By
NY Times & USA Today Bestselling Author
Cynthia D’Alba

Being the younger sister of a beautiful, popular, and smart woman makes following behind her in life a tough existence…especially when you’ve always been in love with her childhood boyfriend.

As her sister’s maid of honor, Brianna Treadway can’t wait to help with the wedding planning. The problem is her sister wants to do the wedding planning during a couples snow ski trip for six days, and Brianna isn’t part of a couple. Her sister spontaneously invites one of Brianna’s co-workers to come along as Brianna’s date, a man who was once her sister’s high school boyfriend. Convinced her co-worker’s love interest is her sister and not Brianna, and believing he is going on the trip to come between her sister and her fiancé, Brianna agrees to go to keep him away from her sister. But how can she stop wanting him for herself?

At thirty-five, Brody Knight is tired of the dating scene. He’s ready to settle down and knows exactly who he wants to spend his life with. The problem is the woman he wants doesn’t want him, unless he’s misinterpreting her actions. When an old childhood friend invites him on a snow ski trip as a date for her younger sister, Brody jumps at the chance. The trip gives him six days to impress the woman who keeps turning him down.

When Brianna confesses that she’s only going on this trip to keep Brody from breaking up her sister and fiancé, how can he convince her that she’s the one he wants, not her sister? When Brianna sees something not meant for her eyes, how can she believe anything else but that Brody wants her sister and not Brianna?

Brianna has spent years concentrating on her career. As an architect she not only designs buildings but also renovations. Her current project is designing a ski lodge for the Carmichaels.

Brody is partners in the firm where Brianna works, he encouraged his partner to hire her when she left her previous position before she had chance to look for another. The problem for him is he’s attracted to her and would really like the chance to win her heart.

Brianna has had a crush on Brody since he dated her sister Addison in High School. However, Addison insists that all those dates with him were friend dates. Brianna is not convinced since the two of them have kept in touch over the years.

Addison is now engaged and has asked Brianna to be her maid of honor and join her and Eli on a ski trip where she would be planning her wedding. Eli’s brother Zane and his wife Wendy and one other couple would be joining them and Brianna doesn’t want to be the only single person their and she has no one to ask. Well at least not until Brody interrupts a video call with Addison in her office.

This is just one of many favorite scenes.

My sister, however, had been aware of my adolescent crush, and ever since I’d joined the same architectural firm in Dallas where Brody worked, loved to tease me about him.

“I’m on the phone, Brody.” I might have snarled the words a little.

“Brody?” my sister said. “Brody Knight? Is that you?”

Brody frowned and walked around my desk like he owned the space. “Addison? Wow.” He whistled. “You look fantastic.” He perched his butt— a pretty fabulous ass I had to admit— on the credenza behind my desk and crossed his ankles. “How long has it been?”

“Five years,” she said. “Our tenth high school reunion.”

“Right. You still married to jerkface?”

Addison snorted. “Nope. Jerkface can’t come within one hundred feet of me.” She grinned. “Court-ordered restraining order, but I think it’s my fiancé who’s really keeping him away. Eli threatened to shoot Denis if he saw him again.”

Brody laughed. “Fiancé, huh?”

“Yep.”

He snapped his fingers. “Missed you being single again.”

Addison rolled her eyes with a laugh.

I sighed loudly. “Brody, this is a private conversation. Can I bring the plans down to you later?”

“Sure, Queen Bee.”

“Please don’t call me that.”

Addison laughed. “I can’t believe you remember her nickname.”

“Of course, I do. Your little sister followed us everywhere back then.”

I groaned; I’m sure my cheeks went rosy red. “Enough with the good old days.”

“Hey, Brody,” Addison said. “You married?”

I leaned toward the computer screen and gave my sister my fiercest glare in an effort to shut her up. I’m sure she got the message, just as I’m sure she chose to ignore my threat, and with her being located hundreds of miles away in Montana, I simply had no threat power.

“Not married, not engaged, not dating anyone at the moment. Why?”

“Wait,” I said to my sister and turned to look at him, his sexy ass still propped on my credenza. “What happened to Tiffany, or Brittany, or whatever her name was that you brought to the company Labor Day party?”

“Aww,” Brody said. “You remember my date. Her name was Eva, and we broke up.”

“Oh. Sorry.”

He shrugged. “I’m not. We weren’t on the same page when it came to long term.”

“Ah.” I was nobody’s fool. I could read between the lines. My money was on Eva wanting marriage, the white picket fence, and babies, and Brody wanting football, poker nights with the guys, and no commitments.

Sorry, world, but the last thing I needed in my life was a commitment-phobic man.

“Hey, Brody. I was trying to talk Bri into going with us on a snow skiing vacation. Doesn’t that sound like fun?”

“Addison….” The warning threat was clear in my tone, not that my sister cared. She was in Montana. I was in Texas. Short of turning off my computer, there wasn’t much I could do to her.

“It does.” Brody smiled at me. “I didn’t know you knew how to snow ski.”

His mega-watt smile sent my belly twisting with lust. “I know how. I don’t get to go as much as I would like, but I can ski.”

Addison snapped her fingers in the camera lens. “I’ve got a great idea. Brody, why don’t you come along with her? Neither of you is dating anyone, so there’d be no one left at home to be jealous.”

“Addison, that’s rude. You don’t ask someone you haven’t spoken to in forever to go on an expensive vacation. Besides, I’m sure Brody has better things to do than go skiing with my sister and her fiancé.” My heart pounded loudly in my ears. I’m sure if anyone looked closely, the veins in my neck and forehead were distended and pulsing visibly.

“Brody has a voice and his own opinions,” he said with a wink in my direction. “And Brody says it sounds interesting. What’re the deets?”

“We’re going to a large estate in Winter Falls, Montana. There are nine bedrooms, all with private baths. A gourmet kitchen that has my fiancé drooling with appliance lust. There are fireplaces and gathering rooms all over the house. Best of all, it’s ski-in-ski-out. We head to the lodge on December tenth and go home on December sixteenth. Just a quick getaway before the holiday madness.”

Brody’s eyes widened. “That sounds incredible. I’m assuming we’re all pitching in on costs?”

Addison grinned. “Nope. That’s the best part. Everyone has to get themselves there, rent skis, if needed, and pick up the food costs, but the house rental is covered, compliments of my future brother-in-law and his wife.” She leaned closer to her camera as though sharing a secret. “And my guy will be doing the dinners at night. That alone is worth the trip.”

I sighed and looked at Brody’s chiseled chin and piercing blue eyes. He’d begun growing a beard in October, and my fingers were itching to see if it was as soft as it looked. Butterflies scattered in my belly as I risked a long look at him.

“Brody, we can’t both be out of the office at the same time. There’s no way Mr. Kent would allow that. Besides, I can’t go. I have to work on the Carmichael plans. You promised them we’d have the plans ready to review in January. With Thanksgiving next week, followed by a ski vacation, and then all the Christmas parties leading up to the holidays. Tme will evaporate, and the plans won’t get done.” I looked at Addison. “I’m sorry, Addy, but I can’t see how this would work out. Don’t get me wrong. I’d love to, but…” I shrugged. “Work.”

Addison’s face fell. “Are you sure?”

“Let me see what I can do to get you that time off, Bri, okay?” Brody said with a grin that make his damn blue eyes twinkle. “Besides, nobody works the week after Christmas. The office is open, but it’s very quiet. It’s kind of the perfect week to get a ton of catch-up work done.”
Cynthia D’Alba. Six Days and One Knight (Kindle Locations 77-119). Riante, Inc.

Brody makes a lot more than just the trip possible, he kind of makes it a working trip. Research for the Carmichael plans which means more than just this trip together for them. Apparently, there’s another property the Carmichaels might just renovate instead of a full build.

I love this story and the way it unfolds. Brianna is convinced Brody wants to break Addison and Eli up which makes for some funny situations. Brody denies it all and has one heck of a time trying to get Brianna to understand he wants her, not Addison.

Lots of laughter, fun, sizzle and some tears too.

5 Contented Purrs for Cynthia!

Cynthia D’Alba

New York Times and USA Today Bestselling author Cynthia D’Alba started writing on a challenge from her husband in 2006 and discovered having imaginary sex with lots of hunky men was fun.

She was born and raised in a small Arkansas town. After being gone for a number of years, she’s thrilled to be making her home back in Arkansas living in a vine-covered cottage on the banks of an eight-thousand acre lake. When she’s not reading or writing or plotting, she’s doorman for her two dogs, cook, housekeeper and chief bottle washer for her husband and slave to a noisy, messy parrot. She loves to chat online with friends and fans.