In
Charlemont, Kentucky, the Bradford family is the crème de la crème of high
society—just like their exclusive brand of bourbon. And their complicated lives
and vast estate are run by a discrete staff who inevitably become embroiled in
their affairs. This is especially true now, when the apparent suicide of the
family patriarch is starting to look more and more like murder…
No one is
above suspicion—especially the eldest Bradford son, Edward. The bad blood
between him and his father is known far and wide, and he is aware that he could
be named a suspect. As the investigation into the death intensifies, he keeps
himself busy at the bottom of a bottle—as well as with his former horse
trainer’s daughter. Meanwhile, the family’s financial future lies in the
perfectly manicured hands of a business rival, a woman who wants Edward all to
herself.
Everything
has consequences; everybody has secrets. And few can be trusted. Then, at the
very brink of the family’s demise, someone thought lost to them forever returns
to the fold. Maxwell Bradford has come home. But is he a savior...or the worst
of all the sinners?
Release Date: July 26, 2016
Berkley NAL
Contemporary Romance
Bourbon Kings #2
Review copy provided by publisher
When I read the first book in the Bourbon Kings series,
I found it to be too much like going back in time to an 80's nighttime soap
opera. Seriously I compared it to a mix-up of Dynasty, Dallas, and Falcon Crest
with a little Knots Landing thrown in for good measure. While I loved each of
those shows when they first aired, it was hard to read the first book because
some of the characters were not likable. However, I adore JR Ward with
everything in me, so I had to give The
Angels’ Share a chance, and I'm glad I did.
I found the Bradford siblings to pretty much be spoiled
rotten brats in the first book. However, as I read The Angels’ Share, I started to see growth with the characters.
Lane, who has to step up way more than he ever expected when it came to the
family business, actually has grown up so much since the first book. I also
enjoyed seeing him with Lizzie, who was one of my favorite characters in the
first book. I honestly thought we might see focus on one of the other Bradford
siblings, but The Angels’ Share still
focused mostly on Lane and Lizzie with glimpses of the other siblings. I did
like seeing Lane finally start to grow up and take care of business, and really
enjoyed seeing him reach out to his brother Edward. I really liked Edward in The Bourbon Kings, and was honestly
hoping he would play a bigger role in The
Angels’ Share. I found myself liking him more and more as I saw him
interact with his family. I thought we might get more time with Gin,
and though I have to say she is taking way longer to grow up than her
siblings, I did like the changes she made for herself and her daughter. Maxwell
Bradford returned towards the end of the book, and I feel like he might play an
important role in the next book.
There are so many twist and turns in The Angels’ Share, some I saw coming
others totally threw me for a loop. I really enjoyed The Angels’ Share and am looking forward to the next installment in
the Bourbon King's series, which I'm pretty sure won't be out until next
summer.
Rating: 3.75 Stars (B-)
Excerpt from THE ANGELS’ SHARE by
J. R. Ward
Toyota
trucks were not supposed to go seventy-five miles an hour. Especially when they
were ten years old.
At
least the driver was wide awake, even though it was four a.m.
Lizzie
King had a death grip on the steering wheel, and her foot on the accelerator
was actually catching floor as she headed for a rise in the highway.
She
had woken up in her bed at her farmhouse alone. Ordinarily, that would have
been the status quo, but not anymore, not now that Lane was back in her life.
The wealthy playboy and the estate’s gardener had finally gotten their act
together, love bonding two unlikelies closer and stronger than the molecules of
a diamond.
And
she was going to stand by him, no matter what the future held.
After
all, it was so much easier to give up extraordinary wealth when you had never
known it, never aspired to it—and especially when you had seen behind its
glittering curtain to the sad, desolate desert on the far side of the glamour
and prestige.
God,
the stress Lane was under.
And
so out of bed she had gotten. Down the creaking stairs she had gone. And all
around her little house’s first floor she had wandered.
When
Lizzie had looked outside, she’d discovered his car was missing, the Porsche he
drove and parked beside the maple by her front porch nowhere to be seen. And as
she had wondered why he had left without telling her, she had begun to worry.
Just
a matter of nights since his father had killed himself, only a matter of days
since William Baldwine’s body had been found on the far side of the Falls of
the Ohio. And ever since then Lane’s face had had a faraway look, his mind
churning always with the missing money, the divorce papers he had served on the
rapacious Chantal, the status of the household bills, the precarious situation
at the Bradford Bourbon Company, his brother Edward’s terrible physical
condition, Miss Aurora’s illness.
But
he hadn’t said a thing about any of it. His insomnia had been the only sign of
the pressure, and that was what scared her. Lane always made an effort to be
composed around her, asking her about her work in Easterly’s gardens, rubbing
her bad shoulder, making her dinner, usually badly, but who cared. Ever since
they had gotten the air cleared between them and had fully recommitted to their
relationship, he had all but moved into her farmhouse—and as much as she loved
having him with her, she had been waiting for the implosion to occur.
It
would almost have been easier if he had been ranting and raving.
And
now she feared that time had come—and some sixth sense made her terrified about
where he had gone. Easterly, the Bradford Family Estate, was the first place
she thought of. Or maybe the Old Site, where his family’s bourbon was still
made and stored. Or perhaps Miss Aurora’s Baptist church?
Yes,
Lizzie had tried him on his phone. And when the thing had rung on the table on
his side of the bed, she hadn’t waited any longer after that. Clothes on. Keys
in hand. Out to the truck.
No
one else was on I-64 as she headed for the bridge to get across the river, and
she kept the gas on even as she crested the hill and hit the decline to the
river’s edge on the Indiana side. In response, her old truck picked up even
more speed along with a death rattle that shook the wheel and the seat, but the
damn Toyota was going to hold it together because she needed
it to.
“Lane . . .
where are you?”
God,
all the times she had asked him how he was and he’d said, “Fine.” All those
opportunities to talk that he hadn’t taken her up on. All the glances she’d
shot him when he hadn’t been looking her way, all the time her monitoring for
signs of cracking or strain. And yet there had been little to no emotion after
that one moment they’d had together in the garden, that private, sacred moment
when she had sought him out under the blooms of the fruit trees and told him
that she’d gotten it wrong about him, that she had misjudged him, that she was
prepared to make a pledge to him with the only thing she had: the deed to her
farmhouse—which was exactly the kind of asset that could be sold to help pay
for the lawyers’ fees as he fought to save his family.
Lane
had held her, and told her he loved her—and refused her gift, explaining he was
going to fix everything himself, that he was going to somehow find the stolen
money, pay back the enormous debt, right the company, resurrect his family’s
fortunes.
And
she had believed him.
She
still did.
But
ever since then? He had been both as warm and closed off as a space heater,
physically present and completely disengaged at the same time.
Lizzie
did not blame him in the slightest.
It
was strangely terrifying, however.
Off
in the distance, across the river, Charlemont’s business district glowed and
twinkled, a false, earthbound galaxy that was a lovely lie, and the bridge that
connected the two shores was still lit up in spring green and bright pink for
Derby, a preppy rainbow to that promised land. The good news was that there was
no traffic, so as soon as Lizzie was on the other side, she could take the
River Road exit off the highway, shoot north to Easterly’s hill, and see if his
car was parked in front of the mansion.
Then
she didn’t know what she was going to do.
The
newly constructed bridge had three lanes going in both directions, the concrete
median separating east from west tall and broad for safety purposes. There were
rows of white lights down the middle, and everything was shiny, not just from
the illumination, but a lack of exposure to the elements. Construction had only
finished in March, and the first lines of traffic had made the crossing in
early April, cutting rush-hour delays down—
Up
ahead, parked in what was actually the “slow” lane, was a vehicle that her
brain recognized before her eyes properly focused on it.
Lane’s
Porsche. It was Lane’s—
Lizzie
nailed the brake pedal harder than she’d been pounding the accelerator, and the
truck made the transition from full-force forward to full-on stop with the
grace of a sofa falling out a second-story window: Everything shuddered and
shook, on the verge of structural disintegration, and worse, there was barely
any change in velocity, as if her Toyota had worked too hard to gain the speed
and wasn’t going to let the momentum go without a fight—
There
was a figure on the edge of the bridge. On the very farthest edge of the
bridge. On the lip of the bridge over the deadly drop.
“Lane,”
she screamed. “Lane!”
Her
truck went into a spin, pirouetting such that she had to wrench her head around
to keep him in her sights. And she jumped out before the Toyota came to a full
stop, leaving the gearshift in neutral, the engine running, the door open in
her wake.
“Lane!
No! Lane!”
Lizzie
pounded across the pavement and surmounted barriers that seemed flimsy, too
flimsy, given the distance down to the river.
Lane
jerked his head around—
And
lost one hold of the rail behind him.
As
his grip slipped, shock registered on his face, a flash of surprise . . . that
was immediately replaced by horror.
When
he fell off into nothing but air.
Lizzie’s
mouth could not open wide enough to release her scream.
Posted
by arrangement with New American Library, a member of Penguin Group (USA) LLC,
A Penguin Random House Company. Copyright © J.R. Ward, 2016.
J.R. Ward is a #1 New York Times bestselling author with
more than 15 million novels in print published in 25 different countries around
the world. The books in her popular
Black Dagger Brotherhood series have held the #1 spot on the New York Times hardcover, mass market,
eBook, and combined print/eBook fiction bestseller lists and have debuted in
the top 5 on the USA Today bestseller
list. Prior to her writing career, Ward
worked as a lawyer in Boston and spent many years as the Chief of Staff of one
of Harvard’s world-renowned academic medical centers. Ward currently lives with her family in
Kentucky where she has learned to enjoy and appreciate all things Southern.
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