by Lizzie Shane
“That’s a relief. I couldn’t live with myself if I was the cause of a senseless waste of pancakes.”
“Right?” He smiled at her. “That would be a travesty.”
He didn’t seem to be rushing off. In fact, he seemed happy to stand there in the corridor holding his to-go container. And Ellie would probably appreciate the extra time to sleuth out which hot fireman was Chris Evans. Jenna decided she might as well stay and flirt for a while. She hadn’t met anyone this flirt-worthy in…well, he might be at the top of the list so far. “Honestly, I’m severely disappointed that you would even have leftovers to take home with you.”
“Well, guess what, I didn’t. This,” he brandished the container, “is my second breakfast.”
Jenna felt an unfamiliar unfurling of joy. Was he a Lord of the Rings fan too? Ever since she’d first read The Hobbit, she’d been entranced with the idea of second breakfast. Sometimes she wondered if she had hobbit heritage in her background. “I’m a big fan of second breakfast myself. Also, breakfast dessert.”
“Like an omelet, then a cinnamon roll?”
“Exactly.”
He nodded as if he totally understood. “How do you feel about dessert first?”
“About the same way I feel about dessert any time of day.”
He laughed and put up his hand for a high five. She raised hers and they touched palms. She startled as a little electric pulse zapped between them.
Embarrassed, she dropped her gaze from his and noticed that his sleeve had pulled away from his wrist. He was wearing a woven bracelet made of threads of orange and purple and green and black—a truly godawful combination.
Squinting at it, she remembered the time she’d created that very same awful color combination on purpose for a friendship bracelet for her pen pal. Wouldn’t a true friend wear it even if it looks like crap? That’s what she’d written in the letter she’d sent along with the bracelet. It’s the ultimate test.
She whipped her head up to look at the stranger again. Could it be…no way…it was totally impossible…it must be some weird coincidence that some random guy in a diner was wearing the same friendship bracelet she’d sent her pen pal over seven years ago. How long did friendship bracelets even last?
Forgetting her manners completely, she grabbed his wrist and shoved his sleeve up. Smooth, tan skin over corded muscle, strength exuding from the ridge of tendon— Never mind that. Check the bracelet. She examined it closely. Frayed in a few places, faded to a paler version of its original colors, but there…right there…the special knot she’d used to allow the bracelet to expand. There was no doubt.
“Kit?” she whispered.
His eyes went wide and he searched her face. “Jenna?”
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About the Author
Two-time Finalist for Romance Writers of America’s RITA® Award, Lizzie Shane lives in Alaska where she uses the long winter months to cook up happily-ever-afters (and indulge her fascination with the world of reality television). She also writes paranormal romance under the pen name Vivi Andrews. Learn more about Lizzie and her books at her website or follow her on Facebook. And sign up now to receive Lizzie’s Newsletter for updates on upcoming releases.
Did you enjoy Finding Chris Evans: The Hollywood Edition? Check out the rest of the Finding Chris Evans series and don’t miss these other books by Lizzie Shane:
Reality Romance
Marrying Mister Perfect (RR#1) – Read it now for FREE
Romancing Miss Right (RR#2)
Falling for Mister Wrong (RR#3)
Planning on Prince Charming (RR#4)
Home for Christmas (A Reality Romance Holiday Novella)
Courting Trouble (RR#5)
Reality Romance: The Bouquet Catchers
Always a Bridesmaid
Little White Lies – Coming in 2017
Finding Chris Evans Miniseries
The 9-1-1 Edition
by Erin Nicholas
Chris Evans, aka Captain America to his co-workers, knows what he wants: to lead the best EMT crew around, save lives…and have everything done his way. He’s learned firsthand what can happen when he’s not hyper vigilant, so running the show has become his superpower.
If only he could manage Brittney McNemara as well as he handles everything else. She’s the best EMT he knows-and the most exasperating woman on the planet. Where Chris is serious, Britt is scattered. Where Chris is cautious, Britt is carefree. Where Chris is by-the-book, Britt is rebellious. Despite their intense attraction, they’d never work as a couple.
Or could they?
When Britt gets hurt on the job and temporarily loses use of her thumb, she needs someone to be her left-hand man. Chris, ever the hero, volunteers. Little does he know that Britt’s passion for fun masks a need to care for others that rivals his own. And that now the woman who’s been driving him crazy at work is about to drive him even crazier-in her kitchen, in her bedroom, and on a paint ball field.
Forget the Friend Zone. Chris is about to enter the Fun Zone.
Because sometimes even a superhero can’t help but fall in love.
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The Hollywood Edition
by Lizzie Shane
Trina Mitchell finally has her life back on track. Fully focused on her first semester of med school, she isn’t looking for the love of her life. But a little no-strings fling with hunky contractor Christian Evans? Now that feels like a gift from the gods. Until she learns her humble contractor is actually the star of a popular home improvement show—and completely out of her league.
Chris has been building his brand as a celebrity contractor and he’s this close to all that hard work paying off in the form of a big primetime gig, but only if he carefully protects his image as a TV heartthrob—which means absolutely no romantic complications allowed. Not even the one girl he can’t seem to get out of his mind.
Love is a distraction neither of them has time for, but when Trina learns their one magical night together is going to have some very real consequences—in around nine months—she needs to find Chris again, stat.
In love and renovations, nothing ever goes as planned. But with a little help from fate, this might just be the perfect time to build their happy ever after.
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The Hotshot Edition
by Jennifer Bernard
Jenna Mittelstadt has never forgotten the boy who wrote her a letter every week starting at the age of ten. But it’s been years since she stood him up on their first-and only-attempt to meet face to face. Her world fell apart that day, and she never told him why.
So when her sister Ellie drags Jenna to a pancake breakfast honoring firefighters who’ve been working the Northern Minnesota wildfires, she doesn’t expect to run into a sexy, smoking-hot fireman wearing the friendship bracelet she made all those years ago.
Chris (Kit) Evans spends his summers battling fires, but there’s no fighting the instant heat between him and his childhood pen pal. He was crushed when she suddenly disappeared into thin air eight years ago… and finally meeting her seems like a miracle.
Unfortunately, Jenna can’t get past the tragedy that took all the adventure out of her, while Chris can’t bear to see her drift through life another moment. So now the blaze-fighting expert must do everything he can to make Jenna catch fire…for her hopes, her dreams…and maybe even for him.
The fire season may be almost over, but sparks are about to fly…
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The Royal Edition
by Jennifer Chance
LeeAnn Werth has done everything she must to keep the Werth Inn running strong, including putting aside her dreams of flying away from her tiny north woods town.
But at least this summer, the world has come to her. A mysterious foreign businessman has checked in for some serious R&R, and while LeeAnn knows Cris Evans can’t be the man’s real name, she’s fiercely ded
icated to her guests’ privacy. Especially the incredibly gorgeous ones.
For international soccer bad boy Cristopoulis Matretti, Haralson, Minnesota is the perfect hideout. No one here knows he’s embarrassed his native Garronia by punching out his coach… and no one suspects his aunt is a queen. But when a local girl’s unexpected visit sends his bodyguards into an uproar, Cris realizes he must flee again—just when he’s finally getting to know the inn’s dreamy-eyed, hard-working owner. Still, maybe he doesn’t have to leave immediately…
LeeAnn’s not prepared for Cris’s sudden attention, and her defenses go up even as her heart begins to dance. Consorting with guests who make her long for adventure is something a responsible innkeeper simply does not do.
…If only Cristopoulis had ever learned to play by the rules.
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The Rockstar Edition
by Erin McCarthy
From her Princess Leia buns to her color-coordinated lightsaber, cosplay-loving Harper Harrison is all about low-stress fun. So when her BFF Ellie invites her to a rock concert she’s all in… right up until Ellie unexpectedly rushes the stage and Harper ends up with a broken arm, courtesy of a security guard built like a Tauntaun.
What could be worse? How about the rock god showing up in the ER?
After a woman breaks her arm at his concert, Chris “Stryker” Evans knows it’s past time for him to reform his bad boy image. Step one: visit the hospital and apologize to the fan. Only then he meets Harper, the self-proclaimed nerd, and hears her laughter and sees her banging curves. Suddenly, an apology isn’t the only thing he wants to give her.
Harper refuses to drop her shields around Stryker, even though he sets her over-active imagination on fire. But when Stryker finds himself falling for this fascinating, funny, down-to-earth woman, he realizes that life beyond the bright lights could hold a galaxy of possibilities. So he hits on a plan to show Harper how he really feels for her…
Sometimes, when you least expect it, love becomes the most powerful force of all.
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The Ever After Edition
by Elizabeth Bemis
Worried by an unexpected increase in her caseload, social worker Ellie Mittelstadt is looking for anything to make her smile. When she stops in a fortune teller’s tent at the Haralson Fall Festival, however, she never expects the psychic to predict she’ll fall in love—and with a man named “Chris Evans.” What are the odds?
Worse, she quickly discovers five Chris Evanses in Haralson, which means Ellie can only determine her perfect match via bold—and occasionally hysterical—trial and error. Still, she can’t help wonder…what if?
Dr. John Christopher Evans is new to Haralson, and it’s been a challenging first week. He has a hospital administrator who can’t read his handwriting and business cards and ID badge that read Dr. John Enars, and his first patient is a young boy with an illness that defies diagnosis. The only person keeping the child company is his social worker, Ellie—who instantly charms John with her gentle smile and generous heart. If he had any game, he’d ask her out…but after mourning his late wife for the past couple of years then getting so caught up in his work, he doesn’t even know where to begin.
Ellie’s campaign for true love is going nowhere fast, but at least she’s distracted with her newest charge—and his strong, caring physician “Dr. John”, who’d be perfect except he’s not Chris Evans…and he’s still wearing a wedding band. How in the world will she ever find romance when she can’t stop thinking about Mr. Wrong?
Fortunately for Ellie, fate has things well in hand…
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Finding Chris Evans:
The Fortune Teller Edition
Elizabeth Danforth, Madame Esmerelda to her clients, and Aunt Izzy to her family, has run the carnival fortune-telling circuit long enough to know sometimes, fate needs a little nudge. After tragedy struck years ago, she waited too long to ask the universe to bring love back into her life. She’s determined not to let others make the same mistake.
When her travels take her to Haralson, Minnesota, though, she’s surprised by a visit from her nephew Christopher Evans, a widowed pediatric physician. Izzy’s heart breaks when she sees the sadness Chris still carries years after his wife’s passing. Surely there’s something she can do?
Then her next client buzzes in, bright and full of joy, and Izzy hatches a plan. Ellie Mittelstadt is looking for romance, and the universe owes Izzy a favor. She intones her fateful prediction as she lifts her hands over her crystal ball…
“When you find Chris Evans, true love will follow…”
Then she sees not only her beloved nephew Chris swirling in the mist of her visions…but five others! How will Ellie find the right one?
Fortunately, fate has its own plans. With laughter, luck and a little bit of magic, true love’s now on the job of Finding Chris Evans.
A beam of light pierced the incense-fogged darkness of her colorful tent, and Elizabeth Danforth, also known to the attendees to the attendees of the Haralson Fall Festival as Esmerelda the gypsy fortune teller, adjusted the sheer scarves across her face so that only her eyes showed.
A man stepped in, his features obscured by the bright noon-day sun backlighting his trim form.
“Velcome. I am Esmerelda. Seet. Seet.” She indicated the bench across from the small round table draped in shimmering, multi-colored scarves. “And who might you be?”
A handsome and familiar face appeared before her, and before she could do more than squeal her recognition, he dropped a kiss high on her cheekbone. “Hi, Aunt Izzy.”
“John Christopher Evans! Why didn’t you tell me you were coming to town?”
“Technically, you’re in my town now.” He plopped down on the bench across from her.
“Oh! Your mom said you were moving, but I didn’t catch where.”
“This is what you miss out by not having email or being on Facebook.”
She laughed. “And be tethered to my phone every moment? No thank you. Would you like some tea?”
“Sure.”
Elizabeth poked her head out of the tent to check to see if she had a line. Her assistant sat in front of a TV tray which held a cash box, while she scrolled through something on her phone. “Becky, I’m going to take a break. Let the next person know it’ll be about a half an hour.”
“Sure,” Becky said without ever looking up, and Elizabeth grimaced. That girl was a slave to her technology. She probably hadn’t made eye contact with anyone in a month.
The back portion of Elizabeth’s tent was cordoned off with a curtain, and she ducked behind it to grab two tea cups and a hot pot that was always plugged in and ready to go for those guests who wanted their tea leaves read.
She placed a spoonful of tea leaves directly into each cup and then filled them with hot water. “How are you, Chris?”
“Things are really good.”
Elizabeth studied her nephew closely. She didn’t believe him. Lines bracketed his mouth and creased around his eyes that hadn’t been there a few years before. His aura screamed of loneliness. His wife had been gone for three years, brought down in six short weeks by a cancerous brain tumor.
She took his hands in hers. “Really?” The index finger and thumb on her right hand made contact with the wedding ring he still wore on his left.
She knew what it was like to love deeply, and to take the loss of that love so very hard that it seemed like the world might end. At least she’d had her son, Ben, to help her recover. Having an active toddler had somewhat reduced the temptation of wallowing in her misery—or at least made her too busy to do it for long.
She squeezed his hands before sitting back and taking a sip of her tea. “Are you settling in?”
He began to speak, and absently, Elizabeth drew a card off the Tarot deck in front of her.
Chris cleared his throat. “I d
on’t need my fortune read.”
“Some people crack their knuckles or drum their fingers or bounce their legs. I flip cards. Let an old lady have her quirks.”
“You’re not old, Aunt Izzy.”
“I’m not as young as I used to be either.”
She flipped over a card. Strength. A card that often came up when she’d done readings about Chris in the past. Not that she would have told him that she regularly consulted the cards regarding him. She also did so for her sister and her son and daughter-in-law. She recognized that it made her feel more in control. Or at least allowed her to know what was coming. The cards were rarely wrong.
He didn’t reply to that. Instead he answered her previous question. “The moving company delivered my stuff from Denver last week. For now, I’ve moved into a small apartment. I’m planning to buy or build a house next spring.”
She drew another card and flipped it over. Five of Cups. Loss and ignoring the things that you still have.
“I’ve had a lifetime to come to grip with the mistakes I made,” she said. That probably sounded a bit out of the blue, but it was something she’d considered a lot recently.
“What mistakes are those?” he asked as if she hadn’t just turned the conversation in an entirely different direction. Of all her nieces and nephews, Chris was the one she felt closest to. He was used to her seemingly random changes of subject and he tolerated her quirks even better than her son, Ben at times.
“Closing myself off after my husband died. If it weren’t for Ben, I would probably have curled up in a little ball and waited to die. Of course, having Ben kept me busy, and kept me from being lonely most of the time. So even after I was through the worst of the heartache, I told myself I didn’t have time to date. Or didn’t want to date.”
“Did you?”
She shrugged then flipped another card. “Opportunities were presented to me. I didn’t accept them.” His present, The Fool. A new journey.
