The Scent of Forever Read online

  Table of Contents

  THE SCENT OF FOREVER

  Acknowledgments

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  THE SCENT OF FOREVER

  JULIE DOHERTY

  SOUL MATE PUBLISHING

  New York

  THE SCENT OF FOREVER

  Copyright©2018

  JULIE DOHERTY

  Cover Design by Fiona Jayde

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, business establishments, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.

  The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials.

  Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

  Published in the United States of America by

  Soul Mate Publishing

  P.O. Box 24

  Macedon, New York, 14502

  ISBN: 978-1-68291-737-4

  www.SoulMatePublishing.com

  The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

  For anyone who ever suffered the pain of infertility.

  Acknowledgments

  Many thanks to Marek Y., Jimmy E., and Jock S. for helping me shock Nigel, to Allison S. and Yve S. for advice on posh language (ghastly!), and to Janet G. for researching railway stations. Maurice D., Monica G., Carrie J., Debra R., and Alicia L., thank you for reading scenes and offering honest opinions. Special thanks to my four Fs—fans, friends, family, and followers—for your tireless support and to Mary Harris for superior editing.

  And now, an apology. For plot purposes, this novel paints county staff in a rather negative light. For that, I must beg forgiveness. In truth, everyone at the Juniata County Historical Society and the Register and Recorder’s office goes above and beyond in their efforts to assist those who cross their thresholds. We are blessed to have such dedicated workers in our midst.

  Finally, to my 35+ sisters, a terrible thing brought us together; love made us stay. You are among the bravest, best women I know. I hope this book says what you sometimes can’t.

  Chapter 1

  As birds chattered in the canopy above her, Ann McConnell surveyed the sunken footprint of her ancestor’s cabin. Time erased that frontiersman’s identity, along with his roof and the walls built to keep his enemies at bay. Only his chimney survived, though age and weather reduced it to a sagging hearth and one intact wall. The rest of its stones lay in a heap, just like the pieces of Ann’s life.

  She would restore the chimney—beginning today—but her dismantled world? That would take a different kind of mortar.

  Pressing an empty ice cream pail against her belly, she headed for the wheelbarrow. “Okay, Maggie, let’s do this.” She kicked down weeds, scattering butterflies and grasshoppers. “What’s the ratio again?”

  Her best friend sat on the apex of a stepladder with a Stanley level in one hand and an open book wilting over the other. “Says here three scoops of sand, one scoop of cement, and half a scoop of lime.” She squealed and swatted at a wasp, nearly upsetting the ladder. “Stupid bee.”

  “Be careful, would you?” The last thing they needed was a trip to the hospital.”

  Ann tossed the pail into the wheelbarrow, along with a hoe she would need for mixing the cement. She lifted the barrow’s smooth handles and pushed her tools to a sand mound, where a sculpted penis there stopped her dead in her tracks and sent Maggie into hysterics.

  “What are we, Mags, twelve?” She threw a handful of sand at her friend.

  Maggie brushed the grit off her thighs. “I thought you could use one.”

  Ann giggled. “You do know you’re penis-obsessed, don’t you?”

  “It serves me well.”

  So it did. Maggie made a tidy living writing erotica.

  “I hear a car.” The mischief faded from Maggie’s amber eyes. “Someone’s coming.” She started down the ladder, her auburn ponytail swinging.

  A burgundy Escalade barreled out of the hemlock forest buffering Ann’s property from a desolate township road. It hummed across an iron bridge spanning the creek, then slid to a halt at the cabin ruins, sending dust clouds billowing up from the tires. Its driver doffed expensive-looking sunglasses and opened the door.

  “Shit.” Maggie started up the hill. “I’ll be up at the house if you need me.”

  “Stay right where you are,” Ann said.

  Gucci pumps hit the dirt below the driver’s door.

  A shrill voice scattered a flock of chickadees. “You ever return phone calls?” Janet Morelli slammed the door of her SUV, then picked her way across the driveway with a Louis Vuitton bag slung over her shoulder.

  Ann wiped her hands on her jeans. “Janet, you remember Margaret Mason, don’t you?”

  “Of course.” Janet’s Crimson Rhapsody lips twisted into a grimace-like smile. “I enjoyed your latest release. You have another coming out shortly, no?”

  Maggie nodded, looking terrified.

  Janet had that effect on most people.

  “In November,” Maggie replied.

  “An author with work ethic.” Janet cocked a brow at Ann. “Refreshing.”

  “Here we go.” Ann scooped up the sand penis, then tossed it into the wheelbarrow.

  Janet stormed across the weedy ground, sinking her heels up to their necks. “Yes, here we go. I call you, I email you. I even send you letters. Who sends letters anymore?” She patted her chest. “This idiot right here. And do you respond? No, of course you don’t. You make me get in my car and drive two hundred fuh-rickin’ miles into the wilderness to find out what the problem is. And what’s the problem? Apparently, the problem is a pile of rocks. A crumbling goddamn pile of rocks is more important than your career. Than my career, for that matter.”r />
  “You have other clients.”

  “Yes, I do, I surely do, but not one of them is Ann McConnell.” Janet stepped closer, adding the scent of Chanel No. 5 to the honeysuckle wafting on the breeze. “Let’s be honest. If you don’t make money, I don’t make money. I have bills, too, babe. When I took you on as a client, nobody knew who Ann McConnell was. You promised me you’d work hard, remember?”

  “Look, get off my back. I just need some time.”

  “How much time do you need? It’s been a year. He’s not coming back. Let that sink in a minute, sweetheart. Mike. Is. Not. Coming. Back.”

  “You don’t know that.”

  “Don’t I?” Janet popped open her bag, then pulled out her phone. “Here.” She tapped its screen and turned it around. “Maybe this will help.”

  A kick in the teeth would have hurt less than the photograph she displayed.

  Relax, they said, you’re trying too hard. You should adopt. Women always get pregnant after they adopt.

  Ann feigned indifference. “Well, look at that. She has Mike’s eyes.”

  “Yes, and his girlfriend’s pouty lips. And you know what else she has? Him. And she always will. Pull it together, McConnell, I’m running out of excuses.”

  “Worthington will wait.”

  “Worthington is getting impatient. So are your readers. Have you looked at your Facebook or Twitter accounts lately? You might be surprised at the number of cranky people you’ll find there. You promised them another book ten months ago.”

  “I’m tossing around a few ideas.”

  “You told me that in March.” Her voice softened. “Listen, I didn’t want to have to resort to this, but it’s like this: I have partners. They’re watching the numbers. You’re my numbers. Get your shit together, or I’m out.”

  ~ ~ ~

  Ann ignited the last of the tiki torches bordering the cabin’s flagstone footprint. In the twilight, an open laptop turned Maggie’s ivory skin sky blue. She lifted a bottle from the floor next to her lawn chair. “Want a glass?”

  Ann shook her head.

  “You okay?”

  “I’m fine.” Ann sank onto a bench near the ancient hearth, a feature she always intended to convert into an outdoor pizza oven. Mike hated the idea. Like her parents, he considered the cabin an eyesore, useful only to snakes and rodents. He wanted to level it—even hired a bulldozer on the sly shortly before their breakup—but Ann threatened to chain herself to the chimney. By God, she’d have done it, too.

  “You knew about the baby already, didn’t you?” Maggie asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” Maggie closed her laptop and set it on the slabs. “I’m your best friend. We should have talked about this.”

  “What’s to talk about? My husband—”

  “Ex.”

  “—left me for a younger woman and made a baby with her.”

  “Don’t call her that. She’s a brainless tramp.”

  “She’s a brainless tramp with a functioning reproductive system.”

  “And that makes her amazing, right?” Maggie rolled her eyes. “Wow, Chelsea squirted a baby out of her ass. Nobody’s ever done that before.”

  “Is that her name?”

  Maggie nodded. “Been stalking her on Facebook. Listen, so she had a baby. Big deal. You’re gorgeous. You’re rich. You’re an award-winning, bestselling novelist with a huge following.” She slapped a hand over her heart. “And you have me for a best friend. What more could you possibly want?”

  “I love you, Mags, but you really don’t get it,” Ann replied.

  “So, explain it to me.”

  “Look around you. Where are you?”

  “Um, in Pennsylvania, dumb ass?”

  “Where, specifically?”

  “In some old cabin ruins.”

  “A cabin built by my ancestors. This was frontier when they came here, a land fraught with hardship and danger.” She spread her arms wide. “They traded abject poverty for unforgiving wilderness.”

  “And?”

  Ann dropped her arms. “Why would they do that?”

  “They were probably desperate.”

  “Exactly, because they wanted more for their children, and for their children’s children.”

  Maggie brushed a rich auburn strand of hair off her forehead. “Not following.”

  “Did you know I’m the last of their line?”

  Maggie’s expression softened as understanding hit home. “And you feel like you’re letting them down by not procreating.”

  “They must have struggled to get here, and for what? So their line could eventually die out?”

  “It’s not your responsibility to ensure their DNA makes it to the next generation.”

  “But if it ends with me, it makes their sacrifices pointless.”

  “So don’t let it end with you. You can honor your ancestors without adding to the population, you know.” Maggie stood, casting a long shadow. “For God’s sake, Ann, you have two problems, infertility and a nosediving career. There’s a single solution to both, and it’s as plain as a bowl of yogurt. Write about them. Tell their story. Memorialize them in a bestseller. A novel will live long after Mike and Chelsea’s dumb baby has even dumber babies of her own.”

  Ann stared, momentarily lost for words. “I can’t believe I never thought of that.”

  Maggie waved at a lightning bug. “Remember me in your acknowledgements.”

  “I don’t deserve you.”

  “Probably not. Now, here.” Maggie carried the bottle over. “Have a glass of wine or three, and let’s talk about plots.”

  The bottle dropped and shattered.

  Maggie screamed and leapt onto the bench behind her.

  “What the hell, Mags? Your nails are like daggers!” They would leave dents in her arm.

  Ann scanned the darkness, hoping a bear hadn’t wandered in.

  “There,” Maggie squealed, pointing. “Something scampered under there. It was a mouse, wasn’t it? Aw, man, I hate mice. You know I hate mice. Do you think it was a mouse? I think it was a mouse.”

  “It was probably just a cricket.”

  “Go look.”

  Ann laughed.

  “I’m serious. Go look, or I’m going back to the house.”

  “You’re such a dang scaredy-cat.” Ann carried one of the torches closer to the hearth. She kicked away a tangle of honeysuckle vines, exposing a worn hole at the edge of the cracked hearthstone.

  “It was probably just a mole.” Curious, she slipped her fingers under the broken stone. It was loose.

  “Oh my God, Ann, don’t,” Maggie shrieked from her perch. “Something might bite you!”

  Ann ignored her and hauled harder, quivering with effort. So what if it bit her? She’d survived far worse. Her parents . . . Mike.

  “Seriously, Ann, what if there’s a whole colony of something down there? I’m going in the house. I mean it, I am.” But Maggie’s paralyzing fear of rodents held her fast. “I can’t look.” She spread her hands across her face.

  The stone gave way. Ann flipped it aside, exposing an intricate network of tiny tunnels. In one of them, something shimmered in the torchlight. She brushed away the dirt.

  “Holy shit.”

  “What? What is it?” Maggie screeched through her hands. “A snake?”

  “Holy shit,” Ann repeated. She hooked a finger under one end of something gold, then lifted it from the ground. It looked like a wide, flat necklace, greasy and caked with mud, but completely intact. A green stone gleamed at its lowest point, and as she wiped the jewel on her shirt, she saw that it was sandwiched between the jaws of two doglike creatures.

  Wolves? No, wolf
hounds.

  Maggie peeked through her fingers. “Holy crap.” She forgot her terror and jumped off the bench. “If your ancestors were so poor, where the hell did they get that?”

  “I have no idea,” Ann replied, “but we’re going to find out.”

  Chapter 2

  The necklace lay in a sunbeam next to the coffeepot.

  It hadn’t been a dream.

  Still in her pajamas, Ann poured a cup of coffee, which she carried with the necklace to her desk. She snapped on her computer, unable to recall the last time she did so. About twenty instant messages from Janet popped up, along with a recent one from Maggie. She read Maggie’s.

  Ha! I knew you’d log on today. Stalking Chelsea, are we?

  Hey, was I drunk or did we find something really awesome last night? The story of how that thing got there would make a great plot. Think about it. I probably won’t be over tomorrow. I have an interview with Smolder at ten and a lunch date with the hottie I met at Hanson’s. Research, baby!

  Ann typed a quick reply and then picked up the artifact, which they cleaned last night. Its carvings looked Celtic, so she searched the Internet for “Celtic necklace.” That brought up images of Claddagh pendants, trinity knots, and carved crosses. Page four of the search yielded an image labeled “torc.” When she clicked the picture, it led to a locked forum page at TreasureFinders.com.

  She registered as “Mole’s_Gold,” then drafted a post and proofed it for errors.

  I found what I think is a gold torc under a cabin that’s been uninhabited for almost 200 years. Does anybody know where I can learn more about it? I’m in Pennsylvania.

  She stared at the words, wondering what madness she had just invited into her life. Could some wacko locate her by her IP address?

  You worry too much. Mike always said that. He also said he had an important lunch date the day he was to meet her at the fertility clinic.