Lying Eyes by Robert Winter Blog Tour, Exclusive Excerpt & Giveaway!

Hi peeps, we have Robert Winter stopping by today with the tour for his new release Lying Eyes, we have a great exclusive excerpt and a brilliant giveaway, so check out the post and click that giveaway link! <3 ~Pixie~

Robert Winter - Lying Eyes Cover

Lying Eyes

by

Robert Winter

This bartender’s art lies in more than mixing drinks …

Randy Vaughan is a six-foot-three mass of mysteries to his customers and his friends. Why does a former Secret Service agent now own Mata Hari, a successful piano bar? Where did a muscle daddy get his passion for collecting fine art? If he’s as much a loner as his friends believe, why does he crave weekly sessions at an exclusive leather club? 

Randy’s carefully private life unravels when Jack Fraser, a handsome art historian from England, walks into his bar, anxious to get his hands on a painting Randy owns. The desperation Randy glimpses in whiskey-colored eyes draws him in, as does the desire to submit that he senses beneath Jack’s elegant, driven exterior.

While wrestling with his attraction to Jack, Randy has to deal with a homeless teenager, a break-in at Mata Hari, and Jack’s relentless pursuit of the painting called Sunrise. It becomes clear someone’s lying to Randy. Unless he can figure out who and why, he may miss his chance at the love he’s dreamed about in the hidden places of his heart.

Note: Lying Eyes is a standalone gay romance novel with consensual bondage and a strong happy ending. It contains potential spoilers for Robert Winter’s prior novel, Every Breath You Take.

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Exclusive Excerpt!

There it was again.

The back of Randy Vaughan’s neck prickled as he polished a glass, and he peered sharply around the almost-empty bar. It was a typical weeknight, and only a handful of patrons remained amid the deep couches and inviting club chairs grouped around cocktail tables of dark wood. He’d designed Mata Hari so that his customers would feel that they were guests at a cocktail party rather than a bar, and he even hung the walls with pieces from his personal art collection. Usually the homelike environment gave him a sense of satisfaction, but he drummed his fingers on the bar rail as midnight came and went.

None of the customers appeared to be paying him the slightest bit of attention. Yet he couldn’t shake the sense of being watched—and not in the usual way of guys sizing up his muscular build and deciding whether to make a pass.

As the night wore on, Randy tried to tell himself it was just stress, but twenty-five years of law enforcement left him with an instinct for wrongness he didn’t want to ignore. Surreptitiously, he checked to make sure that the .357 Magnum he kept under the bar was accessible. Then he shook his head at his own paranoia. At least whatever was off seemed to present no immediate threat, so he focused on serving drinks to the last stragglers.

At a few minutes before two, he sent his assistant Malcolm to deal with the back area in preparation for closing before he came out from behind the bar to begin his walk-through. In one of the side rooms off the main bar, he suppressed a chuckle. “Guys, time to take it elsewhere.”

The two men pawing at each other in the corner jolted apart, and Randy snorted at their wide eyes and swollen lips. He turned away to pick up a few stray glasses and napkins from a nearby table, allowing them some privacy to adjust clothing and tuck away obvious erections. When he turned around again, the younger of the two would-be lovebirds ran hands through his hair as he scanned up Randy’s six-foot-three frame.

His red-faced partner, or partner-of-the-moment, caught Randy’s eye and muttered, “Sorry. Didn’t realize it was so late.”

The younger one raised a suggestive eyebrow. “Is it just the three of us here now? Maybe we could—”

“Malcolm will let you out the front,” Randy said pointedly. The men hurried away then, hand in hand. Well, at least someone was getting laid tonight. He hoped they didn’t try to get it on in the alley or the parking lot. There was little worse than a bare ass mooning him through a windshield at two in the morning.

He finished gathering glasses, then wiped down the tables. The cleaning crew would wash up and run a vacuum in the morning, but he never left the place messy. He ran a hand over the gleaming wood of the bar as he left a stack of glasses for Malcolm.

When he was strongly invited to take early retirement from the Secret Service because of the fiasco that was Trevor Mackenzie, he was left at loose ends. Barely fifty years old, he’d been aimless and despondent until his best friend, Thomas, came up with the idea of running a bar.

“We’ve got enough dance places around DC, but there isn’t a good place anymore to have a drink and just enjoy conversation,” Thomas had said. “What about a piano bar?”

Randy had warmed to the notion immediately and threw himself into finding the right building, refurbishing it, and opening the doors. Now here he was with a place to call his own. Mata Hari had been open less than a year, but he’d built a good base of loyal regulars already. They talked the bar up, and on weekends Mata Hari was usually packed.

Tuesdays and Wednesdays though, not so much.

Randy walked through the main room again and stopped to adjust a picture frame that had been knocked askew during the evening.

The painting was a small pastel he’d bought in Kyoto, one that featured cherry trees lining a small stream. A single blossom had detached and drifted down toward the water. The elegance of the lines and delicate shading of pinks and blues pleased his sense of composition. A small tap on the frame’s edge squared the painting again.

“Anything else, boss?” Malcolm called. The tall black youth waited for Randy to send him home, but he already had his jacket in his hand and a baseball cap over his fade.

Randy passed a hand over his bald scalp as he considered. “The side rooms are all empty, so we’re good, Mal. See you tomorrow.”

“Uh, boss?”

“Yeah?”

“Tips were a little light tonight. You think you could give me a small advance on the weekend?”

Randy grinned. “Got a hot date, kid?”

Malcolm preened back. “I’m meeting Sarah at Tryst after this, and then there’s an after-hours club we’re going to hit up.”

Randy didn’t carry a wallet while working but just shoved cash into his pockets. Reaching in, he found two twenties and held them out. “Is this enough? If not, I’ll reopen the till.”

“Forty’s great. Thanks, man.” Malcolm smiled as he took the bills. “Don’t want Sarah to think I’m sponging off her. You remember how it is, right?”

Randy shook his head. “Honestly? No. The last time I took out a girl, you could probably still get a movie and dinner for ten bucks.”

Malcolm reeled a bit and flashed wide eyes, then laughed. “Fuck off, Randy. You never dated girls, did you?”

“I had my moments, back in high school.”

“Yeah? Were you the big man on campus or something?”

“Girls kind of went with the territory, playing football. At least until I wised up and ditched the cheerleaders for the tight end.”

Malcolm’s white teeth shone in his dark face as he grinned. “I’m disappointed in you, boss. Couldn’t you have banged the quarterback at least?”

“Nah, he was too easy. But Mickey Evans, now, he really did have a tight end.”

Malcolm shook his head and laughed as he put on his jacket. “I’d like to see what kind of man you go for. You get these guys wanting up in your muscly, growly business, but in all these months I’ve never seen you take up even one of these dudes on their offers.”

“Aah, it gets old. Everybody wants to fuck the bartender.”

“Whatever you say, boss. But we’d get better tips if you’d play it up a bit instead of snarling. And since you give us your share of the tips, there’d be more to go around, you know what I’m saying?”

“I know what you’re saying,” Randy rumbled in mock outrage. “You want to pimp out your employer.”

“A little smile, a wink here and there—it goes a long way in filling the tip jar!”

“Does Sarah know how much you flirt with these guys and lead them on?”

“C’mon, you know I don’t ever get anyone’s hopes up. I’m just friendly. If they get handsy, I let them know I’m all about the vajayjay and most of ’em drop it.”

“And the ones that don’t?”

“Well, then I holler for you.” Malcolm gave him a huge smile. “Nobody’s messin’ with the boss bear!”

“Get outta here before I remember I don’t need an assistant bartender on Tuesdays.” Malcolm chuckled and waved a goodbye as he left through the front door.

Randy smiled to himself as he took a last walk around the place for the night. He stopped by the piano, raised the cover on the keyboard, and plinked a few keys. The tone was clear and the notes seemed to hang in the air of the quiet, empty bar. Even as the sound faded away, the hair on his arms stood. He just couldn’t quite shake his unease.

I need a drink and a good night’s sleep. That’s all.

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About Robert!

Robert Winter author picRobert Winter is a recovering lawyer who likes writing about hot men in love much more than drafting a legal brief. He left behind the (allegedly) glamorous world of an international law firm to sit in his home office and dream up ways to torment his characters until they realize they are perfect for each other.

Robert divides his time between Washington, DC, and Provincetown, MA. He splits his attention between Andy, his partner of fifteen years, and Ling the Adventure Cat, who likes to fly in airplanes and explore the backyard jungle as long as the temperature and humidity are just right.

Contact Robert at the following links:

Facebook | Website | Goodreads | Twitter | Email RobertWinterAuthor@comcast.net

Robert Winter - Lying Eyes Square

Giveaway!

Enter for a chance to win a paperpack copy of Lying Eyes.
Three winners will be chosen, one lucky winner will receive a signed copy!

(Just click the link below)

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(Ends 14th July 2017)

Check out the other blogs on the tour!

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