Meant to Be by Nan Reinhardt
(Four Irish Brothers Winery, #2)
Published by: Tule Publishing
Publication date: July 18, 2019
Genres: Adult, Contemporary, Romance
Can a near-tragedy help two best friends realize they’re meant to be so much more?
Best friends since grade school, high-powered Chicago attorney, Sean Flaherty, and small-town mayor Megan Mackenzie have always shared a special bond. When Sean is shot by a client’s angry ex, Megan rushes to his side, terrified she’s about to lose her long-time confidant.
Upon his return to River’s Edge to recuperate, Sean discovers that his feelings for his pal have taken an undeniable turn for the romantic. While Megan struggles with an unfamiliar longing for Sean, she worries that he may be mistaking a safe place to land for love.
Can Sean help her realize that they are truly meant to be so much more than friends?
EXCERPT
Meg was afraid to ask, but she did anyway. “What happened?”
“Sean’s been shot.” Sam crumpled back into the booth, sobbing.
Megan gasped as bile rose in her throat. She couldn’t even comprehend Sam’s words. Sean was shot? The invincible Sean Flaherty? Her buddy? Her best friend? His handsome face flashed into her mind—the lock of dark hair that invariably fell across his brow, the blue, blue eyes that sparkled sapphire with wit or turned dark navy with emotion, that killer smile, those amazing Flaherty dimples… impossible!
“What?” She sat down across from Sam. “Shot?” She could hardly catch her breath. “When? Where?”
Sam grabbed a napkin from the dispenser on the table and swiped at her eyes. “I–I don’t know much. Charlie Smith at the firm said it happened right outside the courthouse in Evanston early this afternoon. Some crazy woman. The wife of his current client. They took him to Northwestern; he’s in surgery right now.” She took a shaky breath. “Conor’s driving up to meet Aidan and Brendan at the airport, then they’re heading to the hospital.” She covered her mouth with both hands as if that could stop her lips from trembling, then shuddered. “Dear God, Meg.”
Megan closed her eyes, trying desperately to banish the dreadful pictures in her head—Sean on a gurney, pale and bleeding—and replace them with ones from the last time she’d seen him—grinning and pouring sparkling wine on New Year’s Eve.
They’d hugged each other at midnight because neither of them had had a date, and Sean had pressed his warm lips to her forehead. “You’re the best, Megs,” he’d murmured and held her close to his brawny chest for a long moment. She felt the even beat of his heart under the navy sweater he wore—the one she’d knitted for him for Christmas that made his eyes look deep blue.
“I’m going up there.” Megan stood and gazed at Sam. “I have to, Sam. He’s my oldest and dearest friend. Maybe there’s nothing I can do, but I can spell the guys at visitation and maybe, I dunno, give blood or something. I just know I can’t stay here. I’ll go crazy. I have to see him.”
Sam stared at her silently, then sighed. “Come on. Let’s trade cars. I don’t trust your old beater to make it to Indianapolis, and you sure as heck can’t ride Big Red all the way to Chicago.”
Author Bio
Nan Reinhardt is a USA Today-bestselling author of romantic fiction for women in their prime. Yeah, women still fall in love and have sex, even after 45! Imagine! She is a wife, a mom, a mother-in-law, and a grandmother. Nan has been a copyeditor and proofreader for over 25 years, and currently works on romantic fiction titles for a variety of clients, including Avon Books, St. Martin’s Press, Kensington Books, and Entangled Publishing, as well as for many indie authors.
Although she loves her life as an editor, writing is Nan’s first and most enduring passion. Her latest novel, Meant to Be, Book 2 in the Four Irish Brothers Winery series from Tule Publishing releases on July 18, 2019. A Small Town Christmas, which is the first book in the Four Irish Brothers Winery series from Tule Publishing, is available now, and she is currently hard at work on Book 3.
Visit Nan’s website at www.nanreinhardt.com, where you’ll find links to all her books as well as blogs about writing, being a Baby Boomer, and aging gracefully…mostly. Nan also blogs every sixth Wednesday at Word Wranglers, sharing the spotlight with five other romance authors and is a frequent contributor the RWA Contemporary Romance blog, and she contributes to the Romance University blog where she writes as Editor Nan.
On the Edge by Dani Collins
(Blue Spruce Lodge, #1)
Published by: Tule Publishing
Publication date: January 16, 2018
Genres: Adult, Contemporary, Romance
When Glory Cormer’s father introduces her to ‘their’ new business partner, she’s appalled. Viking-like Rolf Johansson exudes the same alpha-intimidation that jocks used to torment her through high school. After nursing her mother the last several years, she’s trying to break out of her shell and secretly pursue a writing career, but Rolf insists she go through with the rotten deal her father struck with his brother to renovate an old chalet.
Rolf envisions this mountain as a world-class resort for elite athletes and other jet setters. As a downhill champion and owner of a world-renowned sports equipment empire, he knows what it takes to get what he wants. Nothing will stop him, especially not a hotheaded wallflower who turns the ice in his veins to lava.
Bonus Story! This book contains Glory’s novella Blessed Winter, a no-room-at-the-inn Christmas romance.
—
EXCERPT:
“I’m saying I don’t know how to deal with it. I’m not a sensitive man. I don’t want to hurt you again.” His fingers crept all the way around her upper arm, thumb stroking her skin as he gently clasped her in his warm grip.
“So don’t,” she suggested with a flash of irritation.
“Okay.” How did he make one word sound so dangerous? Like a dare. “You tell me what hurts more. Resisting or giving in?”
And now she was falling into an eclipse, staring into eyes that were golden and black at the same time, pulling her right out of herself and twisting her around so her body was in a sensual agony, tied up and yearning.
“Should we see?” he murmured, hands touching her with light sorcery, caressing her arm, caressing her throat, tilting up her chin.
She shouldn’t be this stupid, but she did hurt. All the time. With want…
His head lowered, slanted. His mouth hovered so she could feel the magnetic buzz of ions bouncing between their lips. When he nudged, made that first contact, her mouth stung, so hot and sensitized with anticipation she gasped.
He settled his lips over hers, hot and thorough. Confident. He kissed her in a way she had never been kissed before. This man held himself back with monumental discipline, she realized, because when he went for something, he went for it, and he was a force to be reckoned with. He claimed her with irresistible precision, mouth pressing hers open so the connection went from sweet suggestion to overwhelming passion in a single heartbeat.
She opened her mouth and let him in. Kissed him back with more offering than skill, not even hesitating. Compelled. If he was screwing with her—
Whatever she had consciously been thinking sizzled into nothing. She forgot how to form thoughts. All she knew was the feel of his lips against hers, smooth and firm, pulling just enough to make her follow him, then pressing to keep her sealed inside their world.
His hand slid through her hair to cup the back of her skull. His other arm went around her, broad hand slipping beneath her loose shirt to sit against the skin of her lower back, leaving a starfish of heat imprinted there. A shudder went through her, all of her muscles checking out and giving her body over to his strength. All she could do was lift her arms and cling around his neck, plastering herself to him while they devoured each other. Tongues came into play. His. Hers. She moaned, loving the swirling textures. Reveling in their blatant consumption of each other.
He was hard. She felt him against her abdomen and pulses of reaction hit her loins, making her want to grind against him. She wanted to do it already. Now.
As she realized how caught up she was, she yanked back, gasping.
He let her put some space between them, but kept his arm around her. His cheekbones were flushed above his beard, his eyes like liquid gold.
She hadn’t minded that beard, she realized, and wanted to stroke it with her fingers. She touched instead where the soft hairs had scraped against her chin, wondering how that rough-soft abrasion would feel against her stomach. Her thighs.
Her body reacted with a rush of heat and another pulse. She was very aware of the bed right there, while his eyes were halos of light around pupils the size of the moon.
“And that,” he said, accent thick. “Is why it is my business who spends time in this room.”
Author Bio:
Award-winning, USA Today Bestselling author Dani Collins thrives on giving readers emotional, compelling, heart-soaring romance with laughter and heat thrown in, just like real life. Mostly she writes contemporary romance for Harlequin Presents and Tule’s Montana Born, but her backlist of forty books also includes self-published erotic romance, romantic comedy, and even an epic medieval fantasy. When she’s not writing—just kidding, she’s always writing. She lives in Christina Lake, BC, Canada with her husband of thirty years who occasionally coaxes her out of her attic office to visit their grown children.
