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THE PROTECTOR by HelenKay Dimon – Blog Tour

Today we have the blog tour for The Protector by HelenKay Dimon! Check it out and get your copy today!

 

Title: The Protector:

Author: HelenKay Dimon

Genre Romantic Suspense

 

 

About The Protector:

Salvation, Pennsylvania. The commune located in the small town was advertised as a modern Utopia: a place to live, share, and learn with other like-minded young people. Cate Pendleton’s sister was one of them. Now she’s dead—and Cate won’t rest until she finds out who killed her. Stonewalled at every turn, she approaches a DC Fixer for help and ends up with Damon Knox, a mysterious man with a secretive past. But Cate soon discovers that she not only needs Damon, she wants him, which isn’t good—for the attraction brewing between them will only lead to complications that can turn into danger . . .

 

Damon has tried to erase the hellish memories and the evil that happened in Salvation ever since he left a long time ago. Still, he can’t turn his back on Cate. As Damon works with Cate to uncover her sister’s killer, he finds himself drawn to her more and more. But how will she feel about him when she learns about his connection to the place?

 

Joining forces to uncover the truth, they must stay one step ahead of a cunning killer who’s bent on not being exposed.

 

 

Get Your Copy Now:

The Protector:

Kindle | Nook | iBooks | Google Play | Kobo | Avon Digital

 

 

Catch Up On the Series!

The Fixer:

Kindle | Nook | iBooks | Google Play | Kobo | Avon Digital

 

The Enforcer:

Kindle | Nook | iBooks | Google Play | Kobo | Avon Digital

 

The Negotiator:

Kindle | Nook | iBooks | Google Play | Kobo | Avon Digital

 

The Pretender:

Kindle | Nook | iBooks | Google Play | Kobo | Avon Digital

 

 

 

About HelenKay Dimon:

HelenKay Dimon spent the years before becoming a romance author as a…divorce attorney. Not the usual transition, she knows. Good news is she now writes full time and is much happier. She has sold over forty novels and novellas to numerous publishers, including HarperCollins, Kensington, Harlequin, Penguin Random House, Riptide and Carina Press. Her nationally bestselling and award-winning books have been showcased in numerous venues and her books have twice been named “Red-Hot Reads” and excerpted in Cosmopolitan magazine. She is on the Board of Directors of the Romance Writers of America and teaches fiction writing at UC San Diego and MiraCosta College. You can learn more at her website: www.HelenKaydimon.com

Connect with HelenKay:

Twitter | FB page | Tumblr | Instagram | Pinterest

Enter HelenKay’s Giveaway:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

 

 

 

 

 

THE PROTECTOR by HelenKay Dimon – Release Day Blitz

Today we have the release day blitz for The Protector by HelenKay Dimon! Check it out and get your copy today!

 

Title: The Protector:

Author: HelenKay Dimon

Genre Romantic Suspense

 

 

About The Protector:

Salvation, Pennsylvania. The commune located in the small town was advertised as a modern Utopia: a place to live, share, and learn with other like-minded young people. Cate Pendleton’s sister was one of them. Now she’s dead—and Cate won’t rest until she finds out who killed her. Stonewalled at every turn, she approaches a DC Fixer for help and ends up with Damon Knox, a mysterious man with a secretive past. But Cate soon discovers that she not only needs Damon, she wants him, which isn’t good—for the attraction brewing between them will only lead to complications that can turn into danger . . .

 

Damon has tried to erase the hellish memories and the evil that happened in Salvation ever since he left a long time ago. Still, he can’t turn his back on Cate. As Damon works with Cate to uncover her sister’s killer, he finds himself drawn to her more and more. But how will she feel about him when she learns about his connection to the place?

 

Joining forces to uncover the truth, they must stay one step ahead of a cunning killer who’s bent on not being exposed.

 

 

Get Your Copy Now:

The Protector:

Kindle | Nook | iBooks | Google Play | Kobo | Avon Digital

 

Exclusive Excerpt:

Cate Pendleton dumped her grocery bags on the kitchen counter and glanced around the living room area of her small one-bedroom condo. Flattened pillows. Magazines spread across the coffee table. A blanket in a ball on the floor from where it slipped off her last night while she watched television. The remote stuffed between cushions.

Everything was exactly where she left it when she took off on her store run an hour ago. But something struck her as off. She felt it rather than saw it. A violation of her scared space. A lingering menace. The sensation of unknown hands skimming over her things. A shiver skated through her at the thought.

With her keys sticking between her fingers like a weapon, she walked around the condo, peeking in the closet and looking inside the bedroom. The journey ended back here she started. She approached the couch nice and slow. She listened for footsteps, but the only sound came from the hiss of her clunky, usually-malfunctioning icemaker.

She leaned toward the cushions, just a bit, and sniffed. There it was. Aftershave. Faint, but present. Since a man hadn’t been in the condo for weeks the smell was out of place. And this was not the first time this had happened. She came home two days ago to the same scent. A mix of musk and orange. The last time it happened in the evening. This time in the morning.

On that first day, she found her patio door unlocked. Living in a city, she didn’t take her personal safety for granted. Being two floors up, tucked behind rows of government buildings and a few blocks back from the National Air and Space Museum in downtown Washington, D.C., she kept her guard up. The neighborhood served as home to many congressional staffers. Traffic, both human and the car variety, moved in a steady beat. But she knew better than to assume everything was fine. She locked her doors. All of them and all the time, but someone got in.

A punch of awareness moved though her as she brushed her fingertips over the arm of the chair. The idea of someone snooping through her stuff, standing in her space, made her gag.  Last time nothing was stolen, so she skipped calling the police with that fear. Wrote the whole thing off as faulty memory. She knew something strange had happened, but she blocked it and pretended otherwise. But this was different. From the first whiff of that cologne, the trembling started deep down in her stomach, spun up to her head and would not stop.

She forced her mind to focus. Someone kept getting in without leave much of a trail. They didn’t stick around, and for that she was grateful. Nothing stolen. Not obviously, anyway.

Her sister. That’s what this had to be about. Cate thought back to the last six weeks and all the ground she’d covered. She poked around, asked uncomfortable questions and clearly upset someone. She got too close, which was exactly her plan. Maybe she uncovered some piece of information she hadn’t realized yet. But she would.

If someone broke in thinking they’d figure out her strategy or grab every lead she’d collected, they miscalculated. No way would she make it that easy for anyone to destroy her work or derail her.

After the first time this happened, she called the police but that led nowhere. A second call likely would end the same way. They would ignore her, write her off as the crazy one with the dead sister. Add to that her complaint wouldn’t pinpoint any clear evidence. This was about a sense of a presence, of being spooked, and she would become the new lunchtime story for the officers.

But she knew. He had been there. He or she. The person knew how to get in and was playing with her. The next time she might come home too soon.

Despite her worries and the downsides, she picked up the phone and dialed the one person who might be able to help her, the mysterious D.C. fixer. The guy no one ever saw who went by one name – Wren.

 

 

Catch Up On the Series!

The Fixer:

Kindle | Nook | iBooks | Google Play | Kobo | Avon Digital

 

The Enforcer:

Kindle | Nook | iBooks | Google Play | Kobo | Avon Digital

 

The Negotiator:

Kindle | Nook | iBooks | Google Play | Kobo | Avon Digital

 

The Pretender:

Kindle | Nook | iBooks | Google Play | Kobo | Avon Digital

 

 

 

 

About HelenKay Dimon:

HelenKay Dimon spent the years before becoming a romance author as a…divorce attorney. Not the usual transition, she knows. Good news is she now writes full time and is much happier. She has sold over forty novels and novellas to numerous publishers, including HarperCollins, Kensington, Harlequin, Penguin Random House, Riptide and Carina Press. Her nationally bestselling and award-winning books have been showcased in numerous venues and her books have twice been named “Red-Hot Reads” and excerpted in Cosmopolitan magazine. She is on the Board of Directors of the Romance Writers of America and teaches fiction writing at UC San Diego and MiraCosta College. You can learn more at her website: www.HelenKaydimon.com

Connect with HelenKay:

Twitter | FB page | Tumblr | Instagram | Pinterest

Enter HelenKay’s Giveaway:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

 

 

 

 

 

THE PROTECTOR by HelenKay Dimon – Excerpt Reveal

Today we have the excerpt blitz for The Protector by HelenKay Dimon! Check it out and preorder your copy today!

 

Title: The Protector:

Author: HelenKay Dimon

Genre Romantic Suspense

Release Date: July 31st!

 

 

About The Protector:

Salvation, Pennsylvania. The commune located in the small town was advertised as a modern Utopia: a place to live, share, and learn with other like-minded young people. Cate Pendleton’s sister was one of them. Now she’s dead—and Cate won’t rest until she finds out who killed her. Stonewalled at every turn, she approaches a DC Fixer for help and ends up with Damon Knox, a mysterious man with a secretive past. But Cate soon discovers that she not only needs Damon, she wants him, which isn’t good—for the attraction brewing between them will only lead to complications that can turn into danger . . .

 

Damon has tried to erase the hellish memories and the evil that happened in Salvation ever since he left a long time ago. Still, he can’t turn his back on Cate. As Damon works with Cate to uncover her sister’s killer, he finds himself drawn to her more and more. But how will she feel about him when she learns about his connection to the place?

 

Joining forces to uncover the truth, they must stay one step ahead of a cunning killer who’s bent on not being exposed.

 

 

Preorder Your Copy Now:

The Protector:

Kindle | Nook | iBooks | Google Play | Kobo | Avon Digital

 

Exclusive Excerpt:

 

He appreciated every inch of her, including that big brain that she didn’t hesitate to use to best him whenever possible. That was some pretty sexy shit right there.

“Are you not a meat eater? Because that’s something I should know up front.” The kind of thing Wren should put in her file. Damon didn’t think that was too much to ask.

As predicted she frowned at him. Shot him one of those you’re-wasting-time looks that she’d been using on him nonstop since they met. “Are you serious right now?”

“Because I eat a lot of burgers and if that’s going to offend you, I can eat something else. I won’t like it, but I will.” Her fidgeting must be rubbing off on him because he picked up his fork then set it down again.

She leaned across the table. “How many burgers?”

Now this was a topic he could handle. Especially since she asked the question in a soft voice, as if they were sharing a secret. “Every day.”

She sat back hard in her seat again. “You do not eat a hamburger every day.”

He ignored the horror in her voice. “True. Some days I mix it up and order a cheeseburger. If I’m feeling particularly frisky I’ll have a steak sandwich.”

“That seems like an invitation to heart disease.” And she was back to shifting around. She crossed and uncrossed her arms before she grabbed for her napkin again.

He could not stop watching her. Energy buzzed off her. He found the mix of tough talk and nervous fidgeting unexpectedly hot. “You’d think, but no.”

“I’m going to pretend you’re kidding.”

“I’m not.”

She cleared her throat. “Shauna.”

They could circle back to food because she had his attention now. He refused to joke about this topic. “Your sister.”

“She’s three years older.”

He noticed she didn’t use the past tense. Shauna died ten years ago and Cate still saw her as an “is.” For Damon, that meant treading carefully. “And you are . . . ?”

“Twenty-nine.”

He knew that answer before she said but thought keeping her to facts might help her emotionally wade through the next part. He’d helped Wren with other cases and this piece—dealing with the grief—never got easier. Damon had a load of grief and guilt of his own piled on top of hers, so he got it.

He nodded to her. “Go ahead.”

“The questions you ask don’t seem that pertinent.”

“I’m going to be honest with you.” He started to lean forward when the waiter came by and dropped off their food. The smell of grilled hamburger filled his senses as he reached for his folded napkin and threw it across his lap.

She didn’t move. “That would be a good way to start.”

“Wren already gave me a file he had on you. The man is an expert at collecting information and then making Garrett put it together in a nice big, easy-to-understand breakdown of what happened and when.”

For a few seconds she sat there, quiet, as her gaze moved over his face, studying him. “Then why are we here doing the get-to-know-you thing?”

He popped a french fry in his mouth. “I’m hungry. That happens a lot. The need-to-eat thing. So, you’ll need to get used to it.”

Catch Up On the Series!

The Fixer:

Kindle | Nook | iBooks | Google Play | Kobo | Avon Digital

 

The Enforcer:

Kindle | Nook | iBooks | Google Play | Kobo | Avon Digital

 

The Negotiator:

Kindle | Nook | iBooks | Google Play | Kobo | Avon Digital

 

The Pretender:

Kindle | Nook | iBooks | Google Play | Kobo | Avon Digital

 

 

 

 

About HelenKay Dimon:

HelenKay Dimon spent the years before becoming a romance author as a…divorce attorney. Not the usual transition, she knows. Good news is she now writes full time and is much happier. She has sold over forty novels and novellas to numerous publishers, including HarperCollins, Kensington, Harlequin, Penguin Random House, Riptide and Carina Press. Her nationally bestselling and award-winning books have been showcased in numerous venues and her books have twice been named “Red-Hot Reads” and excerpted in Cosmopolitan magazine. She is on the Board of Directors of the Romance Writers of America and teaches fiction writing at UC San Diego and MiraCosta College. You can learn more at her website: www.HelenKaydimon.com

Connect with HelenKay:

Twitter | FB page | Tumblr | Instagram | Pinterest

 

 

 

 

THE PRETENDER by HelenKay Dimon – Blog Tour

Today we have the blog tour for The Pretender by HelenKay Dimon! Check it out and get your copy today!
 
Title: The Pretender
Author: HelenKay Dimon
Genre Romantic Suspense
About The Pretender:
They say it takes a thief to catch a thief, and Harrison Tate is proof. Once a professional burglar, he now makes a lawful living tracking down stolen art. No one needs to know about his secret sideline, “liberating” artifacts acquired through underhanded methods. At least until one of those jobs sees him walking in on a murder.
Gabrielle Wright has long been estranged from her wealthy family, but she didn’t kill her sister. Trouble is, the only person who can prove it is the sexy, elusive criminal who shouldn’t have been at the island estate on that terrible night. She’s not expecting honor among thieves—or for their mutual attraction to spark into an intense inferno of desire.
Under the guise of evaluating her family’s art, Harris comes back to the estate hoping to clear Gabby’s name. But returning to the scene of the crime has never been riskier, with their hearts and lives on the line.
Get Your Copy Now:
The Pretender
Catch Up On the Series!
The Fixer
The Enforcer
The Negotiator:
About HelenKay Dimon:

HelenKay Dimon spent the years before becoming a romance author as a…divorce attorney. Not the usual transition, she knows. Good news is she now writes full time and is much happier. She has sold over forty novels and novellas to numerous publishers, including HarperCollins, Kensington, Harlequin, Penguin Random House, Riptide and Carina Press. Her nationally bestselling and award-winning books have been showcased in numerous venues and her books have twice been named “Red-Hot Reads” and excerpted in Cosmopolitan magazine. She is on the Board of Directors of the Romance Writers of America and teaches fiction writing at UC San Diego and MiraCosta College. You can learn more at her website: www.HelenKaydimon.com

Connect with HelenKay:
Enter HelenKay’s Giveaway:

 

THE PRETENDER by HelenKay Dimon – Release Day Blitz

Today we have the release day blitz for The Pretender by HelenKay Dimon! Check it out and get your copy today!
 
Title: The Pretender
Author: HelenKay Dimon
Genre Romantic Suspense
About The Pretender:
They say it takes a thief to catch a thief, and Harrison Tate is proof. Once a professional burglar, he now makes a lawful living tracking down stolen art. No one needs to know about his secret sideline, “liberating” artifacts acquired through underhanded methods. At least until one of those jobs sees him walking in on a murder.
Gabrielle Wright has long been estranged from her wealthy family, but she didn’t kill her sister. Trouble is, the only person who can prove it is the sexy, elusive criminal who shouldn’t have been at the island estate on that terrible night. She’s not expecting honor among thieves—or for their mutual attraction to spark into an intense inferno of desire.
Under the guise of evaluating her family’s art, Harris comes back to the estate hoping to clear Gabby’s name. But returning to the scene of the crime has never been riskier, with their hearts and lives on the line.
Get Your Copy Now:
The Pretender
Catch Up On the Series!
The Fixer
The Enforcer
The Negotiator:
Exclusive Excerpt:
Harrison Tate didn’t believe in luck. He believed in planning. Right now, he needed the luck.
He blinked a few times, hoping the scene in front of him would change. No body, no blood . . . nope, it was all still there.
A woman—the woman—the one who stuck to a schedule and rarely ventured outside a three-mile area. She should have been reading at the dock, as she did every nonrainy day at this time for the last three weeks. Sitting there, watching the waves lap up on the stone retaining wall that separated the Chesapeake Bay from Tabitha Island. Her private island.
He’d staked out the isolated land, this house and this woman for more than a month. Watched from a boat at one point and from the small uninhabited island a short distance away at another. He’d been able to hack into the camera on her laptop. He knew when she was working on it, which was almost always.
He’d tracked her movements, knew her schedule. But on the ride over here he’d missed seeing someone else go into her house. Someone who wanted more from her than a painting.
The longer he stood there, looming over her still body, the more he became locked in a confining shell he could not break. Less than thirty seconds had passed since he walked into the old-school library with its dark floor-to-ceiling bookshelves and massive desk positioned in front of the French doors to the small patio outside. He’d found her there, sprawled on the floor with her eyes closed and her chest not moving. Blood pooled around her and seeped into the muted gray carpet beneath her.
Just as his brain signaled to his hand to grab his cell and call for help, her eyes popped open. Stunning green. That fact registered in his mind. Next came her fear. It bounced off the walls and pummeled him. Her body shook with it.
She reached out and her fingertips brushed his pants right near his calf. She likely thought she grabbed him and pulled hard, but he barely felt the touch. Whatever energy she possessed had been spent during the furious battle that waged in the room before he got there. Glass shattered on the floor, an overturned table. Books and papers scattered everywhere.
He dropped down, balancing on the balls of his feet, and reached for her hand. He still wore his gloves but she didn’t seem to notice. She kept mouthing something. A soundless word he couldn’t make out. He leaned in with his ear right over her mouth, trying to pick up a thread or any noise but that didn’t work either.
He pulled back and looked into her eyes. They were clouded now and unfocused. “Tabitha?”
He knew her name because he made it his business to know the people from whom he planned to liberate any number of items. In her case, a specific painting that usually hung over the fireplace in this room. It balanced there now, ripped from the wall with one edge hanging over the mantel. Teetering, ready to fall. All eleven million dollars of it.
“Help me.” The words came out of her on a strangled cry. Her chest heaved as she fought for breath.
He could see her wince as she inhaled. Her hand slipped out of his as all the tension drained out of her. Her eyes rolled back then closed.
“No, no, no.” This time he started mouth-to-mouth. He blew and counted, trying to remember the precise sequence from every television show where he’d seen it performed and from a class he’d taken more than a decade ago.
Nothing worked.
He clamped down on his fight-or-flight instincts and reached for the burner cell tucked in his back pocket. He’d just hit the first button to make the call as he heard the sound. A gurgling in her throat, as if she was drowning in her own body. An openmouthed labored breath . . . then a shocking stillness. Saliva dribbled out of the corner of her mouth as her head dropped to one side.
The death rattle. Had to be. He’d never heard it before and never wanted to hear it again.
About HelenKay Dimon:

HelenKay Dimon spent the years before becoming a romance author as a…divorce attorney. Not the usual transition, she knows. Good news is she now writes full time and is much happier. She has sold over forty novels and novellas to numerous publishers, including HarperCollins, Kensington, Harlequin, Penguin Random House, Riptide and Carina Press. Her nationally bestselling and award-winning books have been showcased in numerous venues and her books have twice been named “Red-Hot Reads” and excerpted in Cosmopolitan magazine. She is on the Board of Directors of the Romance Writers of America and teaches fiction writing at UC San Diego and MiraCosta College. You can learn more at her website: www.HelenKaydimon.com

Connect with HelenKay:
Enter HelenKay’s Giveaway:

THE PRETENDER by HelenKay Dimon – Pre-Order Blitz

Today we have the pre-order blitz for The Pretender by HelenKay Dimon! Check it out and preorder your copy today!
 
Title: The Pretender
Author: HelenKay Dimon
Genre Romantic Suspense
Release Date: December 26th!
About The Pretender:
They say it takes a thief to catch a thief, and Harrison Tate is proof. Once a professional burglar, he now makes a lawful living tracking down stolen art. No one needs to know about his secret sideline, “liberating” artifacts acquired through underhanded methods. At least until one of those jobs sees him walking in on a murder.
Gabrielle Wright has long been estranged from her wealthy family, but she didn’t kill her sister. Trouble is, the only person who can prove it is the sexy, elusive criminal who shouldn’t have been at the island estate on that terrible night. She’s not expecting honor among thieves—or for their mutual attraction to spark into an intense inferno of desire.
Under the guise of evaluating her family’s art, Harris comes back to the estate hoping to clear Gabby’s name. But returning to the scene of the crime has never been riskier, with their hearts and lives on the line.
Preorder Your Copy Now:
The Pretender
Catch Up On the Series!
The Fixer
 
The Enforcer
The Negotiator:
About HelenKay Dimon:

HelenKay Dimon spent the years before becoming a romance author as a…divorce attorney. Not the usual transition, she knows. Good news is she now writes full time and is much happier. She has sold over forty novels and novellas to numerous publishers, including HarperCollins, Kensington, Harlequin, Penguin Random House, Riptide and Carina Press. Her nationally bestselling and award-winning books have been showcased in numerous venues and her books have twice been named “Red-Hot Reads” and excerpted in Cosmopolitan magazine. She is on the Board of Directors of the Romance Writers of America and teaches fiction writing at UC San Diego and MiraCosta College. You can learn more at her website: www.HelenKaydimon.com

Connect with HelenKay:

 

The Negotiator by HelenKay Dimon – Release Day Blitz

Today we have the release day blitz for The Negotiator by HelenKay Dimon! Check it out and grab your copy today!
 
Title: The Negotiator
Author: HelenKay Dimon
Genre Romantic Suspense
About The Negotiator:

Lauren Gallagher’s life changed almost three years ago. After her husband disappeared at sea, she was left with a failing pleasure boat company and more than a few secrets. Now, after years spent rebuilding the business and paying off the pile of debts, she finally feels in control. But when she finds her husband, actually dead, on the floor, she becomes the leading suspect in his murder investigation.

Garrett McGrath wants Lauren in his bed, not his heart. He doesn’t do emotions, but every time he sees her, holding himself back gets harder and harder. When Lauren comes under suspicion for killing her previously presumed-dead husband, he knows he has to help her, any way he can.

But as the danger becomes more intense and Garret and Lauren grow closer than either planned, they’re in danger of losing everything…including their hearts.

Get Your Copy Now!
The Negotiator:
 
The Fixer
The Enforcer
 
The Pretender
Exclusive Excerpt:
He rose from the dead.
Lauren Gallagher couldn’t come up with any other explanation. Her once-dead husband was very much alive and standing on the other side of her front door…and she felt nothing but numbness spreading inside her.
For a man who supposedly washed overboard in the middle of a violent storm, he looked pretty healthy. Big smile. Bright white teeth. Khaki pants and deck shoes. She forgot how much she hated the deck shoes.
The wattage on his super smile dimmed a bit as he shifted his weight from foot-to-foot and rubbed his hands up and down his arms. “Aren’t you going to let me in?”
Her mind went blank. The world literally flipped sideways on her and her stomach rolled. The whole time she could hear him talking but the words didn’t make sense. None of this made sense. She opened her mouth but nothing came out but a tiny whirling gasping sound. That’s all she could muster as she blinked, trying to process what she was seeing.
“Lauren? Why are you just standing there? Open this door.”
An order. The sharp smack in his voice sounded far too familiar. That fast it brought her crashing back to reality.
She really wanted to say no to his command. Not that she hadn’t mourned him. Even with the dysfunctional state of their faltering marriage at the time he disappeared, she had. She’d grieved for what could have been and dreams that fizzled out early in their time together. She grieved for his loss as she would an old friend, not as a person she viewed as her soulmate, if there even was such a thing.
That was less than three years ago. The police arrived and she dropped to her knees feeling sick and hollow at the idea of Carl gasping for breath as the water he loved so much overtook him.
Months had passed slowly after that. She’d been locked in a perpetual state of shock, topped off with a wallop of guilt because she’d visited a divorce attorney for the first time just before he disappeared. With him gone she’d found about the lies. His hidden debts and how he’d taken their business to the brink of bankruptcy, all while showing her fake bank statements he’d manufactured. He’d gone to a lot of trouble to carry on the ruse of pretending their finances were fine.
And then things had gotten even worse. All those whispers about Maryanne, the girlfriend who seemed to be an open secret to everyone except Lauren. The one who, unlike Lauren, did not have any debts or an unpaid mortgage or a business and house on the verge of bankruptcy. Maryanne Lightwood, the same woman who mysteriously walked out on her rent and left town right as Carl’s boat disappeared.
Lauren prided herself on being practical. She was skeptical of coincidences and not stupid, so confusion had turned to fury in record time. As the cool December wind blew in the front door of the small cottage now she realized the fury still simmered inside her.
She lived far enough from the water that the breeze wasn’t frigid, but it carried a bite. For the past few years early winter in Annapolis, Maryland meant an unwelcome amount of snow. This year had been mild. As someone who ran a pleasure boat and fishing tour business and depended on tourists, she thought she might get lucky this year and only have to survive a short off-season.
Apparently her luck had just run out.
“Lauren, honey?” Carl pulled on the handle of the screen door. When it didn’t immediately open, he shook it, rattling it on the doorframe. Still, it didn’t move.
She’d never been so grateful for her lock-the-door paranoia. He should be happy, too, because the thin screen might be all that was saving his sorry lying ass right now.
Under the numbness and shock lurked a layer of bubbling resentment and rage. She’d kept up the outward farce of being fine for so long that she’d started to believe it. Now the mask slipped. She wanted to throw open the door and pound on his chest and make him apologize for every wrong.
But Carl had never taken responsibility for anything in his life. Even now he had the nerve to stand there with a stupid look on his stupid face, as if she were the unreasonable one in not welcoming him home with a big hug. So, yeah, the door stayed closed for his protection because she knew once she unleashed she would not stop.
“Hey, what is this?” Carl’s hand dropped to his side as he frowned at her through the mesh screen. “Honey, I’m back.”
Honey? What kind of man checked out of his life for almost three years and expected to step right back in it, no questions asked? It’s as if he were empty inside, without a conscience. And he was so close to getting a kick in his junk.
“Yeah, I can see that.” She tried to swallow but couldn’t choke down the lump of anger racing up her throat. “Tell me where have you’ve been.”
“Lauren, Jesus. It’s freezing out here. Let me in.” He pulled on the handle again as if he expected a different result than last time. The door made a thumping sound as it hit against the frame. “What’s wrong with you? Snap out of it.”
He kept up that tone. Short, dismissive, demanding. The only time he hadn’t been obnoxious was during the years when she thought he was dead. Even then…
That’s all it took. Something inside her snapped and wave after wave of uncontrolled, boiling hot rage raced through her. He wasn’t the only one filled with attitude who possessed an I’m-done tone. “Where the hell have you been, Carl? You don’t contact me at all and then you just stroll up to my door. You rip my life, my work – my everything – apart and now act as if you’ve only been gone for an afternoon. What is wrong with you? What happened?”
“I was left for dead.” His surfer boy good looks faded a bit as his eyes narrowed. “Thanks in part to you.” Wherever he was he must have forgotten how locks worked because he rattled the door one more time. “Now open this.”
He was blaming her. Of course he was. She likely was as fault for the fact his hair wasn’t the same sunny blond it once was and he now had a few wrinkles at the corners of his eyes. He was forty-one, having celebrated two birthdays while he was gone. She doubted he was taking the transition out of his thirties all that well.
She’d been thirty-three and inching very close to thirty-four when he went missing and already back then he’d mentioned “hip spread” to her more than once. Hers, of course. Not his. She’d expected him to battle aging as fiercely as he’d fought to be the only one in charge of handling the bills. Now she knew why…because he hadn’t bothered to actually pay any debt with her name on it.
“You disappeared.” Right there, in that moment, she kind of wished he’d do it again and had to push back a wave of guilt that came with that realization. She’d had no idea how much hate festered inside her until he popped up again. The frowning, his ridiculous summer shoes in winter, that voice – it all worked on her nerves and it had been less than ten minutes.
“A wave hit the boat. It tipped and I went overboard.” He shrugged. “Are you satisfied now?”
Not even close. A hundred questions filled her head. “Who could be satisfied with that? What’s the rest of the story?”
His body language and easy dismissal of how his terrible choices impacted her life only made her more determined to understand what his days looked like during the last few years. Then maybe she’d let him in, but probably no.
He waved her off. “None of that matters now.”
“It does to me.” His short non-answers ticked her off even more, and she wouldn’t have said that was possible. “I deserve an explanation. A real one. All of the facts, not just pieces.”
He leaned in closer as his jaw tightened. “I said later.”
Wariness surged through her. She wasn’t afraid. No, scared wasn’t the right word. Carl had never been violent, never raised a hand or threatened her. But near the end he’d been distant and that had turned into flashes of meanness. Snide comments about how he’d married a woman but got stuck with a fisherman. Sneak attacks of blaming her that they didn’t make more money in the boating business.
So much confusion swirled around him and his stories and all that deception. She’d convinced herself he ran off with his girlfriend. Not that she ever admitted that to anyone or said the words out loud. No, there had been too much at risk.
To save her house and business she’d needed the insurance and a final judgment from the court about Carl’s fate. A confirmation that he was legally dead. She had to pretend to believe it. It had taken her almost two years to persuade the court and wrestle the business and house away from the legal No Man’s Land it landed in when he disappeared. The insurance company still had refused to pay on the claim. That meant she’d had to salvage what she could with him gone.
Now he was back, and as much as she hated it, they needed to talk. She tried even though as her brain screamed for her to slam the door. “I think we should–”
“I can’t believe you’re being a pain in the ass.”
Her head snapped back at the fury lacing through his voice. “Me?”
“Jake warned me you’d gone from grieving to stone cold in a matter of months.” Carl shook his head. “I didn’t believe it. Not after everything we’d been through.”
She lost the thread of the conversation as soon as Carl mentioned his brother. “Jake?”
“That’s where I’ll be. At his house.” Carl started to shift away from the door. “But get your act together and do it fast, Lauren. I plan on being in this house and back at work by Christmas.”
“That’s two weeks away.”
“I’ll be back tomorrow.” He made a face that suggested he was sick of her again already. “Be over your shock and ready to talk by then.”
Lauren watched Carl walk back down the path to the car parked on the street. She recognized the dark sedan. It belonged to Carl’s brother, which meant Carl went there first.
Her mind spun with questions about where he’d been and why he was back. She had no idea how he planned to explain and argue his way out of this…or why he thought he could walk back into her life now without any real explanation or sign of remorse.
A gust of cold air got her moving. She slammed the front door closed and rested her palm on it. Tried to breathe in, to think.
Her usual calm detachment abandoned her. Jumbled thoughts crashed into her brain. Panic rose in her chest, threatening to swamp her. Finding a lost husband should be a good thing. For her, it amounted to a nightmare. Her world tilted and all she wanted was to tip it right again.
Help. She never asked anyone for help. Not ever. She’d learned long ago that needing someone, depending on them, lead to heartache and disappointment. But Garrett McGrath’s face kept flashing in her mind. Sarcastic, charming, sinfully handsome Garrett. They’d met in the summer and he’d been asking her out for two months. Hanging around, texting, insisting he’d wait for her to be ready to date again.
The guy honed his Tall, Dark and Smoldering look and for some reason he’d decided to aim it full force at her. Probably had something to do with the thrill of the chase. That was the only answer she could come up with. Because once he knew her, really knew her, he’d back off. Any sane person would.
But right now, as the walls closed in and she struggled to hold onto a coherent thought, all she could do was think of his face. The dark brown hair and those big green eyes. That firm chin…and his uncanny ability to solve complex problems while making a joke and without breaking a sweat.
She glanced around her cottage. It had a beachy vibe with weathered white beadboard walls overstuffed blue furniture. It consisted of two small bedrooms, a bathroom and a joint living and eating area. Her refuge. The place she rented when she lost everything else. The same place Carl for some reason thought he had a right to live in.
She grabbed her cell off the couch and dialed the number Garrett had put in there when they first met. The phone rang and his deep voice came on the line. Voicemail.
She waited a few minutes. Gave herself a bit of a pep talk and mentally insisted she could handle this, just like she handled everything else.
Instead of leaving a message she texted him. She tried to think of the right thing to say. She went with the only words that made sense to her… You were right. Carl is not dead.
About HelenKay Dimon:

HelenKay Dimon spent the years before becoming a romance author as a…divorce attorney. Not the usual transition, she knows. Good news is she now writes full time and is much happier. She has sold over forty novels and novellas to numerous publishers, including HarperCollins, Kensington, Harlequin, Penguin Random House, Riptide and Carina Press. Her nationally bestselling and award-winning books have been showcased in numerous venues and her books have twice been named “Red-Hot Reads” and excerpted in Cosmopolitan magazine. She is on the Board of Directors of the Romance Writers of America and teaches fiction writing at UC San Diego and MiraCosta College. You can learn more at her website: www.HelenKaydimon.com

Connect with HelenKay:
Enter HelenKay’s Giveaway:

 

The Fixer by HelenKay Dimon

 

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It’s release day for The Fixer by HelenKay Dimon! This sexy romance is out now! Check out the book below and grab your copy today!

 the-fixer

About The Fixer:

He’s known only as Wren. A wealthy, dangerously secretive man, he specializes in making problems disappear. A professional fixer, Wren hides a dark past, but his privacy is shattered when Emery Finn seeks him out—and what she wants from him is very personal.

 

Some people disappear against their will. Emery’s job is to find them and bring closure. Wren is the only person who can help solve Emery’s own personal mystery: the long-ago disappearance of her cousin. Just tracking down the sexy, brooding Wren is difficult enough. Resisting her body’s response to him will prove completely impossible.

 

Anonymity is essential to Wren’s success, yet drawn by Emery’s loyalty and sensuality, he’s pulled out of the shadows. But her digging is getting noticed by the wrong people. And as the clues start to point to someone terrifyingly close, Wren will have to put his haunted past aside to protect the woman he loves.

Get your Copy Today!

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Exclusive Excerpt:

She handed him a water bottle and sat down on the opposite end on the love seat, as far from him as possible, which amounted to a half cushion away. “I wasn’t sure you’d come over when I called.”

The bottle made a crinkling noise when he grabbed on to it. “Why not?”

He didn’t mention that she’d used his emergency private number for a nonemergency, so neither did she. “You kind of ran out of here last night.”

Then she’d thought about him all night while Tyler sat there talking about his new job and the new city he loved. Emery had been happy for him, even as a part of her grumbled that it had been so easy for him to move on and never mention Tiffany.

For most of the night she’d been guilty of the same sin. As he talked, her mind switched to Wren. The sound of his voice. The way his muscles felt through his shirt. She certainly wouldn’t have won any Good Friend prize for her mental wanderings.

“You had company. Something and someone else to occupy your time.” Wren didn’t look at her as he set the unopened bottle on the coffee table.

She took in the stiffness of his shoulders and the fact he hadn’t even bothered to take off his suit jacket. He walked in and went to the couch because she told him to have a seat. Very little else had transpired except for her why-am-I-doing-this panicked race to the kitchen for water. “Don’t do that.”

He leaned back on the cushions and faced her. “What?”

Gone was the easy flow of conversation from last night and the touching. Yeah, he didn’t look even a little interested in touching, which was a damn shame. “You sound all haughty and businesslike.”

“You may have just summed up the majority of my personality.” He smiled but the gesture didn’t quite reach his eyes. It looked forced and disappeared right after it happened.

She tugged on the wrapper around her water bottle. Picked at the end until she could rip off a nice long piece. “I don’t buy that. Not anymore.”

His gaze bounced from her hands to her face. “What changed?”

“I don’t even know. Maybe it’s a sense or a hope.” Of course, neither of those explained why the air in the room was all but suffocating her.

“Ah.”

Talk about an unhelpful response. She put the bottle on the table next to his and sat back again, just inches away from him. “Does that mean you get what I’m saying?”

“Not even a little bit.”

She would have laughed at that if the tension strangling her in a bear hug would ease. “Any chance I could get you to take off your jacket? Maybe loosen that tie.”

“You still seem overly concerned with my wardrobe.” But he relaxed a little. Sank back into the cushions and rested his arm across the top.

“It’s like armor.”

His fingers tapped against the love seat. “It’s wool, I believe.”

“Now you’re being a gigantic pain in the ass, just because you can.” The guy could not take a hint. She was dying to get him out of the suit. She could pretend this had to do with wanting to know he was human and to loosen him up. Yeah, there was some of that, but this was really about wanting more from him.

 

About HelenKay Dimon:

helenkay

HelenKay Dimon spent the years before becoming a romance author as a…divorce attorney. Not the usual transition, she knows. Good news is she now writes full time and is much happier. She has sold over forty novels and novellas to numerous publishers, including HarperCollins, Kensington, Harlequin, Penguin Random House, Riptide and Carina Press. Her nationally bestselling and award-winning books have been showcased in numerous venues and her books have twice been named “Red-Hot Reads” and excerpted in Cosmopolitan magazine. She is on the Board of Directors of the Romance Writers of America and teaches fiction writing at UC San Diego and MiraCosta College. You can learn more at her website: www.HelenKaydimon.com

Connect with HelenKay:

Twitter: https://twitter.com/helenkaydimon

FB page: https://www.facebook.com/HelenKayDimon

Tumblr: http://helenkaydimon.tumblr.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hkdimon/

Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/hkdimon/

 

Enter HelenKay’s Giveaway:

 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

 

The Fixer by HelenKay Dimon

the-fier-bt-ban

Today is our stop on the pre-release tour for The Fixer by HelenKay Dimon! This sexy romance comes out on December 27th! Check out the book below and grab your copy today!

 the-fixer

About The Fixer:

He’s known only as Wren. A wealthy, dangerously secretive man, he specializes in making problems disappear. A professional fixer, Wren hides a dark past, but his privacy is shattered when Emery Finn seeks him out—and what she wants from him is very personal.

 

Some people disappear against their will. Emery’s job is to find them and bring closure. Wren is the only person who can help solve Emery’s own personal mystery: the long-ago disappearance of her cousin. Just tracking down the sexy, brooding Wren is difficult enough. Resisting her body’s response to him will prove completely impossible.

 

Anonymity is essential to Wren’s success, yet drawn by Emery’s loyalty and sensuality, he’s pulled out of the shadows. But her digging is getting noticed by the wrong people. And as the clues start to point to someone terrifyingly close, Wren will have to put his haunted past aside to protect the woman he loves.

Get your Copy Today!

Amazon | BN

 

 

About HelenKay Dimon:

helenkay

HelenKay Dimon spent the years before becoming a romance author as a…divorce attorney. Not the usual transition, she knows. Good news is she now writes full time and is much happier. She has sold over forty novels and novellas to numerous publishers, including HarperCollins, Kensington, Harlequin, Penguin Random House, Riptide and Carina Press. Her nationally bestselling and award-winning books have been showcased in numerous venues and her books have twice been named “Red-Hot Reads” and excerpted in Cosmopolitan magazine. She is on the Board of Directors of the Romance Writers of America and teaches fiction writing at UC San Diego and MiraCosta College. You can learn more at her website: www.HelenKaydimon.com

Connect with HelenKay:

Twitter: https://twitter.com/helenkaydimon

FB page: https://www.facebook.com/HelenKayDimon

Tumblr: http://helenkaydimon.tumblr.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hkdimon/

Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/hkdimon/

 

Enter HelenKay’s Giveaway:
a Rafflecopter giveaway

 

 


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