Live Wire by Cristin Harber - Release Day Blitz & Excerpt

Titan Group is expanding. New recruits mean Jared Westin has potential new hires to scrutinize. What he didn’t expect was his very pregnant wife Sugar to finagle her way onto the surveillance team as the prospects were assessed.

Her involvement in the simple observation goes dangerously wrong. She and best friend Lexi Black stumble into a problem with Russian mobsters. Sugar is forced to draw on her old ATF tricks, but weeks from her due date, she has no choice but to team up with Bishop O’Kane, a potential-new recruit and Parker Black, Lexi’s hacker husband, who must go undercover.

This is special ops novella is packed with high-stakes crime and intrigue, a baby story for Boss Man, and two steamy romances for two of Titan’s favorite couples.

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The rhythmic pounding of the man running for his life in between Sugar’s and Lexi’s treadmills was more than enough up-close proof that Bishop O’Kane was as physically fit as his profile said. This gym catered to professional bodybuilders but was empty with the exception of one other person and staff. It was elite and niche, and Sugar had basically used her pregnant stomach and her hormones to get them a day pass.

Not exactly Titan-level detective work, but this was more a girl’s trip than anything else… right? Her phone buzzed as she and Lexi walked lazily on either side of their unknowing target.

Lexi: What have we learned? I’m bored.

Sugar: I was bored at home. This was something to do.

Lexi: Right.

Lexi: I think he knows we know each other.

Lexi: Shoot! He’s looking at both of us.

Lexi: SUGAR!

Sugar got off her treadmill and walked calmly to the bathroom. The second she was out of sight, she pulled her phone back out.

Sugar: Do I have to teach you how to creep up on a dude!?!?

Lexi: Maybe…

She tittered to herself. Well, that was probably true. For as hot as Lexi was, she was clueless when it came to the art of flirting. Though they weren’t flirting. But still, spying on a guy took a certain level of finesse that Lexi didn’t have.

Sugar: We need a new game plan.

Sugar: Does he still look suspicious of us?

Sugar: Hello?

Sugar: Hey, Thelma, it’s Louise. Why’d you go radio silent?

Lexi: We have a problem

Sugar: On a scale of 1 to 10, 1 is we need to hit the pancake house again, and 10 is I have to hit up GUNS for the ammo Jared wouldn’t let me have, gimme a number.

She grabbed her bag from a locker and wrestled out of her exercise pants and back into leather pants, which—thank the Lord for maternity adaptation—were more comfortable.

Sugar’s screen blinked with the text.

Lexi: 10. 10. 10.

Sugar: Easy, killer. On my way.

But the text wouldn’t send. The little circle kept circling. No signal. Ugh. What the hell? She pushed out the door to find the hallway dark. A tickle of adrenaline crept up her neck, and she slowed her pace.

“Hello?” A Russian accent called into the bathroom where she had just been.

Training and instinct made Sugar drop to the floor, listening to the voice continue to call and the person go in and out of the locker rooms and whatever rooms were down the other hallway.

Her pulse picked up. She could feel the blood thumping in her neck and in her stomach, which was a change from the norm. But all in all, this was no different than creeping like a shadow on any other job. Except she didn’t know who or what she was dealing with, and she had to hide what felt like an additional few feet of her stomach from view while trying to figure out what the double deuces was happening.

She tried her cell phone again. Shoot. She got nothing but a spinning circle and a no service signal. Clearly, somewhere in the building was a cell-phone jammer, which meant this was more of a professional job than a slam-and-bam robbery.

Okay… what to do?

Slinking down the hallway, she heard no exercise equipment clinking and clanking. No men throwing heavy things. No people grunting as they lifted heavy objects for personal enjoyment. There was only the empty blare of music that, now that all was abandoned and quiet, played far too loud. Her phone continued to cycle without a signal, and Sugar’s eyes searched for signs of anyone in the building—most importantly, Lexi. And where had that searching Russian man gone? She needed a weapon. Fast.

She checked her phone again.

Nope. The hell with it. She tucked it in her back pocket. Across the open floor were hand weights. She could grab a few jump ropes or one of the calisthenics bars while she was there. But crossing the gym was too dangerous. With a view of nothing but treadmills, elliptical machines, and stair climbers, she had nothing but magazines to smack a bad dude with. Nothing deadly.

So the plan for the moment was to keep against the wall and head for the main desk. Surely there was a pair of scissors. A stapler. Hell, she could be deadly with a phone cord. All she needed was the right angle. But really, Sugar stressed about Lexi.

She crept around another corner of the main gym. No one was there.

No Lexi. No Bishop. No random meatheads. No guy with a Russian accent searching for rogue people hiding and creeping.

“What is going on?” Her pulse pounded in her neck, and confusion covered every thought. Only Emergency Exit signs illuminated the room, and the place was eerie.

Her quiet question went unanswered, and the baby took that moment to kick. “Easy, tater tot. I’ve got this.”

Cristin Harber is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling romance author. She writes sexy, steamy romantic suspense and military romance. Readers voted her onto Amazon’s Top Picks for Debut Romance Authors in 2013, and her debut Titan series was both a #1 romantic suspense and #1 military romance bestseller.

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