Dee's Cornucopia - A Novella

By Jeny Heckman

Dee Walker can kick your ass. At least she thinks so and isn't afraid to say it.

A no-nonsense spark plug, Dee keeps everyo

• Language: English
• Publisher: Celtic Butterfly Group LLC
• Release date: Aug 4, 2021
• ISBN: 9780996509633

Book preview

Best in Category 2018 Chanticleer

International Book Awards

Crowned Heart of Excellence Winner –

InD’Tale Magazine

Feathered Quill Finalist

Q

The Warrior’s Progeny is an intense, page-turning adventure that weaves a hot contemporary romance with spell-binding Greek mythology! While the romance is the main focus of the story, a subplot occurs with characters from the first book (Dee is a hoot!) as they try to work out what is happening and what they need to do to save the gods. The main character’s experience dreams in which Greek mythology is richly woven in, keeping the modern romance tethered to the past. The Warrior’s Progeny is a thrilling ride that will have readers clamoring for the next installment!

Tricia Hill - InD’Tale Magazine

This story is about Finn and Raven, two opposites from different worlds who might just very well be connected by a root in the mythical Greek Gods. I enjoy a story that takes real world and flavors it with the supernatural/mystical. The author blends a story of romance, healing and growth, and a wee bit of the paranormal. I appreciated the characters’ backstory and especially like Dee, Finn’s grandmother (I love layered secondary characters). The Hawaii setting was a joy to read about and I could definitely see that this author did her research.

Jean M. Grant (Author) - Hundred Series

The Sea Archer is a remarkable undertaking. The many diverse sub-plots are a credit not only to author Heckman’s talent for research but to the depths of her imagination. And when Raven finally draws the proverbial line in the sand and reclaims her life, the reader experiences a hip-swinging, foot-stomping happy dance moments—and it’s worth the ride.

Kat Henry Doran - Wild Women Reviews

BOOKS BY JENY

The Heaven & Earth Series:

The Sea Archer

The Warrior’s Progeny

Other Works:

Dancing Through Tears

(Australia Burns Anthology, Vol. 2)

Releasing the Catch

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.

Dee’s Cornucopia

COPYRIGHT © 2021 by Jeny Heckman

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the author or Celtic Butterfly Publishing except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

Contact Information: [e-mail]

Cover Art by Steven Novak

Celtic Butterfly Publishing

PO Box 2661

Stanwood, Washington 98292-2661

Visit us at www.celticbutterflypublishing.com

Publishing History

First Edition, 2021

Print ISBN 978-0-9965096-0-2

Digital ISBN 978-0-9965096-3-3

The Heaven & Earth Series

Published in the United States of America

Logo Description automatically generated

To the grandmothers who care for their grandchildren,

as if they were their own.

Sarah, Lola, and Gloria

CHAPTER 1

SEPTEMBER 1958

"My God, it’s hotter

than a billy goat’s ass in a pepper patch out there," Dee announced as she entered the office furnished with the rich fragrance of leather, old wood, coffee, and tobacco smoke.

Her boss, Bert Norton, sat hunched at his desk, puffing on his ancient pipe. His gaze snapped to hers, and he gave the merest hint of a smile before frowning at her crass expression. The two fellows, also occupying the room, stood a little straighter at her appearance, but gave each other surreptitious glares. They wore identical uniforms of scarred leather boots, dusty work trousers and damp cotton shirts, right down to the sweat-stained field-hand hats squeezed together in their enormous fists.

Ah, sorry? Dee phrased it almost like a question and raised her eyebrows at the deluge of testosterone in the small space.

Deidre, please, take a seat. Bert gestured to one of the broad wing-back chairs occupying the area in front of his desk.

The two imposing men shifted their weight from foot to foot in apparent agitation. If I sit in that chair, I’ll look weak. Possessing a vagina created enough of a disadvantage chasm already.

Thanks, Mr. Norton, I’ll stand. No sense in giving anyone the upper hand, right? she quipped and slapped her hands on her hips, shifting her own weight from side to side, like a metronome. The corner of her boss’s lips twitched, but he sighed with heavy resignation, and they both looked over at the two workers.

One man, Beaker Sparks, of medium height, but strong, muscular build, grunted as she studied him, and frowned. The only remarkable thing about the field-hand? The size of the white-head marring his chin. His icy, steel gaze peered down a nose too long and broad for his pocked face in a way that left her feeling exposed and undressed. Though she was underage, it didn’t stop Beaker, twenty-two years her senior, from trying to step out with her since her arrival at the Sugar Grove Plantation two years prior.

However, with each rejection he became more ardent and acquisitive, until the girl reached her boiling point and punched him dead in the face when he got too handsy one day. Taken unaware by the retaliation, Beaker stumbled in front of the mixed lunch assembly and fell, appearing as if the petite creature knocked him on his ass. Afterward, the man took to impugning her character, even hinting she’d given him a gratifying blow job during a lunch break in the outhouse. Dee gave Sparks a look that suggested he wasn’t worth the lump of cow shit she walked in daily, and it caused the muscles in his jaw to clench and his nostrils to flare like an Adirondack moose ready to charge.

Her eyes darted to the other man. What she discovered about him was his name… Arthur, and delicious dream boat didn’t scratch the surface of his appearance. Arthur stood taller than Sparks by several inches, and Dee by more than a foot. His wide muscular shoulders and massive chest tapered down into a trim waist. Brilliant, clear blue eyes with generous dollops of gold and green encircling the pupils searched the young woman’s face, captivating her attention. His mouth… that wide and generous creation by God, broke into an easy grin whenever their eyes connected across the expansive lunchroom over his short tenure at the plantation. The handsome man worked at the company a little over two weeks and labored in the fields two zones over from where she stripped sugarcane, and he worked and repaired the harvesting equipment. The who worked with her in the fields or in its office all had eyes for the mysterious new employee, and now up close, Dee understood why. Even her best friend, Evie had the hots for him and she about to be a married woman.

Walker, Norton barked, causing her to come out of her reverie. These two men have been brawling over you, and it’s disrupting my lunch hour.

Really? Dee sighed with exaggerated innocence and tilted her head to the side to consider both of them again. Hmm. She pretended to think about it and exhaled hard through pursed lips. Okay, well, I’m probably too young for both of ‘em, but seeing as Sparks is a genuine asshole, I think I’ll take the tall drink of water there. Arthur’s eyes popped open wider and his eyebrows lifted.

Ah, no, ma’am, Arthur drawled out Alabama. I was just tellin’ Mr. Norton here, that the man was speaking wicked regardin’ your appearance. He jerked his chin in Sparks’ direction, and venom shot out of those magnificent eyes. There’s no excuse for such language about a young lady.

The three men scanned the length of the young lady in question, and she followed their gaze. The wet heat left her bright orange work shirt clinging to her rather well-endowed bosom. Purple plaid trousers, also damp with sweat, clung to her thighs. She supposed she’d have to get used to this kind of attention now that she’d at last received her period and became a woman at the venerable age of sixteen.

That right? Well, what’s he been saying then?

Ah… well… Arthur’s neck and face flamed crimson, whether in anger or embarrassment, Dee couldn’t decide. Mr. Sparks here suggested that you’ve… ah… had relations in a public settin’, and in the privy. He hesitated, and when she lifted her eyebrows to continue, he added, Um, with several others watchin’ y’all?

Dee turned to glare at her nemesis, then at her boss. Well, I can’t fault his imagination, now can I? I wonder what Mama would have to say about that, Mr. Norton? She turned back to her boss, eyebrows lifted. An older gentleman makin’ advances at her naïve underage daughter? Dee cocked her head to the side again, as if thinking, then answered her own question. Oh yeah, she’d say, ‘Dee, sweetheart, next time that weasel Sparks opens his mouth, don’t bother punching him in the face, kick him the balls instead. That’ll make his lips pucker to the size of a ladybug’s butt’.

No, your mama would wash out your filthy mouth with soap and tell you to stop leading guys on, Sparks spat in his high-pitched nasal register, then turned toward their boss, as Arthur’s fists clenched in reflex. You gonna believe this, sir? I ain’t never…

Naw, Dee retorted, interrupting what she knew would be a load of horse shit, and stepped forward to stare down the jackass, with all the supremacy her small stature could muster. It’s 1958, Beak. Mama would say break a foot off in the fool’s fucking ass.

With that, she drew back her booted foot and kicked him with exactitude in the center of his scrotum. All three men groaned in immediate solidarity, and Arthur’s powerful arm snaked around her tiny waist, lifting her body from the floor in restraint. She kicked out again, clipping her nemesis’s chin, and popped his pimple. Beaker Sparks wheezed, clutching the most offended area, and gave an uncontrolled fart as he writhed around on the industrial carpet. Arthur set Dee back on her feet and stood between her and the fallen man, as she returned her attention to Norton.

Okay, so I guess we’re done here then… right? Without waiting for his stunned response, she spun around and punched out the door, calling, That’s real good too ‘cause it’s time to get back to work.

The whistle announced the lunch hour conclusion, two seconds after she raised a finger to point at it.

Q

Deidre Georgette Walker lived an adventurous life in her sixteen years. Her mother, Catherine, explained the story of her terrifying entrance into the world on December 7, 1941, on the island of Oahu, many times over the course of her brief life. As echoes of the aerial torpedoes hitting the Pacific Fleet ten miles away ricocheted off the walls, only a single neighbor lady attended the childbirth. Catherine always maintained, with tears in her eyes, Dee entered the world, just as her father, George, a Chief Watertender aboard the USS Arizona, left it in a watery tomb.

Now, Dee stretched her back and glanced over the distant fields, unseeing. The photograph on her mother’s bed stand with an image of her father in full dress uniform filled her mind instead. The enigmatic ghost who one day would have… should have… taught her how to fight off men like Beaker Sparks. However, fate never allowed her that paternal protection. Staring down at weather roughened hands, she sighed. The malodorous scent from the pre-harvest fires filled her nostrils, and she wrinkled her nose. Wanting to rid herself of the stink, she tilted her head up to the sunshine and radiant bright blue sky. A thin line of black smoke coiled and unfurled, blemishing the pristine canvas, and she frowned. Her thoughts wandered back to the previous interlude.

Dee imagined Norton calling up her mother, now owner and operator of the successful, Akua Wahine Floral and Gifts, in Koloa, about what transpired in his office. Oh, how I’d like to be a butterfly on the wall for that conversation. She giggled.

Catherine came to the island of Kauai distraught and overwhelmed after the attack on Pearl Harbor. She inquired into a job at the plantation when Dee was just six months old. Bert Norton took one look at the beautiful broken woman and love at first sight blossomed, or so her mother told her. When they fell on hard times and Dee inquired about her own job, Mama demanded two things from her boss if her offspring worked for him. The first, immediate notification should something like what just happened, happen. The other being equal wages to that of any male peer in her same position and experience. If Catherine Walker’s daughter made the grown-up decision to go to work, by God, Bertrum D. Norton would ante up for the sacrifice.

Dee grinned at her stalwart boss’s blush and puppy eyes whenever he gazed upon her mama. Yep, the eldest Miss Walker had that man wrapped around her little ole pinkie toe.

I meant no offense, Arthur asserted, causing Dee to jump out of her musings. She turned to look at him with a hand to her chest.

Damn, Arthur, you scared me.

Sorry.

The afternoon whistle blew again, and groans