When one of Joleigh-Anna’s favorite cousins, Matt Kelmann, is killed in a senseless dare of Chicken, her fiancé, Dr. Irvyn Woodworth, MD, breaks off their engagement at the grave site. On the day that should have been their wedding day.

Matt and Irvy had been best friends since they were toddlers, sticking together through the years closer than brothers. Each had pledged to be the other’s best man at his respective wedding. To be a pall bearer at Matty’s funeral instead seems to have hit Irvy hard.

Joleigh-Anna understands Irvy’s deep sadness, yet she’s totally clueless as to why he’s choosing to break up with her now. Is grief his reason for it, or is there something else influencing his decision? Whatever it is, he maddeningly keeps it bottled up inside.

His mother, Valorah Woodworth, couldn’t be more thrilled with this break up since Joleigh-Anna has never been her dream for her only son. She succeeds in introducing him to number eleven from her Eligible Women for My Doctor Son list.

Holly Noelle Hallwell is everything Joleigh-Anna is not. Tall, blonde, strikingly beautiful, and wealthy. Not to mention totally insincere and shallow. The woman even detests Irvy’s first name! Still, Valorah feels, since Holly is his social equal, she’ll be a better partner for him.

Moreover, some of Joleigh’s own family members feel as Valorah does. Let Irvy go, and get her own life on track and let him do the same!

Joleigh’s loved Irvy since before she could speak. Why, her first word had been his name—“Irby!” She knew him inside and out. His history was with her, not this pretender! How could anyone believe such a self-centered creature would make a good doctor’s wife?

No way is Joleigh willing to pretend that Irvy’s never been in her life. If it takes her lifetime, she’d determined to win him back and marry him—whether anyone wanted to be there to witness it or not!

To her frustration, no tactic she employs seems to work—glorious bouquets of flowers, hand-drawn cards with original poetic verses, passionate emails . . .

Is his love for her really as dead as poor Matty? Has she truly lost Irvy to this dream of his mother’s?

On the day Irvy comes to deliver his decision, a horrific car crash sends Joleigh-Anna to the intensive care unit.

Where she lingers between life and death . . .

Neenah Davis-Wilson