Starlight Hill: Complete collection 1-8

by Heatherly Bell

  “Are you sure about this? It won’t always be easy.”

  She reached up and wrapped her arms around his neck. “I love you, Riley Jacobs. I’ll take the good with the bad. This is the new me and she’s a little like the old me. The girl you met at Henry’s, the one that would follow you anywhere. I know life won’t always be perfect, but I know perfect is a fantasy. I want real. I want you. As long as I have you to hold on to I’m going to be all right.”

  “Yeah you are.”

  He took his hand off the mike and pulled her up, hands on that ass he loved. He gave her a long deep kiss, satisfied when she sighed and ran her fingers through his hair.

  More applause. “Can we please get out of here?” Riley said.

  “Wait till you see what I have waiting for you at home. Let’s just say that it involves champagne and bubbles.”

  “Don’t tease me.”

  “Baby, I’m just getting started.”

  Epilogue

  Six months later

  The stick was pink.

  Oh.My.Lord. The. Stick. Pink.

  “Open up!” Angie’s voice called out from outside the bathroom door.

  “What’s going on in there?” Lizzie asked.

  “Nothing!” Sophia shouted back through the door.

  Only the most significant event in her life, that was all. Nothing more. And she couldn’t share with her two best friends. Couldn’t. No way. Not yet. Because she had to tell Riley first. That was in the Rule Book.

  “Then why did I hear you scream a few minutes ago?” Angie demanded. “Is it a review? Did we finally get reviewed?”

  She should just lie and say yes so Angie would get off her back, but mothers didn’t lie. And she was going to be a mother.

  “Are you okay in there?” Lizzie said.

  “I’ll be right out.” Sophia started the faucet and washed her hands.

  Keep calm. But she was so excited there was a clear and huge possibility that she would talk like she’d been given a truth serum when she walked out that door. She should have just waited till she got home to do the test, but having picked it up at the drug store on the way in to work this afternoon, she found that she couldn’t stand not knowing another second.

  Sophia dried her hands and opened the door to Angie and Lizzie.

  “My God! What is it?” Angie said. “Your cheeks are all pink and you look like you’re about to explode! What is it? It’s a review, isn’t it? Five stars? I’m going to be famous.” Angie bounced up and down. “I’m sure it was the risotto.”

  “It’s not a review.”

  “What is it, then?” This was from Lizzie.

  “I can’t tell you!” Sophia picked up her purse and keys.

  She’d just drive over to the station right now and tell Riley. This obviously couldn’t wait and no way would she text him or call him with this kind of news. And she was already too close to telling Angie and Lizzie everything.

  “Where are you going?” Angie asked, following.

  “I can’t stay here or you’ll make me talk!”

  “What do you mean?” Lizzie asked.

  “Seriously, I’ve got to go. And don’t follow me!” Sophia flew out the backdoor and slipped into her car for the short drive to the station.

  Suddenly her two-door sedan seemed much too small and she wondered what Riley would think about a minivan.

  Good news like this needed to be spread far and wide, and Sophia couldn’t wait to tell everyone. Spread the joy, Mama always used to say. Sophia wondered if she was looking down from heaven right now, happy her daughter was doing the right thing and telling her husband first. It was tradition. She didn’t speed and not just because residents were now judging her with a kind of “Mrs. Police Chief” standard she didn’t particularly appreciate, but also speeding was dangerous to her unborn child.

  She opened the door to the station and found Claire in her usual spot. “Hey, Sophia.”

  “Is he busy?”

  “Well, you know his door-is-always-open policy?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Mr. Schwanbeck is a frequent abuser. He’s in there now, and he shut the door. Twenty minutes and counting.” Claire glanced up at the wall clock.

  “Oh, no.” Danger! Sophia was about to bust! “I need to talk to him, and it’s important.”

  “I don’t know what to tell you,” Claire said with a sigh. “Should I buzz him?”

  “No, no. I’ll wait.”

  Except her ‘waiting’ involved pacing the hallway past Riley’s office door with the wink window. After her second trip, Riley noticed her and smiled. By the third trip, he quirked an eyebrow. By the fourth trip, he was already staring in her direction when she passed the door, his forehead crinkled. On the fifth trip, Sophia plastered her face to the small window and mouthed ‘need to talk to you.’

  Sophia opened the door. “Hi, Mr. Schwanbeck.”

  Mr. Schwanbeck turned in his chair, scowling.

  Riley stood up and moved toward her. “Is something wrong?”

  “No, I’m good. Nothing’s wrong. I just need to talk to you. Now.”

  “Young lady, if it’s not an emergency surely it can wait,” Mr. Schwanbeck said.

  “No, it can’t!” With that, she hooked her thumb to the door and glared at Mr. Schwanbeck until he finally got up and left.

  Riley’s arms slipped around her waist and he pulled her in for a long kiss. “Have I told you how much it turns me on when you’re bossy?”

  “You have said that.” She linked her arms around his neck.

  “And did I say I love you today?”

  “No, don’t think so.”

  “Well, I love you today. What’s so important?”

  “Nothing much. You’re just going to be a daddy.”

  Riley’s face split in a wide smile and he swung her up to the balls of her feet. “Seriously, baby? That didn’t take you long.”

  “I couldn’t wait to tell you. The stick turned pink!”

  “What stick?”

  “Never mind,” she said, kissing him again and again. “Hey, can we buy a minivan?”

  Riley didn’t answer as he scowled in the direction of his door. Plastered up against the window were Claire and Mr. Schwanbeck, fighting for space. “Damned open-door policy.”

  “We’re not going to tell them. Not yet.”

  Soon enough, everyone in town would know the good news but not today. Today it was just her and Riley. A special day. Private. Personal. Life changing.

  Finally for the first time in years they were together on the same continent.

  And that was something no one would ever take away again.

  I hope you’ve enjoyed Riley and Sophia’s romance. To read the next book in the Starlight Hill series, click here. There are 8 books in this series.

  You may also be interested in Country Gold and She’s Country Strong in my Wilder Sisters series, both small town romances. All books are connected but stand alone.

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  I love hearing from readers! Contact me at heatherly@heatherlybell.com. If you’re on Facebook and a fan of my books, feel free to join my reader group, Heatherly’s Belles. We have a lot of fun and I often name characters after my readers, with their permission, of course!

  Crazy for You

  Christmas in Starlight Hill

  Crazy for You is a work of fiction. Names, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2016 Maria Buscher

  All rights reserved

  Published in the United States by Heatherly Bell Books

  Cover design: The Killion Group

  Edited by: Jennifer Graybeal

  www.HeatherlyBell.com

  Created with Vellum
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  If this was all Los Angeles had to offer in the way of single men, Fallon McQueen might as well give up right now. She’d never find a date to her ex-husband Ted’s wedding.

  A Christmas overkill of tinsel-covered fake trees and strings of red and green blinking lights hung from one end of the room to the other at Anthony’s Bistro. The speed dating events were held every Tuesday and Thursday night, kicking into high gear the closer time marched towards the holiday. For some the holiday decorations and music piping through the speakers served as a powerful motivator. Find someone here tonight, sucker, or spend one more holiday alone. For Fallon, no more motivation was required. Even so, she’d put the season into her presentation tonight with a tight red velvet dress and matching red pumps. Miss Santa Claus.

  Because she needed a man. A very specific man and it would help if his name happened to be Bud. Probably that would be asking too much, but then again, maybe she could have a Christmas miracle just this once.

  “Do you like sushi?” Tagg, as his name tag read, now asked.

  Whether or not Fallon liked sushi didn’t much matter because at this point she had to be flexible. Could Bud be a nickname for Tagg?

  Fallon stalled. “Possibly.”

  “Don’t tell me you haven’t had sushi. And you’re from San Francisco?”

  She hated sushi with the red hot fire of a thousand suns but that was beside the point. “No. Napa Valley. Starlight Hill.”

  “Where?”

  The timer dinged, indicating that her fifteen minutes of ‘get to know you’ with Tagg had finally concluded.

  “Nice to meet you,” Fallon said and moved to the next chair.

  “Hello there,” Danny-boy (as he’d written on his name tag) said. “You’re a mighty fine looking woman. The Miss Claus dress rocks. Ho,ho,ho.”

  This guy wasn’t going to work because he was a blonde. The hoe joke was the nail in his coffin. Shame.

  “Okay, then. Nice to meet you, but I’ve really got to run.”

  Fallon stood, slapped the table once to indicate she was done with this round and exited Anthony’s. Two weeks of this had produced a big fat zero. The speed dating had been a bad idea. Maybe her worst yet, and she’d had some doozies in her time. The worst of which had to be lying to her mother about having a serious boyfriend. Six months ago. Now she had to go to this stupid wedding and produce said boyfriend, which was a bit of a problem since he didn’t exist.

  Outside, she took a deep breath of smog-laced air, coughed, and forced her shoulders to unkink. She decided it was safe enough to walk home alone. Due to it being December, the city was lit up for the holidays, providing even more safety lighting than normal. And it was only a few short blocks to her duplex. Fallon slipped off her pumps and switched them with the flats she carried in her bag. Always prepared. That was the ticket. Of course, even she hadn’t been prepared when her boss, Delilah, had fired her on the spot for daring to ask for time off at their busiest season. Now Fallon had no job and no man.

  Happy Holidays!

  About six months ago Ted had announced he would marry on December twentieth which meant that if Fallon went home for the wedding, she’d get to spend Christmas with her son, David. Even though this year wasn’t her turn to have him. As long as she agreed to spend it in Starlight Hill she could stay with David at her mother’s house while Ted and his new wife were on their honeymoon. David loved Christmas, and Fallon loved David so she wasn’t going to miss this chance. Even if it meant she had to produce a man. But Fallon couldn’t just have any date for this wedding. Unfortunately, she’d narrowed it down to tall, dark and handsome when her mother pressed for details on her non-existent boyfriend.

  “I said sit still, asswipe!” A man’s voice rang into the night, rising above the roaring sounds of the freeway and passing cars.

  When Fallon rounded the corner to her duplex she came upon a man known all over the world by two short words: Santa Claus. But this Santa Claus looked like a badass, given that he had a man pinned on the ground, his knee pressed into his back. The man on the ground was squirming and shouting out obscenities.

  And this was supposed to be a decent neighborhood. “I-is everything okay?” Fallon asked Santa.

  Santa gave a quick glance in her direction. “It’s all under control, ma’am. Just move along.”

  “But I live there.” Fallon pointed to the duplex just behind them.

  “This joker was trying to break into your place when I stopped him.”

  “So you say,” the pinned man said. “I was just out taking a night stroll.”

  Dressed in black, with a black knit cap and black gloves. Oh God!

  “Sure, sure. You’ll get your chance to explain it all once the police come. They’re on their way,” Santa said.

  Fallon stomped her foot near the criminal’s head. “You’ve got your nerve! I don’t have anything in there worth taking, sir! All you would have accomplished is made me feel so icky I’d have to burn the place down. Next time pick on someone your own size.”

  Santa quirked a single eyebrow at her but didn’t say a word.

  “Betsy!” Fallon ran past the two men toward her neighbor’s side of the duplex.

  Hopefully her elderly neighbor was safe and sound. She finally answered the door though, it being past ten o’clock at night, she took roughly a millennium to open it.

  “What on earth?” she asked, holding her cat in her arms.

  “I had to see that you were okay!” Fallon shouted at the hard of hearing woman. “There’s a man! And a knit cap! I think he was trying to break in!”

  “Oh dear,” she said, tugging Hercules closer.

  “Don’t worry, ma’am,” Santa said from his place on top of the criminal’s back. “I’ve got this!”

  Oh whew, he had it. But who the hell was he? He was dressed like a mall Santa Claus, complete with red outfit, beard, and big-bowl-full-of-jelly belly. But he behaved more like a super hero the way he had that man pinned and unable to budge.

  Fallon stared in Santa’s direction. “I don’t know who that Santa is—”

  Betsy shut her door.

  Okay, so Fallon was on her own. Familiar territory, that, except this time she had company in the form of the criminal and Santa Claus. A few minutes later, the criminal, Santa, and the L.A.P.D. It sounded like the start of a demented version of the “Twelve Days of Christmas.”

  Maybe Kailey was right. Maybe Fallon should take her best friend’s advice and move back to Starlight Hill.

  The two police officers referred to the Santa as Jack, as if they knew him. So maybe he was an off-duty cop. The cops handcuffed the would-be robber, read him his rights, and then shoved him into the back seat. They asked Fallon some questions and a few minutes later were on their way. Fallon was still standing at the curb trying to remember how to breathe when she noticed Santa Jack near her front door. Specifically, next to the overgrown Oleander.

  He crooked a finger in her direction.

  She walked over. “Thanks so much. I don’t know what to say.”

  “Say you’ll get these bushes trimmed. Makes it too easy for someone to hide while they break in. He was coming in through the window. Or trying to.”

  She’d never thought about it. The bushes were supposed to give her added privacy. Who knew they would give crooks the secrecy to conduct their crookedness?

  She worried a fingernail between her teeth. “Could you…I mean is there any way that you would...I know it’s silly, because you caught him, right? But what if his…what do you call those people who hang out with the criminal?”

  He squinted. “Accomplices?”

  “Accomplice! What if his accomplice got in somehow when you weren’t looking and he’s in my house right now hiding in the closet like in the movies? The ones where you want to yell at the stupid girl for walking inside all by herself. ‘No, no! He’s inside, you idiot!’” She took a breath. “Maybe you could just…make sure.”

  He moved close
r to the front door. “I’d be happy to check for you. Ease your mind.”

  “Thank you,” Fallon said and unlocked the front door. “Do you have a gun?”

  “Nope. Santa doesn’t need a gun.” He lowered his fake beard.

  Holy Santa Claus! She got a good look at an easy smile and the light scruff of a sexy dark beard. He had deep brown eyes, too. So what if he was a little chunky around the middle? As he went through her duplex, opening closet doors, walking through her bedroom and checking the bathroom, Fallon couldn’t help but check him out. Because this off duty Santa, as Santas went, was sort of five-alarm-fire hot. He took off his hat to reveal a full head of chocolate brown wavy hair.

  Her ovaries wept.

  When he pulled off his red and white coat, he also pulled off his fat belly. “Sorry. This is hot.”

  Oh boy. Yes, she would have to agree. She’d never in her life, except when she was about seven, been so attracted to Santa Claus. But now that the jacket was off she could see a trim, athletic physique under there. He’d worn a white long sleeved t-shirt under the jacket that seemed a half size too small, given the way his muscles strained at the fabric.

  “Cleared,” he said and turned back to her. “You’re good to go.”

  Fallon batted her eyelashes. “Thank you so much, officer…officer…”

  “Jack Cooper, but just call me Jack. I’m not a cop anymore. As in permanently off-duty. By choice.”

  “I’m Fallon McQueen.”

  She might have thought him younger if she went by his lean and agile build, but a long look into his mocha eyes said otherwise. The eyes were edgy with small crinkled lines that led her to believe he’d lived a full and possibly dangerous life.

  “So what are you going to do now, Santa Jack? Canvas the neighborhoods to rescue poor women like me?”