Sample from Chapter One:

"BLOOD & SOUL"

By Deborah O'Toole writing as Deidre Dalton

JENNY JARDINE ALWAYS HAD the sneaking suspicion she was adopted, even from the time she was a small child, although she never told her parents she was onto the truth. Cabral and Darcy Jardine were decent, God-fearing people who loved their daughter, no matter where she came from. If anything was certain in life, her parents unconditional love was the one aspect of her upbringing she never lost faith in, not even when the darkness of her true past threatened to overtake her.

She began to question her parentage just after her sixth birthday, when she noticed her blonde locks were nothing like the jet black hair adorning Cabral and Darcy. "Why is my hair light and yours dark?" she asked in childlike fashion.

Cabral smiled patiently at her. "You take after my dear departed mother," he told her with quick ease. "She had hair the color of straw."

Jenny believed her father. His words gave her a reasonable explanation. Besides, why would Cabral lie to her? It was only much later, when she grew taller than both her parents at the age of fourteen, that lurking questions about her heritage entered her mind again. She became self-conscious about her towering height and small breasts. She was often made the brunt of cruel teasing by her classmates, which made her withdraw into herself and keep the few childhood friends she had even closer.

*Please Note: Blood & Soul is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of the author. Copyright ©Deidre Dalton (aka Deborah O’Toole). All rights reserved. No part of Blood & Soul may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the author. Estimated Completion: 2017. Storyline, estimated completion date, content and book cover art for Blood & Soul may be subject to change.

< Back to "Blood & Soul" by Deidre Dalton