Release Day Blitz & Giveaway
The Sinners Bargain
(Contracts & Deceptions #2)
(Contracts & Deceptions #2)
by
Claire Contreras
Age group: Adult
Genre: Dark Contemporary Romance
Cover Design: Najla Qamber
Release Date: September 30, 2014
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~ Synopsis ~
Being pulled in different directions, Amara must choose what she wants to believe and whom she'll trust
~ Excerpt ~
“Holy shit,” she breathed when she looked at the four women
standing in front of her. Courtney wasn’t kidding when she’d said Philip
collected lookalikes. All of them looked like Amara. Not identical, but enough
that a person who didn’t know her could confuse them or think they were
sisters. They all had dark, straight hair that reached their elbows, a couple
had layers like hers, and the others were cut the same length. Their bodies
were all thin like Amara, although with slight variation in the hip area.
“You must be Amara,” one of them said, speaking up.
“I am,” she said, uneasily. “Isn’t it against code to use
real names?”
The girl laughed. “What am I supposed to call you? Jasmine?”
“Yes,” she responded slowly.
“Okay, Jasmine, I’m Jasmine.”
Amara’s brows furrowed. “For real?”
“All of our Méchant names are Jasmine for the night.”
“What?”
The girl shrugged. “That’s what they told us. We’re all
wearing the same thing; we’re all standing the same way, and using the same
make-up.”
“But how will… Okay,” Amara said, blinking rapidly. She
reminded herself she had this one last thing to do before she was free.
They all dressed in threads of fabric, artfully shredded,
tiny black shirts that left little to the imagination and similar skirts,
barely covering the panties beneath. Before long, Vivienne appeared at the
door, much to Amara’s surprise.
“It’s been a long time,” Vivienne said with a smile when she
spotted Amara.
Amara nodded in response, still gaping at
her. She noticed pairs of handcuffs that Vivienne held in
her hands.
“Okay, girls, stand in a single line so I can put these on
you. Don’t look so scared, Ava, they come off after the auction,” she said,
rolling her eyes. “I’m also going to put masks on you,” she added. “Just a
final touch so you can look more…alike.”
As Vivienne fastened the handcuffs on each girl, she put a
key on the side of their panties and gave them a level stare. “For after.” She
continued to give her unwanted comments as she stood in front of each girl.
Sometimes, “where did they find you?” others “your hips are too big.” Nobody
responded to her ”they just let her talk, cuff and slip the black, demure masks
over their faces.
“Ready,” she chimed before walking out of the room. “Follow
me!” she called over her shoulder.
The women followed Vivienne to a stage where they lined up
in a row beside one another, their shaky arms rubbing against the
other’s as they looked into the crowd. A few scattered women accompanied some
of the men. They watched with equal attention and excitement. The look on their
faces sickened Amara.
“This is crazy,” she heard Ava whisper beside her.
“It’ll be over soon,” Amara whispered back.
Her eyes scanned the crowd again. The lighting in
the room was dim, like everywhere else, and it gave everyone in the crowd a
rosy glow. Amara wondered where the man was—the one looking for her—and that’s
when she spotted Colin sitting off to the left side, by himself with a drink in
his hand. Shit. Amara cursed repeatedly. She tried to see if she
could spot Sam or Philip, but couldn’t. She needed to tell somebody about him.
If he decided to bid on her, if he could even bid on the right her, it would throw everything off.
Before she could do anything else, the auction started. Ava
was pushed up first. She stood in front of the line with her head tucked into
her chest, just waiting, as Vivienne introduced her as “Number One.” So they
would do it by numbers. Nothing more was said about Ava, before a woman stood
up and placed her bid of five thousand dollars, only to be countered by the
woman at her same table with a bid of twelve thousand. They both laughed, as if
it was such a hilarious thing to be bidding on this poor girl’s body. They gave
each other a knowing look, which made Amara’s stomach turn. Ava knew what she
was in for, though. The girls in Méchant were prepared to give their bodies
away without hesitation.
Three more numbers went by before it was Amara’s turn:
Number Five. She stood, with head held down as the others had, until she heard
Colin’s opening bid of fourteen thousand dollars. Her eyes snapped up to meet
his. She wanted to warn him to stop. A man standing off to the other side of
the room countered him. Twenty thousand. Colin raised it to thirty. Her hands
sweated, shaking so hard she was forced to clamp them together in front of her
body as her eyes searched the room for Philip, Vivienne…anybody who could help.
The man raised his bid to forty and Colin countered with fifty. Amara waited on
bated breath and sighed in relief when the man didn’t counter the offer. She
should have been nervous knowing Philip would be furious if that was the guy
they’d been waiting for, but a part of her was relieved. Vivienne said that
standard procedure was for them to check who the winning bidders were before
they left with the girls —that’s how they would know if the man was there.
Maybe if he bid on one of the others and was caught, Amara wouldn’t have to do
much more.
The longer she counted the numerous ways this could go, the
more tied up she felt. The cuffs around her hands began to be weighty, and the
mask on her face felt like it was suffocating her. Amara had to
squash an overpowering need to get out, to run and never
look back.
Auction over, each girl stepped off the stage and stood
beside their winner, eyes still downcast, Amara included, until
Colin squeezed her chin and tilted her face toward him. He glared at her, but
she was defeated. She met his gaze openly, brokenly, until he
finally dropped his hand.
~ Links to Buy ~
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~ About the Author ~
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See where it all began......
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Genre: Dark Contemporary Romance
Cover Design: Najla Qamber
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Synopsis
He gave them a choice.
She took it.
He made her promise two years.
She should have known there was a catch.
Claire Contreras graduated with her BA in Psychology from Florida International University. She was born in the Dominican Republic and raised in Miami, Fl, where she currently resides with her husband, two boys, and two American Bulldogs.
Life is short, and it’s more bitter than sweet, so she tries to smile as often as her face allows. She enjoys stories with happy endings, because life is full of way too many unhappy ones.
~Connect with Claire ~
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