Straight Reading from the Library: To Catch a Bad Guy by Marie Astor

Goddess Fish Promotions is presenting an Excerpt Tour for Marie Astor's release To Catch a Bad Guy.  This is a pretty neat tour....if you go to all the stops, you'll get to read quite a bit of the book.  The other stops and excerpts can be found here: http://goddessfishpromotions.blogspot.com/2012/12/virtual-excerpt-tour-to-catch-bad-guy.html

Not only can you read selections from the book, just by leaving a comment you'll be entered into a drawing for one of these awesome prizes:

READ THE BLURB

Janet Maple’s stellar career ended with a layoff and her boyfriend of five years told her that he wants to be just friends. When she lands a job at one of New York’s premier boutique investment firms, Janet begins to hope that her luck is finally turning for the better. Not only is she happy with her new paycheck, but things also seem to be looking up on the personal front, as the company’s handsome attorney expresses keen interest in Janet. However, her euphoria is short-lived, as Janet soon discovers alarming facts about her new employer’s business tactics. When her boss dismisses her suspicions as groundless, Janet finds herself confiding to a cute IT engineer, Dean Snider. The closer she gets to Dean, the more Janet is tempted to break her rule of not dating co-workers, but what she doesn’t realize is that everything she knows about Dean, including his occupation and even his name, is a lie.

Dennis Walker is a top-notch white collar crime investigator who will stop at nothing to put culprits away. When an opportunity for an undercover assignment at one of New York’s premier boutique broker dealers comes up, Dennis jumps at the chance, adopting a persona of geeky IT engineer, Dean Snider. While he may be an ace at his job, years of experience fail him when Dennis meets Janet Maple and finds himself torn between his professional obligations and his personal desires. Will he have to choose between his feelings and duty, or will he find a way to satisfy both?

READ AN EXCERPT

Janet took a long swallow of her martini. After the traumatizing weekend, she needed a drink. “Don’t look now, but there’s a guy from work by the bar.” 

“Is he cute?” Katie whispered conspiratorially, her eyes darting to the very place where Janet told her not to look. 

“Don’t stare at him!” 

“Geez, relax, will ya? There’s a huge crowd – I don’t even know which one he is.” 

“The tall one, in a blue shirt.” 

“The James Dean look-alike with the slutty blonde?” 

“Yeah, that’s him.” 

“He’s cute,” Katie pronounced her verdict after a momentary deliberation. “What does he do?” 

“He is in IT.” 

Katie nodded approvingly. “A solid and practical profession. I’m getting sick and tired of dating lawyers. They are the most self-absorbed and narcissistic bunch of men on the planet. Litigation lawyers are the worst – so pompous. Don’t ever date a lawyer.” 

“Oh, I think I’ve learned my lesson on that one,” Janet replied, wondering if Katie had forgotten about Alex. 

“I’m sorry, Janet. I wasn’t thinking,” Katie instantly caught on. “But back to the present. What’s the story with the cute IT guy?” 

“No story.” Janet finished the last of her drink. “We chat at work sometimes.” 

“We chat at work sometimes? Come on, Janet, it’s me you’re talking to. Do you like him or what?” 

Janet nodded. “He is kind of cute, but….” 

“But what?” 

“Dating at work could be complicated, and I don’t want to complicate things too much now,” Janet added quickly. She certainly had plenty of things to be anxious about at work without having to worry about Dean Snider. 

“’I don’t want to complicate things right now?’ Things are always complicated: that’s the nature of life. Sounds to me like someone is being a chicken.” 

“Sounds to me like someone is being overly nosy,” Janet shot back, already regretting having mentioned Dean. “Besides, he’s clearly not interested in me: as you can see, he’s got a date.” 

“A date, please! I’m sure it’s some girl he just met at the bar. Speaking of which, there’s an interesting development.” Katie’s eyes darted toward the bar again. 

Even though she knew she should not, Janet let her eyes follow the direction of Katie’s glance, and in spite of herself, she was delighted by what she saw.

MEET THE AUTHOR

 Marie Astor is the author of contemporary romance novels This Tangled Thing Called Love, Lucky Charm, On the Rim of Love; romantic suspense, To Catch a Bad Guy; and a short story collection,  A Dress in a Window. Marie is also the author of young adult fantasy adventure novel, Over the Mountain and Back. 

If you would like to learn more about Marie’s writing, please stop by her website: www.marieastor.com or visit her on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/marieastorcollection