Angela is considering a request to hold a bridal mixer at Betty Snickerdoodle’s Christmas Inn & Ranch, despite past event disasters. Rhonda Butts, owner of a high-end wedding planning service, learned about the location by eavesdropping on her assistant, Georgina, a college friend of Angela’s, and her mother, Maria, at a local flower shop and barged her way into the conversation.

Rhonda wants to hold her next industry mixer at the inn. Angie, always looking for new revenue streams, is tempted by Rhonda’s assertion that the ranch is just the place for expensive Napa Valley weddings, especially with the new Heavenly West – Connie’s outpost of her Kentucky family’s bourbon distillery in the former Domaine Deveraux – next door.

However, Bea and Pat are suspicious of Rhonda and put off by her arrogance, as is Connie. Rhonda wants the inn’s fundamentals to change —no more Christmas trees or decorations — and brushes off Angela’s objections, asserting that she knows best.

Meanwhile, Bea and Pat do everything possible to make Rhonda’s life difficult, starting with the latter calling Pat to remove a vagrant running around in a nightgown on the property. Of course, that’s Bea, and she and Pat have a great time frustrating the haughty planner.

Bea has plunged into writing mysteries in addition to her Treacle Town Christmas bestsellers, with boxes of her first, A Killer Uncorked, arriving at the inn in time for signing at the mixer. However, someone turns up dead, and it’s up to Bea and Pat to solve the murder while Angela tries to iron out problems with vendors and manage her growing relationship with Aseem.

Pepper Frost has turned out another rollicking adventure from the Christmas Ranch.  If only real life was this fun and delicious.