Ready for a fun read? Something sexy with plenty of action outside the bedroom, too? Well, Quincy is here! Quincy is book #8 in my Montana Bounty Hunter series, but can be read as a standalone—although, I’m hoping you will read them all. You know it was fun for me coming up with unique personalities and takedowns for each story! I hope you’ll pick up your copy and read it right away! I’m dying to hear what you think of my former Army Ranger and his beautician girlfriend. Tamara (pronounced Tuh-mahr-uh in my head) reminded me of me when I was in my twenties. Spunky, mouthy, and willing to go after what she wants—and she wants Quincy!
If you read it, think about posting a review. Readers trust other readers to tell them when they’ll have a good time! And you’ll be helping out an author!!!
Quincy
MONTANA BOUNTY HUNTERS: Authentic Men… Real Adventures…
Former Army Ranger Quincy James and beautician Tamara Davis met under less than idyllic circumstances—trapped inside her doomsday-bunker-turned-beauty-shop while he was hunting a skip. Now that he’s settled into his new job with the Montana Bounty Hunters, he knows he’s dawdled too long asking her out on a legitimate date. But then, he gets a new case right in the pretty beautician’s neck of the woods. A dangerous new assignment he doesn’t want her anywhere near, However, NOT bumping into her proves tricky and when they do cross paths, he blows it.
Tamara’s already feeling foolish over the fact she got way too friendly with Quincy when they were trapped together, but then, he never contacts her again. When she sees him on the street in her little town, she’s ready to give him a piece of her mind, but he acts like he doesn’t know her. What the hell?
When the pair find themselves forced together again, there’s time for a reckoning…
I'm planning a new series, featuring police officers and private investigators in New Orleans, and I need help naming the series. Which of these ideas appeals to you?
Crescent City Heroes (21%, 3 Votes)
Big Easy Bad Boys (21%, 3 Votes)
New Orleans Nights (21%, 3 Votes)
Crescent City Blues (21%, 3 Votes)
Crescent City Bad Boys (7%, 1 Votes)
Men of the Big Easy (7%, 1 Votes)
Total Voters: 11
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If you have another suggested series name, list it in the comments, and I will add it to the poll!
What’s the last thing you wish you could’ve told your boss and not gotten fired for it? U.S. workers spend more than 13 years working over a 50-year career—about a quarter of their time. People could be so much happier if they could be honest with their employers without consequences.
Characters in novels often have work issues as a big source of conflict. Why? Because people can relate.
Gillian, the heroin in my romantic suspense, Becker Circle, could’ve used a few frank conversations with her accounting firm boss at her first job out of college. Her boss habitually dumped busy work on Gillian because she was single and had time to work at night. What? She also was one of those bosses who jumped all over anyone who arrived at work or from lunch five minutes late. Worst though, she swept a client’s obvious accounting dishonesty under the rug when Gillian found it during an audit, and then pulled her off the project.
The Japanese have it right. Their culture includes a practice called “nomminication” that encourages honesty in the workplace—both ways. It’s a combination of “nomu” or drink and “communication”. Bosses periodically host their employees for an evening out. When enjoying cocktails in this safe environment, employees can share whatever they’d like to say to their boss. Afterwards, employers don’t allow pay cuts or demotions or job transfers as retaliation.
As a marketing consultant who’s spent way too much time working, the concept intrigues me. I’m spoiled working for myself and thankful my job doesn’t force me to deal with awful bosses. I have fired clients. When I still had bosses, one kept piling more work on me because I wasn’t married or a mom and “didn’t have anything else to do,” she said. I told her it was too much. At raise time, she gave me this tiny, insulting salary increase. I walked out of her office and transferred to a more senior position working with a professional leader soon after, and never looked back.
The U.S. unemployment rate is the lowest it’s been in 49 years. Jobs should be fulfilling, not a sentence. Explore other opportunities inside and outside your company. If a reasonable conversation with your boss doesn’t work—with or without nomminication—the grass may indeed be greener, as the saying goes. It definitely worked for Gillian. And in the meantime, read a good novel with a kickass heroine who says everything you’ve wanted to say to your boss.
Everyone has a boss story worth repeating. Share yours!
Here’s a scene from Becker Circle where Gillian squares off with her unfair boss.
Becker Circle
EXCERPT
Just as the next person is halfway through her first sentence, I interrupt. “One more thing. I saw something weird in their books—like money’s disappearing.”
“What are you saying, Gillian?” Kim sits forward in her chair. “Are you implying embezzlement?”
“Well, yes. I don’t have the full trail together yet, but it looks suspicious.”
“We must be absolutely certain before making a claim like that.” She walks to the window and watches the cars on the freeway zip by. “Do you realize how serious this could be?” she turns and spits back.
I know she’ll be pissed at me for saying this, but I do anyway. “With all due respect, it sounds like you’re upset with me.” The entire table of my accountant coworkers inhales a collective breath and holds it waiting for Kim’s response. She stands at the window with her arms folded. Staring. “Isn’t this why we do audits?”
“I know, Gillian, you’re doing your job.” Kim turns back to the table. “But someone with more experience needs to handle this one.” She pauses and scans the faces around the conference table. Everyone’s looking somewhere else but at her. “Get with Bryan this afternoon. He’ll take it from here.”
Addison Brae lives in Dallas, Texas on the edge of downtown. She has been writing since childhood and continues today as an independent marketing consultant. She addicted to reading and enjoys jogging in her neighborhood park, sipping red wine, traveling the world, collecting interesting cocktail recipes, binge-watching TV series, vintage clothing, and hanging out with her artistic other half and their neurotic cat Lucy.
No doubt we all remember our ‘first time’, the night or day or whatever when we lost our virginity, but what about when we first became aware of ourselves as sexual creatures? I’m not sure why that question recently occurred to me, but I have the answer.
I was a pre-adolescent, playing with my collection of plastic horses, cowboys, and Indians (yes, I’m that old) pretending my plastic human had caught a wild horse and was trying out various ways to restrain the horse. I tied up a leg, roped two legs together, placed a rope around its neck and tied the poor creature to a plastic section of fence. As I studied the mare or stud I became aware of a tingling sensation between my legs. After looking around to make sure no one was watching, I started rubbing myself there. The tingling increased, became more and more pleasurable. For as long as I remained interested in plastic horses and humans, I continued to encourage the feelings I didn’t understand. Of course I explored other ways of arousing the sensations, but ropes often factored in.
Fast forward about a million years and capture/bondage fantasies still turn me on. I’ve written other kinds of erotica but the majority revolve around some kind of restraint. My publisher Stormy Nights specializes in spanking stories. Even though spanking as a turn on puzzles me somewhat, I’m having a great time using that umbrella to engage my characters in sexual worlds. My heroines find themselves restrained while my heroes focus on enhancing the experience. Equality be damned in this fictional world. It’s all about power vs. helplessness.
I took that dynamic with me while writing my latest release Mastering His Pet. Here’s part of the first spanking scene. To explain, Tanner is a powerful Elite in a world I call The Society while Carra is a lowly Other. No question who’s in charge…
Mastering His Pet
“You want to run,” he said. “You’re like a wild animal that has spotted a trap and is trying to decide what to do.”
He hadn’t asked a question, which she took as proof he knew her much better than he should have. She had to be careful around him, not reveal too much, not show weakness.
But how?
“Maybe you’re wondering whether you can outrun me so I’ll answer. Despite my size, I’m fast on my feet.” He paused. “Call it one more weapon in my survival arsenal. If you let instinct get the best of you, I’ll overtake you. Once I catch you things will get even worse than they’re about to become. For one, I’ll make sure you stay where I decide you belong.”
He was still making statements, maybe not interested in hearing anything from her. Feeling as if she’d fallen into a place and space she hadn’t known existed, she kept her attention locked on him.
“I will correct your behavior. Make sure you never forget this vital lesson.”
It took everything she had in her not to assure him she understood, but she didn’t dare completely give into him. If she did he might take everything from her.
“Unfasten your shorts. Pull them down to your knees. Do the same to your panties, if you’re wearing any.”
“I am.” What did he think? That she dressed so she was always ready to fuck? She’d heard enough about military life to know some women hung around the troops. Most were whores looking to make enough to keep themselves fed, clothed, and sheltered. Her understanding was they made more money with their legs spread than they could otherwise.
Nothing could ever make her do that. Could it?
With a start she realized she’d let her mind drift. Somewhere between embarrassment and curiosity, she did as he’d ordered. She was going to be spanked, no way out of it.
Feeling if she’d separated from her body, she straightened. Her sleeveless top was so long it reached her navel, not that she could take comfort in the pitiful protection. She’d exposed her belly, pelvis area, and upper legs. Mostly her bare ass was there, ready for his hand.
“You should have worn long pants. You’ve got scratches, red marks, and indentations on your knees and shins from kneeling on the roof. Not a smart move on your part.”
He leaned back with his arms crossed, looking slightly bored. Maybe he’d spanked so many women he saw the task as nothing more than a chore. In contrast, she couldn’t think beyond the next few minutes.
“You know what you’re supposed to do. Get into place.”
She was just out of his reach, which meant she still had time to bolt, to—no, she couldn’t. Not sure what she was feeling, she positioned herself close to his legs and carefully lowered herself onto his lap. Her bare skin touched a single layer of denim, trapping heat between them. Her belly rested on thighs that felt as if they’d been carved from stone. Most concerning, the sensitive area between her belly and legs pressed against him. It felt good. Wonderful in fact.
Dizzy from having her head low, she ran her fingers over the rough ground. She closed her eyes, held her breath. This wasn’t happening but it was.
“You don’t have any marks here,” he said, his fingers light on her ass. “Considering your behavior, my cousins never corrected you?”
“No.” Her voice was muffled.
“You better not be lying. It’ll only get worse if you are.”
He’d threatened her. She should take it to heart, but how could she when his hand now rested on her backside as if he had every right, which he did.
“I’m telling you the truth.”
“I’ll make that determination. You have an exquisite ass.” He rubbed it. Her head spun and her pussy tightened and twitched. “Knowing my cousins as I do, I’m well-aware of their mindset where women are concerned. Don’t try to tell me you don’t know what I’m talking about.”
“I do.”
“That isn’t enough.” The pressure increased, not painful but impossible to ignore. Arousing. “Tell me, in detail, what takes place during their parties in the rooms without windows and with sound-deadening capabilities.”
“I’ve never been part of it.”
“They’ve never required your presence?”
“No.”
“If that’s the truth it constitutes a serious lack of judgment on their parts. An ass as delectable as this one should be put to use.”
“I’m more than an ass! You have no right saying—”
“Whether I do or don’t isn’t the issue. Might always wins.”
She was still processing his declaration when he slapped her. She jerked. A second blow immediately followed the first. Eyes squeezed closed, she tried to ready herself. Instead of continuing, he left her draped over him. He wasn’t done. She was sure of it.
“Do it!” She clamped a hand over her mouth then let her arm dangle again. What did staying quiet matter? She’d already angered him. “Get it over with.”
“All in good time, or should I say in my time. One way or the other you’re going to learn who is in charge.”
You are. If at all possible she’d keep from admitting that.
Her ass stung from the two sharp blows, the sensation sliding throughout her backside and going deep. She opened her eyes in an attempt to stop thinking about her pussy’s reaction. Weeds covered nearly every inch of the dirt she was looking at.
“Your life’s important.” He struck her a third time, this blow even more intense. “I will not have you treating it lightly. Being careless. If I have to keep you under control to keep you alive I’ll do it.”
“Under control?”
He closed his hands around her neck. “Restrained. Collared.”
Freud, if he hadn’t been so hung up on his belief that only damaged people fantasize, might have tried to understand dom/submissive dynamics. Looks like he left that up to me and other like-minded writers. My most recent releases, Mastering His Pet, Predator’s Pet, His Purchase and His Filly are all spanking stories, but my erotica has covered everything from spanking to shape-shifting, from primitive tribes to science fiction. I honestly don’t know how many sexy stories I’ve had published. It’d probably scare me if I tried to count them. I also write tamer stuff under another name and try to keep the two far, far apart. My free time is spent as a servant to two rescue dogs, hanging out with family and mostly writer friends, and, sadly, selling the family’s mountain cabin. The less I say about this year’s garden the better.
Meet Quincy and Tamara! Hope you enjoy the opening! ~DD
Located in Amity, Montana, the Suds & Saddlebags, or “S&S” for short, was your typical seedy biker bar. The popular dive smelled of sour beer, stale sweat, and motor oil. From the looks of the patrons, there were more firearms worn on hips or hidden under leather vests and jackets than likely sat in the local Army National Guard armory.
Quincy James hid his irritation that this stakeout was taking so long. He was finally here. In Amity. Near enough to whistle at the object of his frustration—the sexy proprietor of an unusual beauty shop, who by this point in time would likely flip him off rather than welcome him with open arms should he ever find the time to seek her out.
Shoulders slumping, he let out a deep breath.
Nearly a month had passed since he’d seen her. Her business card remained tucked inside his wallet. After they’d spent a very amorous afternoon trapped inside her doomsday-bunker-beauty-shop, he hadn’t called. At first, he’d reasoned he sucked at telephone courting and wanted to surprise her, in person, but after he’d spent ten days tracking a skip from south of Bozeman all the way through the Glacier National forest, and then being tapped to be part of teams hunting two more serious offenders, he knew he’d waited too long to even make an awkward as fuck call.
Tamara likely thought he was a bastard—a hit-it-and-quit-it kind of guy, but she’d be wrong. He’d had all the best intentions. When he’d had two minutes to fly down the aisles of a hardware store in Whitefish, he’d bought a knew door lock and deadbolt to take care of the problem that had trapped him inside Tamara’s beauty shop to begin with. The last thing he’d wanted was for the wrong person to find himself in that same tempting situation, someone who wouldn’t be quite as concerned as he’d been that the sexy things they’d done were welcomed and consensual.
The hardware was still in a paper bag beneath the front seat of his SUV—better than flowers, he’d thought at the time, but if he worked up the courage to face her wrath, he figured he’d better bring her at least a couple of dozen roses, too. Just to emphasize the fact he didn’t consider the gift she’d given him something he didn’t value. He did.
So much about their romantic encounter had stuck with him over the weeks since he’d left her behind after being freed from the locked bunker by his teammates. He remembered how soft she was—everywhere—from her fluffy pale blonde hair with its cotton-candy pink streak to the lush curves of her pocket-sized body, and her pink pouting lips. Good Lord, remembering those lips closing around his dick had left him sleepless and horny nearly every night since.
Damn, if they could just nail Tommy Walton’s ass quickly, he could be at her doorstep tonight. He wasn’t good with words, but he hoped if he came bearing gifts and she let him have just one kiss, she’d remember how good they were together, and then maybe she’d give him a chance to mutter through his litany of excuses for why he hadn’t so much as picked up a phone to call her.
He let out a deep breath. Hell, he didn’t deserve a second chance. A girl like her had to have plenty of more attentive suitors. Ones who didn’t disappear for weeks on end. Or who didn’t have dangerous jobs where they sat on their asses in smelly bars waiting for a dirtbag to show up.
“Goddamn, Winnie said Tommy always slips in here when it gets busy,” Hook groused from his table situated close to the entrance of the bar. “Safety in numbers, she said. He knows his crew will have his back if anything goes down.”
After all this time working with the Montana Bounty Hunters, Quincy still wasn’t used to hearing them in his ear. They used state-of-the-art devices, nearly impossible to detect because they were so small. He picked up his beer to hide his lips as he replied, “Some girlfriend, selling him out for a hundred.”
“Winnie’s got her eye on the club’s number two,” Hook said softly, “but Tommy keeps escaping arrest. She knows she’d be in deep shit if she sleeps around on him before he goes to jail.”
“Sounds like a sweetheart,” Dagger murmured, then, “Shit, think I’ve been made.”
Quincy leaned back in his chair next to the window overlooking the street outside and glanced around. Sure enough, two men at a table nearer the bar were staring at Dagger, leaning close together and whispering between themselves.
“The ballcap didn’t cut it,” Hook said.
Dagger was one of the breakout stars of the reality TV show, Bounty Hunters of the Northwest, which featured most of the hunters in MBH. Dagger was a standout due in most part to the fact he was “Bounty Hunter Barbie’s” man. Most times, he had to wear intricate disguises when he wanted to remain unnoticed, but they’d been in a hurry to hustle to the S&S after hearing from Winnie.
“Sucks to be famous,” Hook said then chuckled.
Dagger grunted. “Your turn in the spotlight’s comin’.”
“Maybe they just want an autograph,” Quincy said, his lips twitching. No way in hell would he ever sign up for that gig. He liked his privacy, thank you very much.
From the corner of his eye, Quincy saw one of the men stand then glance around. The biker tipped his goatee at the bald dude behind the bar then turned his gaze to Dagger.
Nearly every gaze in the place moved to his teammate. Quincy turned in his seat, pretending not to know what was going on, and casting his gaze over the suddenly silent crowd, hoping to guess the direction from which trouble was most likely to come.
From the corner of his eye, he watched as Tommy Walton stepped out of the hallway that led to the back of the club. “Well, fuck,” he muttered under his breath.
Check out my newest release, PROTECTING AMY, part of Susan Stoker’s Special Forces. Leave a comment for a chance to win either Protecting Maddie or Protecting Cassie.
Protecting Amy
She thought her past was firmly behind her…
Amy Ressler was a vivacious, outgoing person, looking forward to her first job after graduating college. Until the night her stepbrother slaughtered her entire family, and thought she was dead, too. For ten years she’d been living under an assumed name in a house in Tampa with security guards and a security system. Her agoraphobia keeps her a prisoner in the house where she designs sought after video games.
Quinn Molloy couldn’t seem to find a place for himself when he left the SEALS…
He had been part of the teams for eighteen years and suddenly an injury left him with no place to go, except to visit his friends Melody and Tex Keenan. Where they introduce him online to KitCat, Amy in her online disguise, a terrified woman who needs a bodyguard.
The killer is loose…
When Matthew Baker escapes from jail the hunt is on, led by the US Marshals. But with Amy helpless in her self-imposed prison, Quinn accepts the job as her personal bodyguard, and they discover that what starts online can explode In the bedroom. As long as he can keep her alive.
*****
Excerpt…
Amy Ressler woke with a start, sweating and shaking, throat parched and dry and tight with fear. She sat up in bed, clicked on the nightstand light. Her bedroom looked the same as it had when she’d gone to sleep. Nothing disturbed. Nothing different.
Then the images slammed into her, and she realized it was the dream again, the nightmare. As vividly as if they were all here in her room, she saw the bodies on the family room floor, including hers. Felt the burning pain of the stab wounds. Heard the insane sound of Matthew’s voice. Would it never go away?
Realizing she was shaking, she wrapped her arms around herself. Blinked to clear the scene from her brain.
God. Ten years, and the details were just as vivid in her mind, the fear still as intense and suffocating. At last, when her breathing had evened out, she tossed back the covers and climbed unsteadily out of bed. In the bathroom, she filled a glass of water and looked at herself in the mirror while she drank it. The face that looked back at her was pale and drawn, with dark circles under her eyes. She hadn’t looked this bad since, well, since it happened.
It.
What a small, innocuous word to describe the worst moment of her life. One minute she was happy and enjoying life, excited about her college graduation and her interview for a dream job. The next she was living a nightmare and changing every aspect of her life just to be able to stay alive. Even after all these years the nightmares still came with regularity and still frightened her to death. Ten years!
Was this what the rest of her life would be like? Would it never stop?
USA Today best-selling and award-winning author Desiree Holt writes everything from romantic suspense and paranormal to erotic, a genre in which she is the oldest living author. She has been referred to by USA Today as the Nora Roberts of erotic romance, and is a winner of the EPIC E-Book Award, the Holt Medallion and a Romantic Times Reviewers Choice nominee. She has been featured on CBS Sunday Morning and in The Village Voice, The Daily Beast, USA Today, The (London) Daily Mail, The New Delhi Times and numerous other national and international publications.
Not long ago, a Facebook post popped up on my timeline from an author asking other authors what they believed was their best talent in writing. Some replied, they were unsure. A few were very specific. I sat with fingers poised over the keyboard. Then I curled them to my hands, and my hands slunk away from the laptop like the Wicked Witch of the East under Dorothy’s house.
I needed to ponder the question before answering. Was I good at anything? The author’s doubt began to compress around throat. I shouldn’t even answer this. I had nothing to say.
In my other life, I’m a sports reporter, and I will say I’m good at my job. I’ve won awards and even had racing legend A.J. Foyt ask for more copies of a story I’d written about him.
Fiction writing, however, is a completely different animal—even the punctuation. All you need to do is ask my editors about my comma problem. On a side note, news stories are written in A.P. Style and punctuation is often at a minimum.
I can tell a story in fifteen hundred words or less, but readers are paying for and usually want more words for their investment.
What was so important about me answering this Facebook post? Well, by forcing myself to answer, I was giving myself a little legitimacy. So, I thought over the books I’ve released, and the ones I’m currently writing, and I began to form an opinion of what aspect of writing I believe I write well.
Male point of view.
I have a comma problem. I’m way too fond of adverbs. “Just” is my absolute favorite word of all, but I can get inside a man’s head.
More than a few times, I’ve read or judged a book where I finished the man’s side of the story and ended with my own “said no man ever.” On the flip side, I can tell usually tell when a male has written a female point of view.
I come by this talent honestly.
Because of the age difference between me and my sister, my playmates growing up were the four boys who lived next door who ranged in age from two years older than me to one year younger. Every minute of our free time was spent together.
I sat in the back of the bus and threatened to beat anyone up who made fun of Paul as he sat crying because Dena Bowman had broken up with him in the sixth grade. I went to high school girlfriends and told them they needed to stop trying to keep my boys next door from talking with me. I’d been around way before them; would be around way after them and had no interest in being my boys’ girlfriend as I had my own boyfriend.
In high school, I was still their shoulder to cry on when those girls moved to another guy.
I learned how boys see their parents’ marriage and how they dealt with the divorce.
As I began my career, I learned better ways to cuss and honed my inner smart ass skills. My husband says I have far surpassed his own skills.
In reality, I’ve learned men have their own vulnerabilities and insecurities, but they express them differently than women. Men express themselves in other manners than women in most things, and that’s not a bad thing, nor a wrong thing. It’s just dissimilar.
That’s not to say I don’t shake my head at times, but I understand the roots of the source.
I have great girlfriends, but I prefer to work with men. I’ve worked in a male dominated career my whole life, and I’m comfortable there.
Now, that I’m writing romance, I fully embrace my experience because my talent evolved from my situation.
I can write a male point of view and have discovered I enjoy writing my male characters more than my females. It’s like the girls are along for the ride, but the guys are more fun for me.
For me, the men are easy. The women are soooo hard. I’ll work on my women, but first I have this idea for a guy, and he’s so great.
I write both contemporary and erotic romance. I’m currently finishing the final book of the Love Strictly Test Trilogy, and Jordan’s Trials from the Wild Rose Press will be out in 2020.
After having such an awesome July, where I finally got my writing mojo back, I might have built up my expectations for August a little high. I couldn’t write as much as I’d hoped when school started and my dd and I were back to pinch-hitting for each other, what with four kids, all with differing schedules and needs. So, one of the things I’d hoped to finish in August is still on my To Do list for September, but that’s okay. I’m in good writing form. Ideas are coming at me from everywhere. The well is not dry! But let’s look at August!
A Satisfying August
I edited three projects, two of which were longish and one which was…challenging. 🙂 But I didn’t dilly-dally getting them done. I followed my plan, pretty much, and powered through.
I wrote a new novelette, finishing it in the nick of time to make my release deadline! If you read Big Sky Wedding, you’ll get treated to my philosophy concerning weddings. Not a big fan, which is why I’ve written so few stories with weddings in them (I’d rather blow money on the honeymoon!). But my hero Sky managed to get everything just right for Jamie, who’d been dragging her feet about making wedding plans. Hope you enjoy(ed) it! Rember it’s FREE for Kindle Unlimited readers, for now!
Then there’s this little, naughty, creepy novelette I originally published as part of a series with another author. So I had to revise the heck out of Mambo’s Door to get it ready for re-release. It’s f/f, so not for everyone, I’m sure, but it is a very cool story! And it’s FREE for Kindle Unlimited subscribers!
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