by KL Donn
One Chance
Hogan Brother’s book 1 Nox & Soph
K.L. DONN
Contents
Blurb
Acknowledgments
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Epilogue
About the Author
Also by K.L. DONN
Copyright © 2017 by K.L. DONN
All rights reserved.
Without limiting the rights under the copyright reserved above, no part of this publication or any part of this series may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
WARNING: The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Please purchase only authorized electronic or print editions and do not participate or encourage the electronic piracy of copyrighted material. Your respect of the author’s rights is appreciated.
This book is a work of fiction. The names of characters, places, brands and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and owners of various products and locations referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication or use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.
This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not be re-sold or given away to other people.
Warning: This book is intended for readers 18 years or older due to bad language, and explicit sex scenes.
Credits:
Cover Model – Robert Simmons
Cover Design – Cassy Roop of Pink Ink Designs
Edited by – KA Matthews
Created with Vellum
Blurb
“Stupid.”
One word that could ruin a person.
One word that can change a life.
One word that can destroy a mind.
Soph
Sophia Bennett heard it all her life. Smart, sweet, and shy, she hesitated to voice her ideas and opinions in fear of hearing that dreaded word, “Don’t be stupid, Sophia.”
She became introverted, quiet. Talking to people became a struggle she fought to control. She turned into a woman she never thought she’d be.
Seen but never heard.
Appearance became everything.
Nox
Rough around the edges Lennox Hogan is knee dip in shit – literally. Building a garden for his mother with his younger brothers, when the most beautiful creature he’s ever seen stops by to visit their mother for their weekly book chat.
A fake smile and sad eyes draw him in.
Her intoxicating innocence has him obsessed with the need to know everything about her.
An unknown threat has them questioning everything about her life.
Lennox soon makes it his mission to convince her to give him One Chance, but will she after her world crumbles before her?
Acknowledgments
I honestly feel like I could never thank everyone in my life enough.
Kaci thank you for sticking with me. For being my voice of reason and calling me on the things I miss.
Codie thank you for being in my life. I can’t picture not ever knowing you.
Annelise & Kat thanks for always sprinting with me!
Katherine mercy, I don’t know what I would do without you hounding me every time we spoke.
Bloggers, readers, authors, friends, everyone, thank you for your continued support!
Dedication
For my readers.
Thank you for sticking with me.
Never love anybody who treats you like you’re ordinary.
“Sophia!” She had heard her mother before she saw her. A quick look around assured Sophia Bennett that her room was tidy, the bed was made, and she hadn’t recalled leaving anything out when she’d arrived home from school.
Footsteps in the hall announced her mother’s arrival. Standing quickly—shoulders back, and her back straight—she waited for the berating to begin.
“Did you hear me?” her mother, Rebecca—never Becky or Becca—Bennett demanded as she flung the door open.
“Yes, Ma’am,” was the only reply she knew would be acceptable.
“Well?” The tapping of her foot on the hardwood floor could be heard. “Why didn’t you answer me?”
Sophia’s brain blanked…
One would think they could just say, I heard you coming, but she knew that wasn’t an appropriate answer for her mother.
So she stood there…
No words forthcoming, no immediate answer could be given.
“You can’t be that ignorant, Sophia.” The censure in her voice made Soph feel lower than dirt.
“I’m sorry, Mother,” she whispered.
“I don’t want your apologies; I want to be sure you’re going to be ready for tonight. By your appearance now, I can tell that’s obviously a no.” Disgust crawled across her mother’s botoxed face.
“I will be,” she promised. It was the only time she would get to see her great Aunt Millie. She was the sweetest old woman Sophia had ever known. Always had a funny story to tell and little candies in her over-sized purse for her. It was but once a year now that she actually got to see her.
Aunt Millie had fallen ill two years ago, and travel was hard on her aging body, so Sophia’s mother didn’t let her come across the country from New Jersey to visit them.
Her father was head of security for one of the largest criminal law firms on the west coast. The attorneys he kept safe were made targets by their clients, so he assured all meetings went smoothly.
Last summer, one of the lawyers lost a case for some drug dealer—she didn’t recall the charges—but the defendant’s gang retaliated and wound up paralyzing the man. It brought home how dangerous her father’s job was.
He was a good man and treated Sophia like a princess, as if she were his whole world. She sometimes wondered if that was why her mother hated her so much. They didn’t sleep in the same room anymore, and she couldn’t remember the last time they did. And when he was home, they barely said two words to each other.
Snapping fingers in her face ended her internal analyzation of why she was so hated. “Earth to Sophia! Did you hear me?”
She hadn’t. It was easy enough to figure out what she had been asked, though. All her mother cared about was appearances.
“I have a dress picked out,” Sophia said as she moved to her walk-in closet, grabbing the light green chiffon dress that would match her eyes. It wasn’t too revealing and swished with her body when she walked.
“You’re kidding me? Don’t be stupid, Sophia. You can’t wear the same color as me.”
One simple phrase.
Four meaningless words.
Her brain shut down.
Her body vibrated with pain.
Don’t be stupid, Sophia.
You’re so stupid.
Why do I have to have such a stupid child?
They’re just words, breathe.
Sticks and stones, Soph.
So why did she f
eel like her heart was being ripped from her chest?
You don’t always need a plan. Sometimes you just need to breathe, trust, let go, and see what happens.
“Ma.” Lennox Hogan couldn’t believe she’d dragged him and his two brothers, Levi and Lochlan, out for this. Building a garden two months too early. “It’s not gonna work, Ma.”
“Don’t you ‘Ma’ me, young man. I want this garden done, and I want it done today. When I told you boys I was going to do it, you refused to let me. This,” she swept her arm across the hole they’d dug, “was all your idea.”
He really hated when she was right. They did refuse to let her do it, not wanting her to hurt her hip again after just losing her walking cane after her last fall. Her previous brilliant idea had been to paint the ceiling. His mother, the amazing woman who’d birthed him and his two younger brothers, a woman he respected more than anyone, decided to climb up a ladder, by herself, to paint a vaulted ceiling that even with the extension didn’t mean she could reach the thirty feet needed. She’d fallen six feet to the ground, thus breaking her hip. He shuddered to think of what could have happened had she been at the top.
Now she had crates of roses in varying colors off to the side, anticipating planting them all that day. Leaving Nox and his brothers no choice but to finish digging the fucking hole and building the outer box and small path she wanted going straight through.
“C’mon, Ma, you can’t be serious?” his youngest brother Lochlan groaned. At twenty-two years old, he was pretty sure the other man would rather be out at some park chasing tail on such a nice day. Not in his mother’s garden.
Arching her brow, she sipped her sweet tea, pointedly putting her feet up as if to say, get to it, before grabbing the book she’d been reading. Some new romance she insisted she needed since she didn’t have their father anymore. He passed four years ago from lung cancer.
When he’d first been diagnosed, his mother had been inconsolable, but within only a matter of hours, she knew they had to make the time they had left as amazing as they could. His father’s cancer could have been manageable, but his quality of life would have been shit. Finding it at stage four, they knew they were going to lose him. It took nearly eight months for him to deteriorate right before their eyes. In that time, Nox and his brothers had sent them on the Alaskan cruise they had always planned to go on when they were older.
It was a memory their mother looked upon fondly now. She had taken as many pictures of him as she could. If someone came to her house, she was sure to show you them all whether you’d seen them a thousand times before or not.
Lennox grew up watching the love his parents had for one another, and from an early age, he always knew that would be his biggest goal in life. To love so hard that when your other half was gone, you could still live. Live to be the you they always knew you were.
He was a rough around the edges kind of guy, and at twenty-seven, he was aware that he still had time to find the right girl for him. His dad had always told him he’d know who she was because when he laid eyes on her, his palms would sweat and his heart would race so fast and hard it would feel like it was about to pound out of his chest. Plus, he’d say the dumbest thing he could. If that scared her away, then he’d have to work harder for her. If it didn’t, then he’d be golden and know she would be perfect.
The brothers spent the afternoon digging and rototilling the sixteen by sixteen foot rose garden to be planted. Blood, sweat, and tears would be tossed in that sucker by each of them. Levi had blisters on all but four fingers, Loch had cried in relief when the rain started for about four point six seconds of relief, and he’d been sweating like a pig for hours. Owning the only specialty mechanics shop in town, you would think he should be used to working with the heat. Except in his garage, he had air conditioning. If his men saw him now, they’d be calling him all kinds of names.
“Sophia!” he heard his mother call happily.
Wiping his brow, he ignored her and her friend, wanting to just finish what they were doing. It wasn’t until he noticed his brothers weren’t working that he realized they were damn near drooling at something behind him.
Turning, the sun blinded him for a fraction of a second. Blinking away the spots in his eyes, he felt sucker-punched when he saw the beauty standing before him, cheerily chatting with his mother.
Whoa. She was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen. Long blonde hair wind-blown into a messy style that looked like it took her hours to do, light green eyes that stood out with her natural red-tinted lips, topped off by a cupid’s bow top lip. The fullness in her bottom lip made him want to nibble on it and see how long it would take to plump up to a bee-stung look.
She had an hourglass figure with wide hips meant for a man’s hands to hold onto while he loved her from behind. Her cinched waist led to perky breasts perfect to fit in his palms. Not too big, and not too small. Her light yellow sundress drew his eyes to her in such a way that they couldn’t focus on any one spot.
“Nox.” Loch elbowed him just as the girls turned to them.
Checking for drool, Nox straightened his stance and dropped his shovel. He wasn’t prepared for the impact her soft voice would have on him. “Umm, hi, I’m Sophia Bennett.” She held out her hand, waiting for him to shake it, but all he could do was stare.
The prolonged silence had her fidgeting and slowly lowering her hand again, when one of his brothers coughed loudly in his ear, knocking him from his state of stupidity. “Sophia Bennett, as in Rebecca Bennett’s daughter?” More stupidity spewed from his lips. He knew Mrs. Bennett because she had been bringing in her Mercedes sedan every other week with one fake problem or another. Lately, she had gotten handsier than he liked, so he was trying to avoid her like the plague.
The moment her mother’s name came out of his mouth, though, Sophia paled and seemed to draw into herself. His mom caught it right away, knowing the trouble he’d been getting from her mother. She gave him a dirty look.
“Sorry, Soph, I’m Lennox, or Nox. It’s a pleasure to meet you.” His ma didn’t live in the richer part of town, so he was confused as to what she was doing there. “What are you up to in our neck of the woods?”
Sophia’s cheeks pinked with his rapt attention. “Lennox, she comes every Sunday and has tea with me, and we talk books,” his mother admonished like he should already know.
He watched as Lorraine pulled sweet Sophia to the house, all the time wondering what her game was. It wasn’t coincidence that she had tricked them all into coming over on that day he was sure.
“Who is she?” Levi whispered in wonder, completely smitten with the young woman.
“No clue. But I’d sure like to get to know her better.” Loch smirked. He was the youngest of the three and an eternal flirt. Nox would have his fair share of laughs when the young man finally found his one.
Sophia, though? She wasn’t it.
Because she was going to be his.
Every Sunday for more weeks than she could count, Sophia had been meeting with Lorraine Hogan to discuss new romance books they’d been reading. She had originally met the older woman in a used bookstore when she was combing through the shelves for something different than what she normally read. Which was usually whatever her mother chose. Classic books like Shakespeare.
It’s not to say she didn’t love Hamlet or Romeo and Juliet, but she wanted to read something that got her heart beating faster, made her palms sweat, and her heart ache for the passion read between the pages. Until Lorraine, she didn’t think it could be something she would actually indulge in.
“What would you like to drink, dear?” the woman inquired as they entered her reading room. More like a library. The walls were filled with books of every genre from romance to thriller to murder mystery. Memoirs and classics, true crime mixed with old journals. There was nothing left untouched.
“A sweet tea, please, ma’am.” Smiling unguardedly, Soph truly wished her own mother could be as loving.
“W
hat have I told you about calling me ma’am, Miss Sophia?” There was laughter behind her words.
“I could do that when you started having grandbabies.” She always had a wistful look in her eye when she spoke of her sons giving her babies again.
“That’s right. Now, if only I could get them boys of mine to understand.” A longing entered her gaze.
Finding a chance to be nosy about the one man that had captured her attention, Sophia asked, “Don’t their wives or girlfriends want children?”
A snort of laughter left Lorraine before she could muffle it. “Those boys of mine,” she began, holding her attention, “they’re smart. They won’t settle for anything less than perfect, and not a single one has found that perfect woman for them yet. Single!” she calls out laughingly. “All of them single.”
Perfect?
Something Sophia wasn’t.
Lennox had drawn her eye as soon as she saw the three strong men digging their mother a garden weeks too early. He had a hardness to him that she was drawn to. His strength oozed from his pores like armor.
His dark blue eyes paired with his light blond hair and dark scruff on his face made her heart stutter in her chest. It was that feeling she’d read about. The one she longed to experience. Only now, her dreams were dashed. Gone. Flying high in the clouds with the wind. She wasn’t anywhere near perfect. She would never be what he wanted.
Especially if her mother knew him.
Lorraine watched more emotion flit across young Sophia’s face than she should even know how to feel. The first time she had seen the young woman, she felt a connection. She knew that they were meant to meet in the small bookstore that day but had no idea then how much poor Soph would need her now. Every week she came to Lorraine’s home looking sadder and sadder. Slightly more broken.
