Christmas Four-Book Bundle

I’m only home for the holidays, but this hot, single dad could make me want to stay.

I’m the personal assistant to one of Hollywood’s elite, but I grew up on a Christmas tree farm. Now, after two Christmases away, I’ve decided to surprise everyone by coming home for the holidays. Great idea, right? Of course, right. Except for a couple of problems. Which are not really problems, because I’m Makenzie Vandenberg, and my job is solving problems.

Problem #1: They sold the Christmas tree farm.

Kind of a big one, but somehow my family failed to mention this little detail.

Problem #2: They’re selling it to my old crush.

Guys are jerks. And crushes don’t change that. Cameron was the first one to teach me this, after years of friendship he stomped all over my heart and started dating my mortal enemy. But we’re both adults now. I’ve moved on . . . sort of.

Problem #3: He’s been married and divorced since then and maybe he’s not the same jerk he used to be.

From the moment I arrive in Sugar Creek I can feel him changing my mind, reminding me why we were friends to begin with. Now, my emotions have gone as melty and sticky as his daughter's candy cane kisses.

Which has created the final issue . . .

Problem #4: This single dad could break my heart . . . again.

I was so sure Cameron was in my past. I’d tucked him away with memories of childhood and the smell of pine tree adventures. No matter how much I want to be with him, staying isn’t an option. I've got a job and a life outside of Christmas tree farms. Now, I have a few short weeks to decide if I’m willing to sacrifice everything for a chance at love.

Christmas with the Grumpy Landscaper

Anna’s first
inkling of trouble came when the power went out while she was rinsing shampoo
out of her hair. Ten seconds later the water turned cold and she shrieked as
she jumped out of the stream.

What had the
landlord said about the tankless water heater being so great because you don’t
run out? Oh yeah, it requires electricity. Growling, she turned and dipped her
head under the shower of cold water to finish rinsing her hair, then took a
quick spin to rinse off. Teeth chattering, she jumped out and dried off.

When she reached
for her blow drier, she realized it got worse. First day of work at a new job
and she would be far from her best. She sucked in her breath and counted to ten
as she dressed. Annoyed at the lack of window in the bathroom, she moved to a
living room window for light with her makeup and a tiny pocket mirror.

Of course, her
mom called while she was juggling the mirror and makeup in insufficient light. Could
her morning get any worse? “Hi, Mom.” She pushed the speaker phone button and
returned to her face.

“Hi, dear, this
is your first day at the new job, isn’t it? I hope it goes well.” Her voice
dropped towards the end of the sentence expressing the doubt she had already
broadcast.

“Thank you. What
do you have planned today?” Anna shifted the attention away from herself.

“I’m getting my
hair done and having lunch with the girls at the club. Did you really have to
move all the way to California? What will you do if one of us isn’t there to
help you out?”

“I guess I’ll
just have to take care of myself.” Like
I’ve been doing for the past decade. Seriously, you’d think she had been
begging for help and advice daily from the way her mother acted. She was not a
helpless child.

“It’s just that
you’ve never been so far away and if this job doesn’t work out, you’ll be stuck
there, two-thousand miles away. You know, you’re not too old to go back to
school to become an attorney like your father and sister.”

Anna had heard
this argument a hundred times over the years. She whipped out her mascara wand
and gritted her teeth. “This is a great opportunity. I’ll get to do all kinds
of publicity work for the hot springs, really run the show.” She was more
nervous than she wanted to admit to, even to herself. What if they didn’t like
her work after all? What if she had the same problems with her new boss as she
had with the old one?

“You never think
of anyone but yourself. Your father and I won’t live forever, you know. You’re
missing out on the best years. If you ever manage to hook a man, I won’t even
get to know my grandbabies.”

And that was
Anna’s cue to end the conversation before she said something she might regret.
Like the possibilities that her theoretical future children would be better off
without their grandmother’s hyper-critical nose in every aspect of their lives.
“I’m sorry you feel that way. I need to finish getting ready for work. Thanks
for calling.”

“I love you,
dear.”

“Me too.” Anna
ended the call, grateful it had been so easy to get out of the conversation.
These talks with her mom were never happy or comfortable, but added to the
stress of the morning, they ramped up her tension about three levels of
insanity. She did her best to set that insanity aside and started applying
mascara. The power did not come back on while she got ready. In desperation,
she twisted her long brown hair into a bun and pinned it into place. It will have to do.

Anna checked her
watch and snatched up her purse, hurrying through the cheerful bungalow she had
rented only a mile from work. She was running behind and couldn’t cook this
morning anyway. She might have enough time to pick up something on her way to
work. Maybe.

Anna locked the
cottage door and headed for the detached garage. Two trucks in the neighbor’s
front yard caught her eye. The first belonged to the power company, and the
second was a similar vehicle with the logo for Partridge Landscaping emblazoned
on the door. She had only been in town for two days, but hoped this kind of
outage wasn’t common.

She entered
through the garage’s side door and slid into her car. Anna reached up for the
remote door opener and let out a huff of frustration when she realized it
wouldn’t do her any good. She could not do this today. After everything that
went wrong in the last job, this one had to go perfectly.

Holding onto her
temper by a thread, she pushed out of the car and looked around the garage.
There had to be a way to get the door open, right? She tugged at the door,
checked for any sign of backup power to the door, and tried to release the side
clamps that locked the door in place. No luck. No idea what else she could do,
she headed for the electrical truck. At least they were all working on the
problem instead of standing around with their thumbs in their pockets.

“How long is this
going to take?” she asked.

“At least another
half hour, maybe more. Sorry,” the forty-something man said.

She let out a
huff of breath, trying her best to keep her temper under control. “Worst
morning ever.”

“Blame Quinn.”
The man gestured over his shoulder to the landscaper’s truck.

The man in the
cherry picker was already guiding the arm to the ground. “Can I help you with
something?

Wishing she had
worn pumps as her heels sank into the soft, wet grass, Anna let the steam push
her forward the few steps it took to meet him. The man in the bucket was tall
with close cropped dark hair and a couple days’ beard and mustache growth. He
had been singing along with a country song that poured from a nearby speaker
while he worked.

“Are you
responsible for the power outage?” Anna glared at him.

He looked over
with an apologetic smile. “Sorry about that. We had a small accident this
morning. It should be fixed soon.”

“Your small accident has caused me a world of
problems. No hot water, no blow drier, no breakfast, and now I can’t even get
my car out of the garage. It’s my first day at my new job and if I get fired,
it’s all going to be your fault.”

*~~*

Pining for Christmas

A LIGHT SNOW FELL, JOINING THE THIN LAYER ALREADY ON the pavement as Mackenzie maneuvered her rental
car up and down the hills leading to her hometown. It had been years since she’d driven in snow—at least
three since she had been home for the holidays. She passed the wooden sign
announcing that she was entering the city of Sugar Creek, Vermont, population
30,406. She slowed the car at the lovely, old covered bridge as hundreds of
childhood memories rushed into her mind.

She drove through town, noticing a few of the street light
decorations had been updated since her last Christmas here, and took the road
past the train depot out to her family home, located on the Sweet Pines
Christmas Tree Farm.

Mackenzie wondered again if she should have told her parents
she was coming instead of springing it on them. Perhaps, but she couldn’t wait to see the look of
surprise in her mom’s eyes.

Anticipation thrummed through her as she turned left onto
her family farm, driving past the large space that had been cleared with a
wooden railing separating the parking area from the pre-cut tree sales area.
The snow fell lightly on the car as she pulled around to the family parking spaces
near the kitchen door at the back of the house. She grinned as she saw a figure
hauling Christmas-colored totes from the back of the farm’s blue pickup truck—no doubt
the lights for the annual sledding party the next Saturday. It took only a
second for her to realize the figure was too tall and lanky to be her father,
but all she could see were his legs and the top of a baseball cap until he set
the totes on a table.

Definitely not her dad. The man was probably mid to late
thirties, dark haired with a scruff of beard growth. Wow, he was hot! It took
several seconds for her to realize she knew him because she had not expected to
see him here.

No way. No. Way.

Cameron Navarro was the most clueless idiot she’d ever had the displeasure
to know—and she worked in Hollywood, so she knew her idiots. Surely her dad
didn’t hire him. Wasn’t he some hot-shot engineer now? Why would he be working
on a farm after working so hard in college to escape his family farm? Not that
she’d kept tabs on him or anything, but their parents were close, so she heard
things sometimes—whether she wanted to or not.

A smile spread across that sickeningly handsome face when
she slid into an empty parking spot not twenty feet from where he was working.

“Hey,
Mac. Haven’t seen you in a few years.”

He
was the only person who had called her that. Once upon a time she had actually
liked it. “Cam.” When she stepped out onto the snow, Mackenzie was grateful she
still had a pair of winter boots left from high school. She did her best to
look unsurprised and unaffected by his presence. She took in a lungful of the
beautiful Vermont air and smelled the pine fragrance that had always meant home
to her.

“I
didn’t know you were coming home,” Cameron said as he walked over.

She almost made a snide comment about her parents keeping a
lot of secrets—for example, his presence—but since even her parents had no idea
she was coming home, and it would be easy enough for him to find that out, it
wasn’t worth the effort. “Spur
of the moment decision.”

“I’m
sure your parents will be glad to have you here for Thanksgiving. Your mom is
inside. Your dad is out doing tree stuff.” He waved toward the rows of trees
that stood like a vast arm across the land, some inter-planted with the
honeyberries and lingonberries that provided summer and fall harvests.

“Thanks.”
She wrangled her two large suitcases out of the back seat, and started dragging
them toward the house. The gravel and new snow did not make an ideal rolling
surface.

“Whoa,
how long are you planning to stay? A year?” he asked.

“Not
quite.” Mackenzie wanted her parents to be the first to learn about her plans.

“Need
a hand?” Cameron asked.

“I’ve
got them. Thanks.” Of course, as soon as the words were out of her mouth, one
of the suitcases got caught up on a larger rock, and she had to tug, causing
her feet to slide a couple inches in the snow and nearly landing her on her
butt before she got her balance back.

“You
always were stubborn,” Cameron said as he picked up the larger suitcase and
hauled it onto the back stairs as if it weighed only a few pounds. It had been
very near the max weight allowed at the airport.

“It’s
part of my charm,” Mackenzie ground out, trying not to snap at him. She could
tell herself that it was the long flight, the endless drive, and hunger, but
she knew better. He had annoyed her beyond words since they were teenagers,
even without trying. They had made a game of annoying each other all through
high school despite the fact that they had been friends for years before that.

Cameron grinned. “Right,
your charm is overwhelming.” He reached out and grabbed the second suitcase
that she had been about to pull up the two stairs, depositing it near the first
one. “Good to see you again.”

“I’m
sure it is.” Just because he had big farmer’s biceps, and she had wimpy
computer nerd biceps didn’t mean he had to be smug.