HOME IN YOUR ARMS by Charlotte O’Shay – A Deerbourne Inn Novella

I’ve got one of my favorite authors – and people – visiting here today. CHARLOTTE O’SHAY is a one-click author for me for so many reasons, not the least of which is her amazeballs story telling talent. We are Wild Rose Press sistahs and I have been honored to meet and get to know her at several RWA conferences. Today, she’s visiting because she has a brand new release out, her second addition to the Deerbourne Inn series titled HOME IN YOUR ARMS.

I was lucky enough to read this book before it went into release and I can’t say enough about how much I loved the characters, the storyline, and the way Charlotte just draws me in every single time to one of her stories. I’m gonna turn the mic over to her now…

Charlotte, take it away.

When I asked Peggy Jaeger about visiting her blog to talk about my new release HOME IN YOUR ARMS, and after she delivered her enthusiastic, typically Peggy yes! we had an inevitable moment catching up with our lives and our families, virtually, of course because that’s the way we do everything these days… sigh.

We talked about our families—weddings and funerals, parents and grandchildren, the seasons, the weather, how we’re always looking for time, striving for more and trying to be better.

And when we got to the end of our exchange, and I thought about what I would say about my latest release, I realized our chat was exactly what HOME IN YOUR ARMS is all about.

HOME IN YOUR ARMS is a romance but it’s also about finding one’s life and one’s self again. It’s about recognizing grief must have its time but if you let it, love will find a way back into your life. It’s about forgiving people—family and friends who mean well and accepting they are only being themselves with their own burdens to shoulder. It’s about mourning but recognizing it’s okay to dance again, it’s okay to hope, to look forward, make plans, create a future.

Karla & Zane are two people who meet when the time is finally right for them. They fight their attraction, they’re united in their loyalty, believing all sorts of things, but mainly that they’re undeserving of another chance at happiness. HOME IN YOUR ARMS is about how they understand, eventually, it’s okay to open themselves to love and romance, that it’s okay to be happy again.

It’s no wonder I felt compelled to quote from Ecclesiastes in one of the last chapters of the book. “To everything there is a season…”

Check me out on social media and let me know what you think of Karla and Zane’s story.

BLURB

After her sweetheart Joe dies in a road accident, twenty-four hours after he returns from Army service, grieving Karla Payne slams the door on love.
Five years later, Karla’s tavern business is booming, and she owns her home, but she knows forever love has no part in her future.

Headed to interview for his first civilian job, retired career Army 1st Sgt. Zane Blackthorne can’t resist visiting his late buddy’s beloved Vermont hometown. He also can’t resist looking up Joe’s sweetheart, Karla, who is an alluring mix of brains, beauty, and bravery.
Loyalty to his brother-in-arms demands Zane fight his attraction to Karla. Besides, even if Karla wants him, she’ll never love him.

Can Zane say goodbye to the woman he has no right to call his own?
Even if his only true home is in her arms?

Excerpt: 

He’d neglected to make a reservation for dinner at the inn which would have been handy given his hunger, but he was inclined to want something faster than a three-course meal anyway.

He took a quick look at the town map the desk clerk proffered, but he didn’t need it. It was all as Joe described. Setting the map back on the desk, he proceeded into town.

The Stone Hearth Tavern was filled to bursting with people, the jukebox blaring Roy Orbison. Not in the mood to converse with the throng at the bar, Zane made his way to an empty back table. After he gave the teenage server his order, he did his best to melt into the background—no easy feat given his size, but it felt good to stretch his legs and cross booted feet under one of the tables backed against the rear wall.

There she was—Karla. Exactly as Joe described her and yet more so. A strawberry blonde who commanded the area behind the bar, her staff, and the entire tavern with a simple flick of her capable hand and an impatient lift of one dark auburn eyebrow.

It was a busy night for a Tuesday in early March. Winter had barely loosed its grip on this part of the country, but nevertheless it seemed in the small town of Willow Springs, people socialized. Socializing was as foreign a concept to him as smiling. Two months after his retirement from the service, two months back on American soil, and he was as wary of people as a monk emerging from a twenty-year vow of silence.

This felt weird. No, it was weird because he didn’t belong here. Did he belong anywhere? Zane squashed the intrusive thought because he reckoned he belonged here as much as anywhere else. Even if his mind knew the truth of it, it would take some convincing before his body unwound from its tense coil in the hard seat at the back of the tavern. Wary and on watch, he was the furthest thing from relaxed or social. Cheeseburger and fries consumed, he stood, casting one last look behind the bar. Karla stood at the old-school register, hair gleaming bright under the pendant light, pencil tight between her white teeth as she rang up a customer. He dropped some cash on his table and found the exit.

What a mistake. Zane shook his head at the absurdity of the ridiculous plan prompting him to stop at the tavern Karla owned, and to visit Willow Springs at all.

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A little about Charlotte O’Shay

Award winning, NYC author Charlotte O’Shay is the middle child of a big family who married into another equally boisterous large family. Arguing, er…negotiating skills honed at the dinner table led her to a career in law. After four beautiful children joined the crowded family tree, Charlotte traded her legal career to write about happily ever afters in the City of Dreams.Charlotte challenges her heroines and heroes with a crisis then watches them figure out who they are while they fall in love.

You can connect with, and follow Charlotte here: WEBSITE & NEWSLETTER  // INSTAGRAM // TWITTER // PINTEREST // FACEBOOK PAGE  // BOOKBUB