by Abigail Roux
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Thank you for reading Abigail Roux’s Crash & Burn!
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The culmination of this series has been over seven years in the making. If I tried to thank every person who made this ninth and final book possible, I’d run out of pages before I could do the job well. From the people in my life who gave me inspiration for everything from plot to characters, to the readers who picked up this book and flipped past the title page, everyone who’s had a hand in this journey deserves a word of thanks.
Thank you to the readers who’ve stuck with me, and Ty and Zane, from beginning to end. Thank you for trusting me, and thank you for letting me tell you a story.
Thank you to Rachel and Riptide, who gave me a home when I felt like I was at sea. You’re not just my publisher or my editor, you’re my friend. And I can’t stress how important that’s been to me.
Thank you to the handful of people who have the patience to love me day in and day out. You’ve seen me through the highs and lows and I don’t believe I’d be here if it weren’t for your voices in my ears, your faces in my memory, and you in my heart.
To my great-grandmother, who fought ’til her last breath, and spent her days in the shade of her porch with a shotgun across her lap. Her spirit lives on in the Grady family.
To my daddy, whose love of history permeated my brain from a young age and who encouraged me to study what I loved. Without him, and without that horribly boring
senior-level social studies class I had to take for my degree, I don’t believe I ever would have picked up a pencil and started telling stories on paper as I pretended to take notes.
To my granny, my mama, and my baby girl. You’ve each inspired me in ways I cannot tally. Mara Grady is the mother everyone wishes they had, but I’m so lucky because she came from the two most important women in my life. I hope one day my Little Roux will think the same of me.
And finally, I have to acknowledge a man whose name cannot be given. To Squad Leader, who demonstrated to me that men like Ty Grady do exist. They do exist, and the world needs them.
Cut & Run series
Cut & Run (with Madeleine Urban)
Sticks & Stones (with Madeleine Urban)
Fish & Chips (with Madeleine Urban)
Divide & Conquer (with Madeleine Urban)
Armed & Dangerous
Stars & Stripes
Touch & Geaux
Ball & Chain
Sidewinder series
Shock & Awe
Cross & Crown
Part & Parcel (coming soon)
Novels
According to Hoyle
The Gravedigger’s Brawl
The Archer
Novellas
The Bone Orchard
A Tale from de Rode
My Brother’s Keeper
Seeing Is Believing
Unrequited
With Madeleine Urban
Caught Running
Love Ahead
Warrior’s Cross
Abigail Roux was born and raised in North Carolina. A past volleyball star who specializes in sarcasm and painful historical accuracy, she currently spends her time coaching high school volleyball and investigating the mysteries of single motherhood. Any spare time is spent living and dying with every Atlanta Braves and Carolina Panthers game of the year. Abigail has a daughter, Little Roux, who is the light of her life, a boxer, four rescued cats who play an ongoing live-action variation of Call of Duty throughout the house, one evil Ragdoll, a certifiable extended family down the road, and a cast of thousands in her head.
To learn more about Abigail, please visit abigailroux.com.
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Zane sat on a stool behind the salvaged countertop that graced one side of the first floor of Brick & Mortar Books. He rested his head in one palm, using the other hand to flip the electronic pages on his tablet.
The grand opening had been a few months ago, and they’d had a steady stream of business since then. People were drawn in by the unique façade, by the rich and quirky details of the interior, by the comfortable seating Zane had sprinkled throughout the three stories of new and used books. By the free Wi-Fi.
People were also drawn in by the spectacle Ty had set up in the window: Two tiny long-haired kittens who liked to sleep in a lined crate with “TNT” stenciled on the side. One was orange with a fluffy white crest, the other gray with nebulous white stripes. Both had blue eyes that were slowly but surely turning a mystery color between yellow and green.
Zane turned the page of his book, and Cricket the gray kitty patted at the screen as the page swished by. His app exited and left him with the menu screen.
“Ty!” he called, his voice echoing through the rabbit warren of heavy wooden shelving and thick tomes. He glared at the kitten, who was no more than six weeks old if she was a day. The kittens had been so malnourished when Ty had coaxed them out from between two busted-down levels of a dock on the water, the vet couldn’t accurately guess their age yet.
Zane leaned closer to Cricket. “Can you go away?”
Cricket blinked innocently and tapped him on the nose. With her claws.
“Tyler!”
Ty poked his head out from an aisle, a load of books in his arms. Zane didn’t know if he was stocking them, stealing them, or hiding them so he could read them later without them being bought out from under him like the mystery he never got to finish last week.
Zane had also discovered that Ty was seeding the store, especially the adventure and mystery sections, with spy gadgets. Surprise finds within the pages of books and among the shelves had delighted a few customers already. Zane was terrified to know what Ty was doing in the horror section.
Jiminy the orange kitten was sitting on Ty’s shoulder. Jiminy the orange kitten always sat on Ty’s shoulder, which was how he’d gotten his name.
“What’s up?”
“Will you come get your fluffy thing please?”
Ty’s expression immediately softened as he came closer. That look right there was why Zane had acquiesced. Ty had been on his way to the rescue facility when he’d seen Jiminy and Cricket at the dock. Convincing Zane to assist him in the operation to extract them hadn’t been hard after convincing Zane to let him have a cat—two cats—in the first place. Zane could watch Ty with these kittens all day long. As long as he was an observer and not a participant after the three hours it had taken them to lure the little assholes out.
“Hey there, sweet girl,” Ty murmured as he approached Zane’s cou
nter.
Cricket meowed and began a little tap dance as she tried to work up the courage to take the leap toward Ty. They loved him like nothing Zane had ever seen. Ty plucked her off the counter, depositing her on his other shoulder. He gave Zane a jaunty grin as Jiminy and Cricket mewed happily and settled onto his broad shoulders.
“What are you reading?” Zane asked, leaning both elbows on the table.
Ty looked down at the stack of books in his hands, then slid them onto the counter. “Nothing,” he claimed, grinning in a way that made Zane’s heart flutter.
“Uh huh?”
Ty flipped open the cover of a leather copy of the Complete Works of Edgar Allan Poe, revealing a cutout with a .38 Special nestled inside.
“Ty!”
“What? It’s a display copy, goes behind glass. Customers no touchy.”
Zane put his face in his hands, massaging his temples. “Ty.”
Ty chuckled evilly, retreating into the rows of books as he began to hum the tune to “When Johnny Comes Marching Home Again.”
Zane shrugged, going back to his book with a grin. Whatever kept Ty happy between the occasional buzz from the back door that signaled a delivery from the Company.
Whatever kept them both happy.
