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 Two Princes, the first book in the When We Were Young series, a young adult, LGBTQ+ contemporary romance. Make sure and check out other book hooks from participating authors HERE.

To win over the chief’s haughty son, a drug-dealing punk from a dysfunctional family must risk the only two things he has:  his reputation and freedom.

Blurb:  Billy Redsky, a rebellious punk who loves art and nature, is saddled with a welfare-leeching, alcoholic mother and criminal older brother who are the joke of their Ojibway community.  Sick and tired of being perceived as a loser, Billy deals drugs for his older brother to earn quick money.  He hopes if he buys a dirt bike, he’ll finally impress the chief’s popular and aloof son, René Oshawee.

When the two are forced to serve detention together, a friendship begins to bloom, but much to Billy’s frustration, René keeps putting him on ice.  To make his biggest dream come true if he finally wants to call René his own, Billy must make a huge decision that could cost him everything.

Genre(s):  Multicultural Romance, M/M Contemporary Romance, LGBTQ+, Young Adult.
Heat Rating: Level 2
Publication Date:  June 12, 2020
Publisher:  eXtasy Books

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The walk home shouldn’t have bothered Billy. It hadn’t in the past. But this morning, while clomp, clomp, clomping to James Street, each step had dragged. Now his feet stung, toes pinched, and thighs screamed. It was another hour to the bridge, and an additional ten minutes to reach the T. Then three more clicks home.

Traffic whizzed by him. A horn honked.

Billy turned to powwow music coming from an old pickup rolling up beside him.

The driver was his former Ojibway Culture teacher, René’s super-cool uncle, Mr. Atatise, who’d told awesome stories. Such as when he’d joined a march on Parliament Hill to fight the elimination of aboriginal rights in the proposed constitution. Or when he’d helped occupy a park in Kenora to protest the government’s poor treatment of aboriginal people in Northwestern Ontario. Then there was the time he’d traveled to the States to support the Oglala and American Indian Movement at Wounded Knee where he’d met his soon-to-be wife, a pretty woman from the Indian Reservation.

“Need a lift?”

“Sure.” Billy got in the truck. No wonder the man was nice. His sister was René’s mom, not a blue blood of the nose-in-the-air royal Oshawees.

Mr. Atatise lowered the stereo volume. He checked the lane in his side mirror and guided them back into traffic. “How ya been?”

Of all the questions for someone to ask. Twenty minutes ago, Billy had dropped out of school. “It’s cool.”

“Yeah? That’s good. Me? I’m getting some donuts for the staff. Just came from teaching an early class over at the college. Wanna join me before I head for the rez?”

“Uh… okay.” Leave it to Mr. Atatise to not ask why Billy wasn’t in school.

Looking at the man was staring at an older version of René in the future. They shared the same long, straight nose, smooth cheekbones, athletic build, and thick, straight hair. Any stranger who didn’t know René would’ve mistaken Mr. Atatise for his father and not the super-round chief.

The truck rolled onto Arthur Street to people scurrying down the sidewalks, traffic jamming the four lanes, restaurants and buildings clogging the paved lots, and noises of blaring horns and revving engines screaming in the air.

Mr. Atatise guided the old pickup to the parking lot of Reggie’s Donuts. He switched off the truck. “C’mon. Eat as many as your gut can handle. It’s on me.”

First nachos and smokies. Now every sweet imaginable. If not for René’s shit attitude, this would have been the most bangin’ week of Billy’s life.

They headed inside. At the counter, Mr. Atatise put in his order for the school, while Billy picked out six donuts. If he couldn’t eat everything while they sat, he’d stuff his face at home later.

He plunked down across the table from Mr. Atatise who’d purchased a coffee.

“I used to think school was a waste of time.” Mr. Atatise had the same satin-lining-drink-of-whiskey voice as René. “I was too much of a rebel, believing I didn’t need a white man’s education.”

Billy bit into his chocolate-covered donut. So there wasn’t anything wrong with the decision he’d made. “Me, too.”

“Ya? Whatcha gonna do next?”

“Next?” Billy gobbled down another bite. His stomach sang in approval.

“Sure. You’re a smart guy. Great at art. You gonna be an artist?”

Drawing was something Billy simply did—like breathing. “You really think I’m good?”

“Ya won every art prize at school, didn’tcha?”

“Uh, yeah.”

“There you go. Our school thinks ya got talent.”

“So… so does René.” At the mention of the royal prince’s name, the eaten donut in Billy did a little gurgle. “He told me yesterday he dug my drawing.”

“Renny enjoys the recording arts. You, it’s the visual arts, hey?” Mr. Atatise’s dark-chocolate eyes glittered.

“I… I’m down with realism.” Billy swallowed the last of his donut and reached for a Long John.

“I know ya are. Saw lots of your drawings and paintings at the school. Realism is your forté, although I could see you learning the Woodlands style. My fave? The one of Chief Thunder Cloud.”

Mr. Atatise’s words were reassuring hands kneading Billy’s shoulders. Why couldn’t all teachers be the same as him? “My fave, too. I had to… um… make myself kind of go back in time to when he lived to… um… make him real to me.”

“I get it. Needed to capture his essence, huh?”

Billy bit into the chocolate-covered, cream-filled Long John. His stomach again sang.

“Saw you in Renny’s truck yesterday.”

Of all the people who could have spied Billy, it was the dude’s uncle? What rotten luck. No, it wasn’t bad luck. René was a prick. “Needed a ride home,” he said in between bites.

“At seven? From Mountain Road?”

Heat saturated Billy’s face. Everyone knew about his mile-long list of detentions at the elementary school. It was best to own the truth. “Uh yeah, had to stay for detention. René and I… we kind of… got into a dust-up.”

Mr. Atatise raised his mug and blew on the swirling steam. “We all do when we’re young. The important thing is working out the problem. Seems to me you two did, since you were coming from the mountain.”

“Uh, yeah.”

“I made the walk from school lots of times.” Mr. Atatise rubbed his mug. “In those days, racism was everywhere. It still is, but it’s not as in-your-face as it used to be.”

“You said you went to the residential school.” Billy shoveled the last of the treat into his mouth.

“I did, but when I was sixteen, I went to high school. Didn’t last long. I let them chase me outta there.” Mr. Atatise shrugged.

“I didn’t think you’d let anyone push you around.” Billy reached for a caramel glazed donut.

“Nobody did, but I got the vibe I didn’t belong there. Shoulda stayed. An education, as I said, is important.”

“When did you become a teacher?”

“After I had my two kids. One thing led to another at The ‘Knee.” Mr. Atatise winked. “I needed to find work. The wife and I moved to Winnipeg by then to be closer to my older brother. It’s where I attended university. The U of W has a great native studies program. I got my BA and then applied to the faculty of education. It was a long haul. A high school education prepares you for university. I didn’t know how important education was in those days.”

Something festered in Billy, and it wasn’t the new donut he had halfway eaten.

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