New Adult Romance Box Set

by Emme Rollins, Julia Kent, Anna Antonia, Helena Newbury, Aubrey Rose

  A half grin tugged at my mouth and I tried to suppress it, feeling an alternating current of sappy lust and protective anger, the two feelings like oil and water. Stepping closer to her, I made sure Davey knew I was here, and I wasn't backing down.

  And that's when I got a good look at his badge.

  “Security? You're a mall cop?” I barked. Laughter poured out of me. “Since when do mall cops get shotguns?”

  His face screwed up in anger and Darla shot me a look that screamed shut up. Oops. “Since I'm off duty and carry it around for protection. And I'm the one who should be laughing,” he protested, shining the light up and down my body, the reflection off the Mylar nearly blinding. “I'm not the naked man going down on the ex-girlfriend of the guy with the shotgun, Mr. Alien Man.”

  Fuck. My mouth got me in trouble again.

  Wait. Ex-girlfriend?

  Darla's eyes widened and she shook her head tightly at me. “Ex-girlfriend?” I mouthed.

  She shrugged. “Slim pickings,” she whispered.

  No shit.

  “What I do is none of your business, Davey,” she shouted back, blowing air out of her mouth to push a loose batch of curls off her forehead. She reached over and grabbed my hand, pulling me toward the car.

  “It's my business when I find some naked stranger attacking you,” he protested, fumbling after us and already panting after 200 yards of fast walking. My legs barely felt the near-run she was pulling me at, her body fueled by sheer anger.

  “The fact that you cannot tell the difference between attacking and making love is one of the many reasons I dumped you!” she screamed back.

  I came to a dead halt. “Huh?” What the hell did that mean, and why did it make me want to punch him? Clearly not watching, he bumped into me from behind, then ricocheted back a few feet, nearly falling on his ass. “Darla,” I said in a low voice. “Did this guy hurt you?”

  “Me?” he squeaked, his tone an octave higher suddenly, a protesting sound. “Hell, no!”

  “Davey couldn't hurt me because he couldn't find anything to hurt, Trevor,” she explained, searching her purse for the key to the car. “He could have used that searchlight in his hand, a GPS device, an iPad with Google maps and a bright, glowing red light on the hood of my clitoris and still missed the mark.”

  “Hey, what the hell does that mean?” Davey protested.

  “See?” she said, smiling, her face a fake grimace of sarcasm. Finding the key, she opened the car, leaned over, unlocked my side (no power locks?) and I climbed in.

  “Get some clothes on!” Davey shouted to me, impotently standing there, shining the searchlight right in my eyes just because he could. The shotgun in his other hand made me nervous but Darla didn't seem to care. “I'm gonna tell your mama about this, Darla. It'll be all over town in a few minutes.”

  She placed her right hand over her heart and mocked him. “Oh, my reputation is about to be ruint! Absolutely ruint by Davey telling everyone in Peters that he caught me fucking a stranger on the Interstate.” The weird way she shifted her accent, like an overdone drawl meant to mock him, whooshed right over my head, but it meant something to her. And to Davey, who glared, beady-eyed and furious. She started the car, the pug-pug-pug of the engine's rev a relief; it meant escape.

  “It will!” he screamed, red-faced and bulging-eyed.

  She put the car in reverse, backed up, and then pointed it toward the parking lot's exit. “Davey Rockland, I'll tell you what. You go spreading the truth around town. What you're saying is true, and I don't give a shit about the truth. It's the lies I care about.”

  He stared back, dumbfounded.

  “So here's a bit of truth I'm happy to share with the town.” She held up her pinkie finger, raised her eyebrows, and stared directly at his crotch.

  He blanched. “You wouldn't.” His face was slack and defeated, the shotgun at his side the way you might hold a purse, or a backpack, the searchlight pointed down and his paunch even bigger as he sagged.

  That giant head of ragged curls and blonde love turned and stared at me, her eyes reflecting the massive war of emotions that must be raging inside her—lust, fear, anger, betrayal, arousal, contempt, hatred, and so much more. Wild and uncaged, she was fighting for something I didn't understand, and the petty, schoolyard nature of their banter made me want it to end so we could go back to our little bubble and, mostly, so I could take her and fuck her nice and slow, until we were both tired enough to stop.

  Which would likely be never. Did never stopping work for her?

  “I already did, but he doesn't know that.” My grin came without warning, and my hands reached for her neck, body stretching over the gearshift to kiss those red lips, to take in more of her essence, to connect and—

  Beep! Beep! Beep! Beep! Davey was in his car, which was about as crappy as Darla's, the shade of old, faded shit with a candy apple red replacement roof. “I'm gonna tell your mama, Darla. Picking up aliens in the corn fields on I-76.”

  “Watch out, Davey,” she shouted back. “He has one hell of an anal probe.”

  Screech. Davey peeled out and Darla descended into a fit of giggles, which then shifted into great whoops of laughter and then—just about what I expected.

  Tears. I put the emergency brake on and pulled her to me, nestling her in my arms the best I could, across a gear shift. Her hot face slid against my chest as her tears lubricated my skin, her body heaving a bit with sobs. Mumbled words made no sense through her sniffles, until she sat up and looked at me, eyes red-rimmed and feral.

  “Welcome to Ohio! The heart of it all.” Maniacal laughter as she avoided my eyes and seemed to come down off her angry high, deeply embarrassed for something I didn't understand. As far as I was concerned, she was amazing, someone I enjoyed spending time with and wanted to get to know better, weird life and all. So much of my life back in Mass felt robotic compared to this, like I was attached to a lung machine that breathed for me, a computer that decided what I ate, studied, thought, did—felt. Here, though, I could take deep breaths, could feel a bit dizzy, but had as much space and air and time as I wished.

  And I could feel whatever I wanted, and right now, I wanted her.

  A kiss was the only answer I had, and for Darla, that seemed to be enough. Given what I had on me, that was all I could really give. Literally, because I wasn't giving up the Mylar blanket or my hat. Once a man gets a taste of luxury, he wants to hang on to it. As she melted into me, a hunger for all that she was filled me with desire, a raging powerful sense that I was enough.

  And if this crazy, blasted-out trip was about learning that lesson, then thank God for contraband peyote and brash blondes.

  Chapter Four

  Darla

  The feel of Trevor's soft lips on mine mixed with my own salty tears nearly snapped me in two. God damn Davey and God damn Mama and God damn this podunk town where nothing good ever happened and I felt like the only ambitious crab in a pot full of slacking motherfuckers who grabbed at me with their claws and dragged me back in, over and over, every time I tried to do one God damn thing that made me feel better about myself, or to experience a flash of brilliance about life outside of this God damned place.

  Right now, Trevor was like a god, even though I knew he wasn't. Not really. And he would disappear as soon as his friend Joe arrived, so I needed to ignore the crabs (OK, that just sounds weird...) and take my chances while I could, savoring every second of those sweet lips, his gentle hands, his caring soul and his hot, hot body.

  Time to get even realer and show him where I lived. My bedroom door had a lock on it, and with a loud enough fan and some music, I could fake a sense of privacy so we could make love and I could pretend it would last forever.

  Or, at least, an hour. I could live with an hour. Was it too much to ask for an hour of pleasure with the lead vocalist of Random Acts of Crazy, Trevor's tongue caressing me randomly right now, his hands on my hips and one palm sliding up the hot skin of my—

  “Stop,
” I gasped. “Let's go to my place and we can have a, you know.” The word escaped me, my mind still reeling from the pleasure of what we'd almost done, his lips on my navel, aiming lower, how it felt to be touched as if my pleasure were his only goal. So far, he hadn't said a thing about his own needs, and I'd imagine he had a case of blue balls that made Veruca Salt look tiny.

  Wait, Veruca wasn’t the big round blue one. That was...that was...that had felt so good I couldn’t think….Violet Something. Violet...Violet.... The word. Snap out of it, Darla, the other word!

  The word. Four posts. Mattress. Box spring.

  “Bed!” I shouted. “The Mylar blanket and the occasional whiff of the stale bathrooms was lovely and romantic and all, but a bed would be even better.” My mind raced as the words came out of my mouth, because the trailer where me, Mama, and my uncle lived? I wasn't sure it was much better, after all, than a Mylar blanket and that unidentified smell.

  Eek.

  I was all in, though, and if he turned his nose up at the way I lived, then who cared? He'd leave soon and I wouldn't have to deal with any of his judgment, right? Just reveling in what I'd already gotten from him, what he'd allowed me to give, would keep my mind and heart occupied for a good, long time.

  Anything else right now would be extra.

  Trevor seemed to like extra.

  As I pulled out from the parking lot, he wouldn't stop looking at me, his eyes drifting across my features. Self-conscious, suddenly, in a brand new way, I forced my eyes on the road and made my heart calm down as much as possible, letting myself revel in being admired. Saying anything right now would interrupt him, and that would be the comfortable thing to do, right? My inner critic told me to put myself down, that my wild, matted blonde hair and my too-tight jeans that stretched over hips wider than a goal post were turn offs, that he was only staring at me because he was stupid enough to be caught naked on the Interstate, hundreds of miles from home, or because, because, because...

  A calmer core inside told me to shut than damn inner critic off and let my inner goddess (no, not that one) shine through. Maybe that's what Trevor saw right now, as we plugged along I-76 until we reached my exit, the glow of the gas station lights drawing me like a moth to a flame. My entire life consisted of the same eight or so highway exits, the same twenty or so roads, and all I'd ever known was embedded in these corn fields, the flat horizons, my few ventures out to go to an indoor water park or to Cedar Point.

  How strikingly different his life must be from mine! I'd managed a few classes at the state university extension, but life and money and more heaping doses of life got in the way. My Aunt Josie had made it out, shaking off the crabs that snatched at her ankles in the big pot of Peters, Ohio, her escape my model in how to find my way to Something Better than working shifts at that very gas station that pulled me closer to our trailer.

  Trevor's warm hand sat on my thigh now, resting there as if it had every right to the skin. That was a feeling I could get used to right easy—having him claim me, acting as if I were his and he could just touch me and tell the world I was taken. Taken. How full that felt, so complete and rich and real. Men in my world didn't elicit these emotions in me, rendering instead a sense of tolerance, a mild appreciation to be taken out for a cheap Friday prime rib special, to be escorted to the latest action movie at the cineplex, and to be ridden in the backseat of a car or in their shared apartment because, well—because.

  What else do you do with a life you didn't choose and can't get out of? You adapt and take whatever crumbs you can find so you don't let your soul or body starve.

  Trevor burst out laughing suddenly, the rich baritone exuding a combo of sleep deprivation, mystification, incredulity and a touch of madness. The sound made me smile and it was contagious, too—we devolved into a cluster of giggles until he gasped and said:

  “I am so glad that you, of all people, picked me up on the road.”

  “Well, Jeffrey Dahmer was busy.” Damn, there I went. Deflecting and making silly jokes when he paid me a compliment. I looked down and wondered what on earth he saw in me, dirty jeans and fat thighs pouring out over the sides of the bucket seat. Stop that, Darla, my wiser mind shouted. He likes you because he just does. Enjoy it. Let the man make his own choices.

  He's choosing you.

  “He's dead,” Trevor said, nodding.

  “He's from Ohio,” I prattled on. What a fucking turn-on, talking about a serial killer cannibal. Maybe my dating problems weren't about the gene pool after all.

  “What's your house like?” he asked, changing the subject and turning what had been an awkward joke into an even worse mess. My house? What house? We lived in a double-wide trailer that was older than me, with mice living under it and plumbing that was about as reliable as Lindsay Lohan on a movie set.

  “You're about to find out,” I stammered, turning onto the road that led to my trailer park. Broken down cars and spare lumber littered the lawns of an increasing number of houses as we drew closer to my home, as if the trailer park were a magnet for trash and debris.

  “Whoa. Tornado?” Trevor asked as he gaped, watching the scene fly by, pointing to the piles of random crap in people's lawns. “Lawn” was giving them too much credit, the tufts of grass poking up here and there like remnants of hair on the scalp of a long-time chemo patient. A chicken coop in one yard leaned so far to the right it looked like it was doing pilates, suspended in midair by a series of vines I would wager were poison ivy.

  “Um, sorta,” I answered, my voice sing-songy and my gut tight with a groaning fear and wretched sense that This Would Not Go Well. The man I sat next to about to get one hell of an education you don't find at an upper-crust Boston college. If he thought my flip phone was out of date, what was he going to say when I parked in front of the faded, aluminum-sided old trailer with the crooked porch, torn screen and clutter that made the television show Hoarders look like Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous?

  Real Life, meet Fantasy Life. Bringing home Trevor Connor from Random Acts of Crazy hadn't even been anywhere near my actual Bucket List of life goals. I had wanted to meet him, of course, since the first time I heard his smoky voice as he seemed to sing his way into my clitoris and my heart, but inviting him to a house with yellow walls—not from paint, or some Martha Stewart magazine photo, but from decades of Mama's chain smoking, and linoleum held together with asbestos and apple juice spills—ground in just how bad my life must look to someone from the outside.

  What was Massachusetts like? I drove right past the park's entrance and asked him that very question. Spending a little more time roaming dark country roads meant delaying the inevitable panic that was about to infuse my cells when Trevor met Mama. I could drive without thinking, the roads were imprinted in my mind, the map so embedded in me I could leave for fifty years and come back and still get around in the dark, blindfolded. Buying myself some time, I figured it couldn't hurt to feel him out and get a sense of what his life was like, so I could compare.

  And cringe. Knowledge is power, though—right? If I knew what he lived in, how he functioned, what income level is family was at, then maybe I didn't need to worry so much. There must be poor people in Sudborough. Maybe he was one of them.

  “I don't know. It's like lots of places, you know? We're not rich.” He craned his neck around and spotted two guys sitting on the hood of a rusted out Cutlass, sucking off the teat of some 40s in paper bags. “Uh, not poor. Just, you know. Middle class. Everything is all New Englandy and the people are fake. Half the children are geniuses and we have to be diagnosed with ADHD and medicated to get extra time on the SATs so we can prove how perfect we are. You know.”

  Heh. Around here, half the children are diagnosed with ADHD and medicated so they qualify for SSI for their family income to go up by $700 a month, thereby doubling it. Maybe we weren't so different after all.

  “Your fake sounds better than my real life,” I muttered as I recognized Old Mike, one of my mom's exes, on that hood, stand
ing and unbuckling his belt to take a piss. I hit the accelerator and whizzed by before he could whizz on my car.

  “What do you mean?” Those eyes searched my face and I inhaled slowly, turning the car onto a small road that I knew would circle us back eventually. The early May air made the trees sway a bit, their branches dotted with the tiny, unfurling green buds that would soon become lush leaves, making this bleak road a fertile, pleasant drive and, thankfully, hiding some of the junk that dotted the front yards along the path. Trevor seemed genuinely perplexed, as if he didn't notice how fucked up my life really was, from my junky car to my stupid ex finding us having sex at a rest area to the rotted out shells of cars along the way to my house, all clues that pointed to a grinding sort of working-class life that made me nothing like him.

  “I mean that you are someone who is clearly accustomed to way more than I have,” I answered quietly, cracking my window and taking a deep breath, then tentatively, hopefully, reaching out and patting his hand. He grabbed mine and clenched it with a beseeching pressure that made my heart grow.

  “What?” he asked, more naive than I'd take him for.

  “Trevor, you go to Boston University, don't you?” I remembered that from reading his bio over and over and over on his band's website.

  He nodded, his face relaxed and neutral. “Sure. Where do you go to school?”

  “Uh, Convenience Store University. I'm majoring in selling gas and cigarettes.” It took so much effort to keep the bitterness out of my voice. “U.S. News and World Report ranks it, well...it's pretty rank.”

  His jaw clenched. “I'm not a snob,” he said, squeezing my hand and then patting it. “I don't care if you didn't go to college.”

  “I did, actually,” I piped up, my voice so chipper it squeaked and offended me. Stupid people pleaser in me—I couldn't bury it as much as I wanted. “A few classes. Local branch campus.”

  He brightened. “What did you major in?”

  Oh, boy. Here we go. “Anthropology was my goal.” Half the people around here had no idea what anthropology was, and the other half told me I was an idiot to major in something so useless, and why not get my CNA so I could make $10.50 an hour at the local nursing home and “do something” with my college edumacation?