Table of Contents
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
About the Author
Other Works
Excerpt from Reese (Roughnecks Book 5)
Excerpt from Bound by Affliction written by Ryan Michele
Excerpt from PowerHouse (Power Chain Book 1) co-written with Ryan Michele
Copyright © Chelsea Camaron 2018
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 Chelsea Camaron, except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976.
This is a work of fiction. All character, 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 19, 2018
Editing by: Asli Fratarcangeli and Emma Mack
Author Lifesaving Critique Partner: Ryan Michele
Cover Picture: Shutterstock
Formatting by: IndieVention Designs
Thank you for purchasing this book. This book and its contents are the copyrighted property of the author, and may not be reproduced, copied, and distributed for commercial or non-commercial purposes.
This book contains mature content not suitable for those under the age of 18. Content involves strong language, violence, and sexual situations. All parties portrayed in sexual situation are over the age of 18. All characters are a work of fiction.
This book is not meant to be an exact depiction of life as an oil rigger, but rather a work of fiction meant to entertain.
Series Reading Order:
Maverick
Heath
Lance
Wendol
Reese
Wendol
“I am determined, driven, and damn sure I can tackle life.” Jessika Phillips
Jessika Phillips is comfortable, confident, and charismatic. She loves where she is in life even if it’s alone.
Wendol “Fly Guy” Branch works hard and plays harder. He knows the harsh realities of love and loss. Now, his sole focus is fighting to right all the wrongs.
When trouble lands at Jessika’s feet, will she trust the man Wendol is to keep her safe? Her walls are up, but he’s just the man to break them down.
Intended for mature audiences only. This book contains strong language and strong sexual situations. Please do not buy if any of this offends you.
This is a stand alone story with a HEA. NO Cliffhanger!
The Roughneck Series are a set of stand-alone, interconnected novellas that feature bad boy oil riggers who know how to work hard and play harder. These stories are full of suspense, romance, and men who aren’t afraid to get a little dirty. If fast paced stories with a little edge and a lot of love aren’t your thing, then these aren’t the books for you.
Dedication
For Nick and Suzanne Wendolski – you have the kind of love that lasts the test of time. This isn’t your story, but you both inspire me to believe in everlasting love. Thank you, Suzanne for the many times I have used your name, kid’s names, husband’s name, and all sorts of variations in my books. To Nick, the best chef in real life and fictional fire captain, now roughneck I know – thank you for being Suz’s rock and Prince Charming. Love to you both!
In The Series
Maverick
Heath
Lance
Wendol
Reese
Table of Contents
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
About the Author
Other Works
Excerpt from Reese (Roughnecks Book 5)
Excerpt from Bound by Affliction written by Ryan Michele
Excerpt from PowerHouse (Power Chain Book 1) co-written with Ryan Michele
Prologue
~Jessika~
Five years ago
Zanne’s Bar is always fun. Tonight, though, I really let loose.
While I love to dance, I normally keep the drinks to a minimum. After a long week, a bad breakup, and another reminder that there might not be a man around with the same goals and ambitions I have, it’s time to cut loose.
The drinks are flowing and Wendol “Fly Guy” Branch has been dancing with me for the last hour. He usually doesn’t come out with Hitman, Tapper, Rush, and Drunken Monkey. The crew of studs that I swear no one will ever be able to tame.
Heath “Hitman” Thomas left within thirty minutes of arriving with some chick. Maverick “Tapper” Collins is in a corner with his hand up some broad’s skirt and his tongue down her throat. Lance “Rush” Miller is at the bar chatting with Juliette, everyone’s favorite bartender, while his buddy, Reese “DJ Drunken Monkey” Matthews, is mixing beats at the turn tables. These guys usually frequent Zanne’s, except Wendol.
He owns a local gym, The Basement, and it’s his life. Always working he rarely joins the guys on their weekend adventures. We all went to school together and navigate life as adults in our own ways.
My bestie, Kenzy, is off in Houston working and living life so I’m solo tonight with no wing-woman. I miss her, but she is where she wants to be; living life as a nurse there.
With all Wendol’s attention for the night being on me, I can’t help but wish he would come out more often. He definitely has me turned on.
This man knows how to move. He’s tall at six feet or so. With my body pressed to his, I feel every chiseled muscle through his clothes and I can’t help but want to be skin to skin with the man. Wendol isn’t bulky like most guys from the gym, he’s cut like a swimmer. He has filled out over the years from his days as a fly weight boxer. I don’t think he would make weight if he were still in the league for that any more. He has spikey blond hair and crystal blue eyes. He’s the kind of guy that is easy to get lost in.
Knowing all these guys for so long, they are the walking, talking example of what it is to work hard and play harder. I have never met another bunch like them – hot, fun to be around, honest, and completely upfront with where they see things in life. For them it’s not in a relationship – any woman spending even a little time with them knows they aren’t the guys you’ll be bringing home for the holidays.
I can respect that more than I can a man who leads me on. Happily Ever After should definitely be saved for fairytales and romance novels.
Breaking up is hard to do. My latest is a doozy. James said all the right things, did all the right things, until he didn’t have to anymore. Two years wasted believing in a man who wanted nothing more than to spend his life on my couch playing his video games. While gaming is a nice distraction, it doesn’t pay the bills.
I don’t need a man to take care of me, but I damn sure don’t want to take care of one. Since when does ‘you do you and I do me’ become so hard?
Wendol could be my perfect distraction.
“Come home with me?” I whisper my invitation. One thing I’ve learned, if you want something in life you gotta go for it. Tonight, I want Wendol.
He smirks before dropping his mouth to mine. I open greedily for him. As his tongue hits mine, my entire body comes alive for more.
My body throbs deep in my belly for what he can give me. With quick goodbyes to his friends, Wendol is leading me by the hand outside where we catch a cab to my apartment. Making out in the backseat of a car normally isn’t my thing. I am twenty-three and have no need to do the deed in a car since I moved out of my parents’ house at eighteen after all.
Highly turned on and in an alcohol induced fog, we rush inside and I barely remember to lock the door behind us as we start yanking at each other’s clothes. With us both naked, Wendol lays me back on the couch and stares down at my body.
The cool air hits my skin as my back arches naturally seeking more contact.
“Fuckin’ beautiful,” he mutters as he moves to settle between my legs. His eyes dance in delight. He has this hungry look to him like he’s ready to devour me. He spreads me wide as his hands massage my thighs. With his thumbs teasing my pussy lips, I bite back my own moan. I want to beg him to touch me.
His mouth comes down on my nipple and he sucks … hard. I feel the fire burning as his thumbs continue to tease my pussy lips.
Reaching out, I find his cock and stroke him. He grows larger and larger in my hand. Finally, his fingers find their way inside my heat as his thumb rubs these small, soft circles over my clit. One finger plunges in and out of me working me until I feel my own juices trailing out. His mouth alternates between my nipples and my neck as he continues to work me. Loosing myself to the sensations, I release his cock needing him inside me.
Two fingers slide in as his thumb applies exquisite pleasure to my swollen nub. I see stars. His fingers leave me and I feel his cock rock between my pussy lips working me without entering me.
“Wendol, more.” I cry out wanting him to fuck me senseless.
He pulls away quickly leaning down and retrieving a condom from his wallet and sliding it over his cock. Back over me, I feel him inch by inch slide in. The man is not only long but thick and I relish the feel of him stretching me.
Wild abandon takes over and I press up with my hips needing more. Wendol delivers and his pace is soon relentless as he slides in and out of me. My whole body trembles while I watch his muscles flex with his work. The first orgasm hits and he keeps working as I roll through the aftershock all the while my body builds higher and higher into the next one.
I take all he gives. I feel almost limp as he keeps going. God, this is amazing. I’ve never had sex this good as my pussy clamps down holding him inside me.
“Fuckin’ heaven, Jessika. This is fuckin’ heaven.”
His words come out just as the next orgasm rolls through my body. It’s not long before Wendol stills inside me as a moan escapes.
“Stamina,” I pant out feeling like I just had the best workout of my life.
Wendol laughs pulling out and sliding off me.
“Bathroom?”
I point to the hall as I take in the way my body tingles from the top of my head to the tips of my toes.
I’ve had sex before. Since losing my virginity, I’ve had four partners. I’m not a casual hookup kind of girl, but I have had one partner that was a fuck buddy in college. Wendol, though, he just screwed me for life. I don’t know that anyone will have my body so on fire again.
Chapter One
~Wendol~
Board meetings are not my thing. The law says we have to have them as a licensed non-profit organization. My knee bounces wildly under the big oval desk. My dad sits in the head chair while my mom takes her place to the right. They both are dressed in business professional attire while I’m in gym clothes. This is nothing new.
Also at the table is my Gramps. The surly old man cashed in his entire retirement to be left living on social security to cover Shayla’s funeral and then to give me money to open my gym. He said I needed an outlet for my anger.
I did and still do.
The business binder containing the checkbook sits in front of my dad taunting me.
I know shit’s not been good. And that’s my fault.
Reaching in the pocket of my basketball shorts, I fish out my wallet and the check from the gym. It’s not much this time, but House of Hope takes a lot to stay afloat. I wish I could do more and set the place up to be solid forever, but life doesn’t work that way. They don’t know my gym isn’t where the money comes from, it’s always just been a funnel. I found a place to release my anger that is better than any workout I could come up with. My family just doesn’t know about it.
Heath took a hard hit to the head in a work accident. He’s a roughneck, that’s what they call them here in Midland, Texas, and works on the oil rigs as a derrick-man. The pay is good, but it isn’t what he wants to do in life. The man was born to fight, to be a boxer. Life is a bitch sometimes and things happen. He beat the shit out of a man who deserved it for hurting his wife. The professionals in the league didn’t want to hear a word of it. Especially when the wife changed her tune to protect her abuser. Women, they need to learn to speak up.
The new concussion from work is something he wants to fight with, but as his friend, it’s not safe. Even though the callout for the underground league, The Lottery, has been there, we haven’t shown up.
Tonight that changes, but Heath doesn’t know it. He’s done more than enough for my family. He’s got LoraLeigh to think about now. I’ll be the fighter.
Interestingly, the fight is local at another gym here in Gardendale which is uncommon. Usually, I wouldn’t even let Heath fight in our home town. House of Hope needs me to take the win for the whole night and that is all the motivation I need to break my own rules. One night, probably five to eight fights, and a pocket full of cash.
That’s how it works in The Lottery. It’s a dark, ugly, man’s place to win or get fucked up. Everyone has the same goal – be the last man standing at the end of the night. In The Lottery, fighter’s names are drawn just before the matches. The crowd can bet by picking numbers similar to a lottery. The buy in is five hundred per fighter whichever number you want to back. Each fighter pays two hundred just to be drawn for a match.
The Lottery fund, as the organizers call it, gets ten percent off the top. Fifteen percent of the total is used to pay the winning betters their prize – but only the people who get the fighter who tops the night, win. Every loss is a loss around the room. For the fighters, it’s simple – you pay for the opportunity to fight. The winner of each match moves onto the next round. Be the final winner and the money left is yours. All or nothing, that’s how it goes.
Everyone goes in blind. The odds are always against you. This isn’t about weight classes or one style of fighting. It’s controlled chaos. We don’t even know the location until a few hours beforehand. The call went out early for tonight’s fight and I imagine that’s because some people needed time to travel. We never know how many fighters will show up, what caliber of a fighter they are, who they train with, or where their weaknesses lie. This isn’t like professional fights where you can review your opponent on video and find the key to taking them down. No, this is no holds barred, make them bleed fighting.
Everything about The Lottery is money. It’s an underground enterprise.
One I desperately need.
Sliding the check to my dad, he nods and lifts it. “Wendol, thank you.” He starts to choke up like he does every time I bring them money.
“You make the name proud,” Gramps mutters smiling at me. He’s my mother’s father and my namesake. Marek Wendolski is a strong, proud Polish-American whose parents came to America two years before he was born. When I was born, my mother wanted to pay homage to her history, but thought Marek Wendol Branch didn’t sound as strong as Wendol Marek Branch, so Wendol won. Either way, I win because I was given a strong name from a stronger man.
“I told you when I opened The Basement everything would be for Shayla.” I explain myself again for the millionth time.
My older sister died when I had just turned sixteen and she was seventeen. The year before she had met a man and
fallen in love. To most, they would think it was some teenage thing, but to Shayla it was everything. He was twenty-three and a douchebag, but she wouldn’t hear any of it.
He beat her to death. With his hands, only the man didn’t choke her. He bashed her head into the concrete wall of his detached garage over and over again.
Brutal.
Vicious.
The man kept bashing my beautiful sister’s head into his wall face first until she was beyond recognition.
That’s not love.
That’s a monster out of control.
My parents never expecting to have to bury one of their kids didn’t have life insurance. That’s why Gramps cashed in his retirement and paid for her services. They were advised by an attorney to sue her boyfriend in a separate civil case, but honestly, the trial for her murder was bad enough. A day before the jury was due to deliberate, the man took a plea deal and currently serves in a medium security facility for manslaughter. A crime of passion he called it.
He got off easy.
Shayla did not.
By the time the case made it to trial it was my senior year, and I was full of all out rage. After I graduated, Gramps sat me down and gave me fifteen thousand dollars to either go to school or open a gym with. He knew I had converted my parents basement years before into a home gym because I had been bullied at school. He also knew I was training Heath. In fact, Gramps is the reason I ever even entertained the idea of owning a gym.
And that gym helped me give back to my parents. The loss of a child is something I can’t ever imagine. Losing Shayla was painful and everlasting. I still think about her every day. Moments happen and I look to the sky wondering if she’s experiencing it too. I’ll never truly get over losing her. My mom always stayed home to raise my sister and I, while my dad worked. When the depression won and leaving my mom at home alone became dangerous, my dad had to call in to work. Missing too many days between Mom’s depression and court, they let my dad go. Cashing in his retirement, they used it to live on while building House of Hope. My mom needed a place to redirect her energy.
Wendol Page 1
