“Kauffman’s characters are adorably human and so very magnetic.” —USAToday.com
Pippa MacMillan is a legend on the Irish folk music scene. But when her voice requires a time-out, she’s left wondering how—and where—to find happiness in the silence . . .
Seeking answers, Pippa leaves Ireland in favor of a small town in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia. Turns out lovely Blue Hollow Falls is the perfect place to heal—and solitary Seth Brogan is the surprisingly perfect host. After all, Seth is beginning again too: turning his renovated stone barn and beautiful hillside into a vineyard is the start of a whole new life for the former Special Forces soldier. Only Mother Nature keeps thwarting both their plans, leaving Pippa snowbound with unsettling thoughts about how life can take unexpected turns . . .
To Pippa’s surprise, she might actually fall for small-town living. She might even fall for Seth, whose quiet strength is a balm for her world-weary soul. But when the music starts once more, will she follow her fortune back to Ireland, or surrender to the call of her heart?
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An excerpt from Bluestone & Vine by Donna Kauffman
Unfazed by his continued scowl, she leaned in and lowered her voice, and he found himself bending down to hear her, as if the two of them were about to share a secret. “If it makes you feel a wee bit better, my older brother is something of a professional with these sorts of machines. Anything with an engine, really. He’s a professional stuntman. He taught me a fair bit of what he knows where vehicles are concerned. Normally there’s a big landing pad when you leap off. Fortunately, I had a nice pile of snow to catch me.” She smiled up at him. “If we ever get caught up in a highspeed car chase, I’m your girl.”
Her face was just inches below his now. Normally he’d be having all sorts of thoughts about those eyes of hers and her mouth with those bow-tie lips, and maybe what would happen if he just lowered his head the rest of the way . . .
Only Seth’s brain was still hung up on “professional stuntman.” She was . . . well, he didn’t know what she was. He did know she wasn’t like any woman he’d ever met before.
He straightened, tempted to smile again. She was engaging, and it was hard not to fall under the spell of her gregarious charm. Hell, he was tempted to laugh right along with her. But he was still coming down off the adrenaline punch from the initial wreck, not to mention her cry of alarm might have jarred loose one or two memories from his time overseas that he otherwise was pretty good at keeping buried. And then there was the residual irritation over his sister’s high-handedness mixed in there, too. So, the best he could come up with was, “Moira did mention you were self-sufficient.”
Her lips curved in a dry smile. “You should trust her.” Then she motioned behind her with a gloved hand. “You know, that half-buried snow machine notwithstanding.”
He did chuckle then, even as he gave his head a slight shake. He felt like he’d followed Alice straight down the rabbit hole. Or into the snowbank, as the case may be.
She stuck out her gloved hand. “Pippa MacMillan,” she said. “I promise I won’t be quite so much work going forward. You’ll hardly know I’m here.”
He doubted that, very much. He took her gloved hand in his now chapped-pink, bare one and gave a light shake. His hand felt like a bear paw wrapped around her small, slender fingers.
“I appreciate your letting me bunk in. Your sister said you had plenty of room, but I promise I won’t be in the way. I’m happy to lend a hand if you need one.” She propped her hand on her brow and looked around at the drifts of snow, with more still coming down. “I was imagining springtime in the mountains, though, so maybe that’s not much of an offer.”
“This is springtime in the mountains.”
She grinned at that. “I love the snow. Don’t get to spend much time in it, so this has been a lovely bonus.”
A lovely bonus. “Well, you’ll have a fair amount of it to play in, though my heart might appreciate it if we leave the snowmobile stunts out of it, at least until the storm dies down.”
“Deal,” she said easily.
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About Donna Kauffman
USA Today bestselling author of the Cupcake Club Romance series, Donna Kauffman has seen her books reviewed in venues ranging from Kirkus Reviews and Library Journal to Entertainment Weekly and Cosmopolitan. She lives just outside of DC in the lovely Virginia countryside, where she is presently trying to makeover her newly empty nest into something that doesn’t have to accommodate piles of sports equipment falling out of her coat closet (okay, out of every closet…and under every bed….), size 13 cleats and sweaty uniforms cluttering her foyer (and stairwell, and laundry room, and…), and a kitchen that should have come with a traffic light. And a pantry monitor. (Anyone with a clever idea on how to repurpose lacrosse sticks into matching reading lamps, she’s all ears!) When she’s not stripping paint, varnishing an old auction house find, or trying to avoid bodily injury with her latest power tool purchase, she loves to hear from readers!
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