by Mj Fields
Copyright © MJ Fields 2016
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of MJ Fields, except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976.
This is a work of fiction. All characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
1st Edition Published: January 31, 2016
Published by MJ Fields
Cover Design by: Kari March Designs
Cover Model: Branden Haley
Photo credit: Scott Hoover
Edits by: C&D Editing
2nd Edits by: Kellie Montgomery
Interior Formatting by: Jersey Girl & Co.
Thank you for downloading/purchasing this ebook. This ebook and its contents are the copyrighted property of the author, and may not be reproduced, copied, or distributed for commercial or noncommercial purposes. If you enjoyed this book, please encourage your friends to download/purchase their own copy at an any available retailer, where they can also discover other works by this author. Thank you for your support.
*Disclaimer*
This book contains mature content not suitable for those under the age of 18. It involves strong language and sexual situations. All parties portrayed in sexual situations are consenting adults over the age of 18.
Introduction
Prologue
Accident
O’Donnell’s Pub
Replacement Sticks
Taking Turns
Stank Dankness
Shattered Glass
Eat Shit
For River
Wrong Fucking High
Tastes Good, Doesn’t She?
Long, Hard, And Rough
Birthday Knots And Cake
Fucking Art
Drunk And Irrational
Friendship, Fling, Or Fuck
What Happened?
Going To California
Drunk Dialed
Retribution
RJ And Frank
Divine Intervention
Sick And Dizzy
That Ain’t Gonna Happen
About The Author
Dear Reader,
A big thank you for checking out River James.
If you are new to my work, let me take the opportunity to give you a brief overview of all things STEEL.
Steel men, whether it be Men of Steel, Ties of Steel, or the Rockers of Steel, are not for everyone and, more importantly, not for every woman. They are highly sexual, highly inappropriate, and sometimes … high. They are not always mature, are hard to handle, and most of them would prefer to be the handler. They are man-whores who love all women…until they make the decision to love one woman.
They are undoubtedly Alpha males, each on his own path to finding out what that actually means. When they figure it out, there is no turning it off or turning back. They are genuinely good hearted and have a deep loyalty to those they consider family by blood or by choice. They are all that and then some…until River.
***Warning to the reader***
River seriously has issues, like big-ass issues.
I feel the need to warn you all…
He's an addict.
He's immature.
He has the sex drive of a madman.
He is a victim and an abuser.
He has no regard for rules or laws.
He has no filter, no off switch, and no desire for either.
His loyalties are … sporadic, his mood swings epic.
River James is … a very unlikely hero.
I have asked myself more than once what I was thinking taking this on because, fiction or not, it's an emotional read and a mind-fuck to boot.
***Warning to the reader***
I am not responsible for damage done to your electronic reading device due to the fact that during one, if not all, scenes, you hide it to make sure no one sees you reading it, throw it because you are ready to kill River, or damage it caused by tears from emotion or laughter.
***Warning to the reader***
There are, without a doubt, triggers for some in this book. Sexual and physical abuse is touched on in this book. It was done as tastefully as possible, but I needed to put it out there.
***Promise to the reader***
As raw and gritty as the situations, words, and scenes are in this book, there is heart and emotion in abundance.
Thank you so much for opening your mind and hearts to an unlikely hero because everyone deserves a chance to heal and be loved.
—MJ
P.S. Make sure to check out the link in the back for information on how to claim a free “Rocker, surprise.”
When he fell in love, he fell hard. When he lost her, he lost his will.
Drugs, sex, and rock and roll—in that order—became his life.
River James, the drummer for Steel Total Destruction, loved the brotherhood he formed with his unlikely best friend, the band mates from Steel Total Destruction, and the family he found in his label, Forever Four.
Then one tragic accident takes it all away in the blink of an eye. Twisted metal, shattered bones, crushed dreams, and torn wreckage causes deep, dark secrets to be revealed. One collision causes him to lose all hope, with no one but himself to blame.
Now facing harsh realities, which have never been one of River’s strengths, he turns to the sure things in life: drugs and women who oh so willingly give themselves to a tall, dark, and tattooed rocker like him.
Will he find himself in the wreckage of twisted metal and crushed dreams? Or will he lose his way in the smoke and debris?
The first person in her family to graduate from high school and college, Keanna Sutton is flying high on her accomplishments and hard work. She has the career and man of her dreams … or so she thought until she finds out he is cheating on her. Ending the relationship, she begins rebuilding her shattered self-esteem.
Then a chance run-in with a tall, dark, and handsome, silver-tongued drummer tests her strength and ability to hold her own tongue while trying to ignore the implausible attraction to a man she knows will be no good for her.
Now a second run in at O’Donnell’s pub while under the influence of drink, music, friends, and a fight makes Keanna throw caution to the wind, and she finds herself getting rocked the only way a badass like River can: hard and nasty.
Will the hottest night of her life end there? Or will she lose herself in a man who gives no promises except the lady always comes first?
Six years ago…
The first time I saw Jesse, she was wearing a jean skirt with a frayed hem, and she had on knock-off Ugg boots and a Buckeye hoodie, the same shit every girl in this hell hole of a town wore. She was totally townie, but hot as hell.
Her long, strawberry-blonde hair hung to her waist in ringlets, but not the kind of ringlets that came from a salon; that was all her. She had big green eyes and pale skin. She also had a round ass and the biggest tits I had ever laid eyes on when it came to a frame that size. She had curves for days—hell, weeks and months … could have been years…
I was at Roundy’s place. He was a friend of Steps, my cousin, who was three years older than me. I was sixteen years old and hanging out in a trailer in the middle of bum-fuck nowhere, getting fucking high for the first time in my life.
She looked at her friend and then around the smoke-filled room. She appeared to be nervous and immediately asked for the bathroom. I probably should have warned her that she should take her ch
ances out in the woods with the poison ivy instead of going in to that shit hole, but I was high, and the words didn’t form quickly enough.
When she came out, the bowl was being passed around, and she reached for it. Roundy looked at her, nodded, and she hit it hard several times. After a killer coughing fit, she sat down between her friend Tom-Tom and me, looked at me, and nodded with no smile on her face, not even in her eyes.
At the time, it made me laugh. I mean, what the fuck did a girl who looked like that have to be so pissed off about?
“Aw, you’ve got jokes,” she said, rolling her eyes.
“I’ve got jokes for days, red.” I winked.
“Not interested in days,” she muttered, taking the bowl. “Just moments.” Then she hit it.
I smirked. “If I can make you laugh, Joker, you’ve gotta give me something.”
Tom-Tom leaned forward. “If you can make her laugh, I’ll give you a blow job.”
“It’s on, then,” I said to Tom-Tom, a girl I already knew, but winked at the girl who now looked annoyed.
It didn’t take long. Being high probably helped.
When she smiled, I leaned forward then nodded expectantly to Tom-Tom, and Jesse looked annoyed.
“What?” I asked her, still laughing.
“Her or me,” she said, standing up and crossing her arms while glaring down at me.
I looked over at Tom-Tom, and she shrugged.
I stood. “You.”
That night, we had a moment. It was the first of so many things: blow job, finger banging, and getting high. She was skilled. I was not. I kind of blew it fast, but she only shrugged then started again.
The next day, we got high and fucked, and the condom broke. It didn’t matter to me; I wasn’t worried one bit. I was just happy as fuck when she lay back down and cuddled up against me with a smile—an almost smile—on her face. We fell asleep, looking at each other.
We woke up to Tom-Tom yelling that the Whites were there for her.
She jumped up, threw on her jean skirt and hoodie, and then took off out the back.
When I finally got up and dressed, I looked out the door to see a large man carrying her, kicking and screaming, toward a van. I started out because shit didn’t look right to me, but Tom-Tom held her hand in front of me.
“They’re her foster family. She ran away.”
A tall kid got out of the van, pulled his beanie down, and then held the door open for her. I couldn’t get a good look at him. Then I really didn’t want to when she dove into his arms and cried.
“That’s her boyfriend.”
“Her, what?” I asked Tom-Tom in shock.
“The guy she was running from.”
“Well, why the fuck—”
“That’s how she is, River. It makes no sense.” She shakes her head.
It made no sense to me, either. She had been running from him, and now she was running to him. I was a little pissed off, jealous maybe. I didn’t need to feel that shit, so I went inside and got a little more fucked up.
Two days later, she showed up again. I woke up to her hand down my shorts and her telling me to make her laugh. She was jerking me off, and I was telling her jokes. Fucked up as hell, but then, when she smiled, rolled a condom on me, and mounted me, fucked up met don’t give a fuck.
This went on for a week before I went back home.
To hell.
A couple of months went by before I got a call from a girl crying. I knew immediately it was Jesse.
“I’m pregnant.”
“Okay.” I didn’t feel numb or nervous as I waited to hear her voice, which always told me in the past what she was feeling.
“I need money,” she declared, sniffing loudly into the phone.
“For …?” I sit up in bed and look over the side where I dropped my pants last night before climbing in, high as hell.
“He wants me to keep it. He says we can have a family. He says it like he believes it.” She was pissed.
I knew she was talking about the boyfriend she had admitted to having yet told me he was too straight-laced for her. He didn’t understand her like I did. I was her light, her white knight.
“Is it his, or is it mine?” I asked softly, knowing at any given moment, my mother or that fucking asshole stepfather could walk in my room without notice or care for my privacy.
“If it was yours, what would you say?”
From what I had seen from her, she couldn’t handle being a parent any more than I fucking could.
“I would say, if you wanna keep it, cool. If not—”
“I can’t have a kid, River! I’m not ready. I’m fucked up so much, and when I’m not, I want to be.” She started sobbing. “Please help me! Please.”
“Calm down, Jesse. You know I will.” I swung my legs over the side of my bed and grabbed my jeans. “Text me the time and place. Everything will be fine.”
I met her and Tom-Tom halfway between her place and mine. She talked Tom-Tom into staying the night, and we slept in the back of the SUV, twisted up in each other. She was a mess. Her pain became mine.
I told her to terminate—begged her to—and it made her happy.
The next morning, she took off. We had a plan.
Two days later, that plan was dead in the water … and so was she.
“Grab me that Thermos?” I ask the girl we call Yaya, pointing to the floor of my new ride. I haven’t needed a vehicle in years. I’m too fucked up to drive most of the time, anyway, so why bother?
Finn, my best friend of over six years, is fucking shit up, not that it should surprise me. He has done it before. Now, because he doesn’t want to be around Yaya, I have to leave the party celebrating the end of our first headline tour to get her back to Taelyn and Xavier’s Steels’. X is the owner of our band’s management and production label, and his mom, or Momma Joe as we all call her, is watching their kid and Sonya’s—Yaya—four-year-old boy Noah.
We come to a stoplight, and I pour a cup into the Thermos cap and offer it to her. Her hand comes up and hits the cup.
“Fuck!” I yell as the hot liquid soaks through my shirt and hits my skin.
“Oh, River, I am so, so sorry,” she tells me.
“No big deal,” I lie. It fucking hurts! “Take the cup?”
I hand it to her then pull my shirt over my head, dab up as much of the spill on me as I can, and then reach in the back to grab a sweatshirt and pull it on over my head.
“See? All better.” I wink and look up as the light turns green.
When we get to the next light and stop, I look over. “It’s no big—” I stop when I see her looking at me strangely, waiting for her to say whatever it is she has going on in her mind.
“Was that tattoo a Joker?” she asks.
“Yeah.” I smile and nod, then look back at the light.
“How old is it?”
“Fucked up question, Yaya. Most people ask, ‘did it hurt?’ ‘What does it mean?’ ‘Why the fuck would you do that?’ “ I chuckle.
“Did it hurt?”
“It didn’t tickle.” I smirk as the light turns green.
“What does it mean?” she starts in on the same damn questions I fed her as I pull forward.
“It’s someone I knew a long time ago,” I answer truthfully. “She never smiled, so I gave a nickname that made no fucking sense, because she didn’t make any sense.”
She is quiet and then asks, “Did you love her?”
I laugh out loud. “Sixteen-year-old boys who get a blow job for the first time think they love whoever’s mouth is involved, Yaya.”
“You were sixteen?”
“Yep. First blow job one night and fucking her the next.” I should stop, but why? It feels good to talk about her, and it’s not like anyone would have a fucking clue who it’s about, anyway. She is dead, so is the baby, and no one is any the wiser. I have to live with that all by myself. Well, me and weed, pills, or whatever I need to use take my mind off it.
I st
op at another stoplight and look over, and she is looking at me like she is in shock.
“You okay?” I almost laugh, but she is in a state, Finn just having sent her away and all.
She shakes her head back and forth for a few seconds then asks, “Does Finn know about you and Jesse?”
As a car beeps its horn behind me, I look away from her and hit the gas. My breath is immediately lost as I accelerate. The wind has just been knocked out of me.
Her hands come up and grab the dashboard. “Please slow down. You are making me nervous.”
The light turns from yellow to red, and I hit the brakes hard while throwing my hand out in front of her to stop her from hitting the dash.
“River,” she voices quietly.
I still can’t talk, can’t say shit.
“He would understand if he—”
“Like hell he would!” And with that admission, years of undiluted, suppressed anger and emotion boil over. “He’s sending you away because you know about her. Can you fucking imagine—”
“He’s sending me away because—” she begins, but I cut her off.
I don’t care. I don’t fucking care.
“I hated him,” I seethe. “For six fucking months, I hated him and didn’t even know who the fuck he was.”
The way she looks at me … The fucking look on her face is one of confusion, of pain, then of understanding.
Bright lights hit my peripheral, and then her look changes to horror.
“River, look out!” she screams.
The sound of the collision is deafening; the unbelievable pain from the steel crushing me is agonizing. Glass rains in on me while metal tears at my flesh. The smell of burning rubber and smoking brakes causes immediate nausea. The copper taste of my own blood intensifies the sickness in my stomach.
I look at her face while I close in on her, terrified I will crush her. She scrunches her eyes shut. Then I feel her hand grasp mine tightly. She screams something, but I can’t hear a damn thing.
