PENNY JORDAN has been writing for more than twenty-five years and has an outstanding record: over one hundred and sixty-five novels published, including the phenomenally successful A Perfect Family, To Love, Honour & Betray, The Perfect Sinner and Power Play, which hit the Sunday Times and New York Times bestseller lists. She says she hopes to go on writing until she has passed the two hundred markâand maybe even the two hundred and fifty mark.
Although Penny was born in Preston, Lancashire, and spent her childhood there, she moved to Cheshire as a teenager, and has continued to live there. Following the death of her husband she moved to the small traditional Cheshire market town on which she based her Crighton books.
She lives with her Birman cat Posh, who tries to assist with her writing by sitting on the newspapers and magazines Penny reads to provide her with ideas she can adapt for her fictional books.
Penny is a member and supporter of the Romantic Novelistsâ Association and the Romance Writers of Americaâtwo organisations dedicated to providing support for both published and yet-to-be published authors.
ROCCO threw down the hard hat he had been wearing whilst he showed the âsuitsâ and potential investors round the new complexâa luxury spa and holiday resort here on Sicilyâpushing an impatient hand into the thick darkness of his hair as he held the mobile to his ear and said laconically, âYou wanted me, Don Falcon?â
If his elder brother was irritated by Roccoâs mocking use of his title he didnât say so, announcing coolly instead, âWeâve found her. Here is her address in London. You know what you have to do.â
Falcon had ended the call before Rocco could say anything, leaving him to retrieve his hard hat and stride towards the Porta cabin that was currently serving as his on-site office.
A LOUD bang from a noisy exhaust somewhere in the street had Julie glancing over her shoulder and then checking automatically to see that her shabby shoulder bag was tucked in against her body. This was a down-at-heel and often unsafe neighbourhood. Only the other day she had been warned by the woman in charge of the nursery never to leave any personal documents in her flat as there had been a spate of robberies, with passports especially being targeted. As a result, she was now carrying their passports with her in her handbag.
âMs Simmonds?â
Julie gasped with shock. She had been so busy looking over her shoulder that she hadnât seen the man who was now standing in front of her, blocking her way to the entrance of the converted house where she rented a small flat.
One look at him, though, told her that this was no thief. Not with that expensive car parked right next to them, which she hadnât noticed before and which she suspected must be his.
Warily she nodded her head.
âAnd this is your child?â
Now she could feel herself tensing, hesitating, as she held on tightly to her orphaned baby nephew whilst she fought off her feeling of apprehension. Josh was her child after allânow. The icy March rain that had started when she had left the local eight-until-ten shop where she worked part-time to walk to the nursery to collect Josh had soaked through her thin coat, turning the fine silver-blonde silkiness of her hair into lank ratsâ tails whilst the cold had left her skin blue-white and bloodless, and now she was trapped here on the street with a man who was asking her questions she did not want to answer. The weight of Josh, plus his nappy bag and her handbag, were already making her thin arms ache.
âIf youâre a debt collector â¦â she began. Her voice might be thin with disdain and exhaustion, but it was fear that was making her heart thud so painfully. Josh was hers. There was no reason for her to feel that this manâthis strangerâsomehow threatened her right to call Josh her child, even if she wasnât actually Joshâs birth mother. That was what living a hand-to-mouth existence and constantly fearing the arrival of another demand for money did for you: it made you feel guilty and on edge even when you had no cause to do so.
If it was money that this man was after then he was wasting his time. Julieâs chin unconsciously lifted with the pride she knew he would believe she no longer had the right to have. There was no point in anyone sending in any more bailiffs as there was nothing left to take. Even Joshâs buggy had been claimed against her dead sisterâs debts. There was no point feeling sorry for herself or wishing that her parents had thought to make a proper will. Ultimately, as their now only surviving child, she should inherit somethingâenough, she hoped, to clear all Judyâs debts and buy a small house for herself and Josh. But according to her solicitor a final settlement of everything could be some time away, given the complications of the situation.
The fact was that her parents, her sister, Jamesâher sisterâs fiancéâand his parents had all died, along with twenty other people in the same fatal train crash. It had been such a terrible shock, and had left Julie with the task of supporting herself and her late sisterâs child whilst being hounded to pay Judyâs debts. And, of course, cope with Jamesâs death.