by Hazel Grace
Copyright 2019 © Hazel Grace All Rights Reserved
This book is a work of fiction. Any references to real events, real people, and real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the Author’s imagination and any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, organizations or places is entirely coincidental.
All rights are reserved. This book is intended for the reader of this ebook ONLY. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, or by any information storage retrieval system, without the express written permission of the Author. All songs, song titles and lyrics contained in this book are the property of the respective songwriters and copyright holders.
Cover design: Black Widow Designs
Proofreading: Dom’s Proofreading
Created with Vellum
To my Mom, Sheep, Moo Moo & Bonasha
This is all for you
It’s the look I’ve imagined in my head a million times over.
Widened emerald eyes.
Blush-colored lips partially agape in shock and disbelief.
Body frozen from the surprise of it all.
It being me.
But that was just my imagination over the years, not the reality that is playing out before me right now.
Because I never wanted to see her again.
I’d rather bury myself in a grave or cut my balls off before having to stand here, feet away from her, staring at me like I’m back to claim her.
Fuck. All. That.
I wouldn’t touch her if she was the last piece of pussy on this Earth without an STD.
She’s been dead to me for years, a damn decade, and I want to keep it that way. But when she blinks, her long eyelashes fanning across her bronze-colored skin sprinkled in freckles, she’s very much alive.
And very much in front of me.
Sawyer fucking Boyd—the bane of my existence.
My jaw tightens as she tucks a piece of long red hair behind her ear. I avert my gaze, my jaw granite about to crack under the pressure of her presence.
This was far beyond how I pictured my night taking off. It was more R rated, pounding the woman now clinging to my arm into oblivion so I can overcast the fucked up memories of what this town held in my head.
There were no happy reminders.
Nothing to engrave to memory.
Everything here was stale, stifling, and dark.
I spent my whole life here until eighteen, hell-bent on leaving this fucked-up small town so I could make something of myself. Away from my blood-sucking mom, from this suffocating town where the best career you’d get is being a banker at the only bank here. My dreams were bigger than the limited resources here, and I planned on achieving them.
Until I didn’t.
I couldn’t.
“Sawyer, this is Colson,” Skylar announces, squeezing my tricep. “He’s the assistant baseball coach at Freemont High.” I hold back the cringe that wants to shutter throughout my body. The constant reminder of that fact, thanks to the woman in front of me, only fuels the fire blazing inside of me.
The hate, the flashbacks, the love that once coursed through my soul and veins for her, all singed in ashes now. And she isn’t about to rise like a Phoenix in this story and back into my world. Because I was high-tailing it the fuck out of here after my mother’s estate was done.
“Colson.” Her tone is a breathy realization, sending goosebumps up my arms and down my spine. I force my eyes to stay open while my body starts to liquefy, as though it forgot the memo that we don’t like her.
We fucking loathe her.
And the simple fact that it still weakens at the sound of her honeyed tone, makes me hate her even more.
My traitorous eyes can’t help but notice her modest dress. The navy and white stripes parallel across her breasts while the bottom half is solid navy in color that hits the middle of her tan thighs.
Fuck, it’s not modest, it’s fuckable.
My temples start to throb at warding her body off and the reciprocation it’s displaying now. It apparently doesn’t matter that I’ve put so many years and miles between us, my weak subconscious still wants her. It still craves to sweep her soft skin with my fingers, to tangle them in her thick red hair and brush that lower plush lip that used to drive me insane with lust for her.
I feel like a seventeen-year-old again.
Coming back here to Freemont, Oklahoma was the worst idea I’ve had in a long time. I knew it. I should’ve just told my mother’s attorney to burn her fucking house down and send me whatever was left. But after being told I had shit to sign and it could drag out for months if I didn’t, I hopped on a plane. I just didn’t expect all the nostalgia to suffocate me in the process.
“Oh, Skylar,” coos another voice, making my gaze whip to a middle-aged woman with shoulder-length hair, the same color as Skylar’s blonde. “Is this the man you were telling us so much about?”
My frown deepens.
We’ve known each other three days, seventy-two hours, literally sharing nothing about ourselves other than how good it felt fucking each other. Skylar knew how hard I liked my cock sucked, and I knew that she didn’t like her hair pulled.
That’s really all we needed to know about each other.
“Yes,” Skylar beams, wrapping her arm more securely around me like a Venus fly trap. “This is Colson.” The woman steps closer to me, extending her hand, and then it hits me like a car slamming into brick wall head-on.
She has the same eyes as Sawyer, hued in shades of moss green with a dark emerald color around them. They’re vibrant, hypnotizing, the first thing you’d notice when up close.
Irises that were similar to the ones I used to drown myself in.
Did I just...
“I’m Meredith,” the woman tells me, her hand still outstretched for me to take. I hesitate before giving it a curt shake, dropping it immediately like she has a skin-eating disease. “I hope you like fried chicken and mashed potatoes because it’s Sawyer and Skylar’s favorite. We have it every time it’s one of their birthdays.”
I choke on an inhale.
Geezus Christ. Skylar and Sawyer, like as in fucking related?
A clock chimes somewhere in the house like I just walked into a bad episode of The Twilight Zone. I’m just waiting for a talking doll to appear or a six-year-old with his ability to create or destroy anything with his mind saunter into the foyer of hell.
“Come inside, Colson,” Meredith offers, extending an arm to the adjoining room. “John will be down in a moment. He just got back from his doctor’s appointment.”
My focus skims a modest room with brown-clothed couches set in front of a flat screen TV hanging above a fireplace. A mantle hung underneath, brimming with picture frames of what looks to be school photos and family vacations.
The reality hits me harder.
And this bitch on my arm – oh no, I’m sorry – Sawyer’s sister, brought me here to meet her parents when I clearly said we were just fucking.
One more time: fucking. Just fucking.
Before I can open my mouth, Meredith clasps her hands together in a clap, which makes me jilt.
“We’ll finish setting the table,” she voices, interlacing her arm with Sawyer’s.
Our eyes lock again, Sawyer’s greens to my browns. The daze has worn off hers, curiosity fills in them now. Like she’s prying into my past, where I’ve been and why I’m here. She won’t be getting those answers from me, even though she probably knows them from the sing-song gossip of this bored-as-hell town.
Meredith
guides herself and Sawyer out of the foyer, giving me a wink before leaving me alone with my three-night stand.
“I’m starving,” Skylar whines, guiding me into the family room, but I halt midstep. I’m not about to eat dinner with her sister nor am I going to fake pretend that I’m okay with it and the simple fact that this is weird as fuck.
“I thought you said we were going to your place,” I snap, not giving two shits about the way my tone physically makes her flinch.
She looks up at me, her blue eyes puzzled. “We are.”
“Uh, no, we’re not. I wasn’t that drunk. And this isn’t the place we fucked the last three times.”
I would’ve immediately sobered if I would’ve ran into Sawyer.
“Well,” she admits, twirling her blonde hair around her finger. “That wasn’t exactly my place.”
My brows crease. “Then whose was it?”
“My girlfriend’s. She was out of town and —”
I start for the front door. “I gotta go.”
“Wait!” Skylar grabs my arm and gives it a yank. “I didn’t think you’d mind.”
I whirl on her. “Mind? We’re not dating, we’re fucking. My dick is the only thing interested in having a conversation with you. Other than that, I don’t want anything else to do with you. I’m not interested in meeting your family or having a home-cooked meal with a girl that practically jumped my dick within five minutes of knowing each other.” I rip my arm from her small fingers. “Don’t fucking call me.”
“But Colson,” she whines a high-pitched tone that makes my skin crawl. “It’s my birthday.”
I kiss the tips of my middle and index fingers and plaster them to her forehead. “Happy Birthday.”
Opening the front door, the warm spring air hits my face, signaling freedom, but it’s whisked away instantly.
“Where are you going, son?”
Geezus hell, who the fuck now?
“He forgot his wallet,” Skylar quickly responds, catching my elbow and turning me around. “It can wait, babe, this is a safe neighborhood.”
“She’s right,” the man says, descending down the staircase toward us. “It’ll be safe in the car.”
I take it that he’s the father.
Stocky guy with short gray hair and a pot belly, his beefy hand motions for us to walk into the dining room while his expression digs into me like he isn’t fully convinced that I was about to go grab my wallet.
He more than likely just heard me talking about fucking his daughter from upstairs, and if I didn’t want to be buried in his backyard, I better fucking eat the meal his wife prepared.
I contemplate my options; stay and eat or just punch John in the gut and ditch this shit hole. I’m leaning more toward the latter because my ass isn’t sitting in a chair across from Sawyer in this century or the next.
“Mama makes the best fried chicken, babe,” Skylar gabs, leeching onto me again. “Doesn’t she, Daddy?”
“Best cooking this side of the Mississippi,” John vows. “She’s been looking forward to you coming by.” That again directed at me, and he makes sure his eyes make it perfectly clear that I’m staying or we’re going to be going with the latter option in about two seconds.
Fuck that, let’s do it.
“Wasn’t really looking to eat anything else but your daughter’s pussy tonight, John,” I convey, ripping my arm out of Skylar’s clutches again. “But thanks for the offer.” I hear her soft gasp behind me as I round on my heels.
I’ve never had a door cry out so loudly for me to sprint through it and make an escape before now. Not even when I fucked girls in high school so loud that it made their dads pound on their bedroom door.
Fuck Sawyer Boyd, her sister, and fuck this town, I’m out.
Ten years ago
“Dude, what the fuck?!” Gavin exhorts, raking his hand through his copper hair as I plunge another ping pong ball into one of his red cups.
I smile, watching him drink the lukewarm beer out of it as I take another hit off my blunt.
“Do I get to go again?” I ask, knowing full well that I do. We’ve played two games already, and the more shit-faced Gavin becomes and the more weed I inhale, he gets worse while I get better. It’s the same merry-go-round ride, and this dumbass jumps on each time.
“Fuck you and throw,” Gavin snaps, sending his blonde groupie to the side and leans behind the cups to distract me with his ugly dome that I’ve known since Kindergarten.
I back up and raise both my hands over my head like I’m going to perform a free throw, then toss the ball. It bounces off the table, circles the rim of a cup, and rebounds onto the cement.
Gavin claps his hands and chuckles like a toddler with the mouth of a sailor. “Yessss. Get ready to lose, motherfuckerrrr.” I cross my arms and watch him bite his tongue in concentration, knowing the cups are tilting in his vision because he’s studying them cross-eyed.
“Wanna throw another twenty on it?” I smirk, rubbing my chin.
Gavin glances at me with furrowed brows. “Are you hustling your best friend, dickwad?”
“I’m collecting money for my college fund and the weed of mine that you keep fucking smoking.”
“Our college fund,” Gavin corrects me. “And learn to share, man. I’m the one helping you with your shit attitude so we can get scouts to like your broody ass. Then we might have a shot.”
I roll my eyes and wrinkle my nose.
Who said you had to be personable and an ass kisser to land on a college baseball team? I encourage our team, mainly to move their asses faster around the bases with mild threats, but I give high fives and shit too. I don’t need to sit around, have a tea party, and listen to their life issues and who they fucked last.
“Are you guys almost done?” Gavin and I turn our attention to the voice of a platinum blonde whose hand is propped on her skinny hip. My eyes drag in her red dress that hugs just...her skin. No curves or valleys to leave to mine or any other guy’s imagination. Just a rail with a red table cloth on top of it.
“Is that you, Audrey?” Gavin asks through squinted eyes. “What the fuck happened to your hair?”
She smiles, lacing her fingers between her locks. “I just got it done. Do you like it?”
“Fuck off, Audrey,” Gavin’s groupie snaps, narrowing her brows. “This spot is taken.”
She means the slot in Gavin’s next fuckapades.
It is demented how many girls flock to him like a shoe sale or the next Jude Law movie just to get boned by him. But here, if you fuck the biggest and the baddest, you get the bragging rights. An invisible crown of nailing Gavin Sheston and getting to talk about it.
And Gavin handed them out like Halloween candy.
“You look like a fucked-up Barbie doll that Mattel accidentally put out on the shelves,” Gavin pipes in, wearing an inebriated look on his face. His brows are furrowed, trying to focus on what he’s looking at, and his lips are tight with disapproval.
Audrey’s eyes widen then turn into slits. “Says the dumbfuck who couldn’t finish last week,” she retorts, her face reddening in embarrassment.
I raise a brow at Gavin, who’s leaning on the edge of the table to keep himself standing.
“I’m sorry, Audrey,” Gavin guffaws softly. “But it was like throwing a hot dog down a hallway, I didn’t feel a thing. It was like pumping air, my hand could’ve done a better job. You really need to start doing Kegels.”
Her hand comes across his face hard over the loud music, but Gavin still stares at her like it never happened. Thanks to the liquor and beer we’ve been drinking all night, plus the weed, he could jump off the roof of this house and walk away unphased.
“You’re an asshole,” she seethes, turning on her flip flops to walk away.
“You didn’t finish?” I ask him because that’s really the most important topic here. My best friend scratches his temple.
“I tried but, as I said, little Gavin literally felt nothing down there.”
/> Creative and disappointing.
But it wasn’t like he couldn’t substitute her for someone else, he does it all the time. She’s still standing right next to him with a smug ass look on her face even though she didn’t do anything.
She’d be replaced in twenty-four hours. Just like everyone else.
Gavin and I are known as the two dickheads that don’t call you back after we’ve fucked you. It’s not because we’re terrified of commitment or that it’s scary to fall in love. It boils down to the fact that there’s no point. We’re not staying here after we graduate, and when you have the prospect of hundreds of college girls ready to party and fuck, why settle down?
Besides, this town was like a recycling bin for chicks, no new blood came here, and what’s the big deal with fucking the same girl when there were fifty others of all shapes and sizes that wanted to suck your cock?
I like being wanted.
Call me a selfish prick, you wouldn’t be the first.
Except my dick is a limited edition while Gavin keeps giving his out like free suckers at the doctor’s office.
“Is this yours?” a soft voice asks from behind me. I almost didn’t hear it, but the music stopped for a minute to play the next song.
I peer over my shoulder, where I’m met with stunning green eyes and freckles holding my lost ping pong ball.
My eyes involuntarily graze the blueprint of her body. Her sun-kissed skin makes her coral-colored bikini pop out from underneath a sheer white cover-up. Her tits have to be at least a C cup and, shit, they’d be perfect to fill the palm of my hand with. And her thighs, which are not rails like Audrey’s, are the kind you want wrapped around your head when going down on her.
Fuck, who the hell is this?
“Hayes,” she snaps, interrupting my running imagination. “Your ball.”
“You want his balls?” Gavin blurts, squinting his eyes.
A blush creeps across her cheeks, and she shifts her weight, holding out the ping pong ball for me to take.
I don’t take it.
“Hey, is that Sawyer?” Gavin appears at my side, snatching my blunt out of my hand. My immediate glare falls back on him taking my fucking weed again.
