Books

Boston real estate developer Jamie Standard is about to close one of the most important deals of his life when a gossip rag releases an article painting him as a modern day rake. The bad press threatens to torpedo the deal and tank the largest green building project his company has ever undertaken. With the deal circling the drain, his business partners advise him to escape the limelight and visit his sister, Jocelyn. She happens to be the hospitality manager of L ’Atelier, a hot new resort hotel on the Vegas Strip, so as exiles go, it’s top tier. Especially when he runs into a gorgeous redhead at the airport.

Coral Triton has reached the pinnacle of her career as a professional mermaid by landing a new job at L ’Atelier. Not just to headline a live action mermaid show, but also help create a vision for everything from set design to choreography. Things are on a definite up-swim for her, and only get better when the hot blond guy she bumped into at the airport turns up at her hotel. But, she’s in Vegas for a job – the job – not a guy, so anything beyond one night is out of the question. With a brief note and one last look, she bails the next morning.

Only to be introduced to him days later as her boss Jocelyn’s brother. And Jocelyn thinks Coral is the perfect person to help solve Jamie’s PR problem back in Boston. If Coral will agree to fake a relationship with Jamie, it can restore his reputation, save his business deal, and slingshot Coral higher into the public eye. A win-win-win, right? But when there are no cameras and fake starts to feel all too real, can they keep their heads above water, or will love pull them both under?

As one of Boston’s most eligible bachelors, real estate developer Gideon West has the golden touch. Both with the ladies – from Beacon Hill to Southie and all points in between – and every project he’s helmed for Standard Development. Hungry for his next challenge, he’s set his sights on the untapped potential in the rolling hills and tranquil farmland of the sleepy town of Mimosa, North Carolina. To confirm it’s the idyllic perfection it appears to be, Gideon heads south where he’s enveloped in southern hospitality. By everyone and everything with the exception of two: Monty, a runaway horse, and Everest Kennedy – an emerald-eyed spitfire who can knock everything he’s working toward right off its axis.

Everest’s life in her hometown of Mimosa revolves around one thing – the equine rescue she’s scrimped, saved and struggled to get off the ground since college. After years of work, Second Chance Farms can finally stand on its own four hooves. What she needs now is the ability to expand her little slice of paradise - by buying the one hundred acres next door. That Gideon has under contract. There’s no way she’s going to let Gideon West upend everything she’s worked for. Regardless of the fact she appears to be the only one immune to the spell of the silver-tongued developer. But with each dimpled grin and blue-eyed glance, Everest can’t deny her immunity to his charm is waning. If she isn’t careful, Gideon might turn her carefully planned world upside down. Even worse is that maybe – just maybe – she wants him to.

All he wants for Christmas is her.

Dave Richardson’s life hasn’t turned out the way he thought it would. He never expected to slink back to his hometown of Rochester two years ago and take a bartending job, nor did he expect he’d still be tending said bar. Everyone thought he would achieve great things. Hell, he’d believed he would achieve great things. But when Vivian Walters walked into his bar, wearing that dress, on a random Wednesday night . . . things were looking up for the first time in a long time. And they looked even better when he got her number, even if it was obvious she didn’t see things between them lasting beyond her night out on Sunday. If he wanted to keep a woman like her, he’d need to become the man he was supposed to be, and fast.

If there was one thing Vivian “V” Walters liked almost as much as designer heels, it was checklists. They’d served her well her entire life- first with college, then med school, landing the perfect internship followed by an even better residency, and, finally, her dream job. So far, her checklist for the perfect man hadn’t panned out the same way. But that didn’t mean she would lose her ever-loving mind and chuck it all out the window for a hot, sweaty weekend with a bartender . . . right? No matter how good he looked in those worn jeans, or how his blond hair curled just so at the nape of his neck, or the way his deep-brown gaze made her stomach somersault. And even if she gave in to her purely physical attraction to him, it wouldn’t be anything other than a fling . . . would it?

Regan “Rae” Murphy has zero interest in romance and even less in love. One heartbreak in her life was quite enough, and she has no desire to get wrapped up in the sticky tendrils of love again. She thought she’d left all those messy feelings and entanglements in her past when she moved to Charlotte from Charleston, especially the devastatingly handsome portion of that past, who was wearing nothing but a towel when she walked out on him. His betrayal was the reason she left and is the reason she keeps her heart safely tucked away. But when her best friend, Kez, asks Rae to be her maid of honor, Rae reluctantly puts aside her own feelings about forever.

Love is in the air on Kez’s wedding day, and it smacks Rae right in the face when her ex, Van, appears-and he looks just as good in a tux as he did in a towel. For Kez’s sake, Rae agrees to bury the hatchet somewhere other than between Van’s shoulder blades. He makes it his mission to get Rae to hear him out-something she refused to do before she left him. The pull to listen is strong as the hope she’d buried deep within her starts to rattle its way free. Maybe everything between them hadn’t been one giant, intricate lie. But to get the chance to show Rae what they had was real, Van’s going to have to earn it.

Typing your ex’s name into a search engine is always a crapshoot. But like any gamble, it can pay off big if you find out the idiot who left you is now thirty pounds overweight and missing a tooth. The downside is that you could find out the worthless S.O.B. is still attractive and, even worse, getting married to someone else.

Kez Walsh should’ve cashed out when her last search turned up nothing on her ex, Miller Thompson. But, instead, she goes all in after yet another failed attempt at dating and moving on. Only this time, she turns up a wedding website featuring Miller and his new bride. How is it possible for him to have moved on to the point of marriage while she’s still mired in dating hell? What better way to answer that question than to crash his upcoming high school reunion?

Through a combination of tequila and groveling, she convinces her two best friends to join her on the trip. Only she doesn’t count on meeting sexy and successful Jackson on their first night there. He isn’t spooked by her unorthodox reason for being in town, and doesn’t hesitate to let Kez know he’s the man she needs. Jackson, and her undeniable and unexpected attraction to him, means Kez has to choose between hanging on to the past, or finally moving on.