He’s a billionaire set on escaping the holidays and his demanding family. She’s a single mom with a sunny smile who keeps her heart safely hidden. When she makes him her personal Christmas project, what could possibly go wrong?
Gabe Gatlin would do anything to evade the obligatory family holiday hobnobbing that is nothing more than one horrible business event after another, all wrapped up with a gaudy Christmas ribbon. Then the opportunity arises to explore a property in the small town of Summer Creek, Oregon, and gives him the idea to run away for the holidays. This year, he’s skipping Christmas. All he has to do is hide out until January in the quirky little town where the residents have dubbed him Grinchy Gabe. But when a delightful woman starts making his sleigh bells jingle, he might find it impossible to avoid losing his three-sizes-too-small heart.
Single mom and waitress, Dani Latham, has two priorities: give her son the stable life she never had, and spread joy to her friends and neighbors in Summer Creek. When a stranger with a grinchy attitude sits at her table, she makes it her personal mission to make him smile. As she guides him into a flurry of Christmas festivities, she starts to wonder if this grounch’s heart will ever return to normal size. And even worse. . . if it does, who is going to save hers from breaking when he leaves?
Will a little Christmas magic and wonder bring these two lonesome people together?
Discover the joys of the season mixed with humor, holiday fun, and moments that tug at your heartstrings in this sweet contemporary Christmas romance.
“Mr. Sinclair?” Gabe asked, shocked to see the owner of the chain of stores standing right there in Summer Creek. “Jon, is that you?”
The older man looked at him, blinked a few times, then grinned. “Well, I’ll be. Gabe Gatlin. What in the world are you doing in Summer Creek? According to the gossip, you’ve disappeared and are in a rehab center in Europe.”
“Seriously?” Gabe asked, not at all surprised by the stories society’s wagging tongues spread.
Jon leaned closer to him and grinned. “Actually, my wife spoke to your mother a week or so ago. Jacqui told her you’d run away from home and refused to talk to anyone unless it was an emergency email. Is that true?”
Gabe shrugged. “That about sums it up.”
Jon laughed and slapped him on the back. “Son! You are forty-two. You don’t get to run away from home at your age.”
Gabe grinned and waggled an eyebrow. “Oh, yes, I do. It’s been the single best thing I’ve ever done.”
Jon shook his head. “I’d think you’re in the midst of a midlife crisis, but instead of cheating on a wife you don’t have or buying a sports car you don’t need, you ran away from home. How are your father and Monique handling it?”
“About like you’d expect. Monique calls at least once a day with a snotty message about fulfilling my family obligations and returning home immediately. Dad has threatened to fire me, disown me, or have a hit put out on me if I don’t, to quote him, ‘get your head back on straight and return posthaste.’ What he fails to remember is that Grandpa left the realty division to me, not the company. I elected to have a board, but ultimately Daniels Realty belongs to me, and there is nothing Dad or Monique can do about it.”
“So, what brought you to Summer Creek?” Jon asked with interest.
“One of the things my father has been doing lately that is causing any number of issues is insisting Chadwick cut back expenses. Of course, Chadwick is like an obedient lapdog, doing whatever good ol’ Dad tells him to do. He came to my office one morning with a file on a property we’ve been maintaining for years, but no one knew where it was or what it was. I did some research and discovered it was my grandmother’s childhood home here in Summer Creek. When I couldn’t take another minute of Monique’s holiday plans, I basically disappeared. I’d sure appreciate it, sir, if you didn’t mention to your wife—who will surely tell my mother—that I’m in Summer Creek.”
“My lips are sealed, but you might want to at least get in touch with your mom.” Jon gave him a look of fatherly wisdom. “Jacqui sounded quite worried about you. Even billionaire playboys need to be home for Christmas.”
A gasp behind him made Gabe spin around and look at Dani as she gaped at him. “Billionaire?” she asked on a breathless wheeze. “You’re a billionaire?”
Gabe shrugged. “That’s what my accountant tells me.”
USA Today Bestselling Author Shanna Hatfield writes sweet romances rich with relatable characters, small town settings that feel like home, humor, and hope.
Her historical westerns have been described as “reminiscent of the era captured by Bonanza and The Virginian” while her contemporary works have been called “laugh-out-loud funny, and a little heart-pumping sexy without being explicit in any way.”
When this farm girl isn’t writing or indulging in rich, decadent chocolate, Shanna hangs out with her husband, lovingly known as Captain Cavedweller. She also experiments with recipes, snaps photos of her adorable nephew, and caters to the whims of a cranky cat named Drooley.
Title: Fallen Crown Author: W. Million Genre: Contemporary Royal Romance
Maren Tucker is done with men who check in for the good times and check out for the bad. As a member of one of the oldest families in Bellerive, she doesn’t have to play nice with the Summerset Royals. Especially not the youngest who represents everything she detests.
Brice Summerset is the life of every party, and as the third in line to the throne, he’s never had to take anything in life particularly seriously. Show up. Charm a few people. Make a generous donation. Move on.
But Brice’s life is on the cusp of big changes. His father is sick. His two older brothers are settling down, and he’s starting to wonder what else life has to offer.
When Maren tries to block Brice from joining her charity adventure race team, Brice balks at the notion he’s not up to the challenge. As the two butt heads over everything from training philosophies to life goals, they begin to see something in themselves and each other that they never expected.
I press my lips together to avoid snapping back, which is what Brice wants. If I can’t keep my retorts focused on training, I’ll undermine my authority as the coach, and I’ve worked too damn hard and earned every scrap of my knowledge to look like a fool.
Wren hooks Brice up to the ropes, and he approaches the wall, examining the placement of the holds. When he goes to reach for the first one, Wren cringes but doesn’t say anything.
“You want to maximize your static reach.” I release a deep sigh and go to the wall to demonstrate how to straighten his posture and rise on his toes to get a good grip. “Otherwise, your arms will get tired quickly.”
He gazes at me wordlessly for a beat, and I can’t tell if he’s taking me seriously or not. Then he says, “Any more tips, Coach?”
“Don’t over grip the handholds. Keep your hands relaxed and light.” I demonstrate, and when Brice grasps the rock just above our heads, I slide my hand under his to check the tension in his wrist. His skin is warm and smooth against mine. “Yeah,” I say, “gentle like you’re cupping an egg or a light bulb and trying not to break it.”
“I tend to prefer my grip firm,” he says with a smirk.
“Not a surprise that your primary concern is your own satisfaction.” I give him a mild look and keep my voice pitched low.
“My own satisfaction is always a concern,” he says, leaning close enough that his breath stirs the tendrils of dark hair that have escaped my ponytail, “but it’s never my only one.”
I can feel my jaw tighten at his obvious innuendo, and my heart kicks at his proximity. An unexpected awareness electrifies the space between us, and when our gazes connect, his expression shifts from brimming with amusement to one laced with curiosity.
“You’re not as immune to me as you’d like to believe,” he whispers.
W. Million is a Watty Award winner whose contemporary romances about strong women and troubled men have captivated her loyal readers.
Writing as Wendy Million, she is the author of the romantic suspense series The Donaghey Brothers, the NA sports romance Saving Us, and the contemporary second chance romance, When Stars Fall.
When not writing, Wendy enjoys spending time in or around the water. She lives in Ontario, Canada with two beautiful daughters, two cute pooches, and one handsome husband (who is grateful she doesn’t need two of those).
I’ve never loved someone quite like my high school sweetheart. But she shattered my heart to pieces when she moved to California for college and never came back.
Now she’s back in Drakesville and for the first time in sixteen years, I’ve come face-to-face with the only woman I’ve ever loved. Kissing her was a bad idea. Spending countless nights tangled in my sheets was an even worse idea.
She’s only here long enough to make sure her parents’ bar stays afloat. I can’t get attached, when I know she’s just going to leave again.
And I know I’m not reason enough to make her stay.
Temporarily In Love is a small-town second chance autumn-themed romance book. If you love fall and Halloween, you’ll love this book.
Declan’s dark eyes seared across the length of my body like he remembered all the times he had stripped me out of my clothes. He always did like the knee-high boots I wore during the fall.
“You cold?” he asked.
I nodded. “Been in California too long.”
He shed his zip-up hoodie and put it over my shoulders. “Here.”
A memory of this exact scene played through my mind’s eye. Of me not wearing proper attire because I wanted to dress cute for him and him giving me his jacket. But that was sixteen-year-old Declan and Lila; we weren’t those people anymore.
“Dec…”
“Come on, love, let’s go on the zipper,” he said and took my hand.
I didn’t question his slip up. The old pet name rolled off his tongue like it hadn’t been sixteen years since I broke his heart. Like I hadn’t stood in his driveway all those years ago and told him I got accepted to Stanford and wasn’t going with him to Penn State. I told him I wanted to break up, because long-distance relationships never worked, but I’d always love him. That part had been true, was still true, but I never came back to him. I went to California and stayed there while he stayed in our gossipy small town and made a name for himself.
The pad of his thumb brushed against the back of my palm. “Love?”
“Right. Let’s go on the zipper!” I said excitedly, pulling myself away from the trip down memory lane.
We walked over to the ride and waited in line for a few minutes, but neither of us wanted to sever the connection of our hands. I wondered if he was thinking about all the times we had done this before. Of those times back in high school when he was the one dragging me toward the rides. Adult Declan was quiet and reserved, and I couldn’t get a read on him. He wasn’t the boy I fell in love with, but yet, at the same time, he was.
He led me into the cage and made sure I was seated before he slid in next to me. We pulled the lap bar down, and the ride operator clicked us in before shutting us inside the metal cage. We were pressed so close together, I felt his thigh against my own.
I didn’t know why I did it, but I turned to him and found he was staring back at me intensely. He didn’t jerk back when I brushed my lips against his. He threaded his hands through my hair, one of them gripping my neck possessively as he deepened the kiss. We kissed like we hadn’t forgotten, like it hadn’t been years since we were pressed together. We still fit so perfectly.
Then the ride lurched, and I pulled away to grab onto the handlebar above my head as we moved upwards. We screamed our heads off as our cage flipped us around. I held onto Declan’s arm when the ride took us up to its full height and then brought us back down to the ground, all the while flipping us upside down in our cage.
I felt dizzy by the time we were back on the ground, and the ride operator opened the cage for us. Declan got out first, then offered me a hand when I stumbled out.
He studied me. “Okay, love?”
I could only nod.
My heart was doing somersaults, and it wasn’t because I was motion sick from the ride. It was singing with the way this man still turned me inside out. But I couldn’t get ideas like that. I didn’t deserve him after what I did. Not after I had been such a coward and cut him out of my life.
Danica Flynn is a marketer by day, and a writer by nights and weekends. AKA she doesn’t sleep! She is a rabid hockey fan of both The Philadelphia Flyers and the Metropolitan Riveters. When not writing, she can be found hanging with her partner, playing video games, and reading a ton of books.
