Lynette Endicott's Blog, page 11

Winter leaves home – Runs away to San Francisco

Another Excerpt to whet your Appetite

She straightened her shoulders and jerked up her chin. One way or another, she would find out who was responsible for her current situation; and she would make them pay big time.

She made her way along the beach. The area where she, the body, and the others had been was washed clean by the tides, as if this morning had never happened.

How was she going to nail the corrupt cops and not endanger Grandma Allison?

Her steps slowed as she left the beach area and made her way into the city, the cat padding along beside her.

With a certainty which made her breath catch, she knew the threat against her grandmother was not an idle one.

Memories of the last time she had seen her grandmother and her family swamped her. but this time, rather than push them away, as she usually did, she allowed the bitter truths of what she had done wash over her.

She’d just turned eighteen and graduated high school, then bought a one way bus ticket out of that suffocating small town of Medicine Springs, Missouri for the big city. She rubbed a hand over her face and pushed away hot tears. That was the last time she had seen any of them, yet their faces were etched in her memory.

Her mother’s tears.

Her grandmother’s, Allison’s, and Betty’s looks of stunned disbelief.

Her grandfather Sean had shaken his head and given her a look that for some reason gave her courage. She was almost certain that had not been his intention.

Grandpop Eddie smiled at her, with that vacant smile he got sometimes that told her he didn’t always know what was going on around him.

And her father.

Winter sighed and resisted the habit of trying to shake off the guilt which always assaulted her when she thought about her father.

She’d always been a daddy’s girl.

Her dad had been so disappointed in her that day. And afraid. Fear had shown in his eyes.

Even back then she hadn’t blamed her family for their worry. After all, her father was a detective and had been for two decades or more, and her grandpa Sean — the youngest, sharpest, seventy-three year-old man she had ever known — was a retired detective, himself.

They upheld the law in their small town. However, just because they worked in a small town, didn’t mean they were ignorant of what went on in the bigger cities; or what could happen to an eighteen year old girl alone.

So, she didn’t tell anyone her plans — not a single person — until the morning she walked out of her room, backpack slung over one shoulder and bus ticket clutched in her sweaty, trembling hand.

She’d said goodbye from a distance, not trusting herself to go near them lest she lose her resolve to leave. She stood with the length of the room between them, promised to write when she could. Swallowing back tears  she walked out the door of her childhood home, pulling it closed with a determined snap on the stunned silence of her parents and both sets of grandparents. .

She half expected them to come running out to stop her. The entire thirty minute walk to the bus station she craned her head to look, worried one or all of them would break out of their shock long enough to come and snatch her back home.

Oddly, they had not.

She was still, after all these years, not sure how she felt about the fact they hadn’t.

Only Scat Cat had trailed her steps.

Read Winter’s Grandpa Sean’s story in Animal Instinct, and download Survival Instinct April 11.

Animal Helper “Scat Cat” from Survival Instinct

Each Time After Time book includes a helper from the animal kingdom.  Meet Winter’s

Winter swiped a heavy hand against the sandpaper abrasion wetting her cheek.

A cat meowed

Her brows drew into a frown. Meow?

More sandpaper, then a nudge on her cheek from a wet, somewhat smelly head.

The sound of the ocean registered, and as she struggled to pry her eyes open, memories of the early morning events filtered through her brain.

She squinted up to the sky. The sun was at about ten a.m. Obviously, she hadn’t made the start of her shift, first day.

She could still smell rain in the air but the storm had passed and now the skies were blue. Only in San Francisco.

Another meow.

She turned her throbbing head and met the unblinking golden eyes of a calico cat. “Scat Cat?” she asked in confusion, realizing the second drug hadn’t targeted her vocal cords.

The undernourished, soaking wet cat purred, long and loud.

“You can’t be Scat Cat,” she murmured, reaching up and scratching the feline under its chin.

It couldn’t be the same cat. It was impossible the alley cat who had followed her to and from school since kindergarten, followed her back and forth from her part time job each and every day, then even to the bus stop the very day she had left town, was the same cat.

Scat Cat, because Winter had shouted the words to the cat, along with a hissing noise and a stomping foot, each and every day, worried the fool cat would get hit by a car by following her around everywhere.

Everywhere, that was, except her home. Oddly, when Winter was home, the stray cat never lingered.

She shook the cobwebs from her head and sat up. She had been wedged between two large boulders, completely hidden from the spread of beach where she and her captors had gathered earlier this morning.

Her rain gear was gone, as was the bloody clothing underneath the gear.

She had her own clothes on, right down to her combat boots and she shuddered to think who of the twelve men had striped her and replaced her clothing.

Clearly they had breached the high tech security apartment on the third floor of one San Francisco’s Victorian ‘Painted Ladies’, to get her things. Her hand-held hologram cell phone lay at her feet, along with a sealed bag holding a manila envelope, with the word “Evidence” in bold letters stamped onto it at an angle.

It didn’t take much of a guess to know inside the envelope would be the photo of the man she was supposed to bleed for information, then kill.

She shuddered and scooped up her cell and the bag.

The cat continued to stare at her, almost like she was studying her. Unnerved, Winter waved the cat away. “Scat, cat!”

Just as with the cat back home — and no, she was not ready to consider this was the same cat — this cat simply sat and stared.

“You will have a helper from the animal kingdom.”

Winter lunged to her feet and the world went dark at the edges of her vision. She pivoted, her combat boots crunching wet sand and pebbles as she scanned the empty beach for who had spoken.

The cat meowed.

She jerked her gaze to the cat, sitting serenely at her feet, large golden eyes fixed up at her.

Winter pointed to the cat. “You didn’t just speak to me.”

Winter had had enough. She was late to work, and she’d been drugged twice. She was going to drag herself into the precinct late and looking like — she glanced at the cat again — like something the cat dragged in, and everyone one would put it off to too many drinks last night.

Download on April 11 to read the rest of this story.  Or read about Winter’s grandmother, Dr. Allison Green, a veterinarian who also bore the Heartmark and was fated to face the enemy who chases the women of the Heartmark through time.

Love in the Midst of Turmoil – Detective Forced by Crooked Cops

Will Winter be forced to do their bidding?

Winter tried to shake herself awake. She was standing, barely, kept on her feet by two sets of meaty hands lodged under her armpits.

It took a moment to realize the roaring in her ears was coming from the Pacific Ocean.

She blinked the ocean into focus, and then turned her gaze to the semi-circle of people in front of her.

They were all tall. She counted ten of them in the dawn light, an even dozen counting the two holding her upright, all dressed in hooded police-issue rain gear. The cloth badges glued over their hearts were getting soaked with the mist and the steady, light downfall of rain.

The sound of rain hitting plastic filtered through her stunned brain, and she glanced down at herself.

She was also completely covered with her hooded rain gear.

What was going on?

She tried to make her mouth work, but it was dry and her vocal cords were tight, barely allowing air into her lungs, much less allowing her to speak.

One of the officers at the center of the pack stepped forward. As with the others, she could not see his face through the deep plastic hood.

He reached to his throat and flicked a switch on a VDB, a voice disguising box. “The drug we used to knock you out makes it impossible for you to speak. All you have to do during this little staff meeting is listen.”

Her hood was jerked off her head by the man on her left, and her eyes widened at the leader’s words.

She’d been drugged? Her heart thundered within her breast in panic. She struggled to assess if or how they had harmed her.

He laughed, the sound altered to a robot-like cackle, rather than a person; making it  impossible to identify the speaker or even if be sure he was a man.

“No, not that drug.” He smirked. “We haven’t spent the night taking advantage of you. That would be unethical and we are all sworn to uphold the law.”

Was he serious, or was sarcasm lacing his words?

Her mind raced as the effects of the drug lessened by the moment.

Twelve men, police officers, if the speaker were to be believed, had drugged her and rendered her voiceless.

Why?

“There’s a small task we have decided only you can take care of for us.”

She frowned at him. The cold rain plastered her hair to her scalp and ran into her eyes and down her face, dripping from her chin. Her heart raced so fast she was surprised it didn’t beat out of her chest.

The metallic taste of fear filled her dry mouth and her stomach did a slow churn.

Her knees buckled and the hands holding her up tightened so she could not slip out of their hold.

She was going to have bruises the size of hams when this was over.

“There’s a reporter in town.”

Something in the cadence of his words seemed familiar. Did she know her attackers?

“He is doing some… shall we say investigating…, on our little band here.” The leader’s arm swept out to encompass the other officers. “Your task it to find out what he knows about us and make sure any incriminating information is destroyed, before you get rid of him.”

She frowned at him and shook her head, completely at a loss. Why would a reporter investigate a group of officers? What had they done to warrant the notice of the press?

She tried to ask, to make her vocal cords relax enough to get the questions through.

The hooded officer standing next to the leader reached to his throat and flicked a switch on his VDB. “She doesn’t have a clue what you’re talking about.”

The leader nodded. “Then perhaps we should spell it out for her.”

Five officers took three steps to the left and the other five men of the semi-circle took three steps to the right. There, on the sand, was the lifeless body of the creep who had come on to her last night. Eyes she had stared down in the bar mirror were now glazed with death and sightlessly fixed on her.

Download and read April 11 from Desert Breeze Publishing.

Time-traveling enemy in San Francisco

Counting down to April 11 release of Survival Instinct

Meet Winter, Allison and Sean’s grandaughter from the very end of Animal Instinct, the first in the Time After Time Saga with Tami Dee.

She pushed her hair behind her ears and glanced down, considering her faded jeans, black tee, short, silver studded black leather jacket, and beat up black combat boots. It was her usual off duty attire. There was no reason they couldn’t be her working clothes too.

The other detectives had their own distinct looks, mostly casual, comfortable, but each look uniquely their own. They already ribbed her about her fresh, small town girl face, with a body to pull off a sexy as sin; bad girl, biker image. However, that was their take on her appearance, not particularly hers.

In all fairness; the good natured teasing  she had endured for the past five years may have stemmed from that first day, when she roared into the police academy parking lot on a Harley.

She had picked up the hog the same day she’d arrived in San Francisco.

Some guy down on his luck had been trying to sell it. She’d offered him five hundred dollars cash and he’d snapped it up.

Granted, it had looked like a hunk of junk. She allowed herself a wry smile. It still looked a hunk of junk for that matter, but it ran, and that’s all that mattered to Winter.

She chuckled at the memory, especially her ‘crash course’ in learning to ride the thing. Amazingly, she hadn’t killed herself or broken anything.

Survival Instinct releases April 11. Download from Desert Breeze Publishing.

Easter’s past — for fun

Survival Instinct — Fantasy Romance Releases April 11

Enemy travels through time to destroy love for Heartmark women

Product Description

Tough as nails San Francisco homicide detective Winter Parker runs fast and far to escape ancient threats of revenge, and small town torments. Can equally tough Special Agent Mike Hunter convince Winter to put aside her fears and take a chance on him and their small town?

Excerpt

The door to the small bath slammed open and Mike stood, both hands raised and clutching either side of the door frame in a white knuckle grip.

She sniffed and jerked her chin up. “You’re still here?”

His jaw clenched, he glared at her. “It’s going to take a lot more than you not caring a classmate was murdered to get rid of me.”

Her mouth dropped open.

His hands fell to his sides and he took the one step needed to be right in front of her. He towered over her and she instinctively leaned back, until her lower back was pressed against the smooth porcelain of the bathroom sink.

“The way I see it, Parker,” he growled, “is if you can hate so fiercely, then you will also love just as fiercely, and that’s the kind of woman I want loving me. Oh, and Parker,” he said. “Mark my words, I love you every bit as fiercely.”

His head lowered and he kissed the air right out of her lungs.

When he lifted his head she touched her kiss-swollen lips. “So, you don’t mind I’m not a nice person?”

He rested his forehead on hers and puffed out a half laugh. “I’m not such a nice person either, Winter.”

She shook her head in instant denial and he pressed a finger over her lips. “There are layers to me you cannot even guess at.” He lowered his head until they were nose to nose. “We’ll always have one another’s back, Winter. We’ll get married, and someday have a dozen or more not so nice children, who will make us pay for our raising.”

Download from Desert Breeze Publishing April 11. Learn more about Tami Dee from her website and don’t forget to download the first book in this series, Animal Instinct. Each book stands alone, but the entire series will capture your imagination and, if you are an animal lover, you will enjoy guessing what animal helpers will show up next.

Author offers advice to would-be writers

Photo of author

Paisley Kirkpatrick is my guest this week, and she has two books published with Desert Breeze Publishing, and more to come. Paisley, tell us what makes a writer. How can people with a book in their heads become published as you have?

You’ve got to have a dream to have a dream come true. When you dream, don’t dream small. Go for the biggie because you only go through life once. I can testify that when the biggie comes true, it is worth all the waiting, all the dreaming, and most of all — all the hard work.

Ah, the work. It is more than dreaming then?

My friends said I am one of the most stubborn people they know. How could I possibly practice writing for 22 years and never give up. I prefer calling it perseverance — more letters in the word, and it sounds prettier. Twenty-two years ago I started writing this story called Marriage Bargain. Once I had it into a computer — way back in the days of two floppy discs to get the computer to load up — I needed to learn the proper way to present it. Just how could I do that? I had no idea the wonderful world of writers, chapters, and RWA would change my life. It’s the best thing I’ve ever done for myself. I have landed in a place where I know I was born for, the place I persevered for.

Yes, I agree that a professional association and the support of other writers is key. 

What do you think of the advice to new writers to “write what you know.”?

Unfortunately, I didn’t hear this piece of advice before I started writing, but I did have a great crutch. My great, great grandfather, Dr. Charles Kirkpatrick, wrote a journal when he traveled across the country in 1849 on a wagon train. Not bad for finding what I needed from an ancestors that lived the story. Inadvertently, I did write what I know after studying his words. This five star journal is kept under glass at the Bancroft Library at UC California, Berkeley.

Wow! What a rich resource from your own family’s history! What was your toughest lesson to learn as a writer?

My first review by a chapter mate made me realize how little I knew about the craft of writing. I handed her my magnificent story and could hardly hear her thoughts. She gave it back to me and said she’d try reading it again when I learned point of view. I had no idea what she was talking about, but I learned. I’d say out of all the things I’ve learned to master, POV is one of the most important and can be a very difficult skill to perfect. If I had any advice to give to a beginning author, it’s the one I would tell them to master first. It can make the difference of distinguishing one character’s thoughts from another. I find it difficult to read a story where the author head hops because when you have to stop the flow of your reading and reread to figure out who is talking it takes you out of the story and can frustrate a reader enough that they may give up on your story. You certainly don’t want that to happen. This same friend who guided me into learning POV tells a story on me and how bad I was at POV. ”Paisley had a five sentence paragraph with four POVs, one of which was the rock.” It’s something I will NEVER live down, but laughing at yourself and not taking criticism too seriously, is important when you are a writer.

When we transition from readers to writers we do have to think about how the writers we love actually craft their work. Any last words for your fans?

To let you in on how my dream came true, I got my writing contract and March 21, 2013, my second book is released. It’s about a hero and heroine on a wagon train…

Be sure to check out both Paisley’s books. You can download them right now from Desert Breeze Publishing, Amazon, or Barnes and Noble.

Paradise Pines series of Western Romance

Photo of author

 

Dusty bearded men in miner’s boots and faded shirts, gamblers in fancy vests and frock coats, a ghost or two tossed in for good measure – these are the characters who come to life on Paisley Kirkpatrick’s pages.  Mix them with strong, independent women of the Gold Rush era who delight and tempt their heroes to take a chance on love and, voila, it’s romance.

The Sierra Mountain Range of California is a perfect place to discover the mysteries of a wild time in history.  Placerville, known as Old Hangtown in 1849, provides a virtual hive of tales that Kirkpatrick cannot resist working into her stories.  Underground tunnels, mine shafts, and rumors of ghost sightings provide perfect backgrounds and add a bit of spice here and there. 

Come explore these glorious parts of California’s past with Paisley Kirkpatrick.  Meet the pioneers who dared to live life with gusto.

Her husband of 43 years and she are fortunate enough to live in the Sierra Mountain Range of California where this colorful time in history took place. Exploring gold mines, inspecting the stately historic homes, and traveling through tunnels zigzagging underground stirs the imagination and brings reality to her stories.  To write and create has always been her dream. Joining Romance Writers of America twelve years ago opened the door to achieving what she was born to do.

Visit Paisley’s website or her Amazon Author Page to learn more about her.

Future Releases by Paisley Kirkpatrick:

Paradise Pines Book Three: Forever After - October 2013

Paradise Pines Book Four: Broken Promises - May 2014

Paradise Pines Book Five: One-Eyed Charlie - December 2014

Buy Books One and Two at Desert Breeze Publishing,  Amazon, or Barnes and Noble. 
 

New Release — second in Paradise Pines series of Western Romance

MARRIAGE BARGAIN second book in the Paradise Pines Series, release date March 21, 2013

Marriage Bargain is set on the dusty trail of a wagon train traveling from St. Joseph, Missouri, to the California gold rush area at Placerville, California, in 1849. Betrayal and embarrassment drives Darrah Benjamin to run away from home to take a tutoring job in San Francisco. Darrah finds her journey a pathway to love and forgiveness when an arranged marriage to the wagon scout becomes much more than a convenience. Chase challenges her determination to keep their marriage in name only with his promise — she’ll give him her heart and invite him to her bed before they arrive at their destination. Darrah has an immediate attraction to the rogue, but holds her emotions tight because she doesn’t want her heart broken again.

Charles Danforth, a scout known as Chase, leads a wagon train of emigrants west through plains plundered by murderers. As an undercover agent of President Polk, he has sworn to stop the massacres.  Darrah’s inadvertent comment gives him the clue he needs to achieve his assignment. His Sioux blood brother helps Chase end the killings, but almost ruins Chase’s chance of winning Darrah’s heart when he takes matters in his own hands to demonstrate the depth of love Chase has for his wife.

 EXCERPT:

Footsteps crunched on the rocks a few minutes later. He spun around and froze on the spot. The drowned rat? At least he thought the young woman walking toward him was the drowned rat. Her appearance was a far cry from the woman he’d saved during the storm. Unable to pull his gaze away from the gentle sway of her hips and the firm round breasts pressing against her crisp white bodice, he shook his head trying to clear his thoughts. Light filtered through the branches giving her an ethereal appearance, and touching on pouting lips begging to be kissed. All logical reason vanished. His reaction staggered him as his mounting desire for the woman coursed through him. She was everything he’d remembered and more. She was a liar.

He dropped the last of his gear alongside Cappy’s wagon as she stopped in front of him.   ”What’s your game, lady?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Cut the act, Rose. You know very well we’ve met before. Or maybe you were such a good actress I actually believed you were in trouble during the thunderstorm.”

Her eyes grew wide as saucers. Her hand pressed against her bosom as she gasped. “You can’t be the man who rescued me.”

Cappy cleared his throat. “What’s going on here? Who is Rose?”

“I didn’t tell you a lie, Captain. My name is Darrah Rose Benjamin. It’s true your friend pulled me off my runaway horse. I was cold, wet, and tired. He suggested I remove my clothes before he kissed me, and then he had the nerve to invite me under his fur.” She glared at him. “Under the circumstances I chose not to tell him my full name.”

“What’s she talking about?” Cappy’s voice cracked with anger. “I raised you better.”

Chase shrugged. “It didn’t happen exactly as she says, Cappy. I may have misjudged the lady.    She was such a fetching little thing I couldn’t resist kissing her. Besides, she needed thawing out.”

“Wipe that damned grin off your face, boy. You get into town and find a Justice of the Peace. There’s goin’ to be a wedding tomorrow.”

“Hold on a minute.” Darrah grabbed Cappy’s arm. “If this man is the scout you want me to marry, I won’t do it. He obviously doesn’t trust me or believe in bathing.” She stalked toward the clearing where she’d tethered her horses.

Watching her march across camp, Chase wished he’d handled the situation better. Cappy’s glare shot daggers at him. He’d been a fool for stomping on her pride. Damn, but she’s far too high-strung and beautiful for her own good.

“Why’d you hurt her feelings and how will you fix the mess you made?” Cappy asked.

He set his attention on the old man. “Me?”

“You’re the one who acted an ass.”

“Wait one damned minute. I told you this was a foolhardy idea in the first place. I only agreed I would talk to the girl, nothing else.” His gaze slid over the gentle sway of her hips. He remembered the soft touch of her lips and the seductive way she looked with her hair in ringlets around her shoulders when she dried her hair by the fire.

“You can’t let her walk out of our lives.”

Chase took off his hat and raked his fingers through the tangled mess. “You’re a stubborn old man. It’s not so simple. I was close to being drunk the night of the storm. When lightning struck the ground in front of her horse, I thought I was hallucinating. Her screams brought me to my senses so I went after her. While I had her on the horse with me, she wriggled that little bottom of hers against my crotch until I was nearly out of my mind. Once I got her settled in camp, I went after her horses. It gave me a chance to cool off. She looked so damned desirable dripping wet I couldn’t think straight. When she stole away from camp early the next morning, I figured I was done with her.”

“You didn’t cool off enough, boy.”

“Dammit, Cappy, I’m not proud of my actions.”

“Talk to her. What if she hooks up with someone else? If she attempts the trek on her own as she’s threatened, she could die. I couldn’t bear the weight of another death.”

He didn’t have room in his life for a woman and he sure as hell didn’t have time to babysit. At this point he wasn’t ready to tip his hand and let her know his true identity.

Download Marriage Bargain and read it right now!

Facial disfigurement as a long lasting scar

Eye of the Beholder by Patty Froese

How beautiful are you? If you were to rate yourself on a scale of 1 to 10, where would you land?

I don’t think anyone is terribly comfortable with that exercise. We’ve been trained by the media to criticize ourselves. A droop, a sag, a blemish… Those are inexcusable. Actresses are publicly mocked for having gained a little weight or having some “cottage cheese cellulite” on their thighs, exposed by the prying lenses of unwelcome cameras.

Women have babies and are judged by their “bounce back” time, ridiculous as that may be.

A woman’s value is not based on something as fickle as Hollywood ideals, but the constant battery of messages coming from the media would have us believe something else. Companies want us to believe that tubes and vials will make us beautiful, that certain styles will help us maintain our youth, that dyes will make us feel lovely. From diets to exercise machines, clothing lines to skin creams, the woman in this modern age is bombarded by messages that she just isn’t enough, and she needs some help. Big time.

So when we look at ourselves in the mirror, what do we see? I always joke that it isn’t fair to judge me only on my looks, because when you add in my personality, I get at least a three point lift on that number.  And while I’m only joking around when I talk like that, there is truth under the laughter.

Beauty is more than skin deep. But how much more?

Would you still feel beautiful if you had to wear unflattering clothing? Would you feel beautiful if all your hair fell out? Would you feel beautiful if scars covered your face and distorted your smile?

And if you stopped feeling beautiful, would you feel loved?

Where does our beauty come from?

In Eye of the Beholder, my heroine loses her looks in a freak accident. She goes from stunningly beautiful, capturing the admiration of everyone around her, to scarred and pitied. Doors no longer fly open for her, and the face in the mirror seems to belong to a stranger. When she goes up to the autumn woods to try to make peace with what she cannot change, she’s faced with more than the reality of her new looks–she’s faced with a man from her past who lost more than she ever knew.

When a woman loses her looks, what is there left to love?

Buy today from Pelican Book Group or Amazon. And if you haven’t signed up for Patty’s blog you are in for a treat at http://pattyfroese.com/