Wishing On A Starr Read Online Free

idiot?”
    Still laughing, they lumbered slowly to their feet and then did a lousy job trying to help him up.
    Bones aching, muscles throbbing, Daniel dusted the snow from his clothes and glanced around. “Please tell me you saw where the card went.”
    The trio’s gazes searched around the snow-covered ground and in between the feet of the bustling crowd. However, after fifteen minutes, they gave up.
    “Maybe she’s still in the store,” Starr said, hopefully.
    Daniel glanced at his watch and sighed. “I seriously doubt that. Not to mention the low probability of finding her in that crowd. “What was the name of that interior decorating business?” he asked himself and tried to will an image of the card in his mind, but it wasn’t working.
    Neve patted him on the shoulder. “It looks like you have a wish to make, too, Mr. Davis.”
    “Yeah, but by Tuesday it’ll be too late.”
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     

Chapter 3
     
    “Don’t you dare call that gal,” Ma Belle spat from her sickbed. “She hasn’t come to see me in all these years, so she doesn’t need to come and see me now.” Her jaw set in a stubborn line, but she was unable to prevent her bottom lip from quivering.
    Glenda said nothing as she tucked the blanket tighter around her grandmother.
    “You might as well fix your face ‘cause I’m not gonna change my mind.”
    “I didn’t say anything,” Glenda said, turning and lifting the dinner tray from the nightstand. Everyone knew there was no point in arguing with Ma Belle. She rarely, if ever, changed her mind about anything.
    However, Glenda was hardly fooled by the matriarch’s blustering. Ma Belle’s heart broke the minute Gia escaped Talboton, and it never healed.
    The majority of the family thought Gia’s dreams of finding a better life in a big city like New York wouldn’t last more than a couple of weeks. Some even suggested that she should set her sights on Atlanta-where she would at least be no more than a couple of hours from home and the fall on her face wouldn’t be as painful.
    But Glenda knew her sister would make it because despite what everybody else believed, Gia had already hit rock bottom.
    “Momma, we’re out of Coco Puffs.”
    Glenda glanced at her sixteen-year-old daughter, Jenny, and her bulging pregnant belly, and felt an overwhelming weariness in her bones.
    “Momma, did you hear me?”
    “Yes, chile. Just put it on the grocery list and I’ll get some more in the morning. Why in the world you want to eat cereal for dinner anyway?” Glenda headed for the kitchen sink to get started on the dishes.
    “’Cause that’s what I have a craving for,” Jenny laughed. “Don’t tell me that I have to explain cravings to a woman who had ten kids.”
    Glenda bit her lip and warded off the sting of tears. Without a doubt, Jenny didn’t mean anything by the casual comment, but that didn’t stop it from smacking her with the truth of her life.
    Gia fled from Talboton to avoid turning into Glenda: an endless baby factory and a woman who fell for every lie every man has ever told her. Glenda pressed a hand to her mouth, but failed to stop a ragged sob.
    “Momma, are you okay?” Jenny closed the refrigerator door and waddled next to her.
    “I’m fine,” she answered, but the tears that followed said otherwise.
    “Did I say something wrong?” The concern in Jenny’s voice heightened as she slid her arm around her mother’s waist. “I’m sorry if I did.”
    “No, Chile. I think I just need to go lie down for a few minutes. Be a dear and finish the dishes for me.” Glenda avoided making eye contact and slid out of her daughter’s arms to shuffle to her own bedroom in the back of the house. Once she had entered and closed the door behind her, she glanced around the room she had lived in her entire life and drew a deep breath. “Gia, whatever you do, don’t you ever come back here.”
     
    #
    Miraculously, Gia survived a full day of