All Wrapped Up in You
Sun Chara
A division of HarperCollinsPublishers
www.harpercollins.co.uk
Contents
Greetings from southern California! I’m a teacher turned actor/writer and have appeared on stage and film in How the Other Half Loves, General Hospital, and McGee & Me. The showbiz background comes in handy with speaking engagements, judging RWA contests, and judging the Emmys. I have a Master of Arts Degree, and I'm a member of the Screen Actors Guild and Romance Writers of America. Globetrotting for lore (once, on an excursion amidst the pyramids in the Valley of the Kings, a gentleman offered fifteen camels for my hand…now had it been race horses…) while keeping tabs on Hollywood leads, I love creating stories of pure passion with global thrills!
Mega thanks to creative genius, Jordi Alba for his generosity with the iwallinshop giant advertising billboards … amazing!
Millions of thanks to world-class filmmaker Gerard Alba for the favor of creating my beautiful book trailers amidst his other film projects. Your generosity and talent are boundless!
Super thanks to my fantastic friends Jackie Knazan, Jonna Greenlee and Colleen Shannon for always being there with unlimited words of encouragement, inspiration and cheers! You are truly treasures!
“Ninety-nine cents.” Ellie stood outside the Burbank Media Mall showcasing a Christmas brooch in her gloved hand to shoppers rushing by.
She kept a smile plastered on her face, offsetting the desperation rising in her throat, and wiggled her foot, adjusting the cardboard patch over the hole in her boot.
It had been three weeks since she ditched Prince Charming and the ‘castle’. Had she made the right decision?
She replaced the brooch in the basket, and scooped up the coins on the bottom. Two sales on Christmas Eve; not a good sign.
The Santa Ana winds sliced through her thin coat, numbing her flesh; a gust swayed the palm trees lining the boulevard. She pulled the fur cap lower over her ears, glad she’d also worn the matching scarf.
“A dollar ninety.” Ellie counted the money in her palm and a tremor shot through her. What could she buy with the pennies in her hand? She rifled through the pockets of her coat to ensure she hadn’t missed any coins. Nope, she hadn’t.
She leaned against the street lamppost and heaved a breath. Air frosted her lips. Her heart thudded, and she fisted her fingers, the coins grating in her palm. “I can’t return to the castle…and to him.”
But she had to get home…a laugh bubbled inside her, and she bashed it down before it erupted from her in a hysterical sound that’d have people gaping at her. She dropped the coins in her purse, and with her head slightly bent against the wind; she made her way to the bus stop, but stalled in step when a Porsche pulled up alongside of her.
“Get in,” the driver commanded, his voice sending shimmers of awareness through her. “You’ll freeze waiting for the bus.”
“No.”
“Ellie, don’t be obstinate,” he said, a ripple of impatience in his voice. “I’ll give you a lift home.”
An eerie silence ensued in the lull in the wind, and the melody sailed to her from the car radio. ‘Tis the season to be jolly, fa la la la la la la…’
She nearly snorted at the lyrics. Jolly… Huh!
Peter Medeci, M.D. The highly sought after neurosurgeon, the man of her dreams. The man that had given her everything except the one thing she wanted most…and that’s why she skipped out on him. To get close to him again would be self-destructive, but even as she reasoned, her body hummed with yearning.
“I’ll make my own way.” But as soon as the words were out of her mouth, she cringed; she didn’t even have enough for the bus fare for the long ride back to her North Hollywood mouse hole.
“You will not.” She heard the car door open, and paused. “Get in, before you make a scene.”
A gust whipped her, and she quivered, glancing at the warm interior of the car. Sighing, she reluctantly got in. He reached across her to shut the door, and his arm bumped her breast. A shiver invaded her body but it had nothing to do with the cold weather. “Tha-ank you.”
He grunted his acknowledgment, revved the engine and shot into the traffic cruising onto Victory Boulevard.
Awkwardness filled the interior, but it suited her because she was in no mood to talk. But then she noticed he knew the way to her digs. “You know where I live?”
“I do.” He shot her a shadowed look, his jaw a hard line. “I’ve been keeping an eye on you, Ellie.”
She should’ve realized that Peter Medeci would not easily relinquish what belonged to him. And in his view she belonged to him. She crinkled her brow wondering why it’d taken him three weeks to force a confrontation. “I don’t doubt that.”
He smiled, and her heart involuntarily flipped in her chest.
“We have to talk, Ellie.” He slowed down on her street, which looked like an image of a third world country neighborhood.
“You want to talk now?” She suppressed the giggle gurgling in her throat. For five years, she had wanted to hear those words from him, but now she didn’t care. A niggle zapped. Okay, she didn’t want to care. “You’re too late.”
“Am I?” he asked, shooting her a penetrating glance. “I think not.”
“Just drop me at the corner, and I’ll make my own way,” she said, not even acknowledging his words.
He filled his lungs with air and blasted out a typhoon. Of course,