Author: Priscilla Paul

Publisher: Xlibris Corporation

Published: 2000-11-17

Total Pages: 326

ISBN-13: 1462806333

Three young women from three different parts of the world meet in Williamsburg, Virginia in the early 1700s and become best friends, eventually sharing their most precious secrets with one another. Although they were young when they met, all three had already lived adventures most women never experience in a lifetime. In those adventures of life, each woman finds herself with the burden of a secret that could cost her everything. Their lives, loves and children could be gone in the whisper of a secret. After years of devoted friendship, the women share their secrets with one another, promising to be the guardian of each others lives. Sarah shares her secret first...she is an escaped criminal from an English prison ship. Her crime...she stole some of the crown jewels. Christina tells of being an escaped member of the family of Peter the Great, Czar of all the Russias. Abbey, the young widow of a suicide victim, reveals that the father of her child is not the husband of her youth but a man she has long loved, Matthew Townsend. Although Matthew is himself a widower, years of rumors that Abbey killed his wife, and perhaps even his own mother, leaves him unable to respond to any gesture of love she makes towards him. Abbey knows, if Matthew finds out that she has kept his son away from him, for the boys entire life, he might contemplate killing her himself. When Sarah is threatened by an outsider who knows who she is, she blackmails her best friends to keep her own secret safe. They pay her off, but she is soon found murdered. Abbey is arrested. Christina suddenly decides to go back to Europe and Matthew is to be Abbeys attorney charged with the responsibility of saving her life. As the story progresses, there are times when Abbey wonders if Matthew is out to save her or to hang her. She wonders if he knows her secret, and it appears that before Christina left she shared everyones secrets with Matthew, including Abbeys. Abbey also suspects its possible Christinas husband is the murderer. The trial reveals more secrets about the three women that they had not shared with one another and also reveals the secrets of yet another family which leads to the true killer. All three women and their secrets are fully explored in this novel, giving each character the honor of center stage during lengthy portions of the novel. It is then brought together in the form of an exciting trial, where secrets pop up from the most unexpected places and persons. Enjoy! You can visit Priscillas site at www.priscillapaul.com