Showing results by narrator "Chris Brinkley" in All Categories

It’s officially booty o’clock, I’m alone again in my kitchen choking down a slice of terrible chocolate cake…and I’m pretty sure I just got drunk texted by the man I have a ginormous crush on. I’ve been daydreaming about Eliot Hoffman’s dimples for two months, and even though I’m sure this was a mistake on his end, it doesn’t mean it’s not an opportunity on mine. It’s the middle of the night, and I just wanna talk to him. So I text him back.

Marrying Beckett Coleman is the best idea I've had in years. I can grant my sick dad’s wish to walk one of his daughters down the aisle, and Beckett has my help solving a custody situation with his daughter. Our plan is to spend a year together, then part ways. Easy, especially since I'm not his type, and he's not mine either. He’s too quiet and too serious. And while he’s distractingly gorgeous, he’s also my brother’s teammate. Beckett is fake husband material, not the real deal. I just have to remember that.

Isaac has never been what he seems. Rumor has it that gruff, brooding, and solitary man-of-mystery Isaac Sylvester is back in town, and the only thing folks in Green Valley know for certain is that this prodigal son’s motives are as elusive as he is. He’s been spotted loitering near the old Townsen farm, hanging around the Hill's homestead, and glaring menacingly from the edges of The Donner Lodge’s parking lot. What this hometown-hero-turned-criminal wants, no one knows. Nor can they stop talking about it. Hannah's last night as an exotic dancer might just be her most memorable.

Before he was “Big Texas,” he was “Zac the Snack Pack". Bianca Brannen knows time - mostly - heals all wounds. Including those your once loved ones might have unintentionally given you. (Those just take longer.) She thinks she’s ready when a call has her walking back into her old friend’s life. Or at least, as prepared as possible to see the starting quarterback in the National Football Organization. Before the lights, the fans, and the millions, he’d been a skinny kid with a heart of gold.

They’ve both got good reasons to fight falling in love, but they can’t resist the overpowering attraction pulling them together. As the executive consultant King’s Creamery has brought in to save them from financial ruin, Maggie has to decide which employees get the ax. She can’t afford to make friends or get chummy with her new neighbors. Try telling that to the enormous, hunky fireman next door, who’s annoyingly determined to make friends with her.

She’s not just my ex-girlfriend. She’s my new coworker. I knew Lucy Dillard was "The One" the first time I met her. Yes, I’m enough of a sap to believe in love at first sight. When I fell for Lucy, I fell hard. Everything was great between us - until the moment she dumped me. Now I just want to forget about her. Instead, I’m stuck staring at her face all day. But I need this job, so I’ll find a way to be civil and professional. There’s just one small problem: I’m nowhere close to being over her.

It’s not easy serving Chernobog, the God of Destruction, Darkness and Death…especially during the holidays; and especially when you’re out of eggnog and one of your pesky, freeloading mythic creatures has eaten your last cookie. Roman would like nothing more than to be left alone, but when a wounded boy stumbles into his yard and begs for sanctuary, Roman takes him in. Now elite mercenaries are camped out on his property, combat mages are dousing the house with fire, and strange priests are unleashing arcane magic.

Stuck in a job he no longer found fulfilling, journalist Mike McIntyre felt his life was quickly passing him by. So one day he hit the road to trek from one end of the country to the other with little more than the clothes on his back and without a single penny in his pocket. Through his travels, he found varying degrees of kindness in strangers from all walks of life - and discovered more about people and values and life on the road in America than he'd ever thought possible.

Crashing weddings is so not my thing. I’d much rather stay home and watch HGTV...and ignore the fact that my life is messier than those fixer-upper houses. Because my jerk ex left, and the only thing keeping a roof over my sons’ heads is my crappy telemarketing job. But then, I get a challenge from the Bad Luck Club, the group I joined to turn my luck around: Do something that breaks the rules.

Hate at first sight couldn’t possibly exist, right? That’s what Grace Buchanan thought, before her useless car stranded her on the side of a deserted road just inside the Green Valley city limits. When Tucker Haywood — tall and handsome and full of southern charm— shows up to help, her reaction to him is the strongest thing she’s ever felt in her life, and it makes no freaking sense.

Hank Weller doesn’t help people. He leaves that do-gooder nonsense to his best friend, Beau Winston. Hank does what he wants, when he wants, with whomever he wants—and Hank does not want to hire Charlotte Mitchell to be an exotic dancer at his club, The Pink Pony.

Cletus Byron Winston wishes to marry Jennifer Anne Donner-Sylvester (aka The Banana Cake Queen) posthaste! He’s spent the last year wanting nothing more than for the celebrations to be brief, libations flowing, and BYOB (bring your own blueberries). His future mother-in-law has other plans - plans his intended has been willing to indulge, much to Cletus’s chagrin. Therefore, so must he. To a point. But truth be told, he wouldn’t mind if the meddlesome matriarch disappeared, at least until the nuptials are over.

Marly Rivers is not crazy. No matter what everyone says. They may think her dream is foolish, but she plans to prove them all wrong—one jar of moonshine at a time. Single dad Wade Kelley is just fine. No matter what his best friend Jed says. He doesn’t need a woman in his life. But when his son Jake breaks a jar of moonshine, he sets something in motion that neither Wade nor Marly are prepared for.

She's a city slicker from Los Angeles. I'm a cowboy from Texas. She definitely wants me; she just doesn't know it yet. She walked straight out of my dreams and into this tiny town. I swept her off her feet on the dance floor. She gave me the best kiss I've ever had. It was all going so well … until it wasn't. Like a real-life Cinderella, she ran off without giving me her number. Dumbfounded, I assumed I'd never see her again. Until she walked right into our barn the next morning. Turns out, she's the wedding planner for my brother's upcoming nuptials. And I'm the best man.

Lola Landry stares through the window of her locked car with the keys in the ignition and the radio blaring Beck’s “Loser”. While standing there and sweltering in the soupy Tennessee humidity, she wonders how her orderly life had crashed and burned so badly. Then her high school nemesis saunters up in all of his tall, strapping fireman-to-the-rescue glory, slapping her with the humiliating proof that it can always get worse. When the uber-confident Jedediah Lawson requests a date in return for popping her lock, a lightbulb goes off.

When Selena Martinez had one night with Tom Murray and fell pregnant, she thought maybe this was the start of her happily ever after—just like in her favorite romance novels. But then he told her to get lost, and she realized that life isn't anything like a book. Now, she knows her place. She's meant to be in the background, never the main character, and she's fine with it. She needs all of her energy to focus on raising her son, Max, without the man she once thought could be her hero. When she runs into him again, he's caring and attentive—making her rethink everything she knew about him.

Zora Leffersbee's once-perfect life is no longer perfect. Her tenure at the university is in question, funding for her employees is uncertain, and her faux-fiancé Jackson James’s unpredictability is wearing on her last nerve. Just when Zora is convinced things can’t get more complicated, life proves her wrong. Now a man of power and influence, Nick Rossi's return to Green Valley after so many years hasn’t gone according to plan, especially with the woman he’s always wanted. Been There Done That is a full-length contemporary romance.

Jennifer Sylvester wants one thing, and that one thing is not to be Tennessee's reigning Banana Cake Queen. Ever the perpetual good girl and obedient daughter, Jennifer is buckling under the weight of her social media celebrity, her mother's ambitions, and her father's puritanical mandates. Jennifer is officially desperate. And desperate times call for Cletus Winston.

Sometimes it takes an outsider to force us to see who we are. The real struggle is accepting what we learn. For Beverly Townsen, nothing could be closer to the truth. Virtually a shut-in, Beverly has pulled back from Green Valley’s community, preferring the isolation of her farmhouse and her daily routine of viewing home improvement television shows. When the opportunity arises for her own home improvement and a personal re-assessment, she’s not so excited about the reality of real life versus DIY programs.

I'm done juggling dead-end jobs and deadbeat boyfriends. It's time to nail down my goal of owning a hotel—and fix my friendship with my ex-best friend, Jack Colson. He's a big-shot investor, and I'm going to need one. Nailing him barely crosses my mind. I might actually get my life in order, especially if I snag the deep (and deeply weird) discount for staying an entire weekend at my dream property. It's hard not to fall in love with the place.