When she moves to London following her divorce, Michelle Loeser has no interest in looking for love. She needs to focus on surviving without her ex’s six-figure income, coping with a severe fear of heights, and rebuilding her confidence. And if she keeps her promise to her best friend, she’ll pursue her passion for writing too.

Will Sheridan found his passion early in life. At age eleven, he was cast in the starring role in a film series. Now, at the age of 25, he’s a celebrity at a crossroads in his career. He has no time for women who don’t understand his priorities.

When Will offers to help Michelle acclimate to the unfamiliar city in exchange for cooking lessons, she figures what’s the harm? But jealous fans and coworkers, eager paparazzi, and a distrustful mother see it differently.

Excerpt:

I walked into my office cubicle, hung up my jacket, and logged onto my computer like I did every morning. I stood, picked up my empty coffee mug, turned, and slammed into Olivia. “Come with me,” she whispered. I sighed heavily and followed my co-worker into the conference room where I found Paige already sitting at the large table.

“I saw your photo in the newspaper,” Paige said, shoving a clipping in my direction.

“I wouldn’t exactly call it a newspaper,” I replied, but not having gotten a good look at the picture the previous night, I picked up the clipping and examined it. It was of poor quality—probably taken with a cell phone camera. I hadn’t noticed the caption yesterday: Will Sheridan gets attacked by cougar. Despite the lack of creativity in those words, my insides felt like they were being attacked by a cougar. “Nice,” I said pretending to sound disinterested as I pushed the paper back toward Paige.

“Well?”

“Well what?”

“Tell Olivia and me what you’re doing in the paper.”

“Kissing someone.”

“This is no time to be cheeky. Just what were you doing kissing William Sheridan? We didn’t even know you knew him.”

“You do know him, right?” Olivia interjected.

“No. I just walked up to him in a café, sat on his lap, and planted a wet one on his mouth.”

“You’re on his lap?” Olivia gave the clipping another look. “Why, you are on his lap. And he has no shirt on.”

I let out a deep breath. “I met Will when I first came to London, and we became friends. We’ve spent a lot of time together and gotten to know each other quite well.” Paige’s expression begged me to define how well I knew him. “We’ve become a little more than friends recently.”

“By snogging naked in a café?”

Even I had to laugh at the silliness of Paige’s statement. “I admit, it does look pretty bad, but for your information, Will is not naked, he’s just shirtless.”

“The caption says he’s shirtless and trouser-less,” Olivia corrected.

“He was covered.”

“By a towel,” Olivia added.

“A bath sheet,” I corrected like it made a big difference. I went on to explain what had happened to lead up to the public kiss. When I finished, Olivia stared at me, open mouthed.

“So does this mean you’re dating William Sheridan?” Paige asked.

“Yes, I guess I am.”

I was barely out of the conference room when Paige griped, “Can you believe that American? She thinks she can write a novel and have one our most eligible bachelors.”

To read my blog post about visiting London in search of Will and Michelle’s world, click here.