STAY TUNED: Sneak peeks for UNACCEPTABLE, a motorcycle club & stepbrother romance & Cross Checked, the next standalone hockey romance in the Shots On Goal Series… If you want to know more about Karla and Brayden’s story, don’t miss out on their book!
Unacceptable
Sneak Peek
A Stepbrother & Motorcycle Club
Standalone Romance
by Kristen Hope Mazzola
Chapter 1
Slam!
The sound of my mom throwing her hair dryer across their room and it crashing through the thin walls of our doublewide jolted me from my deep sleep.
“Why don’t you just leave then, you fucking scumbag?” She was messed up again, slurring her words together as she picked another fight with my father after coming home in the early hours of the morning.
“Don’t you freaking tempt me Helen, I swear to fucking God.” My dad’s raspy voice was low and gravely, probably trying to not wake me.
Too late.
This fight wasn’t like every other night that she came home late from the bar; this one sounded worse.
“If you want to leave so badly, then just do me a damn favor and get the hell out, you rat bastard.” I heard their door open and the sound of my dad’s boots stomping down the hallway with the light thudding of my mom trying to run after him in heels.
“Helen, get the hell off me. Enough is enough.” He was right outside my door. I held my breath. I was ready to run away with him.
“You damn asshole you’re not taking her with you!”
Slap!
Slap!
Slap!
I could hear her hitting him.
“You’re not going to raise my daughter, you fucking, no good, whore. I’ll leave her here over my dead body!” That was the first night I ever heard that word: whore. It was the perfect definition for my mother. It was exactly what she was.
I heard my mother’s sobs getting softer as my dad slowly opened the door to my room. I held my breath, trying to pretend I was still asleep, silently begging him to pick me up in his strong arms and whisk me away from the trailer park and the terrible person that pretended to be a good mother.
“Yes. Hello.” I heard her meek voice crack as she sniffled into the receiver of our old yellow corded phone in the kitchen. “My boyfriend is trying to kidnap my daughter. Please send someone fast.”
“You damn—you goddamned cunt! She’s my daughter too.”
“Fuck you, Rave! If you wanted her to be your daughter so badly, you should have signed the damn birth certificate!”
The front door swung open and my father’s boots trudged down the metal steps, the sound echoing in my ears as my heart got heavier with each stomp. I ran to the window and watched my hero, my savior, the only person that ever showed me love get in his truck and drive away.
Taillights. That’s really what I remembered from that night. The glow of the taillights of my father’s rusty, clunking white long-bed. The gravel spit out from under the tires as he ran away to his freedom. Who could blame him? Not me, that’s for damn sure. I was about to follow in his footsteps. It had only taken me seventeen years to grow the metaphorical balls to realize that he was right. He had made the right move. All of the resentment and anger I had displaced onto him for abandoning me was finally falling on the right shoulders: hers, my fucking whore of a mother.
I sat outside the trailer I’d grown up in, in the same spot my dad had escaped from, watching the light switch off in my mom’s room from the front seat of my beat up Camaro. She was probably overdramatically faking another orgasm while john-number-five-hundred-and-something believed every grunt and groan. I had to hand it to her: she was damn good at her job.
I took the worn pages of the letter I had read thousands of times and stuffed them back into the envelope. I read the city name in the return address again: Vilas. That’s where I’d start my new life. That’s where I’d start my search, not for him, but for myself. If it was good enough for my father, it’d be good enough for me.
It had been ten years since I’d gotten my only letter from him. It was my most cherished possession. I knew the whole thing by heart, but the last line stuck with me, like a broken record in my mind:
I have always loved you and I always will, never forget that, Princess.
Getting that handwritten note changed my life. It gave me hope, courage, and a fire under my butt to make something better of myself. In the back of my head I knew that it was only one short letter, that if he truly loved me like he had so dramatically claimed, he would have come back for me, fought for me, even stayed that night, but that was all in the past. It was time to start the future and for fuck’s sake, I was about to take the bull by the horns and be something more than a trailer park critter that stripped to make ends meet.
The old engine cried to life after the third time I turned the key. I really needed to get it looked at, but I needed to get the hell out of the trailer park first. I had no plan, just a stack of uncashed paychecks from the Pink Kitty, where I had been working for years, and a wad of dollar bills that I had managed to hide from my mother, but it would have to be enough. I had hit the wall and was finally able to see it: I needed to move on.
I did have to give her some credit where it was due: my mom tried. She loved me in her own way, but she was never loving or motherly. She was either high or fucking to get her next fix for most of my childhood, but that was ok; I was over it. I’d realized long ago that you can’t ask more of someone than they are capable of; she was nothing more than a hooker, and I had to accept it. My mom had no aspiration to make something more of herself and I would have to live with that. There is no saving someone that doesn’t want to be saved, that’s for damn sure.
I glanced back in my rearview mirror as the dusty road took me away from the only home I had ever known.
Hopefully this will be my last look at that hellhole.
I jammed out to Katy Perry and T-Swift while shifting and grinding gears as the road twisted and turned, my long black curls dancing in the wind coming in through the open windows. Liberation boiled in my veins while a sting of guilt bit at the back of my mind. I knew that she would figure out later rather than sooner that I had ditched her. It probably wouldn’t be until she went to raid my room for my stash of money that I tried to hide from working all those damn late nights for nasty truckers and slime balls.
I drove and drove, stopping for gas a handful of times, having to fill up the clutch and power steering fluid on a few occasions, and ignoring my body’s aching need for a bed. I desperately wanted to put as much road and as many states as humanly possible between me and the shithole I was crawling out of. Coffee and chocolate donut holes would have to do until I just couldn’t take it any longer.
The day droned on and my eyelids got heavier and heavier as a slow Boyz II Men song poured from the speakers. That’s when I finally saw it, the sign that I had been waiting for: “Vilas – 5 miles”.
Heck yes!
I was as giddy as a schoolgirl as joy consumed me. I felt like I had finally made it. This wasn’t just a dream built up in the mind of a naive child. It was real. I was finally free. I could fucking taste the sweet victory as I breathed in the dusty road that was leading the way to my salvation.
As I pulled off the highway and turned down a back country road, the exhaustion started to settle in deep. A yawn took over as I made my way into a dive-looking bar’s parking lot. I needed to find a place to crash and figure out my next move. I grabbed the bright red lipstick from my bag; even though I felt and probably looked like shit, lipstick would make it a little better. Two things I never left the house without: a good bra and lipstick.
A handwritten “Help Wanted” sign caught my eye as I pulled on the worn metal handle. The smell of cigarette smoke wafted out as I swung the heavy wooden door open. It felt like an old movie where the music cuts out when the main character mistakenly walks into a bar that outsiders aren’t welcome in. There were a few
empty bar tables scattered around and a handful of pool tables in the back.
I took a seat at one of the creaking swivel barstools at least five seats away from the next patron. Every eye was glued on me as I threw my purse down on the bar with a thud and waved to the older bartender. It made me a little bit more uneasy when I realized I was the only person with a vagina in the whole joint. A few of the guys at the pool table behind me nearly broke their necks as I walked in with my tight skinny jeans, pushup bra, and flowy yoga top.
The bartender meandered over my way while I got a good look into his kind honey eyes; his shaved bald, shiny head; and the pure white, long handlebar mustache that rested over his curling lips. His rosy cheeks made him look far more jolly than he probably was. What really caught my eye was the cut that he was wearing. I’d definitely wandered into the wrong bar where outsiders were not welcome in the slightest.
I look a deep breath and reminded myself that I was a tall skinny chick and that my gun was only a foot away in my handbag. After working as a stripper for the better part of five years, I’d learned quickly that I needed to know how to protect myself and to not let fear ever cross my face.
In a slow drawl, his voice cracked the silence, “Can I get you somethin’, sweetheart?”
I swallowed hard before answering, “A bottle of Bud Light, please.” I felt like a mouse would have spoken louder than I just had, but he nodded and reached into the ice trough in front of him to grab my beer.
“Do I know you from somewhere?” His pale honey eyes narrowed; he was studying my face pretty intently. I glanced over to my bag where the only letter that I had from my father was concealed next to my three-eighty bodyguard. He very well could be in this bar or know this bartender. The town was small enough.
I shook my head. “I’ve never been here before.”
“I think I would remember meeting you.” He winked with a throaty chuckle before looking over to help a man in a matching cut that just had sat down next to me.
The newcomer ordered his whiskey on the rocks and leisurely turned in my direction. I glanced at the back of the bartender just long enough to read the club’s name scrolled across the back: The Unacceptables. Glancing over, my cheeks flared red as I took in the features of the young biker to my right. Everything faded into a blurry background when the extremely tall, broad-chested stud smiled at me. His lips were the perfect shade of light red, pierced with two small hoops in the left corner, and even his eyes smiled as his gaze met mine.
“Hello there.” He slid his stool closer to mine.
I shook my head quickly, trying to get my wits about me while his deep blues were threatening to drown me. “Hi.” I sipped from my beer slowly, fighting to hide how nervous I had become all of a sudden.
“Not from around here are you?” The bartender slid his drink in front of him.
“Nope. Just passing through.”
I read the words “vice president” on the front of his cut before I let my mind start to focus completely on how breathtakingly handsome this man truly was.
Slow. Deep. Breaths.
Slow.
Deep.
Don’t let him catch you practically drooling.
Damn, he’s gorgeous.
“That’s a shame.” His lip curled under his piercings as his tongue rolled over the silver hoops gently. “I’m Abel.” He held out his hand for me to take.
“Nice to meet you, I’m Crickett.”
“Wait.” He tried desperately not to laugh as his cheeks got red and his lips pulled up at the corners. “Your name is Crickett? Like chirp chirp?”
“Yep, it sure is.” I rolled my eyes before taking a long swig from the bottle. “I’m named after a damn insect.”
“Who would ever think to name their kid that?” He was full blown laughing now as the hilarity of my unfortunate name really sunk in deep.
“A deadbeat and a hooker.”
The bartender practically jogged down the bar after my name hit the air and gave Abel a stern look. “Table. Now!”
“Everything all right, Bucky?”
The gruff old man narrowed his eyes. “The meeting was supposed to start fifteen minutes ago, son. I’ll be up in a second. Rich is looking for ya.”
Another bartender without a cut on slid behind the bar and all of the bikers filed through a door at the back of the bar. Abel was gone in a flash, without the slightest goodbye.
The young guy—who couldn’t be much older than eighteen judging by his patchy beard mixed with peach fuzz—walked over to me. “Miss? Care for another?” He pointed at my almost empty bottle and I nodded.
After taking a sip of the fresh icy cold amber goodness, I looked up at the guy playing on his phone. “Do you know a good motel close by?”
He smiled, glancing up from the screen. “Oh yeah, we have one just a block north of here, right off the main road. Can’t miss it.”
“Great, thanks. What’s your name?” I felt chatty, even bored, and I was great at flirty small talk. I figured, why not chat up this cutie and hopefully get some details about Abel?
“Me? I’m Holt.”
“Oh crap, I almost forgot.” I dug the koozie out of my purse and placed it on my beer.
Holt’s eyebrow raised.
“What? You don’t want cold hands or warm beer.”
“Yeah. I guess you’re right.”
“Are you from around here, Holt?” I twirled a long curl between my fingers and stared into his dark brown eyes.
“Born and raised.” His drawl was thick as he wiped the bar top with a wet towel. “What about you?”
“I’m from a few states over. Making a break for it.” I chugged half my beer.
“Running ain’t always a bad thing. Vilas is a good town. Hopefully you’ll like it here.”
“How much do I owe you for these?”
I bit my lip slowly and watched Holt’s cheeks flare as he rubbed the back of his neck and stuttered a bit. “It was taken care of.” He held up his hand to stop me from taking my wallet out of my purse.
I raised my eyebrow at him. “Really?”
He nodded. “Abel told me to put it on his tab. So you’re good to go.”
Wow. Sweet, mysterious, and hot. I might have to give this town and Abel a trial run.
“Thanks, Holt. Maybe I’ll see you around.”
He nodded. “Hope you get some rest.”
“I look that bad, huh?”
Holt smiled sweetly as he shook his head. “Nah, you just look like you’ve been traveling for a while and need a hot shower and a bed.”
“Well then I look the way I feel. That Abel guy, he’s all right?” I should have been more subtle, but I was worn out and beating around the bush seemed more draining than what it was worth.
“Yeah, he’s one of the best guys I know. Tough skin but a fucking heart of gold.”
“Good to know.” I chugged the rest of my beer and threw a couple dollars on the bar. Holt’s sweet smile spread wider as the guys came back out from the backroom, or abyss, or wherever they’d all run off to in such a hurry. To my dismay, Abel was not in the group that filed back into their bar seats. I waved goodbye to Holt and made my way to finally get the shuteye that I desperately needed.
Chapter 2
Rounding the corner, I saw the neon vacancy light shining bright above the motel’s front office door. The dimly lit gravel parking lot crunched under the tires of my crying car. It was time to put more power steering fluid in for sure. I grabbed the plastic bottle of fluid from the floorboard of the passenger side and fixed the problem. At least there were a few things I could do under the hood of my car to make it run at a somewhat decent level. Growing up where most of the guys around built mud trucks had its perks from time to time.
Looking around as I made my way into the office, I noticed a few cars scattered around the lot, all with out of state plates. It was nice to know that other out-of-towners stopped there. It shouldn’t have made a difference, but it comforted me
to know that other travelers felt safe enough to crash there too.
The bell chimed above my head as I walked into the small office that smelled like mothballs and stale pizza. A sweet girl peeked up from a school book the was laid out on the counter. “Hey miss. Lookin’ for a room?”
I nodded. “Sure am.”
“Smoking or nonsmoking?”
Even though I was a smoker, the thought of stale cigarette smoke embedded in the pillows made me want to hurl on the spot.
“Nonsmoking.”
“All right. I just need a credit card to hold the room. How many nights will you be our guest?”
For not being more than thirteen, she was very articulate and polite. I was pretty impressed by her.
“I’m not sure, actually.” I dug my hands into my pockets; it felt unnerving as hell to not have any plan whatsoever.
“Longer than a week?”
I shrugged. “Possibly.”
“We have weekly specials, you’ll save fifty bucks that way.”
“Sounds like a plan to me.”
“Perfect.” She punched a few keys on the dinosaur of a computer that was in front of me. “If anything changes, just come on in and let us know.” Her kind eyes and sweet smile settled down my growing nerves as she handed me a key with a giant red plastic ornament-looking keychain on it.
“You’re on the first floor, three doors over on the left.”
I handed her my credit card and license. “All right, Miss Hayes. You’re all set.”
“Thanks.” With a quick wave, I was off to finally lie down in a bed for a much needed night’s sleep, even though it was still the afternoon.
The light shining through the window stung my tired eyes as I groggily started to wake up. I had no idea what time I had actually crashed the day before. I’d barely even had time to turn the lights off before I hit the pillow and passed out, let alone undress, take off my makeup, or look at the clock.
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