Hey lovelies! It gives me
great pleasure today to host Peggy Jaeger and her new book, “Can’t Stand the
Heat”! For other stops on her Goddess
Fish Promotions Book Tour, please click on the banner above or any of the
images in this post.
Be sure to make it to the end
of this post to enter to win a $50 Amazon or Barnes and Noble Gift Card!!! Also, come back daily to interact with Peggy
and to increase your chances of winning!
Thanks for stopping
by! Wishing you lots of luck in this
fabulous giveaway!
Can’t Stand the Heat
by Peggy Jaeger
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GENRE: Contemporary Romance
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BLURB:
With
three successful TV series under her belt, including her cousin Kandy’s,
executive producer Stacy Peters is ready to helm her own show. But to make that
happen, she has to do her network boss one favor first—spend two months on a
ranch in Montana wrangling the notoriously difficult director of Beef Battles.
Apparently, he eats producers for breakfast. Yet all Stacy can think when she
meets the lean, rugged man is how hungry he makes her…
Dominic
Stamp—Nikko to his very few friends—has had enough interference from TV
newbies. And when Stacy climbs out of the car in Montana, he’s not convinced
she’s even old enough to drive, much less produce his show. But he can’t deny
that the long-legged blonde with the stubborn will and the dazzling smile whets
his appetite. And as Stacy proves her talent with the crew and the budget
alike, Nikko vows to prove to her that love is on the menu for both of them.
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EXCERPT TWO:
When
Dan Roth caught her eye and grinned widely behind his costar’s back, Stacy
lowered her head and bit down on the inside of her lip. If she hadn’t been
looking down she would have noticed Nikko stop. But she hadn’t been looking
where she was going and, subsequently, barreled right into him.
She
would have ricocheted back and fallen from connecting with the solid wall of
his chest as she hit if he hadn’t thrust his hands forward and grabbed her
upper arms to prevent it.
Like
a blast from a stun gun—quick, sharp and penetrating—she felt the heat of his
touch burn through her blouse and sear straight through her skin.
Numbed,
she dropped her tablet, her hands incapable of holding onto it. They splayed,
open palmed, and sought purchase by grasping his elbows and clutching.
“Steady,”
he commanded.
Stacy
felt anything but. Words wouldn’t form correctly in her mind. All logical,
rational thought had flown the moment the warmth of his hands seeped through
the fabric of her blouse. It was as if she’d walked into an oven, the
temperature set to broil.
His
long fingers squeezed once, twice, then tugged her in closer.
Stacy couldn’t decide which was more intense:
the heat in his eyes or the natural warmth radiating from his body.
“I’m—I’m
sorry. I didn’t…I wasn’t…I—Sorry.” She tried to pull from his grasp, but he
wouldn’t let go.
As
earlier when she’d caught him staring at her, she once again felt the
mesmerizing pull of his gaze and was powerless to look away.
And
for some inexplicable reason found she didn’t want to.
The
little shards of amber floating among the cognac color of his irises were
lighter and brighter than she remembered. They looked like a wolf’s eyes, and,
just like a wolf, their stare was predatory, alpha, and hypnotic.
“Nikko? We’ll all set to start up again,” Todd
called from the doorway of the production trailer.
Without
looking away from her, he called back, “Be right in.” He still hadn’t let go of
her arms.
From
deep down, as deep as she could reach, Stacy grappled for calm. She watched him
watch her while she took a solid, full breath in, then relaxed it out.
“I’m
sorry,” she said when she trusted her voice wouldn’t betray her again. “I
wasn’t paying attention to where I was going.”
She
shifted back, away from him, but he kept his hands around her.
This
close she could read the exhaustion floating in his eyes and his determination
to ignore it.
This
close she could see the fine, subtle lines fanning out from the corners of his
eyes as he narrowed them at her.
This
close she could reach out and smooth the corrugations grooving down from his
mouth to his rock solid jaw. That she wanted to do just that, to offer him any
comfort she could, to soothe the pain he tried so valiantly to keep hidden,
stunned her beyond all thought.
Nikko
Stamp was not a man who would ever tolerate being comforted or coddled.
Why,
then, did she think it was exactly what he needed?
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GUEST POST:
Lessons I learned from my Heroine
When
I first introduced my heroine in Can’t
Stand The Heat, Stacy Peters, to the book reading world in Cooking With
Kandy, she was a hardworking, problem solving and uber-calm personal assistant
and television assistant producer. Now, several years later, she is still the
hardest working person on any and all the shows she’s executive produced, and
is described as being the calming influence in any storm or crisis that blows
up. That makes her the ideal person to keep the network’s new food competition,
Beef Battles, and it’s fiery tempered director Dominick (Nitro Nikko) Stamp on
the straight and narrow. While Stacy’s rep is as a people pleasing, always
professional executive producer, Nikko’s is just the opposite. His legendary
temper and my-way-or-the-highway control are the perfect foils for Stacy’s
demeanor and polish. And you know what they say about opposites attracting.
While
I was fleshing Stacy’s backstory out, I realized I had to give her a reason to
be the calm one in a family of dramatic overachievers. She’s a devoted yoga
practitioner and meditates daily, the reason for both explained in the book. As
I placed her in scenes with an overbearing, shouting, and sometimes out of
control Nikko, keeping her calm and relying on all her meditative training had
a positive influence on me as well as Nikko.
I am
your typical knee-jerk reactor. When something happens that I don’t like, or
that makes me mad/upset/scared, I react with a quick negative barb, a firm “no”
if I am asked to do something, and then a petulant pout when I am called on the
carpet about my attitude. When Nikko confronts Stacy in ways that would make me
cringe or scream, she takes a breath – mentally and physically – and remains in
control of her reactions. By doing this all the time, she begins to have a
positive effect on Nikko’s attitude and temper as well. He even makes reference
several times to how calm he always feels when she is in the vicinity, or if he
knows she is taking caring of a technical problem that would routinely set him
off on an angry tirade.
Taking
both a literal and figurative breath before reacting to a situation is
something I have never done before, and to write a scene where a character does
that, prompted me to see what it would feel like if I did it. So I did. Several
times. And you know what? It’s become a habit. Now, when confronted with a
situation I would previously have responded to without thought or
consideration, I too, take that moment, that physical and mental breath that
Stacy does, to gather my thoughts and consider how I react.
My
family, friends, even telemarketers, are all benefiting from that breath, too!
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AUTHOR BIO:
Peggy Jaeger is a
contemporary romance writer who writes about strong women, the families who
support them, and the men who can’t live without them.
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,
Peggy 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 has created the families she wanted as that lonely
child.
Tying
into her love of families, her children's book, THE KINDNESS TALES, was illustrated by her artist mother-in-law.
Peggy
holds a master's degree in Nursing Administration and first found publication
with several articles she authored on Alzheimer's Disease during her time
running an Alzheimer's in-patient care unit during the 1990s.
In
2013, she placed first in two categories in the Dixie Kane Memorial Contest:
Single Title Contemporary Romance and Short/Long Contemporary Romance.
In
2017 she came in 3rd in the New England Reader's Choice contest for A KISS
UNDER THE CHRISTMAS LIGHTS and was a finalist in the 2017 STILETTO contest for
the same title.
A
lifelong and avid romance reader and writer, she is a member of RWA and her
local New Hampshire RWA Chapter.
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CONNECT WITH PEGGY:
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BookBub:
Goodreads Author Page:
Goodreads Book Page:
Amazon Author Page:
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BOOK BUY LINKS:
Amazon Kindle:
Barnes and Noble:
Kobo:
Apple iBooks:
Google Play:
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GIVEAWAY INFO:
Peggy will be awarding a $50 Amazon or B/N GC to
a randomly drawn winner via Rafflecopter during the tour.
**This post contains affiliate links and if clicked and a
purchase made I may receive a small commission to help support this blog. This does not cost you anything, it just
helps pay for all those awesome giveaways on here.**
This contest is sponsored
by a third party. Fabulous and Brunette is a registered host of Goddess Fish
Promotions. Prizes are given away by the
sponsors and not Fabulous and Brunette. The featured author and Goddess Fish
Promotions are solely responsible for the giveaway prize.
