peace
An
Eva Rae Thomas Mystery #15
by
Willow Rose
Genre:
Suspense, Thriller, Mystery
Sarah
Chapman is angry at her husband. She’s also drunk… very drunk as
she drives down their street, ready to face him.
When
a neighbor hears the commotion and rushes to help, he finds her
inside, gun still in her hand, and her husband, Steven, dead in the
bed.
Sarah
is arrested and taken away but claims to be innocent.
The
only one who believes her is FBI profiler, Eva Rae
Thomas.
She knows Sarah personally, and as she looks at the
evidence in the case, she is convinced that Sarah is telling the
truth, even though she was highly intoxicated when the event
occurred.
But
the detective on the case is determined to have her convicted for the
murder.
As
more bodies turn up, only Eva Rae Thomas sees the
connections and soon starts a race against time to prove Sarah is
innocent and to catch the real murderer before it’s too late and
her own family is targeted.
Lies
and secrets pile up in this chilling next installment of Willow
Rose’s bestselling series about FBI profiler Eva Rae Thomas.
Willow
Rose is a multi-million-copy best-selling Author and an ALL-star
Author of more than 90 novels.
She
has sold more than six million books that are translated into many
languages.
Willow's
books are fast-paced, nail-biting pageturners with twists you won't
see coming.
That's
why her fans call her The Queen of Plot Twists.
Willow
lives on Florida's Space Coast with her kids, two cats and her
Goldendoodle. When she is not writing or reading, you will find her
surfing and watching the dolphins play in the waves of the Atlantic
Ocean.
Isabella Jordan is here to tell us about Obedience, paranormal women's fiction-romantic comedy.
Read on for details...
______________________
Paranormal Women’s Fiction, Romantic Comedy
Date Published: May 10, 2024
A princess with a problem...
Meela must marry a prince from another planet in order to ensure the
security of her people. Trouble is Meela's known to be a bit feisty, and
sometimes that gets her into trouble. It's bad enough she has no say in who
she'll marry. Worse still, the queen places an obedience curse on Meela to
thwart her errant ways.
As a result of the curse, Meela finds herself in plenty of predicaments not
exactly fit for a princess. But what's a princess to do when two gorgeous
hunks come along and place sensual demands on her Meela's not sure she can
-- or even wants to -- deny?
EXCERPT
Meela stared into the flowing red river before kneeling on the grassy bank
to sulk. The red colored water rushing by her looked like blood. There were
so many red rivers on the planet that they'd looked like veins on its
surface to Meela when the star cruiser she'd traveled in approached it
earlier.
Now that she was here, she wished that someone had told her to throw
herself in the river. Her nurse had only told her to take a walk to calm her
mind. It was a rare freedom for Meela. Probably her last.
Today was the day Meela had been preparing for her whole life. Later today
she would be presented to the queen of this planet along with two other
princesses from neighboring planets. The queen would then allow her sons to
each choose the girl he wanted for his bride beginning with her oldest son,
her heir.
It wasn't that Meela minded the arranged marriage. She was a princess after
all and her duty was to her people. Her marriage to a Prince of Nelot, the
strongest planet with the most powerful army in the system, would ensure the
protection of her people. She'd been promised in marriage since her birth
and all of her teachings were in preparation for fulfilling this
obligation.
Meela accepted that.
But when she was sixteen, the Queen of Nelot, a sorceress she was to find
out, paid a visit to Meela and her family on their home planet, Bano. She
wanted to meet Meela, considering one day she would be the bride of one of
her sons.
The queen was pleased with Meela. A little too pleased in fact. She
explained to Meela's parents that their daughter was indeed beautiful,
cultured and intelligent -- befitting a Princess of Nelot. But she felt
those very virtues put Meela in danger from others and from herself until
the wedding, so she placed an enchantment upon Meela. From that day forward,
Meela would be obedient, would do whatever she was told, until her future
husband arranged her release from the spell.
Her life had been misery ever since.
At first, Meela and her family didn't realize just what curse had been
bestowed upon her. A few nights later Meela became angry at her father for
not allowing her some privilege. She sat complaining in her rooms while her
nurse brushed her hair. Finally her frustrated nurse told her to hold her
tongue.
It had taken several hours for the entire family to discover that someone
had to tell Meela to let go of her tongue before she could pry her fingers
away.
It got worse. While her parents enjoyed their new power over Meela, the
power to make her work at her studies longer and attend royal functions in
their places, soon they learned there was a danger to the curse. Once, one
of Meela's friends at court had dared her to kiss the handsome visiting
ambassador from the planet Dalu. Unable to stop herself, she'd walked right
up to the man and kissed him full on the mouth.
Her parents had been so alarmed by the turn of events that she was placed
under the strictest watch until the time of her wedding. No more fun outings
with her friends. No more boring royal functions even. Meela was only
allowed to attend the most important celebrations on her planet, and then
only for a short time with at least a dozen people watching her every
movement. They might as well have locked her away in a prison.
Perhaps that is what the Queen of Nelot had intended when she'd placed the
enchantment on her.
Years passed while the Princes of Nelot fought off one legion of intruders
to their system after another, the stories of their glorious victories
painting them as great warriors. By the time the Queen of Nelot sent for
Meela for the bridal selection and subsequent wedding, she was twenty-seven,
going out of her mind with boredom, and had taken to finding creative ways
of watching the private activities of guests to the palace. It was as close
as she had ever come to having sex after all.
And now that she was here on Nelot, ready to be selected by one of the
queen's sons and do her duty for her parents and her people, she was pretty
damned unhappy. Wasn't it enough of a sacrifice to have the person she'd
spend her life with, share a bed with and have children for, chosen for her?
Then to have the hateful curse of obedience placed on her, robbing her of
her last years of freedom?
Meela no longer wanted to marry any son of the woman who had done this to
her. Meela didn't even want to meet the princes.
"It's not fair," Meela grumbled at her reflection far below in
the red water.
"What's not fair?"
That deep male voice alerted her to the fact that she was no longer alone.
With as much composure as she could muster, Meela turned her head slowly.
She was unescorted, without any of her attendants who understood her
enchantment, for the first time since she had kissed the ambassador at
court. The pace of her heartbeat grew along with her anxiety.
"That I can't stay and enjoy this beautiful view," Meela said in
her best royal voice with her practiced princess smile.
Yet she forgot all about how she was to speak or smile as she gazed at the
two men standing before her, their dress indicating that they were common
soldiers of the planet. They looked very much alike, both tall men with
bodies of steel, the snug black uniforms they wore revealing that they were
all hard, firm muscles.
About the Author
Isabella Jordan is the alter ego of an otherwise stressed out web designer,
programmer, and internet junkie. When she's not trying to perfect her own
personal caffeine IV drip, she enjoys spending time with her family, doing
volunteer work, and writing. She loves creating new stories of all kinds and
chatting with readers and friends.
I never thought my fake marriage, would become real...
Jasper Hamilton
I've always been a pawn in the game of chess my grandfather prefers to play with me. It started when I was a child who didn't have anywhere else to go after my parents were killed.
Gone was my home full of love and warmth, and in its place was a mansion with a man as cold as a winter night.
The only thing that kept me sane were my friends. Those blue-collar buddies who didn't care about my grandpa's bank account.
I never cared about the money either. Until he threatens to take away the one thing I love in this world. The foundation created in their memory. The only way for me to get it back? Play by his rules, take a wife, and secure an heir.
Something I never planned to do after growing up the way I did. But the way I respond to Daisy Williams, and the satisfaction I get from calling her my wife makes me feel like I've been promoted from Pawn to King.
Tropes Included:
small town
blue collar
marriage of convenience
brooding for everyone but her
Jasper is book three in The Broken Falls Series: a series of interconnected standalones following a group of friends who have become family in small-town West Virginia, and the women who bring them to their knees. You do not have to read them in order, but each book builds upon the relationships of the last.
"I don't think I can resist tasting those lips again. I've tried."
"I've tried, too." I admit. But I've thought about it more than I should. Wondered if there was still the slight taste of mint from his toothpaste.
"So we're gonna give in together, right?" He licks his lips, as if he's warming his mouth up for what's about to happen.
"Yeah, if that's what you need in order to sleep at night. We can pretend like you're not the one driving this boat."
Jasper drops his head low. "Pretty sure you're right here with me, Daisy Mae. Unless you turn your head at the last minute, you're about to know what my lips on yours is all about. Ya know, in case you forgot."
I didn't forget, will never forget.
Laramie Briscoe is the USA Today and Wall Street Journal Bestselling Author of over 30 books, with sales of over half a million copies.
Since self-publishing her first book in May of 2013, Laramie has appeared on the Top 100 Bestselling E-books Lists on Apple Books, Amazon Kindle, Kobo, and Barnes & Noble. Her books have been known to make readers laugh and cry. They are guaranteed to be emotional, steamy reads.
When she's not writing alpha males who seriously love their women, she loves spending time with friends, reading, and marathoning shows on Netflix. Married to her high school sweetheart, Laramie lives in Bowling Green, KY with her husband.
Marsh Rose is here to tell us about Escape Routes, historical women's fiction.
She's also hosting a great giveaway.
___________________________
It’s
1985 and pampered psychotherapist Lauren Olive loses her job, the
love of her life to his hairdresser and is forced to move to a
backwoods bungalow as a drug counselor in a rural jail.
Escape Routes
by
Marsh Rose
Genre:
Historical Women’s Fiction
It’s
1985 and psychotherapist Lauren Olive, a pampered Baby Boomer in the
California wine country, has never owned a bank account, lived
without a man, or seen the dark side of life. But after she loses her
job, and then the love of her life abandons her for his hairdresser,
she’s forced to move to a decrepit bungalow in the backwoods and
accept work as a drug counselor in a rural jail.
At
her new job, the inmates view her wide-eyed naivete with hilarity and
her hardened coworkers resent her middle-class roots. Worse, the
bungalow seems poised to collapse around her. If Lauren is going to
survive financially, avoid going back to live with her parents, and
regain normality, she’ll need to leave her little-girl ways behind.
But success doesn’t come without struggle. Surrounded by her crusty
landlord, the jail’s seasoned deputies, skeptical inmates and a new
love interest, Lauren must confront challenges she never could have
imagined in her comfortable city life.
Escape
Routes is a tale of maturity under duress. It speaks to the emerging
audience of readers who want stories of growth and accomplishment by
strong women in compelling situations. Although it is a work of
fiction, it offers a glimpse into rural American criminal justice
during the 1980s, a time when addiction treatment for inmates was in
its formative years. Its narrative captures genuine lifestyles,
concerns, speech, and behavior without demonizing, demeaning, or
glamorizing the characters on either side of the bars.
To stop the meddling of her
matchmaker friends, divorcee Annalee fakes an affair with an Alaskan
bush pilot whose profile she has seen in a magazine about bachelors
in that rugged environment. The plan backfires when he appears in her
small California town and lures her to his remote cabin with stories
about the magnetic pull of the Last Frontier and the promise of
lasting love.
In
ways she never imagined, she finds herself falling for both the pilot
and Alaska in spite of the bears, blizzards, peculiar neighbors,
pyromaniac ex-girlfriend, stack of love letters hidden in a pantry
and evident truth to what they say about single men in Alaska: the
odds are good, but the goods are odd. Before Annalee can sever her
ties in California and move north, a shocking telephone call from an
unknown woman rocks her world and catapults her into a whole new way
of life.
Marsh
Rose is a freelance writer, psychotherapist and college educator. Her
short stories have appeared in a variety of publications including
Cosmopolitan Magazine, the San Francisco Chronicle, Carve Magazine,
Hippocampus Magazine, and New Millennium Writings where she took
first prize for creative nonfiction in 2018. This is her second
novel. She lives in the north San Francisco Bay Area with her
greyhound, Adin.