So pleased to have fellow Decadent Publishing author Alexa Bourne with me today, for the last stop on her LIAR, LIAR tour. She's doing an interview with her heroine! Take it away, Lexi!
Thank you to Taryn for inviting me for a visit! I’m so excited to share my romantic suspense, LIAR, LIAR, with you…and the kick-ass heroine, Devin. She’s agreed to do an interview with me today.
Alexa: Thanks for visiting, Devin.
Devin: I’m happy to do it. Grady told me how easy-going his interview with you was…except for the questions about his brother. You know how he feels about Scott.
Alexa: Yeah. I probably shouldn’t have even brought him up. Let’s get to you. Tell everyone what your job is.
Devin: I’m what you’d call an assistant. I help women and children who are in abusive situations to get to safety and a new life. I have a business called Soul Survivors.
Alexa: I hear you also tread the line between legal and illegal pretty often.
Devin: Wow. You don’t waste any time, do you? Technically I stay on the legal side.
Alexa: But…
Devin: Let’s put it this way. My main goal is keeping my clients safe and I’ll do whatever is necessary to make sure that happens.
Alexa: Fair enough. How’d you get involved with this line of work?
Devin: I had a rough childhood filled with harsh words, heavy hands and blood.
Alexa: Let’s talk more about your family.
Devin: It’s just me and my mom. We’re pretty close even now.
Alexa: What happened with your father?
Devin: (giving me the evil eye) He’s not in the picture and you know damn well why. Move on.
Alexa: Oooookay. Let’s talk about Grady. (Devin smiles.) What was your first impression of him?
Devin: He was obnoxious, self-centered and had stunning blue eyes.
Alexa: What changed your opinion through your story?
Devin: He was still all those things to some degree, but from the start he protected me. He may not have agreed with me or my work or how I handled myself, but he was always conscious of whether I was all right or not.
Alexa: What made you stay around during the story?
Devin: Besides trying to keep my client out of jail? Grady claimed to only care about getting his job done, but he did listen. He may not have agreed or understood me and why I did things the way I did, but he always seemed curious. Also, he was a big, tough guy, which I had always associated with the men I protect women from, but through his actions I started to realize there are good guys in the world. (Her smile grows bigger.) Soon you let me find out how good.
Alexa: So you think I made the right choice putting Grady with you?
Devin: He may be a big kid with a big mouth sometimes and as stubborn as a mule, but I’m very happy he’s all mine. (She stands.) Speaking of which, I’ve got some plans with him. (She heads toward the door.)
Alexa: He didn’t mention anything about getting together when I came to get you.
Devin: Well, let’s just say they’re an afternoon surprise with the love of my life. (She turns around, with a wicked grin and a gleam in her eye.) If you need either of us over the next twelve hours, don’t call. We’ll be…busy and I’m pretty sure we’ll be too tired to answer the phone.
Alexa: Got it. Thanks to Devin for hanging out with me and thank you, blog readers, for sticking with us.
Blurb:
Unable to protect her mother from
her father as a child, Devin McQueen has made it her mission as an adult to
protect as many abused women and children as she can. The rare moments she’s
not consumed with work as a victims’ advocate, she limits her involvements to
safe, predictable men….until she meets bounty hunter Grady Cooper. He is big,
bold, brash, and has no problem speaking his mind.
Growing up in a broken home, Grady
realized early on that good deeds had a price. To survive, he learned to
weigh every decision by what he could gain.
Unfortunately, the successful, solitary life he’s worked so hard to create
spins out of control when demons from his past shake his confidence. His
boss has given him one last chance—bring in Devin’s latest client quickly, and
quietly and maybe he’ll still have a job. It didn’t sound unreasonable until he
met Devin.
Suddenly, Grady must make a
decision: save his career or follow his heart?
Excerpt:
If
Grady Cooper had any hope of salvaging his professional reputation, he needed
to charm Devin McQueen into giving him what she’d never given any other man.
He
tucked his keys into his cargo shorts, stared up at the five-story office
building and cursed the humidity.
And
his dilemma.
Needing
anyone was bad enough. Being forced to rely on a complete stranger to help
prove he wasn’t a menace to society was as appealing as the Red Sox using his
head for batting practice. If she refused to help him, he’d lose his job
for sure.
“That’s
not going to happen,” he whispered. He’d do whatever he had to, promise her the
world even, to get himself out of this mess and restore his reputation. By the
time she realized he had no intention of honoring his pledge, he’d be a free
man and he could get back to chasing the bad guys instead of being labeled one.
Whatever
it took.
He
pushed the glass door open and flew up the stairs two at a time to the third
floor. As he walked down the hallway, he glanced at the business names on the
doors: law offices, non-profit offices, save the bleeding heart offices. Rooms
of people he’d probably chased a bail jumper for at one time or another.
Loud
thumps filtered into the hallway from somewhere up ahead.
The
hairs on the back of his neck stood up. Trade rule number one: Always expect
the worst. Still, the noises could have been any number of things: a fallen
chair, a muffled voicemail message, boxes of printer paper being dropped. It
could have been nothing connected to this woman.
As
he got closer to the door with Soul Survivors carved on it, the name of
McQueen’s business, the noises got louder. Glass shattered. A series of thumps
passed from behind the door. A woman’s voice flew through the walls like a
high-pitched war cry.
What
if someone wanted Devin McQueen even more than Grady did?
Too
bad. He had to put his own needs first.
Adrenaline
pushed him. He turned the doorknob.
Damn
it. Locked.
He
shoved his shoulder against the wooden door. It budged. Barely. Inside, more
glass broke. A male voice growled through a string of swear words.
Whoever
stood on the other side of this door could not have her.
Grady
gritted his teeth and jammed his shoulder against the door again. This time, it
flew open and hurled him into the office.
Silence
reigned across the room. With his shoulder throbbing, he scanned the scene. One
upended chair, one thug cradling his nuts, the other, older one, bleeding from
his nose and one wild-eyed woman in the center of it all. The bleeding man had
his arms wrapped around the woman’s chest, crushing her…assets under his
forearms.
Grady bit back a grin. If this was Devin
McQueen, then some of the rumors were true. She could hold her own. But
now she didn’t need to. “What’s the matter, guys? Couldn’t find anyone your own
size to pick on?”
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Alexa Bourne is a teacher by day and a romance writer by nights, weekends, and all school holidays. She also teaches online classes for writers throughout the year. She writes romantic suspense and contemporary romance and is thrilled to have the chance to share her stories with readers everywhere.
When she’s not concocting sinister plots and steamy love scenes or traveling and exploring new cultures, Alexa spends her time reading, watching brainless TV, and thinking about exercising. Okay, she also spends way too much time interacting with readers and writers on social media sites. But don’t tell her editors! Find out more about her and her books on her website, www.alexabourne.com.
Today is the LAST DAY of Alexa's LIAR, LIAR Blog Tour! Tweet about the tour and share the details on Facebook. For each comment you make (or tweet or Facebook post) on any of the posts, you’ll move closer to winning one of three great prizes!
alexa@alexabourne.com