spice

On June 9th, my stand-alone novella, SECOND CHANCE WEDDING, will be available as part of the 11 novella boxed set from Authors of Main Street: Weddings on Main Street.

I hope that you like the cover as much as I do. SECOND CHANCE WEDDING is a story of coming home again, healing, and a second chance at finding love to last a lifetime. Lemons and flowers – it seemed to fit. Sweet, with a bit of sizzle and summer heat. (A bit of spice – 3/5 flames)

Excerpt from SECOND CHANCE WEDDING:

Life converged on Mel MacAlister with a ferocity it hadn’t shown since she lost both of her parents in a car accident halfway through kindergarten. There were those in her profession who announced with a kind of elitist superiority they found charming, that children in general didn’t have clear memories before the age of two, and after a traumatic loss at the tender age of five, any memories she specifically may have had of her parents, were most certainly the product of fantasy more than memory.

What a load of crap.

Mel remembered.

She remembered the scent of her mother’s perfume on her pillow after Melody MacAlister snuggled with her. She remembered the deep rumbling sound of her father’s laugh when the three of them danced to the Steve Miller Band in their kitchen that always smelled of fresh baked bread. She remembered chocolate cake for breakfast and eggs for dinner. She remembered “silly Saturdays” spent by the lake, and the fact that the lake was called a pond, even though it was way too big to be called a pond. She remembered being carried to bed in strong arms and read to every night to keep the monsters out of the closet and away from under the bed. She remembered the stench of the hospital; the creepiness of the funeral director; the sadness on her grandmother’s face as the big men with expressionless faces lowered her parents into the black earth.

She remembered the first day at her new school, Shute Pond Elementary, in the small-town named after the lake that was too big to be a pond. She remembered one blond-haired girl coming up to her where she stood alone on the playground at recess, hand thrust out like she was an adult business person saying hello. Instead of saying “hello”, she said, I’m sorry your parents are dead. I want to be your friend. My name’s Wendy.

Now, here she was, twenty-eight years later, rehearsing for tomorrow’s walk down the aisle as Wendy Doonan’s maid of honor.

Yep, a lot had happened in almost three decades. Fate had been kind to her for the most part since she first met Wendy. Until now. Until today. Until she had to come face to face with Conall O’Malley, her first, and only, real love.

…

Conall loved four women in his lifetime: his mother, his niece, Kitt MacAlister, and her pain-in-the-ass granddaughter, “Mel” MacAlister. Her real name was Sunshine Melody MacAlister. When he had stolen her lunchbox while walking home from school in second grade, she punched him in the face. His father was so angry with him for what he called tormenting a wee girl. She had been a “wee” girl then. She still was a half-pint. When his mother saw his blackening eye, she said, you’ve been hit by sunshine, laddy. If I were you, I’d treat something so bright with more respect from now on.

Post Script:

I’m dancing on sunshine, anticipating the June 9th release of SECOND CHANCE WEDDING, and all of the marvelous wedding novellas set to release in Weddings on Main Street. Enjoy! I know I will.