The attorney nodded back, then walked over to her grandparents and handed them a document and some photographs. Her grandparents stared at the documents and photos, looking confused, then blinked a few times and looked at Ellie with puzzled expressions. Then they looked back at the attorney.
The lawyer explained it to them again.
With moist eyes, her grandparents looked at Ellie with shocked, incredulous, disbelieving, and finally grateful expressions, and then her grandmother mouthed, “Merci, merci beaucoup, Ellie … .”
Ellie smiled and waved goodbye, hoping they would enjoy their new villa with six bedrooms, lush gardens and a swimming pool overlooking the town of Sainte Anne and the Caribbean. Cousin Nina told Ellie that her grandparents had always loved the rambling estate and hoped one day to be lucky enough to see the inside.
Now they could live inside. They owned it.
EIGHTY
Minutes later, in the departure lounge, Ellie watched Quinn skillfully balancing two full cups of coffee as he sidestepped carry-on bags and a running two-year-old like he used to sidestep defensive tacklers. Clearly he’d overcome his football knee injury … and his dependency on Vicodin.
He handed her a cup of coffee.
“Congratulations,” she said.
“For what?”
“For not spilling coffee on my jeans again.”
“Hey – good things happen when I do.”
“Wrong! Great things happen!”
He smiled. “So it seems.”
She remembered again how he’d tripped on the student center steps, spilled her coffee, and changed her life forever.
Thanks to him, she learned who she came from.
Thanks to her mother, she inherited a large, warm and loving family.
Thanks to her father, she inherited nearly one billion dollars, according to her attorney. So much money, she still couldn’t quite comprehend it. But she could comprehend how the money could help people she really cared about. Like elderly Celeste and neighbor Sarah in Louisville, and her Martinique family, and Carrie and her mom in Harlan, and Nafeesa in Teheran, and Loretta Mae the cook at the House of Grace. But not Irene Whitten the housekeeper. Irene didn’t need a dime – Leland Radford left her three million dollars.
And thanks to Quinn, Ellie’d received the most important thing of all. The courage to love someone again. Love them completely, despite her fear that fate might take them away from her.
She placed her hand on his arm and said, “It’ll be good to get back home.”
“We’re not going home.”
She stared at him.
“We’re stopping off somewhere.” He pulled their tickets from his sport coat, but hid the destination from her.
“Where?”
“Where do people have blue teeth?”
She wondered what he was talking about, then had a hunch … “As in cotton candy blue teeth?”
“Yep.”
“No way!”
“Yep.”
“Disney World?”
“Yep! Remember? I promised I’d take you.”
“Yippee!” she shouted, drawing puzzled glances from passengers seated nearby.
Quinn smiled, but seemed to grow serious about something. “I’ve been thinking … .”
“About …?
“About that big Thanksgiving Day bash you’re having for your whole Martinique family up at The Pines.”
“Yeah, almost everyone said they are coming. Should be great fun.”
“It will be. But maybe everyone should stay a few extra days.”
“That would be great … but why?” she asked.
“Maybe another party.”
“What kind?”
He paused. “Maybe a wedding party …”
Know anyone who might enjoy reading
KENTUCKY WOMAN
If so, just phone AtlasBooks at 1800 2487 6553
Or go to AtlasBooks.com
and order Kentucky Woman
ISBN: 978-0-9846173-9-5
Visa, MasterCard, American Express accepted
Or order from mikebroganbooks.com
Also by Mike Brogan
G8
Donovan Rourke, a CIA Special Agent, discovers a man named Katill will assassinate the world’s eight most powerful leaders at the G8 Summit in Brussels in three days. The President asks Donovan to handle the G8 security.
Donovan agrees …but reluctantly. His wife was murdered there, and he blames himself.
In Brussels, Donovan works with the European G8 Director, Monsieur de Waha, and a beautiful translator named Maccabee. They learn that Katill is the same man who murdered Donovan’s wife.
They also learn that Katill has just penetrated the G8’s billion-dollar wall of security.
Donovan sees the world leaders walking into Katill’s deathtrap! He tries to warn them – but it’s too late …and then his worst nightmare happens right before his eyes.
Also by Mike Brogan
MADISON’S AVENUE
First, she gets the frightening phone call from her father. Hours later, he’d dead. The police say it’s suicide. But Madison McKean suspects murder – because her father, CEO of a large Manhattan ad agency, refused a takeover bid by a ruthless agency conglomerate. Madison inherits his agency – and his enemies. When she and her new friend Kevin zero in on the executive behind her father’s death, they soon discover an ex-CIA hitman is zeroing in on them.
MADISON’S AVENUE takes you inside the boardrooms of today’s cut-throat, billion dollar corporations – to the white sand beaches of the Caribbean – to the high hopes and low cleavage of the Cannes Ad Festival …a world where some people take the phrase ‘bury the competition’ literally.
Available at AtlasBooks.com
Or phone: 1800 247 6553 ISBN: 978-0-692-00634-4
Visa, MasterCard, American Express accepted.
OR
order from MikeBroganBooks.com
Also by Mike Brogan
DEAD AIR
Dr. Hallie Mara, an attractive young MD, and her friend, Reed Kincaid, learn that someone has singled out many men, women and children to die in ten cities across the U.S. in just a few days.
But because Hallie has no hard proof, the police refuse to investigate.
When Hallie and Reed try to find proof, they unearth something far beyond their worst fears. And as they zero in on the man behind everything, the man zeros in on them. Barely escaping with their lives, they finally convince the police and Federal authorities that a horrific disaster is imminent. But by then there’s a big problem: it may be too late.
Midwest Book Review calls DEAD AIR, “a Lord of the Rings of thrillers. One can’t turn the pages fast enough.”
Available at Amazon.com
ISBN 1-4137-4700-0
Also by Mike Brogan
BUSINESS TO KILL FOR
Business is war. And Luke Tanner is about to be its latest casualty. He’s overheard men conspiring to gain control of a billion dollar business using a unique strategy – murder the two CEO’s who control the business. The conspirators discover Luke has overheard them and kidnap his girlfriend. He tries to free her, but gets captured himself.
Finally they escape, only to discover that the $1 billion business is his company … and that it may be too late to save his mentor, the CEO. The story takes you from the backstabbing backrooms of a major ad agency to the life-threatening jungles of Mexico’s Yucatan.
Writer’s Digest gave BUSINESS TO KILL FOR a major award, calling it, “the equal of any thriller read in recent years …”
Available at Amazon.com
or MikeBroganBooks.com
ISBN 0-615-11570-5
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
MIKE BROGAN is the Writers Digest award-winning author of BUSINESS TO KILL FOR, a suspense thriller that WD called, “the equal of any thriller read in recent years.” His DEAD AIR thriller also won national awards, as did MADISON’s AVENUE.
His years in Kentucky, ga
ve him a unique perspective in writing KENTUCKY WOMAN …as did the amazing, but true story that inspired him to write this new mystery thriller.
Brogan lives in Michigan where he’s completing his next novel.
To learn more, visit MikeBroganBooks.com
Kentucky Woman Page 25
