One Woman’s Treasure Read online

  One Woman’s Treasure

  Synopsis

  After Daphne accidentally “steals” a family heirloom from Nina’s front lawn thinking it’s junk left for trash pickup, she learns she’s wanted by the police for questioning. Once the dust settles, Daphne and Nina form a friendship inspired by their mutual love for antiquing and a desire for a fresh start in their lives.

  As they grow closer, their attraction moves way beyond friends. But who will be brave enough to confess her feelings first? Daphne, the self-conscious procrastinator who’s working hard to get her new business off the ground, or Nina, the newly-out mom whose priority is creating a stable life for her son? Before they can take a chance on becoming lovers, they’ll have to decide if love is worth the risk.

  What Reviewers Say About Jean Copeland’s Work

  Spellbound—Co-authored with Jackie D

  “The story is a mixture of history and present day, fantasy and real life, and is really well done. I especially liked the biting humor that pops up occasionally. The characters are vibrant and likable (except the bad guys who are really nasty). There is a good deal of angst with both romances, but a lot of ‘aww’ moments as well.”—Rainbow Reflections

  “Spellbound is a very exciting read, fast-paced, thrilling, funny too… The authors mix politics and the fight against patriarchy with time travel and witch fights with brilliant results.”—Jude in the Stars

  The Ashford Place

  “[A] charming story that I can recommend to anyone who likes a well-written mystery with a good dose of romance.”—Rainbow Reflections

  “Another enjoyable story from Jean Copeland with a bit of a difference. I think this book is definitely one to enjoy with a glass of wine near the warm fire.”—Les Rêveur

  The Revelation of Beatrice Darby

  “The Revelation of Beatrice Darby at its epicentre is a story…of discovering oneself and learning to not only live with it but to also love it. This book is definitely worth a read.”—Lesbian Review

  “Debut author Jean Copeland has come out with a novel that is abnormally superb. The pace whirls like a hula-hoop; the plot is as textured as the fabric in a touch-and-feel board book. And, with more dimension than a stereoscopic flick, the girls in 3-D incite much pulp friction as they defy the torrid, florid, horrid outcomes to which they were formerly fated.”—Curve

  “This story of Bea and her struggle to accept her homosexuality and find a place in the world is absolutely wonderful. …Bea was such an interesting character and her life was that of many gay people of the time—hiding, shame, rejection. In the end though it was uplifting and an amazing first novel for Jean Copeland.”—Inked Rainbow Reads

  The Second Wave

  “This is a must-read for anyone who enjoys romances and for those who like stories with a bit of a nostalgic or historic theme.”—Lesbian Review

  “Copeland shines a light on characters rarely depicted in romance, or in pop culture in general.”—The Lesbrary

  “The characters felt so real and I just couldn’t stop reading. This is one of those books that will stay with me a long time.”—2017 Rainbow Awards Honorable Mention

  Summer Fling

  “The love story between Kate and Jordan was one they make movies about, it was complex but you knew from the beginning these women had found their soul mates in each other.”—Les Rêveur

  One Woman’s Treasure

  Brought to you by

  eBooks from Bold Strokes Books, Inc.

  http://www.boldstrokesbooks.com

  eBooks are not transferable. They cannot be sold, shared or given away as it is an infringement on the copyright of this work.

  Please respect the rights of the author and do not file share.

  One Woman’s Treasure

  © 2020 By Jean Copeland. All Rights Reserved.

  ISBN 13: 978-1-63555-653-7

  This Electronic Original Is Published By

  Bold Strokes Books, Inc.

  P.O. Box 249

  Valley Falls, NY 12185

  First Edition: July 2020

  This 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 persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced in any form without permission.

  Credits

  Editor: Shelley Thrasher

  Production Design: Susan Ramundo

  Cover Design By Tammy Seidick

  eBook Design By Toni Whitaker

  By the Author

  Spellbound

  The Ashford Place

  Summer Fling

  The Second Wave

  The Revelation of Beatrice Darby

  One Woman’s Treasure

  Acknowledgments

  First, I want to thank Sandy and Rad at Bold Strokes Books for always indulging my genre-hopping nature. It’s wonderful to write for such a supportive publishing house. I’d like to give a special shout-out to Dana at Tri-State Vintage for helping me create and authenticate Daphne’s world of antiques, and to Jamie, who’s always there to answer medical questions whenever I make a poor character suffer some ghastly health crisis. And as always, I need to thank the readers, without whom I wouldn’t have a platform to share what I create. Thank you. Lastly, thank you to my friends and family for their tireless support and dedication to my dream, and my author friends Jackie D and Erin Zak, who I lean on throughout the writing process. Love you all.

  Chapter One

  Daphne Carsen’s thirty-eight years on the planet had been generally unremarkable—with the exception of that time she decided to slip into the back pew at the Unitarian church to watch her ex get remarried. Definitely not ranked among her top five best life choices, but rarely does anything good come from combining impetuosity with working through abandonment issues.

  She’d made a noble effort to go incognito, but her last-minute dollar-store disguise of gossamer leopard-print scarf tied under her chin and a pair of round, white sunglasses left her looking more like an aging 1950s Hollywood starlet than an agent of espionage. But surprisingly, it had worked—at least until she’d decided to pursue the procession of limos and infiltrate the reception.

  Her original intention had been to skulk over to the open bar for a free drink, catch a morbid glimpse of the happy couple, and be out of there. When the DJ introduced Savannah and her new wife, Francesca, as “partners for life” upon their entry into the lavish room overlooking the Sound, Daphne pretended to gag into her perfectly crafted lemon drop.

  The bartender pursed her lips. “Something wrong with the drink?”

  Daphne flinched, spilling some of the sticky liquid on her hand. “Oh, uh, no, no. It’s actually pretty great. I was, uh, just thinking back to my own marriage,” she stammered. “I’m divorced now so…”

  As the bartender’s face contorted with judgment, Daphne shrank into her awkwardness even more. What in the hell am I doing? She tilted her head back and dumped the rest of her drink into her mouth. Instead of leaving with her tail between her legs and a morsel of dignity, she signaled the bartender for another.

  Savannah Locke, a voluptuous brunette with prairie-green eyes, was tucked into a curve-hugging, off-white dress and had never looked better. The scars from her surgeries to remove the excess skin were virtually undetectable. But none of this surprised Daphne. Ever since her ex, Ann Marie Cronk, as she used to be known, had morphed into Savannah Locke, all vestiges of the introvert self-conscious of her weight had vanished. Once she’d begun documenting her dramatic weight-loss journey for all of social media’s hungry eyes to devour, she’d become a v
erified YouTube star and influencer. Her inflated ego and income now allowed her to indulge in any and all pampering and medical and cosmetic procedures necessary to complete her transformation into the person she’d always hoped to be: popular.

  Daphne skewered the couple from the bar with a scowl. She’d reveled in her brief life as Mrs. Savannah Locke. They’d paid off their small ranch in a shoreline town in Connecticut, Daphne’s consolation prize in the divorce, and Savannah even purchased a vacation condo in South Florida, but Daphne had never adapted to the way Ann Marie’s self-importance expanded as her waistline shrunk.

  Queasy from the couple’s first dance, she glanced away and stared at the array of liquor bottles lining the wall behind the bar, preparing to order her third cocktail. As she licked the remnants of her second lemon drop from the bottom of the martini glass, someone tapped her shoulder. She turned around and met the blinding glare of Savannah’s shiny Caribbean spray tan.

  “Daphne?” Savannah said. Her false eyelashes twitched as she seemed to process the disguise. “What the hell are you doing here?”

  “You look stunning in ivory,” Daphne said. “Is that Versace?”

  “You have to leave,” she replied through a clenched jaw. “Crashing your ex’s wedding is bizarre even by your standards.”

  “I just needed some closure, that’s all—to know that you and I really are over, and we’ll never get back together.”

  “Getting served with divorce papers would provide most people with all the closure they need.”

  “What can I say?” Daphne shrugged. “I’m an optimist.”

  “That ship has sailed,” Savannah said slowly, coldly. “And you burned the dock when you cheated on me.”

  “Again with the cheating?” Daphne rolled her eyes in frustration. “It was a little online diversion that filled the emptiness in my life when you became obsessed with your internet fame. I never even spoke to her in real time. For all I know, she really was some fifty-year-old mail bomber living in his mother’s basement.”

  “Not the point.” Savannah scanned their surroundings. “Please lower your voice. I have about three seconds before Francesca finds her way over here, and I have no idea how I’m supposed to explain this.” She indicated Daphne’s getup with a flourish of her arms.

  “Speaking of your blushing bride, does she know how intense you are? How wrapped up you get in your Vlogs and responding to each and every one of your adoring followers? How she’ll be enjoying your luxurious vacation property mostly by herself once you tire of her?”

  Savannah regarded her with a jagged glare. “I want you to leave now before I have you thrown out.”

  Daphne exhaled. Despite the satisfaction in recognizing she’d struck a nerve, she feared she was about to burst into tears at the suffocating weight of finality in Savannah’s loveless eyes. “Good-bye, Savannah. My best to you and the new Mrs. Cronk.”

  Her chin up, she marched away with authority in her stride until her heel slid on a wet spot on the floor. After regaining her footing, she pushed through the double doors into the parking lot and pictured the reception hall exploding behind her as she slipped on her sunglasses in the twilight.

  Once inside her car, however, she permitted herself the meltdown she’d been holding in since she learned of this day. Leaning her head against the steering wheel, she wept until she flushed away the images of her former life as someone’s favorite human.

  After she emptied her tear ducts and exhausted her emotional reserve, she determined that she needed to make changes in her life, to transform the work-day fantasies she’d entertained for years into a workable, sustainable reality. After all, what was the point of keeping a vision board in the kitchen and having a “salvaged-treasure room” if not for her to act on their inspiration?

  Wouldn’t it be a nice change to take action in the world instead of always moving in reaction to something beyond her control?

  * * *

  After leaving the wedding reception and making a drive-thru I’ve hit rock-bottom McNugget run, Daphne found herself in the familiar refuge of her eighty-two-year-old neighbor’s dining room. She and Sophie dove into their second bottle of cabernet, and she reminded herself that she had not included the goal of becoming a binge-drinker on her vision board. But after her encounter with Savannah, getting drunker and eating too many homemade pierogies with an elderly widow would perhaps inspire the much-needed impetus for change.

  “Tonight I’m officially swearing off relationships. One and done.” Daphne clinked her wine glass against Sophie’s.

  She waved her off with a petite, wrinkled hand. “Oh, don’t be ridiculous, Daphne.”

  “No, I’m serious,” she said, her words starting to slur. “It’s too painful. You fall in love, promise you’ll be together forever, and then one day, bang! Someone wakes up and decides she’s not in love anymore.”

  Sophie shook her head, but her perfectly-coiffed white hair didn’t move. “I’m sure that’s an awful feeling, honey, but just because things didn’t work out with Ann Marie doesn’t mean you won’t ever find that special someone to grow old with.”

  “I’m in my late thirties, Sophie. You think I can meet someone just like that?” She tried to snap her fingers, but her motor functions had fallen victim to the wine.

  Sophie sliced into a home-made marble Bundt cake. “I don’t know how you gay folk go about meeting each other, but you shouldn’t give up on yourself. I don’t like hearing you talk like this.”

  Daphne sighed. “Believe me. I don’t like saying it, but I’m having a moment. I need to process.”

  Sophie side-eyed her as if Daphne wasn’t making sense. “Why don’t you concentrate on opening that antique business you love talking about? It’ll take your mind off your personal problems.”

  “It’s a work in progress, Sophie.”

  “That’s what you always say. Get off your ass and do something about it. You want coffee now?”

  Daphne grabbed the bottle of wine before Sophie could whisk it away. “And ruin this delightful buzz? No, ma’am.”

  “That’s not a buzz. You’re three sheets to the wind.”

  “That may be so, but nevertheless…” She refilled her glass, careful to control her wavering arm. “You and William were a success story. What was your secret?”

  “We didn’t have a secret. We had fifty-seven years together, one son, and two grandkids.” Sophie smiled fondly. “You know how we made it so long?”

  “How?” Daphne said before shoving the last sour-cream-coated pierogi into her mouth. By that point, the lemon drops and a bottle and a half of wine had her seeing two of Sophie. Luckily, her hearing was as yet unaffected.

  “He never made me feel like I was unimportant to him.”

  “Wow. What’s that like?”

  Sophie raised a coffee cup to her lips with a shaky hand. “It was wonderful, Daphne. We had our hard times, too. Don’t get me wrong. But during our first big fight after we were married, Willie yelled, ‘But I love you, goddamn it,’ smack-dab in the middle of it. And suddenly, whatever we were fussing about wasn’t so important. He said that during every tiff we had from then on. He knew it would always get me.” Her smile receded as she seemed to drift off. “That’s how I knew he was sick…that first fight when he didn’t remember to say it.”

  Daphne stared at Sophie in awe, her heart ready to implode.

  Sophie seemed to gather herself again. “I hope you find a woman who makes you feel that way—not just when times are good either, but also when they aren’t so good.”

  Daphne put down her fork and pushed her plate away. “That’s all I’ve ever wanted. I had it for a while…in the beginning with Ann Marie. Oh, I mean Savannah,” she said with air quotes and a sneer. “She hates when I dead-name her.”

  “It’s easy to feel that way in the beginning of a marriage,” Sophie said. “But then what happened? She got fat and got skinny and suddenly became too big for us on Morningside Drive.”

/>   “Ironic, isn’t it? She loses weight and becomes too big for her britches.” She sipped her wine. “And her britches were big, believe me.”

  “I know,” Sophie said, sliding the bottle away from Daphne. “I used to see them hanging on your clothesline.”

  Daphne snorted into her glass, and they shared a belly laugh that she’d desperately needed. It had been too long since she’d felt anything that deeply other than discontentment and then grief. She was grateful to Sophie for being the coolest old lady ever and acting like a second mother to her since her own mother and stepfather had retired to Florida several years earlier.

  Unable to stand without leaning against something, Daphne helped Sophie clear the table and wrap up the leftovers as best she could.

  “Uh, excuse me.” Sophie intercepted her. “The pierogies go in the fridge, and the dirty dishes in the sink, not the other way around.”

  “I think I’m ready to go home,” Daphne said through slits in her eyes.

  “Yeah. I think so, too.” Sophie cradled Daphne’s face in her hands. “Now you call me as soon as you get in.”

  “Sophie, I live next door. You can literally watch me.”

  “Fine. Then I’ll stand on my porch and do that.”

  “Okay.” She gave Sophie two thumbs up. After staggering across the yard, she had the decency to wait until she was on her own property before puking into the azalea bush on the side of her porch.

  “Daphne? Are you okay?” Sophie shouted from her railing. “You need me to unlock your door for you?”