Please welcome Belinda to Unputdownable Books! Its an honor to have you here. Thank you as well for allowing me to post up an excerpt from your book.
Nobody wakes up one morning and decides that today is the day they are going to cheat on their spouse. When the opportunity presents itself however, it is ultimately a choice. And that choice, whether good or bad, can have irrevocable consequences.
Ethan and Jessica Harrington are doctors who work alongside fellow doctors Gavin and Sarah Williams. After Jessica has an affair with Gavin, their lives are thrown into turmoil as they deal with the aftermath and subsequent fallout.
For the better part of a year the four of them have been working to piece their marriages back together. Sarah and Gavin are still reeling from a devastating miscarriage, while Jessica and Ethan are hesitantly looking forward to the birth of their first child.
Sarah’s hopes are immediately shattered when she learns how far Gavin’s infidelity has gone. Suddenly thrown into an unwanted independence she fights to find her way.
Jessica struggles to repair her marriage to Ethan as they become parents. But when Ethan, a borderline alcoholic, learns a dark secret, his world steadily begins to crumble. His drinking, fueled by this discovery slowly engulfs him. Jessica’s love for him is only matched by her fear of his temper. With his marriage now in pieces and his sanity questionable, Ethan struggles to come to terms with his alcoholism and face his past.
Theirs is a story of the tremendous amount of love some people have for one another, regardless of the pain that is sometimes inflicted.
Book Excerpt:
Ethan folded the last of his father's clothes and tucked them inside a box. He carried it downstairs and placed them with the other boxes by the door. The landlord had told him that he would take them to the homeless shelter for him if he would pack them up.
He went back upstairs to the bathroom and opened up the medicine chest over the sink. He took out a small bottle. It was a prescription for high blood pressure. He slipped the medicine into his pocket. He would give them to a patient at the clinic who couldn't afford the prescription.
Back in the bedroom, he knelt down and opened the drawers to the nightstand. The top drawer contained some old business papers and statistics. He tossed them in a box that was to be thrown away. He opened the bottom drawer expecting to find more of the same. Instead, he found a small box. He opened it to find several items, but a small Polaroid was what caught his attention.
Ethan sat down on the bed as he studied the picture of him and his sister. He couldn't help smiling. He looked to be only five or six and Renee must have been about two. She was in pigtails and wearing a cowgirl skirt with fringe on the bottom. He was dressed as a cowboy. He had on a pair of red boots and a big black hat that completely engulfed his head. He was peering out from under the brim grinning broadly at the camera. Renee's grin matched his own as they stood arm in arm. He sighed. It was true what they said about the innocence of youth.
Over the past two years, he had noticed a change in his sister’s behavior towards him. He suspected that she was jealous over the fact that their father had moved here. She never had any reason to be though as he kept his distance from him. Other than the monthly board meetings and an occasional dinner set up by Jessica, he rarely saw him.
Renee had become particularly aggressive towards Jessica. She took every opportunity to throw her affair in his face, making it difficult for him to get past it. He laid the picture back in the box and snapped it shut.
He sat down on the bed and looked around. The bedroom was sparse with no pictures on the wall. It seemed to fit his father’s personality. Everything his father ever did was for a reason. He never stood on ceremony or talked just for the sake of having a conversation. When he did speak, his tone was usually serious.
He closed his eyes remembering one day in particular his father taking him aside after a board meeting at the hospital.
“How are things going between you and Jessica?”
Ethan sighed inwardly. He knew his father was aware of her affair with Gavin, as was most everyone at the hospital. But he had never said one word to him about it. “They’re fine,” he answered.
His father looked at him long and hard for a moment. “You can hide your feelings from most people. But I can see by looking at you that things aren’t fine.”
Ethan sat down in the chair. It had been a few months since they had reconciled, but he found himself unable to forgive her. He was thinking about divorcing her. But things had just become more complicated as last night she had told him that she was pregnant. A baby was the last thing they needed right now. How could they raise a child together if he couldn’t stand being in the same room with her?
Everett could see how much he was struggling. He suddenly leaned forward and put his hand on his shoulder. “Son, do you love her?”
He nodded his head. “Yes,” he whispered.
“Then you do everything you can to make it work. Because nothing else matters. You have to go with your heart.”
Ethan opened his eyes. He was ever so grateful to his father for speaking those few words. At the time, it had all seemed so hopeless. But in reality, it was such a simple decision. It was a decision that he did not regret. He was very much in love with her, and now he had a family.
Authors Note: I hope this is enough to pique your interest to check out my book.
It is available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Smashwords
Thank you Naj for allowing me the opportunity to be a guest here on Unputdownable Books and thanks to Liz of CBLS Promotions.
HOW TO ENTER:
Comment with your email address to be entered in the giveaway for After All Is Said And Done.
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Author Bio:
I have been happily married to my husband for over 21 years now. I have two great sons, two persnickety cats, and 1 unconditionally loving dog who thinks he’s a person. I am currently working on my second novel, The Monster of Silver Creek, which is due out in December. The follow up book to After All Is Said And Done will be published in 2012.
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