Thank you so much for inviting me here today to share an exclusive excerpt from
my brand new modern fairytale, GINGER’S HEART, inspired by
“Little Red Riding Hood.” Here’s what you need to know: the following excerpt
takes place on Ginger’s 12th birthday. The boys she refers to—Cain
and Woodman—are cousins with whom Ginger has grown up. They are both
15-years-old, wildly handsome and as different as they can be. Do you feel a
love triangle forming? I sure do!!
(Used with permission. All rights reserved.)
“Gran!” shouted Ginger, quickening her pace. She’d barely seen her
grandmother—her father’s mother—all day, and after Woodman, Gran was her very
closest friend.
Kelleyanne McHuid had moved into the in-law cottage after Ginger’s parents were
married, way before Ginger was born, which meant that she’d been a permament
fixture at McHuid’s throughout Ginger’s childhood. Though, she wrinkled her nose
with worry, she didn’t know for how much longer. Recently, Ginger had heard her
mother and father discussing Gran in hushed tones behind closed doors. Gran
suffered from Parkinson’s, and Ginger’s mother seemed to feel that she needed
“more care” than they could provide at home, while Ginger’s father refused to
discuss putting his mother into a “damned home” yet. It worried Ginger near
constantly to think of losing her Gran to the nursing home in town.
“Here’s the birthday girl!” said Gran, patting the seat cushion beside her with
a trembling hand. Gran’s whole body trembled lately. More and more every day.
Her eyes lowered to the bracelet around Ginger’s wrist and she grinned. “Whatcha
got there, dollbaby?”
“Gift from Woodman,” said Ginger, feeling her cheeks flush.
“Awful pretty,” said Gran, reaching for the bracelet, her shaking fingers making
it jingle as she looked at each one of the charms. “And awful thoughtful.
Josiah’s a good boy.”
Just about everyone called Woodman "Woodman" except Gran and sometimes Cain.
Gran insisted on calling him by his Christian name. Cain used “Josiah” and
“Woodman” interchangeably with no real rhyme or reason that Ginger could follow.
“Rumor is you’re gonna marry him someday,” said Kellyanne to her granddaughter,
her sixty-something blue eyes merry. “But what do you say?”
Ginger giggled self-consciously, thinking about her grandmother’s question,
something clenching in her twelve-year-old heart as she thought about marrying
sensible Woodman and abandoning her wild feelings for Cain.
“I don’t know,” she said, feeling her forehead crease in confusion.
“Or maybe you’re thinkin’ you want to marry…Cain,” said Gran softly.
Cain, with his jet black hair and ice blue eyes, appeared like a vision before
her, and Ginger’s heart thumped faster. The way he’d run off to see Mary-Louise
Walker this afternoon made her brown eyes spitting green with jealousy. The way
he swaggered made her breath catch. Woodman was so predictable, so safe in
comparison.
Then again, Woodman hadn’t exactly been predictable this afternoon, had he? He’d
surprised her with the gift and even more with his words. His body had been hard
and warm when he’d held her, the embrace awakening something new and foreign
within her. Something she wasn’t sure she wanted. Something that didn’t feel
safe and even scared her a little bit. She pulled her fingers away from the
charm bracelet and faced her Gran.
“What do I do if I love them both?”
Her grandmother’s eyes, which had been mostly teasing, flinched, and her mouth
tilted down in a sympathetic frown, which made her face seem so serious and sober.
“Choose, dollbaby," said her Gran. "Someday you’ll have to choose.”
The same feeling that she’d had in the barn, when Cain had yelled, “Jump to the
one you love the most, darlin’!” flared up within her—a fierce refusal to love
one cousin more than the other, to give up one in lieu of the other.
Choose? Her memories skated back through a dozen years on McHuid’s Farm
that had always included Cain and Woodman. When they were little children, they
played together, swimming buck naked in the creek and racing over the green
hills and pastures in impromptu games of tag. As the boys grew up, they started
working with Cain’s daddy, Klaus, who was her father’s right-hand man, mucking
out the stables and grooming the horses. She’d run down to the barn every day
after her lessons to see them, working right along beside them until they were
all covered in hay, dust and barn grime.
Though the Wolframs weren’t generally included in the McHuid’s active social
life, the Woodmans were, which meant that in addition to seeing Cain and Woodman
on the farm, she also saw Woodman at every holiday and birthday party…and they
always managed to slip out unseen with some smuggled sweets for Cain.
They were the Three Musketeers of McHuid’s Farm and Ginger knew both boys as
well as she knew herself—Cain’s smirking, hot-headed, impulsive ways, and
Woodman’s level-headed patience, caution and kindness. Regardless of their
differences, she also knew that as the only children of twin sisters, Cain and
Woodman were much closer than most cousins. Genetically speaking, they were
half-brothers, and while they surely liked to tease and torture each other, they
wouldn’t hesitate to jump into front of a train to save the other’s skin either.
In Ginger’s mind, she envisioned them like two halves of the same coin that she
held carefully in the palm of her hand.
She loved them both desperately.
Choose?
No, her heart protested. Impossible.
“What if I can’t?” she whispered, leaning back and resting her head on her
grandmother’s comforting shoulder.
“Then you’ll lose them both,” said her grandmother softly.
Ginger’s shoulders fell, relaxing in surrender as she closed her eyes against
the burn of tears.
“But don’t let’s think about that now, dollbaby,” said Gran, leaning her head
upon her granddaughter’s, the constant tremble of her unpredictable body almost
soothing to Ginger as they rocked side by side in the twilight. “You’re just
twelve today. You’ve got your whole life ahead of you.”
Once upon a time there were two cousins:
one golden like the sun,
one dark like midnight,
one a protector,
one a predator,
one a Woodsman
and
one a Wolf...
both owning equal,
but different,
parts of a little girl's heart.
In this modern retelling of "Little Red Riding Hood," the woodsman and the
wolf are cousins, and Little Red is the girl with whom they both fall in
love.
Beautiful Ginger McHuid, daughter of Kentucky's premiere horse
breeder, grows up on her family farm, best friends with Cain Wolfram, the son of
her father's Stallion Manager, and Cain's cousin, Josiah Woodman, son of a local
banker. Throughout their happy childhood, the three are inseparable friends, but
as they mature into adults, complicated feelings threaten to destroy their long
history of friendship and love.
This is a standalone novel inspired by
Little Red Riding Hood. Contemporary Romance: Due to profanity and very strong
sexual content, this book is not intended for readers under the age of 18.
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