The Gypsy and the Widow

By Juliet Chastain

Joanna Daniels is a widow who wants a father for her son. Tem Lovell is a widower hoping to find a mother for his children. They are perfect for each other except for one thing: she's a destitute English gentlewoman who is being courted by a wealthy lord, while Tem is a Gypsy laborer who lives hand-to-mouth.

As the ardor she shares with Tem grows stronger, Joanna is forced to decide between the financial security the cold and controlling lord can provide and the uncertainty of the open road coupled with the passionate love Tem feels for her—that is, if Tem is willing to take an English gentlewoman as his bride.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Evernight Publishing
• Release date: May 13, 2016
• ISBN: 9781772338522

Juliet Chastain

Fashion writer and photographer, Juliet Chastain says that, in a way, writing fiction is like fashion photography. You have a few elements—the models and the clothes in photography, maybe a character and a couple ideas in fiction—and you make them into an interesting story. Juliet loves to tell stories and if she isn't doing it with the camera she's doing it with her keyboard.

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Published by Evernight Publishing ® at Smashwords

www.evernightpublishing.com

Copyright© 2016 Juliet Chastain

ISBN: 978-1-77233-852-2

Cover Artist: Jay Aheer

Editor: Carlene Flores

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

WARNING: The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. No part of this book may be used or reproduced electronically or in print without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in reviews.

This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, and places are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

DEDICATION

For Tom who came so sweetly into my life.

THE GYPSY AND THE WIDOW

Gypsy Lovers, 3

Juliet Chastain

Copyright © 2016

Glossary of Gypsy Terms

The Gypsies (Roma, Rom, Romani) came to Europe from India a thousand years ago and kept to their own wandering ways for generations. They were always considered outsiders and often mistreated as a result. Some eventually found their way to England, where they referred to themselves as Romanichal.

Baba—grandmother

Dadro—dad, daddy

Didlo—madness

Gadje—non-Gypsies or adjective describing non-Gypsies

Gadji—non-Gypsy woman

Gadjo—non-Gypsy man

Kori—penis

Prikaza—bad luck, especially as a result of coming in contact with something impure (such as non-Gypsies)

Puri Dai—wise woman (usually older), who also takes care of the finances for her clan and whose advice is considered in any major decision

Puro dad—grandfather

Rawni—a great (non-Gypsy) lady, an upper class Englishwoman

Romanichal—the name the English gypsies use for themselves

Romani—an adjective used to describe Gypsy-related people or objects

Rom Baro—the chieftain, the leader of a band of Gypsies

Vardo—horse-drawn Gypsy home, often resembles a small trailer

Ves'tacha—beloved, darling

Vista—gypsy clan

Chapter One

Joanna Daniels ran to the window when she heard them. They're back, she thought, smiling. The Gypsies are back. And there they were, chattering and laughing as they cut the hay not twenty feet from where she stood. She sighed softly when she saw him—the handsome Gypsy she remembered from the year before.

She felt her heart constrict as she watched him, just as she had the previous summer, swinging his scythe back and forth, never stopping, even as he laughed at what the others said. Back then, she had almost allowed herself to wish that she had married a man such as he. A man who laughed, who hugged his children, and who always had a smile for them.

She had spoken with him a few times last year when it had fallen on her to direct and pay the laborers, her husband being God knows where, gambling away his—and her—money as fast as he could, and drinking himself to death.

The Gypsies came to the village every fall in their colorful wagons and brought in the hay. Afterward, she had learned they would travel south to pick hops.

We are all wanderers on this earth. Our hearts are full of wonder, and our souls are deep with dreams. Once he had said that of his people—the Gypsies, or the Romanichal as he called them. Sighing, she leaned her head against the window sill.

He had looked at her then with eyes as black and mysterious as night and smiled, somehow making her very conscious that she was a woman and he a man. He had made her feel that he liked her. She, in return, had liked him. More than was appropriate