Tracy Reed is a real California girl, except she's more comfortable hanging out at Neiman Marcus than the beach. She's a lot like the characters in her stories. She loves God, Couture and Cute Guys. She is working on the third book in her “Alex Chronicles” series and finishing up a new book called “Generational Curses”. She is a member of the Orange County California Romance Writers Association with Pro status. She's still searching for an agent. And she writes because it’s a fabulous way to minister to people who may never step foot in a church or open a Bible. Visit Tracy at www.readtracyreed.com

Karen Philips stood in the bathroom staring at her image in the mirror, trying to figure out how she got here. When she woke up this morning she was on top of the world. Her life was going the way she had planned it. But in the blink of her eye, everything changed.

The lead divorce attorney of Brown, Barret, Cohen, and Associates, with offices in Los Angeles, New York, and Chicago, she was the most successful divorce attorney under the age of fifty. Her two younger sisters looked up to her and wanted to be just like her. Her parents were very proud of how she had turned her life around after a rough couple of years dancing with alcohol. Her girlfriends envied her relationship with Greg, the love of her life. And her boss was seriously considering her for partner. But all of that was about to change in the blink of an eye.

She came home late from a meeting with a potential new client, and she couldn’t get the words out of her head: “my husband Greg.” Wow, we have something in common she thought, until her client continued her story. And that’s when she realized, her client’s Greg, was her Greg. How could the man she’d been dating for twelve years be married to someone else? They had met a year after she started at BBC at an associates holiday party. They hit it off immediately. He called her two days later and invited her for coffee. They’d been together ever since.

As she drove home, she replayed the conversation, trying to figure out how this could have happened. She walked into the beautiful house her years of hard work had provided. She placed her briefcase on the entry table—as she normally did. She continued up the stairs to her expensively decorated bedroom and down the hall to her finely organized walk-in closet and changed out of her working clothes—as usual.

Then she started to question herself. How could this be happening to her? She and Greg spent most of their free time together. She used all of the tools she gave her clients to assess their marriages for signs of betrayal, and she couldn’t find any. How clever this man was to have hidden a wife and two children all these years. What would he have done if she’d said yes to one of his many proposals? Would he have committed bigamy? Would he have divorced his wife? And what about the children? These were just a few of the questions that bounced in her head as she stared at the stupid woman looking back at her in the mirror.

She blinked her eyes and studied the gun lying on the lid of the toilet and thought how easy it would be to right this wrong in the blink of an eye. She looked at the .45 caliber gun and

thought that in the blink of an eye she could save her client thousands in court costs and legal fees, and save herself from all of the embarrassment this would cause her career. But how would she explain not attending his funeral? Simple, he didn’t want one. She rehearsed the conversation she’d have with her client.

“I did us both a favor and shot the lying sack of crap.”

And her client would say, “Thank you. I thought about doing that, but I didn’t want to mess up my new hardwood floors.” And they would sit down in her kitchen and have a cup of coffee to celebrate their new friendship. Other women in her position would immediately want to do harm to themselves. But why give him the satisfaction of an easy way out? No, get rid of him, grieve a little, and go on with your life. That’s what she told all of her clients.

As she stood staring at herself, she knew there was really only one thing she could do. She walked back into her beautiful closet; grabbed a pair of jeans, a sweater, and her favorite Ferragamo flats; picked up her keys; and went for a walk. When she got to the end of the block, she turned around and walked back home. She went back into to the bathroom and stared at the gun, thinking he’s really not worth losing everything she’d worked so hard for.

She blinked her eye and when she looked up, Greg was standing behind her. She thought of the gun lying on the toilet. Yeah, it would be so easy. But just as she was about to reach for the gun, she blinked her eye again and she saw standing next to Greg an angel holding the gun. In that brief moment, God heard her cry and sent help to stop her from changing the course He had for her life. She smiled, looked up, and said, “Thank you. I know what to do.”

She faced Greg. “I know about your wife and children. And it’s okay, because I’m through with you.” She looked over at the toilet and the gun was gone. She looked up in the mirror and the angel was no longer visible. She smiled and walked out of the bathroom and knew her life was back on track.

In the blink of an eye, her life went from good to bad to good again. Funny how a gesture we do so often can carry such a huge impact.