![\"image005\"](\"https:\/\/roughdraftbookblog.files.wordpress.com\/2016\/07\/image005.jpg?resize=355%2C537\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
#1 New York Times<\/em> bestselling author J. R. Ward delivers the second novel in her Bourbon Kings series\u2014a sweeping saga of a Southern dynasty struggling to maintain a fa\u00e7ade of privilege and prosperity, while secrets and indiscretions threaten its very foundation\u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n In Charlemont, Kentucky, the Bradford family is the cr\u00e8me de la cr\u00e8me of high society\u2014just like their exclusive brand of bourbon. And their complicated lives and vast estate are run by a discrete staff who inevitably become embroiled in their affairs. This is especially true now, when the apparent suicide of the family patriarch is starting to look more and more like murder\u2026<\/p>\n No one is above suspicion\u2014especially the eldest Bradford son, Edward. The bad blood between him and his father is known far and wide, and he is aware that he could be named a suspect. As the investigation into the death intensifies, he keeps himself busy at the bottom of a bottle\u2014as well as with his former horse trainer\u2019s daughter. Meanwhile, the family\u2019s financial future lies in the perfectly manicured hands of a business rival, a woman who wants Edward all to herself.<\/p>\n Everything has consequences; everybody has secrets. And few can be trusted. Then, at the very brink of the family\u2019s demise, someone thought lost to them forever returns to the fold. Maxwell Bradford has come home. But is he a savior…or the worst of all the sinners?<\/p>\n BUY LINKS:<\/strong> <\/p>\n EXCERPT:<\/strong><\/p>\n Toyota trucks were not supposed to go seventy-five miles an hour. Especially when they were ten years old.<\/p>\n At least the driver was wide awake, even though it was four a.m.<\/p>\n Lizzie King had a death grip on the steering wheel, and her foot on the accelerator was actually catching floor as she headed for a rise in the highway.<\/p>\n She had woken up in her bed at her farmhouse alone. Ordinarily, that would have been the status quo, but not anymore, not now that Lane was back in her life. The wealthy playboy and the estate\u2019s gardener had finally gotten their act together, love bonding two unlikelies closer and stronger than the molecules of a diamond.<\/p>\n And she was going to stand by him, no matter what the future held.<\/p>\n After all, it was so much easier to give up extraordinary wealth when you had never known it, never aspired to it\u2014and especially when you had seen behind its glittering curtain to the sad, desolate desert on the far side of the glamour and prestige.<\/p>\n God, the stress Lane was under.<\/p>\n And so out of bed she had gotten. Down the creaking stairs she had gone. And all around her little house\u2019s first floor she had wandered.<\/p>\n When Lizzie had looked outside, she\u2019d discovered his car was missing, the Porsche he drove and parked beside the maple by her front porch nowhere to be seen. And as she had wondered why he had left without telling her, she had begun to worry.<\/p>\n Just a matter of nights since his father had killed himself, only a matter of days since William Baldwine\u2019s body had been found on the far side of the Falls of the Ohio. And ever since then Lane\u2019s face had had a faraway look, his mind churning always with the missing money, the divorce papers he had served on the rapacious Chantal, the status of the household bills, the precarious situation at the Bradford Bourbon Company, his brother Edward\u2019s terrible physical condition, Miss Aurora\u2019s illness.<\/p>\n But he hadn\u2019t said a thing about any of it. His insomnia had been the only sign of the pressure, and that was what scared her. Lane always made an effort to be composed around her, asking her about her work in Easterly\u2019s gardens, rubbing her bad shoulder, making her dinner, usually badly, but who cared. Ever since they had gotten the air cleared between them and had fully recommitted to their relationship, he had all but moved into her farmhouse\u2014and as much as she loved having him with her, she had been waiting for the implosion to occur.<\/p>\n It would almost have been easier if he had been ranting and raving.<\/p>\n And now she feared that time had come\u2014and some sixth sense made her terrified about where he had gone. Easterly, the Bradford Family Estate, was the first place she thought of. Or maybe the Old Site, where his family\u2019s bourbon was still made and stored. Or perhaps Miss Aurora\u2019s Baptist church?<\/p>\n Yes, Lizzie had tried him on his phone. And when the thing had rung on the table on his side of the bed, she hadn\u2019t waited any longer after that. Clothes on. Keys in hand. Out to the truck.<\/p>\n No one else was on I-64 as she headed for the bridge to get across the river, and she kept the gas on even as she crested the hill and hit the decline to the river\u2019s edge on the Indiana side. In response, her old truck picked up even more speed along with a death rattle that shook the wheel and the seat, but the damn Toyota was going to hold it together because she needed it to.<\/p>\n \u201cLane\u00a0.\u00a0.\u00a0. where are you?\u201d<\/p>\n God, all the times she had asked him how he was and he\u2019d said, \u201cFine.\u201d All those opportunities to talk that he hadn\u2019t taken her up on. All the glances she\u2019d shot him when he hadn\u2019t been looking her way, all the time her monitoring for signs of cracking or strain. And yet there had been little to no emotion after that one moment they\u2019d had together in the garden, that private, sacred moment when she had sought him out under the blooms of the fruit trees and told him that she\u2019d gotten it wrong about him, that she had misjudged him, that she was prepared to make a pledge to him with the only thing she had: the deed to her farmhouse\u2014which was exactly the kind of asset that could be sold to help pay for the lawyers\u2019 fees as he fought to save his family.<\/p>\n Lane had held her, and told her he loved her\u2014and refused her gift, explaining he was going to fix everything himself, that he was going to somehow find the stolen money, pay back the enormous debt, right the company, resurrect his family\u2019s fortunes.<\/p>\n And she had believed him.<\/p>\n She still did.<\/p>\n But ever since then? He had been both as warm and closed off as a space heater, physically present and completely disengaged at the same time.<\/p>\n Lizzie did not blame him in the slightest.<\/p>\n It was strangely terrifying, however.<\/p>\n Off in the distance, across the river, Charlemont\u2019s business district glowed and twinkled, a false, earthbound galaxy that was a lovely lie, and the bridge that connected the two shores was still lit up in spring green and bright pink for Derby, a preppy rainbow to that promised land. The good news was that there was no traffic, so as soon as Lizzie was on the other side, she could take the River Road exit off the highway, shoot north to Easterly\u2019s hill, and see if his car was parked in front of the mansion.<\/p>\n Then she didn\u2019t know what she was going to do.<\/p>\n The newly constructed bridge had three lanes going in both directions, the concrete median separating east from west tall and broad for safety purposes. There were rows of white lights down the middle, and everything was shiny, not just from the illumination, but a lack of exposure to the elements. Construction had only finished in March, and the first lines of traffic had made the crossing in early April, cutting rush-hour delays down\u2014<\/p>\n Up ahead, parked in what was actually the \u201cslow\u201d lane, was a vehicle that her brain recognized before her eyes properly focused on it.<\/p>\n Lane\u2019s Porsche. It was Lane\u2019s\u2014<\/p>\n Lizzie nailed the brake pedal harder than she\u2019d been pounding the accelerator, and the truck made the transition from full-force forward to full-on stop with the grace of a sofa falling out a second-story window: Everything shuddered and shook, on the verge of structural disintegration, and worse, there was barely any change in velocity, as if her Toyota had worked too hard to gain the speed and wasn\u2019t going to let the momentum go without a fight\u2014<\/p>\n There was a figure on the edge of the bridge. On the very farthest edge of the bridge. On the lip of the bridge over the deadly drop.<\/p>\n \u201cLane,\u201d she screamed. \u201cLane!\u201d<\/p>\n Her truck went into a spin, pirouetting such that she had to wrench her head around to keep him in her sights. And she jumped out before the Toyota came to a full stop, leaving the gearshift in neutral, the engine running, the door open in her wake.<\/p>\n \u201cLane! No! Lane!\u201d<\/p>\n Lizzie pounded across the pavement and surmounted barriers that seemed flimsy, too flimsy, given the distance down to the river.<\/p>\n Lane jerked his head around\u2014<\/p>\n And lost one hold of the rail behind him.<\/p>\n As his grip slipped, shock registered on his face, a flash of surprise . . . that was immediately replaced by horror.<\/p>\n When he fell off into nothing but air.<\/p>\n Lizzie\u2019s mouth could not open wide enough to release her scream.<\/p>\n Posted by arrangement with New American Library, a member of Penguin Group (USA) LLC, A Penguin Random House Company. Copyright \u00a9 J.R. Ward, 2016.<\/em><\/p>\n ABOUT THE AUTHOR<\/strong><\/p>\n J.R. Ward<\/strong> is a #1 New York Times<\/em> bestselling author with more than 15 million novels in print published in 25 different countries around the world. The books in her popular Black Dagger Brotherhood series have held the #1 spot on the New York Times<\/em> hardcover, mass market, eBook, and combined print\/eBook fiction bestseller lists and have debuted in the top 5 on the USA Today<\/em> bestseller list. Prior to her writing career, Ward worked as a lawyer in Boston and spent many years as the Chief of Staff of one of Harvard\u2019s world-renowned academic medical centers. Ward currently lives with her family in Kentucky where she has learned to enjoy and appreciate all things Southern. Connect with her online<\/p>\n Website<\/a> | Facebook<\/a> | Twitter<\/a>\u00a0| Amazon<\/a><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" #1 New York Times bestselling author J. R. Ward delivers the second novel in her Bourbon Kings series\u2014a sweeping saga of a Southern dynasty struggling to maintain a fa\u00e7ade of privilege and prosperity, while secrets and indiscretions threaten its very foundation\u2026 In Charlemont, Kentucky, the Bradford family is the cr\u00e8me de la cr\u00e8me of high … Continue reading #NewRelease – The Angel’s Share by @JRWard1 #Contemporary #Romance @BerkleyRomance<\/span> ![\"44ffc-add-to-goodreads-button\"](\"https:\/\/roughdraftbookblog.files.wordpress.com\/2016\/07\/44ffc-add-to-goodreads-button.png?resize=134%2C45\")
<\/a><\/p>\n
\nAmazon<\/a> | Nook<\/a>\u00a0| Kobo<\/a><\/p>\n![\"20248](\"https:\/\/roughdraftbookblog.files.wordpress.com\/2016\/07\/20248-1.jpg?resize=200%2C241\")
<\/p>\n