Coming Home — Brooke Gillespie-Trout

At the tender age of eighteen, Valerie Russell married her high school sweetheart. Even though the odds were against them, she was determined to make their marriage work. Married for fifteen years, they had two children and a happy home. Or so she thought. Blindsided by her husband's request for a divorce, Valerie's heart is broken, and her world is shattered.     Due to his parent's bitter divorce Steve Preston had been denied a relationship with his father through his youth. After his high school graduation he moved from Portland, Maine to California to rebuild that relationship. Years later, Steve finds himself at a crossroads… he is newly divorced and forced to move out of his beachfront condo. When his mother calls him out of the blue and tells him she's giving him the home he grew up in, Steve makes the decision to move back to Portland.     Steve and Val reconnect when he moves home. They seem to keep crossing paths due to mutual friends and having gone to high school together. They form a close friendship and while neither is looking for love, this serendipitous connection might become something neither expected to happen. They both realize that a second chance at love might be the best chance they ever take.