Almost Home. Debbie Macomber

ISBN-10: 1-4201-4996-2

      ISBN-13: 978-1-4201-3230-4 (eBook)

       ISBN-10: 1-4201-3230-X (eBook)

      20 19 18

      Printed in the United States of America

      Contents

      Whale Island

      Cathy Lamb

      Chapter One

      Chapter Two

      Chapter Three

      Chapter Four

      Chapter Five

      Chapter Six

      Chapter Seven

      Chapter Eight

      Chapter Nine

      Chapter Ten

      Chapter Eleven

      Chapter Twelve

      Epilogue

      Queen of Hearts

      Judy Duarte

      Chapter One

      Chapter Two

      Chapter Three

      Chapter Four

      Chapter Five

      Chapter Six

      Chapter Seven

      Chapter Eight

      Chapter Nine

      Chapter Ten

      Chapter Eleven

      Chapter Twelve

      Chapter Thirteen

      The Honeymoon House

      Mary Carter

      Chapter One

      Chapter Two

      Chapter Three

      Chapter Four

      Chapter Five

      Chapter Six

      Chapter Seven

      Chapter Eight

      Chapter Nine

      Chapter Ten

      Chapter Eleven

      Chapter Twelve

      Chapter Thirteen

      Chapter Fourteen

      Chapter Fifteen

      Chapter Sixteen

      Chapter Seventeen

      The Marrying Kind

      Debbie Macomber

      Chapter One

      Chapter Two

      Chapter Three

      Chapter Four

      Chapter Five

      Chapter Six

      Chapter Seven

      Chapter Eight

      Whale Island

      Cathy Lamb

      To my way-cool sister,

       Dr. Karen Straight,

       and her special friend,

       Matt Farwell,

       of the Kindness Ranch,

       a home for former laboratory animals.

      Hartville, Wyoming

      Chapter One

      I could not believe I was going to climb up on Stephen’s roof in a black burglar-type outfit so I could spy on him through his skylight.

      “I have gone over the edge,” I muttered, adjusting my black leather knee-high boots. “I’m completely whacked. Brain-fried. Crazed.”

      “Our mission,” Brenda whispered to me before we scurried onto the roof, the stars our only witnesses to this sheer stupidity, “begins right now. One for all, all for one, and don’t leave a wily woman behind!” She shimmied her hips, then stuck both thumbs up, her black gloves cutting through the cool night.

      My sister Christie and I smothered our laughter.

      “Never give up, ladies!” Christie ordered as she pulled a black-knit hat over her blond hair and down her face, her green eyes twinkling through the eyeholes. “Never surrender! Never accept defeat!”

      “Women unite!” I said as we high-fived each other.

      Brenda fiddled with her night-vision goggles then grabbed the gutter and shimmied her way up the roof. Her agility was impressive, as she’d had a number of strawberry daiquiris.

      I yanked my black-knit hat over my face, pulled the eye and mouth holes into the appropriate places, tucked in my black curls, and followed her, trying hard not to laugh. If I laughed while I was climbing I might wet my pants.

      “I’m a spy!” Brenda whispered as she climbed. She hummed the James Bond theme song. She has a full head of curling reddish hair, now hidden by her full-face black-knit hat, a huge mouth, huge eyes, and a biggish nose. Men went wild for her. “A sexy spy!”

      My laughter broke free, and I had to cross my legs. Don’t wet your pants! Brenda was wearing black leather pants and a black motorcycle jacket, like me. My sister was wearing a black cowboy hat over the face-hiding knit hat, which was so hilarious, and a black coat that wouldn’t close over her stomach because she is gigantically pregnant with twins. Normally she is the size of Tinkerbell. Now she is the size of a small bull.

      “Chalese is not a sexy spy,” I said about my sorry self as I grabbed the gutter to hoist myself up. “Chalese has been dumped. Damn that snaky Stephen.” I hadn’t even liked Stephen. But I didn’t appreciate being dumped. Nothing is worse than being dumped by someone you dated because he was there, a breathing male, and you desperately hoped he was more than he was but you had to quit lying to yourself in the face of overwhelming evidence of his jerkhood.

      A voice inside my blurry head said, Since you believe him to be a jerk, why are you on his roof in the middle of the night dressed like a burglar?

      Why? Because the three of us, me, Brenda, and Christie, together, are lethal. Daring. Truly ridiculous. And a little drunk. Although Christie is stone-cold sober. She never drinks when she’s pregnant.

      But, really, there was no harm in seeing whom Stephen was dating, even if I had to do it via a skylight. I didn’t care, not at all, but knowledge is power. “Knowledge is a daiquiri,” I intoned as I scrambled up, my black gloves offering a little traction. “Strawberry daiquiri, lemon daiquiri, peach daiquiri …”

      Stephen’s roof was flattish, so our climb to the skylight was not too perilous, even in my fuzzy state. I hummed the Rocky fight song, stopping to pump the cool night with my fists, like Rocky did in the movies.

      “What’s going on, Chalese?” my sister hissed from the ground below, her voice coming in from the walkie-talkie on my hip.

      I giggled and held my walkie-talkie to my mouth. “I’m not Chalese! I’m a spy! A secret agent! I am on a serious mission!”

      Why are you talking about a mission? Why aren’t you home reading a romance novel?

      Brenda burped. She says it’s her best quality. That is patently not true. Her best quality is writing screenplays for major motion pictures that make women alternately laugh and cry like banshees. She’s living with me until she smashes through her writing block.

      Christie said, “Copy that, Ms. Bond. All right, 007, carry on.”

      I carefully—as carefully as I could with two strawberry daiquiris under my belt, well, three, actually, but who’s