An Honorable Man. Kara Lennox

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      Chapter Two

      Twenty-four hours later, Priscilla wanted to eat her words. She was helping her mother fix Sunday dinner and she needed a boyfriend in the worst way.

      Lorraine Garner, who was well known for her cooking skills, had been only too happy when Priscilla had shown an interest in the kitchen for the first time in her life. Now that Priscilla had discovered how essential cooking was to her popularity at the firehouse, she had practically begged her mother to teach her to cook.

      In between instructions on preparing lasagna, Lorraine couldn’t resist interrogating Priscilla.

      “How is your nurse training going?” she asked as she demonstrated how to properly crush garlic without even chipping her manicure. She wore a cream-colored silk dress and pearls around her neck and she never got a spot on herself.

      “It’s paramedic training,” Priscilla gently corrected, “and it’s going fine so far.”

      Her mother would probably be much happier if Priscilla had become a nurse. She’d been horrified when her daughter had announced she was going to leave the home decor shop she’d been managing since she graduated from college and become a firefighter. Lorraine hadn’t liked the whole blue-collar aspect of it, but even more than that she’d been worried for her daughter’s safety.

      Priscilla, however, had been bored to death as a shopkeeper. She’d wanted to do something active, something that would make a difference in the world. She’d needed to turn her life in an entirely new direction so she wouldn’t brood about Cory.

      She’d always been fascinated with fire trucks. She’d even played fireman when she was a little kid, rescuing her cousin Marisa’s dolls over and over from various flaming tragedies. It was pure impulse that had prompted her to apply to the fire department, and she’d wondered at the time if she’d gone a little crazy. But the very first time she’d fought a blaze in training, she’d liked that feeling and wanted more of it.

      Eventually Lorraine had come to accept her daughter’s new vocation and had stopped hoping it was a phase she was going through. But she had not stopped trying to fix what she perceived to be Priscilla’s tragic lack of social life.

      “Are they going to give you time off to attend the bridesmaids’ dinner?” her mother asked.

      “Yes, I have that day off.” And she knew what was coming next.

      “Have you decided who you’ll take as your escort?”

      “Mother, I really don’t think Marisa is going to care whether I bring a date to the dinner.” Her cousin Marisa was the bride. Lorraine and Priscilla’s aunt Clara, her mother’s sister, had been pitting the girls against each other since they were babies.

      “I just don’t want people to feel sorry for you,” Lorraine said. “You know Aunt Clara thinks you somehow messed up your only chance to snag a husband.”

      “The breakup was hardly my fault.” Cory, who had never shown the slightest fondness for children that Priscilla had seen, had nonetheless been devastated when Priscilla confessed that she would never be able to bear his children. When she’d brought up the possibility of adoption, he’d closed his mind. His heart had been set on biological children. And that had meant he most definitely would not be proposing marriage.

      Priscilla had been shocked and then saddened by his attitude. She’d been sure Cory was “the one.” But she hadn’t known him as well as she’d imagined she did.

      “Of СКАЧАТЬ