A Pride of Brothers: Rick | Judith Sterling

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A Pride of Brothers: Aiden, A Pride of Brothers: Rick, award-nominated, contemporary romance, cover reveal, Peggy Jaeger, romance series, The Wild Rose Press

Behold the cover of Peggy Jaeger’s upcoming release, A Pride of Brothers: Aiden! It’s the second book in the series; the first, whose hero is Rick, is nominated for a RONE award. (Best of luck, Peg!)

Here’s the scoop on Aiden’s story:

Lexi Buckley wants answers about her younger sister’s death. The police have labeled it a suicide, but Lexi doesn’t believe it. Stymied in her investigation, she doesn’t know where to turn next. After a chance encounter with a private investigator, she thinks her prayers have been answered.

Aiden Keane has never been an answer to a prayer before, but he agrees to help Lexi. A quirky combo of brains and beauty, the pixie blonde makes him feel things no professional ever should for a client. When their investigation puts Lexi’s life in jeopardy, her safety becomes his number one priority. The hard part is not falling for her.

A peek between the pages:

Were you close with your sister?” Aiden asked.

Not the way we should have been. Not at the end.

“We had a sizable age difference between us. Almost ten years. I was the big sis. The oldest.” Her lips trembled when she pulled them into a sad line. Rolling her eyes she added, “The bossy one, according to her. She was the baby and took full advantage of her status from the moment she realized it.”

“And rightly so.” The corners of his eyes crinkled. “I’m the youngest of my brothers and I’ll can tell you with one hundred percent honesty, my oldest brother is the bossiest one of us. I think it comes with birth order. Although he takes his so called right uber-seriously. Especially at work.”

This time her grin was steadier. “What kind of business do you all own together?”

“We a run a private security company.”

“Security?”

“Personal bodyguards, if a client needs protection from something. Background checks for employers. Mostly we do investigations.”

“What, like private eyes? Like on television?”

He laughed. “Nothing so glamorous. The fast cars and hot babes are all fantasy. It’s a lot of boring research, computer work, and surveillance, but yeah, you could say I’m a private eye.”

Lexi’s entire mood turned on his words. The sorrow flew, the hurt dissolved. Even her nervous trivia-speak went dormant. She sat bolt upright, her knees bumping against the tabletop when she shifted. Excitement shot from her system as she turned her body, placed a hand across his forearm and declared, “Oh, my God. You’re the answer to my prayers.”

Sounds like a great read, and the cover really sets the mood. No buy links yet, but you can find the first book in the series here.

Connect with Peggy:

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Wishing Peggy all the best with her forthcoming release, and wishing you a lovely June!

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A Pride of Brothers: Rick, contemporary romance, Cooking with Kandy, guest post, Judith Sterling, New England authors, Peggy Jaeger, The Wild Rose Press, Will Cook for Love

I’m thrilled to welcome sister Rose (published by the Wild Rose Press) Peggy Jaeger back to my blog! She’s written a lovely guest post about Abigail Lane, the heroine in her upcoming release, A Pride of Brothers: Rick. Take it away, Peggy!

Lawyer Abby Laine made an appearance in my first WILL COOK FOR LOVE series book COOKING WITH KANDY. Abby is the second oldest of the Laine girls (right behind Kandy) and when we meet her in the first book she is working as a paralegal in a law firm and attending law school at night.

Abby’s backstory is a deep one. Her father left the family after multiple affairs when Abby was a child. His defection impacted her greatly because she saw what it did to her mother emotionally and to the family financially. Left with no means of support and with nothing but a high school education, Abby’s mother, Hannah, had to work 3 jobs to support herself and her 7 girls, and the family was forced to live with Hannah’s parents. Abby saw the way her mother was treated by her father – dumped and discarded – and by society – an uneducated, unskilled woman – and vowed to never allow herself to be treated so horribly by anyone. She was determined to be self sufficient and financially sound, get a good education and be successful.

Since she was the second oldest, she and Kandy were tasked with taking care of the younger girls while Hannah worked, and it instilled a great sense of family obligation in her. She loves her sisters, there is no doubt of that, but she never really got to be a kid. Assuming adult responsibilities at such a tender age left no room for friends, outside the home activates, or anything fun related.

When we meet Abby in A PRIDE OF BROTHERS: RICK she is confronted by the angry abusive husband of one of her clients in her office while Kandy is visiting. Abby stands up to him and when he threatens her, has him arrested. The fact that her sister deals with such violent people in her practice scares Kandy, and she asks her Private Investigator/Bodyguard husband to place someone in Abby’s office as protection. Abby, of course, refuses the help.

When Rick Bannerman, Josh’s partner, hears about what happened, he wants to help protect Abby. The two of them have a subtle history that ended when he walked away from her after they shared a hot kiss 4 years ago. Abby has always had a thing for Rick, but his dismissal hurt, so she has kept her distance from him, despite the fact that their families are together a great deal.

Abby has a three-legged cat, adopted from a shelter, and whom no one wanted because she wasn’t deemed “perfect.” In her cat, Abby saw a kindred spirit and it was love at first sight. Despite the hardened, take no prisoners personality Abby shows the world, she is truly a softie at heart and wants nothing more than to be loved for the person she is.

A peek between the pages:

“Right there.” She aimed her fork at him as if it were a spear. “Perfect example. You know I hate being called Abigail. I’ve lost count of the hundreds of times I’ve told you and you still do it, knowing it pisses me off. And”—she cut him off before he could speak— “your usual response is to lift your hands and say ‘and still’ when you’re called on it. Who does that? What kind of person persistently and purposefully annoys people?”

“So you’re saying I’m intentionally annoying?”

“Persistently, so. Yes. Makes the lawyer in me wonder why.”

Just the lawyer? “Any answers come to mind?”

“Plenty.”

“Care to share?”

She placed her fork down next to her plate and regarded him across the table. “You really want to hear this? Because if you know anything about me, you know I’m truthful. I don’t hold back.”

Oh, he was sure she didn’t. And wouldn’t. Her tenacity was one of the things he’d first been drawn to.

That and her fabulous ass.

“I’m a big boy,” he said with a grin. “I can take it.

She took a sip of water first, her eyes trained on him the entire time. “Okay. If you really want to hear this.”

He waved his hand for her to continue.

“I think you use your cocky, aren’t-I-simply-too-witty attitude to keep people at a distance.”

Buy the book:

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More about Peggy:

Peggy Jaeger is a contemporary romance writer who writes Romantic Comedies about strong women, the families who support them, and the men who can’t live without them. If she can make you cry on one page and bring you out of tears rolling with laughter the next, she’s done her job as a writer!

Family and food play huge roles in Peggy’s stories because she believes there is nothing that holds a family structure together like sharing a meal…or two…or ten. Dotted with humor and characters that are as real as they are loving, she brings all topics of daily life into her stories: life, death, sibling rivalry, illness and the desire for everyone to find their own happily ever after. Growing up the only child of divorced parents she longed for sisters, brothers and a family that vowed to stick together no matter what came their way. Through her books, she’s created the families she wanted as that lonely child.

When she’s not writing Peggy is usually painting, crafting, scrapbooking or decoupaging old steamer trunks she finds at rummage stores and garage sales.

A lifelong and avid romance reader and writer, Peggy is a member of RWA and her local New Hampshire RWA Chapter.

As a lifelong diarist, she caught the blogging bug early on, and you can visit her at peggyjaeger.com where she blogs daily about life, writing, and stuff that makes her go “What??!”