Twist of Fate Louise, Tia (read dune .txt) 📖

five p.m., a guard came to my cell, rattled the bars like some old cheesy black and white movie, and told me to get my shit together.

Time to go.

I was halfway through a four-year prison sentence, and last night, they said it was over, early release.

Confused is an understatement for how I felt, but I wasn’t about to argue. I started making plans.

“You can thank the tree huggers for this miscarriage of justice.” The woman behind the desk scowled as she spoke, like the words tasted bad. “Wouldn’t want you getting sick. It might violate your civil rights.”

Rage smoldered in my chest, and I didn’t make eye contact with her. This whole eighteen months has been a violation of my civil rights, but why should she care?

Since the start of this nightmare, nobody cared. I said it once, twice, three thousand times. I. Didn’t. Do. It.

Nobody gave a shit.

Not even my court-appointed lawyer believed me. I was caught with illegal human growth hormone, and that’s all they saw. No one looked at the receipt for perfectly legal adaptogen supplements, which is what I thought I was picking up. I was a redneck from South Carolina with a trunk full of HGH. Case closed.

I entered San Quentin and kept my head down. I made allies with the biggest, meanest guys, and the quiet ones who stayed to themselves. I learned to be ready to fight always.

I started my prison sentence resolved the next time I saw my father, I wouldn’t let up until he was begging for mercy.

Now I’m a free man.

Sort of.

I’m out, and I’m headed back to look him in the eye. He sent me here, and I want to know why.

Staring out across the dark waters, I make a vow. I’m getting back everything I’ve lost. I don’t know how the man who put me here will make it happen, but we’ll sort that out when I get home.

Snatching my navy canvas bag off the ground, I start walking.

* * *

Read THIS MUCH IS TRUE (link) now, FREE in Kindle Unlimited!

Also available on AUDIO (link), narrated by Jason Clarke and Samantha Brentmoor.

When We Kiss Exclusive Sneak Peek

“Kiss me…

You’re too law-abiding for me.

What makes you say that?

That uniform. Those handcuffs.

Maybe I should put you in handcuffs.

Maybe I’d like to see you try…”

Tabby Green:

Preacher’s niece.

Website designer.

Bad Girl.

Chad Tucker:

Retired military.

Deputy sheriff.

Hero.

He’s a hot cop with a square jaw, a sexy grin, and a tight end.

I’m a bad girl, a “Jezebel”—just ask all the old biddies in town.

We’re oil and vinegar. We don’t mix.

But when we kiss…

She’s got flashing green eyes, red-velvet lips, and luscious curves in all the right places.

She’s a bad girl all right, and after what I’ve lost, I’m not looking for trouble.

But when we kiss…

Oil and vinegar DO mix,

And when they do, it’s electric.

A full-length, STAND-ALONE, opposites-attract romance about heroes, bad girls, and what happens when you stop fighting and surrender to love.

* * *

One

Tabby

August, last year…

The air is electric when you’re being bad.

Little currents zip through your veins like lightning bugs grazing the tips of tall grass, and your stomach is tight. You’re right on the edge, holding your breath…

Or maybe it’s just me.

“Climb through.” Blade squints up at me, the devil in his blue eyes.

He’s holding the corner of a chain-length fence, and it makes a metallic screech as he lifts it higher.

Eleven thirty, and the night air is hot and humid—a warm washcloth on my bare skin. I duck through the opening, putting my hands up to protect my hair, my ears.

The space is just big enough for me to fit, hidden behind the tool shed. A rustling and a BANG! lets me know we’re both through the breach. My naughty escort stands grinning in the moonlight. His hair is dark, his skin pale, and shadows deepen his eyes, nose, and mouth. He’s like one of those scary-sexy vampires.

Or maybe I’m a little high.

“Let’s do this!” He lets out a whoop and jerks off his black leather jacket.

His white tee is next, revealing a coiled serpent tattooed on his upper back. Jeans off, I catch a glimpse of his tight ass as he runs straight to the pool and breaks the glassy surface with a loud splash.

I shimmy out of my calf-length jeans and unbutton my short-sleeved shirt. I’m buzzing from the pot we just smoked at my small house, the old parsonage in town near the church, before we got the idea to break into the Plucky Duck Motel pool.

The Plucky Duck is off the Interstate, too far from the beach to be a tourist attraction. It’s a million years old and completely deserted.

“Nobody ever stays here.” I walk slowly down the steps into the shallow end.

The water is warm as it rises up my calves, to my knees, to my panties, to my waist. Blade is under the diving board watching me, his mouth submerged like a shark or a crocodile. His eyebrows rise as the water reaches my waist.

Through a blue haze of pot smoke, he demanded we do something I’ve never done before. I said there isn’t much in Oceanside I haven’t done. Until I thought of this old place.

Skinny dipping with Mayor Rhodes’s tattooed bad-boy nephew is the perfectly spontaneous, irresponsible way to kick the last memories of Travis Walker from my heart.

Acid burns in my stomach. Tattooed Travis blew into town three months ago on a Harley, kissed me, and said I was the prettiest girl he’d ever seen. We screwed around for six weeks, until I caught him sneaking out of Daisy Sales’s bedroom window.

He didn’t even deny sleeping with her. He said Oceanside was getting “too restrictive,” then he hopped on that Harley, lit up a cigarette, and drove away.

Asshole.

Serves me right for letting my guard down.

Pushing off the bottom, I keep my head above water as I glide to where Blade waits at the deep end. It’s darker under the diving board.

“How long you planning to stay in Oceanside?”