Savor the Moment Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Teaser chapter

  Nora Roberts

  HOT ICE

  SACRED SINS

  BRAZENVIRTUE

  SWEET REVENGE

  PUBLIC SECRETS

  GENUINE LIES

  CARNAL INNOCENCE

  DIVINE EVIL

  HONEST ILLUSIONS

  PRIVATE SCANDALS

  HIDDEN RICHES

  TRUE BETRAYALS

  MONTANA SKY

  SANCTUARY

  HOMEPORT

  THE REEF

  RIVER’S END

  CAROLINA MOON

  THE VILLA

  MIDNIGHT BAYOU

  THREE FATES

  BIRTHRIGHT

  NORTHERN LIGHTS

  BLUE SMOKE

  ANGELS FALL

  HIGH NOON

  TRIBUTE

  BLACK HILLS

  Series

  Born In Trilogy

  BORN IN FIRE

  BORN IN ICE

  BORN IN SHAME

  Dream Trilogy

  DARING TO DREAM

  HOLDING THE DREAM

  FINDING THE DREAM

  Chesapeake Bay Saga

  SEA SWEPT

  RISING TIDES

  INNER HARBOR

  CHESAPEAKE BLUE

  Gallaghers of Ardmore Trilogy

  JEWELS OF THE SUN

  TEARS OFTHE MOON

  HEART OF THE SEA

  Three Sisters Island Trilogy

  DANCE UPON THE AIR

  HEAVEN AND EARTH

  FACE THE FIRE

  Key Trilogy

  KEY OF LIGHT

  KEY OF KNOWLEDGE

  KEY OF VALOR

  In the Garden Trilogy

  BLUE DAHLIA

  BLACK ROSE

  RED LILY

  Circle Trilogy

  MORRIGAN’S CROSS

  DANCE OF THE GODS

  VALLEY OF SILENCE

  Sign of Seven Trilogy

  BLOOD BROTHERS

  THE HOLLOW

  THE PAGAN STONE

  Bride Quartet

  VISION IN WHITE

  BED OF ROSES

  SAVOR THE MOMENT

  Nora Roberts & J. D. Robb

  REMEMBER WHEN

  J. D. Robb

  NAKED IN DEATH

  GLORY IN DEATH

  IMMORTAL IN DEATH

  RAPTURE IN DEATH

  CEREMONY IN DEATH

  VENGEANCE IN DEATH

  HOLIDAY IN DEATH

  CONSPIRACY IN DEATH

  LOYALTY IN DEATH

  WITNESS IN DEATH

  JUDGMENT IN DEATH

  BETRAYAL IN DEATH

  SEDUCTION IN DEATH

  REUNION IN DEATH

  PURITY IN DEATH

  PORTRAIT IN DEATH

  IMITATION IN DEATH

  DIVIDED IN DEATH

  VISIONS IN DEATH

  SURVIVOR IN DEATH

  ORIGIN IN DEATH

  MEMORY IN DEATH

  BORN IN DEATH

  INNOCENT IN DEATH

  CREATION IN DEATH

  STRANGERS IN DEATH

  SALVATION IN DEATH

  PROMISES IN DEATH

  KINDRED IN DEATH

  FANTASY IN DEATH

  Anthologies

  FROM THE HEART

  A LITTLE MAGIC

  A LITTLE FATE

  MOON SHADOWS

  (with Jill Gregory, Ruth Ryan Langan, and Marianne Willman)

  The Once Upon Series

  (with Jill Gregory, Ruth Ryan Langan, and Marianne Willman)

  ONCE UPON A CASTLE

  ONCE UPON A STAR

  ONCE UPON A DREAM

  ONCE UPON A ROSE

  ONCE UPON A KISS

  ONCE UPON A MIDNIGHT

  SILENT NIGHT

  (with Susan Plunkett, Dee Holmes, and Claire Cross)

  OUT OF THIS WORLD

  (with Laurell K. Hamilton, Susan Krinard, and Maggie Shayne)

  BUMP IN THE NIGHT

  (with Mary Blayney, Ruth Ryan Langan, and Mary Kay McComas)

  DEAD OF NIGHT

  (with Mary Blayney, Ruth Ryan Langan, and Mary Kay McComas)

  THREE IN DEATH

  SUITE 606

  (with Mary Blayney, Ruth Ryan Langan, and Mary Kay McComas)

  THE LOST

  (with Patricia Gaffney, Mary Blayney, and Ruth Ryan Langan)

  Also available ...

  THE OFFICIAL NORA ROBERTS COMPANION

  (edited by Denise Little and Laura Hayden)

  THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA

  Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700,Toronto, Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada

  (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)

  Penguin Books Ltd., 80 Strand, London WC2R ORL, England

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  (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty. Ltd.)

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  (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd.)

  Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty.) Ltd., 24 Sturdee Avenue, Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196,

  South Africa

  Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R ORL, England

  This book is an original publication of The Berkley Publishing Group.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are 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. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

  Copyright © 2010 by Nora Roberts.

  Excerpt from Happy Ever After copyright © by Nora Roberts.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  BERKLEY® is a registered trademark of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  The “B” design is a trademark of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  PRINTING HISTORY

  Berkley trade paperback edition / May 2010

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Roberts, Nora.

  Savor the moment / Nora Roberts.

  p. cm.

  eISBN : 978-1-101-18712-8

  1. Female friendship—Fiction. 2. Bakers—Fiction. 3. Businesswomen—Fiction.

  4. Connecticut—Fiction. [1 . Weddings—
Fiction.] I. Title.

  PS3568.O243S38 2010

  813’.54—dc22

  2009053564

  http://us.penguingroup.com

  For my brother Jim, the family baker

  I sing of brooks, of blossoms, birds, and bowers;

  Of April, May, of June, and July flowers.

  I sing of Maypoles, Hock-carts, wassails, wakes,

  Of bridegrooms, brides, and of their bridal cakes.

  —ROBERT HERRICK

  I wonder by my troth, what thou and I

  Did, till we lov’d?

  —DONNE

  PROLOGUE

  As THE CLOCK TICKED DOWN ON HER SENIOR YEAR IN HIGH school, Laurel McBane learned one indisputable fact.

  Prom was hell.

  For weeks all anyone wanted to talk about was who might ask whom, who did ask whom—and who asked some other whom, thereby inciting misery and hysteria.

  Girls, to her mind, suffered an agony of suspense and an embarrassing passivity during prom season. The halls, classrooms, and quad throbbed with emotion running the gamut from giddy euphoria because some guy asked them to some overhyped dance, to bitter tears because some guy didn’t.

  The entire cycle revolved around “some guy,” a condition she believed both stupid and demoralizing.

  And after that, the hysteria continued, even escalated with the hunt for a dress, for shoes, the intense debate about up-dos versus down-dos. Limos, after-parties, hotel suites—the yes, no, maybe of sex.

  She’d have skipped the whole thing if her friends, especially Parker Right-of-Passage Brown, hadn’t ganged up on her.

  Now her savings account—all those hard-earned dollars and cents from countless hours waiting tables—reeled in shock at the withdrawals for a dress she’d probably never wear again, the shoes, the bag, and all the rest.

  She could lay all that on her friends’ heads, too. She’d gotten caught up shopping with Parker, Emmaline, and Mackensie, and spent more than she should have.

  The idea, gently broached by Emma, of asking her parents to spring for the dress wasn’t an option, not to Laurel’s mind. A point of pride, maybe, but money in the McBane household had become a very sore subject since her father’s dicey investments fiasco and the little matter of the IRS audit.

  No way she’d ask either of them. She earned her own, and had for several years now.

  She told herself it didn’t matter. She didn’t have close to enough saved for the tuition for the Culinary Institute, or the living expenses in New York, despite the hours she’d put in at the restaurant after school and on weekends. The cost of looking great for one night didn’t change that one way or the other—and, what the hell, she did look great.

  She fixed on her earrings while across the room—Parker’s bedroom—Parker and Emma experimented with ways to prom-up the hair Mac had impulsively hacked off to what Laurel thought of as Julius Caesar takes the Rubicon. They tried various pins, sparkle dust, and jeweled clips in what was left of Mac’s flame red hair while the three of them talked nonstop, and Aerosmith rocked out of the CD player.

  She liked listening to them like this, when she was a little bit apart. Maybe especially now, when she felt a little bit apart. They’d been friends all their lives, and now—rite of passage or not—things were changing. In the fall Parker and Emma would head off to college. Mac would be working, and squeezing in a few courses on photography.

  And with the dream of the Culinary Institute poofed due to finances and her parents’ most recent marital implosion, she’d settle for community college part-time. Business courses, she supposed. She’d have to be practical. Realistic.

  And she wasn’t going to think about it now. She might as well enjoy the moment, and this ritual that Parker, in her Parker way, had arranged.

  Parker and Emma might be going to prom at the Academy while she and Mac went to theirs at the public high school, but they had this time together, getting dressed and made up. Downstairs Parker’s and Emma’s parents hung out, and there’d be dozens of pictures and “oh, look at our girls!” hugs and probably some shiny eyes.

  Mac’s mother was too self-involved to care about her daughter’s senior prom, which, Linda being Linda, could only be a good thing. And Laurel’s own parents? Well, they were too steeped in their own lives, their own problems, for it to matter where she was or what she did tonight.

  She was used to it. Had even come to prefer it.

  “Just the fairy dust sparkles,” Mac decided, tipping her head side to side to judge. “It’s kind of Tinker Bell-y. In a cool way.”

  “I think you’re right.” Parker, her straight-as-rain brown hair a glossy waterfall down her back, nodded. “It’s waif with an edge. What do you think, Em?”

  “I think we need to play up the eyes more, go drama.” Emma’s eyes, a deep, dreamy brown, narrowed in thought. “I can do this.”

  “Have at it.” Mac shrugged. “But don’t take forever, okay? I still have to set up for our group shot.”

  “We’re on schedule.” Parker checked her watch. “We’ve still got thirty minutes before ...” She turned, caught sight of Laurel. “Hey. You look awesome!”

  “Oh, you really do!” Emma clapped her hands together. “I knew that was the dress. The shimmery pink makes your eyes even bluer.”

  “I guess.”

  “Need one more thing.” Parker hurried to her dresser, opened a drawer on her jewelry box. “This hair clip.”

  Laurel, a slim girl in shimmery pink, her sun-shot hair done—at Emma’s insistence—in long, loose sausage curls, shrugged. “Whatever.”

  Parker held it against Laurel’s hair at different angles. “Cheer up,” she ordered. “You’re going to have fun.”

  God, get over yourself, Laurel! “I know. Sorry. It’d be more fun if the four of us were going to the same dance, especially since we all look seriously awesome.”

  “Yeah, it would.” Parker decided to draw some of the curls from the sides to clip them in the back. “But we’ll meet up after and party. When we’re done we’ll come back here and tell each other everything. Here, take a look.”

  She turned Laurel to the mirror, and the girls studied themselves and each other.

  “I do look great,” Laurel said and made Parker laugh.

  After the most perfunctory of knocks, the door opened. Mrs. Grady, the Browns’ longtime housekeeper, put her hands on her hips to take a survey.

  “You’ll do,” she said, “which you should after all this fuss. Finish up with it and get yourselves downstairs for pictures. You.” She pointed a finger at Laurel. “I need a word with you, young lady.”

  “What did I do?” Laurel demanded, looking from friend to friend as Mrs. Grady strode away. “I didn’t do anything.” But since Mrs. G’s word was law, Laurel rushed after her.

  In the family sitting room, Mrs. G turned, arms folded. Lecture mode, Laurel thought as her heart tripped. And she cast her mind back, looking for an infraction that might have earned her one from the woman who’d been more of a mother to her than her own through her teenage years.

  “So,” Mrs. Grady began as Laurel hurried in, “I guess you think you’re all grown-up now.”

  “I—”

  “Well, you’re not. But you’re getting there. The four of you’ve been running tame around here since you were in diapers. Some of that’s going to change, with all of you going your own ways. At least for a time. Birds tell me your way’s to New York and that fancy baking school.”

  Her heart took another trip, then suffered the pinprick of a deflated dream. “No, I’m, ah, keeping my job at the restaurant, and I’m going to try to take some courses at the—”

  “No, you’re not.” Again, Mrs. G pointed a finger. “Now, a girl your age in New York City best be smart and best be careful. And from what I’m told, if you want to make it at that school you have to work hard. It’s more than making pretty frostings and cookies.”

  “It’s one of the best, but—”

  “T
hen you’ll be one of the best.” Mrs. G reached in her pocket. She held out a check to Laurel. “That’ll cover the first semester, the tuition, a decent place to live, and enough food to keep body and soul together. You make good use of it, girl, or you’ll answer to me. If you do what I expect you’re capable of, we’ll talk about the next term when the time comes.”

  Stunned, Laurel stared at the check in her hand. “You can’t—I can’t—”

  “I can and you will. That’s that.”

  “But—”

  “Didn’t I just say that’s that? If you let me down, there’ll be hell to pay, I promise you. Parker and Emma are going off to college, and Mackensie’s dead set on working full-time with her photography. You’ve got a different path, so you’ll take it. It’s what you want, isn’t it?”

  “More than anything.” Tears stung her eyes, burned her throat. “Mrs. G, I don’t know what to say. I’ll pay you back. I’ll—”

  “Damn right, you will. You’ll pay me back by making something of yourself. It’s up to you now.”

  Laurel threw her arms around Mrs. Grady, clung. “You won’t be sorry. I’ll make you proud.”

  “I believe you will. There now. Go finish getting ready.”

  Laurel held on another moment. “I’ll never forget this,” she whispered. “Never. Thank you. Thank you, thank you!”

  She rushed for the door, anxious to share the news with her friends, then turned, young, radiant. “I can’t wait to start.”

  CHAPTER ONE

  ALONE, WITH NORAH JONES WHISPERING THROUGH THE iPOD, Laurel transformed a panel of fondant into a swatch of elegant, edible lace. She didn’t hear the music, used it more to fill the air than as entertainment while she painstakingly pieced the completed panel onto the second tier of four.