Maggie Blackbird

Book Hooks is a weekly meme hosted by Marketing for Romance Writers as part of the MFRW Authors Blog. Readers can jump from one author to another who share hooks from their current WIP (work in progress) or any previously published books.

For this week’s edition of Book Hooks, I give you a teaser from Redeemed, book two in The Matawapit Family series, a second-chance, contemporary romance. Don’t forget to check out the other book hooks from participating authors here.

A single woman battles to keep her foster child from his newly-paroled father—a dangerous man she used to love.

Bridget Matawapit is an Indigenous activist, daughter of a Catholic deacon, and foster mother to Kyle, the son of an Ojibway father—the ex-fiancé she kicked to the curb after he chose alcohol over her love. With Adam out on parole and back in Thunder Bay, she is determined to stop him from obtaining custody of Kyle.

Adam Guimond is a recovering alcoholic and ex-gangbanger newly-paroled. Through counseling, reconnecting with his Ojibway culture and twelve-step meetings while in prison, Adam now understands he’s worthy of the love that frightened him enough to pick up the bottle he’d previously corked. He can’t escape the damage he caused so many others, but he longs to rise like a true warrior in the pursuit of forgiveness and a second chance. There’s nothing he isn’t willing to do to win back his son–and Bridget.

When an old cell mate’s daughter dies under mysterious circumstances in foster care, Adam begs Bridget to help him uncover the truth. Bound to the plight of the Indigenous children in care, Bridget agrees. But putting herself in contact with Adam threatens to resurrect her long-buried feelings for him, and even worse, she risks losing care of Kyle, by falling for a man who might destroy her faith in love completely this time.

Genre(s):  Multicultural, Contemporary Romance, First Nations Romance, Adult, Inspirational.
Heat Rating:  Level 3
Publication Date:  April 19, 2019
Publisher:  eXtasy Books

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“You may enter.” The woman’s supposed invitation came out as an order. She must have worked at the iron house or had a husband as a CO.

Adam opened the door to a hawk—a birdlike biddy in her sixties with gray hair pulled off her narrow face and twisted into a bun. Beady cold eyes looked him up and down with the scrutiny of a judge on the bench. Her nose, the shape of a beak, she held high in the air. She pointed her skinny finger at the chair positioned in front of the desk, square in the middle.

“You may sit.” She lowered her hard gaze to a neat stack of papers and started writing.

Adam sat. The chair was positioned too close to the desk. Even when he opened his legs, his knees hit the cheap laminate. Maybe this was part of the caseworker’s strategy to make clients uncomfortable.

“I’m Mrs. Dale. Your son’s caseworker.” She kept writing on the pad, her scrawny knuckles a bright red from how hard she gripped the pen.

There wasn’t a smidgen of dust on the filing cabinet, desk, or bookshelf. One lone picture faced her. Pens kept in order of color sat in a tray. Even the essentials for an office were set square on the desk. There were no other files present but one manila folder which also sat square beside the paper she wrote on. The off-white vertical blinds were adjusted to keep the sunlight off her but allow the two blooming plants on a shelf to take in a tan.

With all this silence, she must want him to speak first. He swallowed a helping of saliva to keep his voice strong and calm. “I’m Adam Guimond. Kyle’s father.”

“I already know who you are and why you are here, Mr. Guimond.” The Hawk kept writing. “I have been responsible for your file since your incarceration.”

Double great. This old biddy had it out for him. Adam kept his arms unfolded. He stared at her rolled bun. He wouldn’t look anywhere else or shift in his chair.

After five more minutes, and Adam refusing to twitch, the Hawk raised her head. She laid aside the pen vertical to the pad of paper, which she rested her skinny fingers on. “Why are you requesting approval to see your son?”

Adam hadn’t expected this question. He continued to stare at her narrowed eyes tucked behind matching glasses. Again, he made sure to keep his voice even. “He’s my son.”

“I know he’s your son, a son you lost to care, because you not only abused alcohol, but also committed a serious crime while under the influence. Tell me, why are you requesting approval to see your son?”

She’d made a damned good point. He’d cut the old biddy some slack. The twelve steps of his recovery program, the Seven Grandfathers teachings of the Ojibway, and the anger management course he’d followed while in the iron house had prepared him for this moment.

“Saved up enough money working on day parole. Gonna use the coin to rent a small apartment. Got a plan.”

“What plan would that be?”

With her shitload of questions, her unchanging cold stare that was a block of ice, The Hawk was in the wrong line of work. Adam should recommend she become a detective instead of a caseworker.

“Good place for my kid.”

“Mr. Guimond, you are going to have to be specific and find your tongue to elaborate. We are discussing the welfare of your child.” Her voice remained the same stern tone.

She was good. Really good. Better than the too-many cops who’d hauled Adam into an interrogation room for questioning.

“You got the info on me. Came up with a plan in the pen.” He squeezed his toes, a great way to destress when under scrutinizing eyes and effectively hide the flicker of anxiety twitching along his spine.

“A plan?”

“Yeah. Got my grade twelve. Went to twelve-step meetings. Was part of the aboriginal healing program. Took my anger management class and passed. It was my plan. To change. Become a true dad to my son.”

“This is why you relocated from Winnipeg to Thunder Bay—again?”

“My boy lives here. I wanna live here.”

“Why else do you wish to reside here? As I said, you had better be more specific and talk.” She tightened her jaw and lifted her brow.

Adam kept the smile itching to stretch his lips tucked deep inside him. She’d broke first. Confidence swelled in his chest. Maybe, just maybe, he stood a chance at getting his son back. “After my last rubbie bit, I dropped my colors—”

“This is not the federal corrections institution, Mr. Guimond. Proper English. Not street code.” Her voice rose an octave.

He’d broken her again. So he set his hands on his thighs and leaned in a smidgen. Crowding her space was imperative to force her to lean back. He kept his stare rigid and spoke in the same low monologue. “During my second last incarceration, the mother of my kid told me she was pregnant. I wanted a better life for my son. Stopped drinking and left the gang. Went to rehab. My back was against the wall. No protection anymore. Other gangs wanted a piece of me still. Moved here to start a better life. Didn’t wanna get in any more trouble.”

The Hawk failed to recoil into her chair. She remained a statue in her seat. “But you did when you first lived here with your son…”

“I shouldn’t have moved back to…” Nope, he’d better not say the ’Peg. “…Winnipeg after things fell apart here. That was a big mistake.”

“Then why did you move back to Winnipeg, again, if you knew trouble awaited?” The Hawk’s tone shifted to her natural sternness.

Adam kept returning her stare. “It was a mistake. Told you already. Things fell apart here.”

“You mean your ex-fiancée, who’s been responsible for your son for almost four years now, ended your engagement and you couldn’t handle the rejection.” The Hawk’s mask of plaster cracked into a half-smile of part sneer and part triumph.

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