A Miracle on Hope Street: The most heartwarming Christmas romance of 2018!
Remember the true meaning of Christmas with this heartfelt and beautiful novel from bestselling author Emma Heatherington.Can a single act of kindness change a life forever?To many people, Ruth Ryans has everything: the perfect job, a beautiful home and a loving family. But as Christmas approaches, Ruth feels lonelier than ever.Then Ruth meets Michael. A man who she showed kindness to during his darkest moment. That one single act, his miracle, helped change his life forever.Ruth decides to make this Christmas the most perfect one ever, opening up her home to those who need her help – the lonely, the lost and the ignored.Actions speak louder than words and Ruth Ryans’ kindness will create little miracles for everyone … including her own battered heart. Readers love this magical book:‘This heartwarming and emotional story highlights the magic of reaching out to those who otherwise would be alone’ Stacy is Reading‘I utterly adore this book…one of the most inspirational stories I've read’ Kate‘A warm read that will make you think and smile’ Kathleen
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Emma Heatherington is from Donaghmore, Co Tyrone, where she lives with her children Jordyn, Jade, Dualta, Adam and baby Sonny James. She has penned more than thirty short films, plays and musicals as well as seven novels, two of which were written under the pseudonym Emma Louise Jordan.
Emma’s novel, The Legacy of Lucy Harte, was an eBook bestseller in both the UK and US.
Emma loves spending time with her partner (the talented artist and singer/songwriter Jim McKee), all things Nashville, romantic comedy movies, singalong nights with friends and family, red wine, musical theatre, new pyjamas, fresh clean bedclothes, long bubble baths and cosy nights in by the fire.
For my daddy Hugh McCrory, probably the best daddy in the world
Table of Contents
HarperImpulse
an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd
1 London Bridge Street
London SE1 9GF
First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2018
Copyright © Emma Heatherington 2018
Cover illustrations © Shutterstock.com
Cover design by Ellie Game © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2018
Emma Heatherington asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.
Source ISBN: 9780008314989
Ebook Edition © November 2018 ISBN: 9780007568840
Version: 2018-11-06
A simple act of kindness
Can sometimes change the world
Ruth
Eight Days before Christmas – One Year Ago
‘I bet it was the husband. It’s always the husband in the end, isn’t it, Dad?’
My father looks like he’s actually considering my analysis of the TV detective show from his bedside armchair, and even though in the blank stillness of his mind he’s more than a million miles away, I know he’s still in there somewhere.
I just don’t know where.
I reach across and squeeze his hand, taking in the smell of his musky new aftershave, an early Christmas gift from his buddy Mabel who lives just down the corridor in Room 303. He gives me a vacant but twinkly-eyed smile in return.
‘I know, I know, you men aren’t all bad,’ I joke and my heart skips a beat as I look into his eyes and see for the first time in ages a glimmer of his darling personality that used to shine so brightly before this dreaded illness squeezed the life from inside him.
There are rare little times when I see a moment like this, a memory, a time when he is really my father again. I might hear it in his laughter or catch a knowing smile or feel it in the grasp of a hug or see it in the look in his eye, but such moments are becoming fewer and fewer, so I cling to them and savour them when they do surface.
Mostly now, it’s just me watching him go into an adult-like shell in a childhood like state, day by day, hour by hour, minute by minute and it’s killing me to see him slowly disappear from the inside out.
‘It’s about time you found a partner of your own,’I imagine him saying to me like he used to when I worried about him after he had the stroke that started all this sickness. ‘And never mind all this looking out for me, you hear? You’re a special girl, Ruth. Find a good man; a good life partner. Find someone to look out for you for a change.’
‘I know what you’re thinking,’ I whisper, pretending to have that very conversation with him right now, ‘but I don’t need anyone, so don’t you worry, Dad. I have you and Ally, not to mention her gorgeous boys, Owen and Ben. And you can’t stop me from looking out for you. It’s kind of what I do best these days.’
I can pretend all I want that I am having a proper conversation with him, but I know by the silence and the glaze in his eyes that he’s in his own very simple, hazy world; a world of mixed-up noise and colourful shapes bouncing from the television screen that flashes in this darkened room. I lift the bottle of new aftershave from his tight clutch, put the wrapping paper in the bin and then settle back into my own chair to savour every moment of this precious time with him.
