The Trouble With Chasing Aileen - Announcement

It is with great relief to announce the release date, cover, etc for the second book in the Hastings Sisters Series.

Relief?  Yes.  Relief.  I begun to fear it would never make it through the Beta Reads.  But it has.

The Trouble with Chasing Aileen is currently available for pre-order.  Right now until January 10th (the day after the release date) Aileen will be $0.99.  After that date the book will be $2.99.  (The first book in the series will remain $0.99.)

Are you a Kindle Unlimited reader?  The Trouble With Chasing Aileen will be released on January 9th, 2018.

What about book three?  Ashlynn's story will continue off where Aileen's story ended.  She does make some appearances in this book, much like Aiden did in Ainsley's book.  However, Ashlynn's story is still in the planning phases.  With any hope, it won't take a year to write.  (The highly teased and still untitled NaNoWriMo2017 project has been handed over to the Beta readers as well.)

Read below for the book description, the order link, and the first chapter!

Book Description  

         In a series of distracted events, Aileen Hastings never expected to be mistaken for her younger sister, Ashlynn.  It is one thing for the new guy, Noah, to mistake her for her sister, but it’s another thing for him to read her the riot act over how ‘she’ treated his younger brother.  As much as the in-control Aileen wants to dislike the impulsive and semi-charming Noah, she finds herself pulling away from him. 

            Noah Grayson finds himself intrigued by the prickly Aileen.  The more they spend time together the more he wants to know.  Will he ever work his way behind her wall of focus and emotions or will Noah give up and move on?  

Order / Pre-Order Here! The Trouble With Chasing Aileen 

Chapter One

            Leaning over the counter towards the library assistant, Noah Grayson addressed the lady sitting on the other side.  “I am looking for Ashlynn Hastings.  I was told that she comes and hides here on occasion.” 

            He had been technically overheard that she would hide in the library whenever she had gotten into a confrontation or was avoiding someone.  Supposedly the quiet building calmed her down and kept her from saying or doing something she might regret later.  He also heard that she wasn’t a reader like her eldest sister.  The possibility of multiple red-headed Hastings sisters had not entered his mind.

            “Ummm,” the assistant hesitated - she was frequently mistaken for the librarian who chose to hide herself away in the back office so that he didn’t have to deal with people.  “There’s a Hastings sibling over there,” she pointed towards some tables, “but I can’t tell you which Hastings she is…” the unnerved college intern trailed off.  “I just know that at least one of them  has red hair except for Ainsley and Aiden who are blonde, and they’re off to college now…”

            “That’s fine,” he mumbled, not listening to her and running his prepared speech through his head instead.  “How many red-headed Hastings can there be?”  That assumption was Noah’s first mistake.
            “Two,” somebody else spoke up, approaching the counter to check out some books he needed for a research paper.  “Aileen and Ashlynn.  Aileen is in my English class; she’s probably in here somewhere checking out some books for her research paper too.”  The nameless student handed over his new library card and started talking to the library assistant.  “Everybody knows the school library won’t work for this paper.  All of the good books were already checked out by Mrs. Rainey’s first period.” 

            The assistant blinked.  She had only been at the desk for a month - the last intern had quit - and had no clue who any of the local high school English teachers were and only a passing knowledge of its regular patrons. 

            “Eileen huh,” Noah mumbled, making his second mistake by not paying attention to his classmate in front of him due to his impatience to get this mission over with.  “I not interested in…”

            “Oh, she’s the quiet one,” the guy interrupted.  “I’m Chandler Mays.  Aileen is in my English class.  I think she’s more mathematically minded than her other siblings.  Or was it Science.  She ruins the curve either way.”

            “Curve?” the assistant asked, more curious than trying to better know the community she was serving - even though she would probably quit in another two weeks like her predecessor.

            “It was last year,” Chandler mumbled, unaware that half of his audience wasn’t paying attention.  “Mr. Parks decided he would try out a ‘modified’ grading curve on his tests, but Aileen always scored a hundred on her Science tests so nobody ever got those extra points he said he would add to round up the highest grade to a hundred.  Although once,” he remembered, “she did score a 95 and he gave everybody five points, but that only happened once.”

            “I hope that taught everybody to study,” the assistant responded, scanning the barcode on his five books while she listened to Chandler ramble. 

            “Nope,” Chandler grinned, wondering how old she was in the back of his mind.  He estimated that she was a senior in college.

            And that’s how part of Aileen’s problem began.  Noah never knew that there were multiple spellings of the name Aileen.  He’d only ever seen it spelled as “Eileen,” as in Aunt Eileen with the hairy chin.  He also spent so much time rehearsing his spiel that he wasn’t paying attention.  Why else would Chandler ramble about Aileen if she wasn’t nearby?

            With several stacks of books gathered around her, Aileen tackled the daunting task of narrowing it down to only five books.  Mrs. Rainey had tightened down on her research papers and had instructed that they must have a least three non-electronic sources, preferably books or scientific journals, in their works cited pages. 

            Finding the material wasn’t that difficult after she had decided on a topic; narrowing the books down to only five was the problem.  She didn’t want to spend her time shuffling through ten books looking for that one fact she needed, let alone having to carry them everywhere. 

            To slightly complicate things, Ashlynn had their shared car at the moment and Aileen didn’t know if her sister would be back in time to pick her up when she was ready to leave.

            Mistake number three came when Noah looked down at the piece of paper on her table and read “A----- --tings.”  The corner of a book was angled just right and was covering up most of her first and last name and instead of moving the book or asking for her name he moved in for the kill.  It was now or never and Noah was forever jumping into situations without all of the information.

            “Hey,” he said, dropping down in the seat next to her.  “Noah Grayson,” he quickly introduced himself and carried out without giving Aileen a chance to reciprocate.  “I have to talk to you about how you ended things with my little brother.”

            “But…” Aileen tried to protest, instantly aware of his mistake.  It had never happened before, but the girls had both anticipated the day that somebody would mistake them from behind.  It would have to be one of the new guys making his expected mistake. 

            “Look, I know he can be a bit clingy and awkward at times, but we just moved here and he doesn’t know a lot of people…”  For a moment he was distracted by her pretty green eyes when he finally looked at her. 

            “I don’t know…”

            Shaking his head to clear his suddenly disjointed thoughts, he carried on with the lecture had he mentally rehearsed all day while at the same time not listening to Aileen’s protests  that he had the wrong person.  “That doesn’t mean you can just drop him without any explanation.  You couldn’t even tell him yourself.  Instead you sent your best friend to tell him!”

            “Wait a second!” Aileen practically shouted, half waiting for Mr. Howard’s shush.  “I don’t know…”

            “I know you don’t know.  I’ve heard you are a bit of a heartbreaker, but that doesn’t mean you get to discard people just because you don’t like them.”

            “I don’t think…” she hesitated, not wanting to agree with what he was saying.  All her confusion managed to do was make her angrier. 

            “That’s the problem,” Noah stood up, “you don’t think.  You don’t consider the feelings of others before discarding them like they were a… a…”

            “I’m not…” she stood up, mirroring his folded arm stance. 

            “…a piece of used paper.”

            “But I’m not…”  This time a fist started to whiten as her body began to tense.  Normally people listened to her instead of carrying on like an idiot!

            “Whatever.  You know exactly what type of person you are.”

            Walking away, he missed Aileen hissing, “I’m not Ashlynn.” 

            A few moments later the real Ashlynn entered the library and looked around for her sister.  Chandler, spotting her first, intercepted her.  “Macon’s older brother was looking for you.  I think he went over and started talking to Aileen.  I didn’t hear their conversation, but it made Aileen angry.”  Shouldering his now heavily laden book bag, he hurried out of the library and off towards his job. 

            “Oh no,” Ashlynn flushed.  Scanning the room, she slowly walked over to where her sister was staring at a bookcase wondering what had just happened and why she had reacted so angrily.  She never got angry; well, she rarely got angry.

            Sliding into the seat Noah had been sitting in not even five minutes before, she wondered if he was the person she nearly bumped into as he was leaving and she was entering the building.  “What happened?”

            “Noah Grayson assumed you were me.”  Aileen had to force herself not to hiss out that statement. 

            Blinking, “How does that even happen?”  Ashlynn scanned her memory and couldn’t recall that ever happening to them before, even when they were little and their mom dressed them alike.  Even their hair wasn’t identical!

            “I don’t know,” Aileen slowly drew out as she tried to calm down.  “I don’t have a clue.  He was so into his speech about how you treated his little brother like trash that he barely noticed that I kept trying to interrupt him.  Before I could correct him he was gone.”

            “And you aren’t one to speak up, anyway,” Ashlynn added.

            Drawing a deep breath, she hesitated at answering.  “True.  He really needed to get that off his chest.”  Turning to stack up the books she was going to check out, she asked.  “What happened with Macon?”

            “He was sweet and everything, but…” she trailed off.

            “There’s always a ‘but’ with you.”

            “But,” Ashlynn pointedly repeated, “he wouldn’t let me do anything.  Or decide on anything.  He ordered salted popcorn…” she paused as Aileen groaned, “and he picked the movie and he bought water and he requested M&M’s.  Then without saying anything he dumped the entire box of M&M’s into with the popcorn and shook it up.”

            “That actually sounds pretty good,” Aileen interrupted again.

            “It was, but that’s not the point.  He did all of that without asking.  He didn’t ask if I had anything I wanted to see, just assumed I wanted to see that cheesy romantic comedy that everybody is talking about.  He assumed that salted popcorn with M&M’s would be okay.  What if I wanted extra butter and Skittles?”           

            “That sounds gross together,” Aileen smiled for the first time since Noah went off on his diatribe.

            “I wouldn’t have put them together!” Ashlynn huffed.  “And what if I wanted a coke and not water?”

            “So, he didn’t ask.  He just did it.”

            “Like Drew did to Ainsley,” Ashlynn whispered, finally getting to her point.  “Like…”

            Nodding her head and stopping her sister from saying his name, Aileen suddenly understood.  “But you also said he held open the doors for you and he even opened the car door for you,” she interrupted.

            “So?”

            “And he didn’t text you five minutes after dropping your off at home,” Aileen pointed out. 

            “What’s your point?” Ashlynn huffed.

            “You need to stop worrying that you’ll find somebody like Drew and…” pausing, “and wonder if you are letting a Brendan go because you are confusing the two out of fear.  You need to tell Macon why it won’t work out.  He needs to hear it so he doesn’t do the same thing with somebody else.”  Aileen started to pack up her supplied and stack her books into two categories: reshelve and check out.

            “Maybe,” Ashlynn started to pout, hating it that Aileen had made some pretty decent points.

            “No.  Definitely.  Noah was right when he said that you discard people.  I hate to say it, but you can be heartless.”  Aileen paused, wondering why she was suddenly agreeing with what he had said. 

            Ashlynn jerked as the bard hit.  “Heartless?”

            “Yes, heartless.” 

            Leaving her sister stunned, Aileen gathered her ‘check out’ books together and made her way to the new assistant librarian.  “Hi, I need to check these out.  I’ll reshelve the others in a few minutes.”  Handing over her library card, she missed the assistant gulping when she read the name on the card.  Instead Aileen was looking over at where Ashlynn was processing what Aileen had told her.  She barely heard the librarian  say that one of the other workers would reshelve the books she left on the table and started apologizing for Noah interrupting her research.

            Aileen might be quiet around others, but she had no problem speaking her mind when it came to Ashlynn.  Somebody needed to attempt to keep the fiery Hastings under contro

           But why was she so determined to speak up when Noah accosted her?