Pieces of a Life (Colton & Josie Part One) Signed Paperback + Free Swag
Pieces of a Life (Colton & Josie Part One) Signed Paperback + Free Swag
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 1,188+ 5-Star Reviews
- Purchase the Paperback/Hardcover
- If you want the book personalized make a note at checkout.
- Print book are shipped out within 7 business days.
From USA Today and Wall Street Journal bestselling author comes a romantic, psychological-thriller that critics call "unputdownable!"
How well do we know the ones we love?
The summer before fourth grade, Colten Mosley moved into the house across the street from mine, and we became inseparable.
He played the piano and baseball.
I had a penchant for dead things while at the same time imagining what it would be like to kiss Colten.
We were filled with curiosity and overly active imaginations.
We were also forbidden to be more than friends.
But that didn’t stop us.
Weeks before graduation, he annihilated my heart, and it’s been seventeen years since the day I knew I’d hate him forever.
Now he’s back in my life—a single dad and a homicide detective looking over my shoulder while I perform autopsies as one of Chicago’s most gifted forensic pathologists. Then fate throws us a curveball.
Colten saves my life, but he can’t erase the images that now keep me awake at night. And I can’t explain them.
Am I still the girl he’s always loved? Or nothing more than pieces of that life?
Chapter One Look Inside
Chapter One Look Inside
My dad said I need to stay close to you until my mom comes back. He’s afraid a bad person will hurt me.” While my mom zips the back of my white gown, I stare at the little girl before me. So innocent. So loved. So beautiful.
Her dad is right. There are bad people who do bad things to children. However, we are at a private venue surrounded by family and close friends. Whether it’s right or not, this is the perfect example of allowing kids to roam freely until corralled at the last possible minute—there’s an assumption that someone is watching them. Her dad is feeling extra protective today because Winston Jeffries preyed on little girls running around at family events, like weddings, between 1892 and 1901. Nearly a decade of kidnapping.
Nearly a decade of long hair hanging from trees in churchyards. Just the hair. The bodies were never found. Jeffries was convicted of thirty-seven counts of first-degree murder and hanged in Owensboro, Kentucky, on February 10, 1902 without a single body discovered.
He took the location of the bodies to his grave.
“A bad person, huh?”
The young girl nods, her long, dark curls and pink ribbons bouncing with each tip of her chin. Her father’s not worried about a mysterious “bad person.” He’s worried his bride might flee at the last second. This girl has been sent here to keep an eye on me. But why scare her? Why not just tell her I need help getting dressed? Why send her to deliver the one message that would make me want to kick off my heels, toss aside my veil, and run until my heart gives out?
“Mom, will you give us a minute?” I ask. She straightens the skirt of my gown.
“Sure. I need to check on your dad anyway.” When it’s just the young girl and me, I bend down so we’re at eye level.
“Do you trust me?”