Shooting Star (1986)

Barbara Bretton's romance, number 175 in the Harlequin American Romance line and published in 1986, begins on a stalled railway car in Japan. Katie Powers, a staid and punctual Bostonian on holiday, meets Tom Sagan, an American who makes fireworks and has come for the Ogatsu family's pyrotechnics; the story follows them home to Boston. (Open Library)

Watches

Rolex watch: In Boston, Tom explains how he knew Katie was a punctuality freak: a woman with a Rolex on her wrist, a Timex in her pocketbook and a train schedule on her lap, as she was when they met, can give the exact time in three languages (p. 103). Later she unfastens her watch and drops it to the floor, telling him they have all the time in the world. Hours afterwards he picks up the gold Rolex, its crystal cracked in two places, and it has stopped. The maker is named; the model is not.

Source text: Hours later, Tom leaned over and retrieved the gold Rolex watch from the floor next to the bed. The crystal was cracked in two places. He held it to his ear. It was silent. (Barbara Bretton, Shooting Star, scan cataloged as Harlequin Books, 1986, p. 145, with the OCR's soft line-break mark in "crystal" removed; Tom's remark about her watches is on p. 103; Internet Archive scan OCR)

Seiko (unidentified model): Tom arrives for dinner at Katie's house in Boston, timed by her to the minute, and announces that he hates watches and that his is the first thing to go when he is on vacation. Leading him upstairs she glances back, sees a bulky Seiko chronograph on his left wrist and tells him he is wearing one now. The text calls it a chronograph and names no model.

Source text: She glanced over her shoulder and saw a bulky Seiko chronograph on his left wrist. “You’re wearing one now.” (Barbara Bretton, Shooting Star, scan cataloged as Harlequin Books, 1986, p. 103; Internet Archive scan OCR)