Simmer

Chef Lena Ellison had a restaurant, a fiancé, and a name that meant something in Nashville — until the fiancé stole the restaurant and thirty-one seconds of her worst day made her name mean something else entirely.

So when her grandmother's will drags her back to Marlow Bend, the plan is simple: fix up the crumbling Bell & Thistle Inn, sell it, fund her comeback, get out.

Nobody told her about Wes Hartigan.

Gorgeous. Infuriating. A man who uses words like they're rationed — and who somehow owns forty-nine percent of her inheritance. Wes would rather burn the place down than sell it, and thanks to Gran's will, Lena can't unload a single floorboard without him.

One summer. One failing kitchen. One bet: if Lena can cook the inn back into the black by the Founders' Day festival, it stays open. If she can't, Wes signs.

But someone in Marlow Bend wants the inn to fail badly enough to get dangerous. Wes is keeping a secret that could break Lena's heart twice. Gran's letters keep arriving from beyond the grave with instructions — and opinions. And the longer Lena and Wes circle each other across that pass window — all sharp words and slow hands — the more the deal starts to feel a lot less like business.

Because Gran always said anybody can boil. The good things simmer.