Welcome to Weekend Writing Warriors, where writers share an 8 to 10 sentence snippet of their writing on Sunday. Be sure to visit other participants at http://www.wewriwa.com/ and read and comment on their #8sunday posts.
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Welcome to the world of horse racing! For the next few weeks we’ll be featuring excerpts from Detour Ahead, Book Four in our Rider’s Up Series. Each book can be read as a stand-alone, and all four books are always available FREE at KU.
Danger, suspense, stunning race horses,
courageous heroines, and the
complicated men who love them!
Traci Steele may be the most damaged of the heroines in our four-book horse racing suspense series, Riders Up. If she was a real person, she could say “Me, too” – except she’s never told anyone, not even her best friend, Cassie.
EXCERPT
A lanky deputy sheriff leaned down to answer Traci’s unasked question. “Sorry ma’am, the road is closed—we had an oil tanker jackknife and roll on the slick pavement. This road likely won’t be reopened until sometime tomorrow.”
“I’m headed for Buteo, to the Live Oak Resort.”
“No problem, just stay on this route we’re sending traffic over.” The deputy gestured toward the narrow road to Traci’s right. “About a mile down that road you’ll have an option to come back to the main road you’re on now. Don’t take it. This detour is actually a short cut to Buteo, and the views can be spectacular. Just don’t try going too fast.”
BUY LINK
Always FREE to read at Kindle Unlimited
Available in print and e-book
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00RPT6YJA/
BLURB
Hot-shot Chicago prosecuting attorney Traci Steele works tirelessly keeping rapists off the street to prevent other women from suffering the hell she’s endured, so she resists her friends’ insistence that she take a two month R&R in their California Live Oak condo—until they persuade her to help their rancher friend as a private investigator.
Though he runs the stables at Live Oak, well-muscled mustached wrangler Scott McCord much prefers working with the race horses he trains at his ranch, and he can’t believe his old friends have sent a greenhorn female to help him with horse troubles.
The improbable dance between this mismatched pair barely fits in around the escalating suspense of whoever’s after Scott’s horses. Traci is as tenacious in her sleuthing as she is terrified about her inability to ever love a man. Can Scott succeed in gentling her – like he does his horses – before she flees in panic?
REVIEWS
Night Owl Reviews Top Pick This is a story about letting go of your past so you can move on to your future…Add into this touching story of recovery a mystery that will keep you guessing to the very end, and you’ve got a story you won’t be able to put down. Angi
You Gotta Read Reviews Rich in romance and suspense, this book had me mesmerized from the first page…a sensational job of combining just the right amount of suspense with a sauciness that leaves you longing for more. Val
Amazon Riveting mystery and love story in one great book Donna H. A Great story that shows that love can heal anything!” Amy B.
ABOUT OUR STORY
Detour Ahead was born on a vacation trip to southern California a few years back. Did we take the trip to write a book? Well, maybe. Mostly we wanted to escape the cold, windy, snowy, gray, all-too-short mid-January days in Minnesota’s north woods, where we then lived.
Southern California beckoned, and we found a time share we could trade for, not very far north of San Diego, in the foothills outside Ramona.
It was a brief taste of heaven. Warm, sunny, inviting, a horse stable and marvelous riding trails – and we had the place practically to ourselves. We never did figure out why such an upscale property in its beautiful setting wasn’t filled to the gills in mid January.
But Mr. Kraft, among other things, is a criminologist, and it took no time at all for a sinister plot to emerge: Maybe the property was being used to launder money; maybe someone wanted the resort to fail; maybe someone wanted to pick it up for a song and turn it into tract houses. What would they target?
We biked, went on trail rides (led by the easy-to-look at wrangler who ran the stables, and yes, even when married, it’s okay to look!), and explored the region. On one of our forays into the surrounding country we found a back road with a sign pointing to our resort town, so we took it – and Traci Steele’s detour was born. On her way to the (fictitious) resort where her friend Cassie has booked her for a month of badly needed R&R, she’s forced to take a detour in the pouring rain down a twisting mountain back road.
~ o ~ o ~ o
Be sure to stop by the rest of the Weekend Writing Warriors for some great excerpts!
Trouble afoot and I know I’ll enjoy every minute. Best to you.
Uh oh, I have a feeling this detour is going to be disastrous! (But of course supremely exciting and intense to read for us 🙂 Terrific excerpt, creates a lot of anticipation.
Detours – never a good thing – except for plot thickeners. Can’t wait to see where this one leads.
I’m interested to see where this story goes. Great snippet.
Uh oh… Why did he have to tell her not to go too fast?? Trouble ahead. 🙂
Nothing good can come of this! Short cuts make long delays.
Considering that this is a book about racing, the advice of don’t try going too fast, seems nicely ironic. I like that!
Alarm bells started to ring when he told her not to go too fast!
(I love the back story to how this was written, by the way. As a horse lover, it sounds like just the sort of place I’d love to visit)