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Teaser
Excerpt
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The first three chapters are free on Kindle Vella. Look for two new chapters each week! You can read the chapters at https://amzn.to/47txtJS.
Teaser
Welcome to a quaint Jersey Shore town and the lives of three women, each on a unique journey. Olivia, a young widow, is bravely raising her six-year-old son. Her loyal bestie, Maggie, is a single mom with a bundle of joy. And then there’s Olivia’s mother-in-law Maeve, who after losing her husband, finds solace in helping Olivia and Maggie – her cherished girls. It’s a tale of hope and heartache, resilience and renewal, as these three women learn to embrace life and love once more.
Excerpt
“Love comforteth like sunshine after rain.”
Venus and Adonis
William Shakespeare
Prologue
Even reading hurt.
Liam Rodriguez gritted his teeth as he tried to sit in the hospital bed, so he’d be more comfortable as he plowed through his mail. A nurse was immediately at his side.
“Let me help you with that, Commander,” she said, offered support until he was upright, and then arranged the pillows behind him.
“Thank you, Lieutenant,” he said, but took a rough breath to battle the pain that had erupted in his side from his broken ribs and leg from the bullets that had torn into him during his team’s latest mission. Luckily, his team and the officials they’d been sent to protect had all made it to their final location alive and unharmed.
Well, unharmed except for him and two of his team members, but the injuries had all been non-life-threatening and dealt with at their base hospital.
In no time he’d be back to work and in the meantime, he was catching up on the mail that had come while they’d been on their mission. All his bills and statements were electronic, so luckily it was only a few letters. One from his mother. Another from his sister-in-law Olivia. Finally, one from Maggie.
Maggie, he thought with a sigh.
The instant the bullets had torn into him, and he’d fallen, his gaze starting to go black from the pain, it was Maggie’s face he’d seen. Her taste and smell, the feel of her hand against his cheek, was what he’d remembered.
Fool, you left her remember? his conscience reminded.
That didn’t stop him from opening her envelope first. It was a birthday card featuring cartoon dogs and a funny poem to wish him a Happy Birthday.
He blew out a harsh breath as he realized his birthday was in a few days. It was too easy to lose track of time when he was deployed, and lately his focus had been more on when this tour-of-duty would end and whether he would re-enlist. Turning thirty, with nearly twenty-two years in the service if you counted the Naval Academy, it was time to think about what to do for the future.
Being wounded just days earlier had only added another facet to the many things he had to consider.
Forcing away those thoughts, he read the poem again, opening the folds as the greetings continued until he reached the inside where one dog presented the other with a bone and the birthday greetings. It drew a chuckle from him until he saw Maggie’s familiar and messy script across the bottom of the page.
Have a very Happy Birthday. We miss you and hope to see you soon. Maggie.
Not “I miss you”, but “We miss you.” No “love you.”
But that’s how things were between them. Loosie goosy and non-comital. It was the way they’d both wanted their relationship if you could even call it that. Guilt slammed into him because he wasn’t the kind of guy who took relationships lightly and Maggie deserved better.
He stood the card on his bedside table and opened the one from his mother, expecting it to also be another birthday card. He wasn’t wrong, but unlike Maggie’s, there was no hope to see him soon, maybe because his mother knew he had no desire to ever go home again.
Home had never been welcoming for him and he had been only too eager to escape.
If it hadn’t been for his younger brother’s terminal illness and death, he probably would have never gone back to Ocean Grove, but he had. Only to have his father tell him that he wished it had been Liam and not Sean who had died. And then his father had up and died six months later.
Liam hadn’t shed a tear that the old bastard was dead.
He stood the card up behind Maggie’s and braced himself for Olivia’s letter. Like the other two it was a birthday card. Funny, like Maggie’s, but inside there was a letter and as he opened the card, a couple of photos spilled out.
Olivia with Shea, his brother’s son, on the beach. His nephew was named after the stadium that had housed Sean’s favorite baseball team for so many decades. His favorite team also.
A baseball card with Shea in his Mets Little League T-ball uniform.
His heart constricted at the sight of his little nephew who with each day that passed looked more and more like his dead brother. A brother who would never get to see his son grow up.
Guilt slammed into him again and his hands shook as he unfolded Olivia’s letter and read.
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