My Manuscripts

Contemporaries: Lying Eyes (romantic suspense)  Two-bit magician Cosmo Fortune faces the waning years of his Las Vegas career trying to make amends with his three daughters.  His problem?  The bigamizing charmer's daughters don't know each other exist!  When no-nonsense costume jewelry designer Iris Fortune learns her father Cosmo is involved in a jewel heist and possible murder, she finds her steady world was just an illusion.  Detective Mickey Kincaid goes deep undercover to escape the bitterness of her his brother's recent murder.  But while working with Iris to forge a famous set of Czarist Alexandrite gems and track down the elusive Cosmo, Mickey learns the killer has Iris and her sisters in his sights.  Mickey's put his life on the line before, but never his heart.  And Iris, who always believed the illusion of happiness was enough, realizes it can't hold a candle to the real thing.  Winner:   2008 Winter Rose Grand Prize, 2008 Great Expectations, 2008 CONNections Best First Meeting Award Finalist:   2010 Sheila, 2010 Merritt, 2009 Gotcha!, 2008 Maggie, 2008 Daphne du Maurier, 2008 Sheila, 2008 Spring Into Romance, 2007 Beacon, 2006 Great Expectations Public Relations (romance)  Soap hunk Joss Wesleyan finds his life spiraling into an absurd vortex when his high-strung co-star threatens him with a high-profile engagement to further their careers.  In self-defense, Joss hires Arden Deane--an aspiring Broadway actress with more experience at failed engagements than faith in happily-ever-afters--to portray his temporary fiancee.  Despite the media, families from hell, and their own best intentions, Joss and Arden discover their improvisation feels too good to fake.  But for true love to last, Joss will have to confront his fear of failure while Arden must overcome her fear of success. Winner:   2007 Beacon, 2006 Golden Gateway, 2003 Heart of Outreach, 2003 Award of Excellence Finalist:   2008 Golden Heart®, 2008 Maggie, 2008 CONNections, 2004 Fire & Ice, 2004 Barclay Sterling, 2004 Heart of the Rockies Painted Blind (romance)  When a blizzard--and a flock of sheep--run art dealer Ramsey Brent off a mountain road, he temporarily loses not on ly his mind but maybe his heart as well.  Former Miss USA and recovering bulimic Wynn Covington can hardly believe the fates have delivered the man of her dreams and would rather not reopen the unfinished business between Ramsey and herself.  But Ramsey's search for a missing violin brings him right back to her, and suddenly he has to decide whether he's after the woman who stole a violin or the woman who stole his heart.  (sequel to Public Relations) Winner:   2006 Great Expectations Finalist:   2008 CONNections, 2008 Winter Rose, 2006 Four Seasons, 2006 Barclay Sterling                     Historicals: Ambersley (romantic saga) Traumatized by a blaze that kills her parents, young Amber Vaughan remembers nothing of her privileged past. Ignorant of the complexities and dangers that surround her, she gladly accepts a new identity when her guardians, an aging tenant couple, deem it necessary to disguise her as their adopted son.  Raised among the servants, she develops a sense of purpose that helps her survive the betrayal that unmasks her true identity. When forced to take her proper place in Regency society as the highly-sought heiress to the Ambersley fortune, she must defy the relatives who would make her a pawn in their struggle for power.  With his dubious parentage, it's sacrilege for Derek Vaughan to accept the dukedom. But touched by the ravaged estate and its destitute servants, he confronts a society that shunned him while he rebuilds Ambersley and protects it from his stepmother's bankrupting clutches. He intends to grant the title to his half-brother when the boy comes of age, but Derek's plans go awry when the gardener's apprentice--once his trusted young friend--is revealed to be an heiress of immense beauty and the one woman who may finally capture his heart.     Work-in-Progress: The Moon And The Stars (medieval romantic suspense)  With only two daughters to succeed him, the Earl of Densemere strikes a bargain with his family's greatest enemy, Lord Griffin of Worthing, and grants him the eldest daughter's hand in marriage.  But on the eve of the wedding, Densemere is attacked, its lord murdered, and the two daughters flee for their lives.  Separated from her sister, young Phoebe is captured by Lord Griffin, the man she believes betrayed and killed her father.  Held captive, Phoebe does everything in her power to defy Griffin, even as he protects her.  Griffin's sense of duty demands he keep Phoebe against her will, for if he cannot find her sister, he vows to marry Phoebe herself to bind their properties and win a lasting peace.