Violet: Bride of North Dakota (American Mail-Order Bride 39) (20 page)

WHAT A NIGHTMARE
.

It wasn’t bad enough that a freak storm had forced Jennie Ryan’s plane to land, leaving her stranded. Oh, no, not nearly bad enough. She was, at this very moment, standing in the one place on earth she swore she’d never go again.

The city where Bryce would vow to love, honor, and cherish
someone else
in the morning at a lovely June wedding.

The place where his father probably still kept a watch out for her.

And home of the worst experience of Jennie’s life the year before.

Good old Abilene, Kansas.

Exhausted and incredulous, Jennie stepped from the plane which should have carried her from medical school in Boston back home to Idaho for a two week vacation before her pediatric internship began.

Instead she found herself in the small Abilene municipal airport, which was obviously overwhelmed at having not one but two planes forced down.

It would be all right. It had to be. She didn’t have to see Bryce. Abilene was a big town. This was not fate or anything like it—just a random, vastly coincidental, forced landing. And she wouldn’t give it any more meaning than that.

It didn’t matter that Bryce was getting married tomorrow, a fact she knew only because some busybody friends at school insisted on keeping her informed of Bryce’s doings—whether she wanted to hear or not. The marriage didn’t matter, only that she wasn’t still at the airport when the happy couple left for their honeymoon. She’d be out of here way before then.

Jennie followed a businessman down the ramp. He muttered about the delay in a big computer deal. Behind her, a woman in her seventies lamented that now she would miss her sister’s fiftieth anniversary celebration.

Jostled by the crowd as she entered the airport, she followed the businessman, who seemed the type of person who could get things accomplished.

He strode toward a counter with a long line of people waiting—as there were in front of every counter she could see down the length of the concourse.

As a blue-uniformed woman walked past, Jennie snagged her arm. The business man turned today Jennie.

“When can I get a flight out of here?” Jennie asked.

“I’m sorry, but this storm has closed down the entire airport. There will be no flights leaving for at least a few hours.” The woman looked as tired as Jennie felt, and she’d obviously forced the smile on her face. “And there is no guarantee when they’ll start up again.”

Hours? Stuck in Abilene?

“You’re kidding,” the businessman echoed Jennie’s thoughts, only with more decibels. “I can’t sit around here. I’ll take my business elsewhere.”

The woman shrugged. “I wish I could help you. You can talk with the other airlines if you’d prefer, but they can’t take off, either.”

Okay. Think
. If Jennie couldn’t fly out of town, she’d drive. She’d been in this airport before, and she knew where to find the rental car booths. Leaving the man behind her, she crossed the length of the airport, now muttering.

She passed a huge line of people before her foggy brain registered the fact that they were all waiting for a rental car. Disheartened, she started back toward the end of the line, but hadn’t reached it before a woman sitting at the Hertz counter called out, “I’m sorry, folks. We just rented our last car.”

And, as the crowd disbanded, she saw a ‘closed’ sign on both the Avis and Enterprise counters.

Nobody had rental cars?

Jennie sighed. She needed sleep. She’d been up for one hundred hours a week for the last month, during her emergency room training, and she could barely think straight. She probably wasn’t safe behind the wheel, anyway. Hopefully the airport shuttle was still working but, even if it wasn’t, surely she could catch a cab. She’d let someone drive her to a hotel somewhere, get some sleep, and find a way out of town when she was rested enough to think of one.

Jennie passed a bank of telephones. Before she began this running around, she’d better call her mother and let her know she wouldn’t be home for at least a day or two, even longer if she had to drive back to Idaho.

Heading toward the luggage carousel, she bumped into someone. “Sorry.”

“That’s all right, dear.”

Startled, Jennie looked down into the eyes of an old woman and recognized her as the woman who’d sold her and Bryce the painting the year before.

Charity Beaumont.

“My word, Jennie Ryan, is that you?” Charity’s familiar face crinkled into an excited smile. “The storm did bring you into Abilene. Well, this
is
the day, after all. You must come and stay with me, my dear. I insist. I have to hear all about whatever destiny brought you here today.”

Jennie shook her head and couldn’t respond. The older woman was delusional. There was a much simpler explanation.

Not
destiny.

Not
fate.

Nothing but a horrible, ironic accident.

If you’d like to read more, go to
www.McKennaBond.com
.

Excerpt:
Bah, Humbug!

Christmas Street Romantic Comedy Novella #1

(This book is free on Amazon/Kindle)

Lexi Anderson is an up-and-coming, Martha Stewart-type talk show host. When her kids’ favorite author moves in next door, things are bound to get interesting.

For the first time in his writing career, Kyle has writer’s block—until he sees the snowman on his lawn and realizes that this is the perfect place for his villain to hide the weapon. He digs into the snowman to discover two things: the weapon fits in the body just under the head, and the snowman was supposed to be the back drop for Lexi’s next show.

From this improbable beginning comes friendship. Can there be more for a woman who is afraid to get close again and a man who has shadows from his childhood?

Families join together and hearts are healed as this couple goes walking in a winter wonderland.

CHAPTER ONE

SATISFIED, JARED STRONG WATCHED THE POLICE haul off another crook to jail—another crook he had uncovered. He nodded to Melinda and said, “I knew it was old Mr. Sellers all the time.”

Leaning against the headboard of her bed, Lexi Anderson sighed and shut the book. “We did it. We reread the third Jared Strong book, just in time to buy the new one when it comes out Tuesday.”

Her two pajama-clad children leaned into her, one on each side.

Steven said, “I think it’s so cool how Jared always knows who the bad guys are.”

“That’s because you’re nine. When you’re as old as I am, you’ll like Melinda better,” said Trista, from her ripe old age of eleven, referring to Jared’s best friend and co-detective.

“I don’t care what you say. I want to be a detective when I grow up. Just like Jared.” And Steven snuggled back into Lexi’s side and hugged her arm. “Read the last chapter again, okay?”

“Okay.” She smiled as Trista tried to feign indifference.

As she reread the ending, she was filled with a sense of contentment. She was reading her childrens’ favorite book in their beautiful new home.

Things hadn’t always gone so smoothly. She’d had some hard knocks. Her parents had died in a car crash when she was seventeen. She’d married her boyfriend in what she now realized had been a desperate attempt to create a family around her.

Unfortunately, on his twenty-fifth birthday, her husband decided family wasn’t what he wanted, and had taken off to “experience life.” Neither she nor the kids had heard from him since then.

She avoided relationships because she wasn’t about to lose someone else she cared about. And she realized that she was overprotective of her children, but they didn’t seem to mind.

Since the divorce, she’d been forced to fight her way up from the bottom of both the financial and emotional heap. And now, well, they were doing all right. She had been called a younger, fresher version of Martha Stewart. She’d just signed a lucrative five-year contract to continue hosting her one-year-old national television show. She and the kids had more money than they could have ever imagined. Enough money that she’d been able to buy this house, their first, which nestled on a lovely lane with maple trees shaking hands above the street.

At first she’d worried about making the move from San Diego to Salt Lake City. But everything seemed perfect here. The way the kids raced through the house laughing and loving it just as much as she did. The way they all seemed to fit into this home as if they’d lived here forever.

She hoped they’d fit into the neighborhood and school, as well. The neighbors seemed friendly enough. When the moving truck pulled up yesterday morning, six neighbor guys had shown up and helped unload the truck.

There were still two bedrooms filled with boxes, but the rest of the house was unpacked and decorated for the holidays.

The house and neighborhood were perfect. Through the windows, she could see cars driving by, their lights dimmed by drivers wanting to see the decorations on what was known as Christmas Street.

Besides, the kids were excited because the Jared Strong author, Kyle Miller, lived somewhere in the Salt Lake area. Of course, that area covered small entangled towns from Bountiful down to the point of the mountain, so the odds of running into him were minute. But the chance of going to a local book signing had still been an attraction.

Best of all, this year the kids seemed to be doing better than ever in school. And the three of them had settled into a nice routine. They didn’t need anything or anyone else in their lives. They had each other and that was enough.

Next Friday, they were going to splurge, attend the book signing at Fashion Place Mall, buy the fourth book in the Kyle Miller series, Jared Strong and the Mystery of the Haunted House on Walnut Lane, and get Kyle Miller, himself, to autograph it.

As she closed the book a second time and looked down at her children, she decided she didn’t want anything in her life to change. Life was perfect, just the way it was. Safe, secure, single...and happy.

If only she weren’t so nervous about starting over, the perfection of this moment might be real.

This book is free on Amazon/Kindle.

If you’d like to read more, go to
www.BooksByHeatherHorrocks.com
.

Excerpt:
Deck the Malls

Christmas Street Romantic Comedy Novella #4