More Than Words, Where Dreams Begin: Black Tie and PromisesSafely HomeDaffodils in Spring Read online

  HARLEQUIN MORE THAN WORDS

  Where Dreams Begin

  Three bestselling authors

  Three real-life heroines

  Each of us can effect change. In our own unique ways, we can all make the world a better place. We need only to take that first step, do that first good deed and the ripple effect will be life-changing to so many. Three extraordinary women who were compelled to take that first leap and make a difference have been chosen as recipients of Harlequin’s More Than Words award. To celebrate their accomplishments, three bestselling authors have written short stories inspired by these real-life heroines.

  Sherryl Woods captures the magic of pretty dresses and first dances in Black Tie and Promises.

  Christina Skye’s Safely Home is the story of a woman determined to help the elderly in her newly adopted community.

  Pamela Morsi explores how literacy and the love of reading can enrich and indeed change lives, in Daffodils in Spring.

  Dear Reader,

  For many years Harlequin has been a leader in supporting and promoting causes that are of concern to women, and celebrating women who make extraordinary differences in the lives of others. The Harlequin More Than Words program honors three women each year for their compassionate dedication to those who need it most, and donates $15,000 to each of their chosen causes.

  Within these pages you will find stories written by Sherryl Woods, Christina Skye and Pamela Morsi. These stories are beautiful tributes to the Harlequin More Than Words award recipients and we hope they will touch your heart and inspire the real-life heroine in you.

  Thank you for your support. Net proceeds from the sale of this book will be reinvested into the Harlequin More Than Words program so we can continue to support more causes of concern to women. And you can help even more by learning about and getting involved with the charities highlighted by Harlequin More Than Words, or even nominating an outstanding individual in your life for a future award. Together we can make a difference!

  Sincerely,

  Donna Hayes

  Publisher and CEO

  Harlequin Enterprises Ltd.

  Contents

  BLACK TIE AND PROMISES

  SAFELY HOME

  DAFFOLDILS IN SPRING

  BLACK TIE AND PROMISES

  by Sherryl Woods

  Inspired by Ruth Renwick

  Contents

  RUTH RENWICK

  SHERRYL WOODS-BLACK TIE AND PROMISES

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  DEAR READER

  Ruth Renwick

  Inside the Dream

  Imagine you’re a seventeen-year-old high school student. You’ve worked hard, done well and now you’re about to graduate. Your classmates are looking forward to the graduation festivities, but for you the prospects do not look promising. In fact, it’s unlikely you will be able to go. There’s nothing in your closet remotely suitable to wear for the occasion, and no money to buy what you need.

  It may come as a surprise to some to learn how many students face this dilemma. One of the most important occasions in their young lives is looming, and they’re actually dreading it because they’re probably going to have to miss it. Too many quietly withdraw rather than face the misery and embarrassment of showing up without a dress or tuxedo suitable for the occasion.

  Ten years ago Ruth Renwick decided to do something about this. A social worker in the Greater Toronto

  Area’s Peel Region, she was accustomed to helping people in all sorts of troubling situations, so when a fellow worker, Tracey Ciccarelli, called to ask for help for a single mother whose daughter could not afford to attend her graduation, Ruth went home and ransacked her closets for something suitable. She also provided a corsage, shawl, jewelry and a disposable camera so the girl could take pictures of her graduation.

  Helping that girl was the beginning of Inside the Dream, a not-for-profit organization that Ruth set up to assist high school graduates in straitened circumstances. Since that day, she has so far helped 1,803 students realize their dreams of graduating alongside their peers.

  At a special Boutique Day held once a year in May, the students—who have all been referred by a social worker or counselor—turn up to select gowns (from a minimum of three to five choices for each student, “to give them options”), tuxedos, shoes and accessories. Last year, about 267 students in the area benefited from this service.

  Ruth is touched by their stories. Some of the recipients have such low self-esteem that they’re barely able to make eye contact. One girl who was shown a beautiful dress told Ruth, “I don’t deserve that dress,” and eventually selected the plainest one she could find. Ruth put the beautiful dress in a bag and gave it to her social worker for her. Another girl, verbally abused at home, arrived early at a Boutique Day on her way to her part-time job. “We weren’t ready, but she didn’t have much time, so we let her come and choose what she needed,” Ruth says. As she left, the girl told Ruth, “I never had a reason to smile until today.” That girl has now graduated from university.

  It’s students like that—“smart kids in need, kids with great potential”—who inspire Ruth to redouble her efforts. She is constantly on the lookout for people who can help her with donations of clothing and accessories, and isn’t the least bit shy about approaching a beautifully dressed woman at a charity event and persuading her to contribute a gown—and to get her friends involved, as well.

  As a social worker, Ruth sees all kinds of people in need—so why this particular cause? “I’m a mother,” she says simply. “I know what it means to young people to want to celebrate something they have accomplished. It’s one of the first big events in your life. I want to help them create memories.” And so, with meticulous care, she creates the opportunity for each one of them to be a prince or princess for the day.

  Originally from Peru, Ruth had trouble at first believing that there could be such a need in Canada. One mother cried when Ruth took a picture of her with her daughter on graduation day. “She had never had her picture taken with her daughter.”

  Janace King-Watson, a social worker who worked closely with Ruth for three years, calls her an “incredible blessing” to families. “She makes the young people feel really special and treats them with such dignity,” she says. She remembers the beaming face of a boy she had never seen smile, who was transformed by his graduation formal wear. “Something happened that day that made all the difference,” she says, noting that many more of the students are now attending their proms as well as graduation, something they were reluctant to do before because they didn’t want to embarrass themselves.

  The students who come to the Boutique Day are comfortable because they know all their information is confidential. They are each accompanied by a volunteer “godmother”
(for girls) or “godfather” (for boys) to help and advise them. The volunteers take tremendous pride in the successful outcomes for the students, Ruth says. “Look what happened to my boy” or “my girl” is a typical reaction.

  Volunteers are a big part of the enterprise. They include the hairdresser who styles each girl’s hair before her big event, the person who does makeup, a professional photographer and a seamstress who does the alterations, as well as the many individuals who run errands and donate clothing, and corporate sponsors who provide everything from snacks and dinners to cosmetics and tickets to various events for the students. A school in the area recently held a drive and donated almost three hundred dresses, and boxes of tuxedos were sent from a boutique in New Jersey that was closing. Ruth uses her website to solicit donations, but also to provide help and advice to other communities interested in setting up a similar program.

  By persistence and persuasion, Ruth is helping to build precious memories for young people who would otherwise be deprived of a pleasure others take for granted. She wants everyone she meets to become involved. “If you can’t give me anything yourself,” she tells people, “you have friends who might be able to.”

  It’s not just a request for help—it’s an invitation to come Inside the Dream.

  For more information visit www.insidethedream.org or write to Inside the Dream Formal Attire Program, 3326 Martins Pine Crescent, Mississauga, Ontario L5L lG4, Canada.

  SHERRYL WOODS

  Black Tie and Promises

  Sherryl Woods

  With her roots firmly planted in the South, Sherryl Woods has written many of her more than 100 books in that distinctive setting, whether in her home state of Virginia, her adopted state, Florida, or her much-adored South Carolina.

  She is the New York Times and USA TODAY bestselling author of the Sweet Magnolias series and is best known for her ability to create endearing small-town communities and families. She divides her time between her childhood summer home overlooking the Potomac River in Colonial Beach, Virginia, and her oceanfront home with its lighthouse view in Key Biscayne, Florida. Visit her at SherrylWoods.com.

  CHAPTER

  ONE

  Jodie Fletcher leaned across her desk and studied the earnest expression on Laurie Winston’s face. Though beautiful and popular, Laurie was one of those high school seniors who actually thought more about others than she did about herself. Perhaps it was simply her upbringing, or maybe losing her mother at fifteen had turned Laurie into a more compassionate person. Whatever the explanation, Jodie tended to give more credence to Laurie’s heartfelt pleas than she did to those of the teenager’s self-absorbed classmates.

  Okay, there was more to it than that, Jodie admitted to herself. She paid attention because Laurie was Trent Winston’s daughter. A lifetime ago Jodie and Trent had been in a relationship that had been doomed from the start. She’d seen that, even if Trent hadn’t.

  Trent had ambitions to make it big in high-end residential construction, and he’d needed a woman by his side who could help him make the climb to the top. Jodie hadn’t been that woman. She’d had zero self-confidence after years of being the less-than-perfect daughter, the less-than-perfect student, the less-than-perfect younger sister. Back then, she hadn’t considered herself an ideal match for anyone, despite Trent’s obvious feelings for her.

  In what might have been the most unselfish gesture of her life, she’d ended the relationship, setting Trent free to find someone better suited to help him build his empire than a woman still struggling to find herself. He’d fought for her for a while, but in the end he must have seen the wisdom in her decision because he’d finally stopped calling. A couple of years after the breakup, she’d read about his marriage to Megan Davis, the socialite daughter of multimillionaire Warren Davis, a gorgeous, delicate woman with all the right connections. Only then had Jodie truly moved on.

  When she’d joined the staff at Rockingham High School last year, she’d been taken aback when she’d gone through the student records and discovered that Laurie Winston was Trent’s daughter and that he’d been widowed for two years. Every time she encountered Laurie, she avidly looked for traces of Trent in Laurie’s features. Obviously, though, Laurie had inherited her coloring and looks from her mother’s side of the family. Jodie did see a tiny hint of Trent in Laurie’s persistence and in the way she spoke so passionately when she cared about something, like now.

  “There has to be something we can do, Ms. Fletcher,” Laurie repeated. “There just has to be. It’s not fair that so many kids miss the prom and all the other graduation activities just because they don’t have anything to wear. It happens every year and it’s wrong.”

  Jodie had often thought much the same thing at her old school in a neighboring district, but until this past summer she’d been at a loss as to what could be done. Now she actually had a few ideas, thanks to a friend she’d visited in Canada who was familiar with a program called Inside the Dream that provided clothing, accessories and everything else that was needed to kids who might otherwise have to miss those important senior-year events.

  Longtime staff at Rockingham High School told Jodie that as the prom had become more elaborate and expensive, it was no longer within reach for many of the students. More and more young people pretended not to care that they were missing their senior prom. Girls with stars in their eyes, who’d been dreaming of that night ever since they’d started high school, suddenly claimed to have better things to do. The boys, rigid with pride, made their own plans for a guys’ night out and swore it was better than any dumb old dance could ever be.

  As a counselor, Jodie had seen the same unspoken heartbreak many times at her previous school, but she was curious about what had made Laurie aware of the dilemma faced by many of her classmates.

  “Why is this so important to you?” she asked the teen.

  With her pale complexion, there was no mistaking the blush that spread across Laurie’s cheeks. She brushed a strand of silky blond hair back from her face. A diamond tennis bracelet winked on her wrist. “Actually it’s because of Mike,” she admitted. “You know Mike Brentwood, right?”

  Since Rockingham High only had a few hundred students, Jodie knew most of them, at least by name. She knew Mike better than most. She nodded. “You and Mike have been dating for a while now, haven’t you?”

  “Since we were juniors,” Laurie said.

  “So you know his family?”

  Laurie nodded.

  “Then you’ve known for some time that the expense of a big dance might be more than he could handle,” Jodie suggested.

  Mike was one of four kids being raised in a mostly affluent community by a struggling single mom who earned minimum wage. Money was always tight. Jodie knew more than she intended to share with Laurie. She’d already helped to get Mike’s younger sisters and brother free school breakfasts and lunches because they were coming to school hungry too often. Mike had refused any similar help for himself, claiming he got to eat at his after-school job as a busboy at a local restaurant.

  “I’ve known from the beginning that it’s tough for his family,” Laurie said. “Last year we skipped prom. We talked about doing that again this year, and to be honest, I’d be okay with it, but I can tell Mike feels really, really bad about it, like he’s letting me down or something. And then, when we were setting up the organizing committee, I was talking to a couple of girls in my class and they admitted they didn’t have the money for dresses and getting their hair done and all that stuff, so I started asking around. There must be at least a dozen girls, probably more, who can’t afford to do any of the things that the rest of us can. I didn’t ask the boys, but I’ll bet there’s just as many of them who don’t have extra cash. They shouldn’t be left out, Ms. Fletcher. Like I said be
fore, it’s wrong.”

  Jodie nodded, impressed by her compassion. “Okay, then, if you’ve done all this research, I’m sure you have some thoughts about what needs to happen.”

  Laurie grinned. “Actually, that’s why I came to you. You’re in the business of fixing things. I only had one idea and basically it sucked.”

  Jodie laughed at her candid assessment. “What idea was that?”

  “To cancel prom and do something different that everyone could afford.” Laurie shrugged. “That didn’t seem fair, either. In fact, I’d probably get run out of school for even suggesting it.”

  “You could be right,” Jodie agreed. There were some traditions that no one wanted to tamper with. The prom was one of those rites of passage.

  “So?” Laurie asked, that earnest expression back on her face. “Do you have any ideas?”

  “Actually, I do,” Jodie admitted. “But it’s only a few months until prom. It would take a lot of work to pull off my plan in time, but I’m willing to give it a try if you’ll agree to work with me.”

  “Tell me,” Laurie said eagerly. “I’m sure I can get more people to help if it means everyone will be able to participate this year.”

  Jodie pulled up the Inside the Dream Web site on her computer and turned the screen so that Laurie could see it. “A friend I was visiting last summer told me about this organization,” she explained. “They find donations of dresses, suits, tuxedos, shoes, you name it. Some tuxedo rental businesses donate gift certificates. The organizers get volunteer seamstresses to make alterations. They find hairstylists and makeup artists who can help out.”

  Laurie’s eyes lit up. “That is so awesome. I’ll bet we could do that here. A lot of moms give tons of business to the boutiques in the area. I’ll bet they could persuade some of them to donate gowns. And there must be a lot of dads who buy or rent tuxedos all the time, too. They might be able to arrange for some rentals or give us their old tuxes.”