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Apr 7, 20215 min read

The Spy Who Kissed Me by @paulinebjones is a Spring Break Bookapalooza pick #romcom #romsuspense



Title: The Spy Who Kissed Me


Author: Pauline Baird Jones


Genre: Romantic Suspense/Comedy


Book Blurb:


This suburbanite is about to meet a dashing spy…


Isabel “Stan” Stanley is stuck in a rut in the DC suburbs. As a wannabe romance writer, she hopes a sexy muse falls into her lap. But she never expected a handsome spy to dive through her sunroof…


Pursued by a hail of bullets, international CIA Agent Kelvin Kapone didn’t have plans to make a friend. But when his latest mission puts him in the bewildering burbs, the charming Stan is a surprisingly strong guide. As he discovers a chilling terrorist plot, Kelvin doesn’t want to admit that he may just need the suburbanite’s help…


Despite her best efforts, Stan can’t break free from the dangerous mission. And while being in close quarters with a sexy spy is getting her great material for her novel, it won’t do her much good if they both end up dead…


The Spy Who Kissed Me is a suspenseful comedic romance novel. If you like high-stakes action, laugh-out-loud scenes, and stories where opposites attract, then you’ll love Pauline Baird Jones’ award-winning tale of espionage.


Buy The Spy Who Kissed Me to pucker up for a fun, flirty escape today!


Excerpt:


“Get out.” I sounded so firm I startled myself.


He brushed his hair back off the broad, proud expanse of his forehead, seemed surprised to find hand and head still there. With another grimace, he turned and showed me his eyes.


I wasn’t ready for them. Or him. Every nerve ending in my body came to attention. I think some of them saluted. Was that a hallelujah chorus I heard? I jerked my gaze off him and stared out the windshield. A pity I couldn’t resist the urge to peek…


He pushed his hair back again. “Look, I’m sorry about this, but we’ve got to get away from here. Now.”


His voice sent shivers down my spine. His words released a horde of questions in my head. Get away from what? I took another peek and found him looking at me like I was the dangerous one. That killed the chorus or at least muted it.


“I have a better idea. Why don't you just get out here—” I made the mistake of turning to glare at him and found my nose almost touching his nose. Like his other parts, it was nice. His eyes were a bright, cool blue and framed by sinfully long lashes. Sounded tame, but his eyes weren’t tame. They were wild, with the kind of cool that burned straight down to the quivering hearts and souls of innocents. He probably walked through life on broken hearts strewn in his path by virgins. Vestal and non-Vestal. No one, no man should be allowed to have eyes so…so…so and spaced just right for maximum impact. His skin was smooth and firm and clean and smelled good, like a TV commercial. Then he had the nerve, the gall, to smile at me. He had this dimple in his right cheek, just the right distance from his mouth to rubberize the hardiest knees.


“Please?” The mouth I was studying parted over teeth that were a dentist's dream, and rubberization moved up my body. It might have taken out my brain.


“Oh, dear.” I dry swallowed, managed to keep my jaw from dropping by holding it up with my finger. “I should never have crossed my heart and hoped to die.”


He continued with an attractive urgency, “I’d better drive. The odds are already against us.”


He wasn’t that attractive. Outrage gathered my scattered senses from the four corners of my brain. “You’ll drive this car when—”


“Look, love.” Without warning, he was in my space, his hands on my shoulders, his face so close I could see the smooth texture of his skin and smell him, not his after-shave. “There’s no time. If they come after us…we go or we die.”


Now, when it was too late, I felt the undercurrent beneath his yummy, civilized surface. The yuppie had a dark side, and I was in his way. Fear spiked faster than lust. I went from hot to cold in the space of a single heartbeat.


“Please don’t hurt me.” I hated how begging I sounded, but at least he quit gripping my shoulders. One hand drifted up to cup my cheek. Heat bloomed where he touched, sending impossible comfort to battle fear.


“Sweetheart, I’m trying to save you.”


I probed his eyes looking for sincerity. He did sincere well. I wanted, no, I needed to believe him. If his dark side was gonna mow me down, I didn’t want to see it coming.


“What do you want me to do?” My dry whisper sounded distant and a bit hollow. His smile was relieved and as dangerous as bullets to one in my vulnerable state. That dang dimple. I didn’t whimper, but only because my throat was too dry.


“If you’ll stand up, I’ll slide under you—”


Slide? He couldn’t be planning to scale the gear shift again?


“You’re kidding. Aren’t you?” His brows arched in an unspoken query. It put me on the same page he was. The one where neither of us trusted the other one enough to get out of the car.


“I’ll just—” I pointed up, I looked up, then reached up and hooked my fingers over the open edge of the sunroof. His hands, warm and strong, went around my waist, providing extra boost.


“Can you pull your legs clear?” he asked.


I tried to concentrate, but it wasn’t easy. It was hard to do before the feel of his hands on my waist bled warmth that turned more than warm inside me. I managed to work my legs free of the steering wheel. With only minimal skin loss, I got one foot on the armrest attached to the door, the other on the lower edge of the steering wheel and pulled until my head emerged into crisp night air. It helped clear my head a little, but I had other problems. Gravity fought back with an insistent summons that was hard to ignore. Sweaty palms weren’t helping either.


I peered past myself to ask, “Can you get under me?”


I heard a shrill woof and looked toward the sound.


An excitable dust mop dog was doing a “job” on the corner lawn. At the other end of his leash was an old man staring at me with shocked pleasure. I smiled at him, trying to look like it was normal to be half out of a sunroof while a man crawled into the seat under me. My hands squeaked against the unyielding surface of the wet car roof. I dug in. I just needed to hold on a little longer—


Gravity threw in with wet and unyielding. I didn’t want to, but it was no use. Like Orpheus, I was descending. I caught my passenger just as he was mounting the gear shift.


I’ll never forget the sound he made.


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If money were no object and we weren’t in a pandemic, where would you go for a Spring Break vacation and why?


If money were no object, I still wouldn’t go anywhere. Now if I had a transporter, I would go all over the place—briefly—because there is no place like home (when it took 35 years to get back here)!


Why is your featured book a must-read this spring?


We need some laughs and a few chills and thrills after the misery that was 2020, and what is better for spring, than a light, frothy, funny suspense story?

Giveaway:


Enter to win a $50 Amazon (US) Gift Card

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Open internationally


Runs April 1 – 30, 2021.


Drawing will be held on May 3, 2021.



Author Biography:


USA Today Bestselling author Pauline Baird Jones never liked reality, so she writes books. She likes to wander among the genres, rampaging like Godzilla, because she does love peril mixed in her romance. She also loves chocolate, bacon, flamingoes, and mid-century modern anything.


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