Smitten
Smitten
Also by
Colleen Coble
The Lonestar novels
Lonestar Sanctuary
Lonestar Secrets
Lonestar Homecoming
Lonestar Angel
The Mercy Falls series
The Lightkeeper’s Daughter
The Lightkeeper’s Bride
The Lightkeeper’s Ball
The Rock Harbor series
Without a Trace
Beyond a Doubt
Into the Deep
Cry in the Night
The Aloha Reef series
Distant Echoes
Black Sands
Dangerous Depths
Alaska Twilight
Fire Dancer
Midnight Sea
Abomination
Anathema
Also by
Kristin Billerbeck
Split Ends
The Ashley
Stockingdale Series
What a Girl Wants
She’s Out of Control
With This Ring,
I’m Confused
The Spa Girls Series
She’s All That
A Girl’s Best Friend
Calm, Cool,
and Adjusted
Also by
Diann Hunt
Bittersweet Surrender
(available as ebook only)
Be Sweet
For Better or For Worse
Hot Tropics & Cold Feet
RV There Yet?
Hot Flashes & Cold Cream
Also by
Denise Hunter
The Big Sky
Romance series
A Cowboy’s Touch
The Accidental Bride
Nantucket
Love Stories
Driftwood Lane
Seaside Letters
The Convenient Groom
Surrender Bay
Sweetwater Gap
Colleen Coble,
Kristin Billerbeck, Diann Hunt
& Denise Hunter
Smitten
Love is on the way
© 2011 by Kristin Billerbeck, Colleen Coble, Diann Hunt, and Denise Hunter
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. Thomas Nelson is a registered trademark of 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 SpecialMarkets@ThomasNelson.com.
Scripture quotations are taken from THE NEW KING JAMES VERSION. Copyright 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved; and HOLY BIBLE: NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House. All rights reserved.
Kristin Billerbeck is represented by the literary agency of Alive Communications, Inc., 7680 Goddard Street, Suite 200, Colorado Springs, CO 80920, www.alivecommunications.com.
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
Smitten / Colleen Coble.
p. cm.
ISBN 978-1-4016-8494-5 (trade paper)
1. Love stories, American. 2. Christian fiction, American. I. Coble, Colleen.
PS648.L6S54 2011
813’.08508--dc23
2011035671
Printed in the United States of America
11 12 13 14 15 QG 5 4 3 2 1
DEAR FRIENDS,
Have you ever noticed that life’s biggest blessings are often unexpected? That’s how it was with both our budding friendship and the origination of Smitten.
In the mid-1990s, God began linking us together, first Colleen and Kristin, and a year or so later, Denise. Bonded by our fledgling writing careers, we attended writing conferences, connected daily via e-mail, and eventually wrote a few romantic novella collections together. Our relationship deepened and became the kind of friendship we knew could only be a God thing.
Years later, our careers budding just as our friendship had, God brought us Diann. The lonely business of writing was lonely no more—it was a party for four! Diann frequently teased us about being “left out” of our previous novella collections, as if she were our group’s third wheel, but nothing could have been further from the truth. The fact was, we fit together like pieces of a heavenly puzzle.
Although our genres took us down slightly different paths, we were constantly connected by love and support—the kind that got us through bouts with cancer, family crises, and all the other storms that came our way.
When the opportunity arose to collaborate on a collection, we were ecstatic. Do what we loved with the people we loved? How could we turn that down? Besides, it was Diann’s dream, and we (including Thomas Nelson) couldn’t have been more eager to grant it.
Hours of brainstorming and hundreds of e-mails later, Smitten was born—a story that follows a fledgling town and four friends as each finds her true love. To make things simpler (not to mention more fun), we endowed our heroines with a healthy dose of our own personalities, so as you meet them you’ll also be meeting “us.” (We hope you’ll like us.)
In many ways, this collection is a celebration of our friendship, a celebration of enduring love, and a celebration of God’s unexpected blessings, all wrapped in one simple book. It’s our greatest hope that you, our readers, will feel a part of it all as you join us on our journey to Smitten.
Love,
Colleen, Kristin,
Diann, and Denise
CONTENTS
Natalie: Birthday Wishes
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
Julia: Small Town, Big Dreams
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
EPILOGUE
Shelby: You’ve Got a Friend
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
Reese: All Along
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
READING GROUP GUIDE
SMITTEN WITH FRIENDSHIP
RECIPES FROM NATALIE
REESE’S TIPS TO MOTIVATE YOURSELF TO EXERCISE
JULIA’S CRANBERRY EXFOLIATING MASK
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Natalie: Birthday Wishes
&nb
sp; Colleen Coble
CHAPTER ONE
Natalie Mansfield’s heart swelled as she stood on the perimeter of the town square and watched her niece and the other children decorate the town for Easter. A gigantic smile stretched across five-year-old Mia’s face as her Sunday school teacher lifted her to place the lavender wreath at the top of the clock.
Mia saw her and waved. “Aunt Nat, look at me!”
Natalie waved back, her smile broadening. “She’s growing so fast,” she told her great-aunt, Rose Garner. “I love her so much.”
Black threaded Rose’s silver hair, and her smooth skin made her look twenty years younger than her seventy-eight years. “I still remember the first day I laid eyes on you.”
“How could you forget? I was a morose ten-year-old who snapped your head off every time you spoke to me.”
Her aunt pressed her hand. “You changed our lives, honey. Now here you are providing a home for your niece. A full circle, just like that wreath. I’m so proud of you.”
Her aunt’s words made Natalie’s heart fill to bursting. Being part of their family, along with her four cousins, had healed her heart. “You gave me the only stability I’d ever known. I want to do the same for Mia.”
Aunt Rose wasn’t listening. A small frown creased her brow. “Something’s wrong.”
Natalie looked at the men standing a few feet away in front of the hardware store. Their heads were down and their shoulders slumped. The dejection in their stances sent her pulse racing.
She recognized one of her coffee shop patrons, Murphy Clinton, and grabbed his arm as he walked past. “What’s happened, Murphy?” she asked.
He stopped and stared down at her with a grave expression. “The mill’s closing.”
“That’s not possible,” she mumbled. Her thoughts raced. The mill was an institution and the main employer in Smitten. If it closed . . .
He finished her thought. “This town is finished.”
The aroma of the freshly brewed coffee overpowered the less appetizing smell from the drum roaster in the back room. Natalie let her cousin Zoe handle the customers at the bar, as Natalie took the hot beverages to the seating area by the window where she and her friends could see white-topped Sugarcreek Mountain. Spring had come to their part of Vermont, and the sight of the wildflowers on the lower slopes would give her strength.
“So what are we going to do?” she asked, sinking onto the overstuffed leather sofa beside Reese Mackenzie.
“Do? What can w e do?” R eese a sked. Her blond ponytail gleamed in the shaft of sunlight through the window. She was the practical one in the group. Reese was never afraid of hard work, but while Natalie saw only the end goal, Reese saw the pitfalls right on the path. “We can’t make them keep the mill open.”
While rumors about the mill had been floating for months, no one had really believed it would fold. The ramifications would be enormous. Natalie’s business had been struggling enough without this added blow.
She took a sip of her mocha java. A little bitter. She’d have to tweak the roast a bit next time. “If the mill closes, the town will dry up and blow away. We can’t let that happen.” If Mountain Perks closed, she didn’t know how she would provide for Mia.
And she wasn’t leaving Smitten. Not ever. After being yanked from pillar to post with an alcoholic mother until she was ten, Natalie craved the stability she had found here with her great-aunts and extended family which included her three best friends.
Julia Bourne tossed her long hair away from her face, revealing flawless skin that never needed makeup. “This is one of those things outside your control, Nat. I guess we’d all better be looking for jobs in Stowe.”
Shelby Evans took a sip of her tea and shivered. Her Shih-poo, Penelope, dressed in a fashionable blue-and-white polka-dotted shirt, turned around in Shelby’s lap and lay down on her navy slacks. “I don’t know about you all,” Shelby said, “but I wanted my kids to grow up here.”
The women had no children of their own—and none of them was even close to thinking about settling down—but that was a moot point for Shelby. She had a storybook ending in mind that included a loving husband and two-point-five children for each of them. Natalie was sure her friend would find that life too.
Natalie moved restlessly. “There has to be something we can do. Some new export. Maple syrup, maybe? We have lots of trees.” She glanced at Julia. “What about your New York friends? Maybe you could ask some of your business friends for advice.”
Julia shrugged her slim shoulders. “They know spas. I hardly think a spa is going to save us.”
Reese had those thoughtful lines on her forehead. A tiny smile hovered on her full lips, and her hazel eyes showed a plan was forming. “We don’t have time for exports, but what about imports? Tourists would love us if they’d come visit. We have heart.” She took out her ever-present notebook and pen and began to jot down ideas.
“They come to ski in Stowe anyway,” Shelby said. “All we have to do is get them here.”
Natalie rubbed her forehead where it had begun to ache. “But what do we have to offer that’s different from any other town?”
Julia crossed her shapely ankles. “Smitten is cute with its church and all, but cute doesn’t bring tourists. I can’t even get a decent manicure in this dinky town. People aren’t going to pay for ambience. We need some kind of gimmick.”
Reese tapped her pen against her chin. “I have an idea,” she said. “Everyone jokes about the town name. Why not capitalize on it?”
“How do you capitalize on a name like Smitten?”
“What does Smitten make you think of?” Reese asked. “Love, right? What if we turn the town into a place for honeymooners?”
Shelby adjusted the bow on Penelope’s head. “I went to Santa Claus, Indiana, once. Tons of people, even in July.”
Natalie swallowed a groan. They’d all heard about Santa Claus too many times to count. She needed to derail Shelby before she broke into a rendition of “Jingle Bells.” “We could have love songs playing as people strolled the streets.”
Julia snickered and nodded toward the man striding past outside the window. “I have a feeling Carson would have something to say about that. He hated all the jokes about his name in high school.”
Natalie followed the angle of Julia’s nod. Her gut clenched the way it always did when she saw Carson Smitten. He was a man who attracted female attention wherever he went. He looked like his lumberjack great-grandfather, with his broad shoulders and closely cropped dark hair.
He had all the single women in town drooling over him. Except for Natalie, of course. If the other girls knew what she knew about him, they wouldn’t think he was so great.
“I’m still thinking about my idea,” Reese said. “This will mean new businesses, new jobs, lots of revenue pouring in. We’d have to get the entire town on board.”
Natalie’s excitement level went up a notch as she imagined the town transformed with its new mission. “The town meeting is coming up. I can present the idea there.”
“It’s a good thing you’re a selectperson,” Shelby said. “People listen to you.”
Natalie dug paper and a pen from her purse, a Brighton that Julia had given her for her last birthday. “There needs to be a cohesive plan. What would this love town look like? Besides romantic songs playing over speakers around town.” She peered at Reese’s list and copied down the items.
Shelby retied Penelope’s bow. “We need a lingerie shop that sells perfume,” she said. “Fudge. Some plush hotels and bed-and-breakfasts with tubs for two.” Her smile grew larger. “Maybe old-fashioned lampposts along the path around the lake. You could put outside tables on the street and white lights in the trees. Flower boxes all around town.”
“And we’ll need more restaurants,” Julia added.
Natalie eyed her. “You said a good manicure was impossible to find. What if you started a spa?”
Julia’s perfectly plucked brows lifted. She gra
bbed the tablet and pen from Natalie. “I don’t know. I’d like to move back to New York eventually.”
“The honeymooners won’t spend all their time in their rooms,” Reese said, her eyes gleaming. “We offer great outdoor activities. The skiing here is as good as anywhere in the country. People just don’t know about us.” She gestured toward the mountain. “And look at that view.”
Natalie groaned. “The last thing I’d want to do on my honeymoon is go skiing. I’d rather sit holding hands across a linen tablecloth with a lobster in front of me.”
“But I’d go skiing in a heartbeat,” Reese said. “Our big draw is our outdoor beauty. We don’t have an outfitters shop. We’d need that.” She jotted it down on her paper. “You know how I’ve been saving for a shop like that for years. Maybe now is the time.”
“Now is the time,” Natalie said. “Sometimes you have to take a leap of faith. We’re going to push you until you do it.”
“I love it!” Shelby stood and paced by the window. “Maybe my etiquette school can be part of it too. I can coach women on how to put on the best parties and cater to the society women who come to town. Maybe teach ballroom dancing.”
“And your designs,” Natalie said, unable to keep her voice from rising. “Those cute outfits you make for Penelope would sell like hotcakes.” She glanced at the picture of herself with Mia hanging on the wall. “I have to do what I can to save the town. I want Mia to have the security I’ve never had. A-And I’ve been thinking. I want to be Mia’s real mother. I’m going to see about adopting her.”
Her announcement left her friends with mouths gaping. She glanced at Shelby, whose soft heart she knew would be the first to agree with her.
Shelby’s dark eyes glistened. “Oh, Nat, that’s just like you! You have so much love to give. Mia’s a very lucky girl.”