Release Day Blitz: Make Me Whole (Oil Barrons #1) by Marie Johnston

Posted January 18, 2022 by bookstobreathe in Book Blitz/Promo, New Release / 0 Comments

Title: Make Me Whole
Author: Marie Johnston
Series: Oil Barrons #1
Publisher: Self-Published
Release Date: January 18, 2022
Genre: Contemporary Romance
More Info: Goodreads
Purchase: Amazon US
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I had a perfect life. Schoolteacher. Married to my high school sweetheart. Little starter house that we called charming but was really just old. All I needed was the two-point-five kids and I’d be living my perfect dream. Then my husband died.

After the funeral, I had a breakdown that lasted for a month…or twelve. But now I’m reemerging, healing, finding my way. It’s time to learn who I am now, and whether or not I can fix a leaky sink. And by my side, the entire time, is my husband’s best friend, Liam. The single dad knows a thing or two about personal struggles, and about how to replace faucets.

With Liam, I feel alive again. Confident. Capable. Liam has become my best friend too. Except if my parents, my in-laws, and the rest of the town had any say, I’d stay far away from him and his bad boy reputation.

How do I admit to them what’s so hard to admit to myself? That I’m starting to look at him like he’s more than a friend. That the heat in his eyes when he looks at me is far beyond friendly. That like it or not, Liam makes me feel whole again.

Title: Make Me Whole

Series: Oil Barrons #1

Genre: Contemporary Romance

Author: Marie Johnston

Release Date: January 18, 2022

Excerpt

I pulled up to her place and hopped out. I didn’t bother knocking. Since she wasn’t in the kitchen, I headed for the bathroom. The light filtered into the hall.

I rounded the corner and stopped. Kenny was half buried under the sink, her butt in the air. It was the finest ass I’d seen. Round, firm, and swaying from side to side as she mopped up water with a towel.

My gaze was glued to her backside when she sat on her heels and popped her head out. I blinked and shook my head as if it could reorient blood back to my brain and away from my dick. “So, tell me again what happened.”

She jumped and twisted around. My lips quirked. She was a mess. Half her shirt was soaked, part of it plastered against her breasts. I tried, hard, not to look at the way her nipples fought the constraints of the material.

Her appearance didn’t change how my body was reacting. Her hair spilled out of a bun and stuck to her face from either the water or sweat. She was flushed and breathing heavily, as if it wasn’t hard enough to keep my eyes above her neckline.

“I’m so glad you’re here.” She pushed off the floor and dumped the wet towels into the bathtub. Sticking her hands on her hips she gestured to the sink. “I fixed that damn thing. Remember I told you I did it? And then it started leaking again. So I thought I’d put in a new faucet, cuz now I’m a superwoman or some shit. Only I fixed the toilet first. See?”

She flushed, then winced. “I forgot the water was off, so you can’t witness the tank refill, but it will. And it won’t leak.”

I didn’t fight my smile. This was rare Kenny. Rambling, flustered, and a little pissed off.

Make Me Shiver (Oil Barrons #2)

Amazon US

Coming May 17th!

Have you ever gotten married without telling anyone? I did. Not saying anything was the easy part. I had moved to a big city, had no friends, and I wasn’t speaking to my family.

I tried the whole “fake it until you make it” thing. I was the fake part and my husband Archer was only concerned with making it. When I got a call about a family emergency, I walked out on my hot, but overly ambitious, husband and my superficial life and ran back home to the family ranch. And I stayed, ignoring my husband’s attempts to reach me—and I still didn’t tell anyone I was married.

Then a year and a half later, I find Archer standing in on my property, looking like a titanium rod in a pile of rusty nails. He came to end things between us but ends up staying to learn who he really married—the shy corporate woman with a perfect blowout or the sarcastic country girl with mud on her boots.

The longer he’s around, the more I see that I wasn’t the only one who was disingenuous. The suit is gone and my city slicker spouse is fixing fence, diving into muddy stock ponds to save calves, and calling in favors to get the cattle enough hay for the winter.

Yet none of that changes that my family needs me and I’m not abandoning them again. It doesn’t change that the career he worked so hard to build is over a thousand miles away in Texas. Or that the life I want is exactly what he’s run from. The only thing we’re doing is making it harder to sign the divorce papers.

About Marie Johnston

Marie Johnston is a RITA® Finalist, and a best-selling and award-winning writer of paranormal and contemporary romance – and an avid reader of them both. Several years ago, when kids started outnumbering adults in the house, Marie Johnston left her job as a public health microbiologist to stay at home. Settling into working part-time and shuttling kids around gave Marie the opportunity to think about what she wanted to be when she grew up. A die-hard science geek, she explored her previously thought to be non-existent creative side after much time spent making snowman crafts and coloring princesses. Having entertained thoughts of writing a book one day then subsequently deciding it would be too hard, she finally put the figurative pen to paper and began to type – and fell in love with story telling.

Marie lives with her husband and four kids in the Upper Midwest where the summers are gorgeous, the winters are brutal, and spring and fall are luxuries.

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