Fall in Love Book Bundle: Small Town Romance Box Set

by Grover Swank, Denise

  “Sitting in traffic, answering emails—all the aspects of the daily grind. But even when I’m busy, or distracted, stuck in the rat race, the sound of my grandfather’s laughter will tumble into my memory,” I said, hearing the tightness in my throat, the rise of grief in my chest. “Or the taste of hot chocolate, our endless discussion of poetry—the way he always encouraged me to live my life authentically, to embrace joy.”

  I was crying now and found I actually didn’t care because I was heartbroken, desperately heartbroken, and there was no way I could bottle it up. “And I hope all of you take that with you today as you honor his memory.”

  * * *

  The last day of my grandfather’s life, according to him, had been completely banal. He’d been writing in his journal—something he’d done every single day of his adult life—and drinking whiskey, probably by the fireplace in his beloved bookstore.

  Took Chance for a walk down by the beach. Windy, but we were lucky to see the sun for a bit. Had a hysterical moment when Chance chased the seagull for an inordinate amount of time. Seagull won. More customers than usual today in the store, including a sweet couple from Sacramento who were thinking of holding their wedding in Big Sur. Was pleasant to talk with them. Finished that little book of poetry I picked up in Petaluma last week—it was delightful. I’m wondering if

  And that was it. I’m wondering if. And then, just like that, an aneurysm burst in his brain, and he died. He was eighty-one years old.

  I was standing on the patio of my grandfather’s bookstore, holding the journal. Chance, my grandfather’s dog, was curled up at my feet.

  Susan, his lawyer, approached me with a kind smile. She was about my parent’s age, white with short red hair. Mourners were milling inside, but I knew my parents and I needed to discuss the will.

  “Calvin?” Susan said, touching my arm. “Let’s talk in another room.”

  I nodded, following her into the small room that held the children’s books—such a whimsical place for such a stressful conversation. I sat next to my mother, holding her hand. Grief had made her smaller, but she’d smiled through my eulogy.

  My parents and my grandfather had a complicated relationship—one of deep love but also total misunderstanding. Like me, my parents were rational, numbers-driven, orderly people. Both of my parents were engineers, and I’d been a software engineer for almost nine years, ever since I left college. Long hours, tons of dedication, lines of code moving across my computer screen.

  My grandfather, however, had been something else entirely.

  “I’d like to talk with the three of you about the will,” Susan said. “Specifically you, Calvin. As you know, your grandfather purchased this property in 1958 and turned it into a bookstore shortly after. He had stipulations in his will that upon his death, the ownership of this bookstore be passed along to you, Calvin.”

  “Um… what?” I asked, mouth dropping open in surprise. I thought she was going to tell me my grandfather had left me his extensive collection of science fiction. Not the entire bookstore.

  “You are now the official owner of The Mad Ones,” she said simply, and I could hear my parents grumble next to me. My parents and I were planners by nature… and this was not in the plan.

  “Um… what?” I repeated like a broken robot.

  Susan smiled kindly. “It does not mean that you must run the store or anything like that. The ownership of the business and deed to the property has been transferred to you. What you do with it, of course, is up to you.”

  “And what you should do is sell,” my mother said firmly, shifting next to me on the couch. I turned to look at her.

  “Sell the store? But it’s… I mean, this bookstore is famous. An icon.”

  Was I missing something?

  “Sadly, that was a long time ago, Calvin,” Susan said, and my parents nodded in agreement. “Besides, you probably aren’t aware of this, but your grandfather’s business had been operating off credit for a long time. The finances are in terrible shape. The bookstore is in massive debt.”

  “You should sell it, Cal. This is Big Sur. Property in this area, especially with this view, will go for millions,” my mother added.

  On cue, I could hear the waves crashing against the shore. Big Sur was a bohemian paradise once. My grandfather was one of the residents that kept that spirit alive, tending it like a flame about to go out. But like every other part of Northern California, the wealthy had come in droves, seeking the quiet of the redwoods and the dramatic ocean views.

  “Bookstores, especially independent ones, are a dying breed. Everyone buys online now,” Susan said.

  My heart broke at that, even though part of me knew it to be true. I hadn’t bought a book in a while—my grandfather would have been so ashamed—and when I had, it certainly wasn’t through small, independent bookstores.

  “So, you’ll probably sell, right?” Susan asked, to which my parents both replied yes, and I said, “Um, well…I mean, I guess? I don’t know…” but they were already talking over me. I mean, of course I would sell. I had absolutely no idea how to run a business, let alone a dying one.

  “There is one thing on the event calendar I do think you should stay open for. It’s only five months from now.”

  She showed me the contract: a three-day-long photoshoot for a high-end fashion magazine, scheduled for the middle of October. My grandfather must have been desperate, since things like “fashion” and “magazines” went against his bohemian values.

  The contract he’d signed—the sight of his shaky signature sending a pang through me—promised the bookstore as the main location for three days of filming plus lodging at the tiny cabins he owned in the woods.

  “Generate some additional revenue during the final months. Do the photoshoot. Pay off as much debt as you can, then sell it to the highest bidder. Don’t worry, some investor will probably turn it into luxury condos. You won’t have to worry about it one bit,” Susan said.

  “Luxury condos,” I said sarcastically. “Exactly the vision my grandfather had.” I was surprised at how conflicted I suddenly felt.

  Susan looked at me with a pained expression. “Why don’t I leave you with your parents for a few moments?” She left without waiting for an answer, clearly knowing when it was time to make a graceful exit.

  “Cal,” my mom started, touching my knee gently. “I know how much you loved this place. And your grandfather. And the memories you have here won’t disappear just because this place won’t exist anymore.”

  “You lived here too,” I pointed out. “Aren’t you… aren’t you upset?”

  “You know my feelings about this place. I loved it, very deeply, but it’s not my home anymore and hasn’t been in a long time. It’s time to say goodbye, to let someone else enjoy the property,” she said, turning to my father who nodded in agreement.

  “Your grandfather was always very private about his finances, so we weren’t aware it was that bad. But… based on the things he told us, and the way the world has changed, it’s not surprising. I guess your mother and I always figured that when he passed away, the store would close.”

  I nodded, comforted by their usual rational wisdom. A wisdom I automatically gravitated towards, even though just being back in this store had me yearning for the wild, hippie days of my summers here. No numbers, just words on a page.

  “Yeah,” I finally said. “Yeah, you’re right.”

  “And I’m sorry this burden is falling on you,” my mom continued. “You think you can take some leave from work? If not, we can work something out, maybe we can all share responsibility. Hire someone up here to keep an eye on it.”

  I shook my head, thinking of my grandfather on the patio that night, the all-encompassing love he had for this place, the legacy he’d intended to leave me.

  I owed him this. I owed this place to stay open until the bitter end, to close with some dignity and respect—not to bulldoze it tomorrow.

  “I’ll stay,” I said, feeli
ng the weight settle onto my shoulders and not knowing what in the fuck I was going to do. But I was going to stay. “Can you get Susan?”

  My father grabbed her, and we continued the discussion. Susan was outrageously surprised that I wasn’t willing to sell tomorrow and walk off into the sunset, millions of dollars richer.

  I was surprised too.

  By the end of the meeting, my head was spinning, and I had an entire life in Silicon Valley to figure out, to shift up to Big Sur. A job to put on pause, friends to call.

  “Oh, and one more thing,” Susan said, pulling out a worn, creased letter from her bag. “This was with your grandfather’s will. Instructions for me to give to you on the event of his death.”

  A folded letter with just my name on the front, Calvin, in my grandfather’s handwriting.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “I don’t know,” she replied. “I wasn’t supposed to read it.”

  * * *

  Now, as I stood on the deck of my grandfather’s bookstore—my bookstore—I shoved the letter in my back pocket. I had a feeling what it might say, and I wasn’t prepared to deal with it right now. My grandfather was a dreamer. I’d looked up to him. Loved him.

  But I wasn’t him.

  My grandfather stared down life’s challenges head on with a twinkle in his eye and a glass of whiskey in his hand. He was fearless, always had been. If I was like my grandfather, I would have laughed at financial reports and credit scores and back taxes and said, “Fuck it. Let’s go skydiving.”

  In some ways, that was essentially what my grandfather had done, dying before having to face the realities of the irresponsible life he had lived.

  And he’d left me to inherit it all.

  Reckless bastard, I thought with a smile since I was loopy with grief and still stunned from the news.

  Tomorrow, it would hit me. Tomorrow, I’d wake up in my grandfather’s bedroom and begin living his life. Trying my hardest not think about how he’d feel about some smarmy investor buying up the place he loved the most and turning it into condos.

  The wind rustled through the redwoods. I inhaled the woodsy scent I associated with my childhood summers: bark and pine needles, saltwater and earth. Tears pricked at the back of my eyes, but I swallowed against them, turning towards the lights of my grandfather’s store.

  “Come on, Chance,” I said, heading back in.

  * * *

  Want more? Click here to buy BOHEMIAN.

  A Note from the Author

  I started writing LANDSLIDE in a tiny hotel in Ocean Shores, Washington, in August 2017. My husband and I were in the first month of a six-month road trip across the country, living in a van we’d named Van Morrison. We’d had sudden engine trouble in Olympic National Park, and a kind-hearted tow-truck driver had taken us to the only mechanic around for miles. I’d first introduced readers to Gabe and Josie in BOHEMIAN and wanted to write a sexy, insta-love novella for them that would come out in November.

  But Gabe and Josie had other ideas. For a hundred different reasons that you’re about to discover, neither insta-love, nor the hard limit of 40,000 words, was going to work. In draft after draft, I struggled to force Gabe and Josie into a plot that just didn’t fit them. So I took to the woods, literally. My husband and I are big hikers, and during this road trip, we sometimes spent four or five days a week on some kind of dirt trail: lakes, mountains, streams, rivers, canyons and miles of verdant forest. In the quiet and the stillness of nature, Gabe and Josie revealed themselves over time: their motivations, their fears, their joys and sorrows. And five months after I first started their story in Ocean Shores, I was driving home after a lovely weekend with Lucy Score (#TacoTwin), and their perfect ending came to me in a blinding flash—so strongly I had to call my best friend and have her write it down over the phone so I wouldn’t forget.

  All of this is to say I’ve never had two characters make me work harder to tell their story truthfully. For lovers of BOHEMIAN, thank you for your patience. I hope I made you proud. And for new readers, enjoy your first trip to Big Sur!

  Acknowledgments

  Big Sur, California, is a very real place. And it will change you. The Big Sur Bakery (which makes a small cameo in this book) is where I began my first outline for BOHEMIAN. It’s also where my husband and I came up with the idea to travel across the country in a van. If you’re lucky enough to go, enjoy the gorgeous trails in the Ventana Wilderness of the Los Padres National Forest. Visit Nepenthe (the inspiration for Fenix) and the Henry Miller Library (the inspiration for The Mad Ones).

  For my fearless beta readers, Faith, Jodi, and Julia: thank you for your perfect notes, support, and ideas. LANDSLIDE wouldn’t be the book it is without your exquisite feedback.

  Thank you so much to Maria Blalock for reading and offering feedback on Josie’s Mexican-American heritage. And to Michelle Rodriguez for double-checking my Spanish. In both areas, any mistakes made in this book are my own.

  For Joyce, Jodi, and Julia, my Wonder Women: you make this journey worth it. I literally cannot thank you enough for the thousands of amazing things you do for me each and every day. You have created a community of loving affirmation—and that comes from your big, beautiful hearts.

  For the Hippie Chicks, the grooviest ladies around! Thank you for bringing such passion and bravery to our little group. Your endless support and cheerleading means more than I can say.

  For Faith, my best friend and my favorite author: I can’t wait until the world gets to read your words.

  And always, always, always for Rob, who is not only the World’s Best Husband but who very enthusiastically brainstormed LANDSLIDE with me on every hike. Let’s never stop adventuring together.

  About Kathryn

  I'm an adventurous hippie chick that loves to write steamy romance. My specialty is slow-burn sexual tension with plenty of witty dialogue and tons of heart.

  I started my writing career in elementary school, writing about Star Wars and Harry Potter and inventing love stories in my journals. And I blame my obsession with slow-burn on my similar obsession for The X-Files.

  I'm a born-and-raised Philly girl, but left for Northern California right after college, where I met my adorably-bearded husband. After living there for eight years, we decided to embark on an epic, six-month road trip, traveling across the country with our little van, Van Morrison. Eighteen states and 17,000 miles later, we're back in my hometown of Philadelphia for a bit... but I know the next adventure is just around the corner.

  When I'm not spending the (early) mornings writing steamy love scenes with a strong cup of coffee, you can find me outdoors -- hiking, camping, traveling, yoga-ing.

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  Books By Kathryn

  STRICTLY PROFESSIONAL

  Edward Cavendish III and Roxy Quinn couldn’t be more different. He’s a polite, wealthy hotelier from England. She’s a scowling, bad-ass tattoo artist. But when a night of heartbreak brings them together, their chemistry – and connection – is electrifying. Seeing each other romantically is not an option – until they meet again under strictly professional circumstances.

  NOT THE MARRYING KIND

  Fiona plans to be married to her soul mate by the time she turns 30. Unfortunately, she agrees to plan a benefit concert with Max, a cocky bad boy who swears he will never settle down. But when romantic sparks fly between these two friends, will they let their rules get in the way of true love?

  BOHEMIAN

  S
hy, nerdy Calvin inherits his grandfather’s bookstore in funky Big Sur, but has no idea whether to sell the bookstore – or take on the challenge of keeping the store’s literary legacy alive. When a bohemian-style photo shoot brings famous super model Lucia Bell to Big Sur, sparks fly between these two total opposites.

  LANDSLIDE

  Gabe Shaw has the perfect life in Big Sur. He’s the third-generation-owner (and bartender) at The Bar, the only place in this funky small town where the quirky locals can drink in peace. A hopeless romantic, Gabe’s only lacking one thing: his soul mate. And when a sudden storm traps a sexy, funny make-up artist named Josie in Big Sur, one night of searing passion turns into much more. Too bad Josie doesn’t believe in falling in love.

  RIPTIDE

  Avery Dacosta is an ambitious property developer, intent on building a luxury hotel on Playa Vieja’s last untouched beach. And she has no time for Finn Travis, the laid-back, hippie surfer who decides to protest this hotel – and her workplace – every day. Unfortunately, Finn’s not only the most aggravating man she’s ever met – but sexy as hell. Can these two enemies-turned-lovers ever find a middle ground?

  SEXY SHORTS (VOLUME 1)

  A sweet, dirty collection of fourteen sexy short stories.

  BEHIND THE VEIL

  Private detective Delilah Barrett is entirely unprepared for her new assignment: hunt down a stolen rare manuscript that's hidden within Philadelphia's glamorous high society. The only catch? Delilah must go undercover as a fake married couple with her new partner Henry Finch -- a devastatingly handsome librarian. But as the danger intensifies...so does the temptation to let their fake desire become real.