When Fate Isn’t Enough Synopsis:
Can a romance that was written in the stars survive real life? Lily Clark and Gavin Edwards met when their lives collided in a crazy twist of fate. Their relationship started amidst chaos, fraught with lust, passion, and love. Building a life together will take more than destiny, especially when ghosts from their past try to tear them apart.
Needing a fresh start, Lily decides to escape her life in Washington, DC to join Gavin in London. Trust and faith have never come easily to Lily. She’ll be put to the test now that she and Gavin are living under the same roof.
To make matters worse, trouble finds Lily wherever she goes. She thought she’d rid herself of her late husband’s demons, but she soon learns that when you make a deal with the devil, he often comes back to up the ante. Can she learn to let Gavin in or will she continue to fight her battles alone? Find out what happens When Fate Isn’t Enough.
Excerpt:
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Why didn’t I ever learn to cook? One of the many downsides of losing my mother young is I never learned how to cook things like a turkey. I have a cookbook, but it’s completely useless! Stuffed vs. unstuffed. Did I brine? What the hell is brine? I just need to know how many minutes per pound and at what temperature, but the damn cookbook is American, and my turkey is in grams and the oven is in Celsius. Fuck the damn metric system!
Hazel’s gone, and Gavin is probably as useless as I am. My computer and iPad are both in the solarium where my very tired boyfriend is sleeping. However, I spy Gavin’s briefcase in the front hall. Digging around in it for his iPad, I find a little box. A little robin’s-egg-blue box. His briefcase slips from my hands as I stare at the little box of impending doom.
NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. I have a turkey to cook and a kitchen to try to not burn down. I can’t think about little blue boxes. My cell phone ringing in the distance makes me jump and throw the box across the room as if it’s a venomous snake. Ignoring my phone, I crawl around searching for the box so I can return it to its hiding place, hopefully for a very long time. I give great consideration to “misplacing” the box. No box means no ring. No ring means no proposal. No proposal means not having to think about things that suck the oxygen out of my lungs. Instead, I grab the iPad and walk away, trying to pretend I never saw that box and that I won’t have to have a marriage conversation soon. Denial is beautiful.
The iPad and I figure out a plan for the turkey, and I stick it in the oven. I make the sign of the cross in front of the oven, praying not to burn down the house or give us all salmonella. My phone won’t stop ringing, so I have to go on a treasure hunt to try to find it. In a house with so much stone and marble, sounds echo off the walls, making it hard to figure out exactly where my phone is. Eventually I find it in the library.
“Where the hell have you been?” Em screams.
“Sorry, I lost my phone, and hide-and-seek is next to impossible in this house. Once you get here, you’ll understand. It’s bigger than Sacred Heart was.”
“Hmmm.” She’s trying to sound bored, but I know she’s curious. “I’ll be there soon, I think. The GPS says less than an hour.”
“See you soon.”
Over an hour and a half later, Em arrives. When I open the door, she says, “It’s a fucking castle, Lily. You didn’t tell me it was a castle.” Her driver brings in her bags and sets them by the door.
She hands him a tip. He tips his hat and closes the door as he leaves. I glare at her. “You couldn’t have rented a car? You made the poor man work on Christmas?”
“Don’t look at me like that,” she replies. “That man now has five hundred more bucks in his pocket to spend on Christmas. That’s how the economy works.” She hands me her coat. “Now, show me the loo. That drive from the airport is a bitch.”
While she freshens up, I put together some nosh food and pour some juice.
She walks over to the fridge and starts rummaging around. “Do you have any champagne to go with this juice? I’ll even take some vodka if you have some chilled.”
“I have no idea, but you can check. You’ll be drinking on your own, though. I’m still waking up. Too early for me to start drinking. If I start now, I’ll be asleep before everyone gets here.”
She shrugs. “Yeah, you’re probably right.” A devilish look crosses her face. “Stay here. I have something for you.” She runs back to her bags in the entrance. When she returns she hands me a box wrapped in black wrapping paper.
“What is this? You don’t do presents.” I shake the box but can’t tell what it is.
“No, I don’t. But I had this brilliant idea and had to get it. As you can tell by the wrapping, this is not a holiday gift.”
I tear the wrapping off and laugh hysterically. “What the hell is this, Em?” It’s a package of five dolls that look creepily like Gavin.
She looks at me like I’m crazy. “What do you mean? It’s the Gavin Doll collection. There’s Tux Gavin, G. I. Gavin, Alpha CEO Gavin, Sexually Frustrated Gavin, notice the short running shorts, and Club Gavin. If you push the button on the back it goes ‘unce unce unce.’”
I try to say “What the fuck,” but I’m laughing too hard to formulate the words.
“You always describe Gavin like he’s a Ken doll, and I have a friend in the doll biz. Open it up. I made sure he’s anatomically correct.”
My jaw drops. “You didn’t!” I tear open the package.
She pulls out Sexually Frustrated Gavin and lowers his pants. “Since I don’t have first-hand experience, I had to guess on the dimensions. I tried to be generous. Was I right?”
Blush scorches my cheeks.
“What?” she asks. “Bigger?”
I smirk. “Yeah, bigger. Much bigger.”
She stares at the now naked Gavin doll. “Damn.”
I grab the doll from her. “Stop ogling my boyfriend.”
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When Fates Collide:
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Isabelle Richards Bio:
Isabelle Richards spent years as a speech writer before tackling fiction. An avid reader of all genres, Isabelle is drawn to romance novels as they provide an escape from daily life. Through her complex cast of characters, Isabelle creates a sanctuary for readers to dive into for a break from reality.
When she is not writing, Isabelle works as an advocate for persons with disabilities in Washington, DC. Her two yellow labs are her writing partners, although they frequently sleep on the job.
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