Title: Pieces of Blue
Author: Liz Flaherty
Genre: Women’s Fiction (with romantic elements)
Publisher: Annessa Ink
Book Blurb:
Life comes in shades of blue...
Self-imposed loner, Maggie North, has worked for bestselling author Trilby Winterroad her entire adult life, starting as simply his assistant and ending up as his ghost writer. Through ups and downs--including a divorce from an abusive husband--he has been the one person on whom she could always rely. So when Trilby dies suddenly, Maggie finds herself adrift, not sure what she’ll do or where she belongs in the world any longer. And the confusion continues when she discovers he’s not only left her his beloved dachshund, Chloe, but a house she knew nothing about, on a lake she’s never heard of.
It only takes one visit for Maggie to fall in love with both the house and the small lakeside community. The longer she’s there, the safer she feels and the more her life begins to expand...as do her feelings toward her friend and Trilby’s attorney, Sam Eldridge.
But is she really safe? Or are the glistening pieces of her new life about to shatter as an old danger returns?
Excerpt:
“We need to find something out.”
I knew what he meant before he let go of my fingers and drew me to him. I didn’t object when I slipped off my stool or when he tilted my face up to his and kissed me with years’ worth of wondering and searching. I didn’t know how much of the wash of feeling and longing was his and how much was mine, but I did know the emotion flowed through me like Rapunzel’s hair in drawings—long and silky and curving.
Emotion and something else. Longing and something else. He leaned back, just a little, meeting my eyes and smiling into them. “So, Maggie North, what’s this you say?”
I shook my head, laughter rippling up and surprising me. “I didn’t say anything.”
He cupped my face in his hands—oh, the warmth. I didn’t think I’d ever be cold again—and tilted his head for that firm, gentle mouth to take mine again. We were in our fifties, experienced kissers. I understood the jumping around inside and the skittery dance of my heartbeat. I understood the sudden sensitivity of my breasts, that I could feel their weight inside my bra. I got it, as he held me ever closer and deepened the kisses we shared, how precious this zero-dark-thirty time was. I understood the depths of the itch.
I dipped my head, laying it against the shoulder of his sweatshirt, then raised it again to have my turn at taking his lips and tasting. Like me, he’d brushed his teeth before coming to the kitchen, and he tasted of toothpaste and coffee and…oh, sweetness.
“Plundering,” I murmured against his mouth.
He drew back again. “Huh?”
“I’ve written it,” I explained. “We’re plundering each other’s lips.”
“Nah. Plundering is stealing stuff so you have to go to court and I can get you thrown in jail or keep you out depending on how much you want to pay me.”
I burst into laughter, knowing his integrity much too well to go for that one. “It’s that, too, but when—”
“We’re just deposing each other a little bit. Checking out witness reliability and all that. I think you’re a fine material witness.” He interrupted himself to kiss me again. I very nearly moaned with the pleasure of it. I held it back, but a whimper escaped, and he chuckled as he bent his head to kiss the hollow of my neck inside the soft cowl of my sweater. His breath was warm and fast, the feel of his lips on my skin some glorious word I hadn’t figured out how to write yet.
“Yes, ma’am. A fine one.”
What was he talking about? “A fine what?”
“Witness. Material.”
“Oh.”
“For when I go plundering.”
We both plundered a little more then, until I got up, pushing him away with light hands on his shoulders. “Cinnamon rolls.”
“Oh, yeah.” But he gave me one more smacking kiss before subsiding. “I might have to plunder them when they’re done.”
“Kiss them?” I raised my eyebrows at him as went to get the bowl of doubled-in-size dough. “You’re going to kiss pastries?”
He came around the island, carrying his coffee mug, and pulled me into his side, the motion reminding me of his height. “If you make them, you bet.”
I heard Chloe’s tags jingling as she hurried down the stairs. “Will you let her out? It’s always urgent in the morning, and she’s had to come downstairs, so she’s really hustling.”
He opened the back door and the mudroom door, and the little dachshund sailed past both of us without so much as a yip of greeting. I watched through the window as she ran to her chosen spot at the edge of the woods and relieved herself.
A moment later, with her ears flapping as she ran, she scrambled toward the house and breakfast, stopping this time to let Sam assure her she was indeed the best dog in the world.
I have always loved mornings. Although I spend more time alone than is probably good for me, there is something about the solitude of the early hours that does, as the Psalm promises, restore my soul.
But for this early April morning on a little Michigan lake, I was glad not to be alone. And both my soul and my heart seemed to be thriving on restoration.
Buy Links (including Goodreads and BookBub):
Books2Read: https://books2read.com/FlahertyBlue
Author Biography:
Liz Flaherty has spent the past several years enjoying not working a day job, making terrible crafts, and writing stories in which the people aren’t young, brilliant, or even beautiful. She’s decided (and has to re-decide most every day) that the definition of success is having a good time. Along with her husband of lo, these many years, kids, grands, friends, and the occasional cat, she’s doing just that. Find her on Facebook or her blog, Window Over the Sink.
Social Media Links:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lizkflaherty
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lizkflaherty/