Railyn Stone, author of The Christmas Tree Guy, A Secret to Keep, Restored Hearts and Lest We Aren't Forgiven, lives in North Carolina with her husband. When she's not behind the screen of her laptop, she's usually enjoying time with her family. The only child of two educators, she learned early on just how magical words can be.
Q & A With The Author:
4. What is your largest unfulfilled
dream, and what are you doing to reach it?
My largest unfulfilled dream is to
vacation in Bora Bora and stay in an over the water bungalow. I am trying to
save money to get to my destination, but it’s not happening as fast as I want
it to.
5. What is the hardest thing you've
ever done?
At this point in my life, the
hardest thing I’ve ever had to do was to hit ‘send’. When it comes to writing,
I’ve gone through many emotions and feelings, but the most nerve-wracking
feeling was pushing ‘send’ to send my query letter to a literary agent, knowing
there was a chance I would be rejected. And what was harder than that was
receiving rejection after rejection and still having the courage to push send
to other agents.
Connect with the Author here:
EnVee McAlister just bought a house. It’s an old Victorian home that needs a lot of work, especially if she wants to get into it by Christmas.
Logan Edwards is the contractor she’s hired to help her. Unfortunately, he’s not like any man she’s ever encountered and his arrogance and crass demeanor is making it hard to deal with him. Both she and Logan hold no punches and their terribly blunt personalities clash like oil and water.
But when she finds out about Logan’s tragic past, it forces her to deal with her own insecurities and emotions she’s desperately tried to forget. And instead of a house for Christmas, EnVee receives something she never expected.
Snippet:
EnVee was not happy. How
could this happen to her? Here she was excited to be working on her dream
house. The house she’d always wanted. She’d found the
perfect one and now somehow she’d ended up hiring some arrogant, crass man that
was going to be a nightmare to work with to restore it. She could hear him
mumbling something as he opened the door for her to enter. Walking across the
threshold, her frustrations with him subsided and she smiled at the old house’s
charm. It needed work, but she didn’t care. It was perfect. Logan’s deep voice
broke her trance.
“My
brother says you have some things you are requesting. I wanted to go ahead and
get those from you so I can work on the blueprints. If there are major
structural changes, we need to plan for those up front so there are no
surprises later in the job.”
She turned to see him staring
at her and she felt a little intrigued. She wasn’t
quite sure why this man had her feeling this way. She’d dated outside of her
race before, so she had no problems with the cultural differences, but he
wasn’t anything close to the clean cut, expensive suit types she’d ever been
out with before or was usually attracted to. His dark hair lapped at his
collar, but was still neatly coiffed and that was a plus. The eyes, she’d
initially assumed were brown, were actually a deep sapphire hue and they were
sheltered by rows of dark lashes. His strong jawline was covered by rugged but
well-groomed stubble. Shaking her head, she reached into her briefcase and
pulled out a list. “Here.”
Logan stepped forward and
took the list from her manicured hand and she watched him skim the list before
she turned to inspect the fireplace and mantel.
“Wow.
I’m kind of impressed.”
EnVee turned on her heel,
wiping dust from her fingers. “Excuse me?”
“Well,
I figured a hoity toity like yourself would want to modernize everything about
this house. You’d be wanting an elevator installed and all other fancy
accouterments.”
“Are
you this rude with all of your clients? I’m no hoity toity and I happen to
believe this house is perfect the way it is. It just needs some refreshing. It
doesn’t need too much modernization in its structure, just maybe needs life
breathed into it again.” She’d gotten so caught up in her daydream of the house
and all it could be that when she placed her eyes back on Logan, he was staring
at her in shock. “Look, I don’t really care what you think of me.”
“Obviously.”
“I
just want the job done. Can you do it? Or shall I call your brother and tell
him I can’t work with you and I need to find another company that’ll do the job
right?” She crossed her arms in front of her, tapping her Jimmy Choo on the hardwood. She’d just about had it with his holier
than thou attitude.
“I
can more than do this job.” His eyes never left her face and he added. “You
won’t find anyone better suited for this and who can handle this the way you
want it.” His eyes were so intense, EnVee felt a spark of electricity shoot
down her spine, settling in the pit of her stomach and she cleared her throat.
“Well,
fine. I’d like to see the rest of the house if that’s not a problem for you.”
Logan slightly bowed and with a
flourish and twist of his wrist, he smiled. “After you Princess.”
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When soul-eating demons overrun his world, Kaelis, a young seraph warrior, uses the Queen’s ring to open a portal in space and flee with the infant heir to the throne, landing on earth. Unbeknownst to him, the demon leader, Nsark, follows through the portal, determined to devour the soul of every last seraph, especially the Queen’s heir. After Kaelis hides the baby, Nsark creates the ultimate weapon by fathering a half-human, half-demon: a soul-stealer’s child. 
