Azure Secrets
Page 30
“That’s good, isn’t it? Maybe love smells like oranges?” Accepting that her senses worked differently from his, Monty studied the cabin with her.
Workmen had set up a rickety table and chairs where they could take their breaks. Someone had left the trophy football and bat on it. Sawdust and mud coated the tile floor. But the stone chimney had been cleaned out and all trace of soot removed from the hearth. Solid doors and windows had been added. The kitchen. . . needed a woman’s touch.
“You can design the kitchen,” he said, hoping that would persuade enthusiasm out of her.
Instead, she burst into tears. At least she flung herself against his chest this time. Monty held and rocked her, praying for inspiration. “I love you,” was all he could come up with, planting kisses on her shiny hair. “I love you and need you and will do anything to make you happy, but you have to tell me what you want.”
She grabbed his shirt front, stood on her toes, and kissed him through her tears. “You. I want you, any way I can have you. But this. . .” She gestured at the barren cabin. “This is more than I ever dreamed. A home—a forever home? Are you sure? I can sleep on sleeping bags on the floor and boil water and light oil lamps and not care about landscaping if I know that no one will throw me out. And to share it with you. . .” She sobbed again and buried her face in his shirt.
The full feeling in his chest almost exploded. Now he got it, and joy and relief flooded him. “If this is the forever home you want, I’ll find some way to buy it from the corporation. But maybe you’ll want to look around for something better. This is just the one that wasn’t rented out all summer. Come fall, you could have your choice. And it will be yours. I’ll make it happen, one way or another. I don’t want you to ever leave.”
She lifted her head, and joy finally spread across her fey features. “A forever home means the people in it. The roof can change. The location may change. But if you’re there under that roof with me, that’s forever. That’s what I want.”
“I’m here,” he said fervently, finally opening his heart to the possibility that he might deserve love as much as she did. “I’ll always be here, with you. Is there time to find a bed or do we christen the bare floors and let Sukey guard us from intruders?”
She laughed. “Bedroll is at Aaron’s. Let’s not give them more to talk about. Your place for now.”
“I’ll let Sukey bite my mother if she shows up. Better yet, we’ll steal a bed from the lodge and move in tonight. Did I tell you all the ways I love you?” He hauled her into his arms again and carried her back to the car, whistling at Sukey to follow.
“For my juice bar,” she guessed. “And sushi.”
“I don’t eat sushi and you don’t have a juice bar. I love you for your laugh. Do that more. And I love you for your understanding when I don’t understand myself. And I love you for your pink nipples and kinky hair—let’s not forget the obvious.”
He continued his list as she laughed the way she should always laugh. His Fiona cried when she was happy, and laughed when she didn’t understand, and cooked to make others happy, and he loved that too.
And when he finally sank onto the bed with her later, and she kissed him, he felt as if his brain was as full as his heart.
“I’m the happiest woman in existence,” she whispered as he nuzzled her neck.
“And I mean to keep you that way, because you’re the easiest woman in existence to please.”
“Because I have you. You smell of love and home and ocean breezes. I think I’m going to cry again.”
So he kissed away her tears and made her laugh.
Character List
Hillvale residents:
Aaron Townsend—owner of antique store; practices psychometry
Amber—tarot reader
Brenda—retired nurse practitioner
Carmel Kennedy—mother of Kurt and Monty; emotional vampire
Cassandra—family once owned all of Hillvale; Sam’s great-aunt on paternal side
Chen Ling Walker—Hillvale’s new police chief and owner of corporate investigative agency
Dinah—cook and owner of café
Fiona Malcolm McDonald—café cook
Harvey—itinerant musician, friend of Monty’s, related to Menendez family
Keegan Ives—mineralogist
Kurtis Dominic Kennedy—architect; part owner and manager of Redwood Resort
Lance Brooks—Carmel’s brother; artist who lives at resort;
Mariah (Zoe Ascension de Cervantes) computer engineer; creates ghost-catchers
Montgomery (Monty) Kennedy—Hillvale’s mayor, part-owner of Redwood Resort
Orval Bledsetter—retired vet
Pasquale—grocer
Samantha Moon—environmental scientist
Theodosia (Teddy) Devine-Baker—empathic jeweler
Tullah—owner of thrift store; psychic medium
Valerie Ingersson (Valdis)—goddess of death
Wan Hai—feng shui expert, very small
Azure Secrets characters:
Darren Gonzalez and Nadia Lee—Stacy’s dad and stepmother
Ed and Maria Gonzalez—Stacy’s paternal grandparents
Felix Fontaine—owner of diner where Fee used to work; cousin of Peggy’s ex
Harold Haas—the county attorney
Peggy Gonzalez—mother of Stacy,
Randall and Sophia Lee—Stacy’s step-grandparents; shipping magnates
Ramirez—small time thief
Ramon—psychotic Jag driver
Roper—Redwood Resort manager
Stacy Gonzalez—Peggy and Darren’s daughter; three years old
Victor Portelli—investment broker, friend of lodge manager
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Azure Secrets
Patricia Rice
Copyright © 2018 Patricia Rice
Book View Cafe, March 2019
First Publication: March 2019
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book, or portion thereof, in any form.
This is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Published by Rice Enterprises, Dana Point, CA, an affiliate of Book View Café Publishing Cooperative
Cover design by Kim Killion
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P.O. Box 1624, Cedar Crest, NM 87008-1624
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ISBN 978-1-61138-780-3 ebook
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Crystal Magic Series
An exciting new series from the author of Unexpected Magic and Tales of Love and Mystery
Sapphire Nights
Book 1 of the Crystal Magic Series
A lawman haunted by his past . . . a scientist haunted by her future.
* * *
Samantha Moon arrives in Hillvale bereft of friends and family, money and memory. All she has to her name is a stray cat . . . but that's apparently enough for the people of Hillvale to take her in. Except for L.A. investigator Walker, who sees how Sam's arrival disturbs the deceptive peace of the small California town.
Buy Sapphire Nights
Topaz Dreams
Book 2 of the Crystal Magic Series
An empathic woman searching for safety. . . An architect yearning for dreams. . . And the haunted house that endangers them both
* * *
Teddy Devine-Baker arrives in her childhood home of Hillvale with a box of crystals and enough trouble to fill her VW van. With Teddy’s life in pieces, her parents’ old house is her last refuge, but Kurt Kennedy—the aloof architect whose sword-wielding heroics once tickled her childish fancies—claims it belongs to him.
Buy Topaz Dreams
Crystal Vision
Book 3 of the Crystal Magic Series
He is Earth, she is Air, together they catch Fire....
* * *
Mariah lives off the grid by waitressing, weaving ghostcatchers to send Hillvale’s ghosts across the veil, and keeping clear of electronics that haunt her—until the day her friend and mentor, Crazy Daisy, is murdered, and Mariah goes on the hunt for a killer.
Her prime suspect is geologist Keegan Ives. Following clues left by Daisy and Hillvale’s past, Keegan and Mariah are caught in a whirlwind of crystals, power, and cyber-fraud. If they survive, will their world be changed for better—or worse?
Buy Crystal Vision
Wedding Gems
A Crystal Magic Collection
Book 4 of the Crystal Magic Series
Succumb to temptation and follow the call to Hillvale - population 325 - a cozy little mountain town filled with love, mystery, and ghosts...
* * *
Award-winning author Patricia Rice presents three romantic novellas from her celebrated Crystal Magic series—together for the first time in one collection.
The Wedding Gift
Having overcome the obstacles of their past, Samantha Moon and Chen Ling Walker are ready to walk down Hillvale’s eccentric version of a wedding aisle. Can they also conquer the complications of the present—a mysterious doll that won’t stay in one place and the dubious assistance of a feng shui master who moves in with them?
The Wedding Question
While juggling the demands of their busy lives, Theodosia Devine-Baker and Kurt Kennedy find that love and living together require just as much work. Halloween always brings out Hillvale’s spooks, but when Teddy declares a ceramic dragon is sending smoke signals, Kurt wonders if it’s time for him to flee the eccentric community to look for a more normal life.
The Wedding Surprise
With Christmas excitement raising Hillvale’s spirits—both literal and figurative—Keegan Ives and Mariah are setting out on new careers and a new relationship. As the town’s future draws them in different directions, can their love survive an unanticipated bundle of joy?
Buy Wedding Gems
Amber Affairs
Book 6 of the Crystal Magic Series
She sees the future; he lives in the past. Danger shadows the present. . .
* * *
Once a childhood TV star, now a tarot reader in the town of Hillvale—home of 325 people and countless ghosts—Amber Abercrombie is content now that she’s escaped the horror of her stage mother and the constant pressure to kill herself with dieting. Then her former teen-idol lover crashes into her tranquility, bringing with him the Death card.
Now a Hollywood director, Josh Gabriel is on the brink of a marriage of convenience when his wealthy bride-to-be, the producer of his next film, is murdered. Finding Amber—the woman who deserted him once, leaving him devastated—is both blessing and curse now that his whole world is crumbling again.
With corrupt power brokers from their past and an angry poltergeist from the present threatening to tear apart their lives, Josh and Amber must set aside their differences and rely on each other to find a killer. This time, they must trust their abilities enough to find justice—and risk a second chance of love.
Buy Amber Affairs
Moonstone Shadows
Book 7 of the Crystal Magic Series
A librarian searches for healing, a felon yearns for forgiveness, and an enemy stalks them both.
* * *
Hannah Simon holds the library of her ancestors in her head, but she’s in danger of losing her steel-trap mind along with the information it holds. Her only hope is a legendary moonstone said to have healed in times of trouble. The artifact was last seen in Hillvale, a town that needs help as desperately as Hannah.
After spending two years in prison for art fraud, antiques dealer and psychometrist Aaron Townsend has settled in Hillvale, where his past and his abilities are accepted. But when the universally despised woman who owns half of Hillvale is bludgeoned to death, everyone is immediately suspect, including newly-arrived Hannah. Aaron, however, is the only one with a criminal past.
To save his friends, as well as himself, Aaron has to find the killer. His search becomes more complicated when he learns Hannah’s touch can yank them back in time. That way lies madness, but also, possibly the answers they seek.
Despite all Aaron’s attempts to keep the tempting librarian at a distance, her terrifying enhancement of his psychometric ability binds them intimately as they tumble down passages of time in search of clues. To save themselves and Hillvale, they must risk their lives and their minds—and possibly their hearts.
Release Date - 7/9/2019
About the Author
With several million books in print and New York Times and USA Today's bestseller lists under her belt, former CPA Patricia Rice is one of romance's hottest authors. Her emotionally-charged contemporary and historical romances have won numerous awards, including the RT Book Reviews Reviewers Choice and Career Achievement Awards. Her books have been honored as Romance Writers of America RITA® finalists in the historical, regency and contemporary categories.
A firm believer in happily-ever-after, Patricia Rice is married to her high school sweetheart and has two children. A native of Kentucky and New York, a past resident of North Carolina and Missouri, she currently resides in Southern California, and now does accounting only for herself.
For further information, visit Patricia’s network:
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Also by Patricia Rice
The World of Magic:
The Unexpected Magic Series
Magic in the Stars
Whisper of Magic
Theory of Magic
Aura of Magic
Chemistry of Magic
No Perfect Magic
The Magical Malcolms Series
Merely Magic
Must Be Magic
The Trouble With Magic
This Magic Moment
Much Ado About Magic
Magic Man
The California Malcolms Series
The Lure of Song and Magic
Trouble with Air and Magic
The Risk of Love and Magic
Crystal Magic
Sapphire Nights
Topaz Dreams
Crystal Vision
Wedding Gems
Azure Secrets
Amber Affairs
Moonstone Shadows
The Wedding Gift
The Wedding Question
&n
bsp; The Wedding Surprise
Historical Romance:
American Dream Series
Moon Dreams
Rebel Dreams
The Rebellious Sons
Wicked Wyckerly
Devilish Montague
Notorious Atherton
Formidable Lord Quentin
The Regency Nobles Series
The Genuine Article
The Marquess
English Heiress
Irish Duchess
Regency Love and Laughter Series
Crossed in Love
Mad Maria’s Daughter
Artful Deceptions
All a Woman Wants
Rogues & Desperadoes Series
Lord Rogue
Moonlight and Memories
Shelter from the Storm
Wayward Angel
Denim and Lace
Cheyennes Lady
Too Hard to Handle
Texas Lily
Texas Rose
Texas Tiger
Texas Moon
Mystic Isle Series
Mystic Isle
Mystic Guardian
Mystic Rider
Mystic Warrior
Mysteries:
Family Genius Series
Evil Genius
Undercover Genius
Cyber Genius
Twin Genius
Twisted Genius
Tales of Love and Mystery