Never Ever After (Quotable Romance Book 2) Read online

  Never Ever After

  Quotable Romance Book 2

  Lucy McConnell

  Orchard View Publishing

  Contents

  Dear Reader

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Epilogue

  Also by Lucy McConnell

  About the Author

  Copyright © 2017 by Lucy McConnell

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Created with Vellum

  Dear Reader

  In the spring of 2016, Rachelle J. Christensen, Heather Tullis, and I sat down at a bakery with loads of pastries, a blank sheet of paper, and a couple laptops, to hash out the next big idea for the Echo Ridge Romance Anthologies. What we came up with was a set of stories based on contemporary romantic movies that spoke to our hearts. The set, Silver Screen Kisses, is a FUN read. I’m still geeking out about it.

  In the planning, we each picked one of our all-time favorite films. I knew right away that I was going to write While You Were Skiing; but, there were so many wonderful films out there we didn’t even talk about that called to me. They wouldn’t let up until I finally put them into ebook form.

  I truly hope you enjoy these fun romances and that you are inspired to create romance in your life today.

  Happy Reading,

  Lucy McConnell

  Prologue

  “You work too hard.”

  Cindy Knight pulled herself out of a world of Egyptian mummies, desert sands, and a hero with a stubble-covered jaw and a great set of pectorals to answer her daddy. “I’m almost done with this, promise.”

  Her father, Robert Knight, owner of Knight Studios, placed his large hand on her shoulder. “A screenplay is never really done.”

  He was right, of course. Long after she typed “The End,” the director would change lines, the actors would ad-lib, and the cutting room floor would own reams of her hard work. Still, the thrill of putting her imagination onto the page and sharing her vision with an audience was enough to keep her at her desk long into the night. “I can see the story—it’s already a movie in my head.”

  “You have a gift.”

  His words were more than empty parental praise. Robert Knight wasn’t a man to take words lightly, having started in the business as a screenwriter thirty-five years ago. He’d had a full head of James Dean hair and Robin Williams humor back then. The hair may have thinned over the years, but his humor was just as thick as ever.

  “Then maybe I should open a studio,” she quipped. Why not? She knew every inch of Knight Studios, often taking over for her dad when he was out on a shoot. No matter how successful he was or how much money he made, Robert would never be far from the cameras. A fact her stepmother abhorred, but Cindy admired deeply.

  Daddy chuckled. “No one should own a studio before they’re thirty, it’s too much work. Enjoy your twenties; you only get them once.” He planted a kiss on her head, making Cindy smile. At twenty-seven and three-quarters, she’d positioned herself nicely to step out on her own at thirty. Thirty was a good starting age for a large venture.

  “Robert?” Patricia Dixon Knight glided into the room, leaving a trail of glitter in her wake. Her silver evening gown shimmered and flashed, making Cindy want to say, “Ka-Chow!” Lightning McQueen had nothing on this camera-hungry woman.

  “We’re going to be late for the release party.” Her words came out with only a hint of rebuke. For all her high and mighty ways, Cindy’s stepmother coddled and cared for Robert—which was the only reason Cindy kept her mouth shut about the way the woman charged meals to the company account and burned through credit cards. If she made her daddy happy, Cindy was happy too. Besides, they were family. Dysfunctional in some ways, but there was no such thing as a perfect family.

  Robert’s jaw flexed. “I’ll be right out.”

  Patricia purred her way across the room. “Cindy, dear, you aren’t dressed?”

  “I’m not going, Stepmother.” It was always Stepmother—never Patricia from Cindy. As a teen, she wasn’t allowed to call an adult by their first name. No matter how old Cindy got, she’d always be that scraggly little girl to her stepmother.

  Cindy hit print on the manuscript that had taken her months to complete. She’d co-written several screenplays with her father, learning while under his protective wing. But Egypt’s Gold was her first lone venture, and she wanted it to be perfect. She planned on skipping the release party to do another round of edits before she laid the document on her father’s black cherry desk in the morning.

  Patricia thrust out her bottom lip, making a small mewing sound in the process.

  “What is it, darling?” asked Robert. He straightened the picture frame on Cindy’s office wall. She’d framed a picture of the two of them taken just two weeks before at the company luau. Her long, blonde hair was parted in the middle, and she’d tucked a hibiscus blossom behind her left ear. Her dad had on a horrible Hawaiian shirt and pair of khaki shorts. They were laughing at something off camera.

  Patricia pulled on the front of Robert’s shirt. “The girls so wanted their big sister to be there.”

  “I doubt that,” muttered Cindy. Her stepsisters, fraternal twins just over twenty-one years old who had the bodies of preteens, rarely noticed when she was in the room. “I’m sure they’ll survive. Isn’t Justin Bieber supposed to be there?”

  Patricia brightened. “I invited him. It would be so much easier to throw these parties if we were in Hollywood.” Patricia hailed from the land of sun and surf, a fact that she liked to point out on a daily basis, as if being born in California gave her an edge over the “slow Southern women” who worked for Knight Studios—Cindy included.

  Her dad placed a hand at the small of Patricia’s back. “Atlanta has been good to us, my dear.”

  “Of course.” She smiled so wide that her makeup cracked, revealing lines her latest Botox treatment hadn’t corrected. With a peck on Robert’s cheek, and a glance to make sure Cindy had seen the possessive kiss, she sashayed to the door. “I’ll wait in the lobby—don’t forget your tie.”

  Cindy’s fingers uncurled, releasing the tension that gathered when her stepmother was in the room.

  Robert fished a silver bow tie out of his pocket and made a sour face. Cindy bit back her smile as she took it out of his hands and helped him put it on. “This tie is re-donk-u-lous.”

  “I know. But it makes her happy.” He searched Cindy’s face. “You like her… don’t you?”

  “You’ve been married for six years. It’s a bit late to ask that question.” Cindy smiled as she straightened the bow.

  “The truth.”

  Did she like her stepmother? No more than someone liked a pebble in their shoe, but a pebble wasn’t worth throwing a fit over. “I’m happy that y’all got your ever after, Daddy.”

  He clasped her hands, his grip as firm as a talking-to and as serious as a sermon. “There’s no such thing as a happily ever after, Cindy. Life doesn’t hand those out. Whatever happiness you gain in this life is a choice.”

  Like learning to like kale because her stepmother was
on a cleanse and ordered the cook to only serve smoothies.

  Robert’s eyes grew troubled like the Georgia sky before a tornado. “Love you.” He pressed a kiss to her forehead.

  “Love you too.” She hugged him tight.

  “Don’t stay up too late, peanut.” He moved towards the door.

  “I won’t,” she promised, as she gathered papers off the printer. Just one more read-through.

  His head hung low as he headed down the hallway.

  Cindy only watched him for a moment before returning to her desk. Being part of a family meant making sacrifices—she sacrificed cookies in the pantry for Patricia’s no-carb, no-fat, no-taste wafers, and her father sacrificed his pride and wore a sparkling bow tie. No family was perfect, and hers could be a lot worse.

  A moment later there was a thump and a groan in the hallway. Odd. The cleaning crew wouldn’t come in for another hour.

  “Dad?” She hurried to the hallway. Sitting against the wall, his short breaths were accompanied by a garbling sound that sent her heart to her toes.

  “Daddy!” Cindy yelled and flew down the hallway.

  “Robert!” Patricia screeched from the front desk. She yanked up her dress and sprinted in her high heels.

  They got to him at the same time, Patricia on his right and Cindy on his left. Patricia pressed his face between her hands. “You can’t leave me, Robert. Don’t leave!”

  Cindy pushed aside her annoyance at Patricia’s theatrics. Daddy couldn’t die; he had a checkup three months ago and got a clean bill of health. But if they didn’t act quickly, whatever this was could turn into something serious. Cindy pulled her cell phone out of her back pocket and dialed 911.

  She gave the operator directions. Her dad waved his hand as if trying to grab something only he could see. Cindy grasped his thick fingers in her own, dropping the phone to the floor. “Help is on the way.” She tried to calm her racing heart. Patricia sobbed, her head on his shoulder.

  Daddy’s face didn’t go pale, it went gray. The phrase the shadow of death passed over him went through her mind. “No,” she whispered. Her dad was healthy. They’d just had a conversation and he’d been fine. This wasn’t happening.

  She rubbed up and down her dad’s arm to try and keep him alert. “Talk to me, Daddy.”

  With some effort, his eyes lifted to meet hers. “Tell Miranda I love her.”

  Cindy and Patricia gasped at the mention of Cindy’s mother, who had died in childbirth.

  “You look so much like her.” Robert coughed once, then again, then the life went out of him, and he slid to the side like a sack of potatoes.

  Patricia wrenched her hands away. “Miranda.” She breathed the name as if it were an oath used to conjure an evil spirit. She scrambled away like a crab.

  “Dad!” Cindy tugged him flat, his body heavy and uncooperative. She ripped his shirt open, the buttons popping off. They were no match for the adrenaline coursing through her veins. Positioning her hands over his breastbone, she began CPR. “Help me,” she begged Patricia. The woman pressed the back of her hand to her mouth, tears streaming down her cheeks.

  Cindy’s arms pumped, the shock of each compression straining her wrists. She breathed, her lungs struggling against the band of fear around her chest. And she prayed with all her heart that she was doing this correctly. The CPR training at Camp Wallakee was ages ago.

  Stepmother threw her arm over Dad’s stomach. “What will become of us now?”

  Cindy didn’t bother to answer. There was still a chance this was all just a short-lived nightmare. Tomorrow morning they could be delivering flowers to Dad in a hospital room while he begged for a carton of chocolate marshmallow ice cream. Sweat gathered under her bra and at her hairline. Her back ached, but she wouldn’t stop, couldn’t.

  The paramedics arrived and took over, nudging Cindy out of the way. She fell back, watching in horror. Daddy wasn’t breathing. Someone handed Patricia to her as if the woman were a distraught child.

  The strangest thing happened. Her father’s spirit passed through her. There was overwhelming love, and her spirit recognized his spirit—and then he was gone. Just like that.

  She held Patricia close, needing comfort but forced to dish it out instead.

  Daddy’s body was placed on a stretcher. A large man still pumped his chest while a short woman squeezed a plastic thing to help him breathe.

  Patricia suddenly pushed Cindy away, sending her against the wall. “I’m going with him. I’m his wife.”

  “I’m coming too.” Cindy jogged to keep up with the stretcher.

  “No!” Patricia spun on her bedazzled heel. “There’s no room for you.” She hiked up her gown, the tulle and glitter spilling out the back of the ambulance. The fabric was caught in the door and dragged behind as the sirens started.

  Tomás, Knight Studios’ senior writer and her father’s best friend, shook his keys. “Come, peanut, I’ll get you to the hospital.”

  Cindy hadn’t known he was still in the building. She looked around, taking in the worried faces and clasped hands of the employees—the friends—who remained. Where had they come from?

  She shook her head. “He’s gone, Tomás. I felt him leave me.” She clutched her hands over her heart as if she could protect it from shriveling. Her hands turned cold, and her feet went numb. “I think I’m in shock,” she managed to say right before the parking lot faded to black.

  Chapter One

  Cindy

  Cindy opened her desk drawer to gather courage from the picture of her and her father dressed in Hawaiian shirts and laughing as if they had the world at their fingertips. In a way, they’d had the world—writing, consulting on projects, not knowing their time together was so short.

  Even though she could have learned everything about film from Robert Knight, he insisted she get out into the world and have the typical college experience. Having the last name Knight while attending film school wasn’t exactly a typical experience, but she’d graduated on her own merits and started at the bottom when she joined her father’s production company.

  Her stepmother’s company now. Just over two years ago, shortly after her father’s funeral, Patricia had assumed the president’s chair and settled into the role of studio exec. Cindy, in a haze of grief, had met with the lawyer, who assured her that Patricia Knight was named president by Robert Knight. She didn’t remember much of that conversation, just little wisps like in his will and you’re not old enough.

  One change Patricia insisted upon when she took over was removing all personal effects from the work space, including family pictures. Which is why Cindy had to keep this one in the top desk drawer. She traced her father’s proud-papa smile before returning the image to her drawer and straightening her back.

  Her cubicle, along with several others, was located just outside her stepmother’s office. That way, they could hear when Patricia called for one of them without having to use pesky things like interoffice intercoms or instant messaging.

  Cindy’s old office now belonged to the company’s biggest star, her stepsister Drusilla.

  “She can’t say no.” Tomás poked his head over the divide between their work spaces. “The script is too good.” His office had been given to Cindy’s other stepsister, Natalie. In the reorganization process, Patricia moved Tomás from head writer to assistant to the president. Lucky him.

  Cindy rolled her shoulders.

  “If she says no, you call an agent and he will sell it to—”

  “Shhhh.” Cindy pressed her finger to her lips. Their biggest competitor had already absorbed the majority of their talented writing staff and purchased several scripts. Stepmother claimed they were struggling financially and selling off the creative work was the only way to fund their latest teen drama.

  Cindy hoped to change that with one amazing archeological adventure story. The one she’d been working on the night her daddy died. The story that took her eighteen months to get back to. After mulling over the pros a
nd cons of handing her work over, she’d submitted the manuscript to Patricia two days ago and was about to find out if her first solo project cut it or would be cut from Knight Studios’ production schedule.

  “I couldn’t take that script somewhere else, Tomás. Patricia is family.”

  “Technically …” He made a face.

  “Look, when you love the same person and mourn them together—it binds you.”

  Tomás ‘s shoulders softened.

  “And I want to see the Knight logo on the cover.”

  “Me too, peanut.” He gave her a thumbs-up. “Go get it.”

  Nodding once, Cindy strode into her stepmother’s office at exactly three o’clock.

  Patricia Knight had taken the role of president seriously—at least where her wardrobe was concerned. Gone were the glitter and rhinestones, replaced with too-tight pencil skirts and lace tops under blazers. Her heels were still lethal, though they came in dark colors. The changes reflected the idea that Robert’s death had taken the light out of Patricia’s life. Cindy understood how she felt.

  “Cindy.” Patricia nodded for her to sit in the stainless steel chair on the far side of her modern desk. Gone were her father’s dark cherry furniture and bookshelves, the oriental carpet and cream walls. In their place were cold metal and square lines.

  “What have I told you about using office hours to write?”

  “I haven’t.” Cindy sat, crossed her legs, then re-crossed them.

  “Then where did this come from?” Patricia lifted one tattooed eyebrow as high as it could go under the weight of continual Botox treatments. There was a wide bump in the center of her forehead from all the poisons injected into her skin.

  “I wrote it before …”

  The other eyebrow twitched.

  Cindy amended her statement from before Daddy died to, “… a long time ago.” The longest two years of her life.