Autumn Leaves — Annie Smith

Love Starts With Opening Your Heart...
Karen Matheson, a child psychologist and head of Newfoundland Dog Rescue, is great with other people's kids and her huge, gentle canines. But with her own daughter, Katie, single mom Karen feels like a failure. Growing up without a father has taken its toll on Katie, who, in her final year of high school, is moody, resentful, and loath to confide in Karen. Katie's estranged dad was a marine, and the need to somehow connect with that unknown part of her prompts the girl to begin hanging out at local gym, taking boxing lessons from ex-marine Steve Songer.

To nonviolent Karen, Steve has three strikes against him: the Corps, a boxing gym, and, of all dogs, a pit bull. Worse, she blames him when Katie secretly enlists in the Marines! Yet as the distance between mother and daughter grows, Karen turns to Steve for help. The emotional fire that ignites between them stuns her. She has long given most of her affection to the Newfies she rescues. But real love means finding the courage to take a leap of faith, face a long-kept secret, and perhaps risk everything to follow her heart...