Blog Tour: Back in Black by Rhys Ford

Title: Black in Black
Series: McGinnis Investigations
Author: Rhys Ford
Genre: Thriller, Mystery, m/m
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press
Release Date: February 4, 2020

CONGRATS TO MICHELLE H. FOR WINNING THE GIVEAWAY!!

Hello! And thank you for joining the Back in Black Blog Tour! My name is Rhys Ford and I will be your guide through this serialized short story featuring Cole McGinnis and his trip to the altar. Hit each blog stop for the next bit of the story AND as a special bonus, Greg Tremblay has narrated each “slice of cake” on this wedding tour!

As some of you know, Cole McGinnis is a former LAPD detective who found love again in a romance suspense series called the Cole McGinnis Mysteries or as I call it, the Dirty Series. It is there he meets and falls in love with Kim Jae-Min, a Korean photographer with a few secrets of his own and a tiny black cat with an attitude. I left Cole and Jae in quite a happy place five years ago in Los Angeles with a promise to come back and “reboot” Cole’s life in a mystery series.

(You can find the first series here at Dreamspinner Press, including a special free bonus collection of shorts in both ebook and audiobook format)

If you’ve already met Cole, well then I am happy to announce he’s back and well, while things are a little bit different… and he’s a hair older… his life is still as insanely jam-packed with action and more than few mysteries to figure out. All of the old gang is back along with a few new faces and I hope you all enjoy Back in Black as much as I enjoyed writing it.

And as if Cole wasn’t fun enough to write, Greg Tremblay is back as Cole McGinnis in the upcoming audiobook which is supposed to be out on Feb 13th! If you aren’t a part of my Facebook group or follow me on social media, please be sure to find me to learn about any future stuff. Because 2020 is going to be a hell of a lot of fun.

Please comment on this post with the title of a song you’d like Cole and Jae to dance to at the reception.

The lucky song will win a $25 Gift Certificate to the online store of your choice!

***

Nothing Else Matters: Part Two

Audio Snippet Link: HERE

Seeing as I didn’t want to be found dead lying in the middle of a pile of garbage, I pulled myself up, lying as low as I could to keep out of the way. I couldn’t hear any more shots being aimed our way but I also didn’t hear any sirens. The panicked rush of screams dwindled down to a murmur, mostly spits of Mandarin from a partially open window on the second floor of a nearby phone shop.

“Give me your gun,” Bobby growled at me, shoving me back away from the curb. He looked pissed, not that I blamed him. I mean, shit, we were getting shot at. Pity I was about to disappoint the hell out of him.

“I don’t have a gun.”

I was right.

He looked disappointed.

And pissed.

“What?” The veins on his temple bulged and his scowl deepened, eyebrows knitting in tight. The bullets began again, less of a barrage and more of a few pot shots aimed at what was left of the minivan’s windows. “Why the hell don’t you have a gun?”

“I am trying to get married, asshole!” I screamed back, scrambling up to my knees to crouch down as close to the vehicle as possible. “Remember? Came here to get my damned wedding present for Jae?”

“Who the hell orders a camera lens for a present?” Bobby grabbed me, running his hand down my chest then diving into the pockets of my leather jacket. “A knife? Anything? What’s this?”

“My house keys.” His hand went lower. “That’s my phone. You go down any more and Ichi’s going to kill both of us.”

The sound of tires drowned out whatever it was Bobby said and finally the scream of sirens hit the air. I wasn’t sure what was more embarrassing… being a private investigator being rescued by the cops or nearly screaming like a startled hyena when the old woman from the shop behind us burst out of her door wielding a short machete.

The first thwack of the blade down onto the sidewalk missed my crotch by a few inches. I was thankful for the boxer briefs Jae snuck into my underwear drawer, my boxers mysteriously disappearing one by one until I noticed. The snug fabric kept everything tucked up against me but my jeans took the hit, tearing above the knee when the tip of the machete snagged the denim. I jerked my leg up, trying to roll out of the way when she followed through with another strike, nearly taking off my left shoulder.

“Jesus, woman!” Bobby grabbed at her, his fingers nearly closing over her wrist but she was spry, a wiry thin woman with a bony strength I could admired from my less than safe distance a foot away. “We weren’t the ones shooting at … stop trying to kill me!”

He finally got a hold of her, wrapping his fingers in her thin floral shift but she shimmied away, tearing herself free. She swung the long blade wildly about, nearly clipping his head and I scrambled up to my feet as quickly as I could, making a grab for her right arm. Bobby’s elbow caught the old woman on the chin, rocking her head back and her grey-shot black hair twisted partially out of its bun, long strands unspooling around her thin, outraged features as she snarled back at him. A drop of blood edged down one of her pinched nostrils and she spat out a mouthful of pink-foamed saliva onto the dirty sidewalk, her face flushed with anger.

Nearly two feet shorter than Bobby, she took advantage of her diminutive stature and balled up her fist, cranking her left arm back just as I wrenched the machete from her right hand. Twirling about, she screamed with a furious rage I’d only ever heard before from a hamster stuck in an empty toilet paper roll and punched Bobby right in the nuts, yanking herself out of arms length and leaving me standing there with the machete in-hand and a dumbstruck expression on my face. She and I stood transfixed, a mismatched High Noon brawl of an armed six foot tall former cop and a toothpick of a Chinese woman with a bloodied face and a territory she was going to defend to the death while Bobby writhed on the filthy sidewalk, clutching his pearls.

Which looked as bad as it sounded when the cops finally pulled up, drew their guns and told me to get my face on the ground with my hands behind my head.

***

Buy links:

Back in Black at Dreamspinner, Amazon (Globally) and other online book stores:

Back in Black Audiobook can be preordered here.

 

 

 

 

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Author info:

Rhys Ford is an award-winning author with several long-running LGBT+ mystery, thriller, paranormal, and urban fantasy series and is a two-time LAMBDA finalist with her Murder and Mayhem novels. She is also a 2017 Gold and Silver Medal winner in the Florida Authors and Publishers President’s Book Awards for her novels Ink and Shadows and Hanging the Stars. She is published by Dreamspinner Press and DSP Publications.

She’s also quite skeptical about bios without a dash of something personal and really, who doesn’t mention their cats, dog and cars in a bio? She shares the house with Harley, a grey tuxedo with a flower on her face, Badger, a disgruntled alley cat who isn’t sure living inside is a step up the social ladder as well as a ginger cairn terrorist named Gus. Rhys is also enslaved to the upkeep a 1979 Pontiac Firebird and enjoys murdering make-believe people.

Rhys can be found at the following locations:

Blog

Facebook

Facebook Group: Coffee, Cats, and Murder

Twitter: @Rhys_Ford

For more information and to keep track of his upcoming releases, visit Greg Tremblay.

Follow the rest of the story on these blog sites!