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  Taylor glared at her, lips pursed. “For crying out loud. Bar on east, DJ on the west, cake on the south. Sheesh.” She tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. Her hair was thick, long and stylishly wavy, falling well below her shoulders. “It's hardly brain surgery!”

  “I wonder if that would work out better,” Angie said, fingers to chin.

  Sally, her face pinched and tight, turned to Angie. “Only if you want your wet bar to have no ice or refrigeration, the wires for the speakers going across the middle of the dance floor, and your cake shoved in a space where people entering the reception are milling around and it will hardly be seen.”

  “I don't have a band!” Taylor harrumphed. “You know that!”

  “I was talking to Miss Amalfi.” Sally sounded more desperate with each word.

  “Why would you be talking to her?” Taylor cocked an eyebrow. “I'm telling you what I want for my reception, and she's just standing there looking like a potted plant.”

  “A potted plant?” Angie gasped. “I'm the one with the appointment! Who do you think you are, taking over my reception planning?”

  “Well, for one thing, you've got a whole week. I only have two days, and this so-called wedding ‘assistant’ has been anything but helpful. I have to do all the thinking myself.”

  “I'm sorry, Taylor.” Sally looked on the verge of tears. “I'm trying to help you, but you keep making changes.”

  “I do not make changes on a whim. I come up with enhancements—to do the job, in other words, that you aren't capable of doing!”

  Sally gaped, speechless, tears welling in her eyes.

  Angie spun towards Taylor. “Will you please butt out? You’re doing nothing but upsetting Sally, confusing me, and mucking up this entire process.”

  Taylor loomed over her. “Why are you so pushy? I've only got a couple of changes and then I'm out of here!”

  Angie put her hands on her hips. “I’m pushy? I don’t think so. If you’d kept your bossy-pants mouth shut, I would have been finished by now.”

  “Bossy-pants? What kind of infantile word is that?”

  “If you prefer a more adult word that starts with a ‘b,’ I’ll certainly use it,” Angie said.

  “Sally, I demand you do something about this creature,” Taylor said. “I'm an important person. I don't have time for this.”

  Angie was not a violent person, but it was all she could do not to slap the woman. “Important in your own mind, maybe. But sure as hell not in anyone else's.”

  Taylor raised her chin. “I'll have you know, I'm going to be in a movie.”

  “What movie? Bridezilla?”

  “Why you little slut!”

  “Stop!” Sally screamed. “I can't take it anymore! I can't take the orders, the bickering, the mind changing, the disappointment. The fact that not one of you ever thinks about me.” She burst into tears. “I'm here trying to help, and all I get is criticism. You make me sick. Every last one of you.”

  With that, she turned and ran from the room, leaving Angie and Taylor both slack-jawed in the large empty space.

  o0o

  He looked at the bride and smiled. His bride.

  She was beautiful, and everything a bride should be. She wore a white dress with seed pearls and lace, a white veil over her face. White satin shoes, white elbow-length gloves.

  Perfect.

  She lay on her back on the bed, and he lifted the veil off her face just as he would have done on their wedding day. He leaned near and pressed his lips to hers, then lightly ran his hand over her neck, her shoulders, and along the front of her dress to her small waist. He loved her; he wanted her.

  He took hold of the hem of her dress and slid his hand under it along her calf, moving upward. But then he stopped and stood up straight.

  He didn't care for the bright red lipstick she was wearing. He found a tissue and wiped it off, then looked over the lipstick shades in the knapsack he carried and found a soft pink. Carefully, he covered her full lips with color. Much better. Kissable.

  At the thought, he bent forward and kissed her again, much longer this time. He only wished her mouth under his was soft instead of hard and dry; warm instead of cold. But none of that mattered. He crawled onto the bed beside her, circled her with his arms, and slid his fingers under the neckline of the dress, just below her collarbone, then inched lower.

  He heard a noise and stopped.

  He was in a storeroom in the basement of an old, run-down apartment building. The room had been filled with ugly furniture abandoned years before. He moved it all out when he moved his bride in. He also brought in their matrimonial bed, a chair and a lamp. The only window, high on the wall, was at street level when viewed from the outside. It was small, awning-style, and opened by turning the latch and pulling it inward. He had painted it black and nailed it shut. But now, someone was pushing it open.

  He froze.

  Two teenage boys peered through the window and met his eyes. Their mouths dropped open in shock, but their shock turned to horror as they took in the scene before them. With shrieks and cries, they backed away and ran.

  He jumped off the bed. “Wait!” he yelled as he climbed onto the chair to look out the window. “Come back here!”

  But the boys were gone.

  Continue with Cook’s Big Day on Amazon or wherever fine books and ebooks are sold.

  About the Author

  Joanne Pence was born and raised in northern California. She has been an award-winning, USA Today best-selling author of mysteries for many years, but she has also written historical fiction, contemporary romance, romantic suspense, a fantasy, and supernatural suspense. All of her books are now available as e-books, and most are also in print. Joanne hopes you’ll enjoy her books, which present a variety of times, places, and reading experiences, from mysterious to thrilling, emotional to lightly humorous, as well as powerful tales of times long past.

  Visit her at http://www.joannepence.com. Also, to hear about new books, please sign up for Joanne’s Angie & Friends Mailing List.

  The Inspector Rebecca Mayfield Mysteries

  Rebecca is a by-the-book detective, who walks the straight and narrow in her work, and in her life. Richie, on the other hand, is not at all by-the-book. But opposites can and do attract, and there are few mystery two-somes quite as opposite as Rebecca and Richie.

  ONE O’CLOCK HUSTLE – North American Book Award winner in Mystery

  TWO O’CLOCK HEIST

  THREE O’CLOCK SÉANCE

  FOUR O’CLOCK SIZZLE

  FIVE O’CLOCK TWIST

  Plus a Christmas Novella: The Thirteenth Santa

  The Angie & Friends Food & Spirits Mysteries

  Angie Amalfi and Homicide Inspector Paavo Smith are soon to be married in this latest mystery series. Crime and calories plus a new “twist” in Angie’s life in the form of a ghostly family inhabiting the house she and Paavo buy, create a mystery series with a “spirited” sense of fun and adventure.

  COOKING SPIRITS

  ADD A PINCH OF MURDER

  COOK’S BIG DAY

  Plus a Christmas mystery-fantasy: COOK’S CURIOUS CHRISTMAS

  And a cookbook: COOK’S DESSERT COOKBOOK

  The Angie Amalfi Mysteries

  Gourmet cook, sometime food columnist, sometime restaurant critic, and generally "underemployed" person Angelina Amalfi burst upon the mystery scene in SOMETHING'S COOKING, in which she met San Francisco Homicide Inspector Paavo Smith. Since that time she's wanted two things in life, a good job...and Paavo.

  Here are the Angie mysteries in the order written:

  SOMETHING'S COOKING

  TOO MANY COOKS

  COOKING UP TROUBLE

  COOKING MOST DEADLY

  COOK'S NIGHT OUT

  COOKS OVERBOARD

  A COOK IN TIME

  TO CATCH A COOK

  BELL, COOK, AND CANDLE

  IF COOKS COULD KILL

  TWO COOKS A-KILLING

  COURTING DISASTE
R

  RED HOT MURDER

  THE DA VINCI COOK

  Supernatural Suspense

  Ancient Echoes

  Top Idaho Fiction Book Award Winner

  Over two hundred years ago, a covert expedition shadowing Lewis and Clark disappeared in the wilderness of Central Idaho. Now, seven anthropology students and their professor vanish in the same area. The key to finding them lies in an ancient secret, one that men throughout history have sought to unveil.

  Michael Rempart is a brilliant archeologist with a colorful and controversial career, but he is plagued by a sense of the supernatural and a spiritual intuitiveness. Joining Michael are a CIA consultant on paranormal phenomena, a washed-up local sheriff, and a former scholar of Egyptology. All must overcome their personal demons as they attempt to save the students and learn the expedition’s terrible secret....

  Ancient Shadows

  One by one, a horror film director, a judge, and a newspaper publisher meet brutal deaths. A link exists between them, and the deaths have only begun ....

  Archeologist Michael Rempart finds himself pitted against ancient demons and modern conspirators when a dying priest gives him a powerful artifact--a pearl said to have granted Genghis Khan the power, eight centuries ago, to lead his Mongol warriors across the steppes to the gates of Vienna.

  The artifact has set off centuries of war and destruction as it conjures demons to play upon men's strongest ambitions and cruelest desires. Michael realizes the so-called pearl is a philosopher's stone, the prime agent of alchemy. As much as he would like to ignore the artifact, when he sees horrific deaths and experiences, first-hand, diabolical possession and affliction, he has no choice but to act, to follow a path along the Old Silk Road to a land that time forgot, and to somehow find a place that may no longer exist in the world as he knows it.

  Historical, Contemporary & Fantasy Romance

  Dance with a Gunfighter

  Willa Cather Literary Award finalist for Best Historical Novel.

  Gabriella Devere wants vengeance. She grows up quickly when she witnesses the murder of her family by a gang of outlaws, and vows to make them pay for their crime. When the law won't help her, she takes matters into her own hands.

  Jess McLowry left his war-torn Southern home to head West, where he hired out his gun. When he learns what happened to Gabriella's family, and what she plans, he knows a young woman like her will have no chance against the outlaws, and vows to save her the way he couldn't save his own family.

  But the price of vengeance is high and Gabriella's willingness to sacrifice everything ultimately leads to the book's deadly and startling conclusion.

  The Dragon’s Lady

  Against the background of San Francisco at the time of the Great Earthquake and Fire of 1906 comes a tale of love and loss. Ruth Greer, wealthy daughter of a shipping magnate, finds a young boy who has run away from his home in Chinatown—an area of gambling parlors, opium dens, sing-song girls, as well as families trying to eke out a living. It is also home to a number of highbinder tongs, the infamous “hatchet men” of Chinese lore.

  There, Ruth meets the boy’s father, Li Han-lin, the handsome, enigmatic leader of one such tong, and discovers he is neither as frightening, cruel, or wanton as reputation would have her believe. As Ruth’s fascination with the area grows, she finds herself pulled deeper into the intrigue of the lawless area, and Han-lin’s life. But the two are from completely different worlds, and when both worlds are shattered by the earthquake and fire that destroys San Francisco, they face their ultimate test.

  Seems Like Old Times

  When Lee Reynolds, nationally known television news anchor, returns to the small town where she was born to sell her now-vacant childhood home, little does she expect to find that her first love has moved back to town. Nor does she expect that her feelings for him are still so strong.

  Tony Santos had been a major league baseball player, but now finds his days of glory gone. He's gone back home to raise his young son as a single dad.

  Both Tony and Lee have changed a lot. Yet, being with him, she finds that in her heart, it seems like old times...

  Dangerous Journey

  C.J. Perkins is trying to find her brother who went missing while on a Peace Corps assignment in Asia. All she knows is that the disappearance has something to do with a "White Dragon." Darius Kane, adventurer and bounty hunter, seems to be her only hope, and she practically shanghais him into helping her.

  With a touch of the romantic adventure film Romancing the Stone, C.J. and Darius follow a trail that takes them through the narrow streets of Hong Kong, the backrooms of San Francisco's Chinatown, and the wild jungles of Borneo as they pursue both her brother and the White Dragon. The closer C.J. gets to them, the more danger she finds herself in—and it's not just danger of losing her life, but also of losing her heart.

  [This is a completely revised edition of novel previously published as Armed and Dangerous.]

  The Ghost of Squire House

  For decades, the home built by reclusive artist, Paul Squire, has stood empty on a windswept cliff overlooking the ocean. Those who attempted to live in the home soon fled in terror. Jennifer Barrett knows nothing of the history of the house she inherited. All she knows is she's glad for the chance to make a new life for herself.

  It's Paul Squire's duty to rid his home of intruders, but something about this latest newcomer's vulnerable status...and resemblance of someone from his past...dulls his resolve. Jennifer would like to find a real flesh-and-blood man to liven her days and nights--someone to share her life with—but living in the artist's house, studying his paintings, she is surprised at how close she feels to him.

  A compelling, prickly ghost with a tortured, guilt-ridden past, and a lonely heroine determined to start fresh, find themselves in a battle of wills and emotion in this ghostly fantasy of love, time, and chance.

  o0o

  Look for the books by Joanne Pence by visiting her website at http://www.joannepence.com, and learn about new books by signing up for her Angie & Friends Mailing List.

  Copyright

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, public or private institutions, corporations, towns, and incidents are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems without permission in writing from the author, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review. This book may not be resold or uploaded for distribution to others.

  Excerpts from Something’s Cooking by Joanne Pence

  Quail Hill Publishing

  PO Box 64

  Eagle, ID 83616

  Visit our website at www.quailhillpublishing.net

  First Quail Hill Publishing eBook: April 2017

  First Quail Hill Publishing Paperback Printing: April 2017

  Copyright © 2017 Joanne Pence

  All rights reserved.

  ISBN:

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