Surprised by a Baby, Book Two in Mindy Neff’s Texas Sweethearts
March 8, 2018 by marianne h donley in category Apples & Oranges by Marianne H. Donley, Guest Posts, Spotlight tagged as Mindy Neff, Texas Sweethearts
Welcome to Hope, Texas home of the Texas Sweethearts—where gossip’s hotter than three-alarm chili and even the good guys wear black.
This month we are pleased to share an excerpt from Surprised by a Baby , book two in the Texas Sweethearts series by Mindy Neff.
Surprised by a Baby
Mindy Neff
Chapter One
Donetta Presley’s nerves were flat-out wrecked. And no wonder! She’d had another run-in with the town’s new fire marshal; the contractor who’d renovated her trendy hair salon and her upstairs apartment wasn’t returning her phone calls; and, despite feeling like road kill and hugging the porcelain throne more times than she cared to remember, she’d actually given a haircut to a toy poodle named Debbie!
On top of that, she’d had to drive clear over to Austin just to buy a home pregnancy test. Hope Valley had the fastest gossip mill in Texas and she did not want the whole town discussing the nature of her purchase before she could even get home and remove the cellophane from the box.
She could have saved herself the trouble. Pretty soon everyone would know anyway.
She wiped her clammy forehead with the back of her wrist, tempted to lower the thermostat on the salon’s air conditioner another notch. That probably wouldn’t be a good idea. Her clients were shivering as it was.
Trying to take shallow breaths, praying the nausea would pass, she removed the last few bobby pins and rollers from Millicent Lloyd’s blue hair and tossed them into an open drawer. The pink-and-gray perm rods she’d used on a client who’d left more than an hour ago were still scattered in the shampoo bowl. Too bad the scent hadn’t gone with the woman, because the acrid smell of ammonia that wafted from the shiny black sink bowl made Donetta’s stomach revolt anew.
Wasn’t that a hoot? The owner and operator of Donetta’s Secret, the only hair salon in Hope Valley, Texas, couldn’t bear the smell of permanent wave lotion.
Lordy, she didn’t need this grief. Her schedule was so messed up she was now juggling three clients at once. And Miz Lloyd expected to leave here at two-forty-five on the dot—same as every Friday.
She patted the woman on the shoulder. “Be patient with me, okay, Miz Lloyd? I’m tryin’ my best to get you out of here on time.”
She reached for a bottle of finishing spray and gave Millicent’s short barrel curls a squirt, then pumped a couple of aromatic spurts into the air.
Millicent’s blue-tinted eyebrows shot up. “Did you just blast me with air freshener?”
Donetta forced a smile and retrieved her small teasing brush from the top drawer of the laminate workstation. “No, silly. It’s finishing spray. It sets the curl and gives your hair more body. Don’t you just love the way it smells?”
“You’ve never used it on me before,” Millicent said, her light-blue eyes narrowing. Donetta looked down at the sectioned curls. “It’s a new product. Just came in this week.”
“Expensive, I bet. Ought to have a care about wasting it.” She sniffed, still clutching her taupe gloves in her age-spotted fist. Millicent Lloyd never went to town without matching gloves, shoes and pocketbook. “Squirting it all over the place like it was toilet water perfume from the dime store. Why, if I wasn’t trussed up in this cape, I’d be needing a bath.”
“You’re fine,” Donetta soothed. “It’s not sticky.”
As she backcombed Millicent’s thin hair, she glanced at the chrome clock above the front door and checked the minute hands, shaped as neon-red scissors. Barring any more interruptions, she could probably finish these last three clients within the hour and close up early.
Then again, maybe not.
Her hand tightened around the red plastic handle of the brush when she saw the sheriff’s car wheel into a diagonal parking space in front of her salon.
Storm Carmichael.
He was her best friend’s brother—an ex-Texas Ranger who was now the sheriff of Hope Valley.
And he was the last person Donetta wanted to see today.
“I declare, Donetta. You’re about to snatch me bald-headed.”
She jolted and quickly smoothed out the two-inch-long section of hair she’d just teased into a ball of frizz.
“Sorry, Miz Lloyd. My mind wandered.”
“Good thing you didn’t have a pair of scissors in your hand. No telling what I’d look like.” She cut her eyes toward the front window, then back to Donetta’s reflection in the mirror. “That Carmichael boy is heading this way. Is that what’s got you in such a tizzy?”
Storm Carmichael wasn’t anybody’s idea of a boy, Donetta thought, which was partly the reason her knees were shaking. Thank God she hadn’t worn her miniskirt today. The man was more observant than a hawk, and Donetta had learned a hard lesson about showing vulnerability.
“Just running behind schedule is all that’s wrong with me,” Donetta said.
The door swished open, sucking out precious degrees of the salon’s cool air. And there he stood, Sheriff Storm Carmichael, six feet five inches of sinfully delicious masculinity in boots, jeans, a khaki uniform shirt with a sheriff’s star pinned above his breast pocket, and a Stetson sporting a cattleman’s crease.
The very man responsible for this god-awful, debilitating morning sickness.
His gaze locked onto hers and never wavered, yet she knew he could probably give a detailed description of every customer in the salon, as well as the hairstyle models in the photos on the walls. Despite her outward control, her heart galloped like a thoroughbred on an open range.
She’d had a major crush on him when she was a dreamy ten-year-old and he was sixteen. But that was twenty years ago—and at this particular moment, puppy love was not the emotion she was feeling.
“Excuse me just a minute, Miz Lloyd.” She set the brush on her station, then strolled toward the reception desk to head him off in case he had any ideas of coming in and getting comfortable. Not that he’d ever hung out in the salon, but he looked like a man with something on his mind, a man willing to wait until she was finished with her clients.
That was all she needed, she thought with a mental sigh. To have Storm’s eyes trained on her backside while she worked. She’d likely give Darla Pam Kirkwell a Mohawk.
She stopped at the reception desk, realizing she’d almost walked right up to Storm to automatically give him a hug.
That was what happened when a person had sex with a friend. Normal, lifelong habits became awkward. She’d always greeted him with a hug—even if she was miffed at him. Now she was afraid the simple gesture would give away more than she wanted him to know.
Wishing she could sit down for about five hours, she leaned against the red laminate counter and put on her polite, welcome-the-customer face. It took a Herculean effort. She felt about as sociable as a she-bear in satin.
“Afternoon, Sheriff. What can I do for you?”
His eyes blatantly lowered to her V-neck tank top that sported a large, dramatic face of a cat, then to her slim khaki pants and open-toed platform shoes. Although it was October, a warm front had moved in from the Gulf, making it feel like the middle of summer. Storm Carmichael’s visual caress cranked up her internal thermostat to triple digits.
“I guess you didn’t see that red tag on the door,” he said in his perfectly charming Texas drawl. He was one of those men whose smooth baritone voice had an innately sensual, teasing tone. His thumbs were hooked in the front pockets of his jeans, a purely masculine gesture that drew the eye and put a woman in danger of losing her good sense.
“Now, don’t you start in on me, too, Storm. As soon as I get ahold of my contractor, he’ll take care of everything. And park those eyeballs back in your head, why don’t you. I’m not in the mood to deal with one more condescending male today.” She’d couched her annoyance in her trademark sultry tone, but for once, she wasn’t quite certain she’d pulled it off. She knew just how to flirt with a guy, to let him down easy without making him feel as though he’d struck out. It was her means of holding men at bay. The trait was pretty much the only useful lesson she’d learned from a mother she hadn’t seen in eight years.
“Can’t blame a man for admiring. All these bold colors in here, and you still stand out like a million-dollar supermodel.”
She arched a brow. “Flattery, Sheriff? My goodness, you must want something.”
“Oh, I want a lot of things,” he said softly, making her shiver even though she was burning up. “Right now, though, I’ll stick to business. That citation on your door isn’t part of a beautification project. It doesn’t say ‘Pretty please’ and it doesn’t mention a thing about phoning your contractor. It’s an official injunction mandating you to vacate these premises until the issues that have been itemized for you—more than once, I’m told—are corrected and in compliance with county and state building codes.”
At the formality of his words, Donetta’s heart pounded with a mounting sense of dread. This was Storm Carmichael the cop. Not Storm Carmichael the friend she’d slept with, the man who held her heart and didn’t even know it.
“Now, I don’t know how these infractions slipped through the cracks for two years, but the improvements on this unit have been declared unsafe by the fire marshal—”
“Would you just hush?” she whispered fiercely. “I know what the damn thing says.” She looked around to see if any of the customers were listening. Of course they were. The three elderly women were practically leaning forward in their chairs, not even trying to disguise that they were exercising what they clearly viewed as their God-given right to eavesdrop.
“Listen, Storm, this will just have to wait.” He wasn’t wearing a gun belt and she didn’t see any handcuffs, so it was a safe bet that he wouldn’t actually arrest her for violating a court order. Hope Valley was a relaxed small town. The judicial system was naturally a bit more laid- back. And she wasn’t ignoring the stupid paper—even though she’d flipped it the bird as she’d unlocked the front door this morning to open for business.
“I intend to take care of everything,” she said, “but first I need to finish styling Miz Lloyd and rinse Darla Pam before the bleach fries her hair. And I promised Cora I’d have her out of here before three o’clock. She has errands to run and has to be home before dark—you know she can’t drive at night.”
Glancing down, she skimmed a fingertip over her appointment book, noticed that her acrylic nail was chipped at the very tip. Swell. One more thing she could add to her to -do list. She swallowed back the queasiness again working its way up her esophagus. She really, really didn’t feel good.
“Why don’t you give me a call around five,” she said, fully aware she wouldn’t be here. Millicent, Darla Pam and Cora were her last three clients for the day. “I should have a break by then. Meanwhile…” She stepped back and fixed a phony smile on her face. “You have yourself a real nice afternoon, Sheriff, ya hear?”
Mindy Neff is the award-winning author of over thirty novels and novellas. Her contemporary romances touch the heart, tug at the reader’s emotions, and always, without fail, have a happy ending.
Mindy is the recipient of the National Reader’s Choice Award, the Orange Rose Award of Excellence, the Romantic Times Career Achievement award and the Romantic Times Reviewer’s Choice Award, as well as W.I.S.H. awards for outstanding heroes, and two prestigious RITA nominations.
Originally from Louisiana, Mindy moved to Southern California where she met and married a very romantic guy a little over thirty years ago. They blended their families, his three kids and her two, and have been living happily (if a little insanely) ever after. Now, when she isn’t meddling in the lives of her five kids and ten grandchildren, Mindy hides out with a good book, hot sunshine, and a chair at the river’s edge at her second home along the Parker Strip in Arizona.
Mindy loves to hear from readers. You can email her at mindy@mindyneff.com.
Texas Sweethearts from Mindy Neff
February 24, 2018 by marianne h donley in category Apples & Oranges by Marianne H. Donley, Guest Posts, Spotlight tagged as contemporary romance, Cowboys, Mindy Neff, Texas Sweethearts
Welcome to Hope, Texas home of the Texas Sweethearts—where gossip’s hotter than three-alarm chili and even the good guys wear black.
This month we are pleased to share an excerpt from the first book in the series Courted by a Cowboy by Mindy Neff.
Courted by a Cowboy
Mindy Neff
Chapter One
If today had been a fish, Sunny Carmichael would’ve pitched it right back into the water.
She swept up the broken water glass and dumped it into the trash can, adding the clear shards to the shattered jelly jar already there. The jar’s sticky contents lay smeared over the crumpled paper plates and napkins like a gooey mosaic decorating the den.
Putting away the broom, she noticed that her Doc Martens made sucking noises on the faux marble floor. Oh, well, she thought, sitting down at the kitchen table. She wasn’t the greatest housecleaner. Animals were her forte.
Simba lumbered over and rested his huge head on her knee, looking up at her with velvety brown eyes that had snagged her the moment she’d seen him in the pound four years ago, surrounded by a litter of kittens. Part Labrador retriever, part Irish Wolfhound, and part who-knows-what, he was roughly the size of a month-old colt, with a tail that could knock a bull on his butt in one exuberant swoop, and a canine smile that apologized beforehand for his clumsiness.
“What’s next, Simba? Mama says things break in threes. We’ve had two in one day…” She patted Simba’s wide skull. “Three, if you count Michael.”
Michael Lawrey had been her fiancé for the past two years—until three days ago, when he’d dumped her. Wealthy, passably handsome and powerful, he was on a political climb with an eye toward the governor’s seat.
Evidently, he’d decided she no longer fit in with his plans.
Sunny stared at the sticky floor, but couldn’t work up the energy to do anything about it. She was bored and vaguely upset, when she should have been totally torn up. After all, the man she was to marry had chucked her. Something was wrong that she felt more embarrassed and inadequate than heartbroken.
She wasn’t sure what to do with herself. Here she was on a beautiful summer Saturday evening, sitting alone in a plush condo in Malibu.
Finding herself all alone felt weird. The condo was quiet. The right side of both the bathroom cabinet and bedroom closet were empty. Michael had always stored his personal items for the nights he stayed over on the right because he was left-handed. He claimed it gave him more elbow room to brush his teeth, blow-dry his hair and dress.
“Why in the world didn’t I object to the way he’d taken over?” she asked Simba. “It’s my house. Maybe I would have preferred the right side.”
Simba’s tongue snaked out to lick her wrist. His eyes darted away as though he had no idea who’d delivered that sandpapery slobbering caress. It was a vice she’d yet to break him from. Like a chocoholic sneaking sugar, Simba sneaked licks.
Lately, he was the only mammal she cuddled, and that seemed wrong. Her love of animals was part of her life, a soul connection, deep and profound. It was what had compelled her to become a veterinarian in the first place.
The phone rang, and Sunny jumped. She didn’t immediately answer, even considered letting the machine pick up. By damn, she wasn’t up to a pity call now—or talking to some shallow gossipmonger spouting false concern just to get the skinny on what had happened between her and Michael.
By the time she got to the phone, the machine had switched on. The sound of her mother’s heavy Texas drawl made her stomach lurch.
Just what she needed. A lecture from her mom on the merits of hanging on to a man. Still, nothing said she had to tell her mother about the breakup. Anna Carmichael was clear over in Austin. It wasn’t as if she would know what was going on in Los Angeles.
Sighing, Sunny finally reached for the receiver. “I’m here, Mama,” she said, cutting off Anna in mid-syllable.
“Oh, I’m so glad I caught you at home. This being a Saturday night, I worried you and Michael would be out.”
“Michael’s out.” Literally. “I’m not.” Obviously.
Anna paused. “Is everything all right? Are you and Michael having troubles?”
Sunny sighed again. Trust her mother to hone in on the “man” angle. Accurately this time, damn it. She ought to keep her mouth shut, but knew she wouldn’t. Some strange failing inside her made her feel that she was sinning if she didn’t admit every little thing to her mother.
“Michael and I are splitsville.”
“Excuse me?”
“We broke up.”
“Oh, Sunny. What did you do?”
“Me?” Her voice trembled despite her efforts to keep it even. “Why do you assume it’s something I did?”
“Perhaps I stated that poorly. You misunderstood.” Sunny didn’t think so. She’d spent twenty-nine years trying to measure up to her mother’s expectations and Southern standards of what a woman should be. She didn’t think she’d hit the mark yet.
“Sunny?” Anna said when the silence stretched. “Are you all right?”
“Yes. I’m fine, Mama.”
“Would you like to talk about it?”
“There’s not much to say. Michael and I were trying to mesh our calendars and carve out a convenient time for a honeymoon, but he seemed to have a conflict with every date I chose.” More likely, he hadn’t wanted to take time off. He’d reminded her that they were both aiming for the top of their respective fields, and it was imperative that they not let the competition get there first.
“He is busy, Sunny.”
She felt her insides clench, but continued on with the conversation. “Yes, but so am I. Which is neither here nor there at the moment, since there won’t be a honeymoon, anyway.”
“Is this a problem the two of you might overcome?”
Sunny leaned against the kitchen counter. “No, Mama. Despite what you might think of me and my single status, I do want children and a family someday. Michael doesn’t.”
“Not at all?” Anna sounded scandalized.
Sunny found she could smile after all. Her mother believed in family, reminded Sunny and her brother, Storm, at every opportunity that she wanted to be a grandmother, that it wasn’t fair Trudy Fay Simon continually lorded it over her about her fifth grandchild when Anna had yet to claim even one.
“Not at all,” Sunny echoed.
“Well. I knew that man wasn’t right for you in the first place. He had one of those phony-politician smiles. His teeth were simply too perfect”
Sunny felt her heart soften. She and her mother had had their trials, but when it came down to it they were family. And even if they didn’t often agree, family stuck together. “He paid a fortune so those teeth would be perfect.”
“Figures. So what will you do now?”
“Actually, I’ve taken some vacation time so I don’t have to answer a lot of questions.” “Then I called at the right moment. Come home, Sunny. Your room’s just as you left it.” Returning home was an ongoing argument, one they had often. Anna didn’t seem to respect or place any importance on what Sunny did in California. “You know I can’t—”
“You must. We’ve got trouble and we need you in Hope Valley. You’re the only one we can trust to handle it.”
Sunny was momentarily speechless. Her mother had admitted a need. That was a first. But Sunny could only focus on the words Hope Valley. Her hometown was a blip on the
Texas map. It lay just west of Austin, where verdant grass carpeted the ground in a feast for the eyes, and livestock grazed contentedly on ranches that ranged from small family operations to million-dollar enterprises. The town was quaint, and truly Southern in attitude. Everyone knew everyone else’s business, and the townsfolk accepted it as their God-given right to pass along every morsel of gossip that came their way.
Sunny had been born and raised in Hope Valley. Her family and her childhood friends were there. She’d lived and laughed and loved there.
And she’d had her heart broken there.
What she felt now after her split with Michael was nothing compared to the devastation she’d suffered in Hope Valley ten years earlier.
She twisted the phone cord around her finger and closed her eyes for a moment to steady herself. Simba, who’d been lying on the cool kitchen floor, scrambled to his feet and pushed against her leg in his canine version of a hug. How this goofy-looking dog was so attuned to her every emotion was uncanny.
“What kind of trouble?”
“On Jack Slade’s ranch. Now, hear me out,” Anna said, obviously knowing Sunny was about to object. They’d made a shaky deal years ago not to discuss Jackson Slade. Anna didn’t always keep up her end of the bargain. Especially when Hope Valley had been close to economic ruin and Jack had returned to town like a prodigal son. He’d taken over his father’s ranch and turned it into a highly prosperous spread.
From the moment he’d come back to the small community, everything he touched seemed to thrive. Where once he’d been a motorcycle-riding, earring-wearing, bronc-busting heartbreaker, now he was Hope Valley’s golden boy, and there were very few people around these parts who weren’t eternally grateful to him. According to Anna Carmichael, the guy had single-handedly made the town flourish once more.
Of course, Anna rarely missed a chance to remind her daughter what she’d given up.
Sunny rubbed her temples where a headache was forming. “I’m listening.” “This is for your ears only, and it could well be nothing.”
“What, Mama?” She wasn’t in the mood for a whispering campaign.
“Jack’s had some cattle up and die on him. We don’t want Hope Valley splashed across the national newspapers, with speculations on mad cow disease or something.”
Her fingers tightened on the receiver. “Does Jack think it’s mad cow?” The thought was horrifying. So far, livestock in the United States had escaped that epidemic. More t han likely her mother was only using the term because it was familiar.
“I don’t know, dear. That’s why I’m calling you.”
“How many cattle?”
“One or two, I think.”
“Only in Jack’s herd?”
“So I’ve heard.”
“What does the vet say? What are the symptoms?”
“Honestly, Sunny, I’m not the one to be asking these questions. You need to come see for yourself.”
“The vet, Mama…” she prompted.
Anna sighed. “Doc Levin skipped town. We have no earthly idea why. Just packed up his belongings and that young lady he’d taken up with, and left us high and dry. And it’s just as well, if you ask me. He never did fit in. We need one of our own here, Sunny. Someone who cares about us. To investigate, to get to the bottom of this sudden illness, give us an unbiased report so we can handle it quickly among ourselves.”
That was how the people of Hope Valley had always operated. As a community. “If it’s just a couple of steers, that’s hardly an epidemic. Still, you know I’m bound by law to report any outbreaks of infectious diseases once they’re confirmed.”
“Yes, I’m aware of all that, and I’m certainly not advocating we hide anything. But we can trust you not to jump the gun. You’re the best there is, Sunny Leigh. The only one who can do this. We don’t want to be gettin’ the wrong dog by the tail and startin’ an uproar of hysteria.”
Sunny slid down the kitchen cabinet and sat on the floor. Her heart pounded and her brain felt fuzzy.
You’re the best there is, Sunny Leigh.
How many years had she yearned to hear those words? Words of acceptance. Of praise. From her mother.
This was truly out of character for Anna. Sunny had rarely gotten more than a “That’s nice, dear” when she’d called home with career news.
Now Jack was in trouble. It bugged her that even after all these years, Anna’s immediate concern was for him, not her own daughter. But this was the first time her mother had reached out to her, hinted at pride in Sunny’s successes, recognition for the professional she’d become, acceptance of the choices she’d made.
You’re the only one who can do this. Powerful words to a woman who’d longed for years to hear them.
Sunny looped her arm around Simba’s thick neck. She had a month’s vacation and comp time coming to her. Lord knows her life in Los Angeles hadn’t turned out the way she’d thought it would.
She could use some weeks away, time to reflect on the influence her relationship with Michael had had on who she’d become.
Because if she was truthful, she’d have to admit that what she’d started out wanting in the beginning had morphed into something entirely different.
She needed to clear her head. Go back to chasing her dream. Learn to be a woman who stood firmly on her own two feet, made solid decisions based on the facts as she saw them, and stuck by them.
And by God, the lure of showing her mother her expertise was too great to ignore.
Plus, the opportunity to connect with true friends, the kind you could always depend on, was a draw she couldn’t resist.
Sunny, Donetta Presley, Tracy Lynn Randolph and Becca Sue Ellsworth had called themselves the Texas Sweethearts. They’d formed their secret society when they were kids. Even years and miles hadn’t dampened their bond. Seeing her pals again would be good.
“I’ll square things away here and be out there by Wednesday,” she said.
The problem was, if an infectious disease was plaguing Jackson Slade’s cattle, even
Wednesday might be too late to save his herd.
Mindy Neff is the award-winning author of over thirty novels and novellas. Her contemporary romances touch the heart, tug at the reader’s emotions, and always, without fail, have a happy ending.
Mindy is the recipient of the National Reader’s Choice Award, the Orange Rose Award of Excellence, the Romantic Times Career Achievement award and the Romantic Times Reviewer’s Choice Award, as well as W.I.S.H. awards for outstanding heroes, and two prestigious RITA nominations.
Originally from Louisiana, Mindy moved to Southern California where she met and married a very romantic guy a little over thirty years ago. They blended their families, his three kids and her two, and have been living happily (if a little insanely) ever after. Now, when she isn’t meddling in the lives of her five kids and ten grandchildren, Mindy hides out with a good book, hot sunshine, and a chair at the river’s edge at her second home along the Parker Strip in Arizona.
Mindy loves to hear from readers. You can email her at mindy@mindyneff.com.
Beyond Danger by Kat Martin
February 13, 2018 by marianne h donley in category Apples & Oranges by Marianne H. Donley, Guest Posts, Spotlight tagged as best-seller lists, bestseller, bestselling romance, intrigue, newly released, romance, romantic, romantic suspense, Suspense
Beyond Danger (excerpt)
Kat Martin
Pleasant Hill, Texas
Beau could hardly believe it. His father was sixty years old! The girl sitting across from him in a booth at the Pleasant Hill Café looked like a teenager. A very pregnant teenager.
“Everything’s going to be okay, Missy,” Beau Reese said. “You don’t have to worry about anything from now on. I’ll make sure everything is taken care of from here on out.”
“He bought me presents,” the girl said, dabbing a Kleenex against the tears in her blue eyes. “He told me how pretty I was, how much he liked being with me. I thought he loved me.”
Fat chance of that, Beau thought. His dad had never loved anyone but himself. True, his father, a former Texas state senator, was still a handsome man, one who stayed in shape and looked twenty years younger. Didn’t make the situation any better.
“How old are you, Missy?”
“Nineteen.”
At least she was over the age of consent. That was something, not much.
Beau shoved a hand through his wavy black hair and took a steadying breath. He thought of the DNA test folded up and tucked into the pocket of his shirt. He had always wanted a baby brother or sister. Now at the age of thirty five, he was finally going to have one.
Beau felt a surge of protectiveness toward the young woman carrying his father’s child.
He looked over to where she sat hunched over next to her mother on the opposite side of the pink vinyl booth. “Everybody makes mistakes, Missy. You picked the wrong guy, that’s all. Doesn’t mean you won’t have a great kid.”
For the first time since he’d arrived, Missy managed a tentative smile. “Thank you for saying that.”
Beau returned the smile. “I’m going to have a baby sister. I promise she won’t have to worry about a thing from the day she’s born into this world.” Hell, he was worth more than half a billion dollars. He would see the child had everything she ever wanted.
When Missy’s lips trembled, her mother scooted out of the booth. “I think she’s had enough for today. This is all very hard on her and I don’t want her getting overly tired.” Josie reached for her daughter’s hand. “Let’s go home, honey. You’ll feel better after a nap.”
Beau got up, too, leaned over and brushed a kiss on Missy’s cheek. “You both have my number. If you need anything, call me. Okay?”
Missy swallowed. “Okay.”
“Thank you, Beau,” Josie said. “I should have called you sooner. I should have known you’d help us.”
“I’ll have my assistant send you a check right away. You’ll have money to take care of expenses and buy the things you need. After that, I’ll have a draft sent to Missy every month.”
Josie’s eyes teared up. “I didn’t know how I was going to manage the bills all by myself. Thank you again, Beau.”
He just nodded. “Keep me up to date on her condition.”
“I will,” Josie said.
Beau watched the women head for the door, the bell ringing as Josie shoved it open and she and Missy walked out of the café.
Leaving money on the table for his coffee, he followed the women out the door, his temper slowing climbing toward the boiling point, as it had been after he’d first received Josie’s call.
His father should be the one handling Missy’s pregnancy. He’d had months to step up and do the right thing. Beau figured he never would.
As he crossed the sidewalk and opened the door of his dark blue Ferrari, his temper cranked up another notch. By the time the car was roaring along the road to his father’s house, his fury was simmering, bubbling just below the surface.
Unconsciously his foot pressed harder on the gas, urging the car down the two-lane road at well over eighty miles an hour. With too many tickets in Howler County already, he forced himself to slow down.
Making the turn into Country Club Estates, he jammed on the brakes and the car slid to a stop in front of the house. The white, two-story home he’d been raised in oozed Southern charm, the row of columns out front mimicking an old-style plantation.
Climbing out of the Ferrari, one of his favorite vehicles, he pounded up the front steps and crossed the porch. The housekeeper had Mondays and Tuesdays off so he used his key to let himself into the entry.
On this chilly, end-of-January day, the ceiling fans, usually rotating throughout the five-thousand square-foot residence, hadn’t been turned on, leaving the interior strangely silent, the air oddly dense. The ticking of the ornate grandfather clock in the living room seemed louder than it usually did.
“Dad! It’s Beau! Where are you?” When he didn’t get an answer, he strode down the hall toward the study. He had phoned his father on the way over. Though he’d done his best to keep the anger out of his voice, he wasn’t sure he had succeeded. Maybe his father had left to avoid him.
“Dad!” Still no answer. Beau continued down the hall, his footsteps echoing in the quiet. As he reached the study, he noticed the door standing slightly ajar. Steeling himself for the confrontation ahead, he clamped down on his temper, rapped firmly, then shoved the door open.
His father wasn’t sitting at the big rosewood desk or in his favorite overstuffed chair next to the fireplace. Beau started to turn away when an odd gurgling sound sent the hairs up on the back of his neck.
“Dad!” At the opposite end of the desk, Beau spotted a prone figure lying on the floor in a spreading pool of blood. “Dad!” His father’s eyes were closed, his face as gray as ash. The handle of a letter opener protruded from the middle of his chest.
Beau raced to his father’s side. “Dad!” Blood oozed from the wound in his chest and streamed onto the hardwood floor. He had to stop the bleeding and he had to do it now!
He hesitated, praying he wouldn’t make it worse, then with no other option, grabbed the handle of the letter opener, jerked it out, gripped the front of his dad’s white shirt and ripped it open.
“Oh, my God! What are you–”
Beau glanced up. “Call 9-1-1! Hurry, he’s been stabbed! Hurry!”
The woman, a shapely brunette named Cassidy Jones, his father’s recently hired personal assistant, didn’t pause, just pulled her cell out of her pocket and hurriedly punched in the number. He heard her rattle off the address, give the dispatcher the name of the victim and said he had been stabbed.
Beau’s hand shook as he checked for a pulse, found none. The wound was catastrophic, a stab wound straight to the heart. No way could his father survive it.
Cassidy ended the call, ran over and knelt on the floor beside him.
“Here, use this to seal the hole.” She seemed amazingly in control as she handed him a credit card then ran to the wet bar and grabbed a towel, folded it into a pad, rushed back and handed it over. Beau pressed the towel over the credit card on top of the hole, all the while knowing his father was already dead or within moments of dying.
He checked again for a pulse. Shook his head, feeling an unexpected rush of grief. “His heart isn’t beating. Whoever stabbed him knew exactly where to bury the blade.” And compressions would only make it worse.
Cassidy reached down to check for herself, pressing her fingers in exactly the right spot on the side of his father’s neck. She had to know it was hopeless, just as he did, must have known Stewart Reese was dead.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
Beau studied his father’s face. Pain had turned his usually handsome features haggard and slack, nothing like the athletic older man who kept himself so fit and trim.
Sorrow slid through him, making his chest clamp down. Or maybe it was sadness for the kind of man his father was, the kind who had wound up the victim of a killer.
“Just hold on,” Cassidy said to him. “The ambulance should be here any minute.”
His mind went blank until the sound of a siren sliced into his conscious. Cassidy hurried off to let the EMTs into the house and a few moments later they appeared in the study.
“You need to give us some room, Mr. Reese,” one of them said gently, a skinny kid who looked like he knew what he was doing.
Beau backed away and Cassidy followed. He felt her eyes on him, assessing him with speculation–or was it suspicion?
It didn’t take long for the EMTs to have his father loaded onto a gurney and rolling down the hall, back outside to the ambulance. Beau strode along behind them, Cassidy trailing in his wake.
It occurred to him that she could be the killer. But somehow the timing seemed wrong and her reaction seemed genuine. The thought slid away.
As he climbed into the ambulance and sat down beside his dad, he flicked a last glance at the house. If Cassidy Jones hadn’t done it, who had? Had the killer still been inside when Beau arrived? How had he escaped? What was his motive?
The ambulance roared down the road, sirens wailing, blowing through intersections, weaving in and out between cars, careening around corners. All the way to the hospital Beau held his father’s hand. It was the closest he had ever felt to his dad.
The ambulance turned again and Pleasant Hill Memorial loomed ahead. The vehicle slammed to a stop in front of the emergency entrance and the back doors banged open.
After what seemed an eternity but was only a very few minutes, Beau’s father, Stewart Beaumont Reese, was pronounced Dead On Arrival.
Beau’s throat closed up. There were times as a boy he had wished his father dead, but that had been years ago.
Now his dad was gone and Beau wanted answers. He vowed whatever it took, for no matter how long, he wouldn’t stop until he found the man who had murdered his father.
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Surviving Danger by Kat Martin
January 30, 2018 by marianne h donley in category Apples & Oranges by Marianne H. Donley, Guest Posts, Spotlight tagged as best-seller lists, bestselling romance, historical, intrigue, newly released, romance, romantic suspense, Suspense, women's fiction
Surviving Danger
As a writer, I’m always looking for new story ideas. I often find that past experiences can be a great help. Have you ever survived a dangerous situation? How did you do it?
When I was first learning to snow ski, I got caught after dark on top of Stowe Mountain in Vermont. It’s a huge ski area. It was my first day on skis and, somehow I got separated from my friends. I wound up on a black diamond run and of course I started falling—throwing myself down in the snow was the only way I knew how to stop!
By the time I got half way down the mountain, the ski lifts had all stopped running and it was dark and freezing cold. I tried taking off my skis and walking, but the snow was deep, and it was even harder than trying to ski. I knew I was in big trouble.
Maybe the reason I started writing Romantic Suspense had something to do with that day. Just when I was ready to give up and just wait for whatever was going to happen to happen, a guy came skiing down the hill out of nowhere.
Instead of skiing on by, he swished to a stop right next to me. He must have realized I was in trouble and if I didn’t get down the mountain, I could die in the subzero weather that night. The guy—my hero—helped me get up and start “skiing” back down the mountain. He showed me how to snow plow, helped me turn and never left me, no matter how many times I fell.
It took hours to get off that mountain. We wound up in an empty parking lot, where I his car was parked, and he drove me back to the main lodge where my friends were waiting. I never saw him again, but I’ve never forgotten him. There is a chance he might have saved my life that night.
So, I guess there really are heroes out there in the real world. At least I believe that. Beau Reese, the hero in BEYOND DANGER, is that kind of guy.
Mega-rich, black-haired, and blue-eyed, Beau was a highly successful race car driver before he left the circuit, sort of a Texas Paul Newman. Beau loves fast cars and fast women, but under it all he’s a one-woman man and Cassidy Jones is just the right woman for him.
Unfortunately, Beau is wanted for murder.
The good news is, Cassidy is a detective. She’s convinced of Beau’s innocence and determined to prove it.
I hope you’ll watch for BEYOND DANGER, and in June, you’ll look for BEYOND CONTROL, Josh Cain’s story. If you haven’t read BEYOND REASON, I hope you’ll give it a try.
Till next time, all best and happy reading, Kat
Bestselling author Kat Martin is a graduate of the University of California at Santa Barbara where she majored in Anthropology and also studied History. Currently residing with her Western-author husband, L. J. Martin, in Missoula, Montana, Kat has written sixty eight Historical and Contemporary Romantic Suspense novels. More than sixteen million copies of her books are in print and she has been published in twenty foreign countries. Her last novel, INTO THE FIRESTORM, took the #7 spot on the New York Times Bestseller list. This will be the 15th novel in a row to be included on that prestigious list. Kat is currently at work on her next Romantic Suspense.
A Fleshy Toggle Switch? by Diane Sismour
January 17, 2018 by marianne h donley in category Apples & Oranges by Marianne H. Donley, Guest Posts tagged as characters, creativity, Diane Sismour, Guest posts
Sometimes I wish for a fleshy toggle switch just to concentrate. A switch to turn on the, “What ifs,” or off to allow me to listen to a conversation without having a character make a sidebar comment, with a dimmer to shut out the annoying static from everyday life. On the other hand, where would a writer be without those voices banging around, attempting to push a story out of them?
Most writers I know have characters talking to them. Not just giving an occasional shout, but full arguments that can shove a manuscript into unplotted waters. What would happen if they went silent? I shudder the thought.
My characters made themselves present in those geeky years attending a new high school, trying to fit into any group, but not. Of course, telling anyone about them could have brought dire consequences. Someone would have had me committed to a padded cell on the sunny side of a psych ward, so the thoughts went into a journal. The voices got louder, I listened, my writing voice strengthened, and those ideas became plots.
From where did these constant distractions come, and why me? Isn’t there enough going on in my life for one of me knocking around in my mind? Oh my gosh…my characters just gasped collectively.
I smile before giving a mental nudge. “Hey, just kidding guys.”
Although I still wish for a fleshy toggle switch, I cannot imagine a life without writing or my constant companions pushing my boundaries by asking, “What if.”
Have a creative New Year, and as always, Happy Writing,
Diane
Diane Sismour has written poetry and fiction for over 35 years in multiple genres. She lives with her husband in eastern Pennsylvania at the foothills of the Blue Mountains. Diane is a member of Romance Writers of America, Bethlehem Writer’s Group LLC, Horror Writers Association, and Liberty States Fiction Writers. She enjoys interviewing other authors and leading writer’s workshops.
Her website is www.dianesismour.com, and her blog is www.dianesismour.blogspot.com.
You can find her on Facebook and Twitter at: http://facebook.com/dianesismour, http://facebook.com/networkforthearts, and https://twitter.com/dianesismour.
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