What Are Friends For?: Seasons in a Small Town, Book 1

Anton "Zeke" Zeekowsky left the dot on the map called Drago, Illinois, for the big city sixteen years ago. He never expected to return. Quite the opposite, he hoped to forget it even existed. Zeke founded the security software firm "Zeke-Tech". After toiling long and hard, he became a self-made billionaire. Even so, Zeke's mind is always churning away, always designing his next creation. Zeke's life is shaken when his assistant, Brenda, informs him of an invitation from his hometown and urges him to act upon it. Somehow, against his better judgement, Zeke finds himself back in Drago. He has committed himself to being the Grand Marshall of the Drago Lilac Festival Parade, head judge of the Drago Lilac Queen pageant, and guest of honor at the Drago Lilac Festival Dance. The only good thing about it all, other than getting a chance to see how his mother is doing, is seeing Darcie Barrett and Jennifer Truesdale again. Jennifer was the unattainable beauty as Zeke grew up. Darcie was his best friend. And man, how times have changed! Jennifer is now divorced and raising a twelve-year-old daughter, Ashley. Darcie is now a local police officer. Jennifer and Darcie hope to convince Zeke to help turn Drago's economy around. The town is on its last legs. Yet both know that Zeke has bad memories of the place. Darcie, having been closest to Zeke, is the one chosen to soften him up. Problem is that the last night Darcie saw Zeke was also the single time they made love. He was gone the next day. Her feelings toward Zeke has not changed. She tries to hand him off to Jennifer, but even her chief seems to be against her. Chief Dutch Harnett, a hard-nosed outsider who'd taken over Drago's police department almost a year ago, decides that Darcie should change her patrol schedule a bit and drive Zeke everywhere he needs to go. Anytime Zeke drives himself, he ends up speeding, and the chief thinks this arrangement should end the problem. Well Darcie may have to drive him around, but he would have to deal with sitting silently by as she makes her normal rounds. Darcie cares too much about the locals to miss checking up on them. Zeke is happy that his "vacation" will be spent mostly with Darcie, even if he did have to become a slight nuisance to the chief to do it. Perhaps he could even find a way to work some on his latest project. Zeke even brought a disk with his soon-to-be-announced gadget on it for Darcie. But someone else out there has plans for Zeke and the disk. **** Author Patricia McLinn has created a romance that will entice all those ladies out there who are not afraid of a mouse. A computer mouse, that is. No wimpy characters in this book. Zeke and Darcie are both strong characters with enough faults to make them human and real to the readers. I hope to see Jennifer get her own story told someday, in addition to Vanessa (Zeke's business partner). In the meantime, rest assured that more than what I mentioned in the synopsis is going on within THIS sto