Pumping Iron by Nya Rawlyns: Guest Post, Review & Excerpt

Pumping Iron

(Bad Boyfriends, Book 2)

by Nya Rawlyns

Genres: Gay, Contemporary, Erotic, M/M Romance, Comedy

What does it take to bring a slow simmer to a rolling boil?

Sean Rourke is hiding in plain sight as a Bad Boyfriends A-list escort, hoping to dodge the bullet from a few career missteps.

Mike Douglas’ financial backing and very special negotiating skills have him partnering not-so-silently at Bad Boyfriends, as well as running a training center for athletes and gym rats.

Eying each other at a distance is all they've allowed themselves until a joint special project at a seaside retreat in the Hamptons, entertaining a wily Boston attorney, shows them exactly how well they fit together, in more ways than simply business as usual.

Thanks for having me today! It’s my pleasure to present my newest addition to the Bad Boyfriends series: Pumping Iron. From the shadowy world of high-end male escort services to the hot, sweaty, hard bodies in the gym, two men with very different skill sets are forced to co-operate in keeping a mutual client out of sight and out of mind.

Perhaps “forced” is too strong a term. Sean Rourke, the A-list escort renowned for his ability to please, and Mike Douglas, fitness trainer to the stars and a silent partner with Bad Boyfriends, have danced around their attraction to each other for months.

The agency is under fire from competing interests, so when a law firm hires them to sequester one of the named partners for a week in the Hamptons, enough money is on the line to make that an offer they can’t refuse. But to do that means calling out the big guns … and they don’t get any bigger than Rourke. With so much on the line, the head of the agency, Thomas Kane, talks Mike Douglas into providing additional incentives in case the client gets frisky and decides to leave.

Settled into the beach house with the erstwhile client, Lovett Junior, Sean and Mike face their first evening of entertaining the lawyer with a hankering for young and nubile skateboarders.

Lovett waddled to the fridge, a stainless steel French door model, and opened it. From my vantage point it looked stuffed to the gills with food. Pudgy leaned over and scratched his ass. 

Sean said, “Sweetie, do you want to go out?” He and I were on the we don’t cook, don’t even think about it wavelength. He backed it up with, “I’m really shit with cooking.” 

I chimed in with, “Me too.” The man was still scratching his ass but he’d moved his fingers to the crack. It was fascinating and disgusting. I asked again, “Mr. Lovett? Dinner out?” 

He straightened and giggled, sounding like a sixteen-year-old bimbette. “Call me Junior, Mike. Everybody does.” 

Sean had plastered a neutral expression on his face. It cost him. I could tell by his body language. It said, loud and clear, they don’t pay me enough for this shit. He wasn’t getting an argument from me. 

Junior unloaded an armful of veggies and a package of boneless, skinless chicken breasts onto the counter. A fry pan appeared from somewhere at knee level, then other utensils. He grinned, held up a bottle of some gourmet bottled oil and gushed, “I love to cook. My wife hates the kitchen, and our cook can’t boil water without burning it.” He waved the fry pan in my direction. I stepped back. “Dinner’s on me, boys.” 

There were a variety of ways to interpret that statement, not many of them appetizing. Sean and I tried ignoring the possibilities by mouthing at each other, “Wife? What the hell—?” 

Sean was way braver than me. He asked, “So, Junior, do you and the missus have any kids?” 

If the answer was yes, the week was over and done, and I was personally locking Lovett Junior in the basement with no food or water until a car came Monday morning to haul his perverted ass back to Boston, preferably missing a few choice body parts. 

Junior motioned with fingers I wanted to douse with Clorox. “Shoo, boys. Go find us some COCKtail fixings.” He giggled again. 

Sean was choking, his face an unnatural shade of puce, so I asked, “Do you like anything special?” Strychnine on the rocks, rat poison margarita, a stick of dynamite up your ass… 

I muttered to Sean, “Come on. I need a drink,” and steered him out of the kitchen toward the spacious living room and a mini-wet bar. There was a small fridge under the counter, well-stocked with ice and sodas. I had to hand it to the real estate agent who managed our beach house. They went all out to make sure Kane’s clients got first class service. 

Sean beat me to the whiskey. While he cracked the lid, I grabbed two tumblers and smacked them on the shiny teak bar. “Ice?” 

“Maybe later.” 

We chugged two fingers, Sean topped it off with another two and we skåled to each other’s health. After that Sean iced us down in an effort to slow the process of getting drunk as a skunk. 

On the third go, I held my glass up and grinned. “To you … Seanie.” 

“Fuck you, Douglas.” 

“Don’t make promises you don’t intend to keep, Rourke.”

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Attraction from a distance turns into a weekend of passion when Sean and Mike are teamed up by Bad Boyfriends to keep a troublesome lawyer with wandering hands occupied in exchange for a much needed bonus.

What starts as hot sex ends up feeling like much, much more. Both Sean and Mike are caught by surprise by their instant emotions, but are willing to embrace this unexpected chance at love.

When threats from both their pasts turn towards violence, the duo is so busy putting out fires that they aren't left with much time to explore the boundaries of their new relationship. This leaves their emotions vulnerable as each begins to wonder what the other is thinking.

PUMPING IRON is insta-love; bad-boy style. I loved the sexual chemistry between Sean and Mike as well as the dramatic fluctuation from sweet moments of intimacy, steamy passion, humor, and testosterone driven toughness.  Written with a slightly ironic undertone, Rawlyns draws readers into the world of Bad Boyfriends, continuing the general storyline introduced in Curling Iron, while focusing primarily on telling Mike and Sean's story. I would recommend reading this series in order to fully appreciate the character development and overall plot.

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Crossing boundaries, taking no prisoners. Write what's in your soul. It's the bass beat, the heartbeat, the lyrics rude and true.

Nya Rawlyns is the pseudonym of a writer who cut her teeth on sports-themed romantic comedy and historical romances before finding her true calling in the wilderness areas she has visited but calls “home” in that place that counts the most: the heart. She writes M/M erotic romance because her good friends deserve to have their amazing stories told.

She has lived in the country and on a sailboat on the Chesapeake Bay, earned more than 1000 miles in competitive trail and endurance racing, taught Political Science to unwilling freshmen, and found an avocation in materials science.

When she isn’t tending to her garden or the horses, the cats, or two pervert parakeets, she can be found day dreaming and listening to the voices in her head.

Websites: Love's Last Refuge - Romancing Words - The Men of Crow Creek

Social Media/Books: Twitter - About Me - ARe/OmniLit

Her published works include:

(Bad Boyfriends)
Curling Iron - Pumping Iron

(Crow Creek)

Ash & Oak  - Pulling Leather - Strapping Ash
Sorting Will - Flankman

(The Strigoi Chronicles)
Penance - Fane - Michel - Dreu
(Hunger Hurts)

Acid Jazz Singer
(Blood Haven)

Cajun Gothic

Seasonal:

The Christmas Toast - The Valentine Toast

Stand Alone:
The Guardians of the Portals
The Wrong Side of Right - Good Boy Bad

Skin - The Shadow of This World

Sculpting David - Hunters Crossing

Dance Macabre (short story)

Finish Line (novella)

*OVER*

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