Inn at Last Chance

by Hope Ramsay

  Mom was silent for a moment, obviously letting her arguments take their toll, before she continued, “And I don’t think Greg will be wild about the situation after I explain it to him. And you should know that Claire is fit to be tied. How could you turn down her offer to pay Todd’s tuition to the Gilman School?”

  Something deep inside Savannah snapped. “I turned her down because she wants to turn Todd into a big snob, just like you’ve become. Just like Greg is. I’m sorry, Mom, but I’m going to stay in Last Chance. Miriam needs a cook. Todd needs the fresh air. And Dash is not a child molester. I may not have approved of his methods, but he did me a huge favor by breaking that idiotic game. Besides, this is my life, not yours or Claire’s or Greg’s. It’s mine, and if I want to come live here with Aunt Miriam and Cousin Dash, well then, that’s what I’m going to do.”

  She pulled the phone from her ear and pressed the disconnect button.

  “Bravo.”

  She looked up to find Dash leaning in the kitchen doorway clapping his hands. His fitted cowboy shirt accentuated his broad shoulders and narrow hips. He looked tanned and healthy and incredibly male. The puppy Todd found stood beside him looking up with total adoration on his face.

  “I take it that was Aunt Katie Lynne on the phone telling you how to run your life?”

  Savannah nodded, suddenly unable to get a word out. How much had he heard of her rant?

  “Thanks for telling her off on my account. I’ve been wanting to do that since I was thirteen, when she called me a bad seed.”

  Savannah’s eyes began to itch. She’d heard her mother’s opinion about Dash. In fact, she’d repeated her mother’s opinion. Everywhere. To everyone. And now that she thought about it, repeating her mother’s ugly words had set off the infamous snake incident.

  Guilt slammed into her. She hadn’t really understood when she was ten. But now, suddenly, it all came back in a rush. She’d been cruel and mean-spirited.

  Sort of like Mom.

  Savannah took a deep breath and turned back toward her gravy. She needed to get dinner on the table and not think about what had happened in the past or what might happen in the future. Either way it was bad.

  She squeezed her eyes shut and prayed for courage—and maybe an investor with a really, really deep pocket.

  “Princess, I’ve changed my mind about The Kismet,” Dash said.

  She looked over her shoulder. “What?”

  “Last Chance needs a movie theater. So I reckon I’m going into business with you.”

  Dash took one look at the frown on Savannah’s face and decided he didn’t want to hang around long enough for her to refuse his help. He hadn’t considered the complexity of what he’d promised Hettie. It was irksome, to say the least, that Cousin Savannah could stand in the way of his plan to win Hettie back.

  He turned and stalked down the hall and out to the front porch, where he found the kid sitting on the front step looking pitiful. His annoyance at Savannah disappeared, replaced by deep empathy for the boy.

  “Bad move, calling your grandmother and having her call your mother.”

  The kid looked up over his shoulder. “Who asked for your opinion?”

  “No one. Just sayin’. Your momma got all riled up and told your granny that there was no way in hell she’s going back to Baltimore. And I think Aunt Miriam plans to get you registered down at the school tomorrow. So it looks like you’re here for a while.”

  “My father’s going to come and get me, just as soon as he has a free weekend where he’s not playing in a pool tournament.”

  Dash felt for the kid. How many times had Dash told himself the same thing? Dash’s daddy had been a rodeo rider always promising to come home after the next rodeo on the circuit. It sounded like Todd’s daddy loved pool more than his boy. Dash prayed the man wasn’t some kind of hustler or gambler.

  The puppy crawled into Todd’s lap and started washing his face with a darting pink tongue. The kid’s lips quivered. “I can’t even keep him,” he said, stroking the dog’s floppy ears.

  “Well now, that can be arranged,” Dash said as he sat on the porch railing. “Aunt Mim has no objections to the puppy. I have no objections either. And your momma is a guest in this house until she can fix up the apartment above the theater. So she doesn’t have much to say about it. I reckon the dog can stay. Which means we need to find him a name. I’ve been calling him Boulder Head. What do you think of that?”

  The corner of the boy’s mouth lifted just a little. “That’s a stupid name.”

  “Yeah, but it describes him. It’s like someone stuck a head as big as a boxer’s on a frankfurter’s body. That is one weird-looking dog you got there.”

  The kid sniffled and stared down at the dog’s face for a long time. “He’s not weird looking. We should call him Champ.”

  “Champ?”

  “Yeah. He’s got a head as big as a boxer’s, right?”

  “Yeah, I guess. Champ it is, then.” Dash paused for a long moment. “And, uh, I went up to Orangeburg this afternoon, and I got you something.”

  The kid raised his head.

  “It’s in my car.” Dash nodded toward the Cadillac in the drive. “Go on and get it.”

  The kid hopped down from the steps and ran to the car. He opened the passenger’s side door and found the PSP Dash had bought that afternoon.

  “You bought me a new one?” The kid looked really confused.

  “Yeah I did. See, I probably shouldn’t have destroyed your property like that. But I reckon it worked out because, if I hadn’t, we might not have found Champ.”

  “Yeah, I guess.”

  “And there’s another thing. If you’re going to be living in this house, you’re going to have to do some chores. I was twelve when I came to live in this house, and I was required to mow the lawn. And Uncle Ernest—that would be your great-grandfather—insisted that I work at the movie theater and that I go to church and a bunch of things that I wasn’t all that wild about. But there were some good things. I got to help out at Mr. Nelson’s stables, and I like horses. And I got to play baseball.”

  “I hate sports. I’m not any good.”

  “Have you ever played football?”

  He shook his head. “My dad did in college. He was an offensive lineman. He’s always talking about how he almost made it to the NFL.”

  Dash had to stifle a snort of laughter, because the boy was built like an offensive lineman. He might only be twelve, but he was one big child. Dash couldn’t wait to introduce him to Red Canaday, the Davis High football coach and one of Allenberg’s Pop Warner football commissioners. Dash made a mental note to run up to Orangeburg tomorrow and buy a football.

  “Well, maybe you just haven’t had much chance to play anything but that video game. So here’s the deal. You can play that game in the evening after you finish your homework and walk the dog. I also need your help with some repairs around the house.”

  He didn’t mention anything about tossing a football. He would try to ease into that one slowly, like Aunt Mim had suggested.

  “You’re kidding, right?”

  “Nope. It’s all that stuff in order for you to keep the dog and the game. Deal?”

  Champ stood at Todd’s feet wagging his tail and looking up at the boy like he hung the moon. The dog was more eloquent than Dash could ever be. Todd left the game on the front seat of Dash’s car and got down on his knee and petted the dog. Champ responded by wagging his tail and giving the kid a bunch of sloppy puppy kisses.

  Dash tried not to smile, but he couldn’t help it. He said a quiet prayer of thanksgiving to the angels who looked out for lost kids and abandoned dogs.

  Just then a tornado hit the front porch. It came down the hall with fists clenched and blond hair bouncing. “You know I’ve been standing in the kitchen stirring the gravy, trying to control my temper and figure you out. I give up. What do you mean, I’ll have to go into business with you?” Savannah put her fists on her cute little jea
n-clad hips.

  She’d lost the apron she’d been wearing in the kitchen, but her cheeks looked pink, and there was a little smidgen of flour on her navy T-shirt that kind of accentuated her assets, so to speak. Oh, boy, homemade biscuits for dinner. His mouth started watering.

  “Well now,” he said, leaning his backside into the porch railing and folding his arms over his chest, “I think the words are self-explanatory. You’re going into business with me. Actually, I think it’s more accurate to say that I’m going into business with you.” He smiled.

  She gave him her imperious-princess look. “I am not going into business with you.”

  Well, that was predictable. But he wasn’t going to give up. Hettie had asked him for his help, and he regarded it as a test. Besides, if Hettie had asked him to swim the English Channel in his birthday suit, he’d have done it with a smile. “Princess, I hate to disagree, but you and I are about to become partners.”

  “Over my dead body.” She turned and stalked back into the house.

  “Mom really hates you, doesn’t she?” Todd said in a snarky tone.

  Yes, she did. And Dash had the feeling that once Savannah made up her mind about something, she wasn’t ever going to change it.

  THE DISH

  Where Authors Give You the Inside Scoop

  From the desk of Lily Dalton

  Dear Reader,

  Some people are heroic by nature. They act to help others without thinking. Sometimes at the expense of their own safety. Sometimes without ever considering the consequences. That’s just who they are. Especially when it’s a friend in need.

  We associate these traits with soldiers who risk their lives on a dangerous battlefield to save a fallen comrade. Not because it’s their job, but because it’s their brother. Or a parent who runs into a busy street to save a child who’s wandered into the path of an oncoming car. Or an ocean life activist who places himself in a tiny boat between a whale and the harpoons of a whaling ship.

  Is it so hard to believe that Daphne Bevington, a London debutante and the earl of Wolverton’s granddaughter, could be such a hero? When her dearest friend, Kate, needs her help, she does what’s necessary to save her. In her mind, no other choice will do. After all, she knows without a doubt that Kate would do the same for her if she needed help. It doesn’t matter one fig to her that their circumstances are disparate, that Kate is her lady’s maid.

  But Daphne finds herself in over her head. In a moment, everything falls apart, throwing not only her reputation and her future into doubt, but her life into danger. Yet in that moment when all seems hopelessly lost… another hero comes out of nowhere and saves her. A mysterious stranger who acts without thinking, at the expense of his own safety, without considering the consequences. A hero on a quest of his own. A man she will never see again…

  Only, of course… she does. And he’s not at all the hero she remembers him to be.

  Or is he? I hope you will enjoy reading NEVER ENTICE AN EARL and finding out.

  Best wishes, and happy reading!

  LilyDalton.com

  Twitter @LilyDalton

  Facebook.com/LilyDaltonAuthor

  From the desk of Shelley Coriell

  Dear Reader,

  Story ideas come from everywhere. Snippets of conversation. Dreams. The hunky guy at the office supply store with eyes the color of faded denim. THE BROKEN, the first book in my new romantic suspense series, The Apostles, was born and bred as I sat at the bedside of my dying father.

  In 2007 my dad, who lived on a mountain in northern Nevada, checked himself into his small town’s hospital after having what appeared to be a stroke. “A mild one,” he assured the family. “Nothing to get worked up about.” That afternoon, this independent, strong-willed man (aka stubborn and borderline cantankerous) checked himself out of the hospital. The next day he hopped on his quad and accidentally drove off the side of his beloved mountain. The ATV landed on him, crushing his chest, breaking ribs, and collapsing a lung.

  The hospital staff told us they could do nothing for him, that he would die. Refusing to accept the prognosis, we had him Life-Flighted to Salt Lake City. After a touch-and-go forty-eight hours, he pulled through, and that’s when we learned the full extent of his injuries.

  He’d had multiple strokes. The not-so-mild kind. The kind that meant he, at age sixty-three, would be forever dependent on others. His spirit was broken.

  For the next week, the family gathered at the hospital. My sister, the oldest and the family nurturer, massaged his feet and swabbed his mouth. My brother, Mr. Finance Guy, talked with insurance types and made arrangements for post-release therapy. The quiet, bookish middle child, I had little to offer but prayers. I’d never felt so helpless.

  As my dad’s health improved, his spirits worsened. He was mad at his body, mad at the world. After a particularly difficult morning, he told us he wished he’d died on that mountain. A horrible, heavy silence followed. Which is when I decided to use the one thing I did have.

  I dragged the chair in his hospital room—you know the kind, the heavy, wooden contraption that folds out into a bed—to his bedside and took out the notebook I carry everywhere.

  “You know, Dad,” I said. “I’ve been tinkering with this story idea. Can I bounce some stuff off you?”

  Silence.

  “I have this heroine. A news broadcaster who gets stabbed by a serial killer. She’s scarred, physically and emotionally.”

  More silence.

  “And I have a Good Guy. Don’t know much about him, but he also has a past that left him scarred. He carries a gun. Maybe an FBI badge.” That’s it. Two hazy characters hanging out in the back of my brain.

  Dad turned toward the window.

  “The scarred journalist ends up working as an aide to an old man who lives on a mountain,” I continued on the fly. “Oh-oh! The old guy is blind and can’t see her scars. His name is… Smokey Joe, and like everyone else in this story, he’s a little broken.”

  Dad glared. I saw it. He wanted me to see it.

  “And, you know what, Dad? Smokey Joe can be a real pain in the ass.”

  My father’s lips twitched. He tried not to smile, but I saw that, too.

  I opened my notebook. “So tell me about Smokey Joe. Tell me about his mountain. Tell me about his story.”

  For the next two hours, Dad and I talked about an old man on a mountain and brainstormed the book that eventually became THE BROKEN, the story of Kate Johnson, an on-the-run broadcast journalist whose broken past holds the secret to catching a serial killer, and Hayden Reed, the tenacious FBI profiler who sees past her scars and vows to find a way into her head, but to his surprise, heads straight for her heart.

  “Hey, Sissy,” Dad said as I tucked away my notebook after what became the first of many Apostle brainstorming sessions. “Smokey Joe knows how to use C-4. We need to have a scene where he blows something up.”

  And “we” did.

  So with a boom from old Smokey Joe, I’m thrilled to introduce you to Kate Johnson, Hayden Reed, and the Apostles, an elite group of FBI agents who aren’t afraid to work outside the box and, at times, outside the law. FBI legend Parker Lord on his team: “Apostles? There’s nothing holy about us. We’re a little maverick and a lot broken, but in the end we get justice right.”

  Joy & Peace!

  From the desk of Hope Ramsay

  Dear Reader,

  Jane Eyre may have been the first romance novel I ever read. I know it made an enormous impression on me when I was in seventh grade and it undoubtedly turned me into an avid reader. I simply got lost in the love story between Jane Eyre and Edward Fairfax Rochester.

  In other words, I fell in love with Rochester when I was thirteen, and I’ve never gotten over it. I re-read Jane Eyre every year or so, and I have every screen adaptation ever made of the book. (The BBC version is the best by far, even if they took liberties with the story.)

  So it was only a matter of time before I tried to write a
hero like Rochester. You know the kind: brooding, passionate, tortured… (sigh). Enter Gabriel Raintree, the hero of INN AT LAST CHANCE. He’s got all the classic traits of the gothic hero.

  His heroine is Jennifer Carpenter, a plucky and self-reliant former schoolteacher turned innkeeper who is exactly the kind of no-nonsense woman Gabe needs. (Does this sound vaguely familiar?)

  In all fairness, I should point out that I substituted the swamps of South Carolina for the moors of England and a bed and breakfast for Thornfield Hall. I also have an inordinate number of busybodies and matchmakers popping in and out for comic relief. But it is fair to say that I borrowed a few things from Charlotte Brontë, and I had such fun doing it.

  I hope you enjoy INN AT LAST CHANCE. It’s a contemporary, gothic-inspired tale involving a brooding hero, a plucky heroine, a haunted house, and a secret that’s been kept for years.

  From the desk of Molly Cannon

  Dear Reader,

  Weddings! I love them. The ceremony, the traditions, the romance, the flowers, the music, and of course the food. Face it. I embrace anything when cake is involved. When I got married many moons ago, there was a short ceremony and then cake and punch were served in the next room. That was it. Simple and easy and really lovely. But possibilities for weddings have expanded since then.

  In FLIRTING WITH FOREVER, Irene Cornwell decides to become a wedding planner, and she has to meet the challenge of giving brides what they want within their budget. And it can be a challenge! I have planned a couple of weddings, and it was a lot of work, but it was also a whole lot of fun. Finding the venue, booking the caterer, deciding on the decorating theme. It is so satisfying to watch a million details come together to launch the happy couple into their new life together.