In Lunch Tales: Suellen by Lucille Guarino, a wealthy young attorney haunted by her past must confront her fear of love when a stalker ex, a kind old classmate, and a life-changing diagnosis collide. Below is an excerpt from the novel:

CHAPTER 1

I refuse to die today. A gulp catches in my throat, and I remind myself that breathing is imperative to staying alive. I clutch the thick lap bar with a death grip, white knuckles stiffening with strain as screams detonate in the back of my throat, ear-piercing shrieks that sound as if they belong to someone else. A plummet and twist whip my body from weightlessness to heaviness in just under four terrifying seconds, a dizzying array of visuals catching up to my mind’s eye.

Steve flings his dark, wind-whipped hair from his eyes and smirks. “And that’s why they call it the rocket.”

Dazed, heart decelerating, I step out of the orange train car – the color of Jack-o-lanterns – and breathe out one long sigh of relief as soon as my feet touch the earth.

“Let’s go again.” I hear him say, even as my brain tries not to let it in.

My stupor waning, I stare into his eyes with an intensity I want to be certain he sees. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

Steve squints in response. He’s not kidding. When is Steve ever kidding?

“I drove sixty miles so you could get your adrenaline rush. That’s all I agreed to,” I say. We would have to live one hour from the tallest, scariest roller coaster in the world, fastest in North America. “That’s what your coaster enthusiasts group’s for.”

Steve doesn’t hear a word I say. He’s walking backward, his eyes riveted on Kingda Ka. We go over to sit on a bench with a panoramic view of the king of all roller coasters, and I pass Steve a water bottle. “So . . . was it everything you hoped it’d be?”

He picks up on my sarcasm. “No, Suellen. Had you helped me ‘get off’ while we were up there, now that would have been somethin’.”

Oh, Suellen . . . Suellen, when did dangerous and exciting turn into such irony? “If only I hadn’t wasted seconds screaming my head off. How clumsy of me.” If only I hadn’t wasted ten months in an on-again, off-again relationship. It’s a toxic cycle – breaking up, going back for more. Dependable familiarity, thrilling uncertainty.

Steve takes a deep slug of water. “You need to work on your multitasking skills, babe.”

I roll my eyes. This is how it goes with us, the back and forth. Which one will top the other? It’s getting old.

It’s a beautiful, clear September day. The sky is crystal blue. My mother told me it was a day just like this on the fateful date of 9/11, bright and perfect. It’s strange that I’m thinking about this right now. I was young when that happened, but I imagine it’s embedded in northeasterners how tranquility can turn into calamity with almost no warning.

I didn’t go into a relationship with Steve thinking it had long-term prospects. I’m not an idealist. But lately we’re fighting more – a consequence of living on the wild side of life, I guess. What I once thought exciting about him infuriates me now. But it’s his birthday this week and I’m a sucker for birthdays. I promised I’d celebrate it with him as he saw fit, although I may have had a couple of drinks in me at the time I said it. Steve’s wild side is what attracted me in the first place, the beautiful bad boy I couldn’t resist. I wish I had.

Lately, even my short-term expectations leave me feeling deflated. While I consider Steve’s autonomy a strength, he runs hot and cold so often I never know who I’m with until it’s too late.

“Look at that,” Steve says. “Those lucky bastards.” A green train car does a rollback on the coaster, giving its riders an extra hydraulic launch.

I can’t understand his obsession with outrageous adventures, one more thrill-seeking than the next. Don’t get me wrong. I can keep up with the best of them. Or used to anyway. Between my twin brother and me, I was the daring one growing up. Simon was cautious and analytical. I was spontaneous – the risk-taker. Simon hated to get dirty; I was the quintessential tomboy. But Steve’s fixation on danger is something different. In a maniacal way, death defiance powers him up. It’s like a drug to him.

“Can we go now?” I say, trying to suppress a sigh.

Steve stands up from the bench. I still marvel at his muscular twenty-nine-year-old body, his strong stubble-haired chin, his beguiling blue eyes. I have seen them go from a dark iridescent blue to a murky gray within seconds, illuminating the unstable man within. What will you look like ten years from now, Steve? After years of too much drinking and too much anger?

We exit the Six Flags Park jungle scene. “I hope you’re satisfied,” I say.

“Nah. We still have to go bungee jumping.”

“I’m never going bungee jumping.” I cross my arms over my chest. “That’s a solid no.”

“Let’s stop somewhere for dinner,” he says.

Dinner that will consist of several drinks, but I’m driving. “Sure.”

I first met Steve Holt a year ago when he pulled me over for speeding. I couldn’t have been doing more than ten miles over the speed limit, but Officer Holt begged to disagree. His eyes fell to my lap, and I flushed as I looked down at my bare legs under a short skirt. I squeezed my thighs together. He continued writing me a ticket despite my protests, tearing it off with a flourish. “Thanks,” I grumbled. An impervious crooked smile met my frustrated one. I threw the ticket onto the passenger seat and didn’t look at it until days later when I noticed it wasn’t a ticket at all. It was a page torn from the back of his ticket book. On it he had written, “Call me” with his cell phone number.

I didn’t call.

Several weeks later, he spotted me at the Ringside Pub. My co-worker, Carol Bonetti, had invited me to hear her boyfriend’s band. I had only been there once before and didn’t know any of the locals. Before long, his eyes were laser-focused on me, the new girl with the long, glossy dark hair who never called.

The bartender placed a Tootsie Roll shot in front of me, nodding toward the man at the end of the bar. “It’s on him.”

At first, I didn’t recognize Steve without his policeman’s uniform. He was dressed in a hunter-green button-down shirt, his chiseled chest teasingly exposed, long sleeves pushed up on his forearms. Only his sleek black police haircut gave him away.

He shot me a blatant look in total indifference to the blonde woman who was with him at the time. Men and women couldn’t help but stare at him when he was nearby, as if drawn to his good looks, and he knew it. Mischief gleamed from his eyes.

I drank my shot and bought him the next one. I wanted to learn everything I could about this brazen, exciting man.

“He’s a cop,” Carol said under her breath.

“I know. He pulled me over once.”

“I see him here a lot, sometimes in uniform with his cop friends, sometimes not. As far as I know, he’s unattached and bent on keeping it that way. There’s always a different woman chasing him. My instincts tell me you should probably steer clear, but I’m not telling you what to do.”

“You just did.” I smiled.

Carol scowled, her springy mahogany curls surrounding her face. “He’s the trouble type. Just saying.”

“He’s a type?” I laughed. “I’m a big girl.”

Two things stood out. One, he enjoys the chase, and two, he likes to play it tough, so at least he’s not the needy type. Couple that with my propensity for going after things I’m told to avoid, and the perfect storm was brewing.

I challenged myself to change the trajectory of this man’s dating life by falling back on a tried-and-true method. I threw my hair behind me and turned away from him, engaging Carol in more conversation. I could feel him watching me, but I continued playing hard-to-get, feigning disinterest. When I went to the ladies’ room, his eyes followed me. When I returned, he had somehow ditched the blonde and was talking to Carol.

I resumed my seat, Carol giving me her look-who-showed-up-while-you-were-gone stare. With Carol he was cajoling, yet cunning, but his eyes were on me. I knew I was his real target. Carol was blushing, her earlier opinion of him now thrown by the wayside. She giggled so much I wanted to shake her back to her senses. He had her complete attention. Carol, can’t you see what he’s doing? He’s using you to get to me. Remember what you told me?

Steve was adding more conflict to the game by luring Carol to his side. I’ve always been able to think on my feet. I wasn’t about to stop now. With clever finesse, I started a dialogue with the guy on the other side of me. Alone and nursing a drink, he was staring up at a basketball game on one of the televisions overhead. “Who’re you rooting for?” I asked, turning toward him. Two could play at this game. The chase was on.

By night’s end, while Carol helped her boyfriend’s band pack up, the guy on my left was slouched over the bar, fully inebriated, thanks to Steve buying him more drinks. Steve and I found ourselves alone.

“You’re in no position to drive home,” Steve had said. He was buzzed but in control, a man on a mission, his penetrating blue eyes deliberate and clear.

“Good thing I’m not,” I said. “My friend’s boyfriend is driving.” I glanced over at Carol and the band members disassembling instruments. Steve’s face fell and my impulsive smile radiated in triumph.

“So, you’re a lawyer,” he said.

What else did he manage to weasel out of my intoxicated girlfriend?

Steve was not put off. “Did you lose my number?”

“Must have misplaced it.”

“Ready to go?” Carol said, her eyes glazed, head swaying.

I looked at the guy still smashed over the bar. Somehow, I felt a little responsible. “Is there room for one more?”

“No,” Carol said. “Car’s full.”

“Okay. I’ll be right along.” I sighed. “This guy needs help,” I said to Steve. “He can’t drive himself home.”

“What’re you getting at?” Steve said.

I ripped a piece of cocktail napkin and wrote on it. “He lives in town. See him home safely, and you can have this.”

“What is it?”

“My phone number.”

That was ten months ago. Now, after our dinner at the Cloverleaf Tavern, I pull into the driveway of my townhouse, an end-unit in one of Livingston, New Jersey’s newest upscale communities. Steve has dozed off, but as soon as I turn off the car’s engine, his eyes flash open. He looks over at me with woozy anticipation because he’s spending the night.

Steve has two drinker personalities. The one following me inside my house is, I am certain, the I-want-my-birthday-sex one. He hasn’t had enough to drink for his other personality, Mr. Hyde, to show up.

My Persian cat, Lucy, darts out of the room when she sees Steve. Lucy usually leaves wherever she’s lounging if Steve comes within a few feet of her. Steve doesn’t hide the fact he doesn’t like Lucy. Feeling’s mutual.

I flip the switch to the gas fireplace to take some chill out of the house, the living room’s cathedral ceiling challenging the heater. Going over to the kitchen, I drop my purse on the counter. Steve rakes a hand through my thick, long hair, twisting it around his fingers before he grips the back of my neck, turning my face toward him.

“Let me get my jacket off first,” I say to no one who’ll listen.

Steve yanks it down from my arms and throws it onto the floor then bends me over the kitchen center island. He presses his mouth on mine, heating with whiskey breath and a flickering tongue. Moving with amazing dexterity for someone with so many drinks in him, he unzips his jeans with one hand, the other on my breast. He grasps my hips with both hands and lifts me onto the island, stripping off my jeans and panties and letting them fall next to his on the floor. I’m splayed across cold granite. Foreplay out of the way, Steve pushes inside me, hard, urgent thrusts bringing him to a quick finish. Restrained under the heaviness of his upper body, I’m unable to move.

A small spider scurries across my kitchen ceiling. I watch it for a while, waiting until Steve’s off me, thinking only that birthdays can be overrated.

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