Spotlight & Giveaway: Bound by Their Nine-Month Scandal by Dani Collins

Today it is my pleasure to Welcome author Dani Collins to HJ!

Hi Dani and welcome to HJ! We’re so excited to chat with you about your new release, Bound by Their Nine-Month Scandal!

 
Hi Sara! Hi HJ’s! I’m so thrilled to be visiting with you again!
 

Please summarize the book for the readers here:

Pia is a major introvert who is being pressured to accept an arranged marriage. She’s at a masked ball, and meets an intriguing man. She thinks, “Welp, this is my chance to do what *I* want.” She has a fling, masks on, and they don’t even tell each other their names.
And… she turns up pregnant a few weeks later. And… that’s when she discovers the stranger wasn’t even invited. Who *is* the father of her unborn baby?
 

Please share your favorite line(s) or quote from this book:

Angelo insists they marry and this is Pia’s comeback:
“You waited until I found you before you came to see me. Until I told you I was pregnant before you asked me to dinner. I bring more to a marriage than a womb, Angelo. I expect my future husband to want and value me. So, no,” she said firmly. “I will not marry you.”

She’s shy, but not a pushover!

Please share a few Fun facts about this book…

• It’s my first audio book!
• It’s my last Montero Siblings book (if you read my baby swap, Pia is the sister of Cesar from The Consequence He Must Claim
• Angelo made his initial fortune in eSport gaming – something I know way too much about thanks to my son who is a huge fan.
• I chose to set the opening at a masked ball because I knew the book would come our around Halloween and the hostess is one of my Canadian heroines (Poppy from The Maid’s Spanish Secret.)

What first attracts your Hero to the Heroine and vice versa?

It’s tricky, because they’re in masks!

Angelo finds her on the rooftop where he plans to search for the jewels so he makes conversation. Pia is having a small crisis because she’s tempted to go against her family’s wishes, but she’s been raised to be dutiful. He’s bold and honest and convinces her to seize the day. He only intends to dance with her, but a kiss soon happens and then…

Did any scene have you blushing, crying or laughing while writing it? And Why?

I always love when one character gets the jump on the other and Pia is *very* smart so her naivety here amused me:

“You’re smart, but you’re not experienced.” He spoke in a tone of dawning realization.
“In what way?” Her stomach flipped over as she attempted to maintain her laissez-faire attitude. “The use of birth control? You’re right. It hasn’t come up.”
“No? Why’s that?” He had a look on his face that was both amused and bemused, as if he knew the answer while she still didn’t understand the question.
“Because I haven’t had to use it before.” Obviously.
“Because you were a virgin,” he concluded. He was smiling. Laughing at her. Dios, no.
“Why is that relevant?” she asked, as mortified heat climbed her cheeks.

Readers should read this book….

if they enjoy stories with a dashing hero and a heroine who really needs to be drawn out of her shell to believe she’s loveable.
Also, secret baby, tycoon seeking revenge, but not against the heroine, sexy times and family dynasties and men who trash talk each other a little bit.

What are you currently working on? What other releases do you have in the works?

I’m excited for Cinderella’s Royal Seduction coming out in Feb 2020. Then I have a duet coming out next summer called “Feuding Billionaire Brothers” but I’m secretly calling them The Brother’s Grim because they’re very grouchy. Plus, one of them is a Beauty and the Beast take-off called Beauty and her One-Night Baby. The other is A Hidden Heir to Redeem Him.
My WIP is something I’m not ready to talk about, but it’s due at the end of November so I must get back to writing it!
 

Thanks for blogging at HJ!

Giveaway: One set of the three Montero Sibling books (The Consequence He Must Claim, the Maid’s Spanish Secret and Bound by Their Nine-Month Scandal)
Open in the US or Canada only please.

To enter Giveaway: Please complete the Rafflecopter form and Post a comment to this Q: My favourite part of Halloween is seeing the kids in costume and giving out the candy (hopefully before I eat it all. Do you enjoy going to costume parties? Do you have a favourite costume that you’ve worn or seen?

 
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Excerpt from Bound by Their Nine-Month Scandal:

“You don’t want anyone to know I fathered your child?” He wasn’t shocked. She was a pedigree show dog caught in heat by an abandoned mongrel. He deliberately cultivated the image of a low-rank plebeian on an upwardly mobile trend as he infiltrated the establishment. All the better to annoy his noble brothers, but, “Why tell me at all if you want it to be our little secret?”

“I considered not telling you,” she admitted frankly. Damn she was cool, perched so still on the edge of the desk, projecting patient tolerance of his presence before her. “But both of my brothers learned belatedly that they had children. I extrapolated that you might also feel cheated if such news came to light well after the fact. By being open with you, I expect we can make adjustments to accommodate our joint participation in the child’s life while mitigating otherwise-damaging rumors.”

There was the the again. He choked on a humorless laugh. “You sound like you’re still pointing at data and graphs. Speak like a human.”

She sat taller, her chin coming up, but there was a flash of irritation in her gaze that he found very satisfying. It meant he was getting under her skin.

“I’m too smart to be in this position. So are you. It serves both of us to keep this as simple and quiet as possible.”

“Consenting adults have affairs. Sometimes they slip up. This news won’t hurt either of us.” In fact, in the back of his brain, he was seeing how this new connection to the upper echelon of society could play out very much in his favor. Maybe that was her concern? “Are you trying to sideline me because of who I am? You don’t want to be associated with me? Is that it?”

“I don’t know who you are, do I?” she shot back. “I know your name. I know you sneak into parties to which you aren’t invited, place wild bids on innocuous items, then lurk in private areas like a cat burglar, seducing strangers you catch unawares. Would you like to explain any of that?”

He narrowed his eyes. “I was under the impression the seduction was a mutual agreement.”

She looked away and briefly touched the back of her neck before clasping her hands in her lap again. “It was,” she allowed. “But it was impulsive and irresponsible.”

“What happened to ‘no regrets’?” What had happened to that introspective, intriguing woman he’d been so compelled to hold and touch and possess? He really had been on some kind of daredevil high that night. She definitely wasn’t his type.

“Regret comes from wishing for a different outcome from the one you face,” she said flatly. “The truth is, why you were there and who you are doesn’t change the fact that I chose to behave in a way that will reflect badly on my family. I can’t undo that, but for their sake, I intend to do everything possible to cast this in as least damaging a light as possible.”

She really didn’t know about his connection to the Gomez family. She couldn’t, or she would be hysterical right now.

As he was processing whether that was a good or bad thing, comprehension of what she was really saying dawned. With it came a flush of incendiary heat.

“You’re getting married anyway.” He was instantly and inexplicably furious.

She stilled, asking cautiously, “How do you know about that?”

“I know a lot of things.” He didn’t have a clue what was happening, not to himself or her. He moved forward on reflex until his knuckles were on the hard desktop on either side of her hips, the tip of his nose a hair’s breadth from hers. “I’m not letting a stranger raise my baby.”

“I can’t help the state of our relationship, can I?” She set a hand on his chest, but didn’t push him away. Her hand lifted slightly from his shirt, as if she found him too hot to touch. She wasn’t as unaffected as she was trying to appear. Her breasts rose and fell unsteadily. Her eyes were huge, her pupils big enough to eclipse her golden irises.

“You know what I mean. I want my child, Pia. Full access, every single day.”

It was fascinating to watch the burst of emotion behind her eyes, the light flush of pink beneath her skin while she fought to maintain her unaffected expression.

“Until July, I’m the only one with access. I suggest you take that time to reflect on whatever reasons you had for not wanting it known you were at my brother’s that night. When you can react less emotionally, we can resume this discussion.”

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
 
 

Book Info:

Her bombshell: “I’m pregnant.”

His demand: “Marry me…”

Painfully insecure and media-shy heiress Pia is duty-bound to marry well. So illegitimate Angelo is completely unsuitable husband material. Yet this irresistible Spanish tech tycoon seduces Pia with an evening of bliss…that leaves her pregnant!

Pia can’t afford a scandal, but Angelo wants to publicly claim his heir. Now to control the headlines, Pia must wed the only man who has ever made her feel. With Angelo posing a danger to her well-guarded heart, can she step into the spotlight—with the wedding of the century?
Book Links: Amazon | B&N | iTunes | kobo | Google |
 
 

Meet the Author:

Award-winning and USA Today Bestselling author Dani Collins thrives on giving readers emotional, compelling, heart-soaring romance with some laughter and heat thrown in, just like real life. Mostly she writes contemporary romance for Harlequin Presents and Tule’s Montana Born, but her backlist of fifty books also includes self-published erotic romance, romantic comedy, and even an epic medieval fantasy. When she’s not writing—just kidding, she’s always writing. She lives in Christina Lake, BC with her high school sweetheart husband who occasionally coaxes her out of her attic office to visit their grown children.
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