Jennifer Greene - Silver and Spice

For that century of an instant, Anne didn’t move either, and then her toes moved on springs again, bursting out of the motor home for the second time. Moisture was forming beneath her eyelids again. These tears were very different, as soft and helpless as they were inevitable. You’re just making a fool of yourself. She stalked back to the car and clasped the last of the flowers to her chest, dropping some of them and breaking the stems of others. She picked up each one so very carefully and then gathered them tightly to her chest so that more stems broke; stems she didn’t see. She walked back one last time into the motor home, not looking at Jake, unable to look at him this time. She looked instead at the incredible sweet-scented mess she’d made.

Flowers were everywhere. Broken stems and crushed petals. Jake’s shoes were covered in daffodils. One was hanging from his shoulder.

Anne lifted her chin, pretending there were no tears in her eyes. “I’m disgusted,” she said flatly. “Totally disgusted. What on earth is wrong with a town that doesn’t stock more daffodils? So they’re out of season. That’s no excuse. Some people manage to buy violets when they’re out of season…”

Her voice trailed off jaggedly. She just couldn’t keep up the act any longer. Through blurred vision, she finally found the courage to look at Jake. He was still standing by the counter, all but buried in daffodils, setting down his coffee cup after taking a sip. Taking a sip of coffee? Now? And his face no longer had that grayish cast to it. “I do love you, Anne,” he said mildly, “but it took you a hell of a long time to get here.”

She could have killed him.

There wasn’t time. In the blink of an eyelash, he had his arms around her and was lifting her high in a crushing rib-breaking hug. She was the one holding on so very, very hard. “You’re home, Anne,” he said vibrantly.

She was. Home. Not to a place, but to her mate. Security was where love was. Roots were where the heart set them down.

His lips hovered over hers for an instant, and then moved in. That kiss…she could smell the heady fragrance of spring all around them, taste all the sweet heat of a languid summer, hear the sensual crackle of leaves in autumn, feel the warmth of his arms around her on a cold winter’s day. Let the seasons come and go. As long as Jake was here…

Jennifer sold her first book in 1980, and since then she has sold more than eighty books in the contemporary romance genre. Her first professional writing award came from RWA-a Silver Medallion in l984-followed by more than twenty nominations and awards, including being honored in RWA’s Hall of Fame and presented with the RWA Nora Roberts Lifetime Achievement Award. Jennifer has been on numerous bestseller lists, has written for Harlequin Books, Avon, Berkley and Dell, and has sold over the world in more than twenty languages. She has written under a number of pseudonyms, most recognizably Jennifer Greene, but also Jeanne Grant and Jessica Massey.

She was born in Michigan, started writing in high school, and graduated from Michigan State University with a degree in English and psychology. The university honored her with their “Lantern Night Award,” a tradition developed to honor fifty outstanding women graduates each year. Exploring issues and concerns for women today is what first motivated her to write, and she has long been an enthusiastic and active supporter of women’s fiction, which she believes is an “unbeatable way to reach out and support other women.” Jennifer lives in the country around Benton Harbor, Michigan, with her husband, Lar.