Welcome back to Romance Sweet Reads. This week and next we’ll be featuring the nine individual stories from the holiday anthology, Hearts, Homes and Holidays. The anthology is a currently available to pre-order for just 99¢ on all major ebook retailers. All proceeds from the sale of Hearts, Homes, and Holidays will benefit Reece’s Rainbow, an organization that assists with the adoption of special-needs children.
Today, we’ll look at the seventh of our nine stories, Not Part of Our Evening Plans by author Caroline Lee, including an exclusive excerpt available only on Romance Sweet Reads.
So, sit back and enjoy a look at the fabulous collection of heartfelt holiday romances by some of your favorite authors.
Family Ever After
Not Part of Our Evening Plans by Caroline Lee
As a couple, Jace and Dinky Cunningham struggle with the loss of their plans for a family; but, circumstances can change in a split second.
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Discover River’s End Ranch, a gorgeous “destination” ranch and resort in Riston, Idaho, that is run by the six Weston siblings and their well-meaning, semi-retired parents. Five bestselling western romance authors have created a world like no other--full of fun outdoor activities, a huge family in need of love, and side characters you will never forget. Join us in a world where our characters learn, laugh and love. Follow Jace and Dinky’s love story in “Wild West Wedding,” and follow-up with their family in “Bigfoot Believer.” 
Enjoy an Excerpt
“You wanna head to trivia tonight?”
Dink looked up from their tiny kitchen table, where she’d been staring out the window and nursing her coffee. For the last three hours. Since last fall, when the doctor had given them the news, she’d done this more and more.
“Hmmm?” she asked her husband, not sure if he’d said anything more and she’d just been too flaked out to hear him.
Jace’s handsome face softened. He stood by the front door to the tiny house they’d been renting for almost a year and a half, still bundled up in his winter gear. He held a handful of mail in one hand—they got all their mail directed to his accounting office here at River’s End Ranch—and was peeling off his scarf with the other.
Not for the first time, Dink wondered how someone as tall as her husband could manage to be comfortable in this tiny house. As it was, sitting at the kitchen table, she could reach out and touch him, standing at the front door. But they’d learned to manage, and it was fun. Besides, it was just the two of them.
Would only ever be just the two of them…
“I asked,” Jace repeated gently, “if you wanted to go to trivia tonight. We haven’t been in a while, and I recall you and I made a pretty good team.”
Dink snorted. “I recall you didn’t think I had anything to offer, Mr. Smarty-Pants.”
“You’re remembering incorrectly,” Jace deadpanned, slotting the mail into the appropriate “bills to be addressed” or “wastebasket” piles.
She lifted her coffee to sip, but it’d long since gone cold. “Did you just call me wrong?”
“I did!” Jace nodded too enthusiastically to be anything but teasing. “That’s the word I was looking for.”
A grin reluctantly pulled at Dink’s lips. How long had it been since she’d let herself go and really laughed? She and Jace were so very different, but they’d made the perfect odd couple, and were so good together.
It wasn’t until their infertility diagnosis that things had gotten choppy. After researching extensively, they’d decided not to tackle IVF—in-vitro fertilization—because of the strain it would cause on Dink, their savings, and their relationship…and because the doctor said there was a low likelihood of it working. Jace had made his peace with not having biological children, but there were days like today—beautiful winter days where the snow was just begging to be played in—that Dink couldn’t concentrate on her sewing, for all the obsessing she was doing over what it would be like to have a child.
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Meet the Author
USA Today Bestseller Caroline Lee has been reading romance for so long that her fourth-grade teacher used to make her cover her books with paper jackets. But it wasn’t until she (mostly) grew up that she realized she could WRITE it too. So she did.
Caroline is living her own little Happily Ever After in NC with her husband, sons, and daughter, Princess Wiggles. And while she doesn’t so much “suffer” from Pittakionophobia as think all you people who enjoy touching Band-Aids and stickers are the real weirdos, she does adore rodents, and never met a wine she didn’t like.
Caroline was named Time Magazine’s Person of the Year in 2006 (just like everyone else) and is really quite funny in person. Promise.
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Adoption is another word for love, and proceeds from this collection of inspiring stories will benefit special-needs adoption grants through Reece’s Rainbow.
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Please come back again tomorrow when we’ll be featuring author Christine Sterling’s story to this extraordinary anthology.
Blessings,
Nancy
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