Praise for Denise Wells
Once again Denise Wells writes a book that had my eyes to the pages from beginning to end.
Goodreads Reviewer
Denise Wells is a new to me author, and after Love Undiscovered, (which I FREAKIN' LOVED), I'm now a big fan!
Goodreads Reviewer
She’s a great author that writes such in-depth characters with a great storyline!
Amazon Reviewer
D Wells did an excellent job balancing out the different emotions you experience while reading this book.
Amazon Reviewer
Love Unforgettable
Love in San Soloman - Book Three
Denise Wells
Copyright © 2018 by Denise Wells
Cover Design: Shari Ryan, MadHat Books
Editing: Ellie, My Brother’s Editor
Editing: Missy Borucki
Publicity: Linda Russell, Foreword PR
Proofreading: Ashley Erin, Amaris Morrione
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any mistakes or misrepresentations are the authors alone.
This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
Created with Vellum
For my winos - y’all know who you are.
Love has nothing to do with what you are expecting to get, only with what you are expecting to give, which is everything.
- Katharine Hepburn
Contents
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
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Epilogue
Cole and Lexie’s Compromise Playlist
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Also by Denise Wells
Chapter 1
LEXIE
Trevor freakin’ Vaughn.
Here.
In the flesh.
The last person I ever thought I’d see again. Period. Let alone at this random hotel, thousands of miles from where he lives, AND when my besties and I are in the middle of a crisis.
Remi, my best friend, was just held hostage by her boyfriend Chance’s ex, Helen.
Kat, my other best friend, and I had barely rescued Remi, with Chance’s help, before Helen kidnapped him at gunpoint. So now we’ve got to try and save him.
Except we just bumped into Trevor.
Literally.
He’s my ex. Twice over. And he’s at this same hotel.
Of all the hotels in all the world, why this one? And at the same time that I’m here with Kat and Remi?
Crazy, right? I mean, the chances have got to be at least a million to one. Maybe more.
I look around, wondering if it’s a joke, but my eyes can barely see beyond the broad chest in front of me. The one I just bounced off. I pat the pecs at eye level and nod appreciatively. He’s filled out really well in the last few months. The shirt he’s wearing does nothing to hide that fact, or the muscles in his arms, for that matter.
Was he this built before? Is he lifting farm animals for exercise instead of healing them?
Trevor’s hands haven’t left my shoulders from when he prevented me from falling backward after we ran into each other. The heat from his palms sear through my shirt, warming my skin from the outside in.
The hubbub of the elevator bay continues around us. Remi is talking at a high-pitched level and gesturing her arms around. Kat tugs at my phone, which I still have grasped in both my hands. Hotel guests jostle about.
But all I see is Trevor. He’s had this effect on me since the first time we had sex, where I get all stupefied when he’s near.
“Lexie,” he breathes, his voice low and his expression soft. I sway toward him, wanting to feel him against me. I’ve missed him. I don’t care that he disappeared without a word. I don’t care about the crowds around us. Just one full body connection. One more time where every bit of me touches every bit of him—
“Trevor, thank God. Do you have a car?” Remi yells, yanking me out of Trevor’s grasp, forcing me to hear her.
Shit!
I forgot about Remi.
And Chance!
We are in an emergency. I don’t have time to deal with Trevor Vaughn right now.
Plus, I’m mad at him.
I forgot that too.
I move to Remi’s side as Trevor turns toward her, his eyes widen, and his mouth falls open.
“My God, Remi. What happened to you? You were just fine earlier.”
Wait? What?
“How would you know how she was earlier?” Kat asks.
“Trevor!” Remi yells, her voice shrill and panicked. “Focus! Do you have a car?”
“Yes,” Trevor says. “I have a rental. I was going to have my car shipped, but then I gave it to a friend figuring I’d buy a new one when I got—”
“Don’t mean to be rude,” Remi says holding up her hand in front of his face. “But nobody cares about your plans. Where’s the car?”
“In the parking garage,” he says waving his arm in that general direction.
“Okay. What are we waiting for?” Kat says, grabbing both mine and Trevor’s hands and pulling us back into a waiting elevator.
“Remi, is that why you didn’t meet me at the bar?” Trevor asks. “Because you got hurt? What happened to you?”
Kat and Remi both ignore the question, so I answer.
“Remi’s boyfriend’s crazy ex-girlfriend, Helen, held Remi hostage and tortured her,” I explain, finally finding my voice.
“And now she’s kidnapped Chance, that’s Remi’s boyfriend, and . . . wait, you were meeting Remi at the bar?” I ask, surprised.
Remi punches the elevator button for the floor of the parking garage repeatedly. As if her finger connecting with the buttons will somehow make the elevator car lower us faster.
“Yeah. It was crazy that I ran into her,” he says.
“I’m sure.” I
nod in understanding.
“I had some issues to handle back east, but that’s all squared away.” He puts his hands in his pockets and looks down at his feet. “It’s why I left before. But, hey . . . I’m moving back to San Soloman. For good.” He says this like it’s the most natural thing in the world. Instead of something that is shaking me to the core.
For a second time.
Because the last time he was in town he did the same thing. Clearly that didn’t last, because he left again.
“Moving back, huh?” Kat nods and makes a face that is part frown and part agreement.
“Great, one big happy fucking reunion . . . once again.” Remi turns to look at us. “I know that this is probably rocking your world, Lex. And Trev, I’m sure your intentions are solid. At least they’d better be. But we can’t do this right now. It’s just . . . we need to focus on what’s really important here.” Her voice breaks, she clears her throat softly. “We need to go. Now. He could be lying somewhere in a ditch, hurt and bleeding. And I can’t . . . I need . . . Can we just go? Please.” The elevator doors open; she grabs Kat’s hand and pulls her toward the rows of cars.
Trevor motions toward them, letting me exit the elevator first.
I can’t move.
I want to move. I want to help Remi. I want to find Chance. I just can’t move.
Trevor’s coming back to San Soloman. Which is all I’ve wanted since the last time he left. Which makes me sound like a glutton for punishment. And maybe I am.
Shit.
The first time he left, I waited for years for him to finish his veterinary program and remember that he loves me and come home.
Which he did just over eight months ago.
And it was perfect. Everything I’d ever dreamed it would be. And I’ve got an active imagination, I can come up with some crazy romantic things. For close to two months, it was pure bliss.
Until he left again.
Without a word.
And now, after months with no contact he’s back again and saying it’s for good. No explanation, just back. I mean, I don’t want to put too much hope in what it might mean for he and I as a couple. But I can’t help myself.
It also doesn’t help that I can rarely stay in the present. Give me a scenario and I’ll push it years into the future in my imagination. I have to know, or at least be able to realistically envision, how something ends before I can accept it.
Which is why I can’t move.
As long as I stay in the elevator, this is open-ended. Anything could happen. Trevor could be here for me, again; I could be the reason he’s moving back. We could get back together, and everything could be perfect once more.
But after I step out of the elevator, life goes on, and I must face reality. I don’t know how this is going to play out. He’s shocked me before. He can do it again.
“Come on, Lex. Pick up the fucking pace,” Remi yells back at us, snapping her fingers. “Trevor, let’s go! Which car is yours? Beep your lights.”
Trevor unlocks his car remotely with one hand and grabs mine with the other as we head toward his car. His skin feels so smooth against mine. I wonder if he can feel the calluses on my palm.
He clears his throat. “I’m here for you, Lexie. All the way. One hundred percent. Here on the West Coast, here in this fancy hotel.”
Well, that answers one question. But raises quite a few more. “How did you know I’d be here?” I ask, confused.
“I didn’t. I’m here in the city for a night or so to tie up some loose ends. As luck would have it, I ran into Remi after I arrived this afternoon. We made plans to meet up at the hotel bar, only she never showed.”
“So, you made plans with Remi, but you came here for me?”
“No . . . Yes . . . I didn’t have a plan, Lexie. I guess I still don’t. I saw Remi. I thought of you. I knew I wanted to get to you, I just didn’t know how. I thought I could talk it out with Remi to find out where I stand with you. Then by the time I saw you, I’d have a plan. It just didn’t work out that way. Don’t get me wrong, I’m so happy to see you, plan or no plan. Especially, with how you and I left things.”
“Wait. With how YOU AND I left things? Are you kidding me?” I hiss. “You mean when you came back, and stayed with me for months, re-kindled our entire relationship, made promises about the future, then disappeared without a word? Is that the ‘how you and I left things’ you’re referring to? Your memory is seriously selective, mister.”
He nods in agreement.
“You have to explain, you know that, right? And that explanation needs to be really fucking good. But even then, I don’t know if I can do this with you again. You hurt me, Trevor.” My voice lowers to a hoarse whisper and my eyes flood with tears. “Goddammit!” I punch my thigh, tempted to also stomp my foot. I can be a crier. But I also hate it when I cry.
“I’m so sorry, Lexie,” he says softly.
We reach Trevor’s rental car, a large SUV. Kat and Remi are already situated in the back, leaving the front passenger seat for me. I look at them both, questioningly, not sure I want that degree of separation from them. Plus, I’m nervous to be this close to Trevor again.
“You have to navigate, remember?” Remi says, pointing to my phone. That’s right.
Shit! I lost sight of what’s important here AGAIN!
Worst. Friend. Ever.
The only reason we are even in Trevor’s car is so that we can go find Chance. And the only way we’ll find Chance is with the help of his friend, Alex—who does IT work for the police department—by tracing the tracker on Chance’s police-issued phone. Alex is who I was texting when I ran into Trevor to begin with.
Get it together, Lex.
“I’m on it,” I say, renewing my focus and sending my text to Alex. There is no way I’m letting Remi down with this. She’s finally found love and I’m not going to let her lose it just because her man has a psycho ex who kidnapped him.
And I have the attention span of a dog when it sees a squirrel.
Alex responds quickly with the address and wondering what’s going on. I promise to fill him in later and input the address in the GPS to start navigation. It’s going to take us fifteen minutes or so to get there. I give Trevor the starting directions and we head out of the structure and north on the main thoroughfare. This route will take us from the heart of the city, across the bridge, to a more suburban and spread out area with wider streets, and tree filled medians. Trevor takes the onramp for the bridge, leading us right into bumper to bumper traffic.
I hear Remi start to lose it in the backseat, crying softly and whispering furiously at Kat. It makes me wish I was back there with them.
“Sending you hugs, Remi,” I say, not certain if she can hear me.
Trevor reaches over to grab my hand and squeezes it lightly. Then leaves it there, resting softly on mine. He glances over at me every few seconds until I finally glance back. “I came here, Lexie,” he says, softly, “to remind you that we belong together.”
I pull my hand back to my lap. “Trevor, it’s been months, you left without a word after promising so much. You can’t just come waltzing in and expect everything to be hunky dory,” I hiss.
You tell him, Lexie. Be strong.
GIRL POWER.
“I don’t expect anything of the kind.” He looks sincere. “If anything, I know I need to work hard to prove I’m worthy of you, to win back your heart. I know what happened was my fault. And I know that I am more than a fair share to blame for . . . what happened.”
“Trevor, you are one hundred percent to blame for what happened. You—” We make it off the bridge and the phone buzzes, alerting me to the next direction. “Turn right at the next light.”
He nods.
The car quiets for a moment. I don’t feel like picking up the argument again. At least not verbally. I’d rather fuel my fire for why I’m so angry at Trevor.
I have plenty of reasons to spurn him, ranging from today to five years ago. Trevor and
I first met during the last year of undergrad. We were partnered in a BioChem class. What began as a platonic friendship, turned into crazy, frantic sex late one night in a library study room. One day we were friends, the next day we were a couple. Just like that. We got an apartment together, made plans to attend the same grad school, and pretty much planned out our entire lives.
And it was fan-fucking-tastic.
Until it wasn’t.
Because he didn’t get into the grad program at San Soloman University (SSU), where we’d planned on attending together. It still pisses me off even though logically I know it’s not fair to be mad about something like grad school admissions. Especially since the vet program at SSU is a highly competitive program. Doesn’t matter. We had a plan and he screwed it all up. By not being smart enough to get accepted. And when he fucked that up, he fucked up everything else as well.
So, we agreed to table our relationship until after he finished his vet program. Between the distance and our studies, continuing to try and see one another would have been next to impossible. We broke up. He left.
Soon after, both Kat and Remi left as well. Remi to graduate school down south, Kat to law school up north, but that was okay, I was expecting the two of them to leave. And I still had my family and other friends. I made do.
Love Unforgettable: Love in San Soloman - Book Three Page 1
