To those of you who aren’t writers, this is a challenge where by you write a minimum of 30,000 words in whatever you are working on during the 28 days of this month. The goal is to write to 30K, but in my mind, it was really to get into the mood and habit of writing something every single day.
Many days I had over 3000 words to show for my efforts of sitting down at my desk and not moving my butt for hours.
Many days I had less than 1000 words to show for the same efforts.
Yesteray, Febraury 17, I hit my 30,000 word goal. Not bad. A little over 2 and half weeks and I nailed it.
And since I haven’t finished the book I’ve been working on, I’m continuing with the challenge until the end of the month or I finish the book – whatever comes first!
This was just what I needed to get me motivated and going, so a big thank you to the New Jersey Romance writers for the impetus, all the daily love and praise, and the challenge itself!
This is the book I’m working on:
Her job as an assistant wedding planner means everything to Charity Quinn. She’s got a bullet-point plan for her future, and she’s not about to let anything get in the way of her goals. But a drunken hookup with a coworker – a guy she’s had a hate/hate relationship with from the get-go – may put her plan in jeopardy. Charity has to ensure her boss never finds out about her indiscretion. But every day it’s getting harder to hide how much she wants a repeat of that amazing night.
Or at least she thinks it was amazing. Seems Charity can’t quite remember the details.
His life is a series of one-night stands and Kolby O’Brian’s not about to change his status for anyone – not even the little fireball who’s been the bane of his existence since the first day they met. Why, then, are his eyes always straying to Charity when he should be concentrating on work? And why does being around her suddenly make him want to be a different kind of man? A better one? One who thinks about…the future?
These two polar opposites need to decide if they want a future together or a life without the other in it, because an emotional volcano is churning and it’s about to erupt.
Well, it’s finally release day for LOVE MATCH and I am sososo happy.
I just simply adore Layla Warton and Cody Fonda and I hope you do too. For today’s tease, their first “meeting.”
Layla turned and hugged her old friend one more time before nodding. “See ya later.”
After moving from the outer office, she glanced down at her phone to note the time and while walking through the opened elevator doors barreled straight into someone alighting from it.
The someone was built like an army tank and Layla, literally, bounced off it like a coin dropped on a military-made bed.
“Oh.”
Just as she was about to fall backward and – mortifyingly – land on her ass, hands wound around her upper arms and squeezed to keep her upright.
Incredibly strong hands.
Layla’s gaze shot to those hands, which were tanned and sun-kissed, then traveled up the arms encased in a thick brown leather jacket to land on a jaw covered with a half week’s worth of ash-colored whiskers. A tiny vertical crevasse under the bottom lip, sitting squarely in the center of the chin peeked its way through the stubble.
Layla’s mouth watered. A chin dimple was her sexual kryptonite.
A long pair of legs ensconced in faded jeans hugged thick thighs and tapered down to rough and ready work boots covered with old paint splotches. His head was bare despite the cold of the day and the shock of unruly and errant wavy brown hair covering it made her fingers twitch for a touch. While she’d always liked a man with a chin dimple, the rough and ready workman look didn’t ordinarily strike her fancy. All the men she’d ever dated, including her now infamous ex, had been suit, tie, and pocket square guys who had monthly manicures, doused themselves in expensive cologne, and rarely – if ever – had unruly hair.
To say she had a type wouldn’t be wrong. To also say she finally realized that type was a bit of a douche would be equally true.
“Excuse me.” His voice was deep and tinged with a seductive rasp that Layla felt reverberate through her.
Ignoring the words, she concentrated instead on the lips they sailed through. Thick and full, their dusky rose hue reminded her of the color of tropical sunsets. Lifting her gaze up to the rest of his face she encountered a perfectly straight nose and a pair of Hershey’s Kiss-colored eyes shaped like almonds.
Layla had a weakness for almonds. And an absolute penchant for chocolate.
The unusual jealousy that bounded through her at the length and fullness of his eyelashes stunned her. She wanted to press her fingers against them, see if they were real, while at the same time rub her lips against that fabulous mouth to taste him.
She blinked a few times, then shook her head back and forth to rid it of the alien thoughts taking up residence in her brain.
I’ve said this so many times I’m even annoying myself, but to an author, book reviews are the joy of your life and the bane of your professional existence. Luckily, I haven’t received too many egregious and soul-sucking ones ( although, I have received them!)
My newest book, DON’T MESS WITH THE MISTLETOE, has been receiving overwhelming 5-star reviews from readers. I am beyond thrilled with the response to Michael Charles’ story. Across the board reviewers and readers are thrilled with the HEA I gave this deserving man.
From Goodreads, “This is the perfect small town holiday romance.”
From Amazon: “Loved the characters and the vivid locales. Entertaining situations and banter kept the pages turning. Terrific ending.”
From Bookbub: “What a beautiful Christmas story about family, hope, love, together, happiness, taking a chance of forever along with a little bit of Christmas Magic thrown in for good measure. I loved this book so much and I can’t wait to read more books in the future.”
All 5-star reviews!
If you love a holiday romance as much as I do – and my readers do, grab this one. Right now it’s only 99 cents on Kindle, but in 11.8 it goes to full price. So, save some cash and enjoy a fabulous, heartwarming Holiday romance story, too. And enjoy all the other Dorrit’s Diner Dickens books, as well!
So today’s Tuesday tease is a little different. I’m not going to intrigue you with a little snippet of an upcoming book. Rather, I’m going to try and whet your reading appetite by showing you my covers for my upcoming additions to the HEAVEN’S MATCHMAKER series that will be released in 2024.
Intrigued yet? LOL
You’ve already been introduced to MIX AND MATCH, Jasmine and Donovan’s story.
Next in line is Layla and Cody’s love story, LOVE MATCH
Then, book 3, PERFECT MATCH, featuring Olivia and Hunter.
Book 4 features Charity and Kolby from Dearly Beloved fame, YOU’RE MY MATCH
When you see them all lined up they look so pretty!
And if you haven’t clued into it yet, the covers are all seasonal. Book 1 was released in the fall, book 2 will be a Valentine’s Day release ( here’s hoping!) book 3 summer 2023, and hopefully book 4 late fall 2023.
I have my work cut out for me. The books are plotted ( you know me!!!). I just need to put my butt in the chair and type them all up.
“Any updates on the baby?” she asked, moving to the stove, teakettle in hand.
He told her about the diagnosis and the treatment his niece would need while she filled the kettle and then placed it on the stove to heat. When she turned around to him, her face had gone quite pale and a soft curl of moisture shone in her eyes.
“You saved the baby’s life. You know that, right?”
“What?”
“You got her to a place where they could diagnose her and put a plan together to get her better. If you hadn’t been available to fly her to Concord…” she let the rest of the sentence dangle and shook her head again.
“I can’t begin to imagine what your sister is going through.” She wrapped her arms around herself and shook her head. “Her hormones are gonna be going nuts to begin with and now her tiny baby needs heart surgery.”
A single tear snuck down each cheek and when she swiped at them his heart melted.
“I’m sorry for blubbering, but I keep thinking if this had been Blake I don’t know how I would have survived, how I would have handled it. Or what I would have done. I’m upset for your sister. As a new mother, she must be terrified.”
“One thing you need to know about Sasha,” he said. “She’s nothing if not a fighter and survivor. I bet she’s gonna sign herself out of the hospital in the morning if they don’t discharge her and head right up to Concord to be with her baby. Hell, she’ll probably order me to fly her to save time.”
“And you will, without any thought not to, because she’s your sister. Your family.” Her sigh pulled at him.
She was right. He’d do anything for his sisters, for his parents. The very fact he’d given up a month of his life so his mom could take a well-earned rest was all the proof anyone needed.
They were silent as the teakettle whistled and she went about preparing her nightly brew.
“So,” he said as she took her fist sip, “Everything good around here while I was gone?”
“RayLynn and Winston kept things moving smoothly.”
“Good. Thank goodness for the old-timers. They’ve been around long enough to know what’s what. I know my mom trusts and relies on them. I do, too.”
She sipped her tea, the steam rising, drifting around, and touching her face. His fingers tingled because they wanted to do the same.
Good Lord. Jealous of a wisp of air that got to touch her.
“Julia—”
“Michael—”
Her blush charmed him.
“Sorry,” he said. “You first.”
She sipped her tea then placed the mug down on the table. “I, well. I just wanted you to know how much I…admire you. Your whole family. You’re always there for one another. My parents,” she lifted a shoulder and cast her eyes downward, “have always been a little distant with me, now more than ever since the Jeff incident. I’d love if I had a family like yours. I’d hoped to have one like that for Blake, but, well, life intervened and my husband got sick. Then I went off the deep end with Jeff.” Another head shake. “Your family is the kind I’ve always aspired to have.”
Michael rose from the table and slid his fork and plate into the sink, ran the water to rinse them, and then let them sit.
“You know we’re all adopted, right? Abra, Sasha, and me?”
She nodded. “Someone mentioned it. I can’t remember who. But I think it’s wonderful Amy and Andy wanted to share their home and their hearts.”
He leaned against the sink ledge and crossed his arms over his chest. “I told you to make a point.”
She lifted her gaze, the mug warming in her hands.
“You can have a biological family and hope it’s the dream family everyone wants. Most of the time, though, it isn’t. The perfect family is almost always a fantasy. Or you can make a family with the people you open your heart to, like you said. The people you choose to be your family. Amy chose us. And I thank whoever’s in charge,” he pointed upward, “every single day she did. I truthfully don’t think I’d be alive today if she hadn’t.”
Immediately he regretted saying it. For the second time, with her, he’d divulged a little bit of what he’d always kept hidden, what he’d always considered too much to share. Why did it feel so easy, though, to say things to her he’d never given breath to with any other woman?
“That’s…awful to even consider.”
He shrugged. “Like I said, the perfect family dream is just that. A dream.”
He pushed off the ledge and turned around to wash the dishes he’d had rinsing. Before he could turn the water on, Julia’s hand wound around his bicep.
His gaze flicked to it. Her fingers didn’t even meet halfway around the muscle. Had he noticed how small her hands were before now? How long and slender her fingers were, the nails naked and buffed to a natural shine? Heat, flaming heat, singed through his shirt at her touch. It was a wonder smoke wasn’t billowing up from his arm from where she gripped it.
A worry line dragged her brows together.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, staying still, fearful if he moved he’d give in to temptation and rub his thumb along that thin line to soothe it away.
“The time before you came to Amy?” A nervous flick of her tongue wet her lips.
Michael swallowed and tried to ignore how much the little move made parts of his anatomy twitch. “What about it?”
“Can you…will you…tell me about it?”
His breath hissed like a steam valve opening.
The line disappeared as her eyes opened wide, her gaze mating with his as she waited for him to speak.
“I don’t talk about that time.” His throat was raw and dry like sandpaper. “It’s too…” He dropped his gazed to the sink, fisted his hands on the ledge. “I don’t even remember all that much.”
An outright lie. If pressed, Michael could recall every minute he’d spent in that closet, every cigarette the mean mad had put out on his flesh, every slap he’d suffered across his face and back.
Disappointment shadowed her gaze. Julia dropped her hand from his arm and nodded.
Backing away from him she said in a shaky voice, “Of course. I understand. I’m…sorry. Never mind. Sorry.”
When she dropped her gaze to the floor, a bullet of regret tore through him. He pulled in another bracing breath before forgetting all about the dishes and turning around to face her.
“I was four when I came to Amy,” he said.
She lifted her head, zeroed in on his face.
“Five when she and Andy petitioned to adopt me.”
“So young,” she mumbled. “Barely more than a baby.”
Had he ever been young? Some days, when he thought about that time, he felt as if he’d been born old and jaded.
In just 2 weeks DON’T MESS WITH MISTLETOE goes live, so, of course, today’s teaser is from that!
(I swear, I’m a marketing genius – LOL Lol LOLOLOLOLO!)
The kitchen light was on as he came through the back door. Since he’d been the last one out the night before with his mother, he knew it had been off.
Had Winston arrived early?
Quietly, he pushed the door open enough to peek beyond it.
Surprise knocked the cautious adrenaline from his body. Even facing away from him, Michael recognized Julia Maryland seated at the table, a cup in one hand, a book on the tabletop in front of her. Clad in a faded pink, terrycloth robe, her hair spilled around her shoulders in a chaos of untamed waves. He hadn’t seen it down yet, since she’d worn it in a knot on top of her head while she’d waitressed.
Why was she sitting in the diner kitchen at four-thirty in the morning, drinking what he assumed was a cup of coffee, in her robe?
Michael pushed the door open all the way and in a quiet voice, said, “Julia?”
It was as if he’d shouted. She shrieked, jumped up, and dropped the book in her hand all in one jerky motion. Thankfully, she had a better grip on the mug. Swinging around to face him, her free hand flew to her chest.
She hauled in a jagged breath. “You scared the heck out of me.”
“What are you doing here? How did you get in?”
“Amy gave me a key.”
“To the diner? Why?”
Julia placed the mug down on the table, landing it with an audible thud. It was then he noted how fiercely her hands shook.
“Not to the diner,” she managed to say after taking another breath. She lifted her hands to hug them around herself. “To the apartment. You don’t need a key to get in here from there.”
Confusion made him say, “The apartment? Upstairs?” which, he realized as soon as he said it, was a stupid question, because there was no other apartment but the one above the diner. “Why?”
She nodded. “I’m staying there.”
He shook his head. “You’re staying in the apartment?”
Another nod, then a head tick with a question. “You didn’t know?”
“No. I intended to move in tomorrow. I thought it made more sense I be on site if I’m running this place for a few weeks than staying out at the house.”
“Oh, I’m…I didn’t…know. Amy said since it was empty I could…” she flipped her hand in the air. “I’m sorry.” She bit down on a corner of her lip. “Does your mom know you were planning to stay here?”
“Yeah, she does.” He shoved the keys in his coat pocket then shrugged out of it. He’d told her he was going to be moving in after Thanksgiving. Had she somehow forgotten? With everything going on, it was a distinct possibility. But he didn’t think she had. Amy Charles’ brain was stronger than a computer’s memory board. Once something was input, it was never erased.
The question was, why hadn’t she told him about Julia using the space? He had a sneaking suspicion and it had nothing to do with it having slipped her mind. With an internal headshake, he chastised his mother for her matchmaking busybody-ness.
“I’m sorry,” Julia said again, twisting her hands together.
With a quick glance at the wall clock, he said, “Don’t be. If she’s letting you use it I’m sure there’s a good reason,” he put his hand up in the air when she opened her mouth again. “One I don’t need to know about.”
It’s the holiday season in the tiny town of Dickens and pilot Michael Charles is home for his annual visit. His wanderlust has him itching to get back up in the skies as soon as possible, especially since he’s got a full schedule of rich and famous clients waiting to be transported to warm, exotic locales for the winter.
When his heavily pregnant sisters present him with a plan to give their workaholic mother some time off from managing the family diner, he balks. But one look at how tired the woman who took him into her home and heart is, and Michael agrees to run Dorrit’s Diner for a month so Amy Charles can get some well-deserved rest.
He’ll be back in the skies by the New Year.
The diner staff functions like a well-oiled machine, most of them long-term employees. The exception is new waitress Julia Maryland. The beautiful blonde has a past filled with heartache, a charming six-year-old daughter, and a smile Michael could spend the day getting lost in. But starting a relationship with her wouldn’t be wise because his visit is temporary and Julia seems like a permanent kind of girl.
When a family emergency requires him to rethink and reassess his life, Michael wonders if it’s time he becomes a permanent kind of man.
It’s hard to trust when you’re the daughter of a fallen financial scion who bilked people out of billions. Nell’s done everything in her power to keep away from men who see her as their ticket to fortune and fame. All she wants to do is run her ultra-successful business, HELPFUL HUNKS, in peace. But it wouldn’t hurt to find a guy who doesn’t know a thing about her father’s felonious past; one she can give her heart to and trust it won’t come back to her battered, bruised, and broken.
Is Charlie Churchill that guy? On the surface he seems perfect, all polished manners and quiet mirth. Nell’s convinced he knows nothing about her, other than she likes superhero movies and views junk food as a food group.
Can she trust him to be what he appears to be? Or is he just pretending?
For Nell, trust is everything in life…and in love.
SNIPPET…
That old expression if you want something done, give it to a busy person describes my life to perfection.
I was already late for the two-hour lecture I’d agreed to give at Columbia Business School. And I say agreed with my tongue in my cheek.
When Dean Arnold Dietrichson, an old friend of my mother’s from her cotillion days, emailed and asked me to fill in for a professor who’d requested time off to visit a sick parent, I ignored the missive. And the two follow-ups he’d then sent. When he called me directly, I couldn’t come up with an excuse fast or truthful enough to squeak out of it. Public speaking is the last in a long laundry list of things I never want to do. Having my fingernails removed one by one without anesthesia and shaving my head supersede public speaking, so that tells you how much I didn’t want to do what I was about to do.
A scheduling issue had disrupted my afternoon and I found myself two men short for a moving job I’d booked weeks ago for an extremely influential client. It took me two and a half hours, seven pleading phone calls, the promise of an extra day off, plus time and half for the two guys who finally agreed to come in. I toyed with the idea to add sexual favors to the asking price if no one agreed.
That would have been an empty promise, but desperate times…you know?
My business, Helpful Hunks, rents gorgeous twenty and thirty-something between-jobs male actors and models by the hour to do all the things you can’t—or don’t want to—do.
Are you a woman living on your own and need shelving put up but don’t know the business end of a hammer from a screwdriver? Call me. Are you relocating from one small New York apartment to another and don’t want to pay the exorbitant cost a commercial moving business charges to move the meager stuff you own? Check out my website. Need heavy furniture rearranged? Boxes brought in from storage? Someone to help relocate mom’s belongings from her home to her new assisted care facility? Send me an email.
The idea for the business came to me in college. I was my first client. At a spit above five foot, and with a mother residing in a psych facility and a father who was a guest of the state, I had no one to help me lug all my stuff into the dorm room I’d be living in for the next four years.
When a group of upperclassmen who were involved in a project offered to help me in order to gain service points for their frat house, I readily agreed. Flirty, fit, and hunky-hot, the guys got all my crap moved in one one-hundredth of the time it would have taken me on my own. While I watched them heft and heave my trunks, luggage, books, and bed linens, a little idea wormed its way into my entrepreneurial brain.
Despite my father’s mortifying public trial and his subsequent incarceration, Dennison Newbery’s business acumen-laced DNA flowed through me.
Before sophomore year began, I’d already hired a few classmates over the summer break to aid anyone who needed help moving into dorms and student housing. For a nominal fee, of course. My profits that year paid for the next two years of my education.
Business school, a business loan, and a solid marketing plan after I graduated, and here I was.
Peggy Jaeger, Author 