After having led a sheltered life, Belinda is ready to experience anything. When she meets Adam, he easily talks her into running a scam.
Raised in a little Georgia hick town under the rule of hellfire and brimstone, Belinda is ripe for the picking.
When the handsome hunk, Adam, comes into town, and offers her a proposal, she is more than ready to accept.
Adam has been hired, by the wealthy Miss Grace Boston, to find her long lost granddaughter. Miss Grace is dying and wants to see her granddaughter. Miss Grace hasn't seen her granddaughter, Kathy, since the child was three years old.
Belinda readily agrees to help Adam run this scam, but doesn't realize that he has alterior motives. On the trip down to Savannah and the mansion of Miss Grace, Adam proposes marriage to Belinda and she accepts. She cannot believe her luck.
Belinda thinks she is lucky, but Adam knows he had found the righdam believes that he has now set everything up so that he will be a wealthy man, as soon as he gets rid of Belinda/Kathy. What Adam doesn't know is that, even if his wife dies, he will not get the money.
Excerpt
I looked at my grandmother and said, “I went exploring today and found a little girl’s room on the third floor. While I was in there I had a vision of a fire and I had a panic attack, but not as bad as what I just had. Was that room mine, Grandmother?”
“Yes, it was your room,” she said, and she reached for me. “At last, you have come home. But please, if you’re pulling a con, don’t tell me.”
“I was, but now I know the truth. I know I’m your granddaughter.”
We both cried as she held me and I really felt like I had come home.
CHAPTER 11
As I was coming out of my grandmother’s apartment, Susan was on her way out of the house.
“Hi,” she said. “Do you want to go shopping? Where have you been, by the way?”
“I think I’ll pass on the shopping. I’m kind of tired. I explored the mansion and then went to see my grandmother. She’s sleeping now, and I think I’ll go upstairs and have a nap also. Have you seen Adam?”
She shrugged. “He’s at work, I suppose. I guess you don’t know him well enough to know he’s a workaholic. Do you know each other at all?”
When I didn’t answer, she shrugged and left.
As I made my way upstairs to our pretty green-and-white suite, I was deep in thought. I really didn’t know Adam at all. I felt like a fool, marrying a man I didn’t know and going to an unknown place.
Did he marry me for my money? I didn’t think he could possibly love me any more than I loved him. He had schemed and I had gotten caught up in the moment.
I had never been pretty, and my only experience with men were the boys I had dated from the church, who were as brainwashed as I had been, and then with the evangelist who had raped me and I had had to lie to protect him.
Did I really think that someone like Adam could fall in love with me? I had wanted so badly to believe it that I was willing to give up my career that I had worked so hard for, my friends, my mama, my life as I knew it, to follow this stranger.
Now what was I supposed to do? My grandmother was in no position to help me. I didn’t want to leave her; I had just found her. But I didn’t think Adam loved or wanted me in any way.
If Adam had cooked up this scheme for money, which I suspected he had, then was he going to be happy keeping me for his wife? I decided the answer was no.
He had given me just enough attention to get me to marry him, but now he didn’t have to pay
Professional Reviews
By Jay
Five Stars
This review is from: Southern Greed (Kindle Edition)
A wonderful novel about a 23 yr old girl (Belinda) that falls in love with handsome, dashing man (Adam)....but thats not all! As the story unfolds, u will became engrossed in not only a love story but a story of greed (phew!..i was amazed at the levels of greed And realised to what levels people could fall to!) I found that i did not want to put the book down as i was very interested to find out what would happen next. The book was engaging,cleaver,twisty & both plot & character-driven in turns. It kept me in suspense, with so many characters of questionable behavior.i like novel due to the characters,location &the plotting. Peggy Holloway surely knows how to keep the reader interested. Well if you enjoy novels with great romance,mystery,murder &family drama all packed in one, this one is surely a great read. Buy it and you wont regret it or the time you spent getting to know the characters and the story. Highly recommended.......
By T. February
Five stars
This review is from: Southern Greed (Kindle Edition)
The set-up for Peggy Holloway's "Southern Greed," with a naive person blinded by lust and lured by a lover into a risky scheme, reminded me of the great film noir "Body Heat," just with the genders reversed. Here, it's the woman (Belinda) who falls for a man (Adam) who uses her in a "so crazy it just might work" plan to get his ailing grandmother's inheritance.
But even though there are some parallels, "Southern Greed" is still very much its own story. The religious angle is particularly interesting, it has made Belinda into a good person (despite some horrible incidents from her youth), but it has also made her perhaps a little too trusting. (And have fun reading into the significance of the name "Adam.") and the twists and turns are both surprising yet organic. Is there actually some truth to the deception Belinda is trying to pull off? And who is really pulling a fast one on who? I legitimately didn't know where it was going, which can often mean it's in danger of running off the rails, but I always felt I was in the hands of an expert storyteller. I wasn't familiar with Holloway's work (still am not, yet), but this convinced me she's got some talent. I just wish it were a little longer, but it's certainly worth the price.
By Michael Todaro
Five stars
This review is from: Southern Greed (Paperback)
The protagonist of this sultry Southern tale, Belinda, has lived into her twenties yet never tasted life. Her sheltered, Christian fundamentalist upbringing made her mama proud and her a good girl, but also left her ripe for the picking.
Adam Kramer is all too eager to pick the ripe fruit; he brings the excitement to Belinda's life that had been lacking until now. Having been hired to find an rich old lady's granddaughter and last surviving relative, Adam draws Belinda into a plot to defraud dying Gracie of her money. Impersonation! Quite the way to rebel against the straightjacket of moral conformity.
Before the end of the novel, Belinda will have been dragged through the mud, tormented and exposed to ridicule--and I shan't tell you whether this greedy Southern girl gets a happy ending.
While working on the set of a Hollywood horror movie, a simulated murder turns into a real homocide. Special effects artist Harri Lewis (aka Agent Proteus) steps in to try to solve the murder
