Thursday 31 August 2017

Title: ZACK
Series: Southside Skulls Motorcycle Club #4
Author: Jessie Cooke
Genre: MC Romance
Release Date: August 21, 2017
Zack "Attack" Leoni is a wild and free nomad biker who spends most of his time on the road. Each stop there's another woman to satisfy his needs.
He's not one to be tied down to anyone or anything and certainly not a woman with a child. 
Nicole Swafford fears for her life as she tries to escape Spider, her violent ex-husband and the father of her child...the same man Zack is meeting for a club business deal.
Will the smiling Zack Attack jeopardize club business for a woman he doesn't know, with a child he doesn't want?
Will Spider let anyone stand in the way of what he wants? His child and Nicole.
Two men, one woman, and a child. That's trouble. Big trouble.
This is book four in the Southside Skulls MC Series.
It is a Standalone Romance Novel but characters from the previous novels, DAX, CODY & GUNNER are main players in this story too. HEA and No cliffhangers. 
Intended for Mature Readers.

Chapter 1:
Nicole walked in the front door of the little studio apartment and stood there for a few moments torn between her heart melting at the sight of her friend holding her sweet baby while they both slept, and being angry that the door had been unlocked and she’d walked right in. She knew that without Stacey she would had never made it this far, but sometimes her beautiful friend just didn’t get how dangerous things had gotten. She walked over to the rocking chair and touched Stacey on the shoulder. Her green eyes fluttered open and for a second she looked confused. When they finally focused on Nicole’s face she smiled.
“Hey, Nick, is it that time already?”
Nicole slid her arms underneath Stacey’s and took the sleeping baby out of them. For a second she just held him up near her face and breathed him in. The sight and the smell of her baby gave her strength, and God knows she needed it. Taking a seat on the couch and kissing the still-sleeping six-month-old angel on the forehead, she looked at Stacey. Her pretty, blonde, slightly disheveled friend was yawning and stretching. She had spit-up on the shoulder of her pink t-shirt and the messy bun she’d pulled her soft blonde hair up into looked like it had given out some time ago. Nicole felt bad again for being angry with her. Stacey had given up a lot to become a part-time nanny to Nicole’s son. She didn’t stay out all night partying any longer and she rarely had a man in her bed…which was new. Stacey watched little Liam five days a week while Nicole worked the morning shift at the bakery, and then she went to her own job in the evening and worked another eight hours…for little more than a lot of drama in return. Nicole bit back her anger and softly said, “You forgot to lock the door again, Stace.”
“Shit. I’m sorry. Liam and I were sitting on the front porch for a while before he started to get sleepy. I came in and fixed his bottle and the next thing I know you’re standing over me.”
And one of these days it might be Spider standing over her. “It’s okay. I don’t mean to be a nag, but even though we might think Spider doesn’t know where you live now, that doesn’t mean he doesn’t. Spider has a way of knowing everything, sometimes before I do.”
Stacey stood. “You want a glass of wine?”
“No thank you. I should get Liam home…”
“He’s fine. He’s asleep. I’m fixing you a glass of wine and you’re staying for dinner. I’ll order pizza. Neither of us have work tomorrow, and that worry line between your eyes is deep today. Something happened.” Stacey didn’t wait for her response before going into the tiny little kitchenette and taking a bottle of wine out of the refrigerator. Nicole got up and went over to the bassinette in the corner. She kissed her baby’s soft face one more time before laying him down. She was still staring at him when Stacey came back over with two glasses of wine. She handed one to Nicole and then took out her phone and dialed a number. As she pressed it to her ear she said, “You can sit down and relax for a minute, babe. He’s not going to disappear.”
Nicole smiled at her friend and took a seat closer to the bassinette while Stacey ordered the pizza. The idea of Liam disappearing was her greatest fear, one that she lived with daily thanks to Spider. Each time he showed up, no matter how the conversation started, it ended with him making threats, telling her she’d never see her child again…the thought of that alone made her feel like she couldn’t breathe. He used those threats now, hoping she’d give in and come back to him, but one of these days she knew he’d tire of her, or kill her and she’d never see Liam again.
“Pizza is on its way,” Stacey said, tossing the phone aside and taking a sip of her wine. “Now start talking.”
Nicole smiled. “Everything’s fine, Stace. You know how I am…”
“Why do you make me drag it out of you? What did that piece of scum do this time?”
Nicole sighed. She didn’t want to talk about Spider…but since Stacey was as involved as she was by virtue of being Liam’s protector eight to ten hours a day, she needed to know. Maybe it would remind her to lock the door. “He came by the bakery today.”
“Shit. I thought Armand had a restraining order against him.” Armand was Nicole’s boss and the nicest man she’d ever known. He was protective of Nicole and Liam, and when asking Spider to stay away politely didn’t work, Armand had gotten a restraining order and promised the biker that he’d call the cops if he even saw him in the parking lot.
“He does, but he wasn’t there today…”
“So? The order is still in effect. Shit, Nicole, you have to start calling the cops on this guy. Maybe a few days in jail will give him a clue.”
Nicole chuckled sadly. “He’d only come out more pissed off and his absence from club business would just piss the rest of them off. So far Spider has kept the club out of it. I don’t want to make things worse.”
Stacey sipped her wine and sighed as she sat it down. “What did he want?”
“The same thing he always wants, to tell me that I belong to him and Liam belongs to him, and give me an ultimatum. He’s really pissed that I won’t tell him where we moved. It took me forty-five minutes to get here because I was scared to death he was following me.”
“Where was your bodyguard today?”
Nicole shuddered at the mention of Zack. The man had the kind of effect on her that most women pray for. Everything about him was sexy from his long, thick, disheveled brown hair to his light blue eyes and down to his incredibly hard body. But Nicole had almost the same reaction when she first met Spider, and that had worked out all bad. She wasn’t looking to repeat her mistakes. “He’s not my bodyguard.”
“So you keep saying. He and five of his closest friends…a few hot ones, I might add…packed up both of our apartments and moved us in the middle of the night. In the past two weeks, he’s spent more time at that bakery or outside of it than he probably has on his Harley. He’s got it bad, Nick, and he’s fucking hot. You think that Hashtag guy has an old lady?”
“An old lady’s life is not for you, babe. You value your independence too much. And we both know that hot isn’t enough.” When Nicole first met Spider, the fact that he was hot was what got her into trouble. His dark, almost black hair and gray eyes and smoking body had been all she could think about. She was barely eighteen and still living with her over-protective parents, so the excitement of the “bad boy” edge had factored in as well. She had been a good girl for too long and Spider made her want to change that almost overnight. After sneaking around with him for a month and a half, she packed her bags and told her parents she was leaving. Her mother cried and her father lectured. They begged and pleaded for her not to go. Her father threatened that she’d never be able to come back. Her mother told her that she was taking everything they’d ever done for her for granted, and ruining her future.
Nicole refused to listen to anything they told her about what a miserable life she’d have if she left Clarksville and moved to Memphis with Spider, however. By her nineteenth birthday, she was living with him and taking pride in the fact that she was his old lady. Her nightmares didn’t start until they’d been together for almost two years. Spider started drinking more and, Nicole suspected, using hard drugs. The first time he stayed out all night and didn’t call her, he came home smelling like cheap perfume and pussy. They’d gotten into a huge fight and that was the first time he hit her. She’d never been hit before in her life. He used the back of his hand, but he was so much bigger than her, it had knocked her to the floor. She was stunned by that, but even more so when he picked her up and took her to the bedroom. He told her that he was going to show her who was boss as he proceeded to rape her. When he was finished, he told her that from that moment on, she was keeping her mouth shut about what he did and who he fucked. He “owned” her, not the other way around. That night Nicole had waited until he went to sleep and then she’d gotten up and, taking nothing but her purse and her keys, she left the apartment. She’d taken a taxi to the bus station and another from the bus stop to her parents’ house outside of the Clarksville countryside. She got there just as the sun was coming up. Her father was picking up the morning paper as she stepped out of the taxi. He looked at her and went back inside the house without saying a word.
Nicole had almost left then, but she barely had cab money and Spider had sheltered her so much that she didn’t have any friends. The idea of going back and living with her rapist was almost more than she could stand. She had taken a deep breath, swallowed her pride, and followed him inside. Her mother took one look at her in her off-the-shoulder Black Sabbath t-shirt, cutoff jeans, and leather ankle boots and burst into tears. Her dad’s response was worse, however; he just refused to look at her. It didn’t take her long to figure out that going there had been a mistake. They’d washed their hands of her. She’d gone back to Spider that day and endured a second beating, even more severe, for leaving in the first place. Three months later she realized that she hadn’t taken her birth control pill the day that he raped her. She was pregnant and for the first few months after she found out, she waffled between wondering if a baby would “save them” and thoughts of taking her own life and the baby’s along with her. She looked over at the bassinette and shivered at the horrible thought.
“Hey, you still with me?” Stacey asked, bringing Nicole back to the present.
“Yeah, sorry. What did you say?”
“I said, Zack isn’t just hot. What guy goes out of his way to do all he did for you without asking for anything in return? I think he’s a good guy.”
“He’s a biker, Stace. I may have been naïve when I hooked up with Spider, but I’m not anymore; bikers do what they do and they don’t give a shit who they hurt while they’re doing it. Spider was good to me for almost two years and look how that turned out. I’m never going there again. I just need a few more months and then I should have enough money saved to get me and Liam out of here for good.”
Stacey looked sad. “I can’t believe you’re going to take off, with the baby who I love too, and I’ll never see you again.”
“Come with us.” Stacey didn’t have any family and she worked as the manager of a nightclub. She and Nicole had met one night when Spider had taken her there and after feeling up every half-dressed ho in the place, he picked one to go home with. On his way out the door with his ho, he had tossed Nicole a twenty and told her to “put her ass in a cab and be there when he got home.” Nicole found her crying at her table and the two women had quickly bonded. It was going to break her heart to leave her only friend behind, but Stacey loved her job and she was good at it, Nicole doubted that she’d be willing to leave.
Stacey smiled and said, “It’s tempting, babe, but you know I don’t like change. Changing apartments was almost too much for me. If not for you and that baby, I’d never have agreed. I love you and I understand why you have to go. I don’t understand, however, why you didn’t just do it when your hot bodyguard offered to take you anywhere you wanted to go that night.”
“Because then I’d owe him, Stacey. Hell, I already do for everything he’s done. But I plan on paying him back before I leave town and then washing my hands of anyone that wears a leather kutte and rides a Harley.” The sound of a knock on the door caused Nicole to almost jump out of her seat. Stacey gave her a concerned look and said:
“It’s just the pizza, babe.”
Nicole nodded. “Just make sure, before you open the door, okay?”
“Sure.” Nicole watched Stacey walk over and look out the peephole. When she pulled open the door and Nicole saw the young man with a Pizza Hut uniform, she breathed a sigh of relief. She reached over and pulled down the blanket that had worked its way up into Liam’s face. She couldn’t believe he was already six months old. He was growing fast, and she had to get them far away from Spider before he was old enough to be influenced by him. She was smiling when she heard Stacey scream. Instinctively she scooped up the baby before she turned, knowing Spider’s smiling face would be the next thing that she saw, even before she saw it.
$25 AMAZON GIFT CARD GIVEAWAY


Jessie Cooke writes hot romance novels about tough guys, bad boys, bikers, fighters and lovers and the women of strong character who tame them.
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From New York Times Bestselling author Gena Showalter, comes the next standalone romance in the Original Heartbreakers Series—CAN’T HARDLY BREATHE!

Order your copy today!

   

CAN’T HARDLY BREATHE Synopsis:

New York Times bestselling author Gena Showalter returns with an irresistible Original Heartbreakers story about a woman who’s never felt desired and the man who wants her more than air to breathe…

Bullied in high school, Dorothea Mathis’s past is full of memories she’d rather forget. But there’s one she can’t seem to shake—her longstanding crush on former Army Ranger Daniel Porter.  Now that the sexy bad boy has started using her inn as his personal playground, she should kick him out…but his every heated glance makes her want to join him instead.

Daniel returned to Strawberry Valley, Oklahoma to care for his ailing father and burn off a little steam with no strings attached. Though he craves the curvy Dorothea night and day, he’s as marred by his past as she is by hers. The more he desires her, the more he fears losing her.

But every sizzling encounter leaves him desperate for more, and soon Daniel must make a choice: take a chance on love or walk away forever.

 

Preorder CAN’T HARDLY BREATHE here!

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REVIEW
4* read. 
This is book 4 in this series but can be read as a standalone as I did, though I really need to go back and read the other now
Two broken sould who have to overcome their fears and move forward. An emotional rollercoaster of a read you feel every emotion the characters feel. It will make you laugh and cry along with the story.
 Dorothea I instanly connected to and fell in love with, she reminded me of me in some way which I think is why shes so relateable to readers. Daniel was a bit harder to warm to at times but
Dorothea made up for that. A great emotial read, I can't wait for more.

Add it to your Goodreads Now!

       
   
Gena Showalter’s CAN’T HARDLY BREATHE – Review & Excerpt Tour Schedule:
August 21st
Obsessed by books – Review
Scandalous Book Blog – Review & Excerpt
The Book Maven – Review & Excerpt
August 22nd
Alpha Book Club – Review
Beware Of The Reader – Review & Excerpt
Evermore Books – Review & Excerpt
Melena`s Reviews – Review & Excerpt
The Romance Rebels – Review & Excerpt
August 23rd
Booknerd1107 – Review
East Coast Book Chicks – Review & Excerpt
Reads & Reviews – Review
Sweet Red Reads – Review & Excerpt
Under The Covers Book Lovers – Review & Excerpt
August 24th
Lynn's Romance Enthusiasm – Review & Excerpt
Read. Eat. Love. – Review & Excerpt
Reese's Reviews – Review & Excerpt
Shannonbookishlife – Review & Excerpt
August 25th
Never without a book in hand – Review & Excerpt
Reads All the Books – Review & Excerpt
August 26th
Kayns Book – Review
The Lovely Books – Review & Excerpt
With Love for Books – Review & Excerpt
August 27th
From the TBR Pile – Review & Excerpt
Kdrbck – Review & Excerpt
August 28th
Book Angel Booktopia – Review & Excerpt
Read-Love-Blog – Review
The Book Reading Gals – Review & Excerpt
August 30th
As The Book Ends – Review & Excerpt
Nerdy Dirty and Flirty – Review & Excerpt
Red Cheeks Reads – Review & Excerpt
Smut Book Junkie Reviews – Review & Excerpt
August 31st
Embrace the Romance – Review & Excerpt
Milky Way of Books – Review & Excerpt
Once Upon a Book Blog – Review & Excerpt
September 1st
BJ's Book Blog – Review & Excerpt
Books and Things Blog – Review & Excerpt
Foxylutely Books – Review & Excerpt
Somewhere Lost in Books – Review & Excerpt
September 2nd
A Fortress of Books – Excerpt
September 3rd
Francoise's Reading Corner – Review & Excerpt
September 4th
All Things Dark & Dirty – Review & Excerpt
Lover of Big Books Cannot Lie – Review & Excerpt
Rantings of a Reading Addict – Review & Excerpt
September 5th
Escape Inside the Pages – Review & Excerpt
Taylor Fenner's Bookish World – Review & Excerpt
The Sassy Bookster – Excerpt
September 6th
Travels N Reads – Review & Excerpt
Sassy Book Lovers – Review & Excerpt
September 7th
JOJO THE BOOKAHOLIC – Review & Excerpt
Sofia Loves Books – Review
Wrapped Up In Reading – Review & Excerpt
September 8th
Book Lovers Hangout – Review & Excerpt
Crazii Bitches Book Blog – Review & Excerpt
Dirty Girl Romance – Review
Stuck In Books – Excerpt
Shannon's Book Blog – Review & Excerpt
September 9th
ContemporaryCween – Review & Excerpt
G & T's Indie Café – Excerpt
Jax's Book Magic – Excerpt
Ms. Me28 – Review & Excerpt
Relentless Romance – Review & Excerpt
    About Gena Showalter: Gena Showalter is the New York Times and USA TODAY bestselling author of the spellbinding Lords of the Underworld and Angels of the Dark series, two young adult series--Everlife and the White Rabbit Chronicles--and the highly addictive Original Heartbreakers series.  In addition to being a National Reader's Choice and two time RITA nominee, her romance novels have appeared in Cosmopolitan (Red Hot Read) and Seventeen magazine, she's appeared on Nightline and been mentioned in Orange is the New Black--if you ask her about it, she'll talk for hours…hours!  Her books have been translated in multiple languages. She’s hard at work on her next novel, a tale featuring an alpha male with a dark side and the strong woman who brings him to his knees. You can learn more about Gena, her menagerie of rescue dogs, and all her upcoming books at genashowalter.com or Facebook.com/genashowalterfans    

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Wednesday 30 August 2017












































































I’m warned that Carter Hayes is heartless.

He’s part of the screw crew.
He’ll just use you and leave you.
He’s ruthless and always gets what he wants.

Just look for the trail of broken hearts and dreamy sighs and you’ll find him.

“Hot as sin, Carter.”

I don’t have time to fall head over heels for any guy. Besides, he’d never notice someone like me. I have a three step plan. Get through college. Get a job. Get my sister out of the hell hole I left her in. That’s all I have time for.

That’s until I hear of the betting pool the guys started. Whoever screws me first gets the money.  The moment Carter looks at me, I know it’s only because of the bet.

I tell myself our first kiss is only for show.
I hate my heart for falling for his irresistible charm.

For one foolish moment, I actually want him to be my first earth-shattering love. All it takes for me to give in is a little attention, a cocky smile, and a fake promise of a happily-ever-after.

When I’m surrounded by crumpled sheets and the smell of sex, I realize I let him have me for four hundred dollars.

To save what little pride I have left, I pretend it didn’t mean anything, that he’s just one last screw before we all leave college.

I’ve spent the last four years lying to myself. When I’m ready to take the final step of my plan, and save my sister, guess who walks through my front door?








































































Michelle Horst is a Bestselling Romance Author who likes her books hot, dirty, and with a touch of darkness. She loves an alpha hero who is not scared to fight for his woman.

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