by Piper Frost
All rights reserved under the International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, organizations, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
This book is for sale to ADULT AUDIENCES ONLY. It contains substantial sexually explicit scenes and graphic language which may be considered offensive by some readers.
Warning: the unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in prison.
Copyright 2017 Piper Frost
Cover design © 2017 Inked Imprints
We don’t usually do these, but it needs to be said because these people really stepped up when it came to making sure Brandt and Jo’s story is just PERFECT!
Laren- Thank you for not lubing it up when giving us the harsh facts. We may not take it like a champ, but in the end we know you’re right 90% of the time. Thanks for putting up with us. <3
Bex and Brandi- Our two B’s. You two rocked so hard and without you this book would have made Frost and Piper pull their hair out. THANK YOU.
Trees, crops, cows, horses, more trees, more fucking corn. What did I do to deserve this? Oh, that’s right. Stopped caring.
I look over at the monster next to me. Or you could call her a faker? Schizo may be more accurate.
My birth mother, Donna. The woman that didn’t give a shit about me four years ago and let me make some of the biggest mistakes of my life. Yep, I’m throwing some sort of fit and blaming my poor decisions on my ‘mother’.
She’s driving me across the country and we’re heading south, y’all.
I was happy in New York. The cops weren’t happy with me, though. Most people aren’t happy with the homeless. Add in a little theft and a lot of drugs because you hit rock bottom, and they’re more than happy to let you rot in jail. I was even okay with that but good ole mom wasn’t. Like I said though, four years ago she was too busy with her career to even recognize me for the shithead I was, so when I walked out, she didn’t even bother to try and stop me. The apple doesn’t fall too far from the tree, but this apple hit so many branches on the way down that the only thing I have in common with Donna is substance abuse.
Donna is a country star. I loathe country music. Donna is a blonde haired, big tittied, southern belle. I cover my blonde with black hair dye so when it starts to grow back I look like I’m balding. My chest has been compared to mosquito bites. I never lived in the south a day in my life and neither had Donna up until four years ago when I became a missing person. That really helped her shitty career blossom. Now though, now she has a drawl that crawls under my skin almost as bad as going a week without a fix.
I’m not proud of the shit I’ve done, but I’m just to the point where I don’t give a shit anymore.
Gasp! How could such a young girl give up so easily?
I’ve heard all the ‘positive’ mantras and there have been so many prayers for me that if The Big Guy is real, he definitely knows who I am. Live a day in the shoes I did prior to the last six months I’ve been in rehab, and you’d give up too. This isn’t your fault or society or whomever you think I’m trying to blame. And I know I said I was blaming Donna before, but honestly, I made the choices I did, and I can make the choice not to give a shit anymore too. It’s my life. Donna gave me full custody of my life on my sixteenth birthday and decided nurturing her career was more important than her daughter. So I took the reigns and did everything possible to fuck it up just enough that I don’t care anymore. It wasn’t intentional; I didn’t set out with the mentality to become a homeless drug addict. I set out to live instead of watching my mom breathe every breath she had into trying to become a country star.
Whatever. That’s my sob story. Now I’m headed south to live on Donna’s farm that her husband and his son tend to while she acts like she’s a retired country singing phenomenon. Her career didn’t take off until the tragic story of her missing daughter hit the media, along with the song she wrote for ‘me’ when I ran away from home.
I’m twenty and can tell her to piss off, but like I said, I just don’t care anymore. It’s just a place to sleep and not worry about where my next meal will come from. And if anything, Donna can afford to take care of me now, unlike years ago when the only thing she wanted to afford was buying a career.
“You’re really gonna like Brandt.” Her drawl seems thicker the closer we get to the place she calls home. Like she’s settling back into her roots that have never been in her blood because she was raised in Canada then went to college in New York, got knocked up, and then had me.
Like most of this trip, I don’t respond. She said she would have just flown me down but wanted the fifteen-hundred-mile drive to ‘bond’. The only bonding we’ve done so far is shared a large fry from McDonalds. I’m not to tell Garrison, her husband, because they don’t eat anything that’s not organic… I can’t wait to arrive.
She keeps blabbing on about this Brandt guy, but I just want to sleep.
“He graduated last year so he’s not much younger than you and he’ll be working around the farm for the summer so you guys can get to know each other. Maybe he can show you the ropes.” And that’s when I stop listening, because unless ‘the ropes’ are sleep, TV, eat, and repeat, there’s nothing Brandt can show me.
Only a few more hours and I can actually sleep. I’ve been pretending to sleep as much as possible, but if I go too long she doesn’t pull over and I’ve somehow developed the bladder of a pregnant woman who’s nine months along with quadruplets.
When her hand lands on my shoulder I open my eyes and clamp my jaw to keep from biting it. The last thing I want from her is to pretend she’s been my mother, or to pretend we’re even friends. But I have to play along until I get out of here, and as of right now, I’m not sure when that’ll be because I’m not in a hurry to do much of anything.
“We’re here,” she speaks in a soft voice like I’m an adopted child that’s being welcomed home.
I don’t even bother to look at the place. It’s a farm. How exciting can it be? When I do glimpse at the house as I head toward the trunk of the car, the first thing I notice is how ridiculously large it is. This isn’t your typical farmhouse. This is a mansion sitting on farmland.
Being homeless for the last three years hasn’t really given me opportunity to build my wardrobe, so I grab my backpack and a rolling suitcase that Donna bought after the rehab clinic gave back what little belongings I had in a plastic bag.
“Howdy.” The deep southern voice that greets me in a way I thought only happened in movies comes from my back, and I turn around to a cowboy dismounting a giant horse. No joke.
Instead of replying, I get enamored by the beast he just rode up on like it’s running on a motor. It’s not the first time I’ve seen a horse, but it is the first time I’ve seen one standing in place of a vehicle and not pulling some bullshit carriage that charges tourists two hundred bucks a pop.
“I’m Garrison.” His huge hand extends and I get caught-up studying it because I’m used to men as thin and fragile as I am.
Before I let my laugh escape at how alien I’m acting I push my hand into his and pull my upper lip between my teeth.
“Jolene?” he asks as if maybe my mother decided to pick up a diffe
rent ex-drug addict daughter on that three thousand mile drive.
“Jo.” I haul my backpack over my shoulder and reach for the rolling suitcase but he picks it up.
“Alright then. Let’s get through the grand tour of the museum.”
“Oh stop.” A hearty southern laugh comes from Donna while she wraps herself around his arm.
“You hungry, Jo?” he asks. I quickly glance toward her because we just ate McDonalds, but the look on her face makes me reply, “Sure,” and step to the side so they can open the door to their home.
“Brandt will be here in twenty. I’ve got stew in the crock.”
The overwhelming aroma of a home cooked meal hits me and makes my mouth water but also makes my bloated stomach cramp because I haven’t eaten this much in one day since I was a kid.
“Bathroom?” I glare at Donna because her cowboy husband is staring at me and he’s intimidating. Like I said before, I’m not used to men like him. I’m used to fiending crack-heads whose arm I could break before running off with their stash. A man like Garrison though, he could lift me by the collar of my shirt and throw me the distance of a football field. I don’t like feeling intimidated by men.
“Let’s get you to your room and I’ll show you around.” Donna detaches herself from John Wayne and wraps her arm around mine like we’re the best of girl friends. “You okay, honey?” she whispers while leading me toward a long hallway that looks more like it belongs in a museum, like Garrison said.
“Fine,” I mutter.
“Does Garrison make you uncomfortable?” I swear her accent gets thicker and thicker each time she talks.
“No.” I shrug hoping she lets go of my arm. She doesn’t.
“You tell me if he does. He can seem intense, but he’s a sweetheart.”
I have no response for that. I just hope we get to this room sooner than later but it seems like we’re traveling to a completely different house. After she unlocks a door that looks like it leads to a garage, she holds the key out to me.
“You and Brandt will have to work out some sort of rules and boundaries. The guesthouse has been his for the past year.”
As long as the dork leaves me the hell alone and lets me sleep, we won’t cross paths.
“You’ll have your privacy but I won’t be far if you ever need me.” She points her square French-tipped fingernail back toward the door. “Brandt’s room is upstairs, but I don’t think he’d fight you if you wanted to switch. I don’t think it’d be too much of a trouble.”
“A bed in a corner is fine.”
She starts to laugh, making me jump because I wasn’t ready for that cackle. “Don’t be silly, Jolene. This isn’t going to be anything like the life you were used to living. We’re getting you on the right track.”
I raise my eyebrows and stare into her blue eyes, but when her smile doesn’t falter I look away and clench my jaw to hold in the smartass comment. The last thing I need is to treat her like the mother she’s not.
"Can you work on calling me Jo?" It's not really a request, and I hope she doesn't take it as one. I can't stand Jolene.
"Sure, honey." She turns the handles to double doors and I’m hoping it’s to a pool, but it’s not. It’s to a bedroom. Double doors for a bedroom. This woman has more money than she knows what to do with. And I’m sorry, but bedroom is an understatement. This is a suite. “Take a look around, then I’ll take you to the other room and you can decide.”
“This is fine.” I walk toward the bed and release my backpack from my shoulder.
“You sure?” She looks like she’s genuinely worried but I don’t know what the hell she could be worried about. She’s offering a peasant a palace when I was okay with a sleeping bag in a corner.
“Yeah. Sure.” I nod, looking around, because she has a tendency to stare at me for too long and it makes me uncomfortable. I’d hate to try and analyze what she sees. Not to mention, I don’t exactly care.
“Get settled a little, then let’s see if Brandt is home.” She smiles at me like she’s happy I’m a guest in her castle, but she’s going to be disappointed when she realizes any semblance of a relationship between us is long lost.
“I should have thought about this before we arrived. Is there maybe a store within walking distance?” I know there isn’t because we were at least fifteen miles away from the small gas station I noticed on the drive in, and I can’t remember where or when I saw an actual store on our drive.
“What do you need?” She moves closer to me and I’m so worried she’s going to try and hug me that I move away. She tried it at the rehab center but commotion from a new patient made it short lived.
“Toothpaste. Toothbrush.” I shrug. “Just stuff.”
“Go look in your bathroom.” She gestures to another set of double doors that are inside the bedroom and I open my mouth to tell her how absurd this house is, but I quickly clamp it closed. “I stocked it before I got you, but if there’s something you need, I’ll take you to the market.”
“Do you have a Walmart around or something?” I’m not sure what she means by a market. Is this a southern name for convenience store? Or does she literally mean market?
“There’s one in the city.” She nods then heads to the doors that I haven’t made a move for yet.
“I need hair dye.”
“Are you going back to blonde? I can get you in to see my stylist.”
“Black,” I respond before she gets her hopes up. “And box dye is fine.”
“Don’t be silly.” She looks away with discontent but I’m not going to be the little country girl she’s wanted since I was a young New Yorker. “I’ll get you in to see Crystal.”
Whatever. I’m not going to bother arguing right now, but Crystal can use her time on someone else while I pour box dye over my head. I don’t give a shit what my hair looks like, with the exception of the golden locks trying to take over.
“Take a look around, honey. What do you think you need that I forgot?” she asks while gently placing her hand on items she has lined up on a bed-sized sink counter.
“I have to use the bathroom.”
Her boar bristle brushes and electric toothbrushes don’t impress me. I’d be happy with a fork for a brush and dollar store toothbrush.
“You want me to wait out here for you?” she asks leaving the bathroom.
“No,” I respond while closing the doors.
“You remember where we came into the house at? The dinning room isn’t far from there. Why don’t you head that way when you’re done.”
“Sure thing.” When I’m done with sleeping and can’t stand the hunger anymore. I can usually go at least five days.
“Okay, Jo. We’re happy you’re here, honey.”
“Okay. Thanks.” I close the door and exhale a deep breath when I’m finally away from that woman.
She’s not that bad, except for the fact she wants to play happy family. Yes we’re family, but we’re not happy and she wasn’t happy until I left. She can cut the shit.
When I exit the bathroom I stare at the closed double doors and wonder if she’s waiting on the other side. I can’t find the urge to check so I slip my shoes off and climb into the bed that’s nothing like any bed I’ve ever laid on. Letting out a groan, I sink into the pillow with a grin and close my eyes. I’ll be more than happy wasting away to nothing in this bed.
“Jo?” Thudding knocks finally wake me and the unfamiliar masculine voice has me jolting upright, staring at the door in a confused panic.
“Jo? It’s Garrison. Are you okay in there?”
Garrison. Donna’s husband. I’m at Donna’s farm.
“Sleeping,” I weakly call out then clear my throat. “I’m sleeping,” I yell with a little more confidence in my tone.
“Your mom’s worried.”
My head starts jerking around, looking for a clock.
“We thought you’d join us for dinner?”
“Fuck,” I whisper then drag ass out of the bed and ove
r to the door.
When I open it, he eyes me curiously. “You were sleeping in jeans and a hoodie?”
“I was just excited there was a pillow.” My brief grin got the point across and he looks away like he’s concerned about my past life. I want to laugh. “I’m not really hungry. I kind of just want to sleep.”
“You can sleep when you’re dead.” His hand clamps to my shoulder, and it’s all in my head, but his grasp is too threatening. Before I can stop myself I grab his wrist and he lets me twist his arm. It’s like arm wrestling with your dad. He doesn’t even try.
“Do you like beef stew?” he asks, not indicating any awkwardness or discomfort in the pathetic twist I have him in.
I quickly move away and turn so he doesn’t see my embarrassment.
“Jo? Stew?”
“I’m sorry I twisted your arm,” I blurt and move farther away.
“I’ll teach you how to do it so you can actually disarm me.” His smile softens his serious gaze.
“I’m not hungry. I just want sleep.”
I think I’ve had my fair share of interaction with them.
“You’ve been napping two hours and Brandt is a really patient kid, but he’s itching to meet his new roommate.” That smile is still set like he’s trying to disarm me.
I’m disarmed, but I don’t want to play house with these people.
“I’m really tired.” It’s not a lie, but I’m always really tired.
“Your mom said you slept most of the drive.”
“I pretended,” I shamelessly inform him.
“I do that to her sometimes too.” He heads for the door. “Take that sweater off and join us for dinner.”
I look down at my hoodie in confusion then realize it probably looks like I garbage picked it, but I didn’t. I actually paid five dollars for it at a secondhand store.
“Eh.” I migrate toward the bed again. “Wouldn’t want to interfere with your family time. I’ll see you guys tomorrow maybe.” I start climbing back onto the soft mattress and when he turns toward me I only mean to glance but it turns into an intense stare-down. This man demands respect and compliance but at the same time you can see he’ll return it.
