{"id":331,"date":"2015-09-04T16:04:29","date_gmt":"2015-09-04T16:04:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/danavolney.com\/?p=331"},"modified":"2015-09-04T16:04:29","modified_gmt":"2015-09-04T16:04:29","slug":"labor-of-love-bloghop-lolhop","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/danavolney.com\/?p=331","title":{"rendered":"Labor of Love Bloghop #LOLHop"},"content":{"rendered":"

[spider_facebook id=”1″]From sweet to dark, divas of romance work their fingers to the bone for your reading pleasure in the Labor of Love Bloghop from 9\/4-9\/6. Come join me and enter to win a Kindle with new, heart-pounding titles just for you!<\/em><\/strong>
\n\"2015_8<\/a><\/p>\n

Happily ever afters only come after heart-breaking work, and this Labor Day weekend, we are celebrating our written labors of love by giving our readers a chance to win a brand-spankin’ new Kindle with our personal bests. That’s right, you could win all of our books! Aren’t you excited? We are! So here’s your chance, just click the link below to enter our giveaway:<\/h6>\n

a Rafflecopter giveaway<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

While each story I create is close to my heart, I’ve decided to share one of my holiday stories, Christmas Clash.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"\"Christmas<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

When long time foes, Luke and Candace, are forced to work together to stop city government from taking their businesses, will Christmas bring merriment and miracles or the destruction of everything they love?<\/span><\/p>\n

Excerpt from Christmas Clash:<\/span><\/p>\n

Candace stomped back to her cozy flower shop, Kiss from a Rose. That guy. Thinks he knows everything. Of all the places she had to choose to locate her flower shop, she had to buy the one right smack dab next to Luke friggin\u2019 Carrigan.
\nShe\u2019d never daydreamed about kissing Luke in high school or before, she\u2019d never written their names together in her homework notebooks, and she\u2019d never studied his body. Until present day. Setting up Kiss from a Rose right next door to the Carrigans\u2019 family pub was pure coincidence, and one that had made her grimace internally and externally when she\u2019d come face to face with him while painting her newly purchased walls.
\n\u201cWell, well, well.\u201d
\nShe\u2019d heard his unmistakable tone behind her and whipped her head around so fast her neck muscles stung.
\n\u201cYou\u2019re stalking me, aren\u2019t you?\u201d he\u2019d asked.
\nHis tall, defined build took up her doorway and stopped the sunlight from streaming through.
\n\u201cLuke Carrigan,\u201d she deadpanned as her mind raced to catch up. Why would he think she was stalking him? The bar next door. Dammit. How had it taken her until now to piece that gem together? \u201cJust trying to make the neighborhood a better place.\u201d She focused on his eyes, careful not to let her gaze roam. She couldn\u2019t give him any upper hand. Especially not now. Great, just what I needed. It\u2019s bad enough I\u2019m new to having a business of my own but now I have to contend with Luke Carrigan? Just my luck.
\n\u201cSo you\u2019re just doing the work for the real owner, then?\u201d
\n\u201cYou wish,\u201d she said. \u201cI\u2019m here to stay. I bet it\u2019s going to suck to have someone around who won\u2019t take your crap.\u201d
\nIf his dark brown polo hadn\u2019t fit him snug around his biceps, she might\u2019ve said something nice. But it did. He\u2019d grown up well. Time had only created a handsome man. And one who knew he was handsome. Which, sadly, wasn\u2019t totally unattractive. What are you doing? Don\u2019t think of him like that. He\u2019s bad news. He\u2019s still bad news.
\n\u201cI don\u2019t mind at all. Because she surely doesn\u2019t give it as good as she gets it.\u201d With a proud chuckle at his own ridiculous try at a joke, he rolled from the wood door frame and ambled toward his pub. Those were the only few seconds she\u2019d ever thought about selling her new building and setting up shop somewhere else, but the notion was just plain dumb. She would have to find a way to deal with him, just like high school.
\nAnd, just like school, they managed to stay out of each other\u2019s way unless completely necessary\u2014which was usually in the back parking lot that their businesses shared. Seven months into a neighborly relationship, it seemed their stay-out-of-my-way truce had now ended.
\nShe made her way through her flower shop. The year-round bright green walls, crisp white flooring, and splashes of pinks were a welcome relief to all the mahogany in Luke\u2019s dank bar. She tried to shake off the cold of winter\u2014and Luke. The small white Christmas trees peppering her front room and cheerful ornaments hanging from the ceiling couldn\u2019t help but bring a smile to her face. The holiday magic always conjured hopefulness, possibilities\u2014this year, however, it had brought negative tidings.
\n\u201cWho was that hunk of hottie?\u201d Sophie Graystone asked as she finished repotting a large butterfly palm plant. \u201cI\u2019ve seen him around. I didn\u2019t know you knew him.\u201d
\n\u201cHe\u2019s no one.\u201d Candace rubbed her forehead before picking up a sprig of evergreen lying on the island workstation behind the main counter. The beautiful bouquet of dark, long-stemmed red roses for the customer who was apparently very sorry for his actions the previous night wouldn\u2019t start itself.
\n\u201cIf I had a no one who looked like him, I wouldn\u2019t share either.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Have I got your attention? Good, because there\u2019s more! Check out all of my holiday romances on Amazon <\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

Join the fun on Facebook<\/a> as well!<\/p>\n

And because I don’t want your To Be Read pile to wither away over the holiday weekend, one lucky commenter will win an e-copy of CHRISTMAS CLASH<\/a> . Whatever shall you comment on, you ask? Well, let’s celebrate your favorite holiday memory! Just post your favorite holiday memory in the comments below and I’ll announce our winner on 9\/7.<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

\"2015_8<\/a><\/p>\n

Thank you for join joining our Labors of Love Blog Hop. To see who’s participating, click the link below and work your way through our participating authors: <\/h6>\n

Powered by Linky Tools<\/b><\/p>\n

Click here<\/a> to enter your link and view this Linky Tools list…<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[spider_facebook id=”1″]From sweet to dark, divas of romance work their fingers to the bone for your reading pleasure in the Labor of Love Bloghop from 9\/4-9\/6. Come join me and enter to win a Kindle with new, heart-pounding titles just for you! Happily ever afters only come after heart-breaking work, and this Labor Day weekend, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-331","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4whBp-5l","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/danavolney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/331","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/danavolney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/danavolney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/danavolney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/danavolney.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=331"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/danavolney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/331\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":333,"href":"https:\/\/danavolney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/331\/revisions\/333"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/danavolney.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=331"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/danavolney.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=331"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/danavolney.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=331"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}