A feisty ballerina with a broken heart. A minister-in-training whose faith can work miracles. Can two strong-willed people find true love and a match made in heaven?
JESSICA & JAMES: A Love Story is a boxed collection of two romances set in Snow Valley, Montana—the saga of rising star ballerina Jessica and the sparks that fly between her and gorgeous James Douglas, the new pastor in town.
This collection includes new chapters, and a Brand New Bonus Wedding novella!
Suffering with a broken heart, Jessica has struggled to forgive herself for that fateful night when her childhood love was killed in a car accident. After staying away from home for years, she finally returns for Christmas and meets James Douglas who is unlike any minister-in-training she’s ever known. James can not only dish back Jessica’s finely tuned sarcasm but understands grief all too well, turning Jessica’s world and her faith upside down. Is she ready to take another risk on love?
Living 2,000 miles apart proves difficult and Jessica and James' love is tested in a myriad of ways, but James can’t get the spitfire Jessica out of his mind. When she comes home to Snow Valley to accept an inheritance with her male ballet partner in tow, James and Jessica's passion for each other takes on a new edge.
Clean romance with heart, and a surprise wedding you won't see coming.
#1 Pastor James Douglas saw the girl sitting in the snow when he glanced up from his computer screen in his church office. Papers and research books were strewn across the oak surface of the old desk, including two different translations of the Bible–open and underlined in red pencil where he was marking various lines for this week’s Sunday School class he was teaching. James ran a hand through his hair and rubbed his eyes. When he glanced at the clock on the wall, he blinked in surprise. It was already one o’clock. No wonder he was starving. Leaning forward, he glanced through the window again, curious. It wasn’t often he saw such a striking woman around Snow Valley, which was more known for mud-splattered cowboy boots, wind-blown hair, and chapped cheeks—all definitely had their small-town charm. But this girl—she— She hadn’t moved an inch in five minutes. James jumped up from his chair, knocking the back of it into the wall. His heart crept into his throat, worry tugging at him. It was only ten degrees out in the church cemetery. Piles of snow lay drifted about the bleak shrubs, turning to slush across the parking lot. Who came to visit the church cemetery just after a snowstorm—in the middle of December? Of course, people came to lay flowers and Christmas wreaths, but they never stayed longer than two minutes before hurrying back to their cars. She was truly beautiful. Blonde hair flying away from her face in clouds, porcelain skin, a perfectly sculpted body. As a pastor, he wasn’t supposed to notice that, he supposed, but to him she was the picture of perfection. Yet she looked so tragically sad, so lost, so very fragile sitting there, her eyes glued to the headstone. Who was she mourning? His nose hit the window pane as his eyes glued to her crouched figure. The young woman didn’t look well. He had a sudden irrational fear that she’d actually frozen into place. Should he call the police, or an ambulance? Two seconds later, he was slamming through the door of his office, grabbing his coat and stuffing his hands into gloves. Then he was sprinting through the graveyard gates, hoping he wasn’t too late to save her. #2. Jessica saw him the first time at Snow Valley’s cemetery striding fast across the dead, snow-covered grass. He wore a black wool coat and leather gloves. Not a ski jacket, a man’s long overcoat. His head was uncovered, hair cut just below his ears, a thatch of dark brown tossed across his forehead. Her breath caught like a thorn in her throat, and her palms grew clammy despite the fact that she’d forgotten her own gloves and the tips of her fingers were turning into icicles. Was it—no, it couldn’t be. Dread dropped to the pit of Jessica’s stomach. Because if the figure coming toward her was Michael, she was seeing things. Not things—dead people. Which would mean that the séance at Madame LeBlanc’s parlor back in New Orleans was for real. Narrowing her eyes, Jessica burrowed her chin into her zipped-up coat so it didn’t look like she was staring bug-eyed at the guy. Picking up his pace, the man grew closer. Should she ignore him? Pretend not to see him? Or run away before he reached her. Perhaps the angle of his body was merely an optical illusion in the whiteness of the snowy scene, the skeletal trees, and the dreary gray sky? Jessica’s heart went into overdrive, hammering painfully against her ribs. The possible specter looked so much like Michael, come back from the dead; she swore she was having palpitations, maybe even a heart attack. It couldn’t be him. That was crazy. It meant she was truly losing her mind. #3. It was only a small-town Christmas talent show, but Jessica tried to become the Sugar Plum Fairy and dance as well as she did for her job at the New Orleans ballet company. Lighter, lighter, float through the air, she repeated in her mind when the final leaps and spinning began. She was almost finished. The performance had been flawless. Jessica could go home knowing she’d done her best for her old ballet teacher and the people of Snow Valley. Then she spotted him, and her heart stopped inside her chest. He was sitting in the audience. Right in front of her parents, sister, and younger brother, Sam. The man. From the cemetery. James Douglas. A tiny whimper sounded in Jessica’s throat. Second row, stage right, crisp white shirt, suit coat, red tie, one leg crossed over his knee while the other stuck out into the aisle seat due to their long length. No, it couldn’t be that same guy. He was too uptight, too perfect and suave and—and crisp in his starched white shirt. He wasn’t the type to come to a ballet, was he? In Snow Valley of all places. Maybe it was someone who just looked like him. But this dude was staring at Jessica. Intensely staring. She stared back, shocked, wondering if she was seeing things, but the stage lights were too bright, blinding her. The Sugar Plum Fairy crown began to slide off her head. Her left leg that was supposed to bow in the concluding move of the dance stiffened up from the raw Montana December day. It probably hadn’t been the wisest decision to sit in a snowy cemetery earlier that afternoon. That man watching her leaned forward in his chair and gazed at her in such a mesmerized stance, that the auditorium whirled around her in a frenzy of faces and self-consciousness. Jessica crashed to the stage, falling into an ungraceful heap, her ankle burning as if she’d broken it. There went her ballet career. All because of some guy’s gorgeous crystal blue eyes. #4. At last, she was in the sanctity of her own bedroom – a tousle of strewn clothes, unopened mail, and dishes from late night snacks sitting on the nightstand. Unfortunately, with the grueling Swan Lake ballet schedule, she hadn’t had time to properly clean her apartment in a month. Fifteen minutes later she was dressed in jeans, a cute yellow sweater and brown suede boots with her hair pulled off her face, tendrils of curls popping out along the sides. “You will have to take me as I am, James Douglas,” Jessica said out loud, searching for her handbag under the couch pillows. “And that’s just how I like you,” a deep, male voice said at the door. “Every which way you are every, single day.” It was James, standing tall, fresh and perfect in her foyer, although overdressed in a gray woolen overcoat like the Pastor Dude he was. At least that’s what Jessica’s eighteen-year-old brother, Sam, called him. Jessica sucked in a breath, trying not to swoon at how good James—her James—looked. “How’d you get in the door?” “I knocked,” he confessed. “But I spotted your car outside and then discovered the front door wasn’t locked, so I took the liberty of coming in.” He smiled and his beautiful crystal blue eyes knocked Jessica over like they always did. Her stomach shot into her throat at the sight of him and her heart began to race. Every single time. “I probably didn’t hear you from the sanctity of the shower.” He came closer, closing the front door behind him. “I didn’t try the handle on your bedroom door. I do have discipline even if it was a temptation. But one of these days, Jessica,” he added with a murmur. “I didn’t think pastors of God ever got tempted,” she teased, a delicious shiver running down her neck when he ran his warm hands along her bare arms. “We just pray a lot.” Jessica’s mouth quirked up and they grinned at each other before he gave her a long, slow kiss. Author Kimberly Montpetit When she was in Paris, Kimberley Montpetit spent most of her souvenir money at the La Patisserie shops with their beautiful and delicious pastries. She grew up in the fabulous city of San Francisco, loves all things chocolate, and now lives in a small town along the Rio Grande with her engineer husband and three sons. She once stayed in the haunted tower room at Borthwick Castle in Scotland and didn't sleep a wink, sailed the Seine in Paris, rode a camel in the ancient world wonder of Petra, shopped the Grand Bazaar in Istanbul, and spent the night in an old Communist hotel in Bulgaria. Kimberley also writes Award-winning Middle-Grade novels with Scholastic and epic Young Adult novels with Harpercollins under the name, Kimberley Griffiths Little.
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