Wannabe More

by Billie Dale

  Five bridesmaids and groomsmen. F-I-V-E. Not a problem for Mazric, but I don’t even know five women who I want standing next to me when I say I do. Mazzy, Preslee, and Dallas. The extent of fellow females I can tolerate. I’m better at sticking my head in the sand. Give me a date and time to show up and leave me alone.

  Most days I rise with the sun but with each flick of the calendar the day grows closer and I’m summoned to the main house before I drink my first cup of coffee. “Hey, babe, hiding under the covers won’t keep them from finding you. The human-sized lump is a dead giveaway.” The mattress sinks next to me, and hands try to pull at my comforter shield.

  “If they don’t leave me alone, this lump’s gonna become a chalk outline.”

  “Prison orange isn’t your color, girl. I arrived in the nick of time.” Smack, a bag hits the floor and heels clack on the hardwood.

  “Preslee?” I call at the same time Mazric cheers, “Elvis.”

  I reveal my eyes and nose, displaying my version of Kilroy, and sure enough standing there in a tie-dyed T-shirt bearing a huge marijuana leaf, black skinny jeans ripped to shreds, and ankle boots with a heel I’d break my neck in, is my friend and Hendrix’s twin sister, Preslee Carmichael.

  She flops down next to me. “Bitch, I’m done taking a best friend back seat to my brother. I could hear you whining about this wedding all the way in Cali, so I’m here in an official Maid of Honor capacity and to stop all your plan hating.”

  I sit up, allowing the blankets to fall. “Are you for real? The wedding’s still months away. You will stay until June? What about the movie you're working on?”

  “Oh, full frontal, Sam.” She slaps a hand over her eyes. I forgot I passed out without slipping on Mazric’s shirt after he blew my orgasmic top last night.

  “Shit.” I yank the blanket over my naked chest, ignoring their snorting laughter.

  Preslee is one of the best makeup artists in Hollywood. Coveted and requested by the biggest names in the business. She built her brand over the last handful of years, so her being here is beyond curious, especially when the last time we emailed she was over the moon about her newest job. Some big remake they had sworn her to secrecy about with a nondisclosure agreement, but she promised when she could we’d dish all the juicy gossip. The job started two weeks ago, so I know she’s not finished and her professionalism would never allow her to leave before the assignment’s done. Even more curious is the flame of red hair she’s replaced her platinum with.

  “I’m all yours for as long as you need,” she says, but the shake in her voice says there’s more to tell. “Now, why didn’t anyone tell me my ex was the town cop and, fuck me, when did Joey Holmes get so damn hot?”

  She’s stubborn and independent and we’ve been apart for far too long, but the look in her eyes is the same she had when we first met and Asia was making her new kid existence a living hell. Fear brought Preslee home, and while having her here to help plan my wedding is wonderful, something sent her running back to Seven Mile Forge. She won’t tell me until she’s ready and that’s a story for another day.

  ** KEEP READING FOR A sneak peek at the next book in the Seven Mile Forge Series**

  THE END

  Say You’ll Be There

  LOOK AT THE NEXT BOOK in the Love in Seven Mile Forge series.

  COMING 2020

  (Subject to change)

  One

  MEREDITH BROOKS ADVISES every woman to embrace her inner bitch through my car’s Infinity sound system. One of the many songs loaded on my Men Suck Ass playlist. Snowcapped mountains fill my windshield and the sunny balm of California is long gone in the rearview. Salt and sand cover the road, plinking underneath my car, and I’ve slowed to a crawl navigating the thick slush ruts. Frozen trees whiz past my windows. I haven’t made this drive since the day I left with a busted hearted Mazric Vortex when I was eighteen years old.

  When we traveled to college together, our small group of friends was solid. Samantha Gentry and Mazric got it on and told each other what the rest of us knew. They loved each other. My twin brother, Hendrix, was kicking ass at Juilliard, readying to perform his final compilation. Joey Holmes was my first lust. You know the one. The boy you secretly crush on and who you gave all your firsts. The same man-boy who got all butt-hurt when you left the tiny confines of Seven Mile hell to follow your dreams. Unlike Sammy Lee and Mazric, Joey wanted to try the whole long-distance relationship, but come on. Sun-tanned surfer dudes and movie stars. No way would I’d stay tethered to that shitty small town.

  As the miles tick off on the odometer, I remember why I’m forced to leave my home of the last near decade.

  “HOWDY, NEIGHBOR.” NASH from the condo next to mine holds the elevator door when he sees me buzzing through the door. A huge step up from my first apartment when I arrived for school. Two units occupy each floor of the twelve and ours is at the top. I offer a quick wave to Decco, the doorman, and rush between the heavy steel doors. “Girly, you look wiped. Rough day?” Nash asks.

  “Nice way of saying I look like shit, Nashy baby. Another day dealing with actress divas who refuse to accept makeup can’t fix everything. I touched up so much paint my feet are killing me,” I answer.

  “You love it.” He grins.

  “Yeah, I kinda do. So how about you and Martin come over for dinner?” Nash and his husband make it their mission to ensure I don’t survive on takeout alone, so once a week I offer to return the favor.

  “Can’t, Martin’s feeling overweight again and all up in the Keto diet. If you don’t mind eating your body weight in meat, you should join us.”

  Martin goes through random health kicks. The man’s all lean muscle but swears he’s fat. “Now you know I love good meat as much as the next girl, but I’ll pass.” I wink knowing he’ll catch the double entendre. The bell dings and the door opens. Laughing we step in the hall. Martin stands outside my place where the door is stained red and hanging open.

  “What the hell?” I yell, running to my home.

  Martin catches me around the waist as a man in a navy polo shirt blocks my entrance. “Are you the lady who lives here? Miss...” He looks at his notes. “Carmichael?” If I weren’t preoccupied with why this group is outside my door, I’d flirt my ass off with the man whose low gruff voice could bring the deadest of vaginas to life.

  I respond with a nod, wiggling out of Martin’s hold. The khaki clad ‘Jake from State Farm’ wannabe holds up a hand. “It’s not pretty in there, Miss.”

  “Got it.” I weave around him careful to avoid the crimson stains, I push the door open the rest of the way. Inside, glass covers the floor from all my shattered pictures and dishes. White stuffing sticks out of gaping slashes in the furniture. The cabinet doors hang off the hinges. What sends chills down my spine, are photos tacked to the walls with knives from my kitchen. Each one of me, taken without my permission or knowledge. At work, outside the building, eating lunch with friends, on dates; different angles but in each a red X erases my face.

  “Damn it, not again,” I groan, hating how long it will take to clean up the mess.

  “Again?” the guy questions.

  “Who are you?” I ask, realizing he never introduced himself.

  “Detective Brick Highland. I moved in on the fourth floor a month ago. Happened to be available when the call came in from Martin.”

  I’ll question how he knows Martin later. “Well, if you run a check, you’ll see this isn’t the first time. I’ve moved seven times in the last ten years, but the bastard finds me every damn time.”

  “Can you tell me if anything is missing?”

  “Clothes will be the only thing. Uh, my underwear, bras. Anything he can take from my dirty clothes.” I spot the dumped food and water bowls near the counter. “Wait where’s my cat? BINX!” I run to the hall, asking Martin if he saw him. Whenever he gets out, he always heads down to their door for a can of tuna.

  Martin looks to Nash before they both shake their heads and sta
re at the floor. “BINX! Where are you?” I shout, racing toward the bathroom.

  The detective blocks me. “Whoa, Miss Carmichael. I’m sorry, but I can’t let you in there until the forensics team does their thing.”

  “Oh God.” I rake my tear-filled eyes around and crimson smears the whole place. The door, the photos, the walls. “Binx,” I sob. “He’s never hurt him before.”

  “I’m sorry. I’ve got a call in and your file will be on my desk. Do you know who did this?”

  “Can’t prove anything because he always has an alibi, but it’s him.” Tears flood my cheeks and my insides quake with terror.

  “Okay, start at the beginning.”

  RED AND BLUE LIGHTS fill the interior of my car and a whooping siren drowns out my music. I glance down, cursing when I see my thoughts weighted more than my mind. My lead foot has me going seventy-five down the two-lane highway outside Seven Mile Forge. This thruway is the same stretch that makes up SMF’s main drag.

  “Ugh, damn Barney Fife’s pulling me over,” I groan, applying the brake and shifting to the shoulder. The lowering sun blinds me as I watch him park behind me. With his lights filling my mirror and the horizon glaring in my windshield, he’s nothing but a silhouetted lump when he exits his cruiser.

  Mirrored aviators perched on his nose reflect the light as I watch him become clearer in my side mirror. Wide shoulders, narrow waist accented by a utility belt, and his hand resting on his gun. Long legs and thick thighs testing the strength of his god-awful beige pants carry him forward with sinful swagger.

  Resigned to my ticketed fate, I press the button lowering my window. Cold pours in as the span of his chest fills the frame and his mighty fine broad, bulletproof vest-enhanced chest with the word SHERIFF emblazoned in the center warms me from head to toe. A citrusy pepper scent swirls off his body. I can’t help noticing the size of his biceps, cut and framed by the not big enough squeeze of his short sleeves.

  It’s snot freezing cold outside and this guy is bronzed and making me colder with his non-coat-wearing self. I hand the required documents—license and registration—out the window, my fingers turning to ice cubes because he’s hovering and not following the routine. You know he takes them, says ‘did you know how fast you were going?’ I play dumb, bat my lashes and flirt, he blushes, gives me a warning, and sends me on my way.

  “Well, well, well. Look what wind blew in.” A rugged twangy drawl sends my eyes traveling up, up to his face. Those damn sunglasses hide his eyes, resting on the narrow skin at the top of his slim upturned nose. A stray longer piece of his hair moves on his forehead, the blondish tip contrasting with darker brown shaved short fuzz behind his head. His ears tip out, a smidge too big for his head but working with the rough edge of his shaved jaw. A multicolored goatee surrounds his plump wind-cracked lips. Wheat above his lip turns cinnamon at the corners of his smile, darkening to umber on his chin. His grin spreads, pulling in his laugh lines, displaying a straight white set of choppers with the front two teeth kind of Chicletish.

  I know that man-child smile. The one that turns the hardest, scariest enforcer into a big kid. “Joey? Joey Holmes?” Fuck my life. He was a slumpy, thin short stack the last time we were together. Not much taller than me, which I liked because when I wore heels, I was actually taller than someone. Now he’s all towering, beefy, and hot.

  “I’m gonna run these. Sit tight and don’t make any sudden jerky movements.” He yanks the items from my hand.

  “Joey? Come on, it’s me. I’m cold and headed to Sammy Lee’s. Can’t we let this one slide?” I blink my eyes, remembering how he never could tell me no when I turned on the charm.

  His cheeky vigor falls to a thin pinched line. “Officer Holmes,” his voice lowers, turning jaded. “And I let nothing slide.” The icy bite of his tone is worse than the blustering winter tundra surrounding me. He twists on his booted thick heel, and I’d be lying if I said I didn’t watch those tight, ass-cupping pants walk back to his car.

  The frost continues when he returns, handing me a ticket and my documents. “Slow it down,” he warns. He pauses on his path away, turns those irritating glass hidden eyes, which I want to slap off his face, he jeers, “Welcome home, Preslee Carmichael.” Cocking a one-sided smirk, he head bobs in that Southern gentlemanly way and walks to his car.

  I spend the rest of the drive to Double V Ranch pissed off. Angry at the insane circumstances that sent me running home, raging because my brother can’t be here for a few weeks, and irritated at Joey Fucking Holmes for not only ticketing me, but also pretending we meant nothing to each other and being delicious while he did it.

  Fuck my life and fuck Seven Mile Forge.

  Acknowledgements

  THIS IS ALWAYS THE hardest part of a book because it really does take a village to release a book into the wild.

  First a huge thank you to my nephew, Mazric, and his wife, Sam, for providing the inspiration I needed to bring Wannabe to life.

  To my very own Carrie Lynn & John, thank you for the life of friendship and muse to create great, no nonsense characters.

  My beta readers, my tribe, you are essential and I’ll never be able to thank or praise you enough.

  Karen Hrdlicka I am so happy to have met and started working with you! I look forward to many years of you making my work flawless with your editing mojo.

  Golden and Furious Fotog this cover is magnificent and your creativity awes me.

  To my husband, my inspiration for every book boyfriend I create, thank you for being you. And my kids for dealing with mom’s craziness.

  Readers...oh my lovelies, I value each and every one! Thank you for sticking with me on this journey with me.

  About the Author:

  BILLIE DALE LIVES IN nowhere middle earth. Lost in a small village in the Midwest with four kids, three animals, and an amazing, word inspiring book boyfriend worthy husband.

  A blogger by nature and a writer because she got tired of arguing with the voices in her head. She loves and lives the words on the page, whether writing them or reading them her life is consumed by the worlds her head creates.

  Her greatest wish is that readers will fall in love with her words as much as she loves writing them and as much as she loves reading others. She loves to create new worlds to explore and loves to write words that will take root in your soul.

  Paranormal, New Adult, Romantic Comedy, Contemporary—there is not one box she fits in. She’s a rebel in the author world who writes what her head tells her even it jumps from genre to genre.

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