Prints Charming Read online

  PRINTS CHARMING

  rebeca seitz

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  Copyright © 2007 by Rebeca Seitz.

  All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, scanning, or other—except for brief quotations in critical reviews or articles, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

  Published in Nashville, Tennessee, by Thomas Nelson, Inc.

  Thomas Nelson, Inc. books may be purchased in bulk for educational, business, fund-raising, or sales promotional use. For information, please e-mail [email protected].

  Publisher’s Note: This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. All characters are fictional, and any similarity to people living or dead is purely coincidental.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Seitz, Rebeca, 1977-

  Prints charming / Rebeca Seitz.

  p. cm. -- (Sisters, ink ; book one)

  ISBN-13: 978-1-59554-271-7 (pbk.)

  ISBN-10: 1-59554-271-X (pbk.)

  1. Scrapbooks--Fiction. I. Title.

  PS3619.E427P75 2007

  813'.6--dc22

  2006038739

  Printed in the United States of America

  07 08 09 10 RRD 6 5 4 3 2 1

  For my precious Charlie.

  Thank you for loving this

  broken woman. I love you.

  Contents

  prologue 1

  prologue 2

  chapter 1

  chapter 2

  chapter 3

  chapter 4

  chapter 5

  chapter 6

  chapter 7

  chapter 8

  chapter 9

  chapter 10

  chapter 11

  chapter 12

  chapter 13

  chapter 14

  chapter 15

  chapter 16

  chapter 17

  chapter 18

  chapter 19

  chapter 20

  chapter 21

  chapter 22

  chapter 23

  chapter 24

  chapter 25

  chapter 26

  chapter 27

  acknowledgments

  reading group guide

  tips & tricks

  prologue 1

  “I’m telling you, Jane, this dog don’t hunt.”

  “Keep your voice down, Lydia,” Jane hissed, watching Lydia tuck a stray brown curl back into the wreath of baby’s breath in her hair. “They’ll hear you and wonder why I’m sitting in here listening to the one woman who’s supposed to support me wholeheartedly on my wedding day, spouting country wisdom and down-home clichés like they’re going out of style. Which they are.” The big white train of her wedding dress swished around the floor in time to her nervous pacing on the baby blue carpet in the bride chamber of Grace Church. Satin white shoes with pearl-encrusted heels that had felt so perfect in the store now pinched her toes. Not that any shoe in the world would be comfortable after hours in front of a wedding photographer’s lens, running back and forth behind trees to hide every time Bill came into view.

  “Look, missy”—Lydia wagged a finger at Jane, other hand on her hip—“you can make all the excuses you want for him, but I know what I saw, and I saw him in the parking lot of Cadillac’s with Lacy Champeign just last night.” Lydia’s righteous indignation made her seem taller than her five-foot-two frame.

  “It was a bachelor party.” Jane looked to the door and lowered her voice. “I’m sure he did a lot of things I wouldn’t approve of and I don’t want to know about. That’s what bachelor parties are for.” She glanced in the mirror, grateful that every black hair was in place beneath the tiara. Her hair, at least, was performing as expected.

  Lydia sniffed and turned her brown eyes to the window overlooking a parking lot crowded with cars. “Character is what we do when we think no one is watching.”

  “Cute one. Dr. Phil?”

  Lydia turned back to Jane, fire in her eyes. “Don’t you make fun of me, Jane Goodwin. I might use other people’s words every now and then, but that’s because they’re truth. Bill Sandburg is a cheater, pure and simple. He doesn’t have character, and you shouldn’t be marrying him, I don’t care what people say.”

  The door cracked open and a face caked with powder and rouge peeked around the corner. “Two minutes, Jane.” The wedding coordinator tapped her clipboard. Her eyebrow arched at the stormy look on Lydia’s face. “You gals need anything?”

  “Yeah, a lobotomy,” Lydia said under her breath, and Jane cut her eyes to her best friend since grade school.

  “Nothing, Madge. Thanks.” Madge nodded and shut the door. Lydia walked over to Jane, reaching her hands up to Jane’s shoulders.

  “Look, I know this is your wedding day, and I know I’m supposed to be supportive. This day is all about you. That’s what every magazine says, and I believe it. But you’re making a mistake here. This man is not faithful. He’s not loyal. I saw it with my own two eyes.”

  Jane looked out the window, debating. It seemed as if every single person in the Brentwood area had turned out for this wedding. Her clients, present and former, were out there. Bill’s parents, their friends from college—heck, from high school. This was the wedding everyone knew would eventually happen. Months had been spent planning and preparing, right down to the shade of pale gold for the ribbons on each pew. Hours of cake tasting, band auditioning, and vow choosing were behind her. The finish line was within sight. She would not be the one to let down every beautifully dressed person sitting in that sanctuary, expecting to see a wedding over a decade in the making.

  Lydia’s hands fell away as Jane shook her shoulders a bit. “Lydia, thanks for your concern, but I’m going out there in two minutes and becoming Mrs. Bill Sandburg,” just like this entire community has expected since we were in junior high, “and if you do or say anything to ruin this wedding, so help me, I will never speak to you again.”

  The door cracked open again. “Jane, it’s time.” Madge looked from Jane to Lydia and back again. “Or I can stall if you need me to.”

  “No need, Madge.” Jane picked up her skirts and stepped to the door. “We were just coming out.” She tilted her chin up and squared her shoulders. Bill and she would be fine together, had been fine together for years. Through Brentwood Academy and Vanderbilt University, they’d been the only ones to stick together through it all. She wasn’t dumb in choosing a mate. Bill loved her with a quiet friendship that shouldn’t be taken for granted. So what if he had a little fling at a bachelor party? That was the whole point of them. Lydia was probably blowing it way out of proportion anyway, since Jane was pretty sure Bill didn’t have a passionate bone in his body. He just wasn’t that kind of man. Solid, steady, dependable, yes. Passionate? No. Not once in all her years of knowing him.

  She stood before the large oak doors, staring at the blue carpet, noting a footprint stain just to the right of the entrance. Why hadn’t someone cleaned that stain? Only then did she realize Lydia was not in front of her, where she belonged as the matron of honor.

  “Lydia?” She turned just in time to catch the bouncing brown ringlets as her best friend of forever ran from the church. The sounds of “Canon in D” by Pachelbel, an opening cue it h
ad taken Jane three months to decide on, floated through the crack above the sanctuary doors.

  prologue 2

  TWO YEARS LATER

  Coke fizzed in its glass as Jane settled herself in front of the computer. The caffeine would keep her up for at least three hours, plenty of time to finish up this publicity and fund-raiser proposal and e-mail it off to Sonya. Jane smiled at the memory of Nashville’s larger-than-life socialite. A diehard shopper and president of Nashville’s most prestigious nonprofit, many people regarded Sonya as a force to be reckoned with. Her firm raised millions each year, doling it out to various charities in town. Jane knew the heart behind the name brands, though, and was grateful such a formidable woman stood in the gap for those less fortunate.

  “Though they won’t ever be more fortunate if I don’t get this crazy proposal done,” she mumbled. Sometimes owning her own publicity firm was more work than she’d bargained for. But working from home had its perks. Putting fingers to keys, the first words were just flying onto the screen when a message box popped up. Jane sighed and snatched the mouse, x-ing out of the box. “Stupid pop-ups.”

  She typed a few more words, and another box popped up. Again, she x-ed out of it and went back to the proposal.

  One minute later, the box popped up again, and Jane decided to see what product would endure her wrath from this point forward to eternity. It looked like an instant-messaging box.

  Hey, hot thang. You’re up late.

  Ugh, some crazy cyberman had found her IM address. Dateline would love this guy. She x-ed out of the box and reread her last line of the proposal. The IM ding sounded, and another box popped up.

  You there? Is the Boring One around?

  Jane chuckled. This guy must know Bill. She thought about responding, her fingers hovering over the keys for a few brief seconds, but images from the Dateline online predators episode flashed through her mind, and once again she x-ed out of the box.

  When ten minutes passed without another ding, she sighed. Patience is a virtue. She winced as the cliché reminded her of Lydia. Two years was a long time without a best friend.

  The ding made her jump.

  Hey. I’m signing off. Is Jane around,

  or can you call me?

  Jane read the message, chills coursing down her spine as she read her own name on the screen. Confusion raced through her brain. Her fingers flew to the keyboard before she could command them not to.

  Jane’s not here.

  What do you want to talk about?

  Her cursor blinked as the little window told her “Secrt1” was typing. What was she doing?

  You know. Tomorrow . . .

  Bill had told her about the golf game he was playing in the morning with some of his old frat buddies. Why would this guy need to make sure she was gone to talk to Bill?

  What about tomorrow?

  Just making sure you can still come out to play.

  Why wouldn’t I?

  So you told her?

  Jane sat back from the screen, staring at a cursor that she was certain held secrets best left untold. This guy and Bill obviously shared a mystery she wasn’t privy to. Not a big deal. Happened all the time in marriage. The twinge in her stomach forced her fingers back to the keys.

  Told her what?

  Bill! Don’t you play me. Did you tell her

  you were leaving or not? I’m not meeting

  you if you’re still a married man.

  Her mind noted a searing pain in the general vicinity of her heart, but wouldn’t admit the niggling of truth begging to surface.

  Leaving? Why would I be leaving?

  Seconds crawled by while the cursor blinked and bubbles fizzed in her glass. Had it only been minutes since she poured her caffeine kick?

  LOL. You’re so funny. I’ll see you tomorrow.

  Can’t wait to get you off this screen and into

  my bedroom. Hugs and kisses flying your

  way, and a whole lot more when you

  get here. Call me when you can.

  xxxxxoooooo

  Jane stared at the screen, unwilling to accept what her mind was beginning to say. Her Bill was not having an affair. He couldn’t be. Memories of Lydia pleading with her in the bride room at Grace Church flitted past her mind’s eye. No. Jane shook her head, tiny stars of light beginning to flash, harbingers of the migraine to come.

  Her hands pushed away from the desk, legs extending, feet walking. A rush of blood pounded through her ears, making it seem as if she was walking under water down the hallway to her bedroom, their bedroom.

  Bill lay beneath the covers, his blue striped pajama top buttoned all the way up, just as it had been every night of their two-year marriage. She walked to the bed, looking down at this, her husband. Years of friendship shared, more of her life spent with him than not. He could not be cheating.

  Her fingers massaged the temple pulsing with blood as she willed the headache away, refusing a reality that was not possible inside the Norman Rockwell painting that was her life. What would their friends think? Did they know already? Was Scrt1 a friend of theirs?

  She stepped away and pulled her gown from the poster of the bed. Dropping her clothes, she paused a moment, willing Bill to wake up and find her naked. If he took her in his arms, it would mean this wasn’t real.

  Bill’s steady breath kept on, wounding her with its rhythm.

  The gown was soft as she pulled it on, a stark contrast to the shards of glass falling through her insides. Gingerly, scared now he would awaken, she crept into the bed. This was all a nightmare. In the morning, they would laugh about it over breakfast.

  She counted the seconds, then minutes, as the vise around her head tightened. What if he was leaving her? What would she do? Who would she be? For almost as long as she’d been alive, her identity was being Bill Sandburg’s girl. Could she be anything but?

  Can a pope pray? Lydia’s voice sounded in her head, the old wisecrack sounding just as if she sat beside her in the bed. Jane’s heart twisted further. Her best friend had walked out of her life, abandoning their friendship the day Jane married Bill. Or was it me who did the abandoning?

  Jane thought for one second more, then slid out of bed. Enough wasted moments already. A woman couldn’t be a woman without her girlfriends. And there was one woman in the world who would get Jane through this.

  She padded down the hall to the kitchen phone. Pressing buttons, praying Lydia wouldn’t hang up on her.

  “Hello?” The voice she hadn’t heard in two years unleashed a torrent of tears.

  “Lydia?”

  chapter 1

  ONE YEAR LATER

  Jane’s tires screeched as she flew around a curve on Bluff Road.

  “Girl, where are you?” The excitement in Lydia’s voice came through loud and clear, and Jane pushed her foot down a bit harder on the accelerator.

  “I’m coming, I’m coming.” She kept one hand on the steering wheel while frantically sifting through the things in the passenger seat of her Blazer. There was a brush somewhere, she just knew it, but finding anything at seven in the morning after pulling an all-nighter was difficult at best. Exhaustion picked at her brain, but she took it for the victory it was. Her all-nighter had resulted (finally!) in a completed logo for Sisters, Ink. Bleary eyes gave testament to the long hours she’d put into creating the official representation of their scrapbooking group. A box of stationery rested in the passenger floorboard amid granola bar wrappers, a beautiful Sisters, Ink logo centered at the top. Four smaller boxes held their new business cards, printed on her laser printer at three a.m. The skeleton of their web site was even up and running, though none of the Sisters knew about it or the business idea she’d been brewing for weeks.

  “Do I need to grab anything for you? This stuff is going fast. There are barely any of the foam alphabet sets left.”

  “Shoot, Lydia, I barely even know what I need. I’ll be there in about two minutes.” Jane lunged again, still searching for the brush
while trying not to drop the cell phone from her shoulder.

  “Okay, but don’t let the grass grow under your tires. I’ll be over in the baby girl section. I need to find something for Olivia’s first bath pages and get ribbon for Mac. What’s this big secret you have anyway?”

  “I told you I’m not saying a word until we all get to Mac’s. Be there in a flash.” Jane snapped the phone together and slammed to a stop at the red light. Turning her attention to her still-searching hand, she finally found the elusive hairbrush and grabbed it. A blaring horn sounded, and she realized the green arrow had finally appeared. This business idea had monopolized her mind for weeks. And she had Bill to thank for it, in a way. Without him, she’d never have learned the value of girlfriends.

  Jane pushed thoughts of her ex-husband out of her mind. Tires squealing again, she tore into the parking lot of The Savvy Scrapper. Tossing the hairbrush back into the passenger seat, she threw the car into Park, grabbed her purse, and flung open the door.

  “Ouch!”

  Jane looked up just as her door collided with the midsection of one very tall man.

  “Omigosh. I am so, so sorry. I’m just in a rush. The sale is happening, and I’m late and—”

  “It’s okay.” Mr. Tall held his hands up as if to ward off any other car doors she might be hiding somewhere, and she noticed the coffee cup in one hand and bagel bag in the other. Bagels would be so heavenly right now. “I’m fine, really.” He set the bag down on the ground and brushed the dust off of his olive green sweater, then looked at her. “I know how women can be when there’s a sale involved.” He grinned as he knelt to pick the bag back up.

  She tried hard to ignore his sexist statement and not remind him of how many guys camp out at golf stores before a sale or sleep in the parking lot to get tickets to a concert.

  “Are you sure you’re okay? I mean, I have insurance, and we can call somebody.” Jane shoved her hair behind her ears, willing herself to focus on the problem at hand rather than the sale happening about ten yards away or the way her stomach was now grumbling for coffee and a bagel.