Her Fifth Husband? Read Online Free PDF

Muddy Landing and set herself up as an interior decorator, Sally June had become Sasha. She had stuck with her fourth husband’s name because it was easier than changing everything again.
    Besides, it sounded good with Sasha.
    She’d chosen Muddy Landing because at the time, property in Currituck County had been comparatively cheap. That was rapidly changing as more and more of it was developed, but the location was perfect, being little more than an hour from the Norfolk shopping area and less than half that from the Outer Banks where building was booming and decorating jobs were plentiful.
    That had been eleven—no, nearly thirteen years ago. Once it gathered momentum, time seemed to fly. At the age of thirty-eight, thirty-five years of which she admitted to, Sasha was single for keeps. Each time she’d married she’d been certain she’d finally found her prince.
    Instead she’d found another poor jerk who thought that learning to dress and speak well would alter whohe was. Underneath the designer sportswear, the fancy colognes and the rip-off Rolexes, they’d all been every bit as insecure as she had once been, the difference being that they’d lacked her guts, her brutal self-honesty and her relentless drive to succeed.
    She might joke with her friends about looking for number five, but before she would ever allow herself to get involved with another man, she would let her hair go natural, dump all her makeup in the North Landing River and turn her jewelry into fishing lures.
    Parked in the shade of the Jamison cottage, she sat outside for a few minutes, savoring the perfect spring weather and the last of the double-strength coffee. She should be able to wind things up here in an hour, with some time to spare.
    Opening the door, she swung her legs out and sat there for a moment, savoring the relative quiet of the early morning. A week from now, traffic would have doubled and most of the cottages would be filled, but for now the quiet cul-de-sac was almost like a private retreat.
    Leaving the top down, she trudged up the first flight of outside stairs, unlocked the main door and disarmed the security system. The place still smelled of stale cigarette smoke, so she left the sliding glass doors open to air it out. Mosquitoes weren’t yet a problem as they’d had a record dry spring. On the next level up, she opened another door, drawing air from below.
    At least she didn’t turn the air-conditioning full blast with all the doors and windows open the way too many thoughtless tenants did.
    Humming under her breath, she began double-checking the list she’d made yesterday to make sure that everything that had been lost, stolen or damaged had been replaced. The new bar stools had been delivered. She checked that off her list. Climbing to the top level, she took a good look around to confirm that she hadn’t overlooked anything. Once she was done, she slid open the glass doors on the top floor and stepped out onto the sundeck, her favorite place of all. Ignoring the spectacular view of dunes and ocean, she glanced at the cottage next door.
    Not that she’d expected to see him—the parking area next door was empty. Not that she even wanted to see him, but he’d said he wasn’t finished with whatever it was he was doing over there—installing, updating or repairing a security system.
    She told herself she wasn’t disappointed, and really, she wasn’t. Not for herself. But for months now she and her friends had been looking for a candidate for Lily Sullivan, the beautiful blond CPA with the sad eyes who lived a few streets over from Marty’s house. So far as anyone knew—Faylene could find out more about a person from their garbage alone than any CIA agent—Lily had no social life at all.
    The trouble was that there were so few available men around—certainly none who might interest a woman who was both attractive and intelligent. The