Let’s Get Physical by Cassie Cross – Release Day Blitz + Excerpt

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Title: Let’s Get Physical
Author
: Cassie Cross
Series:
Love Is… #2
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Release Date: March 26, 2020

Amazon

Corinna McKnight is a chronically single girl in need of toned abs and a hot date for a wedding that her highly successful, deliriously happy lifelong frenemy will be attending. The weddings is only six weeks away and she doesn’t have much time to make it look like she has her life together. Luckily, her best friend’s boyfriend owns the hottest gym in town and sets he up with Noah, the best personal trainer he has on staff.

Noah Cartier is at a pretty good place in his life. He has a job and he loves working for his best friend, Hinter. Noah is in high demand, mostly for his talent, but sometimes for his body and Hunter has one very firm rule: no fooling around with the clients.

It’s an easy rule to follow until he meets Corinna, who makes him want more out of life and leaves him straddling the line between breaking a promise and betraying his heart.

Excerpt:

I look down at the napkin in my lap to keep myself from saying something that I might wind up regretting.

Noah notices.

“What?”

“It’s just…what is wrong with me?”

“There’s nothing wrong with you. You’re beautiful and funny, and—”

“And I have the worst luck with men. It’s not this guy necessarily, because he seemed kinda smarmy when I talked to him, but it’s just, like, impossible for me to find a good guy? And it’s not just now, it’s…months. Years. I’m always finding men who can’t commit, who are flakes, who have issues I can’t even begin to address. I even went out with one guy five times before I found out that he was married. It’s been a non-stop steady string of badness since…well, since you actually.”

The second I register the words that came out of my mouth, I clamp my lips together. I went a bit too far there, unfortunately.

Noah caught on. It would be difficult not to. “Me?”

“Forget I said anything.”

“Kind of impossible to do that now,” he says, and I can tell he’s not going to let this go.

“I had the biggest crush on you. We went to Centerville for the summer for years and you were just Noah. And then, one year, I set eyes on you when we pulled up at my grandparents’ house and you were Noah. I think you were mowing the grass. I looked at you, and things felt different. There might’ve been cartoon hearts flying around you at the time, I can’t remember.”

He laughs as he leans in close, like I’m telling the most intriguing story in the world.

“I started tagging along with you and Mike more that summer. I was positive you were going to get tired of me; I know Mike was.”

“I never got tired of you,” he admits. “I made up reasons to see you when Mike wasn’t around.”

About Cassie Cross:

Cassie Cross is a Maryland native and a romantic at heart, who lives outside of Baltimore with her two dogs and a closet full of shoes. Cassie’s fondness for swoon-worthy men and strong women are the inspiration for most of her stories, and when she’s not busy writing a book, you’ll probably find her eating takeout and indulging in her love of 80’s sitcoms.

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Fool Me Twice by Carrie Aarons – Excerpt

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Title: Fool Me Twice
Author
: Carrie Aarons
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Release Date: March 12, 2020

Goodreads

When my best friend died of cancer just before her eighteenth birthday, she left her coveted bucket list to me.

The things she already crossed off? Skinny dipping, going to Paris, completing the local hot wing challenge, road tripping to the ocean, and sending out a message in a bottle.

So, it falls on me to finish it for her, to honor her memory. In the next year, it’s my mission to:

  1. Dye my hair
  2. Have sex
  3. Camp out in a tent
  4. Go bungee jumping
  5. Get revenge on Lincoln Kolb

Most are doable, some terrify me, and then there is the last item on the list. When the raven-haired football god dumped my best friend during senior year of high school, she was devastated. The jerk with charm for days found out she was sick, and betrayed her in the worst way possible.

But he doesn’t know me, I went to school a town over. Now, to fulfill my promise, I’m the newest freshman on the campus where he is the big man. If there is one thing, aside from cheap beer, that a jock can’t pass up, it’s a shiny new girl.

So when I catch his eye, play hard to get, and then fall into his bed, I know my scheme is working to perfection. But what Lincoln can’t see coming is the beatdown I have planned for his ice-cold heart.

Unfortunately, what I never saw coming was the one he had planned for mine.

Excerpt:

Look at him, strutting through campus like he’s got his dick in his hand, and every girl wants a taste.

Jesus Christ, he’s preening more than a world-class peacock.

I pull my sunglasses down to the bridge of my nose, peering over them as Lincoln Kolb swaggers his way through the Warchester Campus quad. There are two other bros flanking him, big beefy guys who wear the same smug, shit-eating grins as their leader. How the guy is already a legend, by the way guys fist bump him and girls fawn as he walks by, escapes me.

It’s like that scene in Beauty and the Beast when Gaston sweeps into town. All of his idiotic, adoring fans practically crawl on their knees in his wake.

Only this time, Lincoln Kolb may be their god, but I’m here to bring him crashing back down to earth.

About Carrie Aarons:

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Author of romance novels such as The Tenth Girl and Privileged, Carrie Aarons writes books that are just as swoon-worthy as they are sarcastic. A former journalist, she prefers the love stories of her imagination, and the athleisure dress code, much better.

When she isn’t writing, Carrie is busy binging reality TV, having a love/hate relationship with cardio, and trying not to burn dinner. She’s a Jersey girl living in Texas with her husband, daughter and furry son.

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Blog Tour: Best Man by Katy Evans – Excerpt

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Title: Best Man
Author
: Katy Evans
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Release Date: December 10, 2019

Goodreads
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When the wedding of your dreams is just around the corner, everything needs to go as planned. Only problem is, the groom didn’t get the memo.Aaron forgot the rings, and Lia is determined to make the long drive home to get them in time for their “I do’s.”

But there’s a catch. There always is with Aaron, isn’t there?

Aaron is too hungover to come, and sends a replacement.

The best man.

Miles Foster. The cocky, arrogant, sexy best man…and the last person Lia wants to be trapped in a car with for hours.

But Aaron insists, and Lia wonders if there’s another reason Aaron wants Miles tagging along–aside from sticking her with a hot, surly babysitter.

Yet how bad can it be? It’ll be over before she knows it, and she’ll never see him again. Just like in college.

But when secrets are revealed, and Lia’s whole world is turned upside down, she realizes she’s been living a lie–and so has her groom.

Miles is supposed to be the best man at her wedding.

But what if he is simply the best man she has ever known? The best man for her?

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Excerpt:

The dress is a strapless Carolina Herrera, with layers and layers of whisper-thin organza. It blows my budget and the “less is more” mantra out of the water, but like Eva said the day we bought it in downtown Denver, when you know, you know. The locale is the sumptuous Midnight Lodge, nestled in Colorado’s Rocky Mountains, every tiny detail of the place costing my father more than an entire year of his salary. The twenty-three members of the bridal party are assembled. It’s the scene of every little girl’s fairytale fantasy.

My fantasy.

At least, the one I’d been harboring up until today, when everything changed.

Eva smiles at me. “Ready to make your dreams come true?”

I stare at myself in the mirror. I look like Cinderella, if the wicked stepmother had just materialized at the castle on Cinderella’s wedding day and gunned down Prince Charming in cold blood. I’m also about three minutes away from losing the mimosa I’d polished off earlier that morning at breakneck speed. I go to chew on my nails but then I remember Eva painted them, and the last thing I want is for him to see the chips.

He notices things like that. He’s an observer.

And I want to be perfect for him.

Him.

The wrong him.

Oh, god.

I go to chew on my lip, but I can’t do that because they’ve been lacquered with bubble-gum pink gloss, and he’d probably notice if I got it on my teeth, too. All my normal ways of freaking out are off limits.

This is the day of my dreams, the day I’ve planned to the letter, just so I could avoid any potential calamities that might make me freak out.

But I am freaking out. Oh, lordy, am I ever.

I’ve been waiting my whole life for this day.

This perfect day, where the sun is shining, the snow is melting, birds are singing, and the sky is the deepest blue I’ve ever seen.

But there’s a problem.

A problem in the form of a pretentious, bearded, six-foot-three wall of hot man flesh who stalks around hating the world and thinking he’s better than everyone in it.

My fiancé’s best friend. The best man, Miles Foster.

This is all his fault.

“You okay?” Eva asks.

“I am,” I insist, pushing the infernal veil out of my face for the thousandth time. “This dress is itchy as hell.”

I stand and pluck the dress up under my armpits, hoisting it over my boobs. I try to take a step but…too much fabric, in all directions. It’s a wonder I don’t drown in this sea. In this sea, or in this mess I’ve created for myself. I sit back down on the vanity stool and pout. “I’m stuck.”

In more ways than one.

She gathers handfuls of too much organza and helps me up, depositing the pile of fabric safely in my wake. I shuffle to the full-length mirror and glance at myself. I don’t look like a bride, or even a fairytale princess. I look like a prisoner who just got her death sentence.

“It’s too loose,” I whine. I never had much of a rack, and now it’s super obvious. Why did I decide to go strapless again? “I think I must’ve lost some boobage during my diet. What if the top of my dress falls down while I’m walking up the aisle?”

Eva smirks. “I’m sure Aaron’ll love the show.”

The thought makes the mimosa turn in my stomach. I used to live for what Aaron thought. Whenever I had a choice to make on something, be it a new movie coming out, or a sweater at the mall, or a new hair style, I’d think, Would Aaron like this? But I realize, as she says his name, that it doesn’t matter to me in the slightest what Aaron thinks. The only opinion I care about now is that of the man who will be standing precisely two feet to my husband-to-be’s left.

I am such an idiot.

In less than fifteen minutes, I will be marching down the stone steps outside the Midnight Lodge to a picturesque gazebo at the foot of the hills, on the arm of my father, who has socked his entire life’s savings into making this day picture perfect for his only daughter. I will take the hand of the man I’ve been attached at the hip to for over five years, ever since I met him in a dank frat cellar when I was a wide-eyed little college freshman. I will join with this man—this man I’ve spent all of my adult life with—in holy matrimony, ’til death us do part.

I will become Mrs. Aaron Eberhart.

But I know I’ll be looking past my husband-to-be to the man who, up until twelve hours ago, I’d thought I hated. Miles Foster.

And I will be wondering What if…

I wish choosing a husband was as simple as choosing a dress.

When you know, you know.

I did know, or I thought I did. Up until twelve hours ago, I thought Aaron Eberhart was my true soul mate, the one I’d happily spend the rest of my life with. That’s when things took an unexpected turn.

Right now? I don’t even know my own name.

And I have a feeling I might be making a huge mistake.

About Katy Evans:

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Katy Evans is a New York Times, USA Today, and Wall Street Journal bestselling author. Her debut REAL shot to the top of the bestselling lists in 2013 and since then 9 of her titles have been New York Times bestsellers. Her books have been translated into nearly a dozen languages across the world.

 

 

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The Princess Problem by Christi Barth – Excerpt + Giveaway

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Title: The Princess Problem
Author
: Christi Barth
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Release Date: November 18, 2019

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What girl doesn’t want to wear a tiara? Me. The one who lives in yoga pants and knows she’s not special enough to be a princess.

One minute I’m starting my dream life in NYC, and the next, a man too hot for his own good is banging on my door, telling me that I’m a long lost princess of a country on the other side of the Atlantic.

Not exactly your typical Friday night in the Big Apple.

Suddenly, all of my plans for the future are yanked away. I’m trapped in a life filled with social obligations—and stilettos!—and an uptight royal family I didn’t know existed. They, and the whole rest of the freaking country, have lofty expectations I’m not sure I can meet.

At least the aforementioned sexalicious man, Elias, is my constant shadow, protecting me with his life. The whole situation is overwhelming. So I’ve secretly put him in charge of my happiness, too…and he’s taking my orders very, very seriously.

So seriously, I’m falling for him even harder than the new country I’m coming to…maybe…love.

And that’s a major problem, because he’s crazy about me, too. I may not know all the zillion rules about being royal, but I know one for sure: No way can a princess date her bodyguard…

Excerpt:

“My life—the brand new life I just started—is gone. Nobody seems to care about me,” Kelsey thumped her chest as her voice cracked, “the actual person in here behind the princess title. Except for you.”

Her aching vulnerability tore into Elias like a sword straight through his gut. It tore through the rules and protocol and every layer of common sense.

All that was left was a man watching a lost, lonely woman. It was blindingly obvious what she needed. So he wrapped his arms around Kelsey and hugged her.

She didn’t cry, or even tremble. But she did heave in a deep sigh, and when she let it out, her whole body relaxed into his. Except for her arms, which slid into a tight embrace around his waist.

They sat like that for long moments. Long enough for Elias to notice the determined buzz of a bee overhead. Long enough for a peacock to strut past them, its vibrant green and blue tailfeathers dragging on the ground like a train. Long enough for Elias to also notice how his arms wrapped so far around her small frame that the tips of his fingers grazed the sides of her breasts.

He knew he should move. Readjust.

He didn’t care about should. Elias only cared about making Kelsey feel better. Feel like herself.

Feel that he did, indeed, care for her.

Finally, Kelsey lifted her head from where it rested on his collarbone. “Thank you.”

“You’re—” but before he could finish the phrase, Kelsey kissed him.

It was just a soft, faint brush of lips over lips. Probably meant to be nothing more than a continuation of her thanks. Except that something sparked between them. The one, faint touch instantly morphed into more. Elias honestly couldn’t say which one of them consciously deepened the kiss. It felt organic.

It felt necessary.

It felt right.

They clung to each other, and that soft brush grew into a real kiss. The kind he gave after a date where everything clicked, where he and the woman connected deeply. The kind he hadn’t given anyone in many, many months.

Kelsey’s beauty had struck Elias from the moment that flimsy, splotched apartment door opened. But then, as she stood her ground with such determination, as she sassed him on the plane, as she approached every step of this journey with such bravery, his feelings had changed. The involuntary, primal acknowledgement of wanting her body had flipped over into wanting her.

The pressure between their lips, between their bodies intensified. Elias moved his lips harder against hers. Kelsey pushed right back. They kissed and kissed and suddenly their tongues were tangled, tasting and teasing.

Elias groaned. God, she was delicious. Sweet. Tantalizing. And so soft every single damn place they were touching.

His hands slid up through the silk of her hair to tilt Kelsey’s head back, to deepen his angle. But then he immediately slid one palm down her back to keep her pressed close. To keep those firm breasts rubbing against his chest as she swayed her upper body.

It didn’t make up for the fact they were seated side by side, that their hips and legs and bellies weren’t rubbing together. But it was damned sexy, especially sexy, paired with the breathy little moans she kept exhaling.

“Elias,” she murmured, as his lips moved down the tantalizing column of her neck. God, he just wanted to keep going. Push that prim and proper sweater out of the way and keep lapping at the pale skin that he couldn’t get enough of.

“Princess,” he replied.

And then froze.

His subconscious had just saved him. Tossing out that automatic title had been the necessary reminder that he wasn’t only kissing Kelsey. Elias was making out with a Princess of the Realm.

Also? He was making out with his best friend’s little sister.

Giveaway:

  • Ends November 28, 2019
  • Prize: Princess Basket (includes princess-themed items: journal, pen, mug, tea, candle)
  • Enter HERE

About Christi Barth:

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USA TODAY bestseller Christi Barth earned a Masters degree in vocal performance and embarked upon a career on the stage. A love of romance then drew her to wedding planning. Ultimately she succumbed to her lifelong love of books and now writes award-winning contemporary romance.

Christi can always be found either whipping up gourmet meals (for fun, honest!) or with her nose in a book. She lives in Maryland with the best husband in the world.

 

 

 

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I Fade Away by Elle Keating – Cover Reveal + Excerpt

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Title: I Fade Away
Author
: Elle Keating
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Release Date: November 12, 2019

Goodreads
Amazon

After four months, Tia Peterson has been found. The woman who was kidnapped and trafficked has escaped hell only to realize that her nightmare isn’t over. Her story has hit the media and every reporter and news outlet wants to know the gory details; things she doesn’t want to speak of ever again.

But then she meets Trent Reddick.

The former Navy SEAL doesn’t ask too many questions, never pressures her to talk about what happened while she was held captive in the New Jersey Pine Barrens. He just wants to help her get her life back.But the more time they spend together, the stronger Trent’s feelings for Tia become…and that scares him. If he doesn’t find a way to rein in his emotions, be the friend she needs instead of the man he wants to be for her, he may lose her for good.

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Excerpt:

The Feds are gone for now. Because they have what they need. The name of my captor, where they can find the bodies…if there is anything left of them. According to the news, the fire spread quickly, consuming everything in its path. Part of me hopes that they find something, though. Some bones, a couple teeth, anything to prove that they are truly dead. But most likely they will only uncover ash, which leaves me disappointed.

I figure I bought myself a few hours until the agents return to probe me for more information, to ask me the same questions a thousand different ways.

How did you escape?

I ran.

Why did you run?

The house was on fire and I just witnessed three murders. Freedom was through the front door and I took it.

Who shot Edward Gaskill?

His nephew, Matthew.

Where is he now?

I have no idea.

And that is the truth. I don’t know where Matthew fled to. I just hope that wherever he is, he stays there, free to live out his life. I’ll always be grateful for what he did for me, that in the end he had become the man he had always wanted to be.

Was there anyone else in the house?

Yes, Edward Gaskill’s housekeeper and his slave, Aubrey. They’re both dead.

“Okay, Tia. I need to check your vitals again.” I don’t turn to look at the nurse who just entered my hospital room. She has already tried to strike up conversation once by telling me that she likes my name because it rhymes with Mia, her daughter’s middle name. “Tia, we have trained advocates who you can talk to… to be a support…”

I tap out and peer at the world through my hospital window. I can’t listen to another nurse or medical professional talk about the supports and services I should take advantage of because I’m an assault victim. Or stomach the way they look at me, pitying me.

“I already met with psych. I’m fine.” I don’t mean to be a bitch, but I have reached my limit and that is saying something.

“Oh, that’s great!”

I spoke to the psychiatrist, not to purge and express my feelings and relive four months of hell, but to convince the doctor that I’m stable enough to be discharged. Because that is my only goal right now. To leave this hospital, this fucking state.

“You’re almost finished with your last sodium bag. You should be nice and hydrated. How does your neck feel? Still irritated? Do you need something for the pain? On a scale from one to ten, what is your pain level?”

My hand goes to my neck and I touch the raw, sensitive flesh. “I’m fine.”

A hospital is the last place I wanted to end up because I knew this would happen. The questions, the sympathetic stares, tests to determine if I contracted something while I was…away. For a second I wish I had caught something lethal, because then it would be over; the memories, the nightmares. I would never see their faces again when I slept. I could just fade away.

About Elle Keating:

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Elle Keating is the author of romance novels with sexy heroes and fierce females. Her first book, Thrill of the Chase (Dangerous Love, #1), was published by Forever Romance’s digital imprint, Forever Yours, in 2015. She has since expanded the series and released the Dream Duet and the taboo romance, Keeping His Commandments. Elle is currently working on several projects including the sequel to Into Temptation and a steamy forbidden romance that may raise some eyebrows.

When Elle isn’t torturing her heroes and heroines (don’t worry, there’s always a happily ever after), she is a public school administrator and enjoys spending time with her husband and 3 children in New Jersey. For more on Elle and her books, visit ellekeating.com.

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