Book picks similar to
One Hot Holiday by Cynthia Eden


romantic-suspense
christmas
romance
contemporary

Operation Sheba


Misty Evans - 2008
    After a mission was blown and Conrad died, Julia was yanked back to Langley and given a new identity. She is now the Counterterrorism Center’s top analyst, spending her days at CIA headquarters and her nights in her boss’s bed. Her former life as a secret agent has been sealed off with her heart.Former SEAL Conrad Flynn—codename Solomon—has his own secrets.For starters, he’s not dead. Going under the deepest cover possible, he faked his own death to save Sheba’s life. Now he must tear that new life apart and ask for her help to hunt down a traitor inside the Agency’s walls.Is Conrad a rogue operative or a jealous ex-lover looking for revenge?Julia must risk everything for the man who still holds her heart in order to decide. Drawn into a web of seduction and betrayal, she is forced to play the spy game of her life, flushing out an Agency mole and stopping a hostage situation using nothing more than her iPod and her intuition.

Burns So Bad


Anne Marsh - 2013
    The jump team’s bad boy, Rio Donovan is one hundred percent pure, sensual trouble. He never backs down from a fire or a dare and he loves putting it all on the line when he parachutes into the heart of the fire. When the fire camp gets a much-needed new player, however, Rio lands in uncharted territory. The jump team’s newest member is sexy, strong—and female. She’s supposed to be just one of the boys, but Rio burns to claim her one heated kiss at a time. This jump, Rio Donovan’s putting it all on the line. Body and heart. INTO THE FIRE… AND INTO LOVE Kissing a fellow smoke jumper would be career suicide and Gia Jackson has worked too hard and too long to earn her spot on Strong’s jump team to jeopardize it all now for a man. The love-em-and-leave-em boys of summer aren’t her type and she’s hiding a few secrets of her own, but, when her chute tangles with Rio’s on a jump, he’s thrown into her arms. Literally. She’s held firm on the fireline for years—but can she hold the line now against Rio’s seductive charm?

Wilde Nights in Paradise


Tonya Burrows - 2013
    Although she makes it clear she wants nothing to do with Jude, they’re forced to fake a relationship for her safety. He can’t ignore the heat still simmering between them, and when her stalker’s threats escalate to attempted murder, he’s left with no choice but to whisk her away to a friend’s safe house in Key West, FL. Cooped up in paradise together, Jude begins to chip away at Libby’s resolve to hate him. But even as she gives in to his proximity and her body’s demands for his, she refuses to fall for his charms again. Maybe a torrid affair in the sun is exactly what she needs to get him out of her system. But when her stalker tracks them down, can they escape the steamy Key West night without anyone getting hurt?

The Mystery of Nevermore


C.S. Poe - 2016
    But when Snow’s Antique Emporium is broken into and a heart is found under the floorboards, Sebastian can’t let the mystery rest. He soon finds himself caught up in murder investigations that echo the macabre writings of Edgar Allan Poe. To make matters worse, Sebastian’s sleuthing is causing his relationship with Neil to crumble, while at the same time he’s crushing hard on the lead homicide detective of the case, Calvin Winter. Sebastian and Calvin must work together to unravel the mystery behind the killings, despite the mounting danger and sexual tension, before Sebastian becomes the next victim.In the end, Sebastian only wants to get out of this mess alive and live happily ever after with Calvin.

Beneath This Mask


Meghan March - 2014
    Son of a congressman. Successful businessman in my own right. With a résumé like mine, women have never been a challenge.Until I met her. This sexy, tatted-up bad girl wasn’t part of my plans, but that punch to my gut every time I see her tells me I have to know more.She’s a mystery. An enigma. A challenge. I’m going to figure her out — and then I’m going to make her mine. We’ll find out what she’s hiding... beneath this mask.

Forged in Desire


Brenda Jackson - 2017
    Bold enough to love her. When good girl Margo Connelly becomes Lamar "Striker" Jennings's latest assignment, she knows she's in trouble. And not just because he's been hired to protect her from an underworld criminal. The reformed bad boy's appeal is breaching all her defenses, and as the threats against her increase, Margo isn't sure which is more dangerous: the gangster targeting her, or the far too alluring protector tempting her to let loose. Though Striker's now living on the right side of the law, he's convinced his troubled past keeps Margo out of his league. But physical chemistry explodes into full-blown passion when they go on the run together. Surrendering to desire could be a deadly distraction—or finally prove that he's the only man qualified to keep her safe, and win her love.

Marx Girl


T.L. Swan - 2017
    addictive.I fell hard and fast and then I left.I've thought about her every day since.As I sit here at a wedding watching her with her new boyfriend......I have regrets.Regrets for the past things I've done.But I won't regret what I'm about to do.She's telling me no but her body's telling me yes.I need her beneath me.I'm having her tonight. Bridget. It's the little things I remember about Ben.His smile and the icing sugar he had on his pancakes.What started out as private jokes between us soon turned into private visits.The quiet man at the back of the crowd.His dry wit made me laugh.His dominant body ruined me foreverHe never told me he loved me, until he was leaving.That was five years ago.Things are looking up for me.I met someone, someone special.But Ben is back.I find myself thinking about him ......more than I should.No matter how hard my heart is freefalling from my chest.I will never go back there.You only get to break my heart once.This is a stand alone, Contemporary romance.

Still Not Over You


Nicole Snow - 2018
    I'm just counting on him to save my life. Never, ever fall for your brother's hot older friend. I flunked the test the instant I laid eyes on Landon Strauss. Tall. Ripped. Commanding. Irresistibly alpha. He gave a damn like no one else did. His soul-searing eyes saw me, not just a nerd girl next door. I had my idol, my destiny, and names for our future kids picked. Then I read Landon's little black book. One nosy peek exposed the shock of a lifetime. His confession. His pain. His plan. The sweet boy I loved was gone. Hero-turned-villain-turned-bad-memory overnight. Five years later, an insane slip of fate puts us under the same roof. Sweet closure, I think. I almost forget he hates me. I almost think we'll talk like normal adults. I don't expect the shirtless behemoth who comes barreling through my door. Landon's grown up. All snarls, testosterone, and lethal chemistry. We're in trouble, he says. Oh, Landon. Oh, baby, don't I know it? From Wall Street Journal bestselling author Nicole Snow – a tale of two hearts torn, stomped, and dragged through the mud. An uber-alpha protector bent on reclaiming his nerd next door. Full length romance novel with a Happily Ever After worth a “hell yeah.”

Picture Perfect Lie


Marquita Valentine - 2018
    All Knight King wanted was to leave his hometown behind. I never expected to end up in Castle Beach, surrounded by a family who believes that I’m not only their brother’s wife, but the mother of his infant daughter. I can’t tell them the truth—Knight and I met only three days earlier, during a layover in Atlanta. He was headed out to fight in a war that hardly anyone talked about anymore, and I was headed back home to a family who pretended that I didn’t exist. He helped me with my baby. He kept us safe while we slept. We shared lunch and dinner… and I spilled all my secrets to him. Then he gave me an address, along with an offer I couldn’t refuse. *** Six months later he’s back to bury his brother, and my lie is about to be exposed. Only Knight doesn’t say a word. He goes along with the charade, and each day we spend together, pretending to be husband and wife, it’s getting harder and harder not to believe in our lie. Could our picture perfect lie turn into a picture perfect forever? Kings of Castle Beach Series: Picture Perfect Lie Big Talking Man (May 2018) What Lovers Do ( Summer 2018) Dirty Little secrets (Summer/Fall 2018) Hide Your Crazy (Fall 2018)

Here With Me


Samantha Young - 2021
    It is as unattainable and as mysterious as its owner —ex-Hollywood leading man Lachlan Adair—and it's poised on the edge of a dark scandal.After narrowly escaping death, police officer Robyn Penhaligon leaves behind her life in Boston in search of some answers. Starting with Mac Galbraith, the Scottish father who abandoned her to pursue his career in private security. To re-connect with Mac, Robyn will finally meet a man she’s long resented. Lachlan Adair. Hostility instantly brews between Robyn and Lachlan. She thinks the head of the Adair family is high-handed and self-important. And finding closure with Mac is proving more difficult than she ever imagined. Robyn would sooner leave Ardnoch, but when she discovers Mac is embroiled in a threat against the Adairs and the exclusive members of the estate, she finds she’s not yet ready to give up on her father. Determined to ensure Mac’s safety, Robyn investigates the disturbing crimes at Ardnoch, forcing her and Lachlan to spend time together. Soon it becomes clear a searing attraction exists beneath their animosity, and temptation leads them down a perilous path.While they discover they are connected by something far more addictive than passion, Lachlan cannot let go of his grip on a painful past: a past that will destroy his future … if the insidious presence of an enemy lurking in the shadows of Ardnoch doesn’t do the job first.

Ready


Lucy Monroe - 2005
    Her highly charged, sensual stories touch on the realities of life while giving the reader a fantasy story not easily forgotten. In Ready, she delights a whole legion of fans with three ex-Army rangers who make Chuck Norris look like a wimp and one introverted writer who is about to enter into the most explosive affair of her life. As a writer, Lise Barton is used to coming up with wild scenarios for her characters, but the one that's playing out for her right now is no fiction--it's frighteningly real. Someone is stalking her, someone who knows where she lives and what she does. Someone who has even threatened her family--her brother, his wife, and their precious baby girl. Lise isn't about to let someone hurt them, so she packs up and leaves Texas for the anonymity of Seattle. And then the threats start again. Joshua Watt's mission is simple: Go to Seattle and bring Lise home for Thanksgiving or he'll never hear the end of it from his sister. It's not like "Aunt Lise" to stay away from their adorable niece, and Joshua's pretty sure he's the reason for it. He's spent months trying to forget the taste of her lips, the feel of her soft hair in his fingers. Yeah, okay, he wants her--badly--but family comes first. But the minute he sees the fear in Lise's eyes, his survival instincts kick in. The former Army Ranger isn't about to let some creep terrorize an innocent woman--not on his watch. He's going to do what it takes to protect Lise and try to keep his personal feelings out of it. Because if there's one thing he's learned, it's that sex and work don't mix. Not ever. So far.

Collision Point


Lora Leigh - 2018
    A member of the Brute Force Protection Agency and an operative working with the Elite Ops, Rory is the fiercest of warriors and protectors. Honed from the strong Irish stock of their grandfather and sharpened to a razor’s edge, Malone men live for one single purpose: to protect the women who own them, body and soul. From the moment he saw Amara Resnova, he knew she could be that woman.But Amara, daughter of an alleged notorious crime lord, is a force in her own right. When she betrays her father, she’s finds herself in the arms of a man who is dangerous for her body and soul.Can Rory keep Amara safe while protecting his own heart? Can Amara trust Rory not to break hers even as the danger mounts, threatening to take them and their passion to a breaking point?

Speak No Evil


Allison Brennan - 2007
    . . . Just scream.The murder of eighteen-year-old Angie Vance was exceptionally vile–her mouth was sealed with glue, an obscenity was scrawled across her skin, and she was suffocated in a garbage bag. The killing seems personal, so police detective Carina Kincaid focuses her efforts on the victim’s much older ex-boyfriend, Steve Thomas. But without physical evidence, Carina can’t make a collar or a case. She also can’t stop Sheriff Nick Thomas, the prime suspect’s brother, from conducting his own unwelcome investigation. Though Nick is still scarred and unsteady from a recent confrontation with a serial killer, he’s determined to prove his brother’s innocence. But his confidence is shaken when he learns of Steve’s dark side, and when a friend of the murdered girl meets a similarly gruesome fate. With no time to lose, Carina and Nick work together to trap a psychopath, before another unlucky woman faces an unspeakable end.

Perilous Trust


Barbara Freethy - 2017
    They were two tortured souls, looking for escape, and they weren't supposed to see each other ever again…Four years later, Sophie's FBI father, who is also Damon's mentor, is killed in a suspicious car crash after leaving Sophie a cryptic message to trust no one from the agency. When Damon shows up looking for her, she isn't sure if he's friend or enemy, but she knows he could easily rip apart what is left of her heart.The last thing Damon wants is to get involved with Sophie again. It was hard enough to walk away the first time. But she's in trouble, her father's reputation is under attack, and the lives of his fellow agents are at stake if there's a traitor in their midst. When someone starts shooting at them, they have no choice but to go on the run and off the grid. Everyone in their world becomes a suspect. They want to uncover the truth, but will it turn out to be the last thing they expect? Proving her father's innocence might just cost them their hearts…and their lives…

Sweet Seduction Sacrifice


Nicola Claire - 2013
    I promise you that."With a loser ex-boyfriend threatening her dream business, Sweet Seduction, Genevieve Cain is forced to go to a lawyer to finalise things once and for all. Gen knows she's only good for one dream in her lifetime, so when she meets senior partner, Dominic Anscombe, in the foyer of the law firm's building, she dismisses any delusional ideas her mind creates involving his very fine body. But Dominic is intrigued by Gen's run-away mouth and if there's one thing to say about Dominic Anscombe, he knows what he wants and when he finds it, he sets out to take it, claim it and possess it - completely.Kidnappings, shootings, dream-shattering moments, hot investigators and just as hot lawyers, everything comes to a head when Genevieve sacrifices something so precious for something even more so. And it wasn't the sacrifice she thought she'd make. The sweetest of sacrifices, the most worthy offering. But can she believe Dominic has fallen as hard for her as she has for him in such a short time? And can she allow herself a second dream in her life, by letting him in?Love at first sight has never been so dangerous and so very delicious at the same time.