Ava and Grant take the seats next to me, and Harper falls onto my lap right where I want her, right where she belongs.
“I am the lucky one around here.” I press a kiss to her cheek and linger. Every last square inch of this woman is so perfectly soft.
“I’m Lucky.” Lucky smirks over at the two of us. “But for the sake of semantics, I’ll admit you’re pretty lucky too.”
The waitress comes by with a round of drinks, and it’s Laney Capwell. “It’s on the house”—she gives a quick wink to Harper and me—“as a thank you for helping me find my dream home.” She leans in. “I just knew you two would work things out! And thanks to you, Baya and Bryson are already in escrow with the house down the street. Any time you want, all-you-can-eat fries are on me.”
“I think I love you!” Harper says as she bubbles with laughter. “And I love him for sure.” She gives my ear a quick nip as Laney takes off.
Lawson leans in and lifts his glass, and we do the same. “To another semester. May it be better than the last.”
“Hear, hear!” I touch my glass to Harper’s. “It already is.”
I look out at my sea of friends, at this sea of love, and I know we’re all damn lucky to have one another. And with Harper in my life, I’ll be feeling the love from here on out.
The night wanes, and Harper convinces me it’s time to split by way of those heated kisses she’s dripping down my neck. Just as we hit the door, a familiar brunette with a face I see in the mirror stomps in.
“Trix.” I pull her in and offer a spontaneous hug. “I’ve missed you.” There. That’s the truth. Our little experiment of spending more time apart has failed miserably and left me miserable in turn as well. “I still need your nagging, annoying, lovable as hell presence in my life, and I can finally admit it.”
Trixie and Harper share a laugh and it warms my heart, and just as quickly breaks it because Trix hasn’t quite warmed up to her yet.
“I’m sorry.” Trixie shrugs as she looks to Harper. “I was mean and nasty, but I love my brother. He’s the other half of me.” She bites down on her lip the way she does when she’s about to cry, and I panic for a moment. As history has proven, whenever one of us cries, the other is not far off. It’s biology, genetics, or lousy timing—take your pick. “I guess it kills me that he sort of looks at you that way.”
Crap. She’s got me. It’s true. “Hey—in no way are you being replaced. I love you. And just because I have room in my heart for one more person doesn’t change that.”
“Wow,” she marvels, blinking back tears. “Who died and made you the king of mush?”
“So, we’re good?” Harper gives Trixie’s sleeve a quick tug. Her eyes are glittering with tears too.
“Yes.” Trixie makes a face. “You know, I never really liked Janelle. I don’t know why, but we never clicked. Maybe you and I can hang out sometime—without the giant toad following us around. I’m in Cutler Tower, so maybe you could meet me at Hallowed Grounds once in a while? I’ll tell you all those deep, dark secrets Knox is too ashamed to let out.”
“Don’t you dare.” I glance to Harper. “Not that there are any.”
“I’m definitely taking you up on it. And by the way, I’m in Prescott Hall. I’m sharing a room with an old friend of mine.”
Trixie’s eyes explode in size. “I thought you two—”
“We’re not living together,” I offer. “Harper thought it was best to take things slow.”
“I’m all about the mysteries and mud masks, if you know what I mean.” She winks at my sister. “Plus, I’ll probably still be at his place more than mine anyway.”
“Like every night.” I frown at my sister. “So don’t use that key I gave you, just in case.”
“Eww.” She looks as if she’s ready to puke. “Well, I’d better get in there. My new roommate is already on the prowl, and I have some catching up to do.”
A groan comes from deep within me. “No, Trix. Stay away from the boys. The guys in there are animals.”
“It’s true.” Harper laughs as if she knows firsthand, and she does. “They’re all hungry, ravenous bears, and they’re hungry for human flesh—especially young, tasty girls with long legs and big—”
“All right”—I wraps my arms around Harper—“this is my baby sister we’re talking to. Let’s keep it G.”
“I’m no baby.” Trixie eyes the crowd as if she’s going in for the kill.
“Whoa, slow your roll. This isn’t high school. You’re not going to run in there and tease some poor kid to death. These boys move fast and you don’t. I want to keep it that way.” I know for a fact Trixie is a virgin. She’s saving herself for love, not giving it away to any idiot she sees. “Stay away from the frat boys. Hell, stay far away from the jocks. And whatever the hell you do, don’t come near those eligible idiots I hang out with. You need a nice kid—someone untarnished by life, and there’s no one who fits the bill at Briggs. Sorry, sis. You’re out of luck.”
Trixie’s mouth opens slow in some incredulous sarcastic smile as if everything I said was laughable. “Maybe you’re the one out of luck, Knox. I’ll see you both later.” She dives into the crowd, and I lose sight of her. A part of me wants to dive right in there, wrap my arms around her and keep her safe from all the hurt, all the psychos in the world, and that’s just the dudes at Briggs.
Harper inches me to the door. “Boy, you are going to die a slow and agonizing death when she finally finds the one.”
“Not true. I happen to know for a fact Trixie’s personality is inhospitable to the male species. There’s no way she’s finding the one at Briggs. She’s a castrator, a walking dominatrix. No dude is going to want to hand over his balls just because she says so. I’m safe right through grad school with her. Trust me on that.”
Harper bubbles with a laugh as we step out into the balmy night air. A floral perfume replaces the scent of pizza and beer as the rowdy bar gives way to the final Saturday night of summer vacation.
“It’s been a long, hot summer,” Harper moans low and sexy as hell, and my balls ache just to hear it. “Sylvia is in desperate need of a massage. Do you think Will might be able to help her with that?”
“Will is already up and looking forward to it. I might sneak a few kisses to Sylvia myself.”
“Sylvia will most definitely hold you to it and to her. She happens to have a mean crush on you, but don’t tell Will. They seem to have a pretty good thing going.”
“They do, I agree.” I spin her around until we’re standing in front of the mascot of the establishment, an old oversized black bear that stands more than ten feet tall. “I think we have a pretty good thing going too. How about a quick selfie for old times’ sake?”
She whips out her phone and snaps it. “Done and done.” Her thumbs dance across the screen like lightning, and she holds up the caption for me to see.
“Boy meets girl. Boy loses girl. Girl seeks revenge. Boy gets girl back. Revenge zero. Love plus two. Hashtag scariest photobomb ever.” My chest rumbles over her as we share a quiet laugh. “It’s perfect. Just like we are.”
“We are perfect, aren’t we? Isn’t it ironic something so whole and beautiful came from something broken? If our relationship with the two that shall not be named kept plodding along, we never would have been linked the way we were.”
“By hatred and fueled by revenge.” I nod into this. “The universe sure has its mysterious ways. I think it’s a good lesson. Next time things look like they’re in the crapper, it might just be the best thing that’s ever happened to you.”
“So essentially—hard to see at the moment.” Her cheeks turn bright pink. “Confession. That first night at the mixer when you were making me insane—I thought you were a perfect specimen. And it turns out I was right as usual.”
We share another laugh and I scoop Harper up and carry her down the street, bouncing her in my arms as we share kisses, and hopes, and dreams.
With Harper near me, all of my hope
s and dreams have already come true.
I can’t wait to see what the future holds.
I know for a fact I’m holding my future.
***Read Red Hot Kisses (3:AM Kisses 15) NOW! Happy reading! XOXO ****
Edited by Paige Maroney Smith
Cover Design: Gaffey Media
Hollis Thatcher Press, LTD.
Copyright © 2018 by Addison Moore
This novel is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to peoples either living or deceased is purely coincidental. Names, places, and characters are figments of the author’s imagination. The author holds all rights to this work. It is illegal to reproduce this novel without written expressed consent from the author herself.
All Rights Reserved.
This eBook is for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this eBook with another person, please purchase any additional copies for each reader. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return it and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
Copyright © 2018 by Addison Moore
Table of Contents
Created with Vellum
Book Description
What do an obnoxious attorney, a coed gone wild, and a corpse have in common? Shep and Serena are about to find out the hard way.
Spending summer in Hollow Brook will be murder. …
*this is a standalone romance*
When Serena lets her roommate talk her into going to an exotic nightclub that promises to make all of her wildest dreams come true, she’s mortified to find the man behind the mask has an all too familiar obnoxious face. But it turns out Serena and Shep share more than a penchant for soft restraints—they share a propensity for trouble. Finding a corpse places Serena and Shep right at the top of the suspect list, and try as they might to unravel the mystery themselves, they discover that time has already run out for the two of them. Or has it just begun?
Once upon a Body
Serena
The place to be in Hollow Brook on a hot Friday night—and I mean hot in the most literal sense—is the Black Bear Saloon. Since the weather in Hollow Brook itself has devolved into Satan’s armpit, the Black Bear is about the only place to get decent air conditioning along with your fair share of hard bodies. It’s June. School is out and summer has descended upon us like fire-breathing cats and dogs raining down like a punishment. Everyone under the sweltering sun has arrived at the restaurant-slash-bar for a night of boozy festivities and all of the sleazy events that will ensue thereafter.
Of course, I’m here with my shortest skirt, my tightest tank top, in a quasi-manipulative effort to pull in the big tips. God knows I need them. The bigger, the better. I might have scored a scholarship to Whitney Briggs University, but that free ride sure doesn’t help with the incidentals of life, such as that cute cherry red bikini I’ve had my eye on and the perfect matching shade of fiery red MAC lipstick—all specifically chosen to highlight my auburn hair.
My sister, Lex, and I both have our deadbeat of a mother’s deep red locks. Although, Lex has an ebony undertone and I’m more Little Mermaid. Not that I mind the cartoonish nature of my beastly mane. I’ve come to embrace it. Hell, I’ve come to embrace just about every quirk and jerk about me—and I kind of mean the jerk part literally. In no way do I set out to come across as a jackass. It’s just that the constant stream of sarcasm that spouts from my mouth is often misconstrued as surly and inconsiderate—as detailed to me by my sweet cousin, Sunday.
Sunday has always been as puritanical as her moniker suggests—with the exception of that whole getting knocked up after a one-night stand gone wrong last winter, but I digress. It’s merely the beginning of summer, and the humidity is already creating a sticky situation. The place is pumping, and I’m hopeful that all of these moderately drunk bodies will equal more than enough to buy a string bikini or two once the night is over. Heck, I might even make enough to fill my gas tank and venture down to the beach to show off my new stitches. There is nothing like a North Carolina white sandy beach in the summer.
I’ve just crested the entry of this fine establishment, passing the overstuffed black bear that greets the guests just outside the doors. It’s usually mobbed by freshmen waiting their turn to sneak in the obligatory selfie, and tonight is no different with three prepubescent looking girls trying to dry-hump the poor thing in the process.
I glance to the floor as my fingers work in haste to tie on my apron, only to have a brick wall of a body slam right into me.
Crap. My nose just pushed in like an accordion, and my strawberry lip-gloss just smacked its way onto someone’s salty flesh.
The brick wall moves back a step, only to reveal himself as a tall heap of muscles—my lip print neatly pressed against his neck—greasy blond hair, and a dangerous smile on his equally greasy lips. Yes, he’s handsome, but he’s got a cocky air about him that says I’ve got a power drill in my pants and I’m not afraid to wield my tool belt. But that squirrely look in his wicked eyes spells out insanity more than it ever does the stable committed type, so I attempt to sashay to his left, but he sidesteps right along with me. His brows bounce in amusement, and I can’t help but note he has that perennial bad boy appeal—and not in a good way—I’m talking fresh out of the slammer tattoo factory, body is a coloring book right up to that lip print I gifted his neck, eyes red with rage and quite possibly the aftereffect of a quasi-illegal substance. He’s older than me by a decade at least. My guess is he’s no frat brat, just a roving troublemaker looking to get drunk and sunk between some poor unsuspecting barfly’s thighs. And as long as he’s got at least a ten-dollar bill with my name on it in that dingy pocket of his, I couldn’t care less what illegal substances or raging sluts this greaseball does to fill his downtime.
“Watch where you’re going, kid,” he barks it out like a reprimand while trying once again to charge right through me. Instinctively, I slap my hands over his chest, sending him sailing backward as his phone slips from his pocket along with a tiny white receipt.
His cell makes an awful slapping sound that penetrates the music blasting through the speakers, taking the decibels in this place to jet engine levels. Oh crap. That can’t be good.
“Did you just push me?” he barks once again, his upper lip set in a snarl as if he were a rabid dog—an insult to rabid dogs everywhere.
“You bet your greasy dollars I did.” My voice is a bit snippier than usual, but I can’t help it. This block of less than hygienic flesh has my blood boiling. “I suggest you watch where you’re going and think twice before referring to me in a derogatory manner—likening me to some kid. I’m all woman, moron, and don’t you forget it,” I shout up over the 12 Deadly Sins, the house band happily blaring away while Dirty Boy—and yes, I don’t mind one bit reducing him to the childish moniker—bends over to pick up his cell phone with an alarming lightning-shaped crack running the length of the screen.
Dear God, how I pray it was damaged well before our scuffle because I sure as heck don’t have two nickels to buy him a new one. I’m pretty sure a week’s worth of my measly tips wouldn’t be able to fix a cracked screen either. And a douchebag like Dirty Boy will certainly want to pin the blame on me.
His eyes narrow in on mine, dark and beady. “Honey, I’ve got bigger fish to fry. Stay out of my way. And if you’re still around by the end of the night, I’ll gladly take you out back and teach you a lesson or two on how to be a real woman.” He winks while brushing his finger over my cheek, and I gag on a thousand different expletives. Dirty Boy dives to my left and thankfully disappears in a flurry of bodies.
“So help me God, I will kill or maim that jackass before the night is through,” I mutter. And just as I’m about to rush over to clock in, the receipt that fell from his pocket catches my eye and I pick it up myself. “On top of being a sexist idiot, he’s a damn litterbug, too.�
� I glance at it a moment. It’s just a string of numbers written across the front. I plunge it into my pocket without thinking. It’s probably last night’s bed-hopper’s number. I bet after a few beers he’ll be willing to fork out the big bucks to get this valuable promise of STDs back in his possession.
Cole, the bartender, nods my way as I make my way over to clock in. Holt, one of the owners, is usually working alongside him, but he and his wife, Izzy, just had a sweet baby girl named Paige.
Baby fever seems to have swept through Hollow Brook this last year as evidenced by my sweet and yet not-so-innocent cousin Sunday getting knocked up after a one-night stand that she happened to have with the love of her life, Seth. They’re officially together now—engaged to be exact.
Sunday wants a simple courthouse wedding, but there’s no way in hell I’m letting that legal nightmare ensue—the courthouse, not the wedding. Lex and I are gunning to surprise her with something nice at the overlook come Fourth of July. Seth says he’s fine with it, but if the moment arrives, and Sunday decides it’s not what she wants, we’ve agreed to pull out of the endeavor. Pulling out isn’t something in which Seth is an expert, thus the fact their baby is due in September. But, overall, Seth is a great guy, and I just know they’re a perfect fit.
Seth’s sister, Misty, is married to Sunday’s brother, Nolan, so it’s kind of cozy that they’re keeping things in the family quite literally. Nolan, Sunday, and their brother, Rush, are my first cousins on my aforementioned deadbeat of a mother’s side. Since they lost their own mother more than a decade ago through a tragic accident and I lost mine due to negligence on her part—rumor has it, an old boyfriend and a casino had a starring role in the tragedy—my older sister, Lex, stepped in and played the part of mama bird to us all. It’s ironic, of course, since Lex was the least likely of the bunch with a maternal instinct. She’s sort of an anti-nurturer, but she did her best and we’ve all grown up in appreciation of her efforts.
Summer Breeze Kisses Page 59
