Excerpt of The Holiday Serenade by Ava Miles

Excerpt 1: Fairy Tales Come True

And then the crowd seemed to part, and her fairy tale prince appeared. He wore gray dress pants and a white dress coat with a white shirt underneath. The gray silk tie had sparkles on it, something only Rhett could pull off. He wasn’t truly in a Christmas costume, but it didn’t matter. It was the most dressed up she’d ever seen him. And her heart beat rapidly in her chest.

“Don’t make the man suffer much longer,” Jill suggested, giving her a squeeze. “It’s Christmas. Time to make up. Let’s go, girls,” she said to the others.

“Wait,” Abbie called after them, but they just smiled and continued on their way.

Rhett bowed grandly in front of her. When he straightened, he plucked a red rose from his lapel and extended it to her. “Merry Christmas, Abbie.”

As she took the rose, part of her wished she wasn’t wearing white gloves. She wanted to run her fingers over the velvety petals. Instead, she brought it to her nose. “My goodness, this one is fragrant.”

That cocky smile flashed across his face. “What can I say? This hotel carries great flowers.”

And since ordering the flowers fell under her purview, she appreciated the compliment.

“So,” he continued, his golden eyes as inviting as shiny tree ornaments, “do you like it? I missed you so badly last Christmas that I wanted to celebrate being together this year. And I know you like elegant parties.”

She bit her tongue as she struggled with what to say. “Rhett, this is…lovely…more beautiful than I ever could have imagined. But you know we’re not a couple.”

His smile lost a few watts of its power. “Sure we are. You just haven’t realized it yet.”

Excerpt 2: Dating on Thin Ice

Rhett bought the tickets, and together, they put on their rental skates, sitting in the metal chairs that lined the outdoor rink. Couples skated by—and many times one partner was clearly better than the other, helping their loved one stay upright with each slip and trip. Kids screamed at each other as they skated past, some looking like they’d been born with blades on their feet, others doing a hop-hop-hop, arms flailing before they took a dive and slid across the ice like they were trying to get to second base.

Christmas music boomed over the loud speakers arranged around the rink. Right now, Bing Crosby was crooning “I’ll Be Home For Christmas.” His mama would have loved it.

Hands pulling at her laces, Abbie said, “I’m really relieved they spray the skates with Lysol. I mean, you don’t know what people’s feet are like.”

Her voice was so serious, he had to bite his lip to keep from laughing out loud. Only Abbie would think of something like that.

All laced up, he took her hand. “Okay, let’s go.”

The minute he hit the ice with her, his right foot slid out a few inches. Wisely, he released Abbie’s hand, his arms flailing out like those little kids they’d watched earlier. And at his whopping height of six foot six, he probably looked like a giraffe about to make a crash landing on the ice.

“Best stay a few yards away until I get the hang of this,” he told her, watching as she tucked her hands behind her back, skated forward like a pro, and then did this ridiculously scary turn he knew would make him break a leg if he tried it.

“You’re a natural!” he beamed, and then his feet jimmied again on the ice, causing him to hop like an out-of-control rabbit.

The smile on her face was the kind that inspired poets. “I can’t beat you at poker, but I’ll best you at this. I took ice skating lessons when we lived in Wyoming. I love it.”

And when she threw her arms out and did another one of those twirly turns, his heart plopped at his feet. God, she was the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen, and he’d seen a fair amount. He could never get enough of her black hair, green eyes, and porcelain skin…or that wickedly slim yet curvy body.

Then his ankle turned, and he had to fight to stay upright. Shit. Where were his leg muscles? Heck, he worked out, but two minutes on the ice had turned him into Plastic Man. The dumb things a guy did for a girl.

“Go on and skate ahead. I know you want to,” he said, being realistic. This wasn’t going to be the romantic hand- holding date he’d hoped for.

Mostly because he sucked.

And looked like an idiot. This was not putting him in his best light at all.

She waved and skated off, her feet crisscrossing as she picked up speed on the ice. He tried to follow her, but when he swiveled his head to watch her, his feet did the whole slide-scamper, running-in-place thing again. He’d invented a new skating technique: jogging on the ice like a moron.

The people watching from the sidelines weren’t even trying to contain their laughter. Terrific. Normally he didn’t mind attention—heck, he invited it—but tonight he’d wanted to lay a metaphorical Christmas cloak at Abbie’s feet like a prince.

Instead, he was trying not to crash onto the ice more than those punishing few times he’d fallen in the beginning. Each time he’d get back up, jaw locked, and think, watch out, kids, I don’t want to crush you as the adolescent skaters zipped past him, guffawing like baboons. When Rhett started complaining to himself about the kids’ antics, he realized he was sounding like an old man.

It was a low point, all right.

Abbie would circle him when she reached him, making him dizzy from something other than her perfume. Then she’d laugh and take off again, her blades calling out swish-swish as they made grooves in the ice.

“I like seeing you like this,” he said as she came to a stop in front of him for what seemed like the hundredth time, a mist of ice from her toe-picks cascading over his own skates.

“I love being out here. The weather is perfect when you wear the right gear, and it’s so freeing.”

Yeah, she did look free—a word that could rarely be used to describe her.

For as long as he’d known her, she’d been chained to the past—a past she’d finally shared with him—and her responsibilities to Dustin, Mac, and the hotel chain.

How wonderful to see her this way. He would do anything he could to put this look on her face every day.