Twelve years of marriage, 4,000 square feet of dream house, and a handsome husband. Jessie Stanton has it all… until one fateful afternoon when she notices her BMW bouncing by the window behind a tow truck. Her husband has gone, and he’s taken it all. The whirling tornado that cuts down the life she’s built drops Jessie onto the sandy beach of Malibu with a thud, penniless and alone. When all she’s left with are the designer labels in her closet and the dreamy Neil Lane rock on her finger, Jessie tries to make ends meet by pawning her prized ring to fund a new business venture: a small shop where her designer duds and shimmering accessories are temporarily leased out to Southern California women with champagne tastes but root beer realities. As Jessie tries to rebuild, she realizes she can’t move on, not without answers. Reluctantly, Jessie turns to beach bum/private investigator Danny Callahan for help. But is she staking her future success and happiness…on a ring and a prayer? In a city where everything is gorgeous and expensive, can Jessie Stanton survive on pennies and prayers? Sandra D. Bricker was an entertainment publicist in Los Angeles for more than 15 years, where she attended school to learn screenwriting and eventually taught the craft for several semesters. She became a best-selling, award-winning author of Live-Out-Loud Fiction for the inspirational market, authored books such as the Jessie Stanton novels, and was best known for her Emma Rae Creation series. Over the years, as an ovarian cancer survivor, she spent time and effort toward raising awareness and funds for research, diagnostics, and a cure. Sandra lived in Toledo, Ohio before her passing in 2016. She is remembered online at SandraDBricker.com. On a Ring and a Prayer A Jessie Staton Novel By Sandra D. Bricker Abingdon Press Copyright © 2015 Sandra D. Bricker All rights reserved. ISBN: 978-1-4267-1160-2 CHAPTER 1 Watch this. If I hold my coffee at just the right tilt, the reflection off my ring will blind her." "Jessie, stop that." Jessie angled her hand so that the sunlight streaming through the café window bounced off nearly four carats of perfect clarity, ricocheting back toward the window. Just one slight adjustment and— "There!" "What are you? Ten?" "Ten-year-old Jessie would never have this ring." She grinned as the woman two tables over flinched, squinting as the beam of sunlight hit her right in the eye. "And why are you acting like this anyway?" Jessie asked in a graveled whisper. "Support me in my cattiness like a good friend should. You know perfectly well that Shea McDermott has been talking smack about my marriage for three years now, since the night of Elton's Oscar party." They both glanced over toward Shea's table, and Jessie offered the bleached blonde a forced, cursory smile. Through her tightened, pearly white expression, Jessie muttered, "She makes me crazy." "I can see that. But you have an unfair advantage, Jess," Piper replied with a serious tone as she tucked her short, streaked strawberry-blonde hair behind one ear. Then a sunbeam grin ignited her face, and her glossy green eyes shimmered with mischief. "You've got nearly two carats on her." They both snickered just as the waiter approached the table. "Can I get you ladies anything else?" His nametag read DIRK. Jessie thought it was the perfect name for an obvious actor-turned-waiter like so many hundreds of them flanking trendy restaurant tables from Malibu to Glendale. Dirk-the-waiter looked like he belonged in a leading-edge fashion layout in Esquire rather than schlepping lunch for LA's hot-du-jour. "It happens to be my friend's birthday," Piper told Dirk, and Jessie held her breath and used her birthday wish against Piper revealing which one. "We'd like a generous slice of amaretto cheesecake and two cappuccinos." "Right away." "Oh, and—" Piper wrinkled her nose at him and whispered, "put a candle in it?" "Piper, no." With one hand, she waved Jessie into submission, and with the other she sent Dirk-the-waiter quickly on his way. "So what are we doing?" Piper asked. "Twenty-five again?" "Sounds good." "Twenty-five it is. And you don't look a day over twenty-four." Jessie smiled. She didn't feel her thirty-seven years either. At twenty-four, she'd been working the fragrance counter at Bloomingdale's in the Beverly Center. Jack had parked outside of the store on his way to pick up a couple of new suits from Hugo Boss. On his way back through the store, he circled Jessie's counter three times before he stopped and asked her to recommend a perfume for his mother's birthday. They made a date for dinner at Moonshadows Malibu that very evening; a patio table at sunset. And Jack had swept her off the size-seven Manolos she'd borrowed from one of her roommates before the panna cotta had been served for dessert. Six dinner dates later, she learned that Jack's mom had passed away in the previous decade, and he'd only summoned up her memory as a