Long Time Coming

by Jayne Rylon

  Long Time Coming

  Jayne Rylon

  Long Time Coming

  Jayne Rylon

  Published by Happy Endings Publishing

  Copyright © 2015 Jayne Rylon

  Edited by Kelli Collins

  Cover Art by Angela Waters

  Cover Photography by Sara Eirew Photographer

  eBook ISBN: 978-1-941785-09-6

  Print ISBN: 978-1-941785-10-2

  contact@jaynerylon.com

  www.jaynerylon.com

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  For a complete list of Jayne’s books click here.

  If you have purchased a copy of this eBook, thank you. Also, thank you for not sharing your copy of this book. This purchase allows you one legal copy for your own reading enjoyment on your personal computer or device. You do not have the rights to resell, distribute, print, or transfer this book, in whole or in part, to anyone, in any format, via methods either currently known or yet to be invented, or upload to a file sharing peer to peer program. It may not be re-sold or given away to other people. Such action is illegal and in violation of the U.S. Copyright Law. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please purchase your own copy. If you no longer want this book, you may not give your copy to someone else. Delete it from your computer.

  Thank you for respecting this author and supporting her work.

  *

  Hot Rods, Book 8

  Some things are worth the wait.

  Tom London has done a pretty damn good job. Despite an illness that stole his young wife years ago, he’s raised his biological son, and several adopted ones, to be fine men. The Hot Rods might be unconventional, but they’re hardworking, hard-playing, and hard-loving. Tom couldn’t ask for anything more—except perhaps an equally fierce love of his own. And he’s got his eye on a luscious candidate. Ms. Wilhelmina Brown, a longtime widow with more than enough sass in her step to take him on.

  Willie has a lot in common with Tom. She’s raised two wonderful daughters, both now married into the Hot Rods family, and lived through her own tragedy, having lost her husband in a horrific accident. More than two decades later, she and Tom still live with the ghosts of their pasts, but she’d have to be dead herself not to feel the man’s effect on her libido. They already share a mutual respect; perhaps they can each be what the other needs in more tangible ways…

  As Tom and Willie take one step closer, an explosive revelation shoots them several steps back. But that bombshell turns out to be just a precursor to something potentially worse…potentially deadly…and potentially enough to keep the mature lovers apart forever.

  Dedication

  For Kelli Collins. It might have taken forty-one books, but here we are. Together at last!

  Another huge thank you to my beta readers: Fedora, Casey, Jenna, Shari and Brandi.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  About the Book

  Dedication

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Epilogue

  Thanks For Reading

  Shop at JayneRylon.com

  Sneak Peek – Night is Darkest

  About The Author

  Other Books By Jayne Rylon

  Prologue

  Wilhelmina Brown couldn’t believe she’d been married for seven full years. People had said she and Steven would never last when they’d tied the knot the day after high school graduation. She was happy to prove them wrong. Looking at the two precious children they’d made, who slept together on a pullout couch in the tiny yet spotless living room, she couldn’t have been prouder or more content.

  Hopefully, her husband would enjoy the dinner she’d cooked to celebrate their milestone and the time they’d had together. The roast was the prime cut of the latest slaughter from the Berry Family Farm down the road from the house they shared on the outskirts of town. She’d bartered some extra sewing to supplement her grocery money for the splurge. Rural Mississippi life had to have some perks. After all, inclusion certainly wasn’t one of them.

  She tried not to think of some people’s outdated ignorance and the hatred they tried to inject into her relationship with Steven, simply because her skin was drastically darker than his. Or how he’d been passed over for promotions after he’d brought her to the company picnic. Or her guilt about the way even some lifelong friends had treated him, turned on him, since he dared to love her.

  Not tonight.

  Sometimes it felt as if it was them against the world. She was okay with that. With a partner like him at her back, she could manage pretty much anything.

  Willie tidied the already neat kitchen then fussed with her hair and the skirt of the pink dress she’d made while she waited for her husband, who frequently doubled up on his shifts for overtime. Maybe they’d get lucky and the girls would sleep straight through the night. They were almost always in bed by the time their daddy got home. In the cramped quarters, they often woke up to sneak in a visit before Willie and Steven were ready to go to sleep in the house’s single bedroom. She probably shouldn’t let them stay up so late so often, but when she saw how happy the playtime made her children and her husband alike, she didn’t have the heart to put her foot down.

  Willie checked the clock on the wall.

  Wouldn’t it figure that Steven was running even later than usual?

  She peeked in at the supper, breathed deep, drew the savory aroma into her lungs, then crumpled the tinfoil over the baking pan tighter to keep the meat warm without drying it out.

  *

  An hour later, it was pretty clear something had gone horribly wrong.

  Willie sat with the phone on the kitchen table in front of her, twisting the spiral cord in her fingers as she waited for Steven to call and explain whatever fluke had kept him at the factory where he welded hot water heater tanks, or how he’d run out of gas, or…something.

  He never did.

  Instead, a loud triple knock on the front door had her shooting out of the kitchen chair so fast it toppled to the outdated harvest-gold linoleum behind her. The kids woke at the crash. Nola began to cry when Willie darted past her and her older sister—Amber, who comforted her sibling—to answer the door.

  “Shush, it’s okay,” she lied to them as she paused, her fingers wrapped around the knob, afraid to turn it and change her life forever. Alternating red and blue washes of light painted her babies’ lovely mocha skin ghastly unnatural shades.

  Right then, she knew she’d relive this moment in her nightmares for the rest of her life.

  The pounding on the door came again, startling her into action.

  Before she could stop herself, she opened it—just a little, like Steven had shown her. She peeked from inside the safe haven they’d built together at the police officers standing on her cracked front stoop.

  “Mrs. Brown?” the taller of the two asked with a grimace.

  “Yes.” Her heart pounded so fast and so hard that she had trouble hearing her own voice. Or maybe it was merely a wisp compared to usual.

  “I
regret to inform you that there’s been an accident.” He paused and swallowed. “A bad one. It’s your husband, ma’am.”

  “No!” As if it would block out the terrible news she’d never be able to unhear, she lifted the hem of her apron, covering her face with the gingham material Steven had salvaged from a stained tablecloth at the Salvation Army for her last birthday.

  It seemed as if her children understood the cops when their wails escalated to shrieks. Or maybe that was her making those strangled sobs.

  “He’s hurt?” She tried to keep herself together in case she could go to him, help him to fight.

  The stockier officer came to his partner’s aid. “There was no chance for survival. The car was completely destroyed in the collision with a delivery truck. Then it spun off the road, crashed through the railing on Jefferson’s Bridge and went into the river. With all the rain we’ve had lately, he washed away before anyone could even think of assisting. I’m very sorry.”

  Willie’s knees buckled. She fell to the ground, gasping for air through the searing pain in her chest, which resulted from her shattering heart. Was this what Steven had felt like in those final moments?

  If it weren’t for the girls behind her, she would have let herself wither away and rejoin her husband. Amber and Nola screamed a chorus of “Momma, Momma!” endlessly, as if they could tell how desperately Willie needed a reason to pick herself up.

  Somehow she would do it.

  She had to.

  For them, the only remaining pieces of her husband in the world.

  Chapter One

  Twenty-One Years Later

  “No!” Willie thrashed as she surfaced from her nightmare, her heart thundering every bit as wildly now as it had years before. The piercing pain never lessened. Each time she rehashed the darkest moment of her life, it stabbed her.

  Over and over.

  So she focused on separating reality from the lingering replay of her past. Something trapped her, keeping her from injuring herself or anyone around her with her desperate flailing. A man.

  Not the police, who’d restrained her from flying into the night to join her husband, carried away by those flood waters. She shook her head to clear the last of the vision from her mind. It wasn’t easy. Not tonight or any other.

  Unlike every other time, though, she wasn’t alone.

  Strong arms banded around her, keeping her still. It would be easy to maim herself or the guy sleeping beside her—fully dressed in shorts and a Hot Rods T-shirt—if left to her own reenacted grief. Unbelievably fit, he sheltered her, keeping her safe.

  So different from the man she’d lost all those years ago. She breathed deep of his comforting scent. Unmistakable, it smelled something like the air outside his house. A mix of fresh green things from the garden he loved with a tinge of gasoline from his service station.

  A hint of a smile crossed her face as he brought her to a place filled with promise instead of desolation.

  Iron-willed and kindhearted, Tom London was always there for her.

  At least he had been before he’d seen this side of her. What would he think now?

  “Tommy,” she whimpered, her voice a harsh crackle that would have annoyed her if she was awake enough or brave enough to give a crap right then.

  “Yeah, it’s me. I’m here. I’ve got you.” He sat them up, rocking her gently, stroked her hair, and rubbed her back with endless patience that she couldn’t bring herself to reject. Only the fact that he too had suffered a similar devastation allowed her to accept his comfort. Sometimes he even let her return the favor when he was missing his wife, who had died of cancer more than a decade earlier. He understood Willie like no one had before.

  Unashamed, she cuddled against his solid chest. The wedding ring he wore on a chain around his neck came between them. They may have been sharing a bed, but that was about as intimate as things had ever gotten between her and the handsome garage owner. They’d made out a few times, sure. Almost had sex.

  Inevitably, something had kept them apart.

  Less than a month ago her daughter, Nola, and Tom’s adopted son, Kaige, had made them grandparents. Willie couldn’t believe her baby had a precious little one of her own and had gladly volunteered to help out during the tough adjustment period that came along with a new family. The kids lived across the driveway from Tom’s house, above the garage Kaige worked at along with the rest of his misfit mechanic gang, Hot Rods.

  Due to the complex polyamorous relationship among the group, Willie felt more comfortable…less intrusive…staying at Tom’s house. With Quinn, another refugee from a devastating childhood—fifteen-year-old brother to one of the guys in Tom’s collection of strays—taking up residence in the spare bedroom, there weren’t a lot of options in the cozy cottage.

  Tom had refused to let her sleep on the couch and she had insisted she wouldn’t displace him. Though he was sexy as sin, he wasn’t as young as their kids and squishy cushions could wrap a person’s spine into a pretzel if he wasn’t careful. Hence, her spot in the only available space…the other half of Mr. London’s bed.

  Same mattress, separate sides.

  PJs all the time.

  Him on top of the sheets while she dozed under them.

  It could have been an awkward arrangement. Nothing she did with Tom was anything but natural, though. They were seasoned adults, her forty-six and him a few weeks short of fifty. So they pretended it was no big deal, even if they both seemed to take an awfully long time to fall asleep in each other’s presence.

  Tonight she was glad for his company. His friendship.

  In the past year, since their kids had met, he’d become someone she confided in—relied on—during emotional times. That alone was enough to terrify her. Solo was her style.

  It was safer that way.

  Except Tom had a funny habit of sneaking beneath her guard, making her open up in ways she’d never dreamed possible for her again.

  “Do you have nightmares a lot?” he wondered.

  See, like this. She should brush him off and keep him from getting further entangled in her dysfunction. No matter how many times she cleared her throat, hating the raw sting her shouts had left behind, she couldn’t seem to stop herself from admitting, “Some.”

  Another reason she’d avoided sleepovers with the mature yet ultra-desirable man.

  When she would have pulled away, straightened her nightgown, then rolled over, pretending to sleep as she watched the glowing red numbers on the clock beside the bed countdown to dawn, he kept her close.

  “Not so fast, Willie,” he practically growled. “Why do I get the feeling some actually means a lot?”

  “Because it does. Now leave me be so I can get some rest,” she grumbled, though part of her secretly sighed, finally able to divulge her weakness to someone who might not judge her.

  “Don’t act like you’re going to doze right off again. I never can when I dream of Michelle.” His voice changed when he whispered his wife’s name into the darkness.

  Full of pain, even now.

  “Did you know I met her once?” Willie felt as though she’d been keeping secrets, not admitting it before.

  “You did?” He put a sliver of distance between them, only moving far enough to meet her stare. Despite the dim interior of the room, his sky-blue eyes glowed like lasers. “I bet she liked you very much. She didn’t take shit from anyone either, though she had this awesome way of putting people in their place without letting them realize precisely what she was doing.”

  “Bless their hearts.” Willie allowed Mississippi to roll thick off her tongue.

  “Exactly.” He laughed gruffly. At least for a few seconds, before he grew serious again. “It was at her shelter, wasn’t it? Nola told me once that you’d used the services there when times were rough.”

  Thank God for her dark skin and the night, both of which should hide her flaming cheeks. Would she ever forgive herself for being such a failure? Probably not.

  �
�Yes. I knew it was really a place for children who needed assistance. So I took the girls. She saw me huddled outside and invited me in. Told me she could tell how tired I was. Gave us food, clean clothes, and a place to freshen up since we were living in that stinky old van.” Willie couldn’t help it, a tear slipped down her cheek. She would have dashed it from her face, but Tom noticed and kissed it away. “Michelle was beautiful. Glowing with kindness. It was hard not to smile when I was around her. She had herself so together. I admired her.”

  “We all have good and bad days. I loved her through to the bottom of my soul, you know I did. But even she wasn’t perfect. She left her dirty clothes on the floor and never put the cap back on the toothpaste, dumb shit like that. I remember arguing about stuff that didn’t matter worth a damn…” He trailed off.

  “Yeah, but the important things…she had those right.” Willie shivered. “As we were about to leave the shelter, she took me aside, looked me straight in the eyes, and told me—”

  Tom didn’t press her to finish. Instead he kept up that maddening rock, lulling her into complacency. Suddenly, it poured out.

  “She promised me that I wasn’t a bad mom. That I was doing the best I could under the circumstances. And she gave me her card. Said that she would look into resources for adults, instead of children only, and that we should come back. Let her help us.”

  “You didn’t take her up on it?” He groaned. “Why, Willie? We would have done whatever we could have.”

  She didn’t doubt it. After all, that’s how he’d ended up with not only his son Eli, but also custody of the other seven kids who’d grown up as Hot Rods.

  “I tried, actually. A couple months went by before I could work up the nerve. I’d taken on some more seamstress jobs and had enough to do okay, relatively. Until the winter kept dragging on. Amber had a cough she couldn’t shake from sleeping in the freezing car. I was worried about the girls. So I thought about what Michelle had said and I swallowed my embarrassment to go ask for help.” She shook now in his hold. “When I went back, they told me she was unavailable to see us. At first, I thought she hadn’t found anything and didn’t want me bugging her about it. I understood. A few months later, they had that article about her that took up the whole front page of the newspaper.”