Gator

By Debra Salonen

Is she or isn’t she...in love with another man?
When Patrick Sullivan shares his deepest, darkest fear with his business partner and best friend, Jay, he's hoping Jay will talk him down from the ledge. But how does anyone talk sense to a man who is convinced his rival is Gator--the hunky, heartthrob hero of his romance author wife’s latest novel?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Debra Salonen
• Release date: May 4, 2011
• ISBN: 9781465747693

Debra Salonen

Susan was born with a book in her hand. Okay, maybe not quite, but she did begin reading at the age of four and hasn't been able to stop. Her mother enrolled her in the Weekly Reader Book Club before she went to school, and provided her with books in all shapes, sizes and genres. Born and raised in northwestern New Jersey, Susan grew up in a houseful of readers. Trips to the library were frequent, and she always participated in summer reading programs and read-a-thons. (Though getting sponsors, if they knew her voracious appetite for books, wasn't always easy.) Named valedictorian of her high school class, Susan also cowrote the school's alma mater - and married her cowriter/high school sweetheart after college. With a love of books and schooling, it was only natural that she become either a teacher or a writer. And she's been both. Graduating from Douglass College - Rutgers University - with a B.A. in psychology, and certified to teach early childhood/elementary school, Susan went on to a nine-year elementary teaching career, teaching second and fourth grades. Her favorite part was passing on her love of reading and books to a new group of eager students each year. She left New Jersey in June of 1996 to follow her husband's career, which first took them to Clarksburg, West Virginia, and then a year later to Erie, Pennsylvania, where they still reside. Erie is the setting for her first novel. Getting her teaching certificate in Pennsylvania turned out to be more hassle than Susan wanted to deal with, so she taught in a private school for one year, then homeschooled her own son for a year, then turned to writing in an effort to restore her sanity, having discovered that instructing one child of her own was far more challenging than teaching 25 kids who belonged to other people. She admires the people who can homeschool and do it well. In December of 1999 she was facing her 35th birthday and the turn of the century. She knew it was time to set some goals, to figure out what she wanted to do with the rest of her life. The goal she set was to sell a novel to a major publisher within five years - before her 40th birthday - but she reserved the right to reevaluate the goal in five years if she hadn't succeeded. In January of 2000, she enrolled in an online class on "Writing and Marketing the Category Romance," started her first romance novel and was off and running. She submitted The Baby Plan to Harlequin Superromance in April of 2001. At the end of August the full manuscript was requested, and the "hear-by" date was set at April of 2002. In February of 2002, Susan Gable got "The Call" from Harlequin. In November of 2002, she held the culmination of her dream in her hands. "I do believe dreams can come true," she says. "You just have to work hard at it. It's not enough to just dream it. You have to go after the dream with a plan for success. Henry David Thoreau said, 'If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.' And I really believe that." What are her hopes for the future? "To keep writing and selling books. And hopefully to have readers enjoy reading them as much as I do writing them. It's just as much fun on this side of a book." Any regrets at this point in her career? "That my sophomore English teacher, Mr. Solomon, didn't live to see this. He always hassled me about starting sentences with conjunctions in my creative writing assignments, and I'd tell him that published authors did it all the time. He told me when I was a published author, then I could do it, too. Look, Mr. Solomon. I can start a sentence with a conjunction now."

Book preview

Gator

Award-winning Short Story

Debra Salonen

Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Afterword

About the Author

Also by Debra Salonen

Gator

A short story about love...or something like it

by Debra Salonen

Copyright 2011 Debra Salonen

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Chapter 1

Lori’s having an affair.

The words boomeranged from Patrick Sullivan’s mouth to his gut, making him double over in Jay’s burgundy wingback chair. Jay’s office was decorated in subtle shades of pewter, wine, money and power. Two doors down the hall, Patrick’s humble, bone and navy reflected his deep need for order. Order that now teetered on the brink of chaos.

Jay’s lean, handsome face expressed first shock then disbelief, kindling within Patrick’s heart a flicker of hope. They’d been friends since college, linked by business since the end of Jay’s second marriage--or was it his third? That’s crazy, Pat. Lori’s the best woman I’ve ever known. And I’ve known a few, he added with the mildest hint of pride.

No one could argue with that. Four marriages and four divorces before the age of forty-five. An unenviable record to most, but one Jay wore like a badge of courage.

"Maybe affair isn’t the