Title: Boys
Don't Cry
Author: J.K. Hogan
Publisher: J.K.
Hogan
Release
Date: May 25th 2017
Heat Level: 4 - Lots
of Sex
Pairing: Male/Male
Length: 70,000
words
Genre: Romance
Synopsis
Mackenzie Pratt is having the worst
luck of his life. His apartment building is being torn down, and since he’s
jobless and just weeks away from graduating college, he can’t find anywhere
else he can afford to live that isn’t a critter-infested dump. As he’s
lamenting the very real possibility of job hunting while couch-surfing, he gets
an offer from the coworker of his best friend.
An in-demand mobile app developer and
heir to his parents’ fortune, Laurent Beaudry is literally an eccentric billionaire.
Even though Mackenzie realizes he’s basically living the plot of a cheesy
romance novel, he takes the proffered room in Laurent’s Baltimore mansion. He
finds his new housemate to be grumpy, brooding, and, at times, incredibly kind
and endearing.
Raised by his brother after their
father’s death, Mackenzie spent his formative years plowing headlong through
school, focusing on little else beyond earning his teaching certification. He’s
never taken the time to explore love and relationships, much less sexuality, so
when he finds himself being courted by another man, he has no idea what to do.
And when he realizes he might actually return those feelings, his life takes a
whole new direction.
Excerpt
The house was dark so I couldn’t see
much, but what I could see was immaculate, contrary to what Taylor had said.
The hardwood floors gleamed in the moonlight, the furniture looked expensive
and perfect, and there wasn’t a dirty dish or dust bunny in sight. “I thought
you said it was a sty,” I whispered.
“Oh, this? Not this. He only uses a
fraction of the house, the suite with his bedroom, living room, library, and
office. All of this is just for show,” he said with a sweeping gesture toward
the big empty parlor we were facing. “And why are you whispering? He knows I’m
coming.”
“I don’t know. It seems so quiet
and…undisturbed.”
Taylor’s chuckle had an evil ring to
it. “You want disturbed? Follow me.” He cupped his hands around his mouth and
yelled. “Mr. Beaudry! It’s me, Taylor. Morrison. From Mindstream. The place you
work.”
He made his way down a dark corridor
with me dogging his heels. “He doesn’t remember who you are? Where he works?”
“Oh, he knows. But when he’s been
staring at code for hours on end and not sleeping, sometimes basic stuff slips
his mind. Details like that can be hard for geniuses like him.”
Genius? I didn’t think I’d ever heard
that term used to sincerely describe someone. “What does he do again?”
“He’s a mobile app developer. Highly
sought after, but right now he works exclusively for us. That was a huge coup
for the company.” He stopped in front of a heavy, ornately carved door made of
some kind of dark hardwood. He rapped his knuckles on it three times before
barging on in, while I hovered in the doorway.
So this was the suite. Taylor
had been right. What a mess. We stood in what I assumed was the living room,
but it was hard to tell because every available surface was covered in wrinkled
clothing, pizza boxes, and empty dishes. A huge fireplace was installed in the
far wall, surrounded by shelves and shelves of books. More books than I’d ever
seen in one place outside a library. The fire blazed in the hearth, and I was
honestly surprised there wasn’t any garbage close enough to it to catch fire.
As beautiful as the house was, the mess made my skin crawl. I usually lived in
shitty apartments, so I was a bit of a neat freak to balance the universe.
“Beaudry? You in here?” Taylor called.
There was no answer. “He must be in the bedroom suite.” He headed to a door on
the left, like it was no big deal.
“Wait! You’re just going to
barge into the guy’s bedroom?”
Pausing in his tracks, Taylor looked
over his shoulder. “This is no ordinary bedroom. Just because there’s a bed in
the corner doesn’t mean it’s some intimate setting. It’s just a giant
workspace.” With that parting shot, he burst through the door, once again
calling the man’s name.
Trembling from too much alcohol and
not enough nerve, I stepped inside the room. I was stunned speechless by the
scene before me. Taylor had one thing right—it was no ordinary bedroom. It was
the size of three average rooms lined up in a row and probably had double the
square footage of the apartment I was getting booted out of. There was indeed a
bed, a California king canopy bed off in one corner of the room. A fire was
blazing in this suite as well, only I realized that it was the same fire in the
same fireplace, which apparently connected the two rooms.
Taylor stood next to what had to be
the man’s workspace. There was a giant U-shaped desk adorned with four
widescreen computer monitors and various other gadgets typical of an office.
However, on one leg of the U, there was a collection of what looked to be every
tablet, PDA, smartphone, and any other mobile device known to man. I supposed
he had to test his software on each gizmo that was likely to employ it.
Behind the office area was a ginormous
TV screen—at least seventy inches—that looked like it would be more at home in
a movie theater. Several fluffy couches were set up in a semicircle facing it.
It would be amazing to have a movie marathon in this place. And of course,
there was every gaming console imaginable to go along with the screen yardage.
But…despite all the cool stuff, there was some very weird stuff about
the place as well. Besides the office setup and the movie area, all the
furniture in the suite looked like it had been bought from a garage sale at
Versailles. It was expensive-looking, obviously, but very gilded and frilly.
There were also several racks flanking the giant TV that displayed the man’s
sword collection.
And then, the murals. The murals were
creepy. On at least a couple of the walls above the wainscoting, there were
huge, garish wall paintings of nudes in various scenes. Men and women,
sometimes in sexual situations, sometimes just hanging out or whatever. But
they weren’t like Renaissance or fine art nudes or anything; they seemed to be
done by just some random modern artist. I had no idea how the guy could manage
to look at them all day every day. Though if it weren’t for those, I’d never
leave a place like this either. Speaking of the guy, though, there was no sign
of him.
“Where is he?” I was whispering again.
It just seemed like the thing to do when you snuck into someone’s bedroom at
night. Not that we were really sneaking, but still.
As if in answer to my question, we
heard a toilet flush, and a door to my right that I hadn’t even noticed swung
open, startling me. The person who came through was pretty much just as
unbelievable as the house he lived in. He was tall—very tall—and lanky, but
with wide shoulders and well-defined musculature. His hair was just a little
too long, like maybe he’d forgotten his last couple of haircuts, and very dark,
shot through with a tiny bit of gray. It had to be premature because I doubted
he was much more than ten years older than me. His facial features—though
thrown in deep shadow because of the low light in the room—were chiseled and
angular, too handsome to be fair to the rest of the world. Wire-rimmed glasses
perched on the tip of his straight nose, slightly askew. Despite the
handsomeness, he had dark circles under his eyes and frown lines around his
mouth, as if he hadn’t slept in weeks.
And he was wearing Angry Birds pajamas.
When he saw me, his deep-set blue eyes
widened and he flinched like I’d snuck up on him. “Who the hell are you?”
I let out a squeaky gasp and backed
away toward Taylor because the guy looked fucking scary when he turned on the
full force of that scowl.
“Jesus Christ, Beaudry, relax,” Taylor
said. He picked up his briefcase and pulled out a legal-size envelope. “This is
my friend Mackenzie. I was driving him home, and I just popped in to drop off
these contracts from Harrelson.”
Beaudry grunted and crossed the room
to sit at his desk. He waved a hand in the vague direction of a stack of
shelves. “Just put them in the inbox. I’ll deal with them later.”
“If you look them over now, I can take
back any questions or return them…”
He glared at Taylor over his shoulder,
and Taylor wisely shut his mouth. Then the man’s gaze settled on me. It wasn’t
the scowl he’d given me earlier, but it wasn’t exactly a…nice expression
either. It was more of an assessing glare than anything. “Welcome to Chatham
House, Mackenzie. What do you think?” he asked.
I had no idea what he meant. What did
I think of the house? The room? Him? “It’s…impressive. The artwork is…unusual.”
He let out a belting laugh that I
hadn’t been expecting, so I jumped, but then the rich baritone of it made my
toes curl. It was an odd reaction, as I wasn’t usually affected by such things.
“Unusual is a kind way of putting it.
The artwork came with the house, along with much of the furniture. I just
haven’t gotten around to redecorating.”
“Oh, that’s…” . “How long have
you lived here, then?”
Beaudry turned back to his computer
and began typing furiously. “About five years,” he answered without turning
back around.
I choked on air, and Taylor snorted.
“I think by ‘haven’t gotten around to it,’ you mean ‘just don’t give a shit,’”
he muttered.
“Touché, Mr. Morrison. Is there
anything else you need?”
Taylor sighed, probably realizing that
the man was not going to look at whatever was in the envelope while we were
still there to relay any messages back to Mindstream. He clamped a hand around
my wrist and started dragging me toward the door. “All right, we’re going.
Remember, drinks at the King’s Shield next Friday.”
“I don’t think I’m going to be—”
Taylor spoke right over Beaudry’s
muttering. “You already said you would. No backsies. I can pick you up.”
“I think I’d enjoy driving my shiny
Lotus instead, but thank you very much for the offer,” Beaudry growled. “Nice
meeting you, Mack,” I heard him call through the open door.
“Nickname basis already?” I laughed to
Taylor.
“That has nothing to do with nicknames
and everything to do with your name being too long for him to remember.”
“I heard that, Morrison!”
Purchase Links
J.K. Hogan: http://jkhogan.com/boys-dont-cry/
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All about Boys Don’t Cry by J.K. Hogan
Hi
y’all! Thank you for stopping by my blog tour! I’ve been on a year-long soft
hiatus—from publishing, not writing—but now I’m back with a vengeance.
Regrettably, my publisher Wilde City Press is closing its doors, so I spent the
beginning of this year re-releasing my backlist as self-published titles. Some
of you may know that I had another son at the beginning of last year, and that
little critter turned out to be a huge mama’s-boy-lapchild. He gets jealous of
my laptop. But he’s recently discovered walking, which means I have
rediscovered writing large blocks of work at a time! I will have several
releases this year, so I’m back in the saddle in a big way.
Boys Don’t Cry is sort of a diversion from
my usual subject matter. My work tends to be either dark, angsty, or
psychological, or various combinations of the three. While BDC is not without its angst, it’s a lot fluffier than what I
usually write. It’s full of (intentional) tropey goodness like an eccentric
billionaire, jealous lovers, accidental sexiness, and dorky-clumsy heroes. Writing
this book actually saved me, because I was totally burnt out on everything I
was working on, and when this story started coming to me, it just flowed
effortlessly. Mackenzie is a precious little virginal (not for long) cinnamon
roll, and Laurie is a grumpy rich guy with a sappy gooey heart inside—deep,
deep down.
I
hope everyone loves these boys as much as I do, because more than any of my
other stories, this one was for me. I’ve written a lot of books with heavy
subject matter, like anxiety, childhood abuse, PTSD, and all the many disorders
that were touched on in Strong Medicine,
so it was fun to write one where everyone is basically doing okay, they’ve just
got regular-life struggles to get through.
Readers,
how do you feel when an author puts out a book (or starts a new series) that is
different from previous works? Not necessarily a change in style, but subject
matter/themes?
Meet the Author
J.K. resides in North Carolina, where she was born and raised. A true southern girl at heart, she lives in the country with her husband and two sons, a cat, and two champion agility dogs. If she isn’t on the agility field, J.K. can often be found chasing waterfalls in the mountains with her husband, or down in front at a blues concert. In addition to writing, she enjoys training and competing in dog sports, spending time with her large southern family, camping, boating and, of course, reading! For more information, please visit
www.jkhogan.com.
Author Links
Website: http://jkhogan.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/OfficialJKHogan
Twitter: https://twitter.com/JK_Hogan
Google+: https://plus.google.com/u/0/+JKHogan
Email: jkhogan@gmail.com
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jkhoganbooks/
Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/jkhoganbooks/
Tour Schedule
5/26 Wicked Faerie's
Tales and Reviews - http://wickedfaeriesreviews.blogspot.com
5/26 My Fiction Nook - http://myfictionnook.com
5/27 Erotica For All - http://eroticaforall.co.uk
5/28 A Book Lover's Dream
Book Blog - http://abookloversdreambookblog.com
5/29 Love Bytes - www.lovebytesreviews.com
5/30 Joyfully Jay - http://joyfullyjay.com/
Giveaway:
$20.00 Amazon Gift Card
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