Lucy Smith, a British born and raised marketing executive who now lives in Boston, snags the biggest prize of them all at her boss’s annual holiday party—a paid 30-day sabbatical at his beach house on a tropical island off the coast of Florida. Three months later, she and her two tabby cats are settling into a stunning cottage with nothing to do but soak up the sun and enjoy the beautiful beaches. Oh, and work on a last minute assignment given by her boss to catch a major client.
Until Pete.
A long-time local celebrity, Pete has long skinny legs, bright pink feathers, a golden curved beak, and big dark eyes. Injured as a youngling, Pete is a native flamingo who can’t fly and enjoys the company of people more than his own kind. People and cats, it seems, as he and Lucy’s two fur babies become fast friends the first morning he shows up on Lucy’s deck.
When Lucy chases after the flamingo, fearful he’s after her pets, she meets Pete’s favorite human, Aaron Graham, retired Army Special Forces and now the owner of “The Beach Bar”, a locals-only place on Flamingo Island.
Despite an immediate attraction, Aaron is going to steer clear of the beautiful redhead staying at a beach house on Millionaire’s Row. He’s been burned before by a fling with a bored tourist from the other side of the island. He wouldn’t be making that mistake again. Besides, he’s got enough to deal with when it comes to local bureaucrats and keeping his fledging inheritance in the black.
Still, he does his best to reassure Lucy the flamingo is harmless and he’ll make sure they both—him and Pete—will stay out of her way. However, it seems Pete has decided that his two favorite humans, Lucy and Aaron, should be together.
And he—and the two tabby cats—will go to any lengths to make sure that happens.
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Once upon a time there was a fictional town called Destiny, located about an hour west of Cheyenne.
A small ranching community where three girlfriends grew up best friends, managing to stay that way through the ups and downs of life, no matter the direction their destinies took them.
Now that direction was leading each of them to falling in love...
This is how a trio of books filled with "Sassy Women, Smart Men and Small Town America" came to be. Those three books have since turned into nine happily-ever-after stories that make up my "Welcome to Destiny...where fate leads to falling in love" series.
But there are always more stories about falling in love in town called Destiny.
What about the brothers Katie Ledbetter-Murphy, the heroine in the latest book, His Destiny Bride, only just found out about? Each of them surely deserve a happily ever after of their own.
Don't they? Doesn't everyone?
About me
Thanks to a beloved aunt’s love of genealogy, Christyne discovered both Louisa May Alcott and Harriet Beecher Stowe are members of her extended family tree on her mother’s side. She firmly believes her love of writing has always been her destiny.
Growing up in a USAF family that settled in New Hampshire, she followed in her family’s rich military history and joined the United States Navy where she fell in love with romance novels after someone remembered women were serving aboard seagoing vessels and sent a box full of paperback romances to her ship, the USS VULCAN AR-5.
She pursued her own writing in 2002, sold her first ever ‘finished’ manuscript in 2006, and made her first sale to Harlequin two years later. She writes contemporary romances full of life, love, a hint of laughter and perhaps a dash of danger. And there has to be a ‘happily ever after’ or she’s just not satisfied.
She lives in south central Texas with her husband and their rescue pets.
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Yes, that's how you spell her first name, after her mom's good friend in the 8th grade who spelled her name the same way.
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Her first completed book, A Single Yellow Rose, was a fan fiction written about the daytime drama, Days of our Lives.
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While in the US Navy she served onboard two ships, USS Vulcan AR-5, a repair tender ; the first US Navy ship (other than nurses on hospital ships) on which women were deployed starting in 1978, and USS Hunley AS-31, a submarine tender.
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Yellow roses have special meaning to her. They are the official flower of her non-academic sorority, Beta Sigma Phi, and she put them somewhere in each of her books.
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She loves to name characters, businesses & towns in her fictional worlds after friends & family (with permission, of course!)
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Even though she's now in Texas, she still considers herself a New Englander at heart and is a die-hard sports fans for the New England Patriots, Boston Red Sox, Bruins and Celtics.
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When not writing she into collaging, journaling, hunting for vintage finds at estate sales and flea markets, and watching classic black and white movies and her favorite movie musicals.
More about Christyne
Christyne's Continuing Bookshelf!
Here are my books that are a part of Harlequin Special Edition's continuities, "Fortunes of Texas" & "Montana Mavericks".
"We all have our own life to pursue, our own kind of dream to be weaving, and we all have the power to make wishes come true, if we keep believing."
Louisa May Alcott
Have You Seen My Movie?
Receiving an email telling me my book, The Last-Chance Maverick, part of the Montana Mavericks continuity series with Harlequin Special Edition, would be made into a TV movie was one of the greatest moments of my life. Being invited to spend a few days on the set during filming and even appearing as a background player...wonderful!
The actors and crew were terrific (so accommodating with answering my many questions!) And meeting the famed Kelly Bishop, a Tony Award winning actress, most known for playing matriarch Emily Gilmore on the long-running and beloved series Gilmore Girls and Marjorie Houseman, the mother of Jennifer Grey's Frances "Baby" Houseman in the film Dirty Dancing, was a dream come true!
I love images almost as much as I love books. You'll never know what might pop us here! Come follow me!
Christyne can usually be found hanging out on Facebook or Instagram, but if you'd like to send her an email, please do!
