Christmas Watch By Petie McCarty ~ Peek Inside And Giveaway

Posted: August 13, 2025 in Excerpt, giveaways, Romance, suspense
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Welcome to my stop on the virtual book tour for Christmas Watch organized by Goddess Fish Promotions.

Author Petie McCarty will be awarding a $10 Amazon or B&N Gift Card to a randomly drawn winner. Don’t forget to enter!

And you can click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.

 Christmas Watch

By Petie McCarty

 

 

Genre:  Romantic Suspense

Synopsis

The Watchers Series

Fallen angels seeking parole for their betrayal . . .

 

Someone is watching Rachel . . . but who? And why?

 

Child psychologist Rachel Kelly has her Christmas stocking full of troubles this holiday season, both personal and professional. Recently separated from her boyfriend, Rachel still loves him but has no idea how to win him back. If that’s not enough to cause her sleepless nights, she’s uncertain how to handle her newest therapy client—a six-year-old boy who claims he talks to Watchers. And a Watcher is coming to help Rachel.

 

Lt. Jake Dillon has his heart broken when his fiancée Rachel, without warning, suddenly calls it quits. Yet when a stalker crashes Rachel’s Christmas party and takes her young clients hostage, Jake is the first person Rachel calls. Now he has a choice to make—stand back and wait for the cavalry to save her, or step in and try to save her himself. Time is running out, and Jake may be their only chance for rescue.

 

Unless Rachel’s young Watcher spy is telling the truth . . .

 

This romantic suspense tale with paranormal elements is Book 2 in The Watchers series . . . A captivating tale of small-town Christmas romance that will leave you looking over your shoulder and wondering, Is someone watching me?

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Enjoy this peek inside:

Jake whipped his BMW into the Azalea Center parking lot and switched off his headlights in one smooth motion. Guided by the light from the few streetlamps, he coasted to a silent stop next to Wally’s Jeep, though his emotions had urged him to come screeching around the corner like the cavalry. Common sense and the need for stealth won out. He couldn’t risk driving the trespasser underground only to have him surface later after Jake had gone.

 

Clicking off his interior lights, he unlocked his glove compartment and drew out his Sig Sauer, then climbed out and quietly pushed the car door in until the latch held. He waited several seconds to let his eyes and ears take in the entire scene. Damn. All the landscaping crowded around the Center provided a multitude of places for a trespasser to hide.

 

He put a hand on the hood of Wally’s Jeep. Still warm, even in the cold night air. A brief stab of guilt hit him for dumping his team so abruptly in the Beef n’ Barrel. Couldn’t be helped.

 

He scanned the closest landscape beds for some sign of Wally. A stiff north breeze whipped across the parking area, stirring up leaves and debris. Barely visible through the treetops, the almost-full moon blazed bright.

 

He made his way past the large perimeter oaks to the interior sidewalk and began a slow circle of the building, checking sections of the garden as he paced. All the offices on the west side of the building were unoccupied, and all the windows were dark, with a few showing vestiges of their interiors due to adjacent emergency lighting.

 

Rachel’s office, just around the corner, faced the back of the property. At this time of night, her office interior would be entirely visible with her lights on. Jake knew this because he’d snuck over here enough times in the last few months to observe her office from the garden. He was pathetic and, every few weeks, needed a glimpse of her to get by. A wry smile twitched the edges of his mouth. He could’ve been called in as a trespasser on any one of those nights should someone have spotted him and cared enough to make the call.

 

Careful to remain off the sidewalk, he silently paced toward the back garden. If the trespasser was a stalker, then the perp probably knew the Center had no security guard and no security system. A fact that had always bothered Jake.

 

At the back corner of the property, he crossed the sidewalk to inspect the landscape areas adjacent to the building. With quick steps, he shifted from one landscape bed to another. Crouching as he left the larger camellias, he moved through the shorter azaleas and Indian hawthorn.

 

Clearing the corner, his position even with the back of the building, he paused to reconnoiter and stared at the faint pool of light cast by an overhead office. Rachel’s office.

 

As his gaze rose to the second-floor office, his eyes searched for the all-too-familiar figure. Without thinking, he straightened to his full height, clearly visible to anyone glancing out the window. Yet no one searched for a figure in the garden. All eyes in the office were busy.

 

Rachel stood with Olivia and her children on one side of the conference room. On the other side of the room, a man in a worn red jacket and baseball cap faced them. Pointing a gun.

 

This was Jake’s horrible nightmare.

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About Author Petie McCarty

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Petie spent a large part of her career working at Walt Disney World—”The  Most Magical Place on Earth”—where she enjoyed working in the land of fairy tales by day and creating her own romantic fairy tales by night, including her new series, The Cinderella Romances. She eventually said good-bye to her “day” job to write her stories full-time.

These days Petie spends her time writing new Cinderella series tales, her new The Watchers series, sequels to her regency time-travel series, Lords in Time, and more contemporary romance standalones to go along with her two previous releases—Any Fin For Love and Ambush in the Everglades.

Petie shares her home on the Cumberland Plateau in Tennessee with her horticulturist husband and an opinionated Nanday conure named Sassy who made a cameo appearance in Book 2 of The Watchers, Christmas Watch.

 

Visit Petie’s web site online at http://www.petiemccarty.com or her Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/petie.mccarty.

 

Social Media: Website / Facebook / Twitter/X / Goodreads / BookBub / Amazon

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Thanks so much for visiting fuonlyknew and Good Luck!

For a list of my reviews go HERE.

To see all of my giveaways go HERE.

Comments
  1. Thank you so much for featuring CHRISTMAS WATCH today.

  2. marcymeyer says:

    The blurb and excerpt sound good.

  3. Kim says:

    Enjoyed the excerpt. Petie, do you have a favorite character from this book?

    • I do. I loved writing Alex, the little boy who sees Watchers. He is such a sweetheart, and the scene on his birthday where he and “Mark” get hit by a car actually happened to a good friend of mine. When she told me her story, I rewrote his scene in the book.
      Glad you liked the excerpt, and thanks for following!

  4. allibrarycefdb51301 says:

    Working for Walt Disney World would be an interesting career for an aspiring writer. There are lots of people to observe there.

    Nancy
    allibrary (at) aol (dot) com

    • There isn’t a greater place to work in the country than WDW, both for opportunities and the wonderful people you get to work with.
      I’m still close friends with the tour guides I worked with in the Magic Kingdom back in the 70s, and we actually have reunions. We found each other via Facebook, about 60 of us now spread out all over the country.

  5. Rita Wray says:

    Sounds like a book I will enjoy reading.

  6. Anne says:

    A captivating and intriguing novel. A real treasure.

  7. Carol G says:

    This sounds interesting, but would probably like to read the first one before starting this one.

  8. PIroska says:

    Thanks for the great excerpt. The book sounds very intriguing. Love the cover!

    • Thank you so much for the kind words. I hope you’ll give it a try. This was the most difficult writing challenge I have faced thus far with the hostage scenes and keeping everyone in the right place at the right time.

  9. This looks like a very good book.

  10. wendy hutton says:

    this sounds like a good book

  11. Mary Preston says:

    Fallen Angels caught my attention.

  12. wendy hutton says:

    the cover really grabbed my attention

  13. Thank you so much, Laura, for sponsoring my Goddess Fish Book Blitz tour for my new release, Christmas Watch! I greatly appreciate your support and the wonderful opportunity to meet some of your many followers!

  14. wendy hutton says:

    thanks, hope you have a good weekend

  15. wendy hutton says:

    do you have any hobbies

  16. wendy hutton says:

    what inspired you to be a writer

  17. Mx. Phoebe says:

    I love holiday stories.

  18. wendy hutton says:

    this sounds like a wonderful story to read

  19. wendy hutton says:

    how many books have you written

  20. wendy hutton says:

    when did you start writing

  21. wendy hutton says:

    any new books coming out soon

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