Title: The Christmas Secret
Author: Jeannie Watt
Publisher: Tule Publishing
Release Date: November 2015
Length: 165 pages
Series?: Marvels of Montana #2
Genre: Contemporary, Romance
Trapped in a cabin in a raging blizzard with the one man on earth who could turn her world upside down…this Christmas holiday was not playing out at all the way Lil Reynolds had planned. Not even close.
When Lil’s former fiancé chose to marry on Christmas Eve—the day he and Lil had planned to marry one year ago—she knew she had to get out of town for the holidays. Heading to the isolated family cabin seemed like the perfect solution, until the blizzard came…and a man showed up at her door in the heart of the storm. Casey Lanigan. Her ex-fiancé’s brother. A man with whom she shared a secret summer romance many years ago. A man who’d betrayed her trust. A man who, despite everything, still made her heart beat a little harder…
So much for a Lanigan-free holiday.
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This is a short and quick read. It is perfect for the holidays and a second-chance romance.
Lil has decided to take off to the cabin during the holidays. Her ex-fiancé is getting married on Christmas – the same day they were going to marry the year prior. She can’t stand the pitying looks of the townspeople and their attempts at comforting her, which is just salt in an open wound.
She thought she’d spend the holidays alone, cozied in the cabin, but that’s not how things go. Someone else also winds up near the cabin during the storm. Turns out it is Casey Lanigan. Her young love crush.
Being sequestered inside for a while, they can’t simply ignore one another entirely. Eventually, things get said. Lil has experienced the emotional roller coaster of abuse, living her whole life with an alcoholic father – except during the holidays. But it was always false hope. Casey’s father, on the other hand, could find only his faults, never being good enough. After hearing it for so long, he started doing things for his father to indeed blame him for.
They met when Lil took a job working at Casey’s family business, Lanigan Greenhouses. They were put to work together. They were opposites and they attracted. But Lil set some boundaries, given what her father was like. All of his stints that landed him in juvie – over. She could not withstand the pain and humiliation if he were to be arrested.
And that’s exactly what happened. Lil cut him off. Lil felt betrayed; Casey felt betrayed. He left town and went off to prove himself and she went back to school. He came back once before to prove himself to her…to find her dating his younger brother.
Back again to work for the family business following his father’s heart attack, he is roped in to being the best man. There is more family fighting, and that’s how he wound up at the cabins to retrieve his gear one final time.
There’s more family drama that is revealed and unravels throughout the rest of the book. One that threw me for a loop!
Girl of 1000 Wonders 