Maggie Shayne

Rom-Com Ghost Mysteries by Award-Winning Author Maggie ShayneJohnny's would-be girlfriend has called it quits, his newfound grandfather has pulled a vanishing act, and his odd connection to the dying has mutated into something else altogether, something he doesn't understand. Suffice to say, he was already having a lousy week when a kid came tearing out of the woods like the devil was chasing him and right into the path of his truck. Teenage Ryan isn't too badly hurt, but it turns out the seventeen-year-old has a serious ghost problem. He was convinced no one would believe him or be able to help him even if they did. But that was before he met Johnny and the gang at Spook Central. Johnny takes Ryan and his gorgeous older sister Breia to Kiley and Jack's no-longer-haunted Victorian money pit, which is also the gang's ghost-busting headquarters. But Kiley's not so sure the house is phantom-free. She says she's heard a female's smoke-and-whiskey voiced laughter a couple of times, which is weird as she's a total muggle. Maya, their resident Wiccan, sets wards around the place to keep ghosts away while Johnny sets wards around his heart to stay in the friend zone where she's put him. Her reasons are both practical and ridiculous since she's as drawn to him as he is to her. Also, he's pretty sure their fates are entwined. Soon, however, they're both too busy trying to protect a young boy and stay alive while doing it. Spirits the likes of which they've never encountered unleash hellish fury on them all, and survival takes precedence over their own star-crossed journey to love. A romantic comedy ghost mystery.

Caleb didn't know that one night of bliss last spring with small town beauty Maya Brand had resulted in a pregnancy, until the blackmail attempt arrived on his desk in an unmarked envelope, complete with photos of Maya with a belly out to there. When he learns the truth, Caleb rushes back to Big Falls, determined to make it right despite what the scandal will do to his high profile career and the family legacy he's never truly wanted. All he wants is Maya and their child. But can a girl whose father abandoned and betrayed her, ever truly believe in the goodness of a man who left town the morning after losing her virginity to their one-night-stand? How can he convince her that he hasn't stopped thinking about her since then, much less do so with the whole world watching? His chance to prove himself arrives when a freak storm isolates Maya and labor comes on early on a Christmas Eve no one in Big Falls will ever forget.

When former Secret Service agent Alex Stone is asked to impersonate a foreign dignitary who wears a full beard and is rarely seen without his sunglasses, it's not a problem. But getting someone to impersonate the man's new bride, a beauty the world adores, is a little bit harder. Melusine Brand looks astoundingly like the pampered princess. She's also a rough and tumble Oklahoma girl with colorful language. Besides, she'll never agree. Only, she does. Alex has to tutor her to survive the glitzy world he's used to. But when things take a turn and they're on the run in the wilderness with killers on their heels, it's Mel's turn to school him. Depending on each other to stay alive, these two opposites find a love that's stronger than either of them could have imagined...and hope they can live long enough to claim it.

The girl who was too good for him? In high school, Wade Armstrong had been half in love with Edie Brand, even though she barely seemed to notice his existence. Like the rest of this town, she thought him beneath her. That was how it seemed to him, anyway. But he'd grown up determined to prove them wrong, and now he owns a successful garage which is wallpapered with Edie Brand's photo spreads from the Vanessa's Whisper lingerie catalogue. He fascinated and terrified her? In high school, Edie had been afraid to even look at Wade Armstrong. He was too hot, too smooth, and his reputation of being able to get any girl to say yes on the first date scared the daylights out of her. Now a bad boy is what she needs? She's back in town, driven out of L. A. and her lucrative modeling career by a crazed stalker who nearly killed her once?and who seems to have followed her home. The attraction between these two burns them both, while a dangerous admirer watches, and grows angrier.

The truth will out? The secret Vidalia Brand has been keeping for decades is about to come out. And she's terrified it will destroy her already fraught relationship with her youngest daughter, Selene. A man's last wish.... Bobby Joe McIntrye is back in Big Falls, Oklahoma, and even he doesn't know what really happened between him and Vidalia all those years ago. But it doesn't matter. All he wants is to spend his final Christmas with the only woman he's ever loved; Vidalia Brand. A Christmas Miracle.... Holidays in Vidalia's clan are known for their miracles, and this year, she's asking for the biggest one of all.

A heartwarming, tear-inducing, holiday miracle kind of story you'll never forget... All Tyler wants for Christmas is a Mommy. He wants that more than he want to be able to walk without his crutches, or to skip his next surgery. Just a mommy. His father, Chicago Cop Jimmy Corona is determined to find him one in his hometown of Big Falls Oklahoma. But trouble follows him there, trouble that could get them both killed. Once shy and awkward, Kara Brand has blossomed into a graceful beauty with the biggest heart in the state of Oklahoma. Jimmy thinks she's the perfect mommy-candidate, and she falls in love with little Ty at first sight. His plan is to win her and wed her, not to love her. But he never intended for her to get caught in between a murderous criminal and his little boy.

When Selene Brand, is out by the falls, dancing half naked with her fellow rebellious tree-worshipping types, and casting for the love of her life to fall at her feet, a stranger stumbles out of the woods and does just that. He's been stabbed. And when he opens his eyes, all he sees is a topless wood-nymph holding a dagger. When she bends close and asks his name, he realizes that he doesn't know the answer. Nor does he know who stabbed him, but the local law seems to suspect Selene. And yet she's the one who picks him up when he goes on the run. It soon becomes apparent that someone is trying to kill him because he knows something that he can't remember. Selene is determined to help him figure out who. Soon he realizes the only person on his side is a witchy little vegetarian who's running away for reasons of her own. And he wonders if a guy without a memory can really fall in love so fast.

Darryl is on a quest for peace. His chance at fatherhood was taken from him long ago, and an IED in Iraq ensured he'd never get another. In Big Falls, the McIntyre brothers hire him to keep an eye on their beautiful cousin Sophie in case her criminal ex shows up. He doesn't expect to fall head over heels. Sophie McIntyre's life was blown apart by a drug dealing ex who cost her her job and nearly her medical license. She comes to Big Falls because she has nowhere else to go. And the minute she gets there, things start to get better. Is it because of that letter to Santa her Aunt Vidalia convinced her to write? Within days she meets a beautiful man with a deeply wounded soul. And oddly, she finds herself giving him the same advice the town Santa gave to her-try believing again, and if it's too much to believe, then just try hoping. Love, magic, and miracles ensue. Because this is Big Falls, Oklahoma. Miracles are an everyday occurrence around here. Especially at Christmastime. BELIEVE AGAIN with MAGGIE SHAYNE expanded author's cut edition of the story previously published in Buckles, Boots and Mistletoe.

A Woman From The Past.... When he first finds himself at an old west hanging in the middle of Quinn Texas, Elliot realizes that he probably hit his head a little harder than he thought when he ran his brother's truck into a tree. It's only a concussion-induced delusion, but he rescues the beautiful outlaw from the gallows all the same. When the delusions clear, and she's still with him, he figures he's either losing his mind, or else that amulet his archaeologist sister-in-law dug up has some kind of strange powers, after all. Regardless of how she got from her time to his, Esmeralda Montoya claims the Texas Brand is rightfully hers. His family want her gone. His sister Jessie would prefer to skin her alive. But all Elliot wants to do is kiss her, hold her, love her, and keep her in his world forever.

As a little girl, Sara Brand witnessed the murder of her family, an event that has left deep emotional scars. She's beginning to heal, having found extended family in Texas and the brother she thought she'd lost. On break from her job teaching Kindergarten, Sarah has come to vacation at Sugar Keep, an old plantation in the Louisiana Bayou country. But trouble hasn't finished with her yet. It shows up in the form of darkly handsome Jake Nash, a man with a hands-off attitude and sizzling brown eyes, who turns out to be an ex-con suspected of murder. Before she can make up her mind about him, someone is killed right in front of Sarah's eyes. She doesn't see the killer, but the killer saw her. Now she's on the run and there's only one person protecting her. Jake. Is he "her shield" as a Voodoo Priestess told her, or is he stalking her with the intent to silence her forever?