by Wood, A. L.
@2014 A.L. Wood (Andrea Wood)
Published in 2014. All rights reserved. This book is copyright. Apart from the fair purpose of the study, research, or review as permitted by the Copyright Act, no part may be reproduced without written permission.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to the actual, locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental, and not intended by the author.
This book is licensed for your purposeful enjoyment only. This book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, please return it and purchase your own copy.
Thank you Tammy Lindey at Butterfly Dreams Proofing & Editing.
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Forever, Hold On: Rock Romance #5
Written by A.L. Wood
For, Carl Bancroft
Have you ever met someone that has the light of 1,000 incandesant blubs burning bright in their eyes? It’s infectious, and leaves you feeling their light.
How about someone who lived life with a fearless attitude, and never held judgment against anyone. You could be you around them, and never have felt fear that they would accept who you were.
Someone who lived their live without fear, without reservations and happily so.
Even though I only knew him a short time, that was more than enough to have experienced who he was, and what he stood for. Family always being number one, and second being work.
By the time I had met him, he had already lived his life, experienced so much more than most people I know.
I could share some stories he had shared with me, and numerous others but it wouldn’t tell you of the person he was.
There isn’t one word that could possibly define him, humorous, loving, caring, easygoing, warm, and optimistic. There are no words that could amount to him, that could be his label.
He was like no other.
So, here’s to Carl and his never-ending desire to keep on.
In hearts, may you always live on...
September 2nd 2014
“It is never too late to be what you might have been.” - George Eliot
Chapter One
“Welcome to our humble abode.” I say while unlocking the door to our house. Gage, Zepp and I bought a house together, just outside of Los Angeles years ago, when we each got our share of the sign-on check our label paid us. About an hour drive from Ryan’s condo on the beach. Thanks to Ryan and Abby, we were allowed a two week break during the tour. Natalie having Temperance is what gave us favor to receive two weeks off. We all decided to head back to California for the break. It helped that we were all in the same area when the break ended, and Ryan had some affairs to put in order, so California was ideal.
I figured I would see my family while we were here, along with Zepp’s and Gage would continue working on his newfound relationship with Abby. She’s staying with us during the duration of our mini vacation.
“Your home is beautiful.” Abagail says, leaving her jaw slack, causing her mouth to hold open on the last word.
She’s in awe. I’ll have to admit it is pretty nice, for a bachelors pad. We all agreed that it was the one, when we first viewed it. We had looked at a few other houses before this one, but none of them came up to par, as this one did.
“How many bedrooms are in this place?” Abby asks.
“Six. Three are guest rooms.” Gage answers for me.
“Why so many bedrooms? There’s only three of you.” she questions.
“Abagail, when we’re home, people stay over often. It’s convenient to have an extra bed for the person to sleep in. Or in my case, maybe the person you plan on sleeping with is only around for the one night. You don’t want to take her back to your own bed. The guest rooms work out perfectly.” I explain.
“Oh.” she says while glaring at Gage.
“Gage never uses the rooms, in case you’re wondering.” I interject before she says something she could come to regret, in defense of Gage.
“Let me give you a tour, ending with my room.” Gage says to her sweetly.
The pang of jealousy hits me. Not jealousy because I have a thing for Abagail, because I don’t. Jealousy as in Gage has finally found that happiness.
Happiness that I’ve been looking for, happiness that has seemed to escape me, and that I don’t believe I’ll ever find. I’ve tried lowering my expectations. I’ve long since faced the reality that I won’t ever find love like my parents have, true soul completing love. Love that Gage, Liam, and Ryan have found.
When women look at me, it’s not with pure intentions of true love and lifelong happiness. It’s instant-love, unreal and deranged, eyes filled with lust for rock stars. It has nothing to do with me, but who I am. Something each one of us in Steele’s Army has dealt with. We’ve all ridden the fence of crazy, causing mistrust and misguidance, when it comes to finding what we long for.
Love and happiness, to replace the loneliness of a cold bed and an empty heart.
Abagail and Gage make their way back to me, before ending the tour in their bedroom. “I was thinking that maybe I would call my friends and invite them out for a week. If that’s okay with you and Zepp. Gage already said he had no problem with it.” Abagail says to me.
I mind if she has friends over as much as I mind the guys having people over, not at all.
“No problems here, and I doubt Zepp would mind either. Make the call. I’ll book them flights if you’d like, just get me their information.”
“Are you sure? You would do that for me?” she asks, smiling.
“Of course.” She flings her arms around me and pulls me in for a hug.
What’s with these girls and their touching? Natalie, Layla, and now Abagail too. As soon as they fall in love, it’s like they become emotional basket cases when it comes to touching. Angry, sad, joyous, excited, they immediately touch to express what they’re feeling and their partner’s don’t seem to mind it either. I would rather Gage get upset, maybe jealous over it, to prevent the touching.
But it seems as if he encourages it. He knows that I have boundaries with anyone touching me and he enjoys my uneasiness when it comes to another’s hand on my body, innocent or not.
Asshole.
I give him a knowing glare, that I’m aware he enjoys this shit. He winks at me. I slowly pry Abagail’s hands off me, “Not a problem. Like I said, just get me the information and I’ll book it.”
“I’ll call Selena now. Thank you.” she says, smiling.
I make my escape into the kitchen.
It’s not that I’ve had some tragic thing happen in my past with touching, no one’s abused me or anything. It’s that because of what I do, what we do as a profession, everyone always feels like they have a right to reach out and grab me. Pull me in for a hug, kiss my face, often grabbing my ass. If they were to ask me for a hug, I wouldn’t have such an issue with it. Then I would know to expect the touching. Instead, it’s forced upon me and I don’t like it.
“I got ahold of Selena, she’s going to call Raven and they’ll fly out as soon as you can get them an available flight.” Selena in
forms me.
I’m sprawled out on the chase that’s part of the large black sectional we have in our living room, one foot dangling off the edge and my laptop laying above me. “I was just searching flights, I can get them a red-eye today if that’s what you want. I mean if you think they can pack fast enough, I can even have a car pick them up and drive them to the airport to save time.”
“Really Jason? That’s so sweet of you, they’ll be fine with whatever you can get. I’ll make sure of that.”
“All right then. I’ll call the airline to book it, even get them in first class. It’ll make for an easier flight.”
“Thank you, normally they would drive out wherever I was if they could. Shows or stops I’d make that weren’t far away, they’d join me at. I can’t thank you enough.” she says while I sit my laptop to my side and pull my cellphone out to make the call.
“As long as Gage is happy, that’s enough thanks. I couldn’t repay you, for being that for him.”
“You’ll find your happiness to Jason, it could be sooner than you think, but it will happen. You’re too good of a catch for it not to.”
“Yeah, yeah, enough of this emotional stuff you’re wearing me out.” I tell her.
“Fine. I’ll let you call and arrange the tickets, let me know so I can call Selena back with the information.”
“Will do Abby.”
“What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us.” - Ralph Waldo Emerson
Chapter Two
“What do ya want now?” I answer, grumpily. That Selena would feel it’s okay to be calling me this early in the morning is crazy.
“Pack your bags, baby! We’re flying to Los Angeles in a few hours.” she replies, dismissing my tone that was to imply that I didn’t want to talk.
“And why would I want to fly to Los Angeles? I have things I’ve got to do.” I make some lame ass excuse just to get out of flying.
“You can reschedule your things. We’re going to see Abagail. She’s on a two week hiatus, all of them are actually, and she called me a few minutes ago to let me know that they’re flying us out. We have tickets waiting at the airport. A car will be there for you in two hours, be ready.”
All I hear is dial tone after that. She hung up so I couldn’t say no. Not that I wouldn’t like to see Abby. I would, but I’m not a fan of flying. I’d rather have the experience of a four day road trip in a car than to get on a six hour flight. On a road trip I could drive, or Abagail if she wanted. We could jam to music the entire way, comfortably with whatever level of volume we wanted. We wouldn’t have to go through airport security being treated as if we were criminals being checked into jail. We could make as may stop offs as we wanted, eat whatever we wanted, whenever we chose. On the way back, we could take our time to visit places of interest along the way.
Flying doesn’t allow you to experience any of that.
I tried it once, flying that it is, with Selena as a matter of fact. It wasn’t enjoyable at all. Beforehand, she told me to get a pack of gum and a drink while we were in the airport after we went through security, so I could bring them on the plane with me. She claimed that the drink would help settle my stomach and the gum would help with ear pressure. As soon as the plane took off, I called her a liar.
Gum didn’t help at all, nothing about chewing Juicy Fruit helped when it came to my ears popping. The higher the elevation, the worse it felt. It’s not something I could forget so easily. I remember Selena sitting beside the window and I in the unfortunate position of being in the middle. We were headed to Miami for Spring Break. Again, I had lobbied to rent a car for the twenty something hour drive. I even volunteered to drive the entire way. I’ve met many people from all walks of life, and oddly somehow not one person ever mentioned the feeling of vertigo when in flight. I could feel earth’s gravity clutching me, my body was pinned against the seat and if I attempted to move my head in any direction, I felt off balanced. It made my stomach queasy.
It wasn’t until we hit the right altitude that the force of gravity left me, not that it helped much. Hearing was almost impossible. You know when you’re a kid and your swimming with friends, you decide to play that game where you go underwater at the same time and your friend attempts to say something, maybe one word, when your heads rise over the water, you have to guess what they were saying? But you really never heard what they were saying, so you make ten guesses as to what words they could have been gargling, and the only way you could have guessed is because you watched their lips? That’s what it was like for me. Every sound around me was gargled, and it sounded so far away. So instead of trying to make conversation with Selena, I read a book the entire flight.
That wasn’t the only lie she spewed to me, oh no, of course not. I should have expected it, with how it was for me when we ascended. I didn’t, though. Descending was worse, the pain of the air pressure in my ear equalizing radiated down into my neck. The entire time we descended. When we finally unloaded, I was relieved, although, I couldn’t hear for hours after.
I put my foot down when it came to heading back home. We refunded our tickets and I rented a damn car, driving the entire way.
That was four years ago, not something I had planned on doing again.
“I was starting to think you weren’t going to show.” Selena states.
“You’re lucky I came. You of all people know how I feel about flying.”
“That was years ago. Who knows, this time it could be different. I took the liberty of picking these up for you. I was waiting for you and figured instead of sitting here on my ass I would get us some packs of gum and drinks. While I was shopping, I found something I thought you’d appreciate.”
“What did you buy?” I ask, only because she was attempting to make up for the fact that I am now in an airport, years after swearing flying off.
“There’s these things they sell here that you can insert into your ears and it’s supposed to help with the pressure. You have to put them in before we take off. It’s worth a try.”
“I’ll try it. Why don’t we find our gate before they start boarding?”
“Okay, we board at gate A2. That’s around the corner, follow me.”
All I have is my purse, full of everything I’ll need to get through this thing. My kindle, and a few light snacks. I already checked my bags before I went through security.
Seconds later, Selena leads me to a chair at our designated gate. We should be boarding any minute, hopefully.
“Do you know how they board here? Do we have assigned seats or do they board in sections?” I ask Selena.
“Haven’t you looked at your ticket? Abagail bought us first class tickets. We have assigned seats, but I believe we board near the first. I’ve never flown first class. This is going to be luxurious.” she says excitedly.
“I don’t think that will make flying for me any easier, but at least we won’t be squeezed into a tiny row.”
At that moment a flight attendant opens the door that leads to the boarding tunnel. She announces over an intercom that they will be boarding, starting with disabled passengers first, then first class.
I stand up and collect my bag, in preparation to board. There aren’t many disabled persons on this flight, so they move on to us pretty quickly, not that I would mind having to wait. They call for first class, and Selena and I approach handing our tickets over.
We walk steadily down the blue tunnel and onto the plane. Another flight attendant is placed at the opened hatch and she escorts us to the first class area, which is to the left. The plane is separated into coach and first, coach being a much bigger area for seating than first.
I’m mildly surprised when we enter the first class seating area. The seats look very comfortable and each one is surrounded by its own compartment. I look to my ticket to see my seat number and enter my assigned compartment. Selena’s assigned seat is next to mine. When sitting down in my seat, I can see her over the divider. I smile,
being excited for the first time ever about flying. I sit my bag down on the floor in front of me, with the intention of checking out the new digs.
A small LCD television is propped in front of me on the divider, and with my busy hands, I discover the chair leans back into a resting position. Not like in coach, where the lean back is maybe half an inch, this goes back as far as a seat in a car does. I enjoy it.
“Put your ear things in.” I hear Selena call over the wall.
Good thing she reminded me too. I reposition the chair and reach into my purse to grab the ear things. Fifteen minutes later I hear the flight attendant over the intercom announcing that we will be taking off for the runway. She goes over her usual safety speech about seatbelts, and oxygen masks. I drown it out while immersing myself into an E-Book on my kindle.
“Those ear things did not help me at all. Being in first class helped soothe my pain, but it didn’t take it away. I’m never flying again.” I tell Selena while we wait for our luggage to come out on the conveyor belt.
“You say that now and then you’ll realize that Los Angeles is more than a day drive to home and then you will be rethinking your decision that you don’t want to fly again. Just think, we could have been flying in couch, sitting next to one other person crammed in like matchsticks in a matchbox. Smelling one another’s sweat, or over-powering perfume. Hell someone could fart and you’d be held hostage with the stench, unlike in first class if someone were to fart it would be in their own cubicle with a fan larger with than the one in coach. Just think about that when flying again, and in first class, things could be worse.”
“Whatever. If you had passed while sitting next to me, I would have let everyone know it was you, only because you forced me to fly. That would be my payback.” I reply before walking over to the conveyor belt to grab our luggage that’s finally made its way inside.
“Do you know who’s supposed to be picking us up?” I ask Selena on our way outside.
