First Chapter: Coming Home by Holly Kerr

Title: Coming Home
Author: Holly Kerr
Publisher: Etopia Press
Pages: 495
Genre: Women’s Fiction
Format: Kindle

Purchase at AMAZON

Loving your sisters is easy. Liking them is the hard part.

Brenna Ebans always wanted more than what Hill n’Valley could give her, so it seemed a simple decision to follow her black-sheep sister Dory’s footsteps and leave Hill n’Valley in her rearview, hoping to locate their missing father. Leaving her sisters and her first love Seamus was harder than she thought, but she’s made a life for herself in Vancouver, started her career at a prestigious law firm, and has found the man of her dreams. But when she finds her husband Toby in a compromising position at work, she loses both her love and her job, and has nowhere to go but home.

Youngest sister Cat has remained in Hill n’Valley, leaving a string of broken hearts—and ex-husbands—in her wake. She’s happy living in the family home, with the ghost of their dead mother to keep her company during the day, and her latest conquest—Brenna’s old boyfriend, Seamus—to keep her warm at night. And she’s less than thrilled to hear about Brenna’s return.

But when tragedy strikes, it brings their father back to Hill n’Valley, and the sisters will have a lot of issues to resolve…

First Chapter:

One little decision changed my life.

The choice I made to follow my husband into the supply closet at work was it for me.

I was in the middle of finalizing the paperwork of a 2.5 billion dollar acquisition for one of my most problematic clients when my sister Cayleigh called. I almost didn’t take the call. I loved my sister dearly but talking to her on the phone meant a certain guilt trip about why I couldn’t find the time to come home for a visit. I much preferred our weekly email communications. Yes, it’d been fourteen years since I’d left home at eighteen and no, I hadn’t managed to come home even once since then. At first it was because I couldn’t afford the ticket to fly home halfway across the country and then it was because of being swamped with school and then work and then…

Instead of trying to justify it to myself, I picked up the phone with a last longing look at the neat file on my desk. I’d been surviving on pure adrenaline for the past three days trying to get the deal done and to everyone’s amazement, but mine, I had done it. I had found the one little loophole that had changed everything and put the power back in my client’s hands. Complicated yes, tedious to some, but I loved my work. It left me no time or inclination for a social life and my hours spent at work both in the office and at home aggravated my husband Toby to no end, but I loved it.

At least I told myself I loved it.

I was listening to Cayleigh tell me some story when my assistant Krystal poked her head into my office to drop another file on my desk with a big smile. There were two yellow post-it notes: “Call them ASAP” with a happy face and “I’m leaving in 10 mins”, with an even bigger happy face. It was already five thirty on a Monday and I wasn’t getting out of here anytime soon. I was going to have to cancel yet another dinner with Toby. We both worked for Davis and Daniels, Attorneys at Law, so it was possible he was as swamped as I was.

Doubtful. My hours at the firm were so long these days that Toby had given up driving me home from work, forcing me to take the bus if I worked late because I didn’t have my own car. I should have really found time to buy a car.

“Are you coming home for Addison’s wedding?” Cayleigh asked, over the phone. I pulled myself back to the reason Cayleigh had called. “Maggie said you haven’t sent your RSVP back.” Addison was the oldest daughter of my oldest sister Maggie and I didn’t remember being told she was engaged let alone being invited to the wedding. I definitely had no clue who she was marrying. I rummaged through my inbox as Cayleigh tried to guilt me into going home for the wedding. I had two inboxes on my desk—one for personal matters and one for work. The contents of the work one were spread over my desk in an orderly manner while the personal one was overflowing and neglected. I spent the majority of my time in my office so I had begun to get my mail forwarded there about a year ago.

“Oh, Cay…work is just so crazy and—” There was the invitation; still unopened in the middle of the pile with my name written in sparkly green ink, along with a credit card bill and an invitation to join the newest fitness center in the area. “It’s been really bad—really busy,” I corrected. “I’m doing this deal and no one thought it was going to come together but I managed it and—”

“You’re always busy. You work over Christmas and you never take vacations. Look at how late it is and you’re still there. It’s been years since you’ve been home, Brenna, and if it wasn’t for your Facebook page, which you never update anyway, I wouldn’t remember what you look like. Come home.” I was readying my arguments but Cayleigh didn’t give me the chance. “Addison’s wedding is in two weeks. Maggie needs you to be there. It’s her daughter. It’s Maggie.”

I pushed the air out of my lungs with a puff. Our older sister Maggie had guided me through my teenage years after our mother died and while my devotion to her hadn’t gotten me back home, Cayleigh knew I would do just about anything else for her. Any mention of Maggie would also make me feel pretty guilty about not going back.

The sight of my husband Toby walking by the open door of my office distracted me once again from my phone call. I raised a hand in greeting but he continued on without glancing in, leaving me with a hand suspended in the air. “I’ll call you back,” I told Cayleigh.

“Brenna!”

“I will, just let me check my schedule. Call you right back.” I had hung up before I even finished speaking and hurried to the door of my tiny little box of an office. Davis and Daniels occupied three floors of a high rise in downtown Vancouver and Toby, being the next in line for partner, had one of the cushy top floor offices. What was he doing down there, if it wasn’t to see me? I caught sight of him at the end of the hall, but he stepped into one of the supply closets before I could call to him.

We’d been steadily fighting for weeks, months really, about my inability to make time for him. Toby was just as busy as I was at work, but seemed to be able to shut it down when he came home, which I’d never been able to. I hated fighting. It’s not that Toby and I would have real fights—more like he would make snarky comments I would pretend to ignore because I didn’t know how to respond to them. We did have a pretty heated discussion when I told him I had to go into work last Sunday, but had I left before resolving anything. Toby hated it when things were left hanging. He needed things packaged up with a neat little bow, but problems in life weren’t always that easy.

Because of that discussion, I decided to follow Toby down the hall. The particular supply closet he ducked into held a fond memory for us, back when Toby had recruited me for the firm, and then for himself. I had a rare smile on my face as I took off after him.

The room wasn’t more than a big closet with shelves separating the space. I smiled even wider when I opened the door and saw Toby’s handsome face through a space on the shelves. He seemed surprised to see me. But not that happy.

“Brenna!” he said in a strangled voice. There was a thump and a crash.

“Hi,” I said tentatively. “I thought maybe…”

And then all words failed me as I stepped around the shelves. Toby stood with his pants around his ankles and a woman kneeling in front of him. From the back of her head, I recognized my assistant, Krystal.

“I guess you had the same idea,” I managed to choke out.

“I can explain,” Toby began, pushing Krystal aside and leaving him fully exposed and suddenly very flaccid. I stood and took him in—his handsome face flushed with annoyance and his brown eyes furiously darting, trying to see how he could get out of this, all the while fighting to keep his composure. He favored an eclectic style, with slim fitting suits and cropped pants paired with sweater vests and argyle socks in bright hues. My mother would have called him a dandy. I noticed for the first time how his close-cropped hair had become more silver than brown. Toby was seventeen years older than I and getting caught with his pants down—literally—suddenly made him look every day of those fifty years. Also, wearing a sweater vest while getting a blowjob made him look plain silly.

I was  reminded of a scene in a book I had been reading, where the heroine came across her boyfriend going down on another girl in a church, of all places. How had my life become a book?

“How can you possibly explain this? You were in her mouth! Oh, sorry dear, I walked in the closet and suddenly Krystal was on her knees on the floor and it was a good height for my dick, so there you go! Is that how you would explain it?” A surge of anger began to boil inside me and I clamped my hand over my mouth to prevent it from spewing out. Or was it nausea? I wanted to throw up. Don’t get mad, don’t get mad, I ordered myself. Things never turned out well when I lost my temper. “Are things that bad between us?”

My jaw dropped when Krystal snorted. “How can someone so smart be so incredibly stupid? Things are horrible between you two! Everyone knows it but you.”

“It’s your fault,” Toby accused. Cracks were appearing in his exterior and he sounded very much like a seven-year-old boy. The size of his penis at that moment was comparable to one as well, but I refrained from commenting on that. I also stopped myself from trying to rip it off and shoving it where the sun didn’t shine.

“You’re a terrible wife!” Krystal relentlessly continued. “He says you’d rather spend time working even when you’re home rather than have sex with him. I take care of you here at work and I’ve been taking care of your husband for weeks now and you’re so busy with your head stuck up your ass you haven’t even noticed anything!”

My vision swam with black dots for a moment. I took a deep breath and it cleared, allowing me to avoid causing Krystal physical pain. Hitting her would have felt great. It would have felt fanfuckingtastic! But it also would have caused me to lose any last shred of self-respect I had left. “I’ve noticed that you’re fucking fired so get your hands off my husband’s dick and get your shit out of this office. And you,” I turned to Toby, furious. “We’re through. So I guess you can get anyone you want to suck your dick, even my fake breasted, wannabe slut of an excuse for an ex-assistant. Because I’m never touching you again.”

I turned to leave, but decided one more shot was necessary. “Not that I would ever want to. Your penis is pathetic,” I said to Toby, hanging onto my composure by my fingernails, “and you’re awful in bed. Plus your socks are stupid and that vest makes you look like a dork.”

Possibly not exactly the truth but I wasn’t about to quibble over falsehoods. As I left the closet, I vowed not to crumple in front of them, or anyone there. Certain things were best saved for alone time.

What had happened? I was reeling. How could I have not noticed what was going on right under my very nose? I’d had no idea. Yes, I worked long and exhausting hours, but so did Toby. How could we have lost the connection? Toby had been the only person I could rely on. He was the only person I had in Vancouver. How could things have gotten so bad? I know it had been a while sex-wise, but to catch him in the supply closet with my assistant of all people…

On my way to the elevator I passed the pod of desks in the middle of the floor Krystal shared with three others assistants. One of my client files was open on her desk, along with a half-empty cup of tea and her iPhone.

“Two Fridays ago,” I suddenly spat. “That’s not too long.”

“Can I help you with something, Brenna?” the women across from Krystal’s desk asked, her eyes wide with confusion. I think her name was Laurel.

“Is two and a half weeks too long to go without sex?” I demanded.

“I don’t think so,” she replied slowly, her eyes widening so that they were practically circular, all the while leaning as far away from me as she could in her chair. I understood her surprise. I barely spoke to anyone in the office, let alone broached conversations about my sex life, so this was a rare occurrence indeed.

“Then what the hell is his problem!” The anger hit me again, this time with a whoosh, similar to turning on a blowtorch. It wasn’t a red-hot mad where I would shriek and cry about the injustice of it and slowly sink into a sobbing heap on the floor. No, I went more of an icy blue mad, which was infinitely more dangerous.

“How long has she been fucking my husband?” I asked conversationally, carefully tucking the papers back into the file on Krystal’s desk.

“What?” Laurel gasped in a thoroughly insincere way that left no doubt she and Krystal had spent many hours discussing Toby, Toby and Krystal, Toby and I and my complete and utter ignorance of the affair. My humiliation was nearing completion.

“Could you hold this for a sec?” I managed politely, passing the file over the dividing wall to Laurel before picking up Krystal’s phone and smashing it onto her desk. And again.

“What are you doing?” The fear in Laurel’s voice was sincere but since it seemed obvious what I was doing, I saw no need to answer.

The phone still looked somewhat functional so I threw it on the floor and crushed the screen with the heel of my shoe, grinding it like you would kill a bug. I looked up in time to see Toby, with a red faced Krystal right behind him, hurrying down the hall. I took Krystal’s new hot pink Coach tote that I had so admired yesterday, and punted it towards them like a football. I was aiming at Toby’s head. Unfortunately, the purse didn’t make it that far but the contents did fly in every direction, lipsticks and pens and tampons flying through the air like miniature Scud missiles.

“Brenna!” Toby called, remarkably still keeping his composure even while a tampon hit him in the head. Something inside me snapped.

“I’m calling security,” Laurel wailed.

“He said never loved you!” Krystal cried. “He said it was more of a marriage of convenience. He said it was the same for you!”

“And you believed him? I loved him! I love you,” I looked sadly at Toby and resolutely pushed away the tears that threatened. Crying wasn’t going to help me get through this. Staying angry was my best bet. “Loved you. And you!” I turned to Krystal. “I thought you were my friend!”

I picked up the teacup and threw it at the computer. The cup broke, ruining the touch screen and splashing liquid everywhere. I heard Laurel’s shrill scream and Toby’s shouts as I ran for the elevator.

Sixty-seventh floor. Toby’s office—with the view of Granville Square. And right inside his door was the Burberry raincoat he had just bought. Had he gone shopping with Krystal? What else had they done together, outside the supply closet?

I felt another icy surge of rage and grabbed the first thing I could see—Toby’s antique pewter letter opener. Very handy as I stabbed and ripped my way around his office. Furniture, papers, any clothing he might have lying around. Finally the icy rage cooled and I stopped, glancing in horror at the end result of my tantrum.

“Shit,” I whimpered.

Other than Toby, I had no one. I had been too busy, so absorbed with first school, then my career, to cultivate relationships. Toby was it. He was the only person at work who had made an effort to get to know me. I had my career and I had Toby. As I glanced at the ruins of Toby’s office, I doubted I had much of a career left.

I was back to being alone.

But then, like a life preserver, I clutched my Blackberry. I was so used to being constantly connected to my clients, my work, that I was never without my phone. I must have picked it up without thinking when I followed Toby into that supply closet.

It rang only once before Cayleigh answered.

“Okay,” I said. “I’m coming home.

---