Virginia Taylor - Author

Starling is the first story in my South Landers series, about a girl brought up in an orphanage who has dreams of starting her own business to employ other young women who have also had limited opportunities. The excerpt begins after she has been offered a large sum of money to pretend to be a rich man's wife for a week.

She stared at the maid’s retreating back while she combed her hair with her fingers. Mr. Do-As-I-Tell-You Seymour hadn’t let her get her belongings, among which was a new comb. She glanced around the room and spotted a silver-backed brush in front of the tallboy mirror. The rich provided every kind of luxury.
Luckily, her hair was easily managed. She brushed her locks through and fluffed her curls to dry, then she went back to the bed and sat cross- legged. She sank inches deep in the down-filled mattress.
Ellen arrived within moments bearing a heavy silver tray. Efficiently, she set the table, uncovering the food dishes with pride. “Cook’s been preparing most of the day.” She pulled out the velvet-covered chair for Starling. “We’re all that excited. She wanted to do something special for you. She hopes you like the food.”
Starling sat, her disappointment in Mr. Seymour making her chest ache. He’d prepared his obliging servants for his bride, and instead he’d presented them with a shopgirl, a former laundress. How used they would feel when the charade ended. Mr. Seymour wouldn’t have thought of that, nor would he have cared. He lacked respect for them and his sister, too. A man like him didn’t deserve a sister.
Ellen put a white linen napkin on Starling’s lap.
“Soup and pie. Lovely. And cream. My favorites. Thank you.”
The maid beamed. “Cook’ll be glad to hear that. Ring when you’ve
finished, and I’ll clear up. Then you can pop into bed.”
Starling doubted that she’d ever tasted a meal as good. The vegetable
soup slid smoothly down her throat. The meat in the pie hardly needed chewing. She also devoured a rich custard covered with cream and decorated with tiny sugared violets. Had everything tasted rancid, she still would have enjoyed the prettiest meal she’d seen.
After Ellen had cleaned up and said good night, Starling turned down the gas lamp and sank into the luxurious bed. She could have been dead and floating to heaven on a cloud. Her hands supporting her head, she gazed at the ornately decorated ceiling. Surely through the gloom she could see gold paint on some of the leaves. She sighed contentedly. Heaven.
This was her night, the best night of her life. She’d had hours of pampering and kindness. And the bed, the bed, the bed, she thought,turning over on her face and breathing the freshly laundered smell of the sheets. A girl would do anything for a bed like this, huge and unshared. She turned down the lamp and snuggled into a guiltless sleep.
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I'm Susanna Craig and I write spicy Georgian/Regency era romances. I'm currently in the midst of edits on the third book in my Rogues & Rebels series, about the Dublin-born Burke siblings who find love among the English in the years surrounding the 1798 Rebellion. Today I'm sharing a snippet from the first book in the series, THE COMPANION'S SECRET. 

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​Rebellious hearts prove hard to tame—but can England’s most dangerous rake be captured by a wild Irish rose?
They call him Lord Ash, for his desires burn hot and leave devastation in their wake. But Gabriel Finch, Marquess of Ashborough, knows the fortune he’s made at the card table won’t be enough to save his family estate. For that he needs a bride with a sterling reputation to distract from his tarnished past, a woman who’ll be proof against the fires of his dark passion. Fate deals him the perfect lady. So why can’t Gabriel keep his eyes from wandering to her outspoken, infuriatingly independent Irish cousin?
Camellia Burke came to London as her aunt’s companion, and she’s brought a secret with her: she’s written a scandalous novel. Now, her publisher demands that she make her fictional villain more realistic. Who better than the notorious Lord Ash as a model? Duty-bound to prevent her cousin from making a disastrous match, Cami never meant to gamble her own heart away. But when she’s called home, Ash follows. And though they’re surrounded by the flames of Rebellion, the sparks between them may be the most dangerous of all…
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Intrigued? Here's a bit from the scene when Cami is forced to chaperon her cousin at a ball and ends up partnered with Lord Ash for supper:
At that moment, a mother and her three daughters approached their table, stopped short, and turned back in the direction from which they had come—no easy feat in the crowded supper room. Above the din of chatter and the clatter of silver against china, nothing more of their conversation could be heard than two shocked words, part recognition, part warning.
Gabriel gave a wry smile. In his experience, there were only two types of women: those who sought him out, and those who shunned him. The society matron clearly belonged to the latter camp—or wanted everyone around her to believe that she did.
“Why do they do it?” Camellia asked when the foursome was well out of earshot. “Why do they all call you ‘Lord Ash’?”
She was studying him again, her head tilted ever so slightly to one side. She seemed to be one of those women who was drawn to his darkness. But what drew her? Some misguided hope to save him from his sins?
Or a far worldlier—and more interesting—desire to share in them?
“I believe the general consensus is that I earned the name by blackening reputations and charring hopes.” Would the answer warn her off, or intrigue her? Which effect was he hoping to produce?
In fact, Fox had fallen into the habit of addressing him as “Ash” when they were boys at school and “Ashborough” had seemed a pretentious mouthful. At the time, Gabriel had been glad of the respite from the weight of a title he had never expected, and certainly had not wanted, to bear so soon. 
Others had taken up the nickname afterward, for far less genial reasons. He might have challenged them, called out their blatant disrespect, but why trouble himself to deny such a fitting soubriquet? Everything he touched turned to cinder.
He was Ash.
Her skirts rustled as she uncrossed her ankles and sat more upright. Her right forearm flattened against the table. She was preparing to take flight.
As she should.
Unwilling to let her go, however, he lifted his chin and said, “My father had me christened Gabriel. Perhaps you think that better suits?” 
He could feel her eyes on him, accepting his invitation to study his profile. “I—I cannot say, my lord.”
“‘My lord’? Come now, Camellia. We are to be cousins, after all, are we not?” Ridiculous, really, how he longed to hear his name on her lips. It was courting an intimacy on which he dared not act.
“I—” The catch in her voice tugged his chin back into its proper place, and he lowered his gaze to hers. She did not blush at having been caught in her inspection of his face. He could almost fancy she liked what she saw. “I believe an angel’s name is entirely fitting, my lord.”
“Oh?” More breath than speech. He cursed the hopefulness in the sound.
“Of course. After all, even the devil was an angel once.”
Damn her. Even hardened gamblers did not trick him into letting down his guard. A familiar wave of cynicism swept over him like a domino at a masquerade, hiding what he never meant to reveal, curling the corners of his lips. “I see. By all means, call me Ash, then. All the best people do.”
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When I was a young mother of toddler daughters, my husband and I bought the house in which I currently live. Pretty soon after, the woman next door invited me into her house for a morning of tea and cakes with the other neighbours, but only those who lived at the bottom of the street.
Mine is highest of the bottom end, built where another street intersects in a T shaped juncture in a street that meanders into the hills. It was explained to me that the people at the top didn't speak to the people at the bottom. Apparently, it was a social thing. I laughed and accepted being at the bottom of the rung.
The next part of the story is about Christmas because my husband's birthday was on Christmas day and mine is in early January. I never had a birthday party as a child. Never. Not once. Then, very soon after we married, we realised that we two, who never had birthday parties, even though we could now afford them and organise them ourselves, would be wasting our time if we tried. Everyone races out of town for the Christmas holidays.
​So, I went to other peoples' parties and envied the fact that friends could celebrate their birthdays but I couldn't celebrate mine, other than with my dear ones. 
So, combining the antipathy of the neighbours at each end of the street and the fact that the Christmas boy and I could never mention our birthdays, we decided to have a pre-Christmas party for more than just us.That year I made invitations and popped them in every letter box along the street.
Finally I got people from the top of the street and people from the bottom together. I think I should mention that many of us had children the same age, we had a swimming pool, and the weather was hot.
The party was a great success and we did it for five or six years. Finally, the neighbours began to get little restless and expressed the sentiment that it was too much for one family to do each year. We demurred, because it was our birthday celebration. However, they took a vote and began to deputise a new family each year to do The Street Party. At first we were a little gobsmacked but we tried to make the best of it.  
Although we attended for few years, since it was  no longer our birthday party, and we were invited to many other functions at that time of year, we no longer felt obligated, and attended others at will. Within a few more years, the street party idea died, which it would. People forgot whose turn it was and the kids grew older. It became a booze-fest for the same people who drank too much every year. 
Then my husband died. In my street,  other people had also died, the children had grown up and left in other's houses, and new people had moved in. 
I needed to reconnect. I designed invitations and trudged up and down the hill and filled every letter box with an invitation to a party for everyone in the street.  The second revision of my party got going and has been happening for the past ten years ...
...until last year when the neighbours decided that my party should be shared around again. Apparently it was too much for me. When I was told, I mentioned that I was happy to cater for and supply drinks for my own party. But no. A new family was delegated, and this year I didn't buy or prepare food, and I didn't worry about a drink supply and having enough glasses.
I did haunt my letter box, but I didn't get an invitation to my birthday party. I don't know if the delegates remembered or not. And so it goes. You invent something, others steal it, and then they forget it.
There must be a lesson in this, but I don't know what it is.

I love pears. I love how the shape feels in my hand, I love the way they get heavier as they ripen, I love the first fragrant bite and the way the juice always dribbles down my chin. The most sensuous, delightful dessert is, in my opinion, the pear Tarte Tatin; the crunch of the flaky pastry, the sticky sweetness of the caramelised sauce and the sliding slipperiness of the pear.
One of my most beautiful friendships was formed because of a pear I was eating while pondering over how to make a fake cake for the theatre production of Emma. I idly said to the designer of the set that I could make a cardboard mould and cover it with plaster and something else, whereupon he gave me history lesson about the size and shape of cakes in the Regency period. (Taller and slimmer than now.)
​Then he said, “How will you decorate it?”
“Hm,” I said. In real life, I love decorating cakes but my piddling efforts wouldn’t show on a stage. 
He looked at the pear. “What about a pear arrangement?” 
That was all. I had to work it out from there but it looked wildly wonderful after it was done with three big whole (plastic) pears and autumn leaves trickling down the sides. You don’t want to know how long that took to do. I could have baked and decorated twenty real ones in that time.
But the best part was that we had built a rapport over pears because we both thought they were incredibly beautiful for the same reason. I became his full time painter after that, and eventually his design partner for the best two years of my life.
From PEARS 101 COURSE FOR ENTHUSIASTS
‘Pears are one of the world’s oldest cultivated and beloved fruits. In 5,000 B.C., Feng Li, a Chinese diplomat, abandoned his responsibilities when he became consumed by grafting peaches, almonds, persimmons, pears and apples as a commercial venture. In The Odyssey, the Greek poet laureate Homer lauds pears as a “gift of the gods.” Pomona, goddess of fruit, was a cherished member of the Roman Pantheon and Roman farmers documented extensive pear growing and grafting techniques. Thanks to their versatility and long storage life, pears were a valuable and much-desired commodity among the trading routes of the ancient world. Evident in the works of Renaissance Masters, pears have long been an elegant still-life muse for artists. 
To complete my pear obsession, in the National Trust garden that I have worked on for the past five years, (on the Garden Blog here) I have the oldest pear tree (160 yrs) in Australia. Every year it blossoms (the pear blossom is also absolutely beautiful) and I get tiny pears that the birds eat before they get to the size of a cherry. This year, I have a tiny crop that I am amazed to see is still there and now the size of my two thumbs put together.
​
Below, a photo of the old tree, the blossom, and the tiny, emerging pears. 

I wanted a bongo drum for Christmas the year I finished my secondary education. Why? I can't remember, but I wouldn't settle for anything else. It seems weird over time because I am far from musical and I hadn't met the only musician I knew, who played the drums in a jazz band. He was my sort-of boyfriend for a while after  I had finished at art-school, and he was 'sort of' because he was a drug addict which made him rather inconsistent. The only thing consistent about him was his insane attachment to me. I still don't understand it, but it was handy at the time, because it made me seem cool when I wasn't at all. Anyway, that was a few years after the year of the bongo.
After I made my need clear to my mother, she said a quite clear, 'hm.' I took that as a commitment but somehow I still didn't trust her.
That year we were staying in a summer venue that consisted of derailed railway carriages that had been re-deployed as accomodation for holiday makers. Why were we there? Because that was my mother's job that year. Her about-to-be third husband owned them and many other properties, and she was his major decorator.
The weather was lovely and both my sisters were holidaying there too. I think my older sister may have been newly married  but she was still in on the plot to get me a bongo for Christmas. Because my mother's answer had been somewhat shaky, I had to keep nagging in case she forgot. That's a sure way to get what you want.
The other sure way is to offer threats. My mother never liked us to make too much noise because 'people.' So, we threatened her with making too much noise if she didn't promise the bongo. She wouldn't, so whenever 'people' walked past, one or the other of us would scream out loud, "Pleeeese stop beating me with the chain.' That would set us all off into giggles, even her, so as insurance, I doubt it was effective. However, I was pretty sure as Christmas day neared that I would have my wish. She had also said, "I know you will love your present."
The other thing about me other than not being musical is that I hate the beach. I hate walking on sand, and I hate swimming in salty water. I hate being sunburnt and I can't bear wearing a swimsuit. Do you wonder why I am saying this? Oh, let me tell you...
After nagging about the bongo for possibly a month, Christmas day arrived. I was so excited and planning on experimenting with my bongo the whole day until I was an expert.
My present was in the little sitting area. I saw it and backed up. No bongo drum could possibly fit into a long slim parcel. My mother was smiling and so I guessed she had used a joke present and the bongo would be hiding elsewhere. I opened the fake present and found a beach umbrella, so I knew she was teasing me.
But unfortunately, although I waited for some hours, I had actually been given a beach umbrella, something that not in my wildest dreams would I want! I tried to be gracious, but she had spent money on but something I would never use.

This is me that year, minus the bloody umbrella. I kept it for years, dragged it around from house to house but never did find a use for it. (You might wonder why I was on the beach when I hated the beach. It was that, or ruin the day for everyone else. But even with my face turned away, you can see I was not in a holiday mood.)

“Don’t get angry with me!  Our meals do not get cold before you arrive home.” The Kardashian lookalike working in the local takeaway, narrowed her eyes with fury, and held out her palm.
I put a twenty dollar note in her taloned hand, my face hot, my anxiety causing my voice to tremble. “I’m saying that if I don’t get my order of fish and chips in separate bags instead of boxes, mine do. Which is why I ask for separate bags.”
“No one has ever said that before,” she said icily, handing back my change, trying to put the dollar notes into my palm and the change on top. Nothing is more likely that the change will slide from the plastic notes when a person does that, and my other hand was occupied by the box of fish and chips. A queue of hushed patrons had lined up behind me to collect their orders. I avoided the note and grabbed the change, giving her no choice other than to pass the note last.
“Don’t you dare snatch from me!” she yelled with unconfined fury. “We don’t need rude customers like you, here. Don’t come back again! You are banned, do you hear me, you are banned!”
I didn’t bother answering, but I couldn’t have gone back anyway. My throat had closed over. I walked out of the shop, my face hot and my heart thudding, having a grade one panic attack. Of course I wouldn’t go back.
As a child I was told I was shy. I never felt shy, but I knew I blushed. Of course, I thought blushing was a sign of shyness and I could say to myself a million times I wasn’t shy, but since I blushed I must have been shy. Anyone who blushes feels the heat on her cheeks and also feels awkward when it happens.
The insensitive say, “You’re blushing,” in a voice of glee, and a lot of people laugh when they say those words. In some situations people tell me to calm down when my cheeks heat. Telling someone to calm down is about the silliest advice I have ever heard. It’s more likely to produce a defensive reaction.
It’s amazing that I should have lived to this age without ever knowing that I have Rosacea. When I am anxious my face flares. It’s a double-edged sword. When it flares I get more anxious because I know how awful it looks, and I know that someone is certain to tell me that my face is red, and make their own deductions as to why.
When D2 was about five, I had an appointment to see her teacher. The teacher told me that D2 had said that she would recognise me because I had a red face. I was quite surprised. I didn’t know. When I look in the mirror, my face isn’t red. It’s only red when I’m anxious, but that isn’t a time when I am looking in the mirror.
I only discovered that I had Rosacea a few years ago, when I was having laser treatment for a large mole.
I had arrived late because I hadn’t been able to find a carpark, and in a high state of anxiety. The skin specialist diagnosed my skin on the spot. I think she assumed I knew, because she didn’t mention that I could do anything about it. I think she said it was unfortunate. She was right.
But, now I had a name for my awkwardness.
I have often been asked to speak at functions but I always decline, not because I don’t think I can make a speech. I know I can. Even if I couldn’t, I could read one, but I have never tried because even in compatible groups, when I speak, I have an anxiety attack because I know my face will turn red, or vice versa.
Then my neighbour asked me why I don’t put something on it. I said I didn’t know I could. Her husband is a doctor and he was dragged into the conversation and ordered to write a prescription for me. I was dubious. If this was so easy, why hadn’t someone told me before?
It’s only a few days later but my skin has completely changed. I’m pretty sure I haven’t blushed in that time. I’m hoping I can’t.
It would be wonderful not to be judged by the redness of my cheeks.

In the heart of Naples, amateur archaeologist Brianna Penderley’s terrible Italian has her accidentally becoming engaged to two men at once. Of course, Daniel Wolcott—the tightly wound Earl of Thornton and the only man ever able to vex her—shows up to rescue her.
Swept up in a perilous adventure, Daniel and Brianna must work together to survive their time in Italy. Now if they can just avoid killing each other.
 

Teaser (190 characters): 
Amateur archaeologist Brianna Penderley’s terrible Italian has her accidentally becoming engaged to two men at once. Of course, Daniel Wolcott—the Earl of Thornton and the only man ever able to vex her—shows up to rescue her.


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Callie Cat is hard to write about.  She was the only female cat we ever had. Anyway, Kitty had disappeared long since and we were left with only Ozzie, the objectionable cat that no-one liked. At work, I had lots of cat conversations, as you do, and discovered that one of the nursing aides bred Burmese cats.
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She thought they were the most wonderful breed in the world, but I had owned Kitty and knew Siamese were. We argued long and hard, but she knew I was a cat person and a sucker.

One night she rang me at home, and asked if I could take a Burmese cat that had been given to her because she was known to be a breeder of Burmese. I wasn't sure. A reject cat was sure to be a problem. She assured me I would adore this cat who was about six months old and had never been outside in her life. Our cats were adventurers. We didn't consider imprisoning them. In other words, I hated having a poo-dish inside the house.

After much household discussion we decided to take the cat who had been spayed already. She was dropped off and she sat in my lap, a tiny ball of pale cream fur. Her colour was the most beautiful of any cat ever. I couldn't move. I didn't want to reject her when her first owner had. I couldn't put her on the floor.  My youngest daughter was two at the time. I think I was having an 'I want another baby' moment. Eventually I moved. Callie spent her days on my lap or my shoulder if I was at home, or sitting on one of the window sills looking out when I wasn't. Finally I thought she could be let outside for a while.

She loved being outside, but what she loved most of all was me. She followed me like a shadow. Even when I went shopping, she insisted on coming. She adored the car and she would sit on the dashboard, her version of 'helping' me with the shopping, She also helped with the cooking by waiting and frowning at Oz who always had to get underfoot. He was such a pest and she was so perfect. 

We decided to 'show' her and she won many ribbons, including The Best in The Show. One time - cats had to be bathed before being shown - she disappeared just after she'd had her bath. I called and called and I could hear her answer, but from a distance, that loud Burmese 'mewl.' Two days passed. We asked the neighbours if we could search their yards, but we still couldn't find her. The mew became more faint.

Bob was sent on a neighbourhood excursion. One lot of people in the next street said they could hear a cat and thought she might be on their roof, though they couldn't see her. So Bob got onto the roof and there was Callie, who leapt into his arms, trying to 'splain' what had happened. I was overjoyed to see her again. She spent the next few days on my shoulder as if she was afraid to venture too far in case she did something too adventurous. However, she had plenty more adventures. She was hit by a car (I know, cats should be kept indoors) and survived.

One day she completely disappeared. We scanned all the local roofs but we didn't hear a mewl from her. Months went by and I mourned every single day. I never wanted another cat because I couldn't cope with the misery of losing her. However, the daughters insisted, and so we bought a blue Burmese male (Gemini) from my coworker perhaps to replace Callie, but she was irreplaceable. 

One fine and sunny day, I was weeding the garden around the side when something landed on my back. Callie used to do this, her way of helping with the weeding. Then she dropped beside me, mewling. I couldn't breathe. I didn't honestly believe what I was seeing. The relief was incredible. I just sat with her, howling my head off. She was a bag of bones with mucky eyes, starving and filthy. For the only time in my life,  I believed in miracles. I don't know where she had been, but she was taken instantly to the vet.

If you have read my book Perfect Scents, the cat in the story was based on this episode. She healed and she was the same gorgeous loving cat as ever.  But I need to speak more about her car addiction. If anyone left a window open in a car, she would pop inside, hoping to be taken for a drive. This was her eventual downfall and what had probably happened to her the previous time.

She disappeared again. We asked all the neighbours and one mentioned he saw her in the back of a tradies' car, or a pale cat he thought could have been her.  We tracked down the guy who had been working over the road. Bob made a phone call and drove to the other side of town to speak to him. The man hadn't noticed a cat, but he left his car windows open which is why we suspected Callie had gone with him.

Despite the fact that he lived so far away, we hoped she would somehow make her way back again. We could only assumed this is what had happened the last time. We put ads in all the papers.

About a month later, a woman saw the ad. She had found a starving cat that she took to the vet, who said she was a cream Burmese. He put her down.

I sobbed for days. Callie only had one more main road to cross and she would have been home.

For one reason or another, we didn’t have cats when I was a child. Once a stray dog followed my mother home, an ancient black bitzer. He adored her and I don’t remember what happened to him, but we didn’t have him long enough to get used to. My dream was to have a cat. 
After I had been married for six months, I graduated as a midwife and my husband finished his thesis. He took a job in far north Queensland as a deputy mine manager. It was one of those scam mines, meant to make money from selling the shares. He didn’t know that of course, which is why rookie Bob was offered the job.
I couldn’t live with him at the mine site because only cabins had been constructed for the workers. Therefore I had to live in Cairns, which was okay because my best friend had married a doctor and he had a job (coincidentally) at the Cairns Base hospital. So, I took my enforced separation from my husband as an opportunity to buy a cat. I wanted a Siamese.
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​Orimedes Lilac Tamkara was his name. He was a sweet little kitty about eight weeks old. I adored him. We had great adventures while I was living in the motel in Cairns because he hated living there. He disappeared constantly trying to find a more interesting place to dwell. Eventually he was given his wish. My husband arranged for a caravan to be put on the site at the mining camp. Kitty (yes, he never lost that name) and I travelled to our new home in one of the single engine planes we used in those days. He settled easily into the camp. I think he mentioned he was an outdoor kind of fellow. In the first week he did nothing much but pounce on cane toads. Within a month he totally ignored them. 
He was my best and only buddy. The men left for work and I stayed in the camp with the cook and my cat, who used to follow me everywhere. Kitty wore a blue suede collar with a bell so that I could find him in the tall grass, though he did come running when I called him. The miners thought it was hilarious to meet a cat called Kitty who wore a pretty collar. They re-named him Tinkerbell, which was meant to be an insult to the cat, who didn’t care a bit.

​The guys were a pretty rough lot, who treated me like a princess. On occasion, one or another could be caught petting my cat, lil ol’ Tinks. Each had many and varied reasons to want to work in the back of beyond, mainly related to being of interest to the police. I don’t know why, but I recall one time we heard a group of police wanted to inspect the camp. That day, only Kitty, Bob, and I were to be seen. Miraculously, every bloke had disappeared. I may have known where they were but I wasn’t asked. 
Kitty was used to roaming far and wide and he was very interested in the snakes. The guys told me to watch out for him, because the snakes were the poisonous browns. He had many tussles with them and one day he brought a half dead one back to the caravan. I was blissfully unaware, being fast asleep. He put my gift on the bed with me. Eventually I woke up. I got out of bed and the snake came after me, perhaps imagining I would say “Good morning. Would you like a Kitty for breakfast?” The snake had been severely bitten and was not in a good mood. I opened the door hoping he would take the hint and leave, but he hadn’t been brought up in caravan and didn’t know what the door was. He had come in through the window in Kitty’s jaws.

​Since the brown was blocking my exit, I struggled out of the caravan through the window and dropped to the ground. Wearing tiny PJs. Bare feet. The caravan was parked in long grass. I went around to the door to see if I could encourage the snake to slither out. Kitty was very interested. He had followed me. He sat neatly to watch. I wanted to get dressed but I couldn’t get in. Eventually, very embarrassed, I had to go to the camp kitchen and ask for the cook’s help. He was thrilled, also being a blokey bloke.
He dashed to the rescue and grabbed the snake and killed it. Kitty was not pleased. He had imagined hours of fun.
He killed many snakes, walked over many cane toads, had many adventures in the far north and then South Australia. But the brown snake eventually killed him. Kitty died with lung-worm, which the vet said he would have gotten from eating snakes. Vale, beautiful Kitty.

Golden Opportunity is the last in my Romance by Design series. I wanted to write slightly older characters for a change and I wanted to mend a broken relationship. Marigold and Hagen were always perfect for each other but her  responsibilities caused her to break with him. But now is the time for her Golden Opportunity.

​Here is a little excerpt. Having spent years apart, they are experiencing for the first time a boss and employee situation... 

Hagen arrived in the staff car park directly behind Marigold, as would naturally happen when he wanted to avoid her. He took his named spot, and she drew up in the general area. She, of course, drove a small car of obscure make. He couldn’t walk off without acknowledging her and so he waited. She, of course, stared his car up and down without a word.
“I know I should drive a twenty-year-old homemade car, but I prefer speed and comfort,” he said, using his bored voice.
“I didn’t say a word, and if I had, it wouldn’t be about your beautiful car. Don’t doubt it, if I had less class and more money, I would buy one of those, too.”
He blinked at her. She didn’t smile but her whole face expressed hope. Her eyes sparkled and her mouth pursed. He eked out a reluctant laugh, possibly for the first time in a year or more. “Words you might wish had remained unspoken.”
“Oh? Was I making one of those comments that make me sound like an envious snob?”
He put his hand to the back of his neck and considered. “That sounds like something I might once have said.”
“It does, doesn’t it? And I might have said something about the high proportion of village idiots who owned fast cars. But I also might have grown up a little.”
“Since school days? I know,” he said with emphasis, staring straight into her eyes. He began to walk with her to the loading bay door.
“Though I’m still wearing hand-me-downs. Well, that might change in the near future. You will be pleased to know that for three months I will be earning more than the average wage. I might even buy something smart.”
He glanced back at her, concentrating for the first time on the clothes she wore. If they were hand-me-downs, he wouldn’t have guessed, not that she wore the type of clothes Mercia used to buy, which he knew were expensive and seen only a few times before she loaded her dressing room with her next buys. Marigold wore a plain blue shirt with a black skirt and jacket. She looked like any businesswoman of his acquaintance, except for her light golden-red hair, which she had tangled into a knot at the back of her head. As ever, the soft curly tendrils around her face had escaped. He thought she didn’t wear much makeup. Her eyelashes, long and spiky, seemed to be her own, but what would he know? 
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