WAY TO GO
by Mandy Colton
Veronica Lane works in the travel industry in her dream job when she
experiences a hellish travel day ending in the loss of her job and stranded far
from home. To make the situation even worse, she drowns her sorrows in the
hotel bar, and wakes the next morning to a big surprise.
Gathering up the remains of her dignity along with her travel bags, she
returns to her hometown in Peachtree City, Georgia. A community similar to a
progressive Mayberry, except with golf cart paths and carts. A lot of them. Her
family is kooky. The parents are sexually free and liberal, her brother is a
golf cart cop with more good looks and brawn than brains. Her grandparents, one
from each side, live in the same retirement community and maintain a constant
battle while entertaining the other senior citizens. The Grandmother on her
dad's side is stuck in the 1960’s, and the Grandfather on her mother's side
served in WWII and thinks that the Japanese are still trying to kill him.
She calls inquiring about a job in the newspaper, a group escort for a
small tour company in Atlanta. She is hired immediately and leaves the next day
with her first group to Jamaica. First, she meets a handsome pilot with the
charter airline they use, and then there is one unusual group participant that
doesn’t seem to belong. He leaves the group for periods of time and when things
happen, he uses MacGyver like skills to get them out of the situations. She is
aggravated and knows something is fishy and the bad thing is, the man is very
charismatic and she’s not just a little attracted to him.
Upon their return, she finds out that the man is friends with her rather
unconventional boss and after a second unusual group excursion to Puerto Rico;
she knows for sure that the little tour company in Atlanta is not really what
it seems on the outside. When the truth is revealed, she finds herself
unintentionally dropped into a new career that she can't exactly add to her
resume.
Veronica finds herself in uncomfortable and hilarious situations,
surrounded by crazy tour participants, family, friends, neighbors, and pets.
After a long dry spell, she finds that there is suddenly an overabundance of
romance, drama, and intrigue in her life. Her life is now a sometimes very
bumpy, yet exciting ride.
One thing
we Southerners liked was our red velvet cake. I even remembered a fierce battle
over one between some of the female relatives at a couple of our family
reunions. The rivalry had lasted for years. Aunt Darlene thought hers was
better than Aunt Gerta’s, and she’d gotten caught trying to sabotage the other
aunt’s cake. The next year, Aunt Gerta had just picked up Aunt Darlene’s cake
and dumped it. That resulted in a catfight out in the yard and the family dog
barfing up a piece of Gerta’s wig when all the kids were eating watermelon
later that day. What a great memory.
Plowing
through my warm plate of chocolaty red velvet pancakes had brought up that warm
and fuzzy memory. I shoveled another bite of pancake with the cream cheese
icing and powdered sugar on top and then took a bite of my bacon and looked at
the table. It was covered with plates. I looked up at Wes, who shoveled his own
mound of food into his mouth. He had pretty much ordered and eaten one of
everything on the menu.
Wes could
be a dimwit of a brother, but I guess he was considered handsome. His hair was
brown with red highlights, and he had our dad’s chiseled good looks and Mom’s
eyes. He was tall and muscular, and the girls seemed to like him a lot. He had
also always been into sports; he’d played football and was on the track team in
high school.
I knit my
brows. “How the hell do you eat that way and look like you do?”
He burped
and grinned, raising his arm to show me his bicep muscle. “I work out every day
at the gym next to the station. We get a discount because we serve the
community. Need to stay in tip-top shape, and the women really dig the muscles.
I’m ready for anything. Bring it on, bad guys. Grrr!” He chuckled and went back
to shoveling.
I rolled
my eyes at him. “You’re a golf cart cop. When’s the last time you ran over a
felon?”
Mandy Colton is from Louisville, KY, and lives a
very quiet life with her husband and teenage son. She’s a fan of romance, fun
adventure stories, and some occasional sci-fi or paranormal thrown in. Veronica
Lane and the idea for her adventures came from her own experiences and career
working in the travel industry.
She claims that working in the travel business
could be horribly stressful but was equally laugh-out-loud funny at times. She
enjoyed many priceless and comical experiences with groups, friends, and peers.
Even her clients shared humorous adventures of their own. Her opinion is that
there just are no better stories than those that involve true life.
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