The Color of Secrets
Lindsay Jayne Ashford
Language: English
Pages: 402
ISBN: 1477828435
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
Everyone has secrets, but some can change your life forever…
In the midst of the Second World War, Eva receives the devastating news that her husband is missing and presumed dead. Neither wife nor widow, she lives in a numb state of limbo until, in the heat of an English summer, she meets Bill, a black American GI. Despite their vastly different backgrounds, neither can deny the love that overcomes them in the frantic weeks that follow, when every day could be their last.
After Eva discovers she’s pregnant, Bill is shipped off to join the D-day fight, leaving her alone in a bigoted world. As her mixed-race daughter, Louisa, grows up, how far will Eva go to keep her safe and bury the past? And how far will Louisa go to uncover the truth?
Revised edition: Previously published as With Love and Crocodiles: The Untold Story of a War Bride, this edition of The Color of Secrets includes editorial revisions.
Nemesis: The Battle for Japan, 1944-45
Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption
The Polish Army 1939-45 (Men-at-Arms, Volume 117)
was only half past seven, but Eva had been awake since just after five. She was ravenous and the thought of bacon and eggs made her quicken her step as she made for the door. Her aunt usually had breakfast ready. Eva trudged across the farmyard sniffing the air. But there was no smell of cooking coming from the kitchen. She peeped around the door and saw Rhiannon sitting at the table, her head in her hands. “What’s the matter?” Eva set the basket down on the slate flagstones and ran across
like a magic wand pointing the way to a secret world. Louisa gasped when the pink satin curtains rippled back. She was transfixed by the enormous screen. A box of popcorn lay untouched on her lap as she gazed awestruck at Snow White singing into the wishing well. That night, when she was supposed to be in bed, she stood in front of the strip of mirror on her wardrobe door. She had rolled the long arms of her blouse up past her elbows to look like puffed sleeves and draped her blue bedspread
back outside. All except Beverley, who was sitting quite still, her head resting on her hands. “Beverley Samuel! Why aren’t you getting changed?” Miss Pudney barked, a deep line appearing between her whiskery eyebrows. “Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten your PE kit again!” Beverley said nothing, her head dipping farther forward. “Have you actually got a PE kit?” Beverley mumbled something Louisa couldn’t make out. “What did you say?” “No, Miss.” Beverley sounded hoarse and close to tears.
me!” Gina stared at her, openmouthed. “Incredible, isn’t it? I’ve often wondered why he adopted me, but I daren’t ask. I couldn’t bear to upset him.” “He’s a lovely man, your dad.” Gina’s sympathetic face was streaked with confusion. “I think it must have been a lot easier for him when we were living here,” Louisa said, glancing toward the farm. “We were hidden away from the big bad world. No one in these villages had ever seen a black person. I suppose I blended in pretty well. Of
Dressed in a US Army uniform, with his arm around her smiling mother, was a tall, athletic-looking young man with the face of an Egyptian pharaoh. The sunlight had caught his high cheekbones and his huge dark eyes—which were just like Tom’s—twinkled with mischief. “You’ve got his smile.” Cathy’s voice seemed to come from a hundred miles away. “As soon as I saw you, I thought: oh, yes, that’s Bill’s girl.” Louisa blinked back the tears welling up. “I . . . I’ve always wondered what he looked
