Keepsake (47 page)
Christy Ptak, who could not have been more than Jessie's age when Quinn and his father pulled her from the bus, was the last to come forward. She couldn't have understood in any profound way that she was standing there because of the heroism of a father and his son; possibly she was there because it was a free trip out east, a lark with meals and lodging thrown in. But she was the one of the three who seemed to have moved Quinn most deeply. His mouth compressed in a tight line of emotion as he nodded and accepted her tentative hug.
He's thinking like a father
... he's thinking of Jessie
... Oh, Quinn
... how I love you.
Tears were running freely now; Olivia heard the mayor's announcement that a memorial plaque would be installed at the base of the flagpole to honor Francis Leary. She lifted her hands to wipe her eyes, because she didn't want to miss any of it, not a look, not a smile.
But letting go of Jessie's hand had an inevitable result: The child, set free, took off at a gallop, heading not for her father at the podium, but for
the opposite side of the semi-
circled crowd.
"Oh, Jessie, wait—!"
And then Olivia saw where she was headed. Owen Bennett was standing soldier-straight in the space behind where the survivors had been waiting.
And next to him, his wife.
"Gammy, Gammy, Gammy!"
Teresa Bennett turned from the podium to the fat-legged child making a beeline for her. She dropped down low and held out her arms, and some of the old joy, and all of the old radiance, returned to her face as she hugged her granddaughter tight.
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A Month at the Shore
"
An addictive, captivating story of love, family and trust.
"
--
Romance Reviews Today
Laura Shore has fled her humble past on Cape Cod and made a name for herself on the opposite coast. But when she returns and joins forces with her two siblings to try to save Shore Gardens, the failing family nursery, she finds that she hasn't left the past behind at all. Kendall Barclay, the town's rich son and her childhood knight in shining armor, lives there still, and his hold over Laura is as strong as ever. Like a true knight, he's attentive, courteous, and ready to help -- until a discovery is made that threatens the family, the nursery, and Laura's deepening relationship with him.
Select here
to read the prologue and five sample chapters of
A Month at the Shore
.
"
Complex … fast-moving …humorous … tender"
--
Publishers Weekly
SAFE
HARBOR
. That's what
Martha's Vineyard
has always been for Holly Anderson, folk artist, dreamer and eternal optimist. If she could just afford to buy the house and barn she's renting, fall in love, marry the guy and then have children as sweet as her nieces, life would be pretty much perfect.
Poor Holly. She has so much to learn.
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Safe Harbor
.
"Buy this book! A truly fantastic read!"
--
Suzanne Barr
,
Gulf
Coast
Woman
USA
TODAY
bestselling author Antoinette Stockenberg delivers an original and wonderfully romantic story of two people -- college lovers separated for twenty years -- who have the chance to be happy together at last.
But family, friends, an ex-husband, a teenaged daughter and an unsolved murder seem destined to keep the lovers star-crossed, until Dan takes up residence in the Cape Cod lighthouse, with Maddie's rose-covered cottage just a short walk away ...
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A Charmed Place
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"
Richly rewarding
… a novel to be savored
.
"
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Romantic Times Magazine
A
Nantucket
cottage by the sea: the inheritance is a dream come true for Jane Drew. Too bad it comes with a ghost —and a soulfully seductive neighbor who'd just as soon boot Jane off the island.
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Beloved
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"
A deft blend of mystery and romance … sure to win more kudos"
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Publishers Weekly
To Meg Hazard, it seemed like a good idea at the time: squeezing her extended family into the back rooms of their rambling Victorian home and converting the rest of the house into a Bed and Breakfast in the coastal town of
Bar Harbor
,
Maine
.
Paying guests are most welcome, but the arrival of a
Chicago
cop on medical leave turns out to be both good news
and bad news for Meg and the Inn Between.
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Embers
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"As hilarious as it is heart-tugging ... a rollicking great read."
--I'll Take Romance
In Gilded-Age Newport, an upstairs-downstairs romance between a well-born son and a humble maid is cut short of marriage. A hundred years later, the descendants of that ill-fated union seem destined to repeat history. Or not.
RITA Award Winner
"Booksellers' recommended read."
--
Publishers Weekly
A showdown between a U.S. Senator (with a house on
Martha's Vineyard
) who believes in ghosts and a reporter who doesn't.
What could possibly go wrong?
"Full of charm and wit, Stockenberg's latest is truly enthralling."
--
Publishers Weekly
In 1692,
Salem
,
Massachusetts
was the setting for the infamous
persecution of innocents accused of witchcraft.
Three centuries later, little has changed.
Helen Evett, widowed mother of two and owner of a prestigious preschool in town, finds her family, her fortunes, and her life's work threatened —all because she feels driven to protect the sweet three-year-old daughter of a man who knows everything about finance but not so much about fathering.
USA Today bestselling novelist Antoinette Stockenberg grew up wanting be a cowgirl and have her own horse (her great-grandfather bred horses for the carriage trade back in the old country), but the geography just didn't work out: there weren't many ranches in
Chicago
. Her other, more doable dream was to write books, and after stints as secretary, programmer, teacher, grad student, boatyard hand, office manager and magazine writer (in that order), she achieved that goal, writing over a dozen novels, several of them with paranormal elements. One of them is the RITA award-winning EMILY'S GHOST.
Stockenberg's books have been published in a dozen languages and are often set in quaint
New England
harbor towns, always with a dose of humor. She writes about complex family relationships and the fallout that old, unearthed secrets can have on them. Sometimes there's an old murder. Sometimes there's an old ghost. Sometimes once-lovers find one another after half a lifetime apart.
Her work has been compared to writers as diverse as Barbara Freethy, Nora Roberts, LaVyrle Spencer and Mary Stewart by critics and authors alike, and her novels have appeared on bestseller lists in USA Today as well as the national bookstore chains. Her website features sample chapters, numerous reviews, many photos, and an
enchanting Christmas section.
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If you enjoyed reading this novel, please "Like" Antoinette Stockenberg's Facebook author page!
Sample
Prologue and
Chapter
1
Antoinette Stockenberg
"
An addictive, captivating story of love, family and trust.
"
--
Romance Reviews Today
Laura Shore has fled her humble past on Cape Cod and made a name for herself on the opposite coast. But when she returns and joins forces with her two siblings to try to save Shore Gardens, the failing family nursery, she finds that she hasn't left the past behind at all. Kendall Barclay, the town's rich son and her childhood knight in shining armor, lives there still, and his hold over Laura is as strong as ever. Like a true knight, he's attentive, courteous, and ready to help -- until a discovery is made that threatens the family, the nursery, and Laura's deepening relationship with him.
Prologue
The day after eighth-grade graduation was the best and worst of
Kendall
's life.
He was minding his own business, which happened to be tracking down a snowy owl that had been sighted in a woods just outside of town, when he heard boys' voices farther up the trail.
He was sorry to hear them. He didn't want to be caught with a pair of expensive binoculars around his neck and looking for birds, so he got back on his bike with every intention of leaving the way he had come: quietly. As he pedaled off, the voices got more shrill—whoops and yelps, the sounds of small-town kids on the warpath. He would be fair game for them, he knew from experience, so he picked up his pace.
And then he heard the scream. It was a girl's cry, frightened and angry at the same time, and it sent chills up his back and arms. He slammed on the brakes so violently that his bike skidded on the soft path and went out from under him, falling on top of him and scraping across his pale, thin legs.
He righted the bike, but his hands and legs were shaking as he mounted it again and set off in the direction of the scream. Part of him was hoping and praying that it was all just fooling around; but part of him knew better.
He found them in a clearing next to the trail where he knew kids liked to hang out drinking and smoking—and, he had always assumed, having sex. Four boys had a girl cornered.
She was standing in front of the campfire rocks. Ken couldn't see her very well because she was shielded by the four boys. They were practically shoulder to shoulder, but one pair of shoulders stood higher and broader than the rest: they belonged to Will Burton, the doctor's son, a bully who had squeezed more than one allowance out of Ken on a Friday afternoon. Will's younger, red-haired brother Dagger was there, too, and two other kids
that
Ken didn't recognize.
"Hey!" he yelled at their backs, almost before he could think about it.
They all turned around at the same time, surprised and therefore pissed. But Ken wasn't looking at them, he was looking at her. He was stunned to realize that she had breasts; how had he never noticed that? She was clutching her torn shirt to herself, but he could see her dark pink nipple. Instantly he looked away. When he looked back again immediately, he saw that her face was all flushed and her cheeks were wet, and he felt desperately ashamed.
"Leave her alone," he said in a voice filled with fury.
Will
Burton
just laughed. "Ooh, I'm scared. What're you gonna do? Run and tell your daddy?"
The other boys snickered and approached him as he stood astride his bike.
He could have taken off. He didn't, because he wanted her to make a break for it. But she stayed right where she was! He couldn't believe it. She wasn't moving. It was like she was hypnotized or paralyzed or something. She was looking straight at him and nobody else. He was ashamed in advance for what he knew was going to happen to him.