Title: The Challenge
Author: Penelope Ward
Genre: Standalone Contemporary Romance
Tropes: Single Dad, Second Chance, Forced Proximity
Friends to Lovers, Small Town, Found Family
Release Date: August 30, 2026
Nothing says welcome home like accidentally moving in with your first heartbreak…and his little girl.
Coming back to my small Wyoming hometown was supposed to be temporary. I only planned to stay long enough to help my ailing mother and sort through the mess of my family’s old belongings.
Instead, I somehow ended up living in Evan Ricci’s house. The single dad now owned a bunch of properties and one of them was the place I’d rented. He’d taken it off the market and moved in before I got there. I just never got the memo. Unfortunately, there was no other place in town available, so Evan let me stay.
Evan—the guy my parents took in years ago after his mother died.
The same Evan who used to dare me into ridiculous challenges that somehow always made me stronger—a game we’d dubbed The Challenge.
The same guy who ultimately rejected me before I left for college after I’d finally garnered the courage to shoot my shot.
Now Evan was a rugged single dad with an eight-year-old daughter, a cocky attitude, and a dangerous ability to make me forget every reason I should still hate him.
Sharing a house with him should’ve been unbearable. Instead, it felt dangerously familiar, nearly making me forget that I had a life and a job to get back to in Chicago. I realized the biggest challenge wasn’t surviving living with Evan Ricci.
It was not falling in love with him all over again.
Instead, I somehow ended up living in Evan Ricci’s house. The single dad now owned a bunch of properties and one of them was the place I’d rented. He’d taken it off the market and moved in before I got there. I just never got the memo. Unfortunately, there was no other place in town available, so Evan let me stay.
Evan—the guy my parents took in years ago after his mother died.
The same Evan who used to dare me into ridiculous challenges that somehow always made me stronger—a game we’d dubbed The Challenge.
The same guy who ultimately rejected me before I left for college after I’d finally garnered the courage to shoot my shot.
Now Evan was a rugged single dad with an eight-year-old daughter, a cocky attitude, and a dangerous ability to make me forget every reason I should still hate him.
Sharing a house with him should’ve been unbearable. Instead, it felt dangerously familiar, nearly making me forget that I had a life and a job to get back to in Chicago. I realized the biggest challenge wasn’t surviving living with Evan Ricci.
It was not falling in love with him all over again.
Special release price of $3.99
for a limited time only!
Free in Kindle Unlimited
A model-cover paperback will be live on release day
WHAT YOU CAN EXPECT
SINGLE DAD
SMALL TOWN
FRIENDS TO LOVERS
SECOND CHANCE
FORCED PROXIMITY
FOUND FAMILY
She grew up in Boston with five older brothers and spent most of her twenties as a television news anchor. Penelope resides in Rhode Island with her husband, son, and beautiful daughter with autism.
With millions of books sold, she is a 21-time New York Times bestseller and the author of over forty books. Her novels have been translated into over a dozen languages and can be found in bookstores around the world.
