Total pages in book: 125
Estimated words: 120631 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 603(@200wpm)___ 483(@250wpm)___ 402(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 120631 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 603(@200wpm)___ 483(@250wpm)___ 402(@300wpm)
Soren Hawthorne is arrogant, brooding, and used to getting everything he wants—including ruthless control of his family's empire. The last thing this grumpy alpha billionaire needs is any lip from Jocelyn Collins, the sharp-tongued, beautiful, chaotic, Viking smut author with an evil chihuahua that hates his guts.
Jocelyn has spent her whole life being too much. Too loud, too messy, too wild for a small-town that likes its love stories neat and tidy. She writes happily-ever-afters for a living but never believed she'd get one of her own. Especially not with the infuriating, insufferable, impossibly gorgeous man she's been at war with since the third grade.
But twenty years of slow-burn tension has to break somewhere. And once Soren realizes the woman he wants has been right there all along, his possessive nature kicks.
This autumn, Soren Hawthorn is falling for the enemy, and he doesn’t plan to lose in this steamy, small-town, enemies-to-lovers romance with a found-family you'll want to adopt and a happily-ever-after worth fighting for.
Perfect for readers who love:
⚓ Enemies to lovers · Small town romance · Flirty Sarcasm ⚓ Alpha hero · Possessive & protective · Power Dynamics ⚓ Slow burn · Years of longing · Forbidden-ish (best friend's brother energy) ⚓ Forced proximity · Banter that bites · High heat / open door ⚓ Found family · Meddling best friends and brothers · Plus, a chihuahua with a Nepolean complex and a domestic house-horse side-plot romance
*************FULL BOOK START HERE*************
CHAPTER 1
“I DON’T GIVE A DAMN ‘BOUT MY BAD REPUTATION”
“Will there be anything else, sir?”
Soren Hawthorne barely glanced at the well-dressed waiter as he discreetly nudged his black card forward with the bill. “That’s all. Thank you.” He folded his hands, attention returning to Olivia. “You were saying.”
His date grinned, the aligned, camera-ready smile of a woman who spent her life being photographed at charity galas. Blonde waves cascaded past her narrow shoulders. Her heritage green dress accentuated years of disciplined self-maintenance, and she wore it as if it were a uniform.
“I was saying, how nice the new renovations turned out on the Vineyard house.”
“Mm.” Soren nodded, tipping back the watered-down remnants of his old-fashioned. He set the rocks glass at the edge of the table and signaled a passing waitress for a refill.
He pictured the Aldrich estate as he remembered it from his childhood visits. Like all memories set before his mother’s passing, the sound attached to those recollections mostly faded to faint echoes, dull watercolor glimpses washed out by time.
For a split second, despite the cool autumn night, he could smell the clean, cut grass and hear children’s laughter in the distance. The muscles around his mouth subtly lifted at the youthful visions of him and his brothers running barefoot across a pristine lawn in Bonpoint linen shirts and seersucker shorts.
The faint sound of his mother’s laughter ghosted through the restaurant, haunting and far away where only he could hear. Memories from his childhood now wore a vintage haze as if distorted by heavy film grain. Every time he thought of her, it got harder to determine if he was really remembering the real woman or an amalgam of softness his brain had collected over time.
“Is the property from your mother’s side or your father’s?” he asked, mentally sliding the delicate memory to the back of his mind for safekeeping.
The pleasant scent of woodsmoke drifted from the copper hearth and settled into the low beams of Salt & Ember, warming the dining room against the cool September breeze slipping past the windows, which would close in another week when the weather fully shifted. The waitress seamlessly retrieved his glass and replaced it with a refill as she returned his card.
Olivia’s gaze noted the byplay without comment, the expectation that he would treat her as sure as her understanding that the sun would rise again. “The estate was originally purchased by Daddy’s great-great-grandmother. She was heiress to the Aldrich shipping fortune, back when half of Newport was practically a family affair.”
Soren was well acquainted with ‘Daddy’ and his portfolio. Olivia’s father had maintained a seat on the Hawthorne board for more than three decades. However, his age was starting to show, and since Soren’s father, Magnus Hawthorne, had passed, leaving the multi-billion-dollar company to Soren and his two brothers, some of the board members were dragging their feet about the new direction he was trying to take the company.
Warren Aldrich made it crystal clear Soren would have his vote on one stipulation. He wanted an exclusive contract between Aldrich Shipping and Hawthorne Fishery. It wasn’t a deal Soren was opposed to making. There were plenty of sharks out there in the shipping industry, but landing a solid contract with Aldrich Shipping was akin to harpooning the killer whale in sea transport. Aligning their companies would deliver multi-billion-dollar benefits to both families and fast-track Hawthorne Fishery into a world of new opportunities.