Spotlight & Giveaway: Damned If I Do by Alexandria Bellefleur

Today it is my pleasure to Welcome author Alexandria Bellefleur to HJ!

Hi Alexandria and welcome to HJ! We’re so excited to chat with you about your new release, Damned If I Do!

 
Hi, everyone! So happy to be popping by!
 

Please summarize the book for the readers here:

Several hundred years into her tenure as a demon, Effie finds herself engaged to a seductive, successful, and handsome Prince of Hell. It’s not a love match, but it’ll do. There’s just one tiny problem. Unbeknownst to Effie, she is still bound to her sixteenth-century husband, Finn, who has reincarnated through several lifetimes and has no recollection of her of their life together. Effie must track him down and convince him to renounce their vows, but Finn isn’t willing to let her go that easily.
 

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

“Crazy as it sounds, I think I’ve been dreaming of you my whole life. As long as I can remember, I’ve felt homesick and didn’t understand why.” He sucked in a tremulous breath. “But I think… I think I understand now. This whole time, I’ve been looking for a place, when what I was really searching for was you.”

“I like you greedy.”

“Oh my god.” She toed out of her boots. “You are insufferable.”
He grinned. “And yet, here you are, suffering me.”

Please share a few Fun facts about this book…

• Damned If I Do is a little like if you put Sweet Home Alabama, Supernatural, and Outlander into a blender and hit mix.
• Finn is 100% my swooniest hero to date. He exhibits Hozier-level yearning, very “no grave can hold my body down, I’ll crawl home to her” energy.
• I had so much fun crafting the bureaucratic side of Hell and coming up with the names of the various departments, like the Department of Infernal Internal Affairs and the Office of Infernal Technology and Innovation. I would love to write a dozen more books in this world.

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

Effie and Finn have a soul bond, so there’s an instant attraction and sense of knowing one another, even though Finn has no recollection of their life together. Seeing Effie for the first time feels like coming home to Finn, who has spent his entire life searching for her without knowing it.

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

Oh, most definitely! Chapter 14 made me cry for reasons I can’t share without spoiling a major plot point, and chapter 18 had me blushing like crazy. I’ll just say that Finn has quite a mouth on him, and a way with words.

“Look at that, baby,” he murmured, drawing out halfway only to give a shallow, teasing thrust. “See how perfect we fit? How perfect it feels?” Finn took her hand and placed her palm flat against his chest, holding it there. His heart thundered beneath her fingertips. “Feels like coming home, doesn’t it?”

Readers should read this book….

If they want to read a super swoony, banter-filled paranormal romance with a hero who yearns like it’s his job.

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

I have an m/m new adult romance coming out on December 8, titled IF THESE WALLS COULD TALK, and I just finished revisions on a sapphic romance with mystery elements releasing next May, titled SOMEONE BORROWED, SOMEONE BLUE.
 

Thanks for blogging at HJ!

Giveaway: One finished copy of DAMNED IF I DO. US only.

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Excerpt from Damned If I Do:

Effie looked up into Finn’s eyes and felt strangely weak, her knees knocking together. Her skin tingled where he touched her, and the urge to turn her face into his palm was almost irresistible. Almost.
She gathered her bearings, reminding herself that no matter how much he looked like him, this Finn was not her Finn, and reared back, smacking his hand. “Excuse me?”
“You heard me.” His face was solemn, but his eyes glittered with amusement. “I’m not ready to put the past behind us.”
“What past?” She sneered. “You don’t even remember—”
“You’re right, I don’t. But I’ve tended plenty of bars in plenty of places, and I know one thing’s for certain.” He reached down, capturing her hands in his, her reflexes frustratingly slow with him looming over her. Tall and broad and . . . imposing. Finley MacDonald was an unfair, unwelcome obstacle, with hands that swallowed hers right up and eyes that unmoored her. This close, his scent was a siren’s call, a heady mix of sandalwood and warm skin, the sweetest, most dangerous temptation. “Drunken words are sober thoughts, and no amount of alcohol on this planet could get me to make a promise I didn’t intend to keep.”
His thumb swept across her knuckles, causing her to shiver visibly, violently. Effie wrenched her hand free and glared. “If this is coming from some misplaced sense of honor—”
“It’s got nothing to do with honor.” Finn took a small step back, eyes flickering over to Martha and the other women, and it was clear what this was. A performance. And she his reluctant scene partner. “See, my memory might be foggy, but my heart knows the truth.”
“What truth?” Luella asked, breathless. “Don’t leave us hanging.”
“Yes, enlighten us.” Effie spoke through gritted teeth. “What truth?”
Her heart pounded, something about the way he was looking at her making her feel like she was at the top of a steep roller coaster, suspended in the smile curling at the edges of his lips, seconds stretching into an eternity as she waited, breath bated for the plunge.
“Effie MacLeod,” he said, and she could swear she felt the wind rushing up to meet her. “I think I love you.”
Gasps filled the air. Effie stood frozen, glaring furiously up at Finn, her nostrils flared. “You most certainly do not.”
“Mm, I think I do,” he said, looking as if he was trying hard not to laugh.
“Then, you’re mistaken.”
“You can’t tell me what I do or don’t feel.”
Oh yeah? “I can tell you one thing for sure and it’s that I don’t love you.”
“You don’t love me yet,” Finn corrected, mischief dancing in his eyes. “Martha, you asked me why I won’t divorce this woman. It’s because I want a chance.”
“A chance?” Effie scoffed and Finn raised a brow defiantly. She didn’t, however, miss the once-over he gave her, a lingering look that sent a tingle down her spine. Her jaw clenched. “A chance to what?”
“To win you back, obviously.”
Puh-lease. She didn’t know what game he was playing, but she was tired of it. She turned to Martha. “Maybe you can talk some sense into him.”
“Oh, Effie, I don’t know.” Martha bit her lip. “If my Earl said anything half as romantic as that, I’d be beside myself.”
“He did make a compelling argument,” Iris said, and what fucking twilight zone had Effie entered?
“Ladies,” she snapped. “Focus. Remember what we talked about. It was a drunken farce of a wedding. We clearly are not suited. I’m a—a tart, remember?”
Finn choked. “You’re a what?”
“I wasn’t talking to you.” She turned back to Martha and the other ladies. “I have a fiancé, in case you forgot in the ten minutes it took to get here.”
“That’s right. You do, don’t you?” Luella swooned. “Oh, it’s just like in The Notebook.”
“It is, isn’t it?” Martha clasped her hands under her chin. “Finley, have you considered fixing her up a house? Making it real nice?”
Under other circumstances, it might’ve been funny how Finn’s brows squashed together. “I hadn’t, actually—”
“You know they both die at the end of that movie, right?” Aveline said, apparently the only sane person left in this bar save for Effie.
“Not in the book, they don’t,” Luella fired back. “In the book, they make love.”
“A house, you said?” Finn looked at her, a shit-eating grin splitting his face from ear to ear. “Maybe I’ll take that plan under advisement after all.”
Effie scowled. How quickly her plan had unraveled, and all because of what? Because Finn had seen fit to concoct some bullshit story about—
Oh, that dirty, rotten son of a bitch.
He’d bested her at her own damn game.
While the other women bickered over which was better, the book or the movie, Effie took a step closer to Finn and jabbed a finger at his chest.
“I don’t know what game you think you’re playing,” she hissed, “but you don’t have a chance in hell of winning it.”
“In case it slipped your notice, you’re not in Hell anymore, honey.” He leaned in close, his stubble brushing against her cheek. “This is my town. That means we’re playing by my rules.”
“Your rules?” How cute. “Fire is the only thing you’re playing with. And you know what happens when people play with fire, Finley?” She tipped her head back, looking up at him squarely. “They get burned.”
His eyes dropped to her mouth. “What makes you think that’s not what I’m after?”
Effie bristled, a dizzying rush of heat crackling through her. Her fingers fisted in the front of Finn’s shirt and she fought the urge to give him a good hard shake, shoving him instead. Finn, the bastard, smirked and barely budged.
“You’ll be so sorry for this.” She wasn’t sure whether her words were a warning or a promise.
“Sweetheart.” He chuckled, all breath. “I’ll never be sorry you walked into my bar.”
Game on.
He wanted a wife?
She’d give him a wife. A wife whose prerogative it was to make her husband’s life a living hell.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
 
 

Book Info:

The devil’s right-hand woman must convince her long-lost husband to renounce their vows so she can wed a prince from Hell.

Effie MacLeod is no stranger to making desperate decisions, but making a deal with Lucifer himself—sacrificing her soul to save a loved one—has got to be her most monumental. Several hundred years into her tenure as a demon, Effie’s found herself engaged to Belphegor, a handsome, seductive, and successful Prince of Hell. It’s not a love match, but it’ll do. There’s just one teensy-tiny little problem: She’s still bound to her sixteenth-century Scottish husband. While Effie has completely cast her human life aside, Finn has been reincarnated through several lifetimes.

Effie must convince Finn to renounce their age-old vows in order get the Office of Infernal Internal Affairs off her back. The kicker? When she finds him in this lifetime, Finn doesn’t remember anything, but he refuses her request for a divorce.

Annoyed to be stuck with him in small-town Georgia until she can persuade Finn to abandon their marriage, Effie must convince him that yes, she does want to get on with her devilish shenanigans despite the physical pull she feels toward him. As they get closer in hopes of recovering his lost memories, Effie can’t help but notice murmurings of her deeply buried feelings resurfacing. But while all’s fair in love and war, that’s not the case in Hell—and Lucifer may have his own reasons for wanting to keep Finn and Effie apart for the rest of eternity.
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Meet the Author:

Alexandria Bellefleur is an award-winning USA Today bestselling author of swoony contemporary romance often featuring loveable grumps and the sunshine characters who bring them to their knees. Her debut novel, Written in the Stars, was a 2021 Lambda Literary Award winner and a 2020 winner of The Ripped Bodice Awards for Excellence in Romantic Fiction.
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