An excerpt from All for Love
Excerpt:
We were
drinking iced tea at our favorite sidewalk café when the plastics plant
exploded.
One moment
Ronnie was checking my left hand to see if my wedding ring was still there, and
the next thing I knew she was crawling across the blistered sidewalk in slow
motion, reaching out for me.
Ronnie and I
have been friends since college. She and Carol were my dorm mates. The best
friends I’ve ever had. But college was a long time ago.
“How long do
you think it takes to fall out of love?” I had just asked.
Stalling for
time, Ronnie gazed about The Sidewalk Café. The strong breeze should’ve been
cool, but it was dry and hot. Instead of our usual twelve inches of rain for
the year, we’d received just less than two. The drought in our area of West
Texas had been catastrophic; a simple spark from a piece of machinery could
start a wildfire that might burn for days or even weeks. The weather channel
delighted in telling us we were smack dab in the middle of the worst dry spell
since the nineteen fifties.
In a way, it
was fitting. I seemed to be smack dab in the middle of a drought myself. My
nest felt as empty as the prairie, and my husband, who could’ve been the spark
to light my world, was also brittle
and dry. In fact, he was so dry he was practically nonexistent, like the
prairie grass hiding in the earth, waiting for moisture.
Ronnie swished
a fly away from her drink. “What’s going on, Lizzie?”
I hesitated.
She was so good at taking the wind out of my sails. In fact, I’d swear she was
using “wait time” on me, a technique we had learned in our education classes at
the university about a hundred years ago.
Shrugging
nonchalantly, I forged ahead. I really wanted her input. I still valued it
every bit as much as when we were nineteen. “I think he’s screwing around
again.” I sipped my tea. Mine was sweet, hers was not. She was usually the
sensible one—at least when she wasn’t toasted on Mexican red.
She smoothed
the shiny fall of hair off her face. It was still the fresh, reddish color of a
blood orange.
“Are you sure?”
she asked. “Or is it just suspicion?” She swirled her tea, giving me a moment
to answer. The amber liquid climbed the inside of her glass like a tiny
tsunami. She reached across the table to touch my hand. We weren’t very
demonstrative anymore, not like when we were in school. I don’t know why, but I
suspected it was my fault. A hug upon meeting was the extent of our physical
relationship. Sometimes one of us would hug the other when we parted—it all
depended upon our emotional altitude at the moment. But this time she wasn’t
being demonstrative by clasping my hand, she was simply checking to see if my
wedding ring was still in place. She turned my hand over and pushed it flat
down on the table.
All for Love is Available through 5 Prince Publishing BUY HERE!
Ann lives in West Texas with her handsome hubby and three
rescue pets. All For Love is Ann’s first romance novel. She is the author of the Young Adult books: The Phantom Series. Book One is The Phantom Pilot, Book Two is The
Phantom Student, and she is hard at work on Book Three, The Phantom of Crybaby Bridge. Ann has also published short fiction in the
anthologies Timeless (paranormal love
stories) and Campfire Tales (spooky
stories for the young at heart).
Website: www.annswann.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/annswann.author
Twitter: @ann_swann
Email: swannann76@yahoo.com
5 Prince Publishing (www.5princebooks.com)
books@5princebooks.com
CONTEMPORARY ROMANCE
Release Day:
eBook Format: August 23, 2012 $2.99
print format: August 27, 2012 ($TBD)
eBook ISBN 13: 978-14524648-0-0 ISBN 10:1-4524-6480-4
Print ISBN 13: 978-0615691-9-7 ISBN 10: 0615689191
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