The Avid Book Collector: Entangle

Get ready for Boiling Point! The next installment in Tessa Bailey's thrilling Crossing the Line series. We hope you love the cover as much as we do!

Release date: January 26, 2016

About Boiling Point:

Falling for a con man is the most dangerous game of all...

Con artist Austin Shaw's been in disguise so long he's not sure where his fake identities end and he begins. Now that he's been strong-armed into working for a specialized undercover unit working with the Chicago police—criminals with unique “skills”—the last thing he needs is to risk his iron control. Especially when it comes to a certain stunningly sexy hacker who tempts him with every look of disdain.

Polly Banks will never, ever trust a con man. On the trail of a ruthless crook who destroyed the only family she's ever known, Polly is unnerved by the shadow who follows her every move. The one who makes her pulse pound and breath short with lust. Austin. He's infuriating, enigmatic, and pure sex appeal, and she's determined to resist him.

But an untrustworthy man of disguise can become anyone he wants...including a man that Polly must trust if she's to escape their dangerous game alive.

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Cover

About Tessa Bailey:

Tessa Bailey is originally from Carlsbad, California. The day after high school graduation, she packed her yearbook, ripped jeans and laptop, driving cross-country to New York City in under four days.

Her most valuable life experiences were learned thereafter while waitressing at K-Dees, a Manhattan pub owned by her uncle. Inside those four walls, she met her husband, best friend and discovered the magic of classic rock, managing to put herself through Kingsborough Community College and the English program at Pace University at the same time. Several stunted attempts to enter the work force as a journalist followed, but romance writing continued to demand her attention.

She now lives in Brooklyn, New York with her husband of seven years and three-year-old daughter. Although she is severely sleep-deprived, she is incredibly happy to be living her dream of writing about people falling in love.

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Entangle

by Veronica Larsen

BLURB

Don’t judge me for what I’m about to say. I tried to do things the right way. I wore the big white dress and rode off with Prince Charming. Then Charming changed his mind. See, that’s the part they don’t tell you; he can change his mind. These days, I don’t put my heart in anyone’s hands because I don’t even know where I’ve left it.

Enter Leo. Blue-eyed specimen of a man, stirring me awake in ways I never thought possible. I think I should indulge myself for once. Because one time is all I need. Then he goes and weaves simple, deliberate movements into pure, gilded pleasure. And I’m hooked. I’m so blinded by desire I barely notice the gaping hole opening underneath me, the one that’s sure to swallow me entirely. Because every time I’ve dared to get close to someone, they’ve cracked me wide open.

Why should this time be any different?

Excerpt

I don’t say anything. We fall into a warm silence, listening to the muffled sounds of the road. I guess I doze off to sleep at some point, because the next thing I know, I’m jolting awake.

Leo turns off the engine. I squint, a number of things coming to me at once. I don’t recognize our surroundings. We are parked in an empty lot but I hear the occasional car swooping past a nearby road. The windows are cracked open and the air that drifts in smells of cool saltwater. But there’s something else, too. I look down at the cup holders.

“Oh my God, is that coffee?” I ask.

“Yes, ma’am.”

The rich roasted scent envelops me and nearly lifts me from my seat. My mouth instantly waters as I snatch up the cup and press my lips to the opening to taste the scent.

“You’re amazing. Thank you.” I drink some and shut my eyes as the taste explodes on my tongue. Before Leo, coffee was my drug of choice. I examine the embellishment on the cup. “Starbucks? Where’d you find one open this late?”

“Found an all-night drive-thru,” he says, pulling open his car door. “Come on, those weren’t meant to be drank in the car.”

By the time he comes around to my side, I’m already out. I look around the empty lot and start piecing together our location. We’re by the ocean; Torrey Pines beach is down the hill.

Leo must notice the realization dawn on me because he says, “I hope you don’t have objections to sand in your shoes.”

This feels like a date. I know I said no dates, but this feels so right that I forget to be stubborn about it. Because the moon disarms me with its pearly glow, peering through the overcast sky. The ocean conspires as well, luring me in with the faint but discernible soundtrack of crashing waves. I’m instantly at ease. I forget that I’m tired and a bit sad. The cool breeze has a slight bite to it, enough to stir my senses awake.

“Leo—Thank you. I needed this.”

His lips twist up when I say that.

“Don’t thank me yet.”

His kiss takes me by surprise. I nearly drop the coffee but he wraps a hand around the cup and places it somewhere overhead. On the top of the car, I think. He does it without breaking our kiss. Our hands free, he tastes me like it’s the first time and he’s burning from the inside out with a craving to know what lays beneath my clothes. He’s grazing, pulling, tasting, breathing me in. I’m sure he could take me right where we stand, against his car.

I’m breathless when he pulls away; the breeze swoops in between us and tinges my swollen lips. He grabs his cup of coffee from behind me and hands me my own.

“Come on,” he says, and he guides me hand in hand toward the beach.

Author Bio

Veronica Larsen is a novelist who enjoys writing emotionally rousing stories laced with potent sexuality. She particularly enjoys writing about intelligent and independent women who give the male lead a run for their money. When Veronica isn’t writing, she is working on graphic design projects. She enjoys losing herself in a good book and spending time with her husband and young son.

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