Tarnished Romance

By Sandi K. Whipple

Judy Kalfus fell in love with attorney Bryce Stevens. For the first time in her life she realized feelings that had previously been prevented by her clients. Bryce is led to believe Judy is employed at San Francisco General Hospital. Heartache and emotional pain are no strangers to her. The inevitable happens and Judy's false foundation begins to crumble. Will the truth tarnish their romance?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Sandi K. Whipple
• Release date: Nov 1, 2015
• ISBN: 9781310587238

Sandi K. Whipple

Born in Waukegan, Illinois, I lived in the San Francisco Bay Area for most of my life. In 2000, I bought a home on the internet, packed up a U-Haul, and though I'd never been there and I knew no one, I moved to North Dakota. Kinda crazy, huh? Most of my friends said after one winter I'd return to the California sunshine. Well, that never happened. I'm now proud to be a member of a small community of less than 500 wonderful people in North Dakota where I can witness and experience the way of life most can only dream about. I'm just someone who happens to be a Veteran of the United States Army, and a grandmother, who has an awesome life.I started writing in 2007 while temporarily stranded in a wheelchair. After sharing my disappointment with a friend regarding a novel I’d read, the friend suggested I write one of my own. Loving Adonis was written in September 2007 and stuck in a drawer. A few months later, Twisted Engagement followed, a novel in a completely different direction, and it too ended up in a drawer.In January 2014, the two first drafts were removed from the drawer, “tweaked” a little, and after some fine tuning, published for everyone’s enjoyment. All of my novels are stand alone, no sequels.​I've been enjoying the career of a retired individual who writes romance, and to date, I've published four stand alone romance novels. I'm currently working on the fifth. ​I have a weakness for GOOD Extra Dry champagne. A good book, a glass of good wine, and Kenny G in the background....when reading or writing, what could be better?

Book preview

Tarnished Romance

Sandi K. Whipple

Copyright © 2015 Sandi K. Whipple

All rights reserved.

ISBN-13: 978-1514782194

ISBN-10: 1514782197

First Edition

No part of this work may be reproduced in any fashion without express, written consent from the copyright holder.

This is a work of fiction. All names and any events portrayed herein are fictitious and or the product of the author’s imagination. As well, all characters are fictitious and are not based on any real persons living or dead.

Most hotels, restaurants, lounges, businesses, and locations, while real, are used in a way that is purely fictional, and not in any way mentioned in a negative context.

Cover Design By:

BOOKGRAPHICS.NET

Dedication

I can’t imagine what the past years would have been like for me in North Dakota without my dearest friend Nancy Brown.

Thank you for always being there for me, Nancy. Thank you for always supporting, understanding, and encouraging me. But most of all, thank you for allowing me to be a part of your life.

This is for you, my dear friend!

Also by Sandi K. Whipple:

Loving Adonis

Twisted Engagement

Dancing With A Cowboy

CHAPTER ONE

When a person looks back at the years that have passed, in truth, one realizes memories aren’t all pleasant. Some are funny; some are sad; and some are so painful, tears flood through the ducts faster and harder than the first time around.

Remembering the lies told to others and knowing the heart harbors the real truth is in itself a lie.

****

Six year old Judy Stone pulled the blanket up and over her head, creating a cocoon. She thought with the world outside the blanket, when morning came, she wouldn’t be in another foster home.

Or just maybe, her parents would change their minds, and decide they loved her after all, and come get her. Though she’d heard them before, she couldn’t remember the words I love you ever being directed to her.

Her wish came true! Her parents did come for her, but it took them eleven months to do it.

Less than a year later, as she finally adjusted to being around the four strangers who were her brothers, the nightmare returned. Although it was a different foster home this time, still, it was two more strangers with the title of Mom and Dad.

Some moms and dads were kind, compassionate, and even fun, well two she could remember.

Some of the moms and dads weren’t much different than the ones she was forced to call her own. They fought sometimes, but not like her real mom and dad, who, almost every day, found something to fight about. Then there were the ones who, when they were angry, let Judy know she was only there because they were paid to keep her.

Once, a foster father who was drunk came to her bedroom in the middle of the night. When she told her caseworker about it and what he tried to do to her, she was sent to a juvenile hall for four weeks to receive counseling. They told her that’s where liars went.

Most of the mothers were nicer to her than her own was though. Her mother had a short fuse. She would be fine one minute, laughing and playing with Judy or her brothers, and in only a few minutes she would be screaming and threatening them. She slapped Judy’s face often and beat her and her brothers with belts, and on occasion, with sticks the children were forced to pick themselves.

Judy never touched her mother’s things. She saw what happened to her brothers whenever they took or played with something without permission. Her mother would burn their fingers with a match or hold their hand over the burners on the stove.

The easiest of her mother’s inflictions was the bathroom punishment. That one didn’t hurt. Whoever made Mom mad was thrown onto the bathroom floor, and the door was closed and locked from the outside. But lying on the cold floor for a few hours was nothing compared to the belt or sticks.

Dad was nice though he was rarely around. The best part was Mom never laid a hand on Judy or her brothers when Dad was home - not because he wouldn’t allow it, but because Mom and Dad were too busy arguing and fighting with each other.

Judy’s mother seldom did laundry. She used to say she couldn’t afford the Laundromat. And they never owned a washing machine. Judy and her brothers went to school wearing clothes that were sometimes soiled, and sometimes outright filthy. Once, a teacher took Judy to the bathroom and sponged off her blouse and fixed her hair because it was picture day.

Sometimes, in the winter, Judy and her brothers would sleep on the floor, under the kitchen table. They would pretend they were camping. In reality, there was no money for the oil stove that provided heat. So the upstairs was closed off, and blankets covered the doorways leading to other rooms downstairs. The oven produced enough heat for the kitchen.

The cruelest and most painful sufferings were mental and came from the other children in the neighborhood. Some laughed at and teased the Stone children because they never had clean clothes, and some teased because they had few toys or had no bikes.

It was the on-again off-again foster homes that taught Judy her family was actually poor. But why was there always money for her parents’ cigarettes, her mother’s Pepsi and magazines, and Dad’s booze?

And so it went. Every few months, she went back to the real mom, dad, and brothers. Then, it was either another foster home, or another children’s home.

With all the shuffling around and different schools, Judy never had a chance to make any real friends like other kids did. Even her caseworker was the fifth one she’d had assigned to her. Or was she the sixth?

By the time she was sixteen years old, Judy was unable to remember how many times she’d been passed around. She was left with more doubts about life than any one person should be, let alone a young girl.

She did learn a few important things along her ugly journey though, and not from books. She learned not to trust it when someone said they loved you. She learned that sometimes those who loved you hit and abused you. And usually, those who loved you deserted you.

And the meaning of the word honesty, well, Webster sure as hell had that one wrong!

She learned not to care too deeply for any one person or any one thing, knowing it would soon be taken away in one way or another.

And her four brothers, well, they were basically strangers referred to as siblings, which only meant they had the same biological parents.

So, before her seventeenth birthday, rebellion and distrust became Judy’s only real and dear companions. And she held on to them like a Python wrapped around a child. Subsequently, she felt as though she were suffocating.

She had an amazing intelligence and ability to quickly figure out most situations. Yet, she was ignorant as to the ways of the world. She knew nothing about the smooth talking souls lurking around corners. And they were more than capable of proving beyond a doubt, no one could really be trusted.

Twenty one days after her seventeenth birthday, Judy decided she could confront the world on her own. True, her self confidence was nearly non-existent after years of on-again off-again lies, abuse, and desertion. But she was so driven by her rebellion against the world and everyone in it, running away seemed to be her best choice.

Besides, once she turned eighteen, the state would no longer be her guardian. What foster parents would keep her around if they weren’t getting paid?

So, one day, with $312.00 from babysitting in her pocket, Judy bid her foster mother goodbye and left for school.

Only Judy knew she was now on her own.

How long would it take for the foster parents to realize she wasn’t coming back? That she ran away? Would anyone really care?

Would her parents be notified? Would they care? Better yet, would anyone be able to locate her parents so they could be told?

Her only regret was not being unable to say goodbye to her brothers. How could she? She didn’t even know where their foster homes were. Yes, they were sometimes strangers to her, but in a peculiar way, she did love them.

Judy decided to put as much distance as possible between herself and all of the damned ‘Lake Towns’ as well as others she’d called home. Lake Villa, Lake Bluff, Round Lake, Crystal Lake, Waukegan, and North Chicago, Illinois, were about to become history. Judy Stone vowed to never look back.

And wouldn’t she just show them all? Or would she?

CHAPTER TWO

The cemetery in Daly City, California looked like a field growing black umbrellas. The rain wouldn’t stop.

Twenty-six year old Judy Kalfus wondered why people thought it a necessity to have such a depressing get together called a funeral, and especially in the rain.

All funerals really accomplished were tears, faces that haven’t been looked upon in years, and nosy bodies wondering what, if anything, was left behind.

Respect and caring were supposed to be given while the person was alive, right? God, how she hated being here.

Yes, she was going to miss her friend. Linda Edwards was the only real friend she ever had and the only person who’d been able to make Judy laugh.- really laugh, the kind of laugh that made you cry and wet yourself at the same time.

Forcing her mind to block out the faces of the other mourners, Judy was remembering four years ago when she met Linda.

It was a beautiful day consisting of sunshine with no sign of the usual San Francisco fog and a comfortably moderate temperature. At Turk and Market streets, she had the taxi she was in pull over. She’d decided to walk the seven or eight blocks further to her hair dresser located across the street from the Whitcomb Hotel.

When Judy took a header on Market Street, no one else seemed bothered by the uneven concrete in the sidewalk. But, then, Judy could trip on a toothpick. San Francisco was a town bustling with people, and the sidewalks were busy. Yet, not one person stopped or lifted a finger to help her as she lay sprawled on the sidewalk.

With torn hose and bleeding knees, Judy limped into a nearby coffee shop. After taking a seat at the counter, a smiling waitress approached.

The waitress, who witnessed the fiasco, was Linda. Owee! I was looking out the window, and I saw you fall. You took a good one, girl. Need a case and a half of band-aids?

Judy chuckled. She looked at the blood running down her knees and at the ripped skin on her shin. I don’t think so. But maybe a wet paper towel, and a ladies’ room to take off these ruined hose.

Linda had a bubbly, extraverted personality, and Judy, was quiet and guarded. Their personalities were so different, it somehow made the two click. They became friends instantly - real friends.: the kind who shared almost everything - almost!

They shopped together, watched sad movies together, and even cried together. At Linda’s urging, they both became volunteers on holidays at St. Anthony’s Dining Room on Golden Gate Avenue in downtown San Francisco. Thanksgiving had become their annual ritual there. Judy had even come to look forward to it. Christmas was different. It was a holiday she found depressing. Sometimes, she even pretended not to feel well enough to volunteer.

Linda was also the only person who knew the truth. Judy’s truth. Though not quite all of it, she’d guessed a good portion of it, and even kept her suspicions to herself for a long time.

She remembered the night Linda confronted her. You know what, Judy girl? I never said anything, but I’ve been thinking about it for a while. And I’m not 100% sure, but I think I finally figured it out.

The noise of people conversing brought Judy back to the present. So, it was finally over. The service at the funeral home was awful. And well, this graveside ceremony was excruciating.

Now, it was final. Her one and only friend was gone. All the sad memories and feelings of the lost, lonely, little girl from long ago resurfaced, and all because of a stupid, tiny, little thing called a brain tumor no one even knew existed.

Judy quickly started toward the rented limousine she’d hired for this occasion. She’d sold her car as it wasn’t a necessity in San Francisco, and it cost a small fortune for a permanent parking space anyway. Reaching the limousine, she grabbed the slippery, wet door handle, and a voice broke the concentration of her hasty retreat.

Excuse me ma’am, I think you’re at the wrong limo. I believe this is mine.

Judy snapped to attention and immediately put on her plastic smile. Looking up at the tall, male stranger she asked, I beg your pardon?

Smiling back at her, he said, This is my car. Pointing to the inside of the vehicle, he added, And that’s my driver in there. But, if you’re in need of transportation, I’ll be happy to give you a ride.

Judy stood, looking at the stranger with her plastic smile still in place.

The stranger put his hand out and said, Hi. I’m Bryce Stevens.

She shook the hand offered her. I’m Judy Kalfus. Looking around, she spotted her limousine. Damn it! she thought. They all looked pretty much alike. I’m sorry. And no, I don’t need a ride. I see my limo six cars back. Thank you for the offer though.

Still holding her hand, Bryce asked, Are you going back to Linda’s apartment for the so-called gathering? Her mother hired a catering company, and I understand they’ve put together quite a feast.

Slowly pulling her hand from his, Judy replied, I don’t think so. I don’t do well at those kinds of gatherings. The church service was bad enough. And this grave site ceremony has pretty much put me in a state of depression. I’m only here in the first place because Linda was my dearest friend.

Bryce took a step back, tilted his head, and with humor in his eyes he said, "Oh, so you’re that Judy."

Her plastic smile quickly evaporated, and her well practiced defensive wall was immediately in place. Standing perfectly straight, as if she were a statue, Judy asked, Excuse me?

Bryce shook his head and laughed. "Linda and I were friends for a long time. She was trying for years to