âHeidi Rice is simply brilliant when it comes to writing sharp, sassy and sexy romantic novels!â
âwww.cataromance.com
âThe amusing opening spins into an emotional and heartfelt story.â
âRT Book Reviews on Hot-Shot Tycoon
âI was actually breathless while reading this bookâ¦. Itâs a sensual ride you wonât want to lose the opportunity of reading.â
âwww.thePinkHeartSociety.com on
Public Affair, Secretly Expecting
IF ONLY my love life were as perfect as Selfridges at Christmas.
Cassie Fitzgerald let out a wistful sigh as she gazed at the explosion of festive bling in the iconic London storeâs window display. The Sugar Plum Fairy sparkled flirtatiously on the shoulder of a hunky mannequin dressed in a dinner suit, silver snowflake lights making her tiny wings twinkle. Cassieâs heart lifted. Selfridgesâ Christmas window dressing never let you down. It always captured the hope and expectation of the season of goodwill so beautifully. And okay, maybe her love life wasnât perfectâin fact, it was non-existentâbut that was still a big improvement on last year.
A frown creased Cassieâs brow as she recalled the Christmas wish sheâd made the year before while standing in front of Selfridgesâinvolving Lance, her boyfriend of three years, and a proposal of marriage.
She wrinkled her nose in disgust, the frozen air making it tingle, as her mind conjured up the image of Lance and Tracy McGellan getting up close and pornographic on the sofa in Cassieâs flat a month after Valentineâs Day. A month after Cassie had accepted that wished-for proposal.
Colour hit her cheeks as she remembered her shock and disbelief, swiftly followed by the shame of her own idiocy.
What on earth had possessed her to agree to marry a deadbeat like Lance?
As Christmas wishes went, it was one of her worst. Right up there with wishing for a pair of inline skates when she was eightâwhich had resulted in a broken wrist and four hours in Accident and Emergency on Christmas Day. Marriage to Lance would have been worse, but in her typically romantic fashion sheâd overlooked all his shortcomings, determined to convince herself that he was The One.
Cassie hunched her shoulders against the brisk winter wind. From now on she was going to stop looking at life through rose-tinted glasses ⦠because all it did was blind her to reality. And she wasnât making a Christmas wish this year, because it might come true.
It would be a shame not to have anyone to wake up with this Christmas morningâand sheâd been in a funk about it for days. She adored bounding out of bed, brewing a pot of spiced apple tea and then savouring the presents artfully arranged under the tree. Having to do all that alone wasnât quite the same.
But as her best friend Nessa had pointed out, Cassie was better off doing it alone than with Lance the Loser. Cassie huddled in her coat. Absorbing the bright sparkle of Sugar Plum and her beau, she let the thought of her lucky escape from Lance strengthen her resolve.
âWhat you need is a candy manâto give your girly bits a wake-up call. Then you wouldnât need another deadbeat boyfriend.â
Cassieâs lips edged up as she recalled Nessaâs use-him-then-lose-him advice when theyâd chatted on the phone that morning. Sometimes she really wished she could be as pragmatic about sex as Nessa. If she could just take sex a little less seriously, maybe she could have some fun without getting tangled up with creeps like Lance.
Bidding goodbye to Sugar Plum, Cassie jostled her way to Bond Street tube. Frantic shoppers herded in and out of the shops along Oxford Street on a mission to buy all those essential last-minute items that would make their Christmas complete. Stopping at the kerb as the traffic barrelled past on one of the cross streets, Cassie squeezed her eyes shut and fantasised about her candy man. Hot, hunky and devoted to making her feel fabulous, he would be magically gone by the New Yearâso sheâd never have to spend time picking his socks up off the bathroom floor, or washing the dirty dishes he left piled in the sink, or persuading herself she was in love with him.