Screwball by Linda Morris

Screwball by Linda Morris

Screwball Synopsis:

Passion dominates the diamond in the second novel in this fun and flirty baseball romance series by the author of High Heat.

Paul Dudley, president of the Plainview Thrashers, is spinning out of control. Preserving his family’s baseball legacy in these tough times takes everything he’s got, and constant clashes with his father have left him struggling for authority over the team and even his own future. So when sports reporter Willow Bourne, a one-night-stand from a year ago, walks back into his life, he knows he can’t give into his feelings for her—no matter how strong they are.

Willow never expected to see Paul again, and she’s got her reasons for keeping her distance. Except the more time she spends around Paul, the harder it is to hide her secrets—or stop herself from falling head over heels.

As the sparks between them fly, Paul discovers what Willow has been concealing from him, leaving him with a difficult choice—keep the team his top priority or make his own legacy by following his heart…

Linda Morris Bio:

Linda Morris is a writer of contemporary romance, including High Heat, the first book in the Hard Hitters series; Melting the Millionaire’s Heart; The Mason Dixon Line; and Nice Work If You Can Get It. She writes stories with heart and heat, along with a joke or two thrown in. Her years of Cubs fandom prove she has a soft spot for a lost cause.

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Buy Links:

 Amazon: http://amzn.to/1GW6sK1

Barnes & Noble: http://bit.ly/1O1EC4J

Kobo: http://bit.ly/1JFa9FA

iTunes: http://apple.co/1NQ9iYV

Links:

Website: www.lindamorrisbooks.com

Facebook: www.facebook.com/lindamorrisbooks

Twitter: @LDMorrisWriter

Pinterest: www.pinterest.com/ldkmorris/

Excerpt

Willow is temporarily in Plainview, Indiana, working on a profile of the Thrashers for her employer, the baseball blog Screwball. Her infant son Jack is back with her mom in Florida, and she's missing him dreadfully, but she's just learned that a friend will be coming to visit her and bringing Jack too. She's delighted, but worried about bringing him to the run-down motel where she's been staying in Plainview. Trouble is, there aren't many alternatives:

“Son of a bitch!” The words sliced through the wall as if it didn’t exist. She yanked the pillow out from under her head and tossed it at the wall. No way was she going to pound on those guys’ door and tell them to shut up, though. She’d caught a few glimpses, and they looked suspiciously like guys passing through between stays at the penitentiary. Plus, they’d been very vocal about not wanting housekeeping in their rooms, a request the tired-looking maid had accepted with a shrug.

She picked up her phone. She could at least anonymously call the cops to make a noise complaint. She’d dialed the first number when she heard another spate of cursing.

“Shit! Where’s the fire extinguisher?”

“Oh, that is it.” She rolled out of bed, flicked on the light, and grabbed her shoes and a hoodie from the chair near the door. Another moment to collect her keys, phone and purse, and she was out the door, meth dealers or no meth dealers.

The acrid stench hit her as soon as she stepped onto the second-floor open-air hallway. Smoke seeped out from under the neighbor’s door. She hurried in the opposite direction, dialing 911 as she went. She reported the fire to the dispatcher while watching the culprits scurry into a pickup truck and drive away without pulling the fire alarm. Bastards.

As soon as she got off of the phone, she went to the front office to tell the clerk. The teenager appeared to be on the verge of nodding off, but he woke up fast enough when she told him about the fire. He disappeared, and a moment later the fire alarm shrieked through the building. She went outside to take a safe position on a sidewalk across the parking lot from the building. She shivered as puzzled families and yawning singles made their way out of their rooms. The motel was lightly occupied, fortunately, and easily evacuated before the fire department arrived.

When they arrived, they put the fire out quickly enough and then began asking questions of bystanders. When a Plainview PD car arrived, she told a young officer everything she’d seen and heard and gave them her name and cell number.

After an hour of waiting, watching, and asking questions, they allowed her back to her room to salvage what she could. The room next door was charred, but she could make out a cluster of jars, tubes and a ruined electric skillet. The jumbled mess didn’t bode well for the legality of whatever had been going on in there. Yellow police tape bisected the doorway. The damage was more minor in her room, thank God.

The shared wall between her room and the Walter White wannabes’ was soaked. Wallpaper had peeled and blistered and sagged away from the wall. One blackened hole in the wall showed where the fire had started to penetrate her room.

The pimpled teenage desk clerk spoke from the doorway. “We can reassign you to a new room if you want.” He held up his phone. “My manager has authorized me to give you ten percent off.”

She looked at him and back through the hole to the charred debris that used to be room 212. “Tempting as that awesome deal sounds, I’m going to have to pass.”