Happy Valentine’s Day!

I know Valentine’s Day isn’t always everybody’s favourite day, but I love it…and not just because I’m a romance author 😉. My husband and I met on Valentine’s Day thirty years ago (yes, you read that right. Three. Zero.) . Obviously we were babies 😂 because there is no way I am that old…okay, maybe there is 🤷‍♀️

Anyway, it’s Valentine’s Day and if you didn’t know, I’m part of a boxset full of swoony sweet and spicy love stories specifically aimed at this day.

You can grab this boxset for just 99c or if you’re in Kindle Unlimited, you can download it for FREE!

Click here to buy

The story I have in the set is a Young Billionaires adjacent novella. If you’ve read Christmas with the Billionaire, then you would have already met Trina and Tony, who are the stars of my story, Unbreak My Heart.

It’s a second chance romance and was inspired by a couple of songs (which you can find out all about when you read the book!)

This boxset is only available on Amazon, but if you don’t read on Amazon, I will be releasing it as a standalone at a later date, so keep your eyes peeled!

Now, it wouldn’t be Valentine’s Day without a love story, right? So of course I have one for you…it’s called “While I Wasn’t Looking.”

While I Wasn’t Looking

I couldn’t believe it. Valentine’s Day and I was stuck on a damn bus heading into the wilds…or at least as wild as it got in the bush on the outskirts of Brisbane. What did camping have to do with retail, anyway? Yeah, I didn’t know either, but there I was, on a bus, on the way to three days in the bush for a ‘team building’ exercise or something like that. I knew customers could be brutal but I would hardly have thought I’d need wilderness survival training to deal with them…or maybe I would?

There were plenty of other places I would have preferred to be. On the beach, for one. And it wasn’t that I was anti-camping, on the contrary, I’d done my fair share of it. I was an army cadet for twelve months and spending three days on bivouac in a torrential downpour with nothing but a rations pack, the clothes on my back, and a hutchie taught me plenty about surviving in the bush. I’d also camped with my family and surviving my brother and stepbrother while spending a week in a tent with them gave me many useful skills…probably not ones I could use with customers, though.

So yeah, Valentine’s Day and instead of spending the day hoping that Mark would finally ask me out, I’d spent an hour on a bus with the rest of my training group as we sped up the highway from the Gold Coast and into the city. Apparently we had to pick up some students from another training group before we headed bush. Whatever. I did not want to be there and it wasn’t because I didn’t like camping. If it had been any other weekend then I wouldn’t have minded, but it just had to be Valentine’s weekend, just when I thought I was finally going to move from friend to more than friend with the boy I’d been mooning over for the last few months.

A elbow dug into my ribs. “Hey, Amelia, check out those guys.”

I lifted my head to my friend, Jenny, and listlessly looked out the window to the group of people standing on the curb waiting to board the bus. I couldn’t really see who she pointing to. There were a couple of dark haired guys, butI couldn’t see their faces and I wasn’t looking for a hook up. I had my eyes on someone else and he was a hundred ks away, probably at surfboat training.

I sighed.

The new students boarded and the bus set off again. I looked out the window, not paying any attention to anyone, moping about being somewhere I really didn’t want to be, and wishing Mark would see me as more than a friend.

Eventually the bus stopped and we all disembarked. We were at the head of a trail that led into the scrub and we had to carry our own gear in and then carry it all back out again at the end of the weekend.

I bent over to adjust my pink Converse Hi-tops and picked up my pack. I’d dressed appropriately at least. Khaki cargo pants that ended at my knees and a pink tank top to match my converse. I tightened my ponytail and slipped my hat on. It was summer and it was hot and I once again wondered what the hell I was doing in the bush instead of on the beach.

“The hike in is going to take a couple of hours,” the guide said. “Don’t ask me how much further because I will answer with ‘just around the corner.’ Don’t ask me how much longer because I will answer, ‘another ten minutes.’ Neither of those answers will be correct.”

The was a chuckle from the group and I rolled my eyes. He thought he was funny. Great.

With no more fanfare we headed into the bush along the dirt track. I don’t know how long we walked, but it was long and hot and up a lot of hills. But he time we reached the campsite, I was ready for a shower and a nap, but no such luck. We had to make camp first.

Jenny and I pitched our tent without too much trouble. I’d done it before, bigger and smaller tents, so it was no biggie. I was slowly thawing to the whole weekend camping thing, even if it meant missing out on Valentine’s Day. The scenery was beautiful and it was nice to get out of the hustle and bustle of the Gold Coast.

“There’s a swimming pool,” Jenny said, coming back from getting some supplies. “We’ve got a couple of hours free time before dinner.”

“I don’t feel like swimming,” I said, “but I’ll come and watch.”

A swim would be exactly the thing to cool me off, but there was no way I was getting into my swimmers in front of the people I had to do classes with.

I walked with Jenny to the small pool area and took a seat far enough away from the edge so I wouldn’t get splashed. A couple of guys I didn’t know ran past and jumped into the pool, causing a splash almost big enough to reach me.

“Crap,” one of them said, holding his arm in the air. “I forgot about my watch.”

“I can look after it for you,” I offered.

He climbed out of the pool and walked toward me, a smile on his face.

“Yeah? You don’t mind?”

I returned his smile. He was cute. Dark hair hung over his forehead and he had full lips, the kind I knew would be soft if I kissed him.

“I don’t mind,” I said, reaching for the watch.

He dropped it in my hand and gave me another smile. “Thanks,” he said. “My name’s Daniel.”

“Amelia,” I replied.

He smiled again before walking back to the pool to join his friends.

And that’s the story of how I met my husband 30 years ago! (The names have been changed to protect the innocent 😇 ) . It is a true story and obviously there is more to it…maybe I will write the next instalment sometime…you never know 😉