Nikki Explains Why She Always Eats Dessert First

“I notice you didn’t eat your kale, salmon, and quinoa.” Ainsley gestured at Nikki’s plate with her fork.

“Here’s why,” Nikki said as she began to drizzle her fish with a teriyaki glaze. “One day I was eating lunch at my desk in the newsroom. I had this fantastic piece of chocolate cake and a salad. I ate the salad first, like normal people do, and then, just as I was about to take my first bite of cake, the police scanner went nuts. A thirteen car pile up on the interstate. I jumped in a news car with a photographer and left that cake sitting my desk, but I thought about it all afternoon.”

She flaked off a piece of salmon and stabbed it with her fork. “I didn’t get back to my desk until almost midnight. It was a long, cold day, but I knew at the end of it I’d reward myself with that massive slice of chocolate cake.”

“What happened?”

Nikki shrugged. “Animal ate it.”

Ainsley gave her a blank look. “An animal ate it?”

“No. A photographer named Animal ate it. He had orange hair, kind of like that crazy guy on the Muppets? Anyway, life is uncertain, so when I see chocolate, I eat it.”

“An interesting life philosophy.”

“Obviously I don’t do this in front of the children,” Nikki said through a mouthful of quinoa. “But when they aren’t around, I always eat dessert first.”

Friends with Secrets
Genre: Suspense
Release: August 2024
Format: Print, Digital, Audio
Purchase Link

In a funny and suspenseful debut, Christine Gunderson explores the myth of the perfect mother, the bonds of female friendship, and the haunting impact of secrets.

What you see isn’t always what you get.

Take Ainsley. The gorgeous mother of two lives a picture-perfect life with her husband, Ben—aspiring politician and heir to a candy fortune—in suburban Washington, DC. But in reality, Ainsley has no idea what she’s doing and is terrified someone will figure out who she really is and where she came from.

Nikki’s fighting to keep afloat as a stay-at-home mother of four, subsisting on chicken nuggets and very little sleep. She’s a mess on the outside, and inside yearns for the validation—and the paycheck—of the television news career she left behind.

When a dangerous figure from Ainsley’s past becomes a coach at her kids’ school, she fears the worst and confides in Nikki, spilling every detail of her former life.

Together, they devise a plan to expose the coach and safeguard their kids. But can they protect their own lives—and their new friendship—in the process?

Meet the author
Christine Gunderson grew up on a fourth-generation family farm in rural North Dakota where she read Laura Ingalls Wilder books in her very own little house on the prairie.

She’s a former television anchor and reporter and former Capitol Hill aide. She currently lives in the Washington D.C. suburbs with her three children, Star the Wonder Dog, and a very patient husband.

When not writing, she’s sailing the Chesapeake Bay with her family, playing Star Wars monopoly, re-reading Jane Austen novels in the school pick up line or unloading the dishwasher. Friends with Secrets is her first novel.