The Adventures of Xavier & Vic, Bk 6, The Darkest Days @Liza0Connor

BLURB

          When the pot has too many cooks a feast can be ruined, and that’s exactly what happens with Xavier and Vic’s new cases. Each proves more complicated than initially thought with criminals dropping out of the sky, wreaking havoc upon Xavier, Vic, and their excellent employees. By the end, Vic threatens to open a school that teaches criminals how to stay out of each other’s way.

Worse yet, a treasured member of the staff is shot in the heart while attempting to save Vic and the Queen’s cousin.

EXCERPT

Frederick’s eldest son stood at the kitchen table, wrapping a torn swatch of fabric around his sister’s neck. His intense, almost wild stare, indicated the boy was very close to breaking.

The constable was seated in the corner of the kitchen enjoying a cup of tea.

Jacko went to the boy. “Leeson, you don’t need to do that.”

The boy stopped. “The constable said he planned to take her into town on the back of his horse.” His jaw clenched. “I don’t want her head falling off.”

Jacko gripped his shoulders. “The constable is not taking your sister on his horse.” He glared at the fool sipping his tea. “If you must transport Daisy’s body to a doctor for his official declaration of death, I will provide a wagon.”

The constable took another sip of his tea, studying Jacko over the edge of the cup. “You are most helpful, Mr. Bienora, most helpful indeed.” He then stood. “And since you are so interested in this case, perhaps you will be so kind as to drive the wagon.”

“If you do not know how to drive a wagon, I will provide you a driver,” Jacko snapped.

“I would prefer you to drive. And don’t claim you don’t know how. I believe Jacko Black not only knows how to drive a wagon but captain a ship as well.”

The constable smiled as he aimed his gun at Jacko’s chest. “It took me a moment to recognize you, dressed in those fine clothes, but I’m good with names and faces, and you, sir, are an accomplished murderer. However, this is without a doubt, your most despicable crime yet. And finally, you will hang.”

The Darkest Days

Book 6

Free with Amazon Kindle Unlimited

Need to catch up?

Book 1

The Troublesome Apprentice

Book 2

The Missing Partner

Book 2.5

A Right to Love

Book 3

The Mesmerist

Book 4

Well Kept Secrets

Book 5

Pack of Trouble

All Xavier & Vic books are Free with Amazon Unlimited

Liza O’Connor was raised badly by feral cats, left the South/Midwest and wandered off to find nicer people on the east coast. There she worked for the meanest man on Wall Street, while her psychotic husband tried to kill her three times. (So much for finding nicer people.) Then one day she declared enough, got a better job, divorced her husband, and fell in love with her new life where people behaved nicely. But all those bad behaviors has given her lots of fodder for her humorous books. Please buy these books, because otherwise, she’ll become grumpy and write troubled novels instead. They will likely traumatize you.

You have been warned.

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SAVING MOLLY BY LIZA O'CONNOR

 Saving Molly

By

Liza O’Connor

Book 2 of the

Requires Rescue Series

∞

Contemporary Suspense

∞

Sometimes even the strong

requires a helping hand.

Blurb

Molly Brown always faces life with a smile, even when a frightening thug is intent upon killing her. At first, Detective Sean Cushing finds Molly’s cheery disposition unnatural, especially when he discovers the seriousness of her injuries. When she asks for police protection, he instead offers her a job and home being a nanny to his five-year-old daughter, hoping her cheery disposition can pull his child from her dark hole of misery. Never did he expect he’d be proposing marriage within a day, but life has a way of going in odd directions when Molly Brown is involved.

EXCERPT

“So why’d you get fired?”

Silence.

He glanced down at her. She was mauling her lip. “If I’m going to find you a new job and a place to stay, I need to know.”

The brilliant smile returned. “You’re going to find me both?”

“Depends on why you got fired.”

Her brow furrowed. “I’m not really sure why. I thought I was doing a good job. My boss seemed happy. He didn’t like my clothes—said they were too dowdy. He thought I should dress like Angie, but I wasn’t comfortable wearing…”

“Wearing what?”

“So little. It didn’t seem professional to me.”

“So he fired you for failing to dress sexy?” Sean asked.

“Not directly. He just stopped being pleased with me. In fact, he’d frown every time he saw me.”

“So how’d you get fired?” Why was it that no one could just answer his questions?

“He called me into his office and told me it was time I stopped with the child routine and grow up. He had arranged for me to meet a client in his home, and my job was to make the client happy…so happy he’d buy a thousand top-of-the-line copiers for the company. This sale would be twenty percent of our annual sales, so I couldn’t screw it up.”

“What did you say?”

“I said I didn’t think I was ready for such an important sale and he should send someone else, like Clark.” She paused and explained, “In my opinion, Clark is the best salesman in the office. My boss said Clark wouldn’t do. The client didn’t swing that way.”

Several cops standing in the hall stared their way. “Keep your voice down,” Sean whispered.

BUY IT NOW!

SAVING MOLLY

AMAZON

NOTE: EACH BOOK OF THIS SERIES STANDS ALONE.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Liza O’Connor lives in Denville, NJ with her dog Jess. They hike in fabulous woods every day, rain or shine, sleet or snow. Having an adventurous nature, she learned to fly small Cessnas in NJ, hang-glide in New Zealand, kayak in Pennsylvania, ski in New York, scuba dive with great white sharks in Australia, dig up dinosaur bones in Montana, sky dive in Indiana, and raft a class four river in Tasmania. She’s an avid gardener, amateur photographer, and dabbler in watercolors and graphic arts. Yet through her entire life, her first love has and always will be writing novels.

FOR MORE INFORMATION ABOUT

LIZA O'CONNOR

Investigate these sites:

Liza's Blog and Website   Facebook   Twitter

And check out Liza’s

45+ books

SAVING MOLLY BY LIZA O'CONNOR

Saving Molly

By

Liza O’Connor

Book 2 of the

Requires Rescue Series

∞

Contemporary Suspense

∞

Sometimes even the strong

requires a helping hand.

Blurb

Molly Brown always faces life with a smile, even when a frightening thug is intent upon killing her. At first, Detective Sean Cushing finds Molly’s cheery disposition unnatural, especially when he discovers the seriousness of her injuries. When she asks for police protection, he instead offers her a job and home being a nanny to his five-year-old daughter, hoping her cheery disposition can pull his child from her dark hole of misery. Never did he expect he’d be proposing marriage within a day, but life has a way of going in odd directions when Molly Brown is involved.

EXCERPT

Sean really needed to know what Molly heard, because G-Man had no trouble ordering a hit, and DTX had no problem fulfilling the order. “Well, matters can go very bad for you if you don’t tell me what he said.”

 After a long pause, she continued, “His boss said a shipment of goods was coming into JFK tonight. The mules were puppies.”

She went silent.

“Anything else?”

“He said to take the puppies to the meadowlands and gut them there. That caused me to gasp in horror and stare at the scary man. The moment I realized he knew that I had heard his boss on the phone, I took off running and he’s been following me for the last five hours.”

“You’ve been running for five hours?” God, just when he’d start to believe something out of her cheery, smiling mouth, she’d throw out a load of crap too big to swallow.

“Well, it began as a full out run for my life, that slowed to a track race, then downgraded to a marathon run. My hams got shaky so I dropped to a jog until they blew out entirely, and I could only walk. But I kept moving because I could still hear the scary man behind me. He has a high pierce wheeze.

Sean shook his head. He honestly had no idea if Molly Brown was an informant to a potential drug bust or a complete loon.

BUY IT NOW! 

SAVING MOLLY

AMAZON

NOTE: EACH BOOK OF THIS SERIES STANDS ALONE.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Liza O’Connor lives in Denville, NJ with her dog Jess. They hike in fabulous woods every day, rain or shine, sleet or snow. Having an adventurous nature, she learned to fly small Cessnas in NJ, hang-glide in New Zealand, kayak in Pennsylvania, ski in New York, scuba dive with great white sharks in Australia, dig up dinosaur bones in Montana, sky dive in Indiana, and raft a class four river in Tasmania. She’s an avid gardener, amateur photographer, and dabbler in watercolors and graphic arts. Yet through her entire life, her first love has and always will be writing novels.

FOR MORE INFORMATION ABOUT

LIZA O'CONNOR

Investigate these sites:

Liza's Blog and Website   Facebook   Twitter

And check out Liza’s

45+ books

Saving Molly by Liza 0'Connor

Molly was raised by the worst of parents. 
They are grifters.

Originally the word may have been used for circus people who swindled patron, especially with games of cards. However, with the loss of circus entertainers in general and it being such a cool word, it’s definition broadened a bit. It now means anyone who illicitly acquires money or property from another person (formerly designated as the ‘mark’)  The first time it was used in an American novel appears to be in 1915: George Bronson-Howard’s God’s Man. Here’s the reference:

"Grifting ain't what it used to be. Fourteenth Street's got protection down to a system--a regular underworld tariff on larceny."

In Saving Molly, when Molly was a child, she had an adorable smile and sweetest personality, so her ‘parents’ used her in their cons. Molly was the perfect distraction while they would lift wallets or create untrue reasons why the mark should give them money. Whenever a con would go awry, they would blame Molly and once they got home beat the poor child painfully. But in public, they seemed the nicest couple, and Molly the brightest smile on her face. ALWAYS.

Saving Molly

By

Liza O’Connor

Book 2 of the

Requires Rescue Series

∞

Contemporary Suspense

∞

Sometimes even the strong

requires a helping hand.

Blurb

Molly Brown always faces life with a smile, even when a frightening thug is intent upon killing her. At first, Detective Sean Cushing finds Molly’s cheery disposition unnatural, especially when he discovers the seriousness of her injuries. When she asks for police protection, he instead offers her a job and home being a nanny to his five-year-old daughter, hoping her cheery disposition can pull his child from her dark hole of misery. Never did he expect he’d be proposing marriage within a day, but life has a way of going in odd directions when Molly Brown is involved.

EXCERPT

Suddenly a hand gripped her arm. “Hey, you okay?”

The nice lady officer had returned for her.

“Thank you for coming back. I’m sorry; I couldn’t keep up with you. Normally, I could, but I think I’ve pulled my hamstrings,” she explained with her best smile.

The bathroom turned out to be only about twenty feet from where she stopped. Had she continued on her own to the door and entered the hallway, she could easily have found it. Now she felt doubly stupid. Why hadn’t she done that? She wasn’t a kid in Kansas anymore.

She stumbled as fast as possible to the bathroom stall, and barely got her butt on the seat before her bladder exploded. The smell was vile.

Someone coughed outside the stall.

“You don’t have to wait for me…Go while you can still breathe!”

A moment later, she heard the door open and close.

She covered her face with her hands. Why can’t I be like everyone else? Why do I have to be so freakin’ weird?

But she knew why. Her college roommate, Sandra, who did her psychology thesis on Molly, gave her a copy to read the day they graduated. In one horrible day she discovered how strange she appeared to others, her parents’ manipulations of her difference for their own gain, and that her only friend she’d ever had actually had seen their relationship as one of researcher to lab rat.

That had been the worst day of Molly’s life, far worse than today.

She smiled. If she could survive that day, she could survive anything. She was unsinkable! No matter what, she would come up smiling, because that’s who she was.

BUY IT NOW!

SAVING MOLLY

AMAZON

NOTE: EACH BOOK OF THIS SERIES STANDS ALONE.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Liza O’Connor lives in Denville, NJ with her dog Jess. They hike in fabulous woods every day, rain or shine, sleet or snow. Having an adventurous nature, she learned to fly small Cessnas in NJ, hang-glide in New Zealand, kayak in Pennsylvania, ski in New York, scuba dive with great white sharks in Australia, dig up dinosaur bones in Montana, sky dive in Indiana, and raft a class four river in Tasmania. She’s an avid gardener, amateur photographer, and dabbler in watercolors and graphic arts. Yet through her entire life, her first love has and always will be writing novels.

FOR MORE INFORMATION ABOUT

LIZA O'CONNOR

Investigate these sites:

Liza's Blog and Website   Facebook   Twitter

And check out Liza’s

45+ books

Saving Molly @Liza0Connor

Saving Molly

By

Liza O’Connor

Book 2 of the

Requires Rescue Series

∞

Contemporary Suspense

∞

Sometimes even the strong

requires a helping hand.

Blurb

Molly Brown always faces life with a smile, even when a frightening thug is intent upon killing her. At first, Detective Sean Cushing finds Molly’s cheery disposition unnatural, especially when he discovers the seriousness of her injuries. When she asks for police protection, he instead offers her a job and home being a nanny to his five-year-old daughter, hoping her cheery disposition can pull his child from her dark hole of misery. Never did he expect he’d be proposing marriage within a day, but life has a way of going in odd directions when Molly Brown is involved.

EXCERPT

Sean was on Broadway going south coming up to those crossroads. He scanned the crowded sidewalk before him but saw no one running or jogging. However, a blonde in her early twenties seemed to be getting a lot of people’s attention as she walked by.

He knew he had the right girl when he noticed people stopped after she passed and pulled out their cell phones. He slowed, following behind her, trying to fathom her game. Was she a pickpocket with a unique distraction or just an inconsiderate prankster?

A guy she passed pointed out Sean’s police car to her. He expected the young woman to run like hell at the sight of NYPD. Instead, she smiled and waved at Sean as if he were her best friend. She hobbled to his car, flapping her hands like a broken winged bird. He pulled the car to the side, made sure the doors were locked, and rolled down the passenger window two inches. He’d long ago learned to never trust the citizens of New York; no matter how benign they might appear.

Sure enough, the girl grabbed the door handle and repeatedly pulled on it. “Can you let me in? I’m being chased by a very scary man,” she said this with such cheeriness that he had no idea what to make of her claim.

“I’m off-duty.”

She glanced up the sidewalk, in the direction she had come, and for the first time, he saw a flash of true fear in her face. She turned back to him and smiled. “If I commit a crime, will you arrest me even if you’re off-duty?”

He didn’t have time for this shit. His daughter expected him home hours ago. She’d probably fallen asleep crying again.

“Lady, go home and see a shrink.” He checked the traffic to pull back into it and would have driven off if he hadn’t noticed in his side mirror, three blocks back, a drug dealer named DTX cutting a path down the sidewalk, literally knocking people out of his way.

The brutish thug was six-eight, built like a tank, with black bushy hair, and a scar on his left cheek.

A loud thump hit the right side of his car. He refocused on the blonde, hopping on one leg in a circle.

He shoved the gearshift into park, stormed around, and stared at the dent she’d made in his door panel. “That’s it. You’re under arrest.” He opened the back door, and pushed her inside. He must have used more force than he intended, because the girl flew off the seat and fell into the floorboard.

Several of the commuters and tourists bantered about the dreaded word: ‘police brutality’. He hoped to God none had caught the incident on their cell phone because he was pretty certain it looked a lot worse than he had intended. He hadn’t meant to send her flying into the back seat, and certainly not into the narrow foot space, but that’s where she was now.

BUY IT NOW!

SAVING MOLLY

AMAZON

NOTE: EACH BOOK OF THIS SERIES STANDS ALONE.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
JESS IN HER PRIME

Liza O’Connor lives in Denville, NJ with her dog Jess. They hike in fabulous woods every day, rain or shine, sleet or snow. Having an adventurous nature, she learned to fly small Cessnas in NJ, hang-glide in New Zealand, kayak in Pennsylvania, ski in New York, scuba dive with great white sharks in Australia, dig up dinosaur bones in Montana, sky dive in Indiana, and raft a class four river in Tasmania. She’s an avid gardener, amateur photographer, and dabbler in watercolors and graphic arts. Yet through her entire life, her first love has and always will be writing novels.

FOR MORE INFORMATION ABOUT

LIZA O'CONNOR

Investigate these sites:

Liza's Blog and Website   Facebook   Twitter

Click here For ALL Novels by Liza

Saving Molly by Liza O'Connor

Saving Molly

by Liza O’Connor

Contemporary Romance Suspense with Humor

Favorite line: I would much rather have good dead parents, than live evil ones.

Blurb

Molly Brown always faces life with a smile, even when a frightening thug is intent upon killing her. At first, Detective Sean Cushing finds Molly’s cheery disposition unnatural, especially when he discovers the seriousness of her injuries. When she asks for police protection, he instead offers her a job and home being a nanny to his five-year-old daughter, hoping her cheery disposition can pull his child from her dark hole of misery. Never did he expect he’d be proposing marriage within a day, but life has a way of going in odd directions when Molly Brown is involved.

Link

Excerpt

“Hi there. Sorry to bother you,” Molly Brown said as she flashed her smile. “Could you call 911 and tell them a scary man is following me?”

The man in a tailored suit, talking on his phone, stopped and stared as Molly continued weaving through the tourists and New Yorkers moving down Broadway. She saw a young man up ahead and thought he might help. “Hello, could you call 911 for me?” she asked as she beamed him her dimpled grin. “There’s a very scary guy following me.”

The guy slowed and looked behind him while Molly moved on.

“Hi,” she said to a woman, who frowned and moved away from her.

She rather missed her childhood when her smile could get her anything she wanted. Now it was hit or miss, and today was clearly a miss.

“Sorry to bother you, but could you call 911?” she asked another businessman, giving him her sweetest smile. “There’s a big scary guy following me.” He frowned at her and moved away, continuing the conversation he was on.

Today, it seemed her smile wasn’t working at all.

If only she had her own phone. But she’d lost her job as a photocopy salesgirl a week ago and along with it, her very nice cell phone. She tried to get them to let her keep it as a souvenir, but her boss just gripped his forehead and shook his head.

“That’s a lovely red scarf you have,” she said to a bag lady. “I bet you have a phone.”

The woman hugged her bag and sped up.

Molly matched her stride. “I think everyone deserves to have a phone. I used to have one, but now all I have is a scary guy following me. Could you call 911 and let them know?” She finished her request with a smile.

The wheezing sound she’d been running from, then jogging, and now walking from was getting louder, alerting her that she needed to make shorter requests, or the big scary guy was going to catch her.

In desperation, she shortened her plea as she sped up her pace. “Will someone call 911? A big scary man is following me. Anyone?” She still smiled, but no longer made eye contact with the people she passed. She just smiled and repeated her plea as she rushed as fast as her pulled muscles could move her, desperate to get away from the wheezing scary guy.

Getting help on a NYC street is not always easy...

Lots of weird people walk the streets

And sadly, Molly appears to be one of them.

NOTE: EACH BOOK OF THIS SERIES STANDS ALONE.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Meet Jess in her prime

Liza O’Connor lives in Denville, NJ with her dog Jess. They hike in fabulous woods every day, rain or shine, sleet or snow. Having an adventurous nature, she learned to fly small Cessnas in NJ, hang-glide in New Zealand, kayak in Pennsylvania, ski in New York, scuba dive with great white sharks in Australia, dig up dinosaur bones in Montana, sky dive in Indiana, and raft a class four river in Tasmania. She’s an avid gardener, amateur photographer, and dabbler in watercolors and graphic arts. Yet through her entire life, her first love has and always will be writing novels.

FOR MORE INFORMATION ABOUT

LIZA O'CONNOR

Investigate these sites:

Liza's Blog and Website   Facebook   Twitter

And check out Liza’s

45+ books