Spotlight: Vanished by Lisa Hughey

Vanished
Lisa Hughey
(ALIAS, #3)
Publication date: July 23rd 2019
Genres: Adult, Romance, Suspense

He will do anything to find his brother’s killer, even pretend to love his enemy.

His final opportunity…

On an unsanctioned quest, Scottish officer Hamish Ballard tracks his brother’s killer across the world… until he hits a dead end at Adams-Larsen. Jillian Larsen knows more than she admits, and he’ll do anything to uncover her secrets, even fake an attraction to her. But that fake attraction turns all too real, and using her when she was just a name in a report was easy, but he’s falling for his target.

Her first responsibility…

Jillian Larsen’s mission in life is helping people disappear to keep them safe. She has never betrayed a client, and when the Scottish hottie accuses her company of hiding a criminal, she has no intention of revealing her client’s whereabouts or giving in to her inconvenient attraction for the pain in her ass. Giving in means giving up and she’s never going to abandon her principles. But what does she do if the woman she helped turns out to be a killer? When her business partner vanishes along with their complicit client, can she use Hamish to track them down without risking her heart?

Their only chance…

He needs her resources. She needs his intelligence. Working together is the only logical choice, but it means jeopardizing everything.

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EXCERPT:

Edinburgh, Scotland

“What now, Officer Ballard?” Fiona Thomas, Hamish Ballard’s boss at the National Crime Agency, let out a long-suffering sigh.

“I was able to trace Brianna Walsh to America.” Hamish leaned forward, perched on the edge of the uncomfortable chair across from his supervisor, as if he could will her to get excited about his success. He had exhausted all his leads on the woman responsible for his brother’s death. Until today. Finally, one of his connections at MI5 had managed to give him highly classified information about Brianna. Her last known contact was at some public relations firm, Adams-Larsen Inc. and Associates, in Washington, DC. “She’s using the name Beatrice Winter. I want to go—”

“You’ve got to let go of this obsession.” She put her head in her hands.

Brianna Walsh needed to pay. And she needed to be stopped before more people died. “But—”

“No more. If you keep pursuing information about Brianna Walsh, your job is in jeopardy.”

He kept his mouth shut but his expression must have given him away. Family was everything. He’d been raised to stick together. He’d forgotten that lesson for a while. But he would never forget again. Blood, family was everything—even in death, blood prevailed.

“Do you understand?” she pressed.

He didn’t answer.

Couldn’t answer. The rage and frustration that had fueled him for the past year had only grown after it seemed as if Brianna had just…vanished.

“Officer Ballard?”

“Aye, ma’am.” Hamish Ballard stood in front of his boss’s desk like a little kid in front of the headmaster and nodded while he lied through his teeth.

“Go on holiday for a week and get your head on straight. When you come back, I don’t want to hear anything else about the Walsh family. Her father and brothers are in prison. The rest of their empire is in disarray. The Walsh cousins are impotent and ineffective without them. Brianna served the Crown with her testimony. Leave. Off. Full stop.”

Hamish had no intention of dropping his quest for justice. He hadn’t been there for his brother in life, he wasn’t about to abandon him in death. “Aye, ma’am.”

“Get on with your fuckin’ life, Ham.”

He left the office…and headed to the airport.

He’d find his answers in America. In Washington, DC. At a public relations firm of all things.

He had one week to find Brianna Walsh. No fucking way was he letting this—her—go.

Author Bio:

USA Today Bestselling Author Lisa Hughey has been writing romance since the fourth grade, which was also about the time she began her love affair with spies. Harriet and Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys later gave way to James Bond and Lara Croft and Jason Bourne.

Exploring the complex nature of a profession that requires subterfuge and lies fascinates her. She loves combining her two passions into fiction. As evidenced by her Black Cipher Files series.

Archangel Rafe was her first foray into the paranormal but after spending time in the Angelic Realm, it won't be her last. At their heart, the Seven novels are about the dynamics of family relationships. But the really hot Archangels don't hurt.

And recently she's been immersed in the Stone Family novellas, four stories about a blended family of brothers and sister who have a lot more in common than they realize. But of course she couldn't just write about family and romance. There are complex plots, bad guys, and suspense too.

Lisa loves to hear from readers and has various places you can connect with her, although, shh, Twitter is her favorite.

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Spotlight: Cowboy Summer by Joanne Kennedy

Publication Date: June 25, 2019

The first book in Joanne Kennedy’s brand-new Blue Sky Cowboys series!

Jess Bailey broke Cade Walker’s heart when she left for the city—but she was just trying to find her own way in the world. When Jess’s dad calls her home and tells her he’s selling the ranch, she realizes she’s about to lose the life she was born to live. And when she sees Cade again, she knows how much she’s lost already.

As their nearest neighbor, Cade is always trying to help. But he’s got his own ranch and his horse training business to think about. Even though his heart fills with hope for a second chance when he sees Jess, she left him once when things got tough. And she knows he moved on without her.

As the sale of the Bailey ranch looms over them, Jess and Cade start looking to the future. But can they ever trust one another again?

Excerpt

Stepping out of the car, Jess clutched her hair as the Wyoming wind slapped her upside the head, flinging grit that stung her skin. Some people might have gotten back in the car and hightailed it for someplace more hospitable, but Jess was a Wyoming girl, accustomed to winds so strong they often overturned semis on the interstate.  

Gathering her curls in one hand, she shaded her eyes with the other and sipped a long, slow drink of home. All the empty places inside her filled with peace and pleasure, as if she’d downed a whole pitcher full of blue skies garnished with wildflowers and sunshine.

A friendly voice hailed her from a rusty flatbed parked by the barn. Painted letters on the driver’s door, nearly obscured by rust and flaking paint, read “Jeb Jo  son Hay & Fe d.”

“Hey, Jeb!”

Jeb Johnson had been working with her dad since Jess was knee-high. Racing to the truck, she hopped on the running board and reached through the open window to drag his weathered face to hers and lay a smooch on his grizzled cheek.

He reached up and touched his face with shy reverence. “Oh, girlie, it’s good you’ve come home.” His eyes, normally bright with mischief, were glossy with—could that be tears? “They need you ‘round here. Cade…”

Jess didn’t want to talk about Cade. “I need them, too. My dad, I mean. And you.” Grabbing the steering wheel for support, she popped up on tiptoe and peered inside the cab. “Got snips?”

Since she’d been a little girl, Jeb had made a game of letting her choose which wire to cut. If she chose the right spot, the bales would tumble safely off the far side of the truck. Choose wrong, and they’d tumble all around her, bouncing to the ground like giant hairy hailstones. But she needed snips to play.

“Forgot ‘em at the last place.” He nodded toward the barn. “He went in to grab some.”

“Oh, good. I’ll surprise him.”

Heading for the barn, she hugged herself with glee. Her dad, stepping out of the dark tool room, would be blinded by the sunlight. She’d surprise him, all right.

Jeb called after her. “Now honey, I’m not sure…”

Shushing him, she pressed her back to the sun-warmed barn. The paint would rub off on her shorts, but a barn-red butt was a small price to pay for scaring her dad into one of his creative cussing streaks.

She heard the rasp of wood on wood, then bang—a drawer slammed shut. Tensing, she tightened her smile to restrain the laugh trapped high in her chest.

Footsteps hit the hollow floor, approaching the door. She counted.

Five, four, three, two…

“Arooooo!”

With a crazed coyote howl, she leapt for the shadowy form in the doorway, knowing with giddy certainty her daddy would catch her, like he always did.

The wire cutters rattled to the ground, and a masculine grunt greeted the impact of her body.

She was caught, all right. The only trouble was, that wasn’t her father’s grunt. It wasn’t his body, either.

It was Cade Walker’s.

***

Cade had pictured his reunion with Jess waking, and he’d pictured it in dreams. He’d pictured it happy, and he’d pictured it hard. But he’d never pictured it quite like this.

Momentarily blinded when he stepped out of the dim barn, he was shocked, even scared, when a howling bundle of womanhood slammed into his chest. He’d almost pushed Jess away—but then she’d kissed him.

It was a family kind of kiss, not a romantic one, and it landed on his cheek instead of the other body parts that would have been happy to host it. But it was still a kiss from Jess, and that made it electrifying. He caught the familiar scent of her—grass and flowers, summer sun and peaches—and his heart sailed away on an ocean of happy memories.

But the seas were choppy. She was fighting him like a cat in a bathtub.

“Let…me…go!”

He couldn’t. For one thing, he needed to look at her—just drink her in like a tonic that warmed his heart, plus a whole lot of other body parts. Jess wasn’t a classic beauty, being taller and stronger than most movie-star types. But with her wild blonde curls tumbling down her back, her blue eyes sparkling with energy, and her lithe, fit body warm and strong in his hands, she’d always been his feminine ideal.

She managed to wrench herself away, but he kept his grip on one firm thigh. The ground sloped steeply to the rocky drive, and she’d fall if he didn’t hang on.

Floundering for balance, she hopped madly down the slope.

“Let go,” she snarled, slapping his arm. “I thought you were my dad. Let me go!”

She always reminded him of some sort of wild critter. Usually, it was something sweet, like a rabbit or a deer. But there were times she was a cat—slinky, smooth, and lovely to look at, but all claws and teeth if you got too close.

This was one of those times, and he was apparently way too close.

***

Excerpted from Cowboy Summer by Joanne Kennedy. © 2019 by Joanne Kennedy. Used with permission of the publisher, Sourcebooks Casablanca, an imprint of Sourcebooks, Inc. All rights reserved.

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Also by Joanne Kennedy:

One Fine Cowboy

Cowboy Fever

Tall, Dark and Cowboy

Cowboy Crazy

About the Author

Joanne Kennedy is the RITA-nominated author of ten contemporary Western romance novels. The first book in her Decker Ranch Trilogy, How to Handle a Cowboy, was named one of Booklist’s “Best Romances of the Decade.” She lives near Cheyenne, Wyoming. Joanne loves to hear from readers and can be reached through her website, www.joannekennedybooks.com.

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Spotlight: The Night We Met by Beth Rinyu

The Night We Met
Beth Rinyu
Publication date: July 18th 2019
Genres: Adult, Contemporary, Romance

I’ve always been three things: Loving daughter, devoted sister, and cynical romantic. Okay, maybe not always the last one, that didn’t happen until my ex-boyfriend cheated on me, and not with just anyone…my best friend.

One year later, and I’m over relationships, only interested in the occasional one-night stand. I don’t fall in love with them, and I don’t expect them to fall in love with me. I won’t be waiting around for their call or stalking their social media—until I discover that one of my little trysts indirectly holds my family’s fate in his hands. So, with a little convincing from my older and much wiser sister, I break my own rules for the sake of my family.

He’s the exact opposite of me: Serious, detached and arrogant. Did I mention that he looks like he should be on a billboard for a cologne ad in the middle of Times Square, or the sexy way he botches up my name in his German accent? Well, he does…but I refuse to relent, remaining committed to my plan. Strictly business, no emotions involved, and nobody will get hurt…until nobody turns into somebody I find myself needing more than I ever thought possible.

What do you do when a one-night stand turns into so much more than you bargained for? And how do you stop one lie that’s getting bigger each time you’re with him from caving everything in around you? I know in the end someone is going to get hurt, but I’m powerless to stop it. And for him…I think I may be willing to have my heart broken all over again.

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—

EXCERPT:

“We don’t have that here. All of our German beers are listed—”

“How do you know it’s German?” He toyed with me.

“Well, I just assumed since you were German that the beer you asked for was German as well.”

“How do you know I’m German?”

“Your accent.”

“You assume a lot of things, Emmeline. Don’t you? Perhaps you shouldn’t be so quick in your assumptions.”

What the hell was his problem? There was no way in hell I could pretend to even like this guy, and judging by his self-important attitude, it wasn’t like I would even be afforded the opportunity to. Bridgette was going to have to go at it alone on this.

“You’re correct on one point, Emmeline.”

“My name is Emme!” I snapped.

He picked up my license still sitting on the bar and studied it keenly. “That is not what your identification says.”

“Emmeline is my proper name. My friends call me Emme.”

Even that stomach flipping smile that had spread across his face wasn’t making up for his arrogance. Look away from the dimples, Em. This guy is an ass!

“Well, since I’m always proper, and I’m not your friend…I call you Emmeline.”

My impatience and anger were escalating at an equal pace. “Okay, fine, since this will be the last time we ever speak, then you can call me whatever you want. Thank you for returning my license, and if there isn’t anything I can get you to drink, then have a nice night.”

His hand covered mine as I went to snatch my license from the bar. “There you go making those assumption again.” There was a spark to his eyes, hinting at amusement over my flustered state.

“Okay…and do tell, what are those assumptions I seem to be making?”

“The beer I requested is Belgian, not German.”

“Well, forgive me. I’ll make a mental note of that, in case another pompous German or whatever it is you are comes in and requests it.” I wanted to walk away and be done with the entire conversation, but his hand was still covering mine with a tightening grip.

Author Bio:

Ever since I can remember, I have always enjoyed Creative Writing. There was always something about being able to travel to a different place or become a different person with just the stroke of a pen - or in today's world a touch of the keyboard. I love creating deep characters who you will love or love to hate.

My life is not as interesting as my books or the characters in them, but then again whose life is? My happy place is a seat by the ocean with my feet in the sand or on the busy streets of New York City. You will more than likely find one of these places as the setting for most of my books.

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Spotlight: The Need by Helen Phillips

When Molly, home alone with her two young children, hears footsteps in the living room, she tries to convince herself it’s the sleep deprivation. She’s been hearing things these days. Startling at loud noises. Imagining the worst-case scenario. It’s what mothers do, she knows.

But then the footsteps come again, and she catches a glimpse of movement.

Suddenly Molly finds herself face-to-face with an intruder who knows far too much about her and her family. As she attempts to protect those she loves most, Molly must also acknowledge her own frailty. Molly slips down an existential rabbit hole where she must confront the dualities of motherhood: the ecstasy and the dread; the languor and the ferocity; the banality and the transcendence as the book hurtles toward a mind-bending conclusion.

In The Need, Helen Phillips has created a subversive, speculative thriller that comes to life through blazing, arresting prose and gorgeous, haunting imagery. Helen Phillips has been anointed as one of the most exciting fiction writers working today, and The Need is a glorious celebration of the bizarre and beautiful nature of our everyday lives.

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About the Author

Helen Phillips is the author of, most recently, the novel The Need. Her collection Some Possible Solutions received the 2017 John Gardner Fiction Book Award. Her novel The Beautiful Bureaucrat, a New York Times Notable Book of 2015, was a finalist for the Los Angeles TimesBook Prize and the NYPL Young Lions Award. Her collection And Yet They Were Happy was named a notable collection by The Story Prize. She is also the author of the middle-grade novel Here Where the Sunbeams Are Green. Helen has received a Rona Jaffe Foundation Writer’s Award and the Italo Calvino Prize in Fabulist Fiction, and her work has appeared in The Atlantic, The New York Times, and Tin House, and on Selected Shorts. She is an associate professor at Brooklyn College and lives in Brooklyn with her husband, artist Adam Douglas Thompson, and their children. Visit HelenCPhillips.com.

Spotlight: Dragonfly by Leila Meacham

From the New York Times bestselling author of Roses comes a gripping new novel about five young spies embedded among the highest Nazi ranks in occupied Paris

At the height of World War II, a handful of idealistic young Americans receive a mysterious letter from the government, asking them if they are willing to fight for their country. The men and women from very different backgrounds-a Texan athlete with German roots, an upper-crust son of a French mother and a wealthy businessman, a dirt-poor Midwestern fly fisherman, an orphaned fashion designer, and a ravishingly beautiful female fencer-all answer the call of duty, but each for a secret reason of her or his own. They bond immediately, in a group code-named Dragonfly.

Thus begins a dramatic cat-and-mouse game, as the group seeks to stay under the radar until a fatal misstep leads to the capture and the firing-squad execution of one of their team. But…is everything as it seems, or is this one more elaborate act of spycraft?

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About the Author

Leila Meacham is a writer and former teacher who lives in San Antonio, Texas. She is the author of the bestselling novels Roses, Tumbleweeds, Somerset, and Titans. For more information, please visit LeilaMeacham.com.

Spotlight: Wicked Promises by L A Cotton

 

 WICKED PROMISES (WICKED BAY #7)

RELEASE BLITZ

 

 

Wicked Promises, an angsty, emotional new adult romance from L A Cotton is live!!!

 

BLURB

The edgy, angsty, addictive YA/NA crossover series from L A Cotton continues...

Forever is a long time.

Summer Stone-Prince has her whole life mapped out. Attend college with her childhood sweetheart. Graduate. Get married and live happily-ever-after. But all it takes are two little words and everything changes.

Everything.

Lost and alone, Summer finds herself wondering how she’ll ever weather the storm.

Until she finds comfort in the arms of an unexpected savior.

There’s only one problem—he can’t promise forever, he can only give her right now.

~

Wicked Promises is the seventh book in the Wicked Bay series but can be read as a standalone

 
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"The angst slapped me in the face and I was alternating between crying and laughing throughout the whole story." ~ Wendy's Wycked Words 

"A story of heartbreak and healing, LA Cotton has just once again proved why she’s a 1-click author for me." ~ Queen of the Books

  

 

 ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Edgy. Angsty. Addictive Romance.

Author of mature young adult and new adult novels, L A is happiest writing the kind of books she loves to read: addictive stories full of teenage angst, tension, twists and turns.

Home is a small town in the middle of England where she currently juggles being a full-time writer with being a mother/referee to two little people. In her spare time (and when she’s not camped out in front of the laptop) you’ll most likely find L A immersed in a book, escaping the chaos that is life.

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