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Holding On (Colorado High Country #6) is out in ebook today on! Watch for Kenzie and Conrad’s story in print next week.

Here are the links:

Kindle US
Kindle UK
Kindle AU
Kindle CA
Nook
Kobo
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Print: Coming next week!


A hero barely holding on…

Harrison Conrad returned to Scarlet Springs from Nepal, the sole survivor of a freak accident on Mt. Everest. Shattered and grieving for his friends, he vows never to climb again and retreats into a bottle of whiskey—until Kenzie Morgan shows up at his door with a tiny puppy asking for his help. He’s the last person in the world she should ask to foster this little furball. He’s barely capable of managing his own life right now, let alone caring for a helpless, adorable, fluffy puppy. But Conrad has always had a thing for Kenzie with her bright smile and sweet curves. One look into her pleading blue eyes, and he can’t say no.

The woman who won’t let him fall…

Kenzie Morgan’s life went to the dogs years ago. A successful search dog trainer and kennel owner, she gets her fill of adventure volunteering for the Rocky Mountain Search & Rescue Team. The only thing missing from her busy life is love. It’s not easy finding Mr. Right in a small mountain town, especially when she’s unwilling to date climbers. She long ago swore never again to fall for a guy who might one day leave her for a rock. When Conrad returns from a climbing trip haunted by the catastrophe that killed his best friend, Kenzie can see he’s hurting and wants to help. She just might have the perfect way to bring him back to the world of the living. But friendship quickly turns into something more—and now she’s risking her heart to heal his.

Visit my website for an excerpt, or read the excerpt in my last blog post.

I hope you enjoy Kenzie and Conrad’s story as much as I enjoyed writing it. It was especially fun to write about a search-and-rescue dog trainer because PUPPY!

As always, thanks for sharing and for caring!

It’s written and being proofread right now. By Thursday at the latest, Holding On (Colorado High Country #6) should be available at ebook retails, with the print release following in about a week.

Yes, the book will be out THIS WEEK — just in time for your Fourth of July weekend.

Holding On tells the story of Harrison Conrad, the elite alpinist whose climbing team was killed on his last expedition to Mt. Everest. He left Scarlet Springs in Falling Hard (book 3) and hasn't come back. Haunted by what happened on the mountain, he holes up in a Buddhist monastery in Nepal looking for peace.

The story opens as he makes the decision to come home.

Conrad's love interest is search dog trainer Kenzie Morgan. He shuts himself away when he gets back to Scarlet, but Kenzie cares deeply about her friend and comes up with an idea to bring him back to the world of the living. It weighs about eight pounds, has creamy fur, and needs constant attention. Oh, yes, and it isn't housebroken.


Gabby, the little golden retriever puppy Kenzie asks Conrad to foster, is a shaft of light in the darkness of his life. But brighter still is the attraction he feels toward Kenzie.

All the locals from Scarlet Springs are back in this story of puppies, love, and redemption.


Here’s an excerpt...

From Holding On 

Conrad was asleep when the knock came at his door. Who the hell would bother him so early in the morning? He raised his head, looked at the clock. 

It was almost noon. “Shit.”

He shoved the blankets aside, stepped into the pair of jeans that lay on the floor, and strode out to the living room to open the door. “Kenzie.”

“Hey.” She stood on his porch looking beautiful in a peach V-neck T-shirt and jeans that made the most of her curves, her long hair drawn back in a ponytail. In her arms was a tiny, squirming puppy. “I hope I’m not bothering you.” 

“Not at all. I was just … uh… ” He ran a hand through the tangled mess of hair on his head, wondering when he’d last had a shower and hoping he didn’t stink. “I was just about to jump in the shower. Come in.”

He glanced around at the mess—pizza boxes, beer bottles, piles of unopened mail from his PO box. “Sorry. I need to clean this place up.”

She stepped inside, set the puppy on the floor. It bounded over to a pizza box and sniffed. “I came to ask you a really big favor.”

It was then Conrad noticed the worry on her face. He gestured toward the sofa. “Have a seat. What’s wrong?”

Kenzie sat on the sofa. “It’s the puppy. Her name is Gabby.”

Conrad glanced down at the little thing. “Hey, Gabby.”

The puppy pawed at the pizza box, her little tail wagging.

“Gizmo is six now—that’s about forty-two in golden retriever years. He’s still healthy, but it takes a while to train a dog for SAR work. So I got little Gabby here. She’s ten weeks old—the perfect age to start training—but Gizmo doesn’t want her around. She’s got so much energy. She’s always hopping on him and trying to play with him. She gets on his nerves.”

Gizmo had always seemed like a friendly dog to Conrad, one that got along well with dogs and people. But what did Conrad know?

Kenzie went on. “I think he’ll have an easier time dealing with her when she’s a little older. I was really hoping you could foster her for me—just for a month or so. It’s essential that she begins her training now if she’s going to get certified, but the situation with Gizmo is making that hard for me. He’s jealous.”

Conrad must have misunderstood. “You want me to foster the puppy?”

“Yes, please. Just for a little while. I’ll tell you everything you need to know. She’s a really good little girl.”

“Isn’t there someone else?” The last thing Conrad needed in his life right now was some little creature depending on him. 

Hadn’t he vowed never to take responsibility for another life again?

Kenzie shook her head. “Most of the people I know work all day or have new babies or dogs. There really isn’t anyone else I would trust with her.”

Well, shit. 

“I don’t know how my landlord would feel about my having a pet. She might pee on the carpet or something. He’s trying to sell the place.”

Kenzie glanced down at the worn green shag carpeting. “Anyone who buys this house is going to want to replace this carpet before they move in anyway.”

Yeah, that was probably true.

Conrad was running out of excuses.

“Besides,” Kenzie added, “there are ways to prevent accidents. Puppies aren’t rocket science.”

“I’m not really in a great space now.” He hated having to admit that. 

“Neither is Gabby.”

Damn.

The puppy had wandered over to Conrad’s feet. She sniffed, looked up at him through big, brown eyes, a creamy ball of complete innocence.

Fuck.

He was screwed.

He bent down, picked up the furball, and held her. She was small enough that he could hold her in one hand. 

She licked his face, her little tail wagging.

Kenzie smiled. “I think she likes you.”

“She probably likes everyone.” Conrad reluctantly set her down again. “I’d like to help, but I have to find a job.”

“How’s the job search going?”

What could he say? It wasn’t going. He hadn’t filled out a single application.

“I’m still trying to figure out what I want to do.”

Kenzie nodded as if this made sense. “How about this? If you have a job interview, you can always drop her by the kennel.”

He supposed that would work. “What about training her? I don’t want her to be a search-and-rescue dropout because of me.”

Kenzie laughed. “Training a puppy this age isn’t very involved, and Gabby is super smart. I’ll help.”

Conrad watched the puppy bound around his living room, stumbling over a pile of mail and sending letters scattering around the floor. 

“Please, Conrad. It would be such a huge help to me.” 

Conrad met Kenzie’s gaze, about to tell her that he wasn’t the man for this job, but the pleading look in those blue eyes stopped him. “Okay, but don’t hold it against me if she flunks out of rescue school.”

Kenzie jumped up, threw her arms around his neck, and kissed his cheek. “Thanks so much, Harrison! You’re a life-saver.”

No. No, he wasn’t. But he could at least help Kenzie with this.

“Can you help me carry her stuff inside?”

“Yeah, okay.” How much stuff could a little puppy have?

 ~ ~ ~

Kenzie hated lying to Harrison. Not that this was a bad lie. She was trying to help him. Still, what she’d told him wasn’t true. 

She carried a box of puppy toys and the bag of puppy food inside and set them down in the kitchen. Then she went out to grab the bag of groceries she’d bought for him and put the salad veggies, meat, seafood, cheese, milk, and eggs in the prehistoric mint-green fridge. “Does this thing even work?”

Harrison saw what she was doing. He glanced into the bag from Food Mart, a frown on his face.  “What’s all this?”

“It’s called ‘food.’ Most people keep it around.”

“You didn’t need to do that.” 

“I can’t have you eating Gabby’s kibble.”

“Funny.” Harrison glanced around, the sight of him without a shirt almost enough to make Kenzie drool. “I had no idea a puppy needed so many things.” 

Those hairless pecs. That six-pack. His shoulders and biceps. Silky, tanned skin.

She swallowed. “You think that’s a lot?”

There wasn’t that much—just Gabby’s crate, her car carrier, her training harnesses and leads, her grooming supplies, her food and water bowls, her toys, her treats, her puppy food, her favorite blanket.

He grinned. “You don’t?”

It was the first real smile she’d gotten from him since he’d come back, and it put a flutter in her belly. “I guess I’m used to it.”

She’d written down instructions for Gabby’s care—everything from feeding and crate training to basic obedience and SAR training. She pulled the pages out of the bag of puppy food and was about to go over them with Harrison when he decided it was time to gather up the pizza boxes and take them out to his recycling bin. He disappeared outside, a stack of pizza boxes in his arms, returning a minute later. 

“That’s better.” He scooped Gabby up and sat at the table with her on his lap. “Okay, go ahead.”

But Kenzie was in the middle of a hormonal meltdown, the sight of little Gabby against Harrison’s bare chest making her ovaries squeal. 

How was she supposed to get through this?

She forced her gaze onto the page and read the sections about feeding and crate training first, fighting to stay focused. “Give her a treat every time she goes into the crate. She’ll sleep there at night. She might cry a bit, but she’s okay. Don’t take her out and put her in your bed. That will only make the problem worse.” 

“Got it.”

“When you let her out of her crate, always take her straight outside to go potty. That way, she’ll come to associate leaving the crate with going outside to do her thing.”

“Won’t she just go potty in the crate?”

Kenzie shook her head. “She’ll try very hard not to. That’s why you have to pay attention. Little puppies can’t hold it very long. I’ve been taking her out right before I go to bed at night and then putting her in her crate with a treat and her toy afterward. She usually wakes me up at about four in the morning, needing to go out again, and then she lets me sleep until about six or seven.”

“Six or seven? So she’s your alarm clock.”

 Kenzie laughed. “A furry clock that doesn’t come with a snooze button.”
Harrison gave a slight frown, clearly not certain how to feel about the fact that he’d be getting up early for the foreseeable future.

“It’s important never to use the crate to punish her. Also, no hitting or kicking her or… ” She stopped at the horrified look on Harrison’s face. “You would never do that anyway, I know.”

“Never.” He kissed the top of Gabby’s head. 

This time it was Kenzie’s heart that squealed. She had a soft spot for men who loved animals. “Do you want to learn how to train her to follow?”
“Sure.” Harrison set the puppy down.

Kenzie took hold of Gabby’s leash and grabbed a few treats. “I hold her leash in one hand, and I hold a treat in the other and bend down like this so that I’m keeping the treat at her face-level next to my leg while I walk. She wants the treat, so she goes right where I want her. Use the command ‘Follow.’ It’s a little awkward to walk like this, but they learn quickly.” Kenzie took a few steps. “Gabby, follow.”

Gabby trotted along at her heel, taking the treat from her fingers.

“Then you praise her.” Kenzie knelt. “You’re a good girl, Gabby. Yes, you’re just so smart.”

“How often do you want me to do that?”

“I’d say a few times a day. She already knows how to sit.” Kenzie grabbed another treat. “Gabby, sit.”

Gabby looked up at her, then plopped her little bottom onto the floor.

Kenzie gave her the treat. “Make sure to praise her. Good puppy! What a good puppy you are!”

“I thought dog trainers use those clicker things.”

“I’ve taught clicker training in classes, but I don’t any longer. Whether you use a clicker or not, it’s all about rewarding desired behavior. If I’m consistent, my pups will learn to be consistent.”

“So be consistent. Got it.”

He looked so serious that Kenzie had to smile. “Exactly. I wrote it all down in case you forget something.”

She glanced at her watch, saw that it was just before noon. “The last thing I should show you is puppy runaways. That’s the first step in training her for SAR work.”

“Puppy runaways? You want her to run away?”

“No, I want you to run away.”

“Me?” A dark eyebrow arched.

Kenzie knew she was taking a chance here, but things had already gone far better than she’d imagined. She gave Gabby credit for that. Harrison had always been fond of Gizmo, and it was clear that he’d fallen in love with the puppy at first sight. Kenzie couldn’t blame him. So had she. “Why don’t we put her in her car carrier and drive to that new park near the library?”

“Scarlet Springs has a library?”

Oh, God. He didn’t know.

“Joe Moffat built a library and donated Silas Moffat’s journals and a bunch of historic photographs. The town had a big book drive. Now we have our own library. They built it on the site of the old schoolhouse. The school became part of the library, and the playground became a pocket park.”

“Cool. Okay.” He glanced down at his bare chest. “I guess I’d better get dressed.”

Bummer.

Well, all good things must come to an end.

Sorry to have been MIA again for so long. I have a good excuse this time.

Much has happened here at Casa Clare since my last blog post. We're deep into the gardening season with lots of landscape projects. I had emergency gallbladder surgery. Barely Breathing (Colorado High Country #1) got a brand new sexy cover that brings it into alignment with the rest of the series. And Conrad and Kenzie’s story (Colorado High Country #6) is in progress and due for release late this month.

Life on the Urban Farm

As some of you know, I love to garden and have completed some of the coursework toward a master gardener certification. We have a large rose garden that is a few days away from being in full bloom. We have lots of wildflowers for bees, along with herbs and lavender for sensory enjoyment. Last year, we put in an orchard of eight fruit trees.

We had a beautiful and unusually rainy spring. The trees—apart from the Honeycrisp apple and peach tree which wore themselves out fruiting last year—flowered and began to set fruit. Then we had a bad hail storm that tore most of the pears from one of our pear trees and took off a lot of leaves. We thought we'd gotten off okay — still lots of pears, still some apples, some plums, and lots of cherries— when we noticed that the Fireside apple tree and Bartlett pear tree had fireblight.

Heartbreak! Lamentation!

The wet spring and the hail damage combined to help the bacteria that causes this deadly tree disease to flourish. We've trimmed diseased branches off both trees, caring to dip the pruners in bleach between cuts, and more twigs die off. First the fruit withers and dies, and then the leaves die. I'm not at all certain we'll be able to save either tree.

Unless we want to break out toxic chemicals we're not really equipped to use, we really have no options besides doing our best to give the tree what it needs and hoping it fights off the disease.

Our strawberries got nicked by hail, but we've had our first few bowls for breakfast. There's nothing like homegrown strawberries. Our raspberries are thriving, too. So there are lots of things to be grateful for.

We planted a lot of potatoes, and those didn't seem to notice the hail. I expect a record spud harvest late this summer.

New cover for Barely Breathing

I’m sure Colorado High Country/Scarlet Springs fans noticed that the series changed its look between the first book (Barely Breathing, Lexi and Austin) and the second book (Slow Burn, Hawke and Victoria). Between those two releases, I’d done some research that showed that solo hero covers sell much better than couples. I made the change for the second book, but that left the first looking like it wasn't really part of the series.

I finally had time to do something about it, and I love the new look.

Conrad and Kenzie get their story

The last we heard about Harrison Conrad, the alpinist on the Rocky Mountain Search & Rescue Team, he had almost died in a catastrophe while attempting to summit Mt. Everest for the third time. His team, including his best buddy, were killed. He was the only one to survive. Rather than coming back to Scarlet, we heard that he was in Nepal.

Well, Megs has had enough of this, and she goes after him, finding him at a Buddhist monastery.

In Barely Breathing, you got the hint that Conrad and Kenzie, the search-and-rescue dog trainer, liked each other. It’s Kenzie — and a sweet little golden retriever puppy named Gabby — that help Conrad pull his life back together in the wake of tragedy.

Watch for an excerpt soon!

Take my gallbladder — please

In early April, I had what I thought was a terrible bout of heartburn. It was agony for more than two hours — and then it stopped. I stopped taking NSAIDs for my arthritis (misery) and tried to eat better. My doc at Kaiser ordered an ultrasound to check for gallbladder trouble, and it came back normal.

Then on May 17, it happened again. Agony.

This time I went to the ER. I was there at 6 a.m., and they could tell from blood work and my blood pressure (which was sky high) that something was wrong and that I was in a serious amount of pain. An ultrasound showed that my gallbladder was full of gallstones, even impacted gallstones, and was distended, i.e., not too far from rupturing. I was in the OR by noon. The post-op pain wasn't as bad as the gallbladder attack itself.

Side note: I wanted to see the gallstones, but they wouldn't save them for me. Not very nice.

I'm doing fine now and am very grateful that the ER radiologist was better than the guy at Kaiser, who clearly misread the original ultrasound.

Enough medical drama!

Many thanks to my sons, Alec and Benjamin, who stayed by my side at the hospital, and to my parents who welcomed me into their home for a couple of days where I could recuperate without cats trying to jump on my abdomen.

Needless to say, work on Conrad’s book came to a screeching halt for a couple of weeks.

What’s next in fiction? 

Conrad and Kenzie’s book — still no title! — will be out at the end of this month.

Then, in August, I’m bringing the I-Team heroes and the Scarlet Springs heroes together for an action-packed novella in the vein of every I-Team fan's favorite novella Dead by Midnight (which still has a 5-star rating on Amazon after 2.5 years). This time, the enemy will be wildland fire, not terrorists. Expect the heroes you love and the women they love to have to give their all to survive and save others.

Stay tuned for Conrad and Kenzie’s excerpt! Or join the I-Team or Scarlet Springs readers groups on Facebook and get excerpts and news before anyone else.

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CLOSE TO HEAVEN: A Colorado High Country Christmas (Colorado High Country #5) is OUT! That had to be a speed record.

Kindle US, Kindle UK, Kindle CA, Kindle AU, iBooks, Nook, Smashwords (international, all ebook formats).

It should be out at any time on Kobo as well.

This full-length novel tells the story of two of people’s favorite characters — Rain Minear and Joe Moffat. We’ve seen them in every Colorado High Country book so far as the general manager and owner, respectively, of Knockers, the brewpub. Now their story comes front and center.

Rain was a mother at 16, abandoned by her much older babydaddy to give birth in a minivan alone. She grew up poor, managed to raise her daughter by working hard and sacrificing, and now at 37 feels alone.

Joe grew up with everything, but his heritage is a burden to him. He is haunted by ghosts of Scarlet Springs' past. He plans to stay single, have no children, and leave all his money to a foundation for the people of Scarlet. I’m telling you right now that things don’t work out the way he'd planned them. In the end, no one will be more grateful for that than Joe.

I hope you enjoy the story!

Here's the blurb from the back of the book:

A woman at a crossroads…

Rain Minear has fantasized about finding herself in Joe Moffat’s arms for years. It’s just her luck that the night it finally happens, he’s carrying her into the emergency room. It’s Joe who steps up to help her when a tragedy brings her life crashing down. He gives her a place to stay, helps her get back on her feet, and even tries to save her Christmas, though he’s never cared for the holiday. But he’s far too ethical to sleep with a member of his staff, holding her at arms length despite the long-simmering attraction between them.

A man haunted by the past…

Joe Moffat moved to Scarlet Springs to repay a debt. He’s struggled for years to keep his hands off Rain. She’s the general manager of his brewpub, and he is not that kind of boss. But, oh, she turns him on. More than that, she has the biggest heart of any woman he’s ever known. He’d do anything to see her smile again, even put up a Christmas tree and listen to carols. 

A season that changes two lives forever…

When a Rocky Mountain blizzard leaves them snowbound, they can no longer ignore their feelings for one another. As their passion turns to something deeper, it becomes clear to them both that this will be the most important Christmas of their lives.

It’s a fun and emotional story that gives us a glimpse into the historical past of Scarlet Springs and its people. It was a blast for me to research mining history and Colorado history for those parts of the story. 

Want an excerpt? I know you do. Without further ado...

From Close to Heaven...

While Joe set up the tree and retrieved box after box of Christmas decorations from storage, Rain rolled out the cookie dough, cut circles in the dough with a glass—Joe had no cookie cutters—then sprinkled the dough with sugar and put the cookies in the oven. She watched Joe as he came and went. Some part of her wanted to pretend that they were a happy couple preparing for Christmas together, but she was too much of a realist to play that game. Besides, Joe was anything but happy. He seemed tense, even grouchy. He was probably still upset about his SUV being stuck in a ditch.

He was always the first person in town to help others in times of trouble, but he had a hard time asking for it. Worse, he hated being out of the action. Now, he was stuck here with her for a couple of days, sidelined by a storm.

Rain cleaned up the mess she’d made, wiping flour off the countertop and getting the dishes into the dishwasher.

Joe walked in, another big box in his arms. He set it down on the floor near the living room fireplace. “I think this is the last one. I had planned to donate all of this. I just never got around to it.”

Rain dried her hands. “Maybe because it means something to you?”

He shrugged. “Nah. I’ve just been busy.”

Rain rested her hands on her hips. “We don’t have to do this, Joe. If this isn’t fun for you, it won’t be fun for me either. We can just chill and watch TV or do our own thing if that sounds better to you.”

He drew in a breath, closed his eyes, the tension inside him palpable. “You’re right. Sorry. I’m being an ass.”

“I didn’t say that.”

He opened his eyes, his lips curving in a lopsided grin. “Maybe you should have.”

“I’m sorry about your SUV.”

“It’s nothing. Compared to what you’re going through…”

She wanted him to know she understood. “It’s hard for you to ask for help, I know, especially when you want to be out there helping other people.”

“Yeah. Pretty much.”

“Okay, now, get over it. Everyone needs help once in a while—even the mighty Joe Moffat.”

He raised a dark eyebrow. “Is that how I come across?”

“Only when you’re beating yourself up for being human.”

Some of the frustration left his face. “Good to know.”

He walked over to his sound system, pulled out his iPod. “Christmas music. Let’s see what I have on here. Andy Williams. My grandmother loved him.”

Rain didn’t want to be negative. “He’s fine.”

Joe frowned. “Okay, so not Andy Williams. How about the Chipmunks?”

“The Chipmunks?” Rain laughed. “You listened to the Chipmunks?”

“No to the Chipmunks?”

She had a better idea. “Do you trust me?”

“Sure.”

Rain drew out her cell phone, found her Christmas playlist, then plugged her phone into the sound system and hit play. José Feliciano’s Feliz Navidad spilled into the room. “I love this song.”

She couldn’t help herself. She sang along and then started to dance, the happy melody and the Puerto Rican rhythm calling to her.

Joe crossed his arms over his chest and watched her, a grin on his face, his gaze warm. “You have a beautiful voice,” he said when the song ended.

The compliment hit a sore spot inside her.

“Not beautiful enough to make a career out of it.” She walked into the kitchen, checked the oven timer.

One minute.

“Come on now. You don’t know that.” He was still watching her, and she knew he was trying to decide whether to let it go. He changed the subject, pointing to the speakers. “What’s playing now?”

“Celtic harp. Kim Robertson.” Rain searched for an oven mitt, grateful that he hadn’t pushed her. “She’s incredible. I saw her play in Denver a few years ago.”

The timer beeped, and Rain took the cookie sheets out of the oven, the sweet scent of fresh sugar cookies mingling with the bright pine scent of the tree. She left the cookies to cool, joining Joe in the living room, where he was going from box to box as if trying to decide where to start.

He glanced over at her. “Let’s open these up, and see what we have.”

“You don’t know what’s in them?” She found this funny.

“They belonged to my mother. They were handed down to me after she passed, but I haven’t opened them.”

Was that it? Was that why he’d seemed so tense?

“If this is going to dredge up unhappy memories for you or make you sad, we can decorate with popcorn or ribbons or old socks for all I care.”

“Old socks?” He chuckled. “It’s fine, really. I wasn’t close to my parents. At Christmas, staff decorated the trees—several of them—for my mother’s Christmas parties. They also did all of my mom’s Christmas shopping. I was away at boarding school until right before the holiday. By the time I got home, everything was decorated, and the gifts were under the tree. It’s not something we did as a family.”

An ache in her chest, she watched as he chose a box and lifted it onto the coffee table. It made her sad to think that he had no real attachment to any of these decorations, no happy memories of putting up the tree with his parents and hanging his favorite ornaments year after year. The stuff in these boxes was just stuff to him. No wonder he’d planned to donate it.

“Let’s see what we’ve got.” He lifted the top off the box he’d chosen.

“Oh!” Delight washing through Rain. “They’re precious.”

On top sat a box of old European-style blown glass ornaments in pastel colors with glittering white, gold, and silver details—angels, Kris Kringles, shimmering birds with feathers for tails, elves, a little church, a trumpet, a cello, a violin. Each ornament was tucked carefully into tissue paper.

Joe took out one of the angels, turned it over in his hand as if it were a Rubik’s Cube. “How do you hang them on the tree? There are no hooks.”

“What do you mean?” Rain gaped at him. “Have you never decorated a Christmas tree before?”

“I told you. We had staff for that.”

“Well, it’s about time.” She found a small box of ornament hooks and opened it. “You take one of these and pass it through that little loop there. See?”

“Okay. Yeah. I get it.” He took it from her, started toward the tree.

“Oh, no, you can’t put it up yet. First, you have to put up the lights.”

He stopped mid-stride. “Lights? Right. I wonder where those are.”



Putting Christmas lights on a tree could test the patience of a saint. They found two big boxes of the damned things—dozens of strands of white lights—and went to work replacing old bulbs and putting the strands on the tree one by one. Rain took charge, imparting her vastly superior experience in Christmas tree decorating to him.

“You don’t want to drape the lights over the ends of the branches. You need to weave them through the tree, get them deep inside.”

She showed him how this was done, starting at the bottom of the tree and passing the lighted strand around its girth to him, their fingers brushing as they handed the strand back and forth. Awareness sang through him at her touch. Their gazes met through the tree’s green branches, the warmth in her eyes a provocation.

Twinkling lights. Soft music. The scent of pine.

Damn.

Joe was in trouble. He knew he ought to distance himself from her somehow, maybe go back outside and try digging out his Land Rover again, but he couldn’t get himself to step away. Their fingers lingered now, the touch deliberate.

They put strand after strand on the tree until it glittered and Joe was about to lose his mind. Then they moved to the ornaments—a new kind of torture. Every time they opened a box, a look of wonder came over Rain’s face, her smile and happiness putting a hitch in his chest. His pulse was tripping, and he wasn’t even touching her.

Jesus.

He got to his feet, walked to the window, needing some distance.

“These must be antique.” She held up a trio of angels. “Look. The faces are made of painted wax, not plastic.”

 “Yeah.” He turned to look out onto a windswept world of white, working to get his emotions under control, while she continued to rummage through the box.

“Oh!”

He heard her exclamation, recognized the excitement in her voice, but didn’t turn to see what she’d discovered, too caught up in his own feelings.
“Do you have any tape or thumbtacks?”

He answered without facing her. “They’re in the drawer next to the fridge.”

When are you going to tell Rain how you feel about her?

Rico’s words came back to him. Damn Rico anyway. What the hell did he expect Joe to do? Was he supposed to pull Rain aside and admit to her that he’d had sexual fantasies about her for far too long? Should he tell her that her smile, her laughter, the very sight of her put a warm feeling in his chest or confess that he spent more time at Knockers than he needed to so he could be close to her?

Listen to yourself. You’re pathetic, man.

When this storm passed, he would make an effort to meet someone again. He’d sign up on one of those online dating sites and—

“Oh, Joe.” There was a sing-song tone to her voice that cut through his thoughts.

He turned to find her standing in front of the sofa, a teasing smile on her lips, a look of expectation on her face.

She looked up at the ceiling, drawing his gaze with hers.

Hell.

Mistletoe.

It was plastic, but she didn’t seem to care.

“Rain.” He shook his head, but his feet began to move. “I’m your boss.”

Her gaze held his, an almost pleading look in her eyes. “Oh, who cares? It’s Christmas. I’m not going to sue you, if that’s what you think.”

“It’s not that.” Joe had come from a long line of assholes, and he was trying desperately not to become one himself.

Just give her a quick peck on the cheek.

Okay. Yeah. Sure. He could do that.

He closed the distance between them, hesitated for a moment, then ducked down to press his lips to her cheek. But his body betrayed him, and his mouth found its way to hers. It was just a brushing of lips, but the shock of it brought him back for another pass and another. Her lips were warm, soft, pliant, the sweet scent of her skin intoxicating. But he was going to stop. Any moment now, he would draw away from her and end this incredible … exhilarating… foolishness.

It was her little sigh of pleasure that undid him.

He drew her against him, claiming her mouth in a hungry kiss. She came alive in his arms, arching against him, matching his fervor, her tongue meeting his stroke for stroke, her fingers curling in his hair. God, she tasted like heaven and felt perfect in his arms, her breasts pressing against his chest, her body soft in all the right places.

Joe’s heart thrummed, blood surging to his groin. Some part of him realized that he hadn’t stopped, that he was still kissing her, but he didn’t care, not when kissing her felt so… damned … right. He nipped her lower lip, drew it into his mouth, felt her tongue graze his upper lip, her fingers fisting in his hair.

Whether she stumbled backward onto the sofa or whether he urged her, he couldn’t say, but one moment they were standing, and the next he was lying on top of her, pressing kisses along her throat, her pulse frantic beneath his lips.

She whimpered, her hips moving beneath his, grinding herself against his erection. She reached for the top button on his jeans. “Joe. I want you.”

“Yes.” What the hell had he just said? “No. No, Rain, we can’t.”

“Why not?” Rain stared up at him, disappointment and desire naked in her eyes. “We’re adults. I want you. You want me.”

As if the hard-on in his jeans left any doubt about that.

“I’m your employer, Rain.” Joe pulled away from her and got to his feet, everything inside him protesting the abrupt loss of contact. Not sure what to do or say, he started packing together the empty boxes.

“Seriously? That is your excuse? I told you. I’m not going to sue.”

“Do you really think I’ve got some kind of risk assessment going on in my head right now?” He glanced over at her. “I’m trying to be fair to you.”

Her expression fell, and she broke eye contact.

Shit. 

He’d hurt her. He didn’t want that. “Rain, I—”

“It’s okay, Joe.” She stood, smoothing her hands over her blouse. “Let’s get these boxes put away and have some cookies.”

Joe said what he’d been trying to say. “I care about you.”

“I know. You care about all of the staff.” She packed tissue paper into two empty boxes then closed them, shutting herself off from him, too.

This is what happened when he ignored his own better sense. He shouldn’t have kissed her in the first place. What the hell had he been thinking?

Copyright (c) 2017 Pamela Clare — All rights reserved

When is old junk not junk? It’s not junk when it tells a story.

I’m putting the pieces together for the next book in the Colorado High Country series and spent Friday up at the Nederland Mining Museum, gleaning what I could about the area’s hard-rock mining history. The museum has so many artifacts from that era — some of them huge pieces of equipment — that they flow out the door and around to the sides of the building.

Joe and Rain’s story — A Scarlet Springs Christmas — will give us flashbacks into the town’s past. You’ll read all the same last names in those flashbacks — Taylor, Jewell, Hawke, Ahearn, etc. — but the characters will be the great-great-grandparents of the people you know and love.

Joe Moffat, the man who owns Knockers and the mothballed silver mine above town, has a unique relationship to the history of the area that brings with it a sense of responsibility. You’ll see what I mean in his story.

In the meantime, I thought I’d share what I saw at the mining museum.


When most people think of the gold and silver rushes, they think of rustic men panning for gold. That happened in Colorado during the gold rush (1859), but that was never the backbone of mining in my state. Here on this old wagon are a variety of different tools used in placer mining (panning for gold), including a small sluice, several gold pans, hammers and shovels for digging and smashing ore and a basket for sifting through crushed ore.


After seeing this display on the evolution of lighting, I knew immediately that I would never have been able to be a gold miner. Back before Edison and electricity, miners went down into the dark wearing tommy sticks (candles) on their helmets or stuck them into cracks in the rocks or timbers using iron candle holders. Some — those who had a bit more money — made little oil lamps using bacon fat or lard. They burned much brighter than the candles — and advantage when you're in the dark — but were also smoky.

Miners had to work quickly because they had only three candles per shift. When that last candle went out... You can see why I wouldn’t be down there.

Later, they wore carbide lamps on their helmets. A small chamber holding water dripped down onto calcium carbide, creating acetelyne gas. The light from the burning gas was directed using a little mirror on the front of the helmet. But this is later than the period of my story.


Here are more light and helmet artifacts. You can see a candle standing in a wooden candle holder the iron-tipped end of which would have been hammered into the rock or a nearby timber.


Here are some rail cars for moving ore. One of them is hand-pumped. When I saw it, my mind flashed on an episode of Scooby-Doo with Shaggy and Scooby frantically pumping their way down the tracks inside some mine. I have such dignified thoughts.


When I got to the museum, I met a volunteer named Susan, who told me she didn’t know much. She then proceeded to answer all my questions and tell me things I hadn’t thought to ask, using her own very extensive notes. Susan knows a lot, whether she thinks so or not.

This photo above shows the tools a single miner might use in the course of a day — hand drills and hammers. Miners used the drills, which were really iron spikes, to drill holes for blasting. There was single-jacking, where one miner held both the hammer and a short drill. He would strike the drill, turning it 1/4 turn after each blow. But a single man couldn't dig a very deep hole. Double-jacking involved one man holding a larger drill and turning it, while the other hit it with a heavier hammer, or dago, as the hammers were called. You can just see one of those iron candle sticks next to a candle there on the display.

Susan told me that two men could drill a single 1.5-foot-deep hole in an hour. That’s an hour of very hard manual labor. Before dynamite could be placed, they had to drill dozens of holes in a specific pattern in the rock. Those holes would be filled with dynamite, which was connected via long fuses for detonation.

This does not sound like easy work to me.


They have a diorama of the Caribou Mine, the fictional version of which Joe’s family owned. Here you can see the shafts dropping from below the shaft house into the mine below.


How did miners get down there? I’m so very glad you asked. The either climbed down a very long ladder or rode in a kibble — a big iron bucket — together with their tools. The kibble was lowered and raised by a hoist engineer, one of the highest paid men at the mine. He had to be a non-drinker and very reputable because lives were in his hands. In emergencies, he had to move that hoist quickly to get men out of the mine.

Susan told me that the Cornish miners who came here from Devon after the copper mines ran out were a very superstitious lot. They refused to ride down in the kibble but had no problem taking it back up again at the end of their shifts. So they would go down the ladder and then ride up in the kibble. She said men who rode in the kibble would put their tools in the center and then straddle it — one leg in and one leg out. If they were short, this would have put their nuts at risk, but that’s just my observation.



Speaking of dynamite...

See that steel box in the center of the table below, the one with the holes in it? That's a dynamite thawer. Life at altitude is chilly, and dynamite becomes volatile at 40 F — well above freezing. This meant that they had to keep the dynamite warm. One way to do that was to place sticks of dynamite into the slots a dynamite thawer, pour water into the box around them, and then set the box on a warm stove or above a few burning candles. Miners from smaller operations didn’t have newfangled, luxury devices like dynamite thawers and so slept with sticks of dynamte in their armpits. Shut the front door, you say? No, seriously, they did.



Below, you can see some tools that were used by the blacksmith. It was his job to make all the tools used for mining and to maintain them as well. The average drill lasted about six hours in a mine before it had to be resharpened. He spent a lot of time on drills. He was one of the better paid employees. Without a good blacksmith, all work at a mine came to a stop.


So that’s the end of our tour. I learned a lot and came away with new questions. I’m doing research for the historical scenes in the novel now and am really looking forward to hanging with everyone’s ancestors for a while. Eric Hawke’s great-great-granddaddy was a rabble rouser. That’s for sure.

If you haven’t tried my Colorado High Country series yet, now is a great time to dive in. The fourth book, Tempting Fate, was just released a couple of weeks ago, and the first book, Barely Breathing, is only 99 cents. The series is straight contemporary romance, not romantic suspense, something that seems to confuse some readers. In other words, there’s no suspense/thriller threat — except that I do sneak some elements of suspense into the stories. It’s not part of the main narrative, however, like it is with the I-Team series, which is romantic suspense.

You can read excerpts from all the books in the new series on my website.

If you had no idea I was writing this series, you might want to sign up for my newsletter so that you can get word of new releases without missing anything. I don’t send out newsletters unless I actually have news, so don’t worry about being spammed. Be sure to check your spam folder for a confirmation email.

Hope you’re having a great week!

I thought it might be fun to take you all with me on a trip to Scarlet Springs. Everyone needs a vacation, right?

I grew up in Boulder, Colorado, right next to the mountains. My view of the world every single day included the incredible Flatirons. We lived a 10-minute drive across town to hiking trails and spent most summer weekends hiking somewhere on the Mesa or McClintock Nature trails or in the Chautauqua Area in general. I know those trails by heart.

The Scarlet Springs series is set higher up in the mountains — about a 30-minute drive up Boulder Canyon. In real life, the town of Nederland sits there, nestled in a little valley surrounded by mountains with the Indian Peaks as its backdrop. This is a look at Scarlet/Nederland from the other side of the reservoir where Moretti likes to boat and where Hawke taught Victoria to wakeboard.




A couple of weeks ago, Benjamin, my younger son who is a park ranger, went up there with me to show me his secret patch of columbines. I took advantage of being up there to take pictures to share with you.

At the top of this page is a small glimpse of that secret columbine patch. Why is this field of flowers a secret? It's a secret because people don’t follow the rules. When you go into the mountains DO NOT pick flowers. Not only will you be ticketed and fined if you’re caught, but you will be depriving plants in a harsh environment of their one and only chance to make seeds this year. If enough people do this in an area, those flowering plants die off, and there are fewer flowers in the mountains. That's why this is a SECRET columbine patch. It absolutely enrages me when I see people picking flowers in the mountains. It’s not your garden, folks. It belongs to everyone.

When I was little, my father, a semi-pro rock climber and alpinist, taught me this:


That’s the proper ethic for time spent in nature. If everyone takes a pretty rock/pine cone/flower, there won’t be any left.



Here’s a closer look at Colorado’s state flower. Columbines are so delicate. They tend to cling to shady areas, often in glades of aspen where you also find poisonous hemlock.




On the hike up to the columbine patch, we passed this little pond where you can often find moose. There were no moose there that afternoon.



 Here’s a look at Mud Lake, what I call Moose Lake in the series. There are often moose there. I’ve seen them myself. This is the lake where Chaska takes Naomi where they see the mama bear and her cubs.


These are some of the wildflowers alongside the trails as you hike up to Mud Lake/Moose Lake. Penstemon was in high bloom, along with cinquefoil, columbine, and many other flowers. The pink/purplish flowers in these two photos (above and below) are penstemon.




The tree itself was fascinating, and I took many photos of it. Wind shaped it; fire killed it. One of my readers felt there was a kind of poetry to this image. It was very poignant, she said.



This is a slighly better look at Sugarloaf. I’m going hiking there soon, and I’ll get photos when I do.



Cinquefoil blooming next to an old log fence.


 A pond near sunset. Still no moose, darn it!

Now, we’re in the town of Scarlet Springs. Above, you can see the little roundabout where two highways come together. That’s Bear's roundabout, where he likes to expound on the Gospel for spare change.



The average street in Scarlet Springs, busy with summer tourists.



The geod store I mention in the stories.

There isn’t a cryogenics business in Nederland, but there is a famous dead guy in a freezer in a tough shed. Locally, we all call him “Grandpa in the Tuff Shed.” A Norwegian guy who lived here many years ago put his deceased grandfather on ice in his Tuff Shed for the day when he might be brought back to life. After he lost his fight to stay in the US, locals felt they had an obligation to take over paying for the electricity and maintaining the Tuff Shed for Grandpa’s sake. Hence Frozen Dead Guy Days, probably the biggest event in Nederland each year. The cryogenics place in my series is a nod to this cultural element. A local ice cream store sells a Frozen Dead Guy flavor of ice cream — blueberry ice cream with crushed Oreos and sour gummy worms.

You can’t make this shit up. The real world truly is stranger than fiction.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this little glimpse of the area around Scarlet Springs (Nederland). I am headed up there today to visit the Nederland Mining Museum to do some research about the town’s mining history for Rain and Joe’s story. We’ll get Joe’s back story, which is really the history of the town itself. There will be historical flashbacks that show the ancestors of the characters you all love. I’m really looking forward to writing it.

If you haven’t tried the Colorado High Country/Scarlet Springs series, the first book, Barely Breathing, is only 99 cents. The fourth book in the series, Tempting Fate, came out a couple of weeks ago and is getting overwhelmingly positive reviews.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Tempting Fate, the fourth book in my Colorado High Country contemporary series, is out! Chaska Belcourt finally has his story, and I’m so excited to share it with you!

The book is available via Kindle US, Kindle UK, Kindle AU, Kindle CA, iBooks, Nook, and Smashwords (all ebook formats, international). Watch for it on Kobo in the next couple of days and in print in about ten days.

For the first chapter, read my prior blog post. Here’s the blurb from the back of the book:

A woman with no roots…

Naomi fled the cult-like nightmare of her childhood and learned to rely on one person—herself. Her resourcefulness keeps her alive during a catastrophe in the mountains, but it’s no help at all when it comes to Chaska Belcourt, the sexy EMT who saves her life. Raised to feel shame about her body and sex, she is putty in Chaska’s hands as he strips away her armor, exposing the vulnerable woman beneath, awakening desires in her that she’d been taught to ignore.

A kiss that changes everything…

Chaska Belcourt grew up on the reservation, the son of a hereditary Sun Dance chief. He left all of that behind for a new life in Colorado as an engineer with an aerospace firm and a member of the elite Rocky Mountain Search & Rescue Team. He doesn’t share his sister’s belief that he was led by fate to find Naomi. But from the first moment their lips touch, he can’t get enough of her.

A love that transforms…

As the passion between them turns into something more, Chaska is forced to admit that his sister is right. There’s no other way to explain the depth of his feelings for Naomi—or the fact that he and his people might hold the key to unraveling the mysteries of her past. But she will have to learn to trust again before the two of them can find the answers she needs—and claim this once-in-a-lifetime love.



For those of you who've missed the series, Barely Breathing, the first book, is available for 99 cents in ebook at all ebook retailers. All of the books in this series, including this one can be read as stand-alones, but as with my I-Team series, you get more out of them if you read them in order.

REMEMBER: This is NOT romantic suspense. There is no suspense thread of the kind you find in the I-Team series.

Thanks so much for your support. I hope you love Chaska and Naomi as much as I do.

Thanks in advance for sharing and helping to get the word out. You are the best!

Barely Breathing, the first book in my new straight contemporary romance series, is finally out in paperback! Click here to order your copy off Amazon.

Thanks to all of you who gave the book—which is a new subgenre for me—such a warm welcome. The story has a 4.8 average on Amazon after 55 reviews and a 4.29 rating on Goodreads after 197 reviews.

Our Scarlet Springs Facebook discussion group is alive with conversation about Lexi and Austin’s story and the other people of Scarlet Springs. Please join us when you’ve finished the book.

A not-so-funny thing happened the day the book came out. I was slammed with a seriously awful case of bronchitis that triggered my latent asthma, and I’ve been sick as a dog ever since. More than a week has gone by, and I’m still nowhere close to well, despite loads of steroids and nebulizer treatments and antibiotics.

Still, I find it kind of ironic that this happened the day I release a book titled Barely Breathing. As a result, I think I will never put out titles like, “My Heart Stopped,” or “Lost My Head,” “Gimme a Coronary” or “Crashed Into You,” and such.

At any rate, my being so sick delayed the print release by a few days. Sorry about that!

In addition to ordering it from Amazon, print readers can order the paperback directly from CreateSpace, or take the ISBN to their favorite bookstore and ask the bookseller to order it for them.

Print ISBN: 978-0-9903771-6-0

Barely Breathing is still available for iBooks, Kindle, Nook, Kobo, and in all ebook formats via Smashwords.

Watch for a print giveaway on Goodreads to celebrate the print release!

Here it is — the cover for Soul Deep, an I-Team After Hours novella.

Carrie at Seductive Designs did a fabulous job of putting it together, and she did it with almost no notice. I wasn’t certain how long it would take me to write Seduction Game, Holly’s story. If someone had told me the book would pour out of me in three and half months, I’d have thought they’d been smoking crack. So I didn’t schedule time with Carrie. Still, she jumped in and saved me. And now we have a book cover.

Here’s the blurb from the back of the book:
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Soul Deep is the first story I’ve written that isn’t about twenty-somethings or even thirty-somethings. Jack, the hero, is a former Army Ranger and widower who served two tours of duty in Vietnam as a young man. He’s a fit and robust 63. Janet, a special agent with the FBI, met Jack when he threw her off his land in Striking Distance. In the weeks that followed, she was badly injured by a sniper’s bullet while trying to protect Laura Nilsson. She is 45.

Romantic fiction centers around very young people, I suppose, because most people have their first sexual and romantic encounters while in their twenties. Romantic fiction has focused on catching that overwhelming experience of first real love.

But as those of us who are over 39 know, romance and sex remain a part of our lives. Everyone who is young and beautiful will grow older — if they’re lucky — but that doesn’t mean their need to be loved or their desire for fulfilling relationships, including sexual ones, diminishes. In fact, it may grow sharper, as they understand the value of such relationships.

It’s been fun for me as a 51-year-old to write about people closer to my age. Their maturity is fun to work with, making them unique among the characters that have inhabited my brain. There aren’t silly misunderstandings. There’s less ego and more thoughtfulness. And the sex is just as hot.

I can’t wait to share the story with you!

I’m down to the last few chapters at this point and hope to have the novella written and edited and out to you by the end of June or the first week of July. For a novella, it’s very long — at least 48,000 words. Some readers hate novellas, but these days there are books being sold as “novels” that are 50,000 words. Soul Deep will be a complete story.

In the meantime, I’m still waiting to see the US cover for Seduction Game, Holly’s story. It will be out in four months — Oct. 20 — in ebook format, with the print version coming out in March. The publisher split the release like that in order to get it to readers as soon as possible.

Seduction Game is available for pre-order in ebook format.

Kindle: http://amzn.to/1Jn7jZJ
iBooks: http://apple.co/1I9hJu8
Nook: http://bit.ly/1QmwI63

After I finish Soul Deep, I”ll be taking a bit of a break to recharge, and then I’m going to endeavor to write an I-Team Christmas story. No hints. I’m letting my imagination run loose on this one.

When that’s done, I hope to start the first book in a new series of contemporary novels set in the Colorado mountain town of Scarlet Springs, which I introduce in Soul Deep. The series will revolve around the loves and losses of the extraordinary men and women who make up the county’s alpine rescue team — chopper pilots, rangers, climbers, skiers, paramedics, avalanche rescue,  search and rescue dog trainers, law enforcement officers, dispatch people and so forth. The series will also include the kind of folks one meets in a real Colorado mountain town — eccentric mountain loners, New Agers, aging flower children, marijuana store owners, pot growers, the descendents of Cornish miners, ranchers, preppers, and the reclusive millionaire who owns the county's defunct silver mine. (If this description makes you laugh, you’re probably from Colorado or another mountain state.)

Also, I’m trying to get set up for direct distribution to iBooks and Google Play and perhaps All Romance eBooks. I’m also planning to revise the way people are added to my newsletter and how the newsletter is distributed. The current system, which has me entering names manually, is bunk.

I hope you’re all having a great summer so far!

Coming soon:
Cover reveal for Seduction Game
Excerpts from Soul Deep