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SNOWFLAKE BAY
SNOWFLAKE BAY
The Brides of Blueberry Cove #2
Donna Kauffman
Released Sept 29th, 2015
Kensington: Zebra
There’s no place like seaside Blueberry Cove, Maine, at Christmas—and there’s nothing like a wedding, the warmth of the holidays, and an old crush, to create the perfect new start…
Interior designer Fiona McCrae has left fast-paced Manhattan to move back home to peaceful Blueberry Cove. But she’s barely arrived before she’s hooked into planning her big sister Hannah’s Christmas wedding—in less than seven weeks. The last thing she needs is for her first love, Ben Campbell, to return to neighboring Snowflake Bay…
As kids, Fiona was the bratty little sister Ben mercilessly teased—while pining after Hannah. But Fi never once thought of Ben like a brother. And that hasn’t changed. Except Fi is all grown up. Will Ben notice her now? More importantly, with her life in a jumble, should he? Or might the romance of the occasion, the spirit of the season, and the gifts of time ignite a long-held flame for many Christmases to come…
Something old might just become something new…
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Big hands
gripped her shoulders again and turned her back around. Then she felt rough,
thick fingers gently tug at the scarf until her face was completely uncovered,
or at least most of it was. Curls still clung to her eyelashes and errant wool
fibers remained plastered to her Chapsticked lips.
She finally
looked up at him. What the hell. She couldn’t possibly be more mortified around
him now than she had been during pretty much every waking, breathing moment of
her adolescence, could she?
Any latent,
exceedingly selfish hopes she might have harbored that time and age had been
unkind to him were extinguished with that one simple glance. He was …
beautiful. He’d always been beautiful. Thick, chestnut-brown hair that was forever
in need of a trim topped a pair of always twinkling eyes the color of Maine
evergreens, and a ready grin set between a strong jaw and sharp cheekbones. Only now, age and time had somehow transformed him into a man who was more
rugged, more handsome, more genuinely, heart-grippingly sexy. The kind of sexy
a thirteen-year-old couldn’t even begin to appreciate, but the
thirty-two-year-old woman standing before him could all too well.
His body was
as ruggedly appealing as his face, with broad shoulders to match those wide
palms, and the kind of muscles roping his arms and biceps that even the green
plaid wool jacket he had on over a faded red hoodie did little to hide and
everything to enhance. She didn’t dare look lower. Didn’t have to. He’d always
been athletic and agile despite his size. Looking at those long legs and
perfectly muscled thighs wasn’t necessary. She imagined them anyway,
remembering far too many summers spent watching him and Logan from her bedroom
window as they played pick-up basketball at the hoop mounted to the front of
the carriage house, in nothing more than gym shorts and gleaming, honey-gold
skin.
It seemed so
unfair, she thought, even as she drank in the sight of him like a woman who’d
been in the desert since, well, since the summer of her eighth grade
graduation. Which was when he’d left town, and her unrequited love, in the
unnoticed and seriously pathetic dust.
“Hello, Ben,”
she said, seeing the wisps of wool still clinging to her lips dance briefly in
the warm, dry air. She wanted to close her eyes. Hell, she wanted to dig a hole
to China. Instead, she forced herself to maintain eye contact. Adult. Mature.
Not thirteen. Not stupidly pining for a guy who never once thought of you as
anything but his best friend’s annoying, bratty kid sister.
At the
moment, however, he looked sincerely happy to see her. That shouldn’t have made
her knees knock. Or her thighs clench.
“I didn’t
know you were back in town,” he said.
“That makes
two of us,” she said, thinking that her heart had to be pounding against her
chest so hard, if she looked down, she’d surely see a cartoon version of it
pumping out through her coat. Her fireplug red, down-filled coat.
Yeah.
Her karma
clearly didn’t include things like having the sexier-than-ever Ben Campbell reenter
her life when she had on cute yoga pants and was in some innocent but super
suggestive pose that had him immediately wondering why in the hell he’d never
noticed her before.
“You, uh …”
He made a brief motion toward her mouth, and then that gleaming white grin
flashed. “Either you’ve been slimed by your scarf, or you have a very
unfortunate fungal issue. Either way—” He reached past her to nimbly snag a
napkin from the holder she’d half buried under her satchel.
“Here,” he said,
offering it to her.
Aaaaand
humiliation complete. Forever thirteen. Ah well, what the hell. Might as well
own it. She tugged off her gloves with her probably wool-coated teeth, then
took the proffered napkin. “Thanks,” she said, and turned to put her gloves on
the marble countertop and do the best she could without benefit of a mirror to
de-fungi herself. Turning back around, she crumpled the napkin in her hand and
gave him a wry smile. “Better?”
“Mostly,” he
said.
She went
stock-still again when, teasing grin still firmly in place, he stepped closer,
bowed his head, and gazed ever-so-intently at her mouth. She had no idea how
her legs held her upright as every one of her adolescent fantasies came
screaming back to mind, but in a far—far—more adult fashion. Surely, he couldn’t
mean to—
He brought
his hand up—not to cup her cheek so he could lower his lips to hers—but to
pluck away the few remaining fibers that still clung to her lips.
What did it
say that the tips of his fingers brushing her lips elicited a far greater
response from her body than the last man she’d actually gotten naked with?
Nothing positive, she was sure. About her, or about poor,
couldn’t-find-an-erogenous-zone-if-it-was- staring-him-in-the-face Charlie.
Which, sadly for them both, one rather universally well-known zone had been.
“Now you’re
good,” he said, smiling again as he stepped back.
No, not
really, she thought. But you sure are. She swallowed against a throat that was
suddenly a dry wasteland, while other parts of her were … decidedly not. Oh,
so, very, very good.
USA Today bestselling author of the Cupcake Club Romance series,
Donna Kauffman has seen her books reviewed in venues ranging from Kirkus
Reviews and Library Journal to Entertainment Weekly and Cosmopolitan. She lives
just outside of DC in the lovely Virginia countryside, where she is presently
trying to makeover her newly empty nest into something that doesn’t have to
accommodate piles of sports equipment falling out of her coat closet (okay, out
of every closet...and under every bed....), size 13 cleats and sweaty uniforms
cluttering her foyer (and stairwell, and laundry room, and...), and a kitchen
that should have come with a traffic light. And a pantry monitor. (Anyone with
a clever idea on how to repurpose lacrosse sticks into matching reading lamps,
she’s all ears!) When she’s not stripping paint, varnishing an old auction
house find, or trying to avoid bodily injury with her latest power tool
purchase, she loves to hear from readers!
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