The Hunt for Summer (NSC Industries)

by Sidebottom, D H

  “Oh God, you do know we’ll never get to her again.”

  I laughed and nodded.

  Troy had been a permanent fixture in our lives since Lucas had found out about him and he was utterly adorable. He had been counting the days on our calendar until Willow’s due date and I knew he was going to be very possessive over his sister.

  Lucas cradled Willow’s soft head in his hand as he leaned up to kiss me. “I love you so much, Red. I’m so glad you made a decent coffee that day when you came into my office. The way you back chatted me would’ve seen you on your arse if it wasn’t for your amazing coffee skills.”

  I smirked at him. “And I’m so glad you stopped wearing tie’s baby, because you don’t wanna know about the visions I had involving those ties and your neck.”

  The End

  Keep reading for a preview from the second

  Room 103 book

  Thrilling Heaven

  Boss’s Story

  By D H Sidebottom

  Coming soon

  Chapter 1

  “Nope” I shook my head adamantly at her and she practically growled at me.

  “Jen, look…” she persisted.

  I shook my head again, slowly and sternly and concentrated on the spread sheet currently demanding the taxing part of my brain. “Zoe, how can you pay this much for ink? Surely you can find it cheaper somewhere else?” I glanced at her over the top of the laptop screen as I rapidly changed the subject. She smiled brashly at me with a twinkle in her eye “I can. I do. But the taxman doesn’t need to know that.”

  I rolled my eyes and tried to set my attention back to Zoe’s tax return, a pile of receipts and paperwork demanding my concentration but my mind wouldn’t shift from last night.

  I shuddered and endeavoured to close off his face, his snarl, the crack of his fist but it was there, right on the frontal hemisphere of my brain… and my cheekbone.

  That reminded me to pick his dry cleaning up tonight.

  Don’t bloody forget again Jen.

  Zoe sighed heavily and I lifted my gaze to her, finding her watching me forlornly with her brow furrowed deep “Okay, Jen?”

  I plastered a smile on my face and nodded firmly “Yep, just struggling with your figures today.”

  She gave herself the once over and winked at me. “Nowt wrong with this figure babe” she grinned as she slipped her hands provocatively over her breasts and I smirked, “You’re not wrong there, treacle” I agreed with an exaggerated wink, using the nickname Shane had always used for her.

  I rubbed my eyes with the palms of my hands, tiredness and fatigue blurring them and stood to stretch my legs, taking a glance at the clock. “Christ its one, you want a sandwich?” I asked Zoe who nodded absentmindedly from her design book as she sketched something beside an already complete illustration.

  “Sure, you know where everything is” she told me without moving.

  “I’ll make lunch then…”

  She ignored me, her attention elsewhere and I knew when she had her head in her tattoos that I wouldn’t hear or see a peep from her.

  I turned to Brett in the corner of the room, his tongue protruding slightly from his mouth as he currently concentrated on the artwork of an eagle on some huge guys back, and I mean huge - sumo size huge.

  “Brett?”

  He looked over at me and blinked rapidly to adjust the focus in his eyes. “Sandwich?” I repeated and he nodded “Sure wren, cheese and tomato, pepper and mayo.”

  I snorted at him “Uhh, I was sure when I last looked this was a tattoo parlour not Subway.”

  He grinned and winked “Now Wren, you know you love me and those delicate little fingers of yours want to work for me.”

  I pursed my lips at him, and then smirked wickedly “And you know I need your delicate fingers to do my next piercing, don’t you?”

  He lifted a brow at me “Another? Where you want this one?”

  I lifted the corner of my mouth and waggled my eyebrows at him. His own eyes widened before a grin erupted on his face and Sumo stared at me. “Oh Wren, just for the privilege I get to pierce your delicious lady parts, I’ll take just cheese” he conceded.

  “Thought you might” I chuckled as I made my way into the back of Zoe’s shop.

  Zoe had been my brother’s wife for four years, but when Shane died of leukaemia three years ago we had become inseparable, leaning on each other in our grief and we became the type of friends that would die for each other.

  She had bought this tattoo shop in memory of Shane. He had made her promise to fulfil her dreams when he had gone and she had worked her fingers to the bone to get ‘Slink’s’ going; the ‘S’ in the name was for Shane, the ‘L’ was for our surname, Linkin and then of course ‘Ink’, but her limit with numbers only extended to her cash till, so I had been doing her finances for the past two years.

  I’m sure she only used me to hide her dodgy receipts. Some of them always brought a chuckle forward. I mean who the hell claims for a spotify account? But give the girl credit; she got her tax back for it when she declared it as essential, saying she needed the music to calm the nervous customers.

  I heard a rowdy group enter the shop as I made the sandwiches and mugs of tea. Stacking the plates on top of one another and grabbing all three mug handles with the other hand, I made my way back into the main parlour.

  The plates and mugs slipped from my hands and crashed to the floor with a loud smash when I set my eyes on who had entered Slink’s.

  The tea and bread mashed into a stodge on the floor as my heart dropped right there with them.

  All eyes in the shop swung to me, but it was only one pair I couldn’t divert from and I stood open mouthed like a fucking guppy staring at him.

  “Jen?” Ethan stuttered as his jaw dropped as wide as mine, “Christ… Jen?”

  The group he was with eyed us both up and the female lifted her lips in a knowing smile as she tipped her head to me and held out her hand “Boss seems to have lost his manners, Hi; I’m E. Short for Eve.”

  I flicked my eyes to her and they widened when I realised who she was. “Oh… yeah, hi. Jen.” I returned her greeting.

  Holy Fuck! I realised now that the whole of the rock group, Room 103, was currently stood in Slink’s and it was a shame I was stood like a zombie playing musical statues when the publicity could have been tremendous for Zoe.

  She smiled kindly and elbowed Ethan in the ribs “Boss…”

  He just stood, silent and staring, his eyes roaming over every inch of me until they settled on my cheek and I fought against the blush that was creeping up my face.

  My whole soul reached out and I grit my teeth and commanded it back inside as my body trembled along with it.

  “Jen…”

  E huffed and glared at him “I think we’ve established her name’s Jen, Boss. We need to move on from that now, to something like hello.”

  He frowned and turned to E who was staring intently at him. “Fuck, E…” he choked out before he turned and left the shop.

  Everyone kind of fell silent and the vocalist of Room 103, Jax I think his name was, lifted his eyebrows at E. “Babe?”

  She shook her head at him and plonked a smile on her face before turning back to me “Boss wanted a tattoo but he’s not very good with needles. Just shit himself there” she tried to defend Ethan and I smiled and nodded, not believing a word she said. I was the only one who knew the reason for Ethan’s behaviour, and it wasn’t a phobia of needles… more a phobia of me.

  More uncomfortable silence fell before a tall dude with pure white hair and covered in tattoos sucked air through his teeth and smiled, well I say smiled, it was more of a cringe, “Well, I’ll be fucked if I come into a tat shop without leaving with some new ink.”

  Zoe was instantly beside me, a purr vibrating from her as she gestured to the design book “Would you like to take a look at what you want and I can get right onto that for you.”

  I snorted. I bet you will Zo.
<
br />   E and her husband, I think they were married if I remember from the media coverage of Room 103, sunk into the chairs in the corner of the shop and started a whispered conversation.

  “I thought you were in America?” I blurted out randomly and rudely.

  Jax raised his eyes to me and E smiled widely. “We were but Jax and I just adopted a baby and I wanted to bring her up in England, so the guys kind of amalgamated groups and took lead, kicked me out of the band and decided we should come back” she said openly with a wide smile and I just nodded dumbly.

  “Oh.”

  “You know Boss?” she asked warmly and I frowned at her. “Boss - Ethan” she rectified.

  “Oh, yeah” I bit my lower lip as memories invaded my mind and I swallowed them back and turned to Zoe “I’m going Zo, see you later.”

  I didn’t give her chance to respond before I whipped my bag from behind the counter and left the shop.

  ***

  I breathed a sigh of relief when I realised the house was empty and hurried upstairs, pulling off my clothes and stepped straight into the shower, needing the hot water to pelt my body and stimulate my brain on something other than Ethan.

  ‘By the way, Jen… I love you.’

  ‘God baby, you’re gonna be mine, all mine one day, and when that day comes, when it’s just you and me, then I’m dragging you up that fucking aisle, Jen…’

  ‘Don’t choose him Jen, please don’t choose him. I love you…..’

  I closed my eyes to the memory assault and stiffened when the screen door opened and Kyle stood grinning at me, completely naked and obviously aroused if the view of his erect penis was anything to go by.

  My stomach dropped through my arse and I frantically fought the urge to pummel this man stood before me, beat him to a pulp for ruining my life and taking me from the only thing in my life I had ever wanted.

  “Hey, Darling” he leered as his eyes roamed over my body and then grimaced when he spotted a few bruises.

  He swallowed heavily before he lifted his eyes to me and I could see him shake off the guilt as he took a step closer to me.

  “I thought you were playing football with Jet?” I asked, hoping he had just forgotten and my reminder would see him belting back out of the shower and disappearing.

  Right, Jen. Good luck with that.

  “He had to cancel, something to with Harriet puking…” he whispered against my neck as he nuzzled me and I grimaced when his hand settled on my breast.

  My eyes squeezed shut when his teeth dug into the soft flesh under my ear and his cock slipped between my thighs, stroking along my sex slowly.

  “You feel so good, Jen. It’s a good job you’re a great fuck, otherwise I’d have divorced you years ago.”

  “Yeah” I murmured as I fought the bile that was rising slowly up my throat and I silently wondered if there was any way I could suddenly become a shit shag.

  Suddenly I was flung around and pushed into the tiles, my already sore cheek hitting the ceramic with force, before he took me feverishly and violently.

  I let him.

  I didn’t have a choice really.

  I never did where Kyle was concerned.

  Fifteen minutes later, Kyle held the facecloth to my bloodied nose and rolled his eyes at me humorously, “Fancy bashing your nose on the tiles you daft mare; they’re hard you know, Jen.”

  I gave him a tiny tight smile and nodded, it was easier to just agree. What was I supposed to say ‘Hey you great big knob, if you hadn’t grabbed my hair and rammed my face into the tiles then I wouldn’t have nose bleed right now!’?

  He tenderly dabbed at my face, gently wiping away the blood as he planted a soft kiss to my forehead.

  “Ethan’s back.”

  What the hell, Jen? What the fuck did you say that for?

  You know why, so he didn’t find out from Brett and batter you for not telling him, that’s why!

  I heard his teeth crack as he ground them together tightly and his fingers curled around the washcloth so forcefully I was glad it wasn’t my neck he had been holding when I told him.

  He narrowed his eyes on me “You speak to him?”

  “No” I answered honestly. I didn’t tell him I had just stared as Ethan repeatedly announced my name.

  He whipped the washcloth in my face angrily, its slap on my skin made me jump, and exited the shower, snatching up a towel and pulling it around his hips before he slammed the bathroom door so hard the contents of the cabinet rattled.

  Well, that got rid of him Jen.

  I peered at myself in the steamed mirror, wiping at it to clear a section and frowned when my cheek had gone from the purple it had been this morning to a black shade now.

  My nose was still trickling blood over my top lip and the sight suddenly brought on the ‘what if…’ the ‘I should have…’ and the ‘why didn’t I…’

  “Come on Jen, pull it together girl” I scolded myself as I straightened my shoulders and took a deep breath before going in search of my wonderful husband.