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A billionaire with a broken heart. An artist with secrets.
Max Heinzman is a devoted friend, a brilliant engineer, and a man who longs for a family of his own. Now that his software company has gone public, making him a young billionaire, he should be focused on his future—only Max can’t stop thinking about the past and the one woman he truly loved. How can he move forward when his heart is with Alana?
Alana Elliot is an artist with no time to paint and a family drowning in dysfunction. With her disabled sister needing constant care, there’s no time for love, even if she still pines for Max, her former husband.
A chance encounter in a small town reunites Alana and Max, bringing secrets to the surface and re-opening old wounds. Will their love be strong enough to conquer the obstacles pulling them apart?
Excerpt-
Alana stood at the window of the hotel, entranced by the shining lights of Las Vegas under a black velvet sky. The luxury bathrobe was baby-skin soft against her bare body. She inhaled through her nose before softly blowing the breath out through her slightly open mouth. The knots in her shoulders were gone, her neck didn’t crack when she tilted her head to the right, and the burning in her lower back was finally soothed into submission thanks to a ninety-minute session with a deep-tissue masseuse.
The massage, the view of the twinkling lights which warmed her from the inside out, the bathrobe caressing her skin—it all came from one singular miracle.
Max!
He is the sun, the moon, the stars, and the planet around which I want to orbit for the rest of my days. Before him, I knew only grief, now I know real happiness exists.
Her year abroad studying art was meant to be more than an education; it was to be a reprieve from being the constant caretaker of her family. Alana expected to go to Europe, learn some new painting techniques, get blisters from walking everywhere to visit any historical site within her purview, and gain ten pounds from eating the tastiest pastries on the planet.
Never had it crossed her mind that she might actually fall in love.
Never.
Not once.
Not even if all the stars in the sky aligned and the moon turned to blue cottage cheese would Alana Elliot meet a good, honest man who loved and accepted her.
She had her role to play in this life, one she’d internalized since the day her mother died. Alana had made peace with the struggle and rarely asked for more.
But then Max—a computer geek who had no idea how hot he really was—bumped her from behind while she was sitting in a restaurant and sketching the Paris skyline, spilling café all over her only nice white blouse.
That moment when his dark eyes met hers, and he turned a hot shade of bubblegum pink—she was his. It was silly and crazy, but the dead garden covering her heart in prickly thorns suddenly gave way to a beautiful spring river of hope. A good man fawned all over her daily. He wanted to hear her every thought and dream. Even more than that, he was willing to share in the obstacles standing in her way.
An emotionally available, sweet, tenderhearted man wanted her.
Maybe I should run out and buy a lottery ticket before . . . Nope! Not going to think that way.
Alana was in utter heaven and walking so far above the clouds she didn’t even hear her inner voice raise a warning flag that good things never lasted for her or anyone else in her family.
Not that she would have listened if she had.
Cristina is new to the billionaire, small town, and cowboy genres. She hopes to make a splash in this new literary world by publishing “Love Comes Again” (a follow up to “Holiday Lights”) and “Cowboy Blues” in 2020. To receive notifications for free books and new releases, please sign up for her mailing list below.
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