by Sara Arden
Sometimes the only way to forgiveness is sin…
Sean Dryden—the superhot all-American golden boy—has always gotten under Kentucky Lee’s skin. She can’t remember a time when she wasn’t in love with the Special Ops Aviation pilot…even when he got engaged to her best friend. What Kentucky never knew is that Sean broke it off with Lynnie just a week before she died.
Something has come apart in Sean—too many missions, too much loss. Only Kentucky seems to understand him…and the undercurrent running between them is tangible. That need to touch and taste—to remind themselves they’re still alive. Can the fire in her warm his frozen heart?
“Do you want to feel, or do you want to forget?”
Kentucky’s touch was still soothing, but it made Sean burn hotter, too. “Because after the orgasm is over, you realize those things you were hiding from never left.”
“Wasn’t this what you wanted when you brought me out here?” He lifted his head and met her eyes. “If it’s not, tell me to stop and we’ll forget this ever happened.”
Her eyes were luminous and open. She wanted him, but she wanted more than what he was offering her.
“I don’t want to forget it happened, and I especially don’t want you to forget I happened.”
He pushed her down in the sand and pressed her beneath him. Color was high in her cheeks and her eyes glittered in the firelight. Her arms twined around his neck. She obviously didn’t give a damn they were out in the open, with her hair fanned out in the sand.
“Live a little.” His mouth descended toward hers oh-so-slowly…
Dear Reader,
I hope you enjoy reading about Sean and Kentucky. Like all my characters, they’re dear to my heart and their road to happily-ever-after is a bumpy one. But isn’t that what makes it so worth it? It makes the light at the end of the darkness so much brighter and that much warmer.
Wishing you your own happily-ever-after, and with much love,
Sara Arden
Sara Arden
No Surrender
Sara Arden lives in a small Kansas town with her husband, two children, a horse, two cats and a bunny. She started reading romance at a young age, and by the time she entered high school, aced world history without ever cracking her textbook because of all the historicals she’d read. Besides reading, Sara enjoys travel, the smell of old books, tea and pedicures. She loves to hear from her readers.
Also available from Sara Arden and HQN Books
Return to Glory
A Glorious Christmas
(ebook novella)
Unfaded Glory
Finding Glory
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For the babybats
Contents
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
Chapter 19
Epilogue
Excerpt from Cowboy After Dark by Vicki Lewis Thompson
Prologue
KENTUCKY LEE MUTTERED under her breath as she watched a sniping pack of carnivorous prowling she-wolves gather around the newly single Special Operations pilot, Sean Dryden. She knew what they were all thinking as they dabbed artfully at their conveniently waterproof eyeliner and made the appropriate sounds of condolence and grief. All talking about what a shame it was that Lynnie James was gone.
She knew each one of them wondered how soon was too soon to offer him comfort of another sort in hopes of catching him like a rabbit in a trap. They were all plotting against one other like corrupt Roman senators.
It wasn’t a surprise that anyone would want him. He was, in a word, beautiful. He was all-American Boy Scout perfection. Kentucky didn’t blame them for being attracted to him. Sean Dryden was everyone’s type. Kentucky could only hope none of them would be stupid enough to make a move here. Especially where she could see. Kentucky would end up a headline in the town rag for causing a scene at the James funeral.
Lynnie James had been her best friend and Sean’s fiancée. This potluck in the Saint Paul Lutheran Church basement consisting of fallout-shelter green-bean casserole, macaroni slathered in “processed cheese food” and bacon bits like gravel was all in her honor. Which was rather kind of terrible. Kentucky hoped that when she left this world, people would do something more interesting, something that reflected the person she was.
Green-bean casserole didn’t begin to sum up the beautiful soul that was Lynnie James. No one really could.
Kentucky didn’t begrudge them their grieving rituals or their terrible choices of potluck dishes. It was just that she didn’t belong. She never had. While the others could hug each other, remember the good times with the all-American girl who made life in small-town Winchester, Kansas, worth living, Kentucky didn’t have that.
Not with anyone but Lynnie.
Her best friend had been the only one who really saw her. Not just the party girl who liked fast boys and faster cars—the rebel without a cause. Lynnie had seen everything—the good, the bad, the ugly—and loved her unconditionally. Lynnie had always been on her side.
Kentucky missed her for all those reasons and more.
She caught Sean’s eye and watched as he extracted himself from the fray of she-wolves and headed straight for her. She could feel the women glaring hot enough to burn through to her bones. But that was the same way they’d looked at her in high school. It bothered her even less now than it did then. She knew who she was, knew her own worth.
He embraced her. “You look beautiful. I never thought I’d see you in a dress.”
She was suddenly aware of the black dress, the way it clung to her, and the knowledge that Sean’s eyes had been on her and liked it. She flushed, her face hot. Kentucky hated that she had this reaction. She felt like a first-class traitor having this reaction to Sean, here of all places.
“Well, it is Lynnie’s funeral. What else would I do?” She fumbled with her hands and then smoothed them down the sides of her dress. It was too tight, a lace prison that caged her breath so she could inhale only shallowly.
His brown eyes were full of some emotion that was more than grief but that she couldn’t name. “You know Lynnie wouldn’t have cared what you wore.”
It was then with the sadness etched on his face that she realized what was in the depths of his eyes: guilt. “Sean, what happened—” she paused, searching for the right thing to say “—it wasn’t your fault. The roads were icy. There’s nothing that you could’ve done. It was black ice.”
He looked away from her and for a moment it seemed as if he’d frozen in place. Then when he met her gaze again, she saw so much pain it was suffocating. “There’s so much you don’t know.”
She reached out and grabbed his shoulders. “I know all I need to know. I know that Lynnie loved you and I know that you loved her. That’s all that matters.”
She hated being here, enduring other peopl
e and their grief. Not Sean so much as the acquaintances who didn’t really know Lynnie. The acquaintances who knew only Lynnie James the former cheerleader who was going to be a kindergarten teacher and marry her high school sweetheart.
How Kentucky’s heart hurt for him. He seemed so lost, so broken and oh-so alone. She hugged him again. She wanted him to know that he wasn’t alone. He didn’t have to be lost. The gesture was meant to be comforting, and she couldn’t help but feel guilty for enjoying the sensation of being locked in his arms for just a moment.
She was supposed to be offering him support, but she took strength and safety from his embrace. It reminded her that even though Lynnie was gone, she wasn’t alone. Or maybe they were just alone together.
“She loved you, too, Kentucky. So much that I know she wouldn’t want you to stay here. She’d know you were ready to jump out of your own skin. She’d tell you to run and she’d probably even cover for you.” He released her from the hug and she reluctantly stepped back from him.
Lynnie had known her inside and out. She’d been the best of friends. Hell, how she missed her. Kentucky smiled softly. “But funerals aren’t really for the dead, though, are they? They’re for the living.” She looked at him pointedly.
“You don’t have to stay for me.” Sean scrubbed a hand over his face. “The sooner I can get out of here, the better. It’s just too much, you know?”
“Yeah.” She nodded. “I get it. I really do.”
Sean studied her for a moment. “I know you do.” He grabbed her and hugged her again, but this time it was hard and quick. “You meant the world to Lynnie.” He released her. “And you mean a lot to me. Don’t be a stranger.”
1
BUT THAT WAS exactly what she was: a stranger.
Kentucky didn’t see or hear anything from Sean Dryden until July, seven months after they said goodbye to the woman they loved.
He’d gone back to his assignment and didn’t email or answer her letters. Not even when she sent him the little notebook of poetry Lynnie had written about him in middle school.
She didn’t know what she expected from him. What was there to say?
Kentucky hoped he was okay, he was safe, and he was processing as best he could. Most important, she hoped he’d realized that Lynnie’s death wasn’t his fault.
She thought about them a lot. The group, the way they used to be. Herself, Lynnie, Sean, Eric and Rachel. But now Lynnie’s brother, Eric, was with Rachel. That wasn’t really a surprise either. They’d been best friends since they were in diapers. It was kind of a natural progression.
Kentucky was happy for them, but there was still an empty place inside her where Lynnie used to be.
And Sean, God, Sean.
She shook her head at her own train of thought, as if that would shake him out of the spot he occupied in her brain. He didn’t belong there, never had. Yet still, he had his own room in her head. He always had. She’d never wanted to take anything from Lynnie, but she couldn’t help the way she wanted Sean Dryden.
She’d dreamed about him the way little girls do members of boy bands. Until it had turned to something earthier in her teens. Something more carnal. He had been her ultimate fantasy. She’d played scenarios out in her head all the time then. Scenarios that involved meeting him under the bleachers after football practice to make out. Or playing Seven in Heaven or Truth or Dare at some party. But Seven in Heaven had been her favorite for a while. If they were locked in the dark together for seven minutes, they were expected to make out. He’d kiss her, touch her, and she’d get to touch him and it would all be okay because it was just a game.
She’d even dreamed that Lynnie would break it off with him and he’d come to her for solace. Sometimes that one made her hate herself because she was wishing to break something that could never be broken or should never be broken for her own gain.
Kentucky rationalized it by saying that it was only in her head. She never acted on it. Never actively wished for bad things. It was more of a passive sort of wishing. Not that it was any better, but it helped her sleep at night in those first years, when she’d wanted him so much she could taste it.
When they’d gotten engaged, Lynnie and Sean, she’d known the rightness of it. Accepted it. She’d managed to stop thinking about him every day. But sometimes she still felt that familiar tug in her belly, the tingle between her legs when his hand would brush hers, or she could feel the heat of his body when he sat next to her.
She knew it was pathetic, but that didn’t stop her.
Now Lynnie was gone, and in a way, she guessed Sean was, too.
It was late on a sticky July afternoon when Kentucky Lee was sure the moonshine cherries she’d been eating while hanging out on the deck of the Shooting Star Honky-Tonk had conjured a ghost.
Sean Dryden, looking as hollow and broken as he had the day of Lynnie’s funeral, sat down in the chair next to her. Its old rusted metal base creaked under his weight, but he didn’t seem to notice. A day’s growth of beard shadowed his handsome face. He had a bottle of her locally sourced—homemade—shine in his hand.
He looked like hell.
And still, he was the handsomest man she’d ever seen in real life.
She offered him a cherry and he offered her a sip of shine.
“I didn’t think that was your speed.” Kentucky pointed her chin at the moonshine.
“It’s not really, but it’s good for what ails you. Isn’t that what your grandmother used to say?”
“She sure did.” Kentucky nodded.
“I like that about you.”
“What?” She looked up.
“No small talk. No accusations wondering why I’m not out playing flyboy.” He said this last bit derisively.
“Playing flyboy? I think what you do is a little more important than that.” As a special ops pilot, it was his job to get operatives in and out of war zones. To move undetected through enemy airspace and ensure the safety of his team and everyone aboard his Black Hawk.
And to destroy whatever operational targets had been provided.
“That’s just it. You’re the only one.”
“I’m sure that’s not the case.” Everyone was mostly in awe of what he did, at least the parts he could tell people about.
“You’d be surprised.”
At the expression on his face, she was reminded of the day of the funeral and all the she-wolves looking to take him down like prey. “So why are you home?”
He wrinkled his nose. “Mental health days.”
“You only got a few days before. It was inhumane. I’m glad you got some more time.” There was no way he could’ve been expected to deal with his loss in the week he’d been given at home before he’d had to return to duty.
“I’d have rather spent it on a beach somewhere. That would be some real mental health recuperation.” He took another swig of shine.
He was so hard, so angry. She couldn’t blame him for it either. Kentucky knew she would be, too.
They passed the bottle back and forth between them a couple of times and sat in a companionable silence for a long moment.
She tried not to think about the heat that burned her fingers when their hands brushed as he handed her the bottle. Or that his firm mouth had been where her lips were, that it was almost like a kiss. It was the closest she’d ever get to something like that with a guy like him.
Guilt surged and washed over her desire, tamping it down to some small, inconsequential thing. But the flame still burned, flickered like a newly lit candle. Kentucky exhaled heavily.
“I just can’t do it.” He tossed back some more moonshine. “It’s stifling here.”
She turned to look at him. The chiseled ridge of his clenched jaw, the stiff set to his broad shoulders, the tension that thrummed through him like a live wire. Kentucky wished she could ease his pain.
And her own.
“I know, right?” She pursed her lips. “I’ve never been like them. Like you.”
“You know, the kind who fits in.” She shrugged.
“You fit in more than you know. You don’t have to hide who you are to be special, Kentucky.”
Part of her wanted to argue with him, to deny any of the more tender things that could hurt her. But this had been part of her fantasies. That he always knew who she was.
And wanted her anyway.
She swallowed. “Yeah, well, you know.” Great. That sentence didn’t even make any sense. Kentucky shrugged again. “I can do that, too. Shine a light on things you’d rather not see. Like Lynnie’s death.” She fixed him with a hard stare. “It wasn’t your fault.”
He looked away from her. “Yes, it was. There are things you don’t know, Kentucky.”
“Like what? Like you made the road slick? You made her brakes fail? It was a terrible accident that could’ve happened to any of us.” Of course he felt guilty because he hadn’t been here. Logic wouldn’t fix that for him. Only he could make it right in his own head.
“I can’t talk about it.” His stare was focused somewhere out on the horizon. Somewhere he could be that wasn’t here, in this place, without Lynnie. Or that was what she imagined.
She pursed her lips again, feeling them go tight and thin. “You don’t have to. I think I’ve had enough of talking. At least talking about death. Because we’re still here. We’re still alive.”
“Are you sure about that?”
Kentucky mustered up a grin. “I guess I don’t know about you, but I am.” This was what she’d been waiting for. Some grand spark of inspiration, a way to honor Lynnie’s life that represented who she was. Not the Saint Paul Lutheran Ladies Auxiliary version. Lynnie had always been so vital. Her life was like a star, something bright and sparkling.
