Three homeless puppies, two lonely hearts and a massive snowstorm.

Candace “Candi” Goodman, an unemployed school teacher, is always sharing a smile and helping those around her. This time she has volunteered to drive three puppies to a shelter in Maine. However, when a road closing sends her on a detour, she gets lost in a snowstorm.

Michael Bishop, a township road supervisor, is still mourning the loss of his young family. As he’s plowing snow late one evening, he notices something amiss. When he goes to investigate, he finds a woman and three puppies in a dire situation. But a helping hand turns into so much more for the grouchy loner.

Up until this point, Michael has kept everyone at arm’s length, but Candi with her sunny smiles threatens to melt the icy wall around his scarred heart. As they spend time together this holiday season, he finds himself falling for her mistletoe kisses. But will it be enough for him to take a chance on love again?

HEAT LEVEL: Clean & Wholesome

Read an Excerpt

CHAPTER ONE

The snowflakes grew in number.
The wipers struggled to clear the windshield.
This early December winter storm had Candace “Candi” Goodman turning up the speed of the wipers while easing up on the accelerator. She squinted into the night, trying to ascertain her position on the snow-covered roadway. It was impossible to make out the edge of the road.
Worse yet, there was nowhere to pull over. No signs of civilization anywhere. She had to keep pushing slowly onward until there was a safe place to stop for the night. Just then there was whimpering from the back of the minivan. She wondered if the puppies could sense her heightened stress level.
“It’s okay, babies.” She wished she believed her own words. She didn’t feel like any of this was okay. “Don’t worry. I won’t let anything happen to you.”
Maybe if she said it enough times, she’d eventually believe it. But ever since an accident had the highway completely shut down and she’d been directed onto an alternate road, she felt as though she were going in the wrong direction.
Still, she’d turned right onto North Route 3 like her phone’s GPS had instructed. So, at least she was headed in the right direction. Her destination was a no-kill shelter in Maine, where these three pups could be adopted.
She regularly volunteered at Bob’s Animal Friends Shelter just outside of Cleveland, Ohio. When the owner, Bob Higgins, who was getting up in age, became very ill and was hospitalized, they needed to empty the shelter for the holidays. It wasn’t an easy task. After she’d placed all but these last three puppies, a shelter in Maine was willing to take them.
After a school consolidation, Candi, being one of the newest hires, had been let go. Now, working as a substitute teacher until a full-time position opened up, her schedule was flexible. It made it possible for her to make this road trip.
With Christmas carols playing, she’d set off at 5:00 a.m. Her goal was to make it to Maine in one day. It wouldn’t be easy with such a long drive, but she decided it would be too hard to find lodging with not one but three excitable four-month-old puppies. With Christmas just a few weeks away, the sooner she got them to the new shelter, the sooner the puppies would find their forever homes.
The only thing she hadn’t taken into account was the weather, or should she say the unexpected change in weather. It wasn’t that she hadn’t checked the forecast. She most certainly had, but the rain they were supposed to get had now turned into snow. Lots of snow.
It wasn’t so bad on the highway, because it was being maintained. But this rural road wasn’t in such good shape. Between the bad weather and the early darkness of winter, it was making it difficult to find her way back to the highway.
She squinted, hoping to see past the army of snowflakes. Where had the cars gone that she’d been following when they were redirected off the highway? They had either gotten swallowed up in the snowstorm or they’d turned off a ways back.
As the roadway narrowed, she had a feeling she’d made a wrong turn. She glanced at her phone, which was mounted on the dash. Why wasn’t it saying anything? Checking her mirrors and finding herself completely alone on this road, she stopped. She picked up her phone and found that it had no signal. A frustrated groan started deep in her throat.
Her gut told her to turn around, but there was no safe place to do that. On her left was a hillside, and to her right was a steep embankment. The last thing she wanted was to end up in a ditch on this desolate road in a snowstorm. Her only choice was to keep going.
She let off the brake and proceeded along the road, all the while peering into the night for a signpost that might tell her what road she was on. She’d even appreciate knowing what town she was nearing, but so far, she hadn’t found any signs.
The large snowflakes were mesmerizing in the headlights. She blinked repeatedly, trying not to get caught up in the hypnotic motion of the snow.
Even the Christmas music had stopped playing. The only sound right now was the crunch of the snow under the van’s tires. She had never felt more alone.
As she climbed a grade, her tires started to spin. Her instinct was to stop, but she knew if she did, she probably wouldn’t get moving again. And there was no way she wanted to get stuck out there in the middle of nowhere.