Navy SEAL Calvin Cooper and Libby Brownlee. They have a chance almost-encounter in Monterey. Cooper and his best SEAL Team 3 buddy, Fredo, are on a mission to buy a new drone prototype. Libby is taking a much-needed day off from her studies at the University of Santa Clara to visit the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

    Leland isn’t just his boss, though. He’s the son of the company’s CEO. And Brian has fallen in love. Hurt by too many stolen kisses and nooners at seedy hotels, Brian finally broke off their secret affair two weeks ago. Leland isn’t ready to let Brian go and he isn’t above seducing Brian — again — to give them both what they really want for Christmas: each other.This free short story was originally written for the Goodreads M/M Romance Group's 2010 holiday event and appears in the event's Stuff My Stocking: M/M Romance Stories that are Nice and… Naughty anthology.

    Not that she cares, though. This holiday season, like all the ones before it, she plans to spend curled up with her laptop, visions of pound signs dancing through her head. When a blizzard traps Janna in the country with handsome Alistair Randall, CEO of the UK's biggest Christmas tree supplier, Janna must either embrace the holiday spirit or risk losing her PR firm's biggest client. Can Janna muster up some Christmas cheer, or will her bah humbug attitude cost her dearly?

    But something is missing, and when her best friend suggests sex as the answer, it strikes a chord. But never did she intend to fulfill her desire with her boss, John Merritt. What starts as a fling boils over into something much hotter, and when emotions become a problem, Adrianna’s not sure she wants to take things to the next level. Now in an uncertain relationship with her boss, Adrianna fears at the future she never had in mind for herself. Her friends see the positive change, and so does her mother, but Adrianna isn’t sure she’s ready to settle down and trust a man again, despite how excited John is to start a life with her. But his loyalty is tested when a work crisis causes him to turn on her and Adrianna wonders if there is there any hope of a reconciliation, or is she going to spend her life as alone as she’d once convinced herself she should?

    She’s spent another year dreaming of being whisked away on a sleigh-ride for two, but she’s facing festive season alone – again. And, just to give her another reason to feel anything other than candy-cane perky, a new shop across the road has opened… Not only is it selling baked goods, but the owner, with his seriously charming smile, has every girl in town swooning.But Lily isn’t about to let her business crumble — the Gingerbread Café is the heart of the community, and she’s going to fight for it! This could be the Christmas that maybe, just maybe, all her dreams – even the someone-to-decorate-the-Christmas-tree-with ones – really do come true!

    Locals and newcomers alike find themselves eager for that special countdown…and that midnight kiss.Drew Foley and Sunny Archer are each visiting Virgin River for the holidays. Sunny was dumped at the altar the previous New Year’s Eve and is in no mood to celebrate. But her uncle and his fiancée drag her to Jack’s Bar. Drew, getting over his own heartbreak, sees Sunny across the crowded room and he’s instantly smitten.As the townspeople gather, two lonely revelers decide the best balm for their broken hearts might just be each other.Originally published in 2010

    If she succeeds, her catering business, Fantasy Feasts, will flourish. If she fails, she may go bankrupt. But a lot can go wrong in one day: car accidents, spilled dip, crushed cakes...and the distraction posed by Ned Wyatt, sexy bachelor brother of the party’s shrewish hostess. Once he gets a taste of Claudia’s homemade chocolate kisses, he wants Claudia catering only to him.Story originally appeared in the Harlequin Valentine Anthology My Valentine 1993

    And he's got a gift planned for her that involves lots of delicious unwrapping. White Knight ChristmasOfficer Parker Ross hates Christmas, while Lily Donaldson lives for it. But he's willing to be converted, especially when Lily is the one doing the persuading. Do You Hear What I HearSergeant Osbourne Decker suspects pet psychic Marci Churchill is barking mad, but she's also a knockout. And when she's accused of stealing a donkey from the local nativity scene, he can't stop thinking about frisking her. The Christmas PresentFurious at her cheating fiance, Beth Monroe decides to enjoy a payback tryst with his gorgeous best friend, and finds that revenge is best served hot and sweet. . .

    Falling for the hunky single-dad every woman in town is hot for—is not on her Christmas list.So what, if the looks he gives her could melt the North Pole? She has no plans to get involved with another man who looks like sin on a stick.But maybe this Christmas, Kate will learn that some men are totally worth melting for.Gianni...All I wanted was for things to turn around for my son at school.I'm a simple man with simple wishes.But I never expected my Christmas Angel to be the mother of my son's nemesis. Or that we'd create enough heat to burn the house down every time we touched.The trouble is... she's already been burned.I don't want to break her heart. I just want to be the next man who takes it. But unlike her ex... I'm gonna cherish it and her FOREVER.All I want for Christmas is Kate--wrapped around me and under my tree..Authors note: This is meant to be a yummy, funny and sexy holiday read that will leave you feeling all mushy and gooey... like a melting piece of chocolate Santa stuffed into a stocking hanging on a mantel on Christmas Eve. No Cheating, HEA with plenty of fire to melt those Kindles. I hope you fall in love with Gianni just as Kate did!

    She treasures beading jewelry for her own small business while watching nature and its amazing creatures outside her window. But, her mom begs her to move back to the city so she can find a man to marry. Holly doesn’t want to give up on her dreams, but does that mean she’ll have to give up on love?

    When he asks her out for coffee, she assumes it’s to sign the divorce papers he’d seen.What’s a girl to do when her heart still goes pitter-patter for a man who ran out on her six months after they made their forever vows but comes back asking for another chance?

    Happy to be on a flight headed home, she never expected to be seated next to a guy who is strong, confident and comforting all rolled into one handsome hazel-eyed package. When things get a little bumpy he’s just the person she needs beside her to calm her fears. It’s just too bad that with a connection so intense the flight ends too soon and they head their separate ways. Or so it seems.Evan Douglas is going home after ten years in the military to an ill father he has constantly disappointed in the past. The dark passions in his life that he has always been able to trust in before have started to leave him hollow and in need of something more. Turmoil in the house he is expecting, but when he awakened to find the lovely tawny skinned beauty from the plane under the same roof, he refuses to deny that fate has played a hand in placing her in his life permanently. However, if he wants her, he better act fast because he’s not the only one that desires a happily-ever-after with Zoey.

    Right before Christmas. But her sister is there to cheer her up with the gift of a vacation to Jamaica, to take her mind off all the stress. Enter Derek—tall, dark, handsome, and everything Cathy needs to refresh her weary spirits, and have some fun for the first time in forever. But Derek is not all that he seems. A businessman with an overbearing father, he ropes Cathy into a fake fiancée agreement that promises to end her financial troubles. Feeling skeptical, but desperate for the money, Cathy wonders if this sexy man will end up turning her Jamaican vacation into a perfect paradise, or a complete nightmare...

    Or perhaps the first to start the trend? Regardless, this is my chance to finally confess.This year, I’m going to hang my stocking on Austin’s door… and hope it’s not just his heart I convince to grow three sizes bigger.The prequel in the laugh-out-loud Dating Season series.

    When Kenya Claiborne wakes up half naked in a stranger’s bed, and the homeowner decides to make the best of a bad situation by propositioning her, she finds herself going along with his plan because she needs the community service hours.Jonathon Blakemore, happy to have someone filling the empty chaperon position, will soon learn that he’s met his match.Then, when the time comes for his grandfather to sign over the estate in Ireland, trouble ensues and neither Kenya nor Jonathan know who wants one of them gone.