Loreli pulled her up into her arms and held her close against her heart.
“We missed you so,” Dede whispered.
“I missed you and your sister, too, pumpkin.”
Bebe awakened then, and when she saw Loreli her eyes went wide, and she yelled happily, “Loreli!”
She launched herself at Loreli like an ecstatic kitten and soon they were all rolling around on the bed, laughing and giggling. Loreli couldn’t remember being this happy ever. When calm returned, Loreli listened as the girls competed to tell her all that had gone on since they’d last been together.
“I didn’t win the Circle Race,” Bebe said. “I came in fifth. De came in third.”
Loreli turned to Dede. “You came in third!”
“Yep. Me and Sapphire.”
“Who’s Sapphire.”
“My horse. Uncle Jake bought her for me after you left. She’s a real nice horse, Loreli.”
“I’ll bet she is.” Dede came in third! An amazed Loreli looked to Jake. He simply smiled. “So did Anthony Diggs win again?”
“No, he had to sell his horse,” Bebe answered.
“Why?”
“Aggie said his father got behind on his mortgage,” Bebe told her.
“I see.” Loreli had forgotten all about the greedy Sol Diggs and how she’d brought him down.
“Anthony and his daddy worked for Carrie’s daddy during harvest,” Dede added.
Loreli once again swung her amazed eyes to Jake. Sol Diggs forced to work for Matt Peterson!
“The Lord works in mysterious ways,” Jake replied.
Loreli guessed so.
Loreli let herself enjoy the company of the girls for over an hour, then she made them hop back beneath their quilts. “I’ll see you two in the morning, okay?”
Both girls smiled sleepily.
Jake and Loreli gave the girls good-night kisses, then Jake doused the lamp and quietly followed Loreli out into the hall.
As the newlyweds stood in the silence just looking at each other, Loreli knew that if someone had told her she’d fall in love with, and marry, a hog farmer, she would have taken them to court for slander. But now, as he pulled her into his arms and held her against his strong chest, she wanted to proclaim her good fortune to the world. Loreli Winters had a man, a good man, and she didn’t care who knew it!
Author’s Note
A few years ago, my cousin Michelle Bivens asked if I would do a story with a twist. She wanted an experienced heroine and an inexperienced hero. I found the idea intriguing but at the time there were no heroines in my company of characters able to pull off such a role. Until Loreli. Her appearances in Topaz and, more recently, Always and Forever won the hearts of many fans. Those appearances also generated a lot of mail asking that she be given a book of her own, and as a result, the story of Jake and Loreli was born. I hope you enjoyed it.
The influence of labor unions, like the Knights of Labor, would continue to rise as the nineteenth century moved into the twentieth century. In 1925, A. Phillip Randolph, the founding president of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, began organizing among Pullman’s Black porters. The Brotherhood won its first major contract with the Pullman company in 1937, and would go on to become America’s strongest and most successful Black trade union. I learned a lot researching this topic, so if I piqued your interest, here are some of the sources I consulted.
A Long Hard Journey: The Story of the Pullman Porter, Patricia and Frederick McKissack, Walker Publishing, New York, 1989.
Beyond Labor’s Veil: The Culture of the Knights of Labor, Robert E. Weir, Pennsylvania State University Press, Pennsylvania, 1996.
Negro Thought in America, 1880–1915: Racial Ideologies in the Age of Booker T. Washington, August Meir, Ann Arbor, 1963.
“The Negro in the Populist Movement,” Jack Abromowitz, Journal of Negro History, Vol. 38, 1953.
I’d like to take a moment to thank some people for their help and love. Ava and Gloria are at the top of the list for putting together another outstanding PJ party. Seventy plus participants came from as far north as Minnesota and as far west as San Diego, and we had a great time! Thanks also to the ladies from the Peters Library African American Book Club: Shirley, Petula, Charlotte and Joan for volunteering their time to help the PJ party run smoothly. Next PJ party is scheduled for Spring of 03.
I owe a big big shout-out to Shareeta, Linda, Angie, and Cheryl, of the Minga Suma Book Club in LA for sponsoring my first trip to the Left Coast, and for showing me a banging time. Thanks also to the great folks at Eso Won books for hosting the book signing.
In closing, I want to express my humblest thanks to all the book clubs across the country who’ve sponsored me and or my books. The African-American community is, in many ways, a word of mouth community, and you ladies and gents have been talking me up in such marvelous ways that women and men who never read romances in the past are now Beverly Jenkins fans. I appreciate the support. For those fans who’ve been with me since the beginning, well, you all know how much I love you, so I’ll just say, thanks again. I have the greatest fans in the world. Until next time, everybody stay strong and keep reading.
BJ
About the Author
BEVERLY JENKINS has received numerous awards, including three Waldenbooks Best Sellers Awards, two Career Achievement Awards from Romantic Times magazine, and a Golden Pen Award from the Black Writer¹s Guild. In 1999, Ms. Jenkins was voted one of the Top Fifty Favorite African-American writers of the 20th Century by AABLC, the nations largest on-line African-American book club. To read more about Beverly, visit her website at www.beverlyjenkins.net.
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Copyright
This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author�s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
A CHANCE AT LOVE. Copyright © 2002 by Beverly Jenkins. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
ePub edition January 2007 ISBN 9780061736865
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