Truly, Madly
A broken heart drove her away--a family tragedy brought her back.
She's buried her parents, settled their estate, but the residents of Jessup will never let Isabelle Connelly live down her past. Now she's a suspect in a murder and mysterious house fire, and Sheriff Rick Hutchings, the man who still haunts her dreams, is on the case.
Will Isabelle be framed for the crimes? Or will she be the next victim?
Length:1 hour, 32 minutes
Author: Alicia Dean
Narrator: Paige Holt
$7.99
Excerpt:
Although the two women thought they knew a great deal about my family, they had some of their facts wrong. My father did not write my mother’s name, or her lover’s, in blood. He simply shot her, wrote a note, and shot himself. My sister, Carmen, was not in a mental hospital. She was living in sunny California, and frequently visited a luxury spa in Palm Springs.
I had also been living in California until the murder/suicide, at which time I’d returned to Jessup. I intended to stay only long enough to settle my parents’ estate and tie up loose ends, but here it was nearly a year later, and I was still here. I’d given up a successful design business to stay in Jessup and take abuse from the townspeople.
Maybe what they said about my family being insane was true, because only a crazy person would have stayed here this long.
Eyes down, anxious to flee from Deanna’s not-so-subtle hostility, I grabbed the plastic bags from the counter and headed out of the store. I walked briskly toward my Jeep Cherokee, but before I made it, I collided with something large and solid, almost dropping the pie Brandon had given me.
“Oh, God, Isabelle, I’m sorry.” Sheriff Rick ‘Hutch’ Hutchings grabbed my upper arms to steady me, and I looked up and found myself staring into his eyes. Concern had darkened their silver hue to gunmetal grey. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. It was my fault. I wasn’t paying attention.”
He studied me a moment then dropped his hands. He indicated his cruiser, which was parked near my jeep. “Damn thing won’t start. You’d think a county vehicle could get better maintenance than this, but I’ve had it in the shop twice this month.”
I nodded, not sure what kind of response that required. Hutch was wearing his uniform, including the hat that concealed most of his dark hair. He had a smudge of grease on one sleeve, and a bit on his cheek.
He took a rag from his back pocket and wiped at the grease on his hands, not very successfully. “Did I get any on you?” he asked, studying my torso for the effects of our collision.
“No, don’t think so. No big deal.”
“Good.” He smiled. “I haven’t seen you around much lately. How have you been?”
I shifted uneasily, adjusting the grocery bags in my arms. Every time I saw him, which fortunately wasn’t often, I thought about our past, about how things had been between us when we were both much too young to know anything about life, or love.
I looked away, afraid he could read the emotion in my eyes. “I’m fine.”
“Here, let me get those bags for you.”
I stepped back and shook my head. “No, I’ve got them. Thanks, though. See you around.”
I carried my bags to the jeep, threw them inside, and drove out of the parking lot, tempted to take the highway that led out of Jessup to freedom. Freedom from the gossip, freedom from the lingering attraction I felt for Hutch, and freedom from the strange hold this town had on me.
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