Valentine's Day. Nicola Marsh

But she smiled to soften her words and added, “I can take it. I’ve been kicked in the teeth a lot over the years. I must say, this is better. It’s nice to have a man who adores me.”

      Cari nodded, watching Randy checking on the wedding cake. “He does do that.”

      “Yeah. But then, you’ve got that, too, don’t you?”

      Cari had to agree. She smiled at Max. He was making faces and gesturing and trying to convey something to her, but she couldn’t understand what he was trying to say. She looked at him questioningly, but his mother came up to say something to him, and he looked away, just as Mara appeared before her.

      “Hey,” she said, beaming at her friend.

      “Do you realize you would never have met Max if it wasn’t for me?” Mara demanded. “I think I deserve some recognition. A plaque would be nice.” She grinned at Cari.

      “So you have to admit it has all worked out for the best,” Cari responded.

      Mara nodded. “Although I’d rather have you in the family than that C.J.,” she told her with a sigh.

      “Oh, C.J.’s okay. And she sure can cook.”

      “My, yes. I would never dispute that.”

      Cari turned away. One of the neighborhood girls who had been hired to help serve was tugging on her satin dress.

      “Excuse me, Mrs. Angeli,” she said.

      Cari thrilled to hearing her new name for the first time. “Yes?”

      “There’s something wrong in the bunkhouse. Something broke. I was asked to get you to come right away.”

      “Oh, dear.”

      The bunkhouse was where they were storing most of the supplies. She looked at the receiving line and couldn’t find Max. Whatever it was, she would have to handle it on her own and she’d better do it quickly. Gathering her skirt, she dashed across the sod to the bunkhouse and hurried inside. As she did so, the door closed behind her, the lock snapped, and she was suddenly engulfed in gloom.

      “What is it?” She turned quickly and found herself being dragged into the arms of her new husband. “Max!”

      “I couldn’t wait any longer,” he told her, raining kisses on her upturned face. “You are the most beautiful bride I’ve ever seen. Ripe for ravishing, I’d say.”

      “Would you say that?” She laughed low in her throat as he began a slow, sexy seduction. “A quick ravishment sounds pretty good to me, too.”

      She kissed him back, then sighed. “But we really can’t. We’ve got to cut the cake and lead the dance and…”

      He said something in Italian and began to peel her dress away. Sighing, she gave in. The cake and the dance would have to wait. Right now, love had the right of way.

       How to Get Over Your Ex

       Nikki Logan

      Being rejected is one thing. Being rejected live on radio takes it to a whole new level!

      After her on-air proposal is turned down by her commitment-phobe boyfriend, Georgia Stone must learn to survive singledom. Unfortunately, thanks to a clause in her contract, she has to do it under the watchful gaze of brooding radio producer Zander Rush.

      And so begins the Year of Georgia! Lurching from salsa classes to spy school, Georgia discovers a taste for adventure. Her biggest thrill so far? Flirting with danger—aka the enigmatic Zander. But admitting she’s ready for more than just a fling…? Definitely Georgia’s scariest challenge yet!

      Next month, look for the second book in this duet: The Guy To Be Seen With by Fiona Harper

      HOW TO GET OVER YOUR EX

      “Why are we here, Zander?” she breathed into the fading light.

      He stared at her in the rapidly cooling, darkening evening. “Because you followed me up here?”

      Half of her was terrified he’d just shrug and blame tradition. That this thing between them wasn’t mutual. But she wasn’t about to be put off so easily. “Here, by the twinkling water as the sun sets.”

      “Do you want to leave?” he murmured, eyes locked on hers.

      She should. “No.”

      “Do you want to feel?”

      Her lungs locked up. Suddenly the grass and cows and water around them seemed to grow as if the two of them had just hauled themselves over the top of a beanstalk, forcing them closer together and making the scant distance separating them into something negligible.

      Her pulse began to hammer in earnest.

      Zander raised his hand and slipped it behind her head, lowering his forehead to rest on hers. His heat radiated outward. His eyes drifted shut.

       ABOUT NIKKI LOGAN

      NIKKI LOGAN lives next to a string of protected wetlands in Western Australia, with her long-suffering partner and a menagerie of furred, feathered and scaly mates. She studied film and theater at university, and worked for years in advertising and film distribution before finally settling down in the wildlife industry. Her romance with nature goes way back, and she considers her life charmed, given she works with wildlife by day and writes fiction by night—the perfect way to combine her two loves. Nikki believes that the passion and risk of falling in love are perfectly mirrored in the danger and beauty of wild places. Every romance she writes contains an element of nature, and if readers catch a waft of rich earth or the spray of wild ocean between the pages, she knows her job is done.

      For Aaron, who knows just how hard

      the getting over part can be.

      Give my regards to Broadway.

       ONE

      Valentine’s Day 2012

      Close. Please just close.

      A dozen curious eyes followed Georgia Stone into Radio EROS’ stylish elevator, craning over computer monitors or sliding on plastic floor mats back into the corridor just slightly, not even trying to disguise their curiosity. She couldn’t stand staring at the back of the elevator for ever, so she turned, lifted her chin...

      ...and silently begged the doors to close. To put her out of her misery for just a few blessed moments.

      Do. Not. Cry.

      Not yet.

      The numbness of shock was rapidly wearing off and leaving the deep, awful ache of pain behind it. With a humiliation chaser. She’d managed to thank the dumbfounded drive-time announcers—God, she was so British—before stumbling out of their studio, knowing that the radio station’s output was broadcast in every office on every floor via a system of loudspeakers.

      Hence all the badly disguised glances.

      The whole place knew what had just happened to her. Because of her. That their much-lauded Leap Year Valentine’s proposal had just gone spectacularly, horribly, excruciatingly, publicly wrong.

      She’d asked. Daniel had declined.

      As nicely as he could, under the circumstances, but his urgently whispered, “Is this a joke, George?” was still a no whichever way you looked at it and, in case she hadn’t got the message, he’d spelled it out.

      We weren’t