**The Right to Remain Silent by Anya Summers**
Good Morning,
Everyone! So thrilled to see you all today! I have yet another new to me author
and book to tell you about today! Yay! Please allow me to introduce to the
blog, Anya Summers and her release THE RIGHT TO REMAIN SILENT …
**ANYA SUMMERS**
**BIO**
Born in
St. Louis, Missouri, Anya grew up listening to Cardinals baseball
and reading anything she could get her hands on. She remembers her
mother saying if only she would read the right type of books instead
binging her way through the romance aisles at the bookstore, she’d
have been a doctor. While Anya never did get that doctorate, she graduated
cum laude from the University of Missouri-St. Louis with an M.A. in
History.
Anya is a bestselling and award-winning author published in multiple fiction genres. She also writes urban fantasy, paranormal romance, and contemporary romance under the name Maggie Mae Gallagher. A total geek at her core, when she is not writing, she adores attending the latest comic con or spending time with her family. She currently lives in the Midwest with her two furry felines.
Anya is a bestselling and award-winning author published in multiple fiction genres. She also writes urban fantasy, paranormal romance, and contemporary romance under the name Maggie Mae Gallagher. A total geek at her core, when she is not writing, she adores attending the latest comic con or spending time with her family. She currently lives in the Midwest with her two furry felines.
To find out more about Ms. Summers, please
visit:
**THE RIGHT TO REMAIN
SILENT**
Publication
date:
April 23, 2020
Series:
Crescent City Kings #3
Genres: Adult, Contemporary, Romamce
Genres: Adult, Contemporary, Romamce
**BLURB**
He never expects to find her there…
Officer
Quinten Blackthorne is working undercover to bring the Rudnikov Mob Empire to
its knees. He never expects to find his best friend’s baby sister, Becca, in
the center of a powder keg situation at the infamous mobster’s home. With her
life on the line, he does the only thing he can think of to save her – he
pretends that she’s his fiancée, who knows nothing of his clandestine
activities with the criminal enterprise, and stands as her stalwart protector.
Forced into marriage…
But
Quinten never expects the mob boss to force them into marriage at gunpoint as a
test of loyalty. Not to mention, the idea of her belonging to him isn’t
unappealing, nor is he as averse to the prospect as he lets on. Becca, with her
sweet curves and take no prisoners attitude, fascinates him, stirs him, and
leaves him craving her submission. Yet his past is fraught with broken dreams
and death, so he uses his friendship with her brother as a shield against his
yearning to claim her as his own.
Resistance is futile…
However,
circumstances soon compel Becca and Quinten to become the most unlikely allies
in a deadly game of deception. Now they must depend on one another for
survival. As they race to unlock the keys to breaking the case, will Quinten be
able to maintain his hands-off policy with Becca? Or will he surrender to the
earth-shattering passion and turn their marriage of convenience into the real
deal?
Publisher’s
Note: This steamy friends to lovers romance contains elements of power
exchange. While it’s the third in the Crescent City Kings series, it can be
enjoyed independently.
**EXCERPT**
Becca searched for a potential exit. Guards
were stationed in groups of two at doorways and stairwells, each guy more
terrifying than the next, with hard faces that probably wouldn’t blink if she
was shot dead where she stood. The further into the mansion she trod, the more
Becca felt like she was heading to her own funeral. Bile threatened in the back
of her throat. She hated that a part of her was impressed by the interior of
the home because of the artwork on display. The paintings and sculptures were
museum quality. If she wasn’t mistaken, they passed an original Renoir.
The heels of Becca’s black leather
boots clicked against the hardwood flooring. Her heart thumped in time with
those clicks, like a ticking clock winding down to zero. Konrad and company
ushered her up a grand staircase that made the one in Gone with the Wind
look cheap and insignificant. At the top, they steered her to the right, down a
wide hall with glossy hardwood floors and high ceilings.
When they reached the end of the hall,
the two henchmen who had joined them opened a pair of double doors that must
have belonged to a Buddhist temple at one time. Becca’s clasped hands shook as
she entered what amounted to a sitting room parlor with an enormous ivory
marble hearth. The fire inside intended to ward off the chilly night couldn’t
make the cold terror in her bones dissipate. Every piece of furniture and décor
in the parlor spoke of wealth. There was a Louis XIV desk in one corner. But
the room held all the warmth of a mausoleum.
“Have a seat. The boss will be with you
shortly,” Konrad indicated in a bullish tone and pointed toward the chocolate
Chesterfield sofas while his buddies shut the doors with a resounding thud and
sealed them all inside. Sealed Becca inside. She assessed the room.
Floor-to-ceiling inlaid shelves held first editions behind panes of glass.
There was a vase on a pedestal that looked to be from the Ming Dynasty, or was
at least an excellent reproduction. She studied her surroundings for a
potential avenue of escape. The only way out would be to jump from the large
crenelated windows. Two stories up, she could break something—like her neck.
Only three guards were present in the room, odds that weren’t great, but left
her a fighting chance.
Konrad shifted his hand to the butt of
his gun until she finally complied with his order. Even if she escaped past
Konrad and his two buddies, jumped out the window and didn’t break anything
when she landed, the boatload of guards stationed over the grounds were far too
numerous to outrun. The odds were not in her favor in making it to the gate and
beyond for help.
Becca said a silent prayer at the
echoing clomp of multiple footsteps approaching. Her anxiety ratcheted up to
cataclysmic levels.
The double doors swung inward. Becca
wasn’t sure what she’d been expecting, but it wasn’t a relatively trim man with
salt and pepper hair, dressed in gray tweed slacks and a button up navy
cardigan sweater over his ivory dress shirt. He looked much more like a history
professor than a criminal mastermind—at least, until you looked into his eyes.
They were cold, devoid of any humanity or warmth, and calculating. Rudnikov
assessed her from head to toe as she rose. That stare made her feel
underdressed in her jeans and Kelly-green chenille sweater. A sense of
helplessness invaded her soul. The uncertainty infused by doubt that she would
live through the next hour.
Rudnikov didn’t travel alone. He had
four of his paid thugs guarding him. Becca skimmed her gaze over them. They
were all similar in manner and form to Konrad, as if they had come off an
assembly line. But it was the last man her gaze landed on who brought her up
short. She kept her jaw from dropping to the floor, but just barely.
Quinten Blackthorne was a member of
Anton Rudnikov’s mob team? What the hell?
Not six weeks ago, she’d danced with
the man at her brother’s wedding. Quinten was an officer with the New Orleans
Police Department and one of her brother’s best friends. He’d been a groomsman
in the wedding party, and had looked downright sinful in his tux, like a dark
prince of the underworld.
Why was he here? What was he doing with
Rudnikov?
Tonight, Quinten wore a charcoal gray
suit, almost identical to the rest of the crime lord’s hired goons. Shock
flitted through his warm cognac eyes the moment his gazed landed on her. The
man was mister badass personified. The utter confidence Quinten exuded in his
pinky made the hired goons look laughable at best in their attempts to seem
imposing. He was the alpha of alphas, top of the food chain, and he knew it.
The suit, combined with the ivory dress shirt, was unbuttoned at the neck and
stretched over muscles that should be indecent. Becca knew that from
experience. The night of the wedding, as he’d held her on the dance floor,
she’d had the good fortune to feel those muscles flex beneath her hands. The
man was ripped, and solid as a tank. He wore his hair, black as midnight, in a
military style cut. And he had one of those masculine faces that tended to have
perpetual dark stubble which, combined with his strong angular jaw, full lips,
and dark slash of eyebrows, only served to make him hotter. As in: five alarm
fire, panties have disintegrated into ash, and a woman was ready and willing to
do whatever the man wanted.
“Miss O’Malley, a pleasure to meet you.
I thank you for coming to meet with me on such short notice. I’m Anton
Rudnikov. My associate, Sasha, speaks highly of you and your gallery. I admit,
I’ve not had the chance to attend one of your showings, but I am impressed with
your use of color in your art,” Anton Rudnikov stated with a friendliness that
belied the underlying air of hostility in the room.
“Thank you, Mister Rudnikov. You have a
lovely home with some rather spectacular artwork. If I’m not mistaken, you have
an original Renoir in your entryway.” Becca redirected her attention to the mob
boss. She shook his hand, hoping she was hiding the dread coursing through her.
“You’ve got a good eye. If we had more
time, I would give you a tour,” Rudnikov said with a frigid smile that didn’t
reach his eyes. Did that mean her time was running out?
Quinten marched up beside Rudnikov,
directing a scowl her way. His fury was evident; he glowered, apparently angry
that she was there. Well, that made two of them. Becca wasn’t thrilled about
the fact either. But he held her gaze, trying to impart some indistinct meaning
that went straight over her stunned head. If she were being fanciful, she would
have said he was pleading with her.
Quinten beg someone? Yeah, right.
She imagined even the Hell’s Angels
motorcycle gang moved out of Quinten’s way when he approached. In front of the
entire crime entourage, he snarled, “What the fuck are you doing here, Becca?”
Rudnikov glanced between them,
speculative interest and suspicion in his dead gaze. “You two know each other,
Quinten?”
Quinten grabbed her hand and squeezed
her fingers. Hard. Like he was trying to pass along a meaning that she still
didn’t understand—mainly because her entire day had taken on a weird damn Twilight
Zone bent, with danger and betrayal filtering in through every crack.
Quinten, with her hand still gripped in his much larger one, turned to Rudnikov
and said, “Yes, we do know each other. She’s my fiancée, sir. She doesn’t know
that I work for you.”
At the pressure on her hand, and
Quinten’s declaration, Becca stared at Quinten like he had gone mad. Fiancée?
What the hell? What was the man playing at?
“Is that a fact? I don’t see a ring on
her hand,” Rudnikov replied, his face an inscrutable mask.
That was it. They were dead. Her story
would end, here, now, holding Quinten’s hand. On the bright side, Becca
thought, she wouldn’t die alone. Tension oozed in the room. She’d frozen and
even forgot to breathe. The guards had their hands in position against their
firearms. Becca prayed she wouldn’t pass out or pee in her pants in terror.
“That’s because she’s miffed with me.
We had a fight the other night and she took it off. But she loves me.” Quinten
stared down at her from his six foot plus height, his cognac gaze imparting a play
along message while he pretended to be a man besotted.
Becca didn’t understand—any of it. Not
why Sasha had betrayed her trust, or whether Quinten was a dirty cop and only
coming to her rescue because he was friends with her brother, or whether the
mob boss intended to let her walk out of his house alive.
“Is this true, Miss O’Malley?” Rudnikov
asked like he was daring her to dispute Quinten’s outlandish claim.
Pain shot up her arm from her hand as
Quinten squeezed. Becca tried to keep her expression serene. Doubt shrouded
Rudnikov’s hard glare. Better to have the crime boss believe she was with
Quinten than alone and at his mercy. With a silent prayer, she tossed her lot
in with the devil she knew. “It’s true, Mister Rudnikov. I’m engaged to the big
lug—for now, at least.”
“And why just for now?” Rudnikov’s
stare made her want to squirm. But she held it together—barely. Staring
Rudnikov in his eyes the color of mahogany, Becca knew what it was like to
stare evil in the face. The man would have no qualms about ending her life,
right here, right now. The bastard wouldn’t even flinch at the blood spilled in
his ornate sitting room.
“Because the blasted man keeps dragging
his heels. Any time I try to set a date, he gives me the runaround. He’s the
one who proposed and made me all insane with wanting the whole fairytale
wedding deal. It’s almost like he doesn’t want to marry me, and I took the ring
off until he’s willing to set a date. And why didn’t you tell me about all
this, sweetie?” She glanced at Quinten and found approval there.
Rudnikov chuckled and said in a
deprecating manner, “Because business is the providence of men, Miss O’Malley…
and to show that there are no hard feelings, I will help you young lovebirds
out. I can’t have one of my men breaking a vow with my newest business
associate, now can I? You’ll marry. Tonight, in fact. Robbie, call Father
Vincent. Ask him to be here within the hour to perform a marriage ceremony.”
“But, but… I don’t think—” Becca
sputtered. Marry Quinten? Was Rudnikov serious?
Quinten’s hold on her hand tightened
even more. She wondered if she would have any bones left before the night was
over, or if they would crack into jagged pieces. Quinten protested, “Sir,
that’s a generous offer. But she wants a big church wedding and I don’t—”
Rudnikov waved him off. “Nonsense. It
will happen tonight. You can always do the fancy wedding later.”
Becca opened her mouth to refuse but
shut it again at Rudnikov’s piercing glare. In the game of chicken, he had
called their bluff and was waiting to strike. Becca moved closer to Quinten,
choosing her side.
Buy Links
**GIVEAWAY**
Blitz-wide giveaway (INT)
$25 Amazon Gift
Card
Thanks so much for joining us today!
HAPPY READING!!!
No comments:
Post a Comment
I lurve comments! Say whatever is on your mind; just keep it respectful. I am always game for a conversation. :)