Navy Officer to Family Man
Emily Forbes
Table of Contents
About the Author
EMILY FORBES began her writing lire as a partnersnip between two sisters who are both passionate bibliophiles. As a team Emily had ten books published, and one of her proudest moments was when her tenth book was nominated for the 2010 Australian Romantic Book of the Year Award.
While Emily’s love of writing remains as strong as ever, the demands of life with young families has recently made it difficult to work on stories together—but rather than give up her dream Emily now writes solo. The challenges may be different, but the reward of having a book published is still as sweet as ever.
Whether as a team or as an individual, Emily hopes to keep bringing stories to her readers. Her inspiration comes from everywhere: stories she hears while travelling, at mothers’ lunches, in the media, and in her other career as a physiotherapist all get embellished with a large dose of imagination until they develop a life of their own.
If you would like to get in touch with Emily you can e-mail her at [email protected], and she can also be found blogging at the Harlequin Medical™ Romance blog—www.eharlequin.com
Dear Reader
This book is my fourth linked tale—I seem to be developing a habit! You might recognise my heroine Juliet from my last book, DR DROP-DEAD GORGEOUS. She was the heroine’s sister, but she was having her own interesting experiences and was demanding that I tell her story too. I have never started a book knowing it’s going to be the first in a series, but somewhere along the way my secondary characters develop to a point where I can’t abandon them. So it was with Juliet.
She has had a rough eighteen months. A divorce, surgery and chemotherapy have taken their toll on her, and now she’s a single mother to two young children and about to undergo more surgery. Juliet would love to turn the clock back a few years—wouldn’t all thirty-something women?——but she knows that’s impossible, and she’s just hoping for a brighter future. I wanted Juliet to have that bright future, I wanted her to be happy, but the trouble was I’d already divorced her from the love of her life. Could I help her to find love a second time, or had her luck expired? Answering that question became my goal.
Juliet and Maggie are the second pair of sisters I’ve written about. That is no surprise to me, because I am lucky enough to share a close bond with all my siblings, including two sisters, and I enjoy giving life to characters who share that same relationship. It’s a fabulous thing to have a person in your life who loves you unconditionally, and I hope that everyone reading this has someone—be it a sister, friend, daughter, cousin or mother—you know will catch you if you fall or will let you catch them. This story is for all the women of the world.
Best wishes
Emily
This book is dedicated to two women without whom this book would still be just an idea in my head. Belinda, my sister, and my editor Lucy
CHAPTER ONE
JULIET entered the courthouse, passing through the security screening area and into the foyer. Her unfamiliar heels clicked on the marble floor, echoing in the space, as she strode towards the notice-board on the opposite side of the atrium. She rarely wore heels any more, not since she’d given up a career in law for a career as a university lecturer, but she knew adopting a power-dressing approach would give her some much-needed confidence today. She’d deliberately chosen one of her old suits—she’d barely worn it and hoped it still passed inspection?and she’d teamed it with the confidence-boosting heels. At five feet two inches she needed all the help she could get in the height department and a couple of extra inches immediately improved her self-assurance.
She checked the list of the day’s cases pinned to the board, looking for her name and case number. She found it, about a third of the way down. Today she was nobody special, just another number. She headed for courtroom number three, making her way towards the waiting area.
The waiting annexe was sombre, dull and outdated, depressing. Gone was the imposing decor of the entrance foyer, the marble floor and chandeliers giving way to stained carpets, fake wood wall-panelling and a mismatched collection of chairs, some plastic, some scratched timber and some with faded upholstery. She wasn’t inclined to sit down.
Juliet knew she was being ridiculous with her silent criticism; the dull room was perfectly suited to her mood, but she wasn’t used to feeling depressed and she wanted the room to lift her spirits, not contribute to the feeling of finality. She wanted the room to instil in her a sense that she was doing the right thing but all it was doing was making her feel worse. It exacerbated her loneliness and increased her sorrow.
But there was no turning back, despite her sister’s parting words as she’d dropped her off at the courthouse earlier. Juliet had come this far and she wasn’t changing her mind now. There had been times where she could have backed down, where she could have stopped this day from coming, but not now. Not any more. The decision had been made.
Juliet had always been stubborn and that hadn’t changed. She sighed and chose a seat on the right-hand side of the room. While she sat waiting for her case number to be called she looked at the other people scattered around the room. Mostly they looked tired and worn out and their demeanour did nothing for her mood either. All of them were in everyday clothing, none of them had bothered to smarten up their attire, and the contrast between their outfits and hers flattened her confidence a little.
The weak winter sunlight struggled to penetrate the grimy windows, the glass surfaces were smeared