Surprised by Love (The Heart of San Francisco Book #3)

Julie Lessman

Description

Shy and unattractive as a child, Megan McClare has always been teased by her classmates. But when she returns home from her senior year in Paris, the wallflower has suddenly blossomed into a beauty. With ambitions to become a lawyer or doctor, Megan accepts an internship at the district attorney's office only to discover that she will be working with Devin Caldwell, a boy who mercilessly mocked her at school--and with whom she was hopelessly enamored. She turns to her dear friend Bram Hughes for support and advice. But Bram's vision is clouded by his sudden unwelcome attraction to a girl he had always thought of as a kid sister. He advises forgiveness, but can he forgive himself for pushing the woman he loves into the arms of another man?Fan favorite Julie Lessman draws a romantic triangle that will have readers in a tizzy in this glittering Gilded Age tale of transforming love.

Sujets

• Historical fiction

Informations

• Publié par: Baker Publishing Group
• Date de parution: 14 octobre 2014
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781441219534
• Langue: English

Extrait

© 2014 by Julie Lessman
Published by Revell
a division of Baker Publishing Group
P.O. Box 6287, Grand Rapids, MI 49516-6287
www . revellbooks .com
Ebook edition created 2014
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—for example, electronic, photocopy, recording—without the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the Library of Congress, Washington, DC.
ISBN 978-1-4412-1953-4
Most Scripture used in this book, whether quoted or paraphrased by the characters, is taken from the King James Version of the Bible.
Scripture quotation on page 222 is from the Holy Bible, New International Version®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan. com
Scripture quotations marked Message are from The Message by Eugene H. Peterson, copyright © 1993, 1994, 1995, 2000, 2001, 2002. Used by permission of NavPress Publishing Group. All rights reserved.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, osr persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
To my precious reader friends—whose relentless support and encouragement have kept me going through two fictional families and eleven books—when I count my blessings in writing for Him, YOU are at the very top of the list.
I love and appreciate you more than I can say, and we all know from the length of my books . . . that’s A LOT!
Surprise us with love at daybreak;
then we’ll skip and dance all the day long. . . .
And let the loveliness of our Lord, our God, rest on us,
confirming the work that we do.
—Psalm 90:14–17 Message (emphasis added)
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Epigraph
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Books by Julie Lessman
Back Ads
Back Cover
1
S AN F RANCISCO , J UNE 1904
I hope you’ re hungry, Mr. Caldwell, because I’m serving up crow. The very thought steamed eighteen-year-old Megan McClare’s cheeks as scarlet as her sister Alli’s dress while the two stood before the gilded vanity mirror of Meg’s bedroom. She chewed on the edge of her lip, mortified such a brazen thought had popped in her head. Even if Devin Caldwell—the most popular boy in school, who’d once called her “four eyes” and “fatso”— did deserve it, she thought with a sigh.
“Now, there’s a thought that’s up to no good,” her sister said with a mischievous grin. Alli’s green eyes twinkled while she looped an arm to Meg’s tiny waist. “Are you wondering what Bram’s going to say when he sees you,” she said with a chuckle, “or just afraid he’ll faint dead out?”
More color toasted Meg’s cheeks at the mention of the best friend who’d been there for her through thick and thin. She released a wispy sigh. Thick before Paris, thin after . Palms damp, she reflected on her senior year in Paris with the Rousseaus, never dreaming one year would change her so much. She smoothed the gold silk waist of her Paul Poiret evening gown—a goodbye gift from Mrs. Rousseau, who just happened to be dear friends with the up-and-coming Paris designer that took Meg under his wing.
She swallowed hard, pulse picking up at the thought of seeing Bram again—the one man who didn’t scare her silly and the only male she trusted outside her family. “Bram, yes,” she said with a timid look, peeking up at her sister with a shy smile, “but the one I’d really like to see faint dead out is Devin Caldwell.” She nibbled on her pinkie, almost ashamed to put voice to her feelings. “Flat on his handsome face, maybe with a crow feather in his teeth?” She slapped a hand to her mouth, green eyes expanding wide and no longer obscured by glasses. “Oh, Al—am I awful?” she whispered.
“Yes,” Alli said with a thrust of her chin, dispensing a tight hug. Her low laughter tickled Meg’s ear. “ Awfully gorgeous! Can’t wait to hear about that little brat’s reaction after all the years he’s picked on you.” Her sister wiggled her brows in the mirror. “A little salt with that crow, Mr. Caldwell?”
Heart racing, Megan pressed a shaky hand to her stomach, wondering if it was even possible the boy who’d hated and humiliated her since the first grade would actually think she was pretty now. Boys in Paris certainly had, if the last six months were any indication—although she hadn’t put much stock in their compliments.
Devin Caldwell cured me of that.
Singlehandedly, the boy on whom she’d once had a crush taught her the danger of trusting in a handsome face and a teasing smile. Not unless it belonged to Abraham Joseph Hughes, the one man who’d made a shy and awkward little girl feel beautiful despite baby fat and glasses. She drew in a deep breath while her pulse slowed to a peaceful rhythm, relishing the calming effect Bram always had on her life. Without question, he was her champion, her defender, her very best friend.
And maybe the one beau I can trust with my heart?
Her cheeks flashed hot again, clashing with the color of her upswept hair—now the same deep russet as her mother’s rather than her own mousy carrot red, compliments of henna. Brooking no arguments, Mr. Poiret insisted on “setting her hair aflame” with the gentle hair dye that gave her rich color and shine. Leaning in, she studied white, perfectly straight teeth, void of the revolutionary braces applied over three years ago by Uncle Logan’s dentist friend. And thanks to Mr. Poiret, those unsightly freckles were nowhere to be seen, hidden beneath rice powder dusted with just a hint of rouge on her cheeks and lips.
“Goodness, you look absolutely breathtaking, Megs! How do your eyes feel?” Alli asked, as thrilled as Meg that the unsightly glasses were no longer part of her wardrobe except for reading in bed at night. Megan had been shocked when Mrs. Rousseau sent her to Germany to be fitted with a new invention called contacts . Apparently the inventor, ophthalmologist Adolf Gaston Fick, was an old medical school chum of her husband’s. Although Meg couldn’t wear them longer than several hours at a time, she adapted quickly to the frequent “eye rest” periods, reveling in the freedom from eyeglasses most of the day.
“Oh, I love them,” she whispered, once again amazed at the striking hue of her aquamarine eyes, something she’d never really noticed before. With a nervous grate of her lip, she blinked several times, in awe of the sweep of dark lashes Mr. Poiret had deemed “ridiculously long.” No longer an invisible pale blond, they were now lush and dark with an application of the Rimmel mascara French women loved. But despite Alli’s claim that she was “breathtaking”—a statement that stole Meg’s breath more than anyone’s—sometimes she still felt like that same chubby little girl inside, playing dress-up. She offered her sister a tremulous smile, feeling a bit awkward that the girl in the mirror didn’t match the shy wallflower in her mind. “Mrs. Rousseau claims men will get lost in my eyes,” she said with a fresh dusting of rose that had nothing to do with her rouge, “but I don’t know . . .”
Alli pinched her waist. “Well, I do, and I say she’s right. And let’s hope Devin Caldwell is the very first one—to ‘get lost,’ that is—once and for all.”
Meg actually smiled, thoughts of Devin Caldwell no longer the primary focus of her daydreams anymore. Not after assisting Dr. Rousseau with his charitable work among prostitutes in the Pigalle district. Now the only daydreams Meg entertained were those about a future of service to the less fortunate. A future in which she, too, could better the plight of young women and girls ensnared in the brothels and cow-yards of the Barbary Coast. Like her mother, who dreamed of teaching disadvantaged young girls through their Hand of Hope School, Meg had had a dream of her own before going to Paris—to become a lawyer who fought for the rights of those very women and girls. To stand up for those who’d been ostracized and beat down—like her family and Bram had done for her. To help free them from their prisons of demoralization, be they physical places such as the Barbary Coast . . . or in the dark recesses of their minds like her, paralyzed by ridicule.
But since working with Dr. Rousseau, her dreams had changed. She had changed. Drawing in a deep breath, she smoothed her beaded bodice with trembling fingers, well aware she had a decision to make regarding her future. Yes, she still longed to reach out to disadvantaged women, but how? Through medicine or law? God had given her a thirst for learning and a passion for the poor, and like her mother, sister, and cousin, she hoped to extend God’s grace to those in need. No longer that shy, mousy girl afraid of her own shadow, she was now a young woman whose confidence was slowly changing from being anchored by others’ approval to the approval of the only One who mattered. Under the tutelage of Mrs. Rousseau—Mother’s dearest friend from college—Meg had literally been transformed both inside and out, just as Mother had hoped. Giselle Rousseau had undergirded the lesson that Mother had begun—that true confidence blooms in the soil of a relationship with God, following His path rather than one’s own, pursuing His truth rather than the world’s.
Tears of gratitude sparked Meg’s eyes as she studied the slim, lithe body she saw in the mirror, hidden for years by layers of baby fat and self-loathing. Following a bout with the flu that had stolen her appetite, Mrs. Rousseau’s eagle-eye diet and endless trekking about the city had accomplished the rest, melting pounds off Meg’s chub