Finding Joy

By Joyce Horstmann

Joy Frost Burton lives a busy, successful life, finding comfort in the lovely home she shares with her three little boys. A widow, she isn't looking for love again, in spite of her three younger sisters' rather pushy encouragement.
Mysterious fate has other ideas and throws charming Sean Summers into Joy's world again and again. Soon, however, ghosts from the past and a challenging family crisis create difficult complications.
Does Joy dare risk loss and sorrow a second time by following her wounded heart's new rhythm?


The Christmas Frost Series--Finding Joy, Noelle's Kiss, Holly's Heart, and Chrissy's Catch--tells the stories of the four Frost sisters, who overcome heartache, betrayal and ghosts from the past to find true love and bring back the magic of Christmas.

• Language: English
• Publisher: The Wild Rose Press
• Release date: Dec 11, 2019
• ISBN: 9781509229284

Joyce Horstmann

Joyce Elizabeth Horstmann was born and raised in the Midwest, where her two older sisters taught her to read and write long before she started school. She's been a total "word addict" her whole life, including nearly thirty years as a secondary school English and creative writing teacher. Joyce graduated from the University of California at Berkeley, where her greatest adventure (or misadventure), occurred when she was maced from a National Guard helicopter during the People's Park riot in 1969. She insists she was just trying to get to her political science class at the time--and was not part of the crowd of Hippies charging the campus in an attempt to take over the administration building. Life has presented many challenges to Joyce, including the loss of her first husband, a United States Army officer, in Vietnam. The main character in her novella, Finding Joy, is based roughly on her own experiences in dealing with widowhood and finding love again. Mother to four wonderful sons and grandmother to seven terrific grandchildren, Joyce finds inspiration for her writing in all areas of life, especially the multitude of family members, friends, and former students who have filled her life with both love and challenges. She writes poetry, historical fiction, and now--her first modern romance, Book One of Christmas Frost, a four-part collaboration of Holiday romances. Joyce finds her own joy in placing words together to create and share adventure, romance, pathos, faith, other-worldliness, and a full gamut of emotions in lovely black ink on inviting white pages. She plans to keep typing away until she runs out of characters to invent--and that, she is sure, will never happen.

Book preview

Inc.

As I arrived at the doorway, I took a quick look back and BAM—ran smack into a man coming in. An indelicate Oomph escaped my lips as we both reached out to steady ourselves. His hand covered mine on the door frame. Warm—very warm.

He kept it there, and I didn’t struggle to free myself at first. I was turned sideways and couldn’t see his face, but my senses—all of them—responded to his closeness.

Finally, I breathed again and pulled my hand out from under his, mumbling a weak, Oh, so sorry.

No, I didn’t see you there. It was my fault. He had a deep voice with a little rumble to it. I looked up and saw a ruggedly handsome face and dark blue eyes. He looked vaguely familiar, but I forced my eyes away too fast to think about that.

Excuse me. I tried to scoot past him, brushing my shoulder against his chest as we both turned to maneuver through the small open space. Unfortunately, we’d moved in the same direction, and then we bumped knees. I was mortified.

Oh, sorry again, I yelped. At that point I noticed his enticing aroma—a mixture of cool autumn air and spicy leather. Definitely masculine.

I couldn’t see his face now, since mine was practically smashed into his neck, but I didn’t mind lingering in his scent. I may or may not have murmured, Mmmmm…

The Christmas Frost Series

FINDING JOY

NOELLE’S KISS

HOLLY’S HEART

CHRISSY’S CATCH

These are the stories of the four Frost sisters, who overcome heartache, betrayal and ghosts from the past to find true love and bring back the magic of Christmas.

Finding Joy

by

Joyce Horstmann

Christmas Frost, Book 1

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales, is entirely coincidental.

Finding Joy

COPYRIGHT © 2019 by Joyce Horstmann

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the author or The Wild Rose Press, Inc. except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

Contact Information: [e-mail]

Cover Art by Tina Lynn Stout

The Wild Rose Press, Inc.

PO Box 708

Adams Basin, NY 14410-0708

Visit us at www.thewildrosepress.com

Publishing History

First Sweetheart Rose Edition, 2019

Print ISBN 978-1-5092-2927-7

Digital ISBN 978-1-5092-2928-4

Christmas Frost, Book 1

Published in the United States of America

Dedication

To all the authors, storytellers, family, and friends

who have inspired and encouraged me,

as well as to the writing students I’ve had the pleasure of teaching how to listen to their hearts

and let their imaginations soar.

Chapter One

This is clearly a case of adult peer pressure gone wild, I mumbled as I hung up the phone. Am I really that pathetically lonely?

All three of my younger sisters had called me to insist for the hundredth time that I needed to stop dragging my heels and go to the support-group meeting that weekend.

Just try it, said Elle.

You will meet people who know how you feel, urged Holly.

And, You need to get out of the house and talk to adults, added Chrissy. They had all offered to babysit my boys as well, which left me no excuse, unfortunately.

I finished loading the dishwasher and heard the loud ping of the timer on the dryer. As I pulled out a load of little boys’ clothes and started folding the denim jeans and superhero T-shirts, I thought about Tom for at least the tenth time that morning; how I wished he were here to see his sons growing up and changing so much.

The twins, Micah and Mitchell, were babies when their father went back to the Middle East for his third—and last—deployment. Their big brother, Charlie, was only five, and his memories had slowly become mixed in with the stories I told him. Daddy’s in Heaven, he said sadly before bedtime prayers.

Yes, little man, your daddy’s in Heaven. So far away.

I’d agreed to go to that meeting, the Colorado Springs Chapter of the Widows and Widowers Support Group, against my better judgment. It sounded dreadful. I didn’t want to hang out with a bunch of sad people and listen to their depressing stories. I knew all about loneliness and mourning. I was living it every day.

Piling the folded clothes into the big red laundry basket, I pricked up my ears to determine if I could hear any sounds of torture or rioting coming from the boys’ rooms. Nothing. I sighed in relief, even though I knew this could also mean trouble. Peace rules for now. Then I heard giggling, followed by a loud thump. Well, I knew it couldn’t last.

As I tried to picture the members of the social gathering coming up in a few days, I imagined I’d find myself surrounded by about fifty widows and a couple of sixty-something-year-old widowers. Fun times, I said to myself.

I looked over at a picture of Tom on the mantel, standing jauntily on a ski slope at Aspen, the beautiful snow-covered Rockies behind him. His dark-brown eyes and handsome smile radiated out, filling the room with love and happiness. I missed him so much. The loneliness can be overwhelming, and that’s why my sisters had urged me to form new friendships with people who understand the heaviness of grief.

I heard more giggles coming from Charlie’s room, including a squeal of delight from Micah—who could easily call pigs to the barn with that piercing voice—and I smiled in gratitude for the three of them. Tom’s boys. Tom’s legacy.

I’ve had a lot of grief during my life. More than my share, I think. My baby brother passed away from heart disease when I was just a kid, and my mother and father died in a car accident on the day after Christmas four years ago, which has ruined the holidays for us sisters ever since. Our lives changed in an instant—one terrible moment in time. A drunk driver killed them. He walked away unscathed.

The month of December used to be the most wonderful time of the year. Mom and Dad had evidently been kind of crazy in their first years of marriage: they planned five December babies and hit the jackpot every time. Well, almost every time. Little Nicholas arrived three weeks early, on November 30th. He still received a holiday name, though. I’m Joy, and I was born on Christmas Eve. Just short of three years later came Noelle, who goes by Elle; followed two years later, almost to the day, by Holly; and our baby sister, Christina Marie, arrived five years less six days later. A Holiday Quartet, my dad used to say. The tail-ender of the family, Nicky, joined us nearly four years later. To add one more punch line to the whole Christmastime cuteness, our last name is Frost. It would only be more outrageous if our parents were Mr. and Mrs. Jack.

I heard yelps of Stop it! and Gimme that! as I headed down the hall with the clean clothes, and I thought about sweet Nicky, my parents’ long-awaited only boy, who died when he was just nineteen months old. Born with a defective heart, he’d suffered cardiac arrest in transit to a hospital in Denver. My parents always believed Nicky would have been saved if the specialist he’d needed had been available here in Colorado Springs, but he didn’t survive the seventy-mile trip. That’s why they’d set up and worked very hard on a foundation to build a pediatric wing on our local hospital, to save other children and help other families in Nicky’s memory.

Shaking off my maudlin feelings, I approached Charlie’s room, and the boys all flew out the door like lion cubs on the loose. Whoa, there, guys. I ducked out of the way, clutching the basket to my chest to avoid an errant little-boy bump that would result in a fountain of flying clothes.

No time, Mom, Charlie yelped. We’re being chased by zombies, and they’ll eat our brains if we don’t get to our ninja weapons stashed on the pirate ship. Neither he nor his little brothers stopped to explain further, and I didn’t bother to question their strange mix of adventure genres. Instead, I just laughed and headed into the twins’ room with the laundry, quite sure my heroic sons would recover their weapons stash in time to ward off the dreaded zombies.

These little guys need a daddy, I thought. But who could take Tom’s place? I didn’t see how it was possible. I knew my sweet sisters’ insistence that I attend the widows’ and widowers’ social wasn’t aimed at finding me a man, but at meeting people to help me move along in my healing process. They hoped I’d readjust to socializing in mixed company, and someday accept the possibility of loving again, of rebuilding my family. I didn’t want to go. I was afraid my old wounds would be reopened when they were only half-healed. I didn’t want to leave Tom behind.

Healing took a long time. Every day my heart has ached for a father’s hug, a mother’s kiss, and a husband’s touch, but I couldn’t see how any of those missing things would ever be replaced. I lived my life in the now, not in the future.

I heard my grandmother’s antique clock chime. It was almost dinnertime. Mac ’n cheese or leftover spaghetti? Hmm…maybe hot dogs and chili. I stashed away in various drawers the fresh, clean clothes, relishing their sweet aroma, and headed to the kitchen.

As I peeled a few carrots to bring an iota of healthy food to the meal, I wondered what I should wear to the sad souls get-together on Friday. I didn’t know if people dressed up or went casual to these types of gatherings. I had to laugh as I realized I couldn’t remember the last time I had dressed up for anything but church.

What does ‘dressed up’ for a social gathering of lonely people even mean? I asked as I chopped up the crispy carrots. Ha! Anything but my Broncos orange-and-blue sweats and lime-green jogging shoes, I guess.

Chapter Two

I cringed when I heard immediately as I walked through the door of the church hall that Friday evening, Welcome to the Widows’ and Widowers’ Support Group meeting! Kind of a mouthful. I wondered why the cheerful woman didn’t just say Hello. She smiled broadly and offered me her hand, which I shook with my clammy one as I mumbled a weak Hi. She introduced herself as Grace Hodges, and I found myself warming to her in spite of my bad attitude.

Kind, brown eyes and a continuing cheery smile broke through my resistance, although I still felt put off by the label widow. I hate that word.

Grace, who looked about forty-five, said, You look new, and when I nodded, she put her arms around me and hugged me to her ample bosom.

Joy—Joy Burton, I mumbled. Releasing myself rather reluctantly from her warmth, I added, It’s nice to meet you. My voice sounded tinny.

She wore a sky-blue silk shirt over tailored black pants, and her subtle make-up meshed perfectly with her beautiful, dark hair. She smelled wonderful, too—like rich chocolate brownies—which relaxed me even more.

As she released me, she said, Oh, honey, I’m so glad you’re here. We’re all in this together, aren’t we? We need to love and support each other, and I’m sure you will find friends among us.

I nodded again and unexpectedly felt the sting of tears in my eyes—the last thing I wanted. I wondered why kindness and a sweet welcome made me feel like crying, and I wanted to turn and run, but in the next instant Grace scooted me to a nearby sign-in table,