That’s right, my newest release is just around the corner!
Preorder THE LANTERN LIGHT here!
Coming your way on 12/24 . . .
This Christmas Eve, get ready to curl up with Peter and Amos in snowy Montana. We’ve got all my favorite tropes packed into one short-ish story: time-travel, long-lost love, poetry by candlelight, oops we’re snowed into this cabin, Wild West antics, grumpy cowboys, sassy horses, and an eye-rolling drag queen to boot.
Is it a mish-mash? Yes. Is it a highly accurate picture of my brain when I think of the exact holiday romance I would want to read? Also yes.
Exclusive Excerpt
As a reward for reading Just Kiss Already, enjoy this never-before-seen snippet of what’s to come!
It’s Christmas morning, and Peter Johnson has just discovered an ancient log cabin on his family property. He could have sworn it wasn’t there before. He decides to investigate . . .
Peter clears his throat. “Hello?” He sounds far less in control than the first time around. A scared child, now, instead of a gruff landowner. Something tells him it’s a man living here, and his long-dormant manners slip out. “Sir . . . ?”
A twig snaps behind him.
Peter is suddenly desperately aware that he is all alone, defenseless, wearing sequined cowboy boots and by the looks of it trespassing in rural Montana. A place filled with guns and old cowboys who would not take too kindly to someone who looks like Peter creeping towards their house, even if it is Peter’s goddamn land.
There’s a furtive crunch of snow, and not from his own boots. Peter’s hand shoots to the coat pocket where he’d slipped his phone, fingers shaking to call for help, surely there’s a single bar of reception—
His phone is gone.
“Shit,” Peter breathes. The world shrinks and swells around him. He imagines that some people might see their life flash before their eyes when they’re about to be shot, maybe think of their children or their favorite vacation.
Phoenix’s latest dress flashes through his mind. His proudest creation. He never got to wear it. He’d been saving it for New Year’s Eve.
He licks his lips in the cold, starts to hold up his hands as the snow crunches again. “Hey, I’m—I’m just your neighbor. I won’t—”
Something slams into his back, knocking the breath from his lungs in a startled scream. There’s a hand at his neck, bunching his coat, and Peter’s feet leave the ground. A boot kicks the front door all the way open, and Peter finds himself unceremoniously hurled inside. A brute force flings him up against the slammed door, smacking his head on the wood. Peter throws up his arms, trying to duck whatever’s about to happen.
“Swear to God,” someone hisses, deep and menacing in his face.
Peter’s arms fall to his sides as the man shakes him by his collar. His toes are barely touching the floor. He lets out a pathetic whimper, starts to scream for help—but a rough hand clamps down over his mouth. He pales at the cold barrel of a pistol pointed at him. A beast of a man has him fully pinned against the wall, and Peter frantically takes in a bushy, unkempt mustache through the shadows, a wide-brimmed hat and weathered skin. Squinting, rage-filled eyes like a menacing snake about to strike.
“I done told you all to stay away,” the man warns. “You got no right trespassin’. I swear—”
There’s an intake of breath.
Peter opens his eyes again—he can’t remember when he’d squeezed them shut—and he stares into a pair of soft green eyes, wide with shock. The hand falls from Peter’s mouth. Peter gets a full, good look at his face for the first time.
“Oh,” Peter unintentionally breathes.
“By God,” the man whispers.
His grip loosens all at once. Peter’s knees buckle as he collapses against the door. There’s a clatter of metal—the pistol dropping to the ground. The man stumbles back, and it looks like he’s just seen the sky for the first time. Like he’s trying to be awed, overwhelmed with the force of it, but can’t remember how.
His back hits the opposite wall of the tiny cabin. Tears fill those green eyes, and his hand goes to his chest.
He whispers a word, a single breathless question.
“Wei?”
Find out what happens in THE LANTERN LIGHT!
And as always, a happy ending is guaranteed. This may even be my most Hallmark-y ending yet.