Born to Ride

by Kasey Millstead

  “Yes, boss.” And I squealed when he slapped my behind.

  The only reason I was a little worried was...well, it wasn’t because Talon had asked me to marry him the night before, as we sat around the table with our closest friends and family. And it definitely wasn’t because he then informed me we were going on vacation with the kids to Fiji.

  I was worried because that morning at my doctor’s appointment, we found out we were having twins. Talon had grinned down at my shocked face and said, “Fuck yeah. Kitten, when I do something, I do it good, and you got it really good.”

  That was still debatable.

  I had been just getting over the fact that we weren’t sure I’d be able to have children, after David had shot me two times in the stomach. You could say that Talon was over the frigging moon we’d be having a child together. He’d said that I’d been through enough shit in my life to last me ‘til I was old and grey; and now that we were finally over the speed hump, we could live our lives to the fullest, each and every day.

  Well, our lives would certainly be filled.

  Of course, after the news, I ran and cried on Deanna’s shoulder, telling her that Talon had super-sonic sperm, and that he’d sonic-ed his way into my...fandola, and shot me up with twins.

  Her response was, “Well, fuck me.”

  I thought another hot-crisis-issue would have gotten her out of her funk. But it hadn’t.

  She was worrying me, because these days I hardly saw her, and when I did, she always seemed to have something on her mind...only she wasn’t sharing.

  It was if she’d been altered when I’d been taken, and it wasn’t something she was getting over. Though, I still doubted it was that alone. Something else was in her head, and I was going to get to the bottom of it.

  So many other things had changed since I got out of the hospital.

  Mattie and Julian were now residents of Ballarat. They moved into my old house when Talon moved me out...yes, he moved me out while I was in the hospital. Maya was ecstatic.

  We’d been keeping a close eye on Maya and Cody since the incident, but they seemed to be handling it okay. We still had Cody every second weekend, but now we were working on going for full custody. Cody had finally come clean that he was home alone most of the time. His mother was always busy at the gym, beauticians, and entertaining her partner’s clients...and that meant entertaining.

  My parents also decided to move to Ballarat, and as soon as they’d told Talon, he found them a house, bought it...because apparently he was rich, and moved them in—while I was still in the hospital.

  My man loved to control.

  But he had my heart at hand. He knew I’d be more than happy to have my family close, and I was.

  Also, it was not only my parents living in their house, they had adopted Josie. Who was still one mixed up girl, but who could blame her after living with David for three years, and what he’d put her through?

  I told her I’d help her along the way to recovery, because we were sisters now. That was the first time I’d seen her smile. Not only has she attached herself to my parents and me, but she’s formed a bond with Maya, Cody, and Billy, the cookie-lover biker, one of Talon’s brothers, who’d been her savior by taking her to the hospital.

  Not long after I was released from the hospital did Talon and I have our first argument, and it was regarding Pick. Mattie and Julian had told me what Pick had done for them. Talon wanted Pick gone from the brotherhood. Mattie, Julian, and I told him to give him another chance...eventually, we'd worn him down, and he said he’d consider it. Meaning Pick was still in the brotherhood, and in the end, it was Talon and Mattie who helped Pick cut the ties his mother had on him.

  I used to wake every night while I was in the hospital, but that stopped as soon as I had Talon sleeping next to me.

  I’d always have scars, but they were something that made me stronger. To prove that I was over what had happened, and that I was stronger for it, I did something that scared me. I got my first tattoo to cover the smallest scar—which hurt like a mother-fruiter. And that was when Talon and I had our second argument. He didn’t want my body inked. That was when I yelled, ‘What's good for the goose is good for the gander.’ His reply was, ‘What the fuck does that mean?” I flashed him my tattoo on my lower stomach, a picture of a hawk, and underneath was written ‘You flew into my life, but I’ve got my claws into yours.”

  The next day, he'd come back with his own tattoo, a picture of a kitten digging its claws into his skin.

  “Jesus, kitten. I can hear your brain churning again. Get to sleep. Everything will be good.”

  I smiled into the dark room and knew that everything would be good, because I had my badass-biker beside me.

  Coming Soon: Deanna and Griz's story.

  Welcome to Sugartown

  by

  Carmen Jenner

  What The Critics Are Saying

  “Very dramatic, very heart wrenching, very sexy, very intense, very violent, very scary at times. Very enjoyable!”

  - Ali @ Ginger-Read Reviews

  ★★★★★

  "5 Magnificent Stars! In this heart-pounding and addictive love story, Carmen Jenner will have you laughing, crying, and become so spellbound with these small town characters that you'll never want to leave. Who ever said small town living was boring has obviously never been to Sugartown."

  - Debbie @ Keep Calm & Read Romance

  ★★★★★

  “Well, spank my ass, that was flipping awesome! My world has been rocked by Carmen Jenner's debut book, WELCOME TO SUGARTOWN.”

  - Paula @ Romantic Book Affairs

  ★★★★★

  “Welcome to Sugartown will tear you to pieces but put you back together again with its humour and host of unforgettable characters.”

  - Jo-Anne @ Worlds of Wonderment

  ★★★★★

  “I don't think I'll ever see insignificant little towns in the same light again ... danger, humour, tats, bikers, loads of pie eating (snigger), and enough chemistry to blow the roof off a science lab!”

  -Leanne Pearson, Author

  ★★★★★

  "Welcome to Sugartown, prepare to have your mind completely f*#&%ed over."

  - Jess of A is for Alpha B is for Books

  ★★★★★

  "Not only was it panty-meltingly hot, it had an incredible storyline with engaging, well-developed characters."

  - Christina of Love Between the Sheets

  ★★★★★

  "This book had everything from sugar coated sweetness, humor, sexual chemistry, friendly banter, angst, dirty talks, sexual innuendos, and a surprising twist of events that will totally keep you hooked till the very end."

  - Michelle of Give Me Books

  ★★★★ and a half

  "You HAVE to one click Welcome to Sugartown ... Not even kidding, right now I have a fierce lady boner for Carmen Jenner. I find this lady in the flesh and I'm gonna have to hump her leg or some s**t. (99% Probability of this occurring in public)."

  - Lola Stark, Author of Needle's Kiss Series

  ★★★★ and a half

  Welcome to Sugartown

  Copyright © 2013 Carmen Jenner

  Published by Carmen Jenner

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

  This is a work of fiction.

  Names, characters, businesses, organisations, places, events, and incidents are either of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  This book is licensed for your personal 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 person you share it with. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return it to the seller and purchase your own copy.

  Thank you for respecting the author’s work and not making me set various motorcycle gangs on you.

  Published: Carmen Jenner November 3rd 2013

  carmenjennerauthor@gmail.com

  Editing: Lauren K McKellar

  http://laurenkmckellar.com/hire-an-editor/

  Cover Design: Frankie Rose

  http://frankierosewrites.com/?page_id=843

  Formatting: E.M Tippets Book Design

  http://emtippettsbookdesigns.blogspot.com.au/

  For Ava & Ari

  May you find a love of your own as big as this someday.

  For Book Bloggers Everywhere

  Thank you!

  Ana

  There’s a mind-numbing restlessness that comes with living in small towns. The gossip, the people, and the unending monotony that makes you want to poke your eyes out with a fork. I’ve lived my whole life in Sugartown, so I should probably expect nothing to ever change, and each new day to be just as dull as the last. And yet, every day I wish for the unexpected. I wish for big cities, for open-mindedness, for the ability to jump on my bike and ride the hell out of town and never look back.

  Every day I dream of leaving Sugartown. And every day I open this crummy pie shop, I make pies and serve customers, and stay several hours after closing to make pies for the following day. I’m nineteen. The world should be full of endless possibilities, right? Wrong. Oh, so very wrong because I’ve just finished high school and my family happen to own this joint. So instead of making the world my oyster and all that, I’m stuck wearing this retro waitress uniform for the rest of my days—my mum and dad had some kind of rockabilly diner fetish, it’s sad really, don’t ask.

  Sugartown sits smack bang on the highway in the middle of nowhere. It’s a quaint little town and a pleasant enough place to stop on your journey from there to anywhere but here, but no one ever stays. And why would they? It’s surrounded on both sides by nothing but cane fields and the ancient sugar mill, that spreads its sweet acrid stench in a smoggy cloud over the whole town, making everything smell like burnt toffee. There’s nothing to do, nowhere to go, and the nearest town is 25 kilometres away.

  I sigh and lean over the counter, staring out the window. Across the road, my dad has shut the doors to his other business, a garage specialising in custom Harley-Davidson fittings: Big Bob’s Bikes and Auto. He leans against his bike and smokes a cigarette as he waits.

  My mum’s dream was to open a diner and make pies all day. My dad’s? To run a garage and customise Harleys. That way he could combine his early midlife crisis with his love of mechanics. They were both lucky enough to have had their dreams realized, and both unlucky enough to have them shattered when she found out she had cancer. Amid the chemo and the hospital visits, mum taught me how to make the pies from her recipes. Now I bake pies in the kitchen she taught me how to bake in, dad runs his garage across the street and in a way it’s like my mum’s dream is still alive and kicking. Though I doubt she expected the dragon stepmother to be a part of that dream.

  “Ana, are you even listening to me?” My friend and long-term tormentor Holly screeches in my ear. Holly works every shift with me. She’s all kinds of crazy gorgeous with wild red curls, green eyes and more ‘personality’ than a whole ward of mental patients.

  “It’s kinda hard not to listen to you, Hols.” I say, and then laugh as I add, “On account of you never shutting the fuck up.”

  “Shut up, biatch, I know you haven’t been listening to a word I’ve said. Lucky for you, I’ve got no problems repeating myself.”

  “Yippee.” I deadpan.

  She waves that away like I’m the one with all the crazy and begins wiping down the counter with a dirty rag, smearing grease all over the Formica. I love her, but I think Holly may have been dropped on her head when she was a baby. “Anyway, as I was saying, are you going to Nicole’s party next week?”

  A scruffy looking kid with strawberry blonde curls and bright blue eyes comes strutting through the shop, saving me from a tiresome conversation in which I continue to argue all the reasons why going to that party would be disastrous for someone like me and where Holly manages to twist the entire conversation back around to the fact that not going would be social suicide. The little brat acts like he owns the place, pokes his tongue out at me and jumps up on the counter that Holly just finished wiping down.

  I ruffle his hair and he smiles up at me. “What’s up, Sammy?”

  “Nothing. Whereth mum?”

  “The dragon’s out the back, primping her dragon lady curls for my dad.”

  I was an only child, until I wasn’t any more. Until former Belle’s Pies employee Kerry sunk her talons into my dad after Mum died. Eventually they got married and she fell pregnant. Kerry sat around on her big-fat-pregnant bum while I worked double shifts on the weekends in the shop.

  I was thirteen.

  I can’t fathom what Dad sees in her. It must be the sex, because I can’t find a single redeeming quality. The only good thing to come out of that woman was Sammy. He’s six now, every second word comes out with a lisp and, despite his unfortunate parentage, he just may be my favourite person in the entire world. It appears I’m his favourite, too, a fact that irritates the dragon beyond belief, that I may or may not play in my favour just to piss her off.

  “But thee thaid thee was going to take me for ice cream tith afternoon.”

  “It’s Friday night. Sorry, kiddo, but you’re stuck with me.”

  “Ith OK. I liketh being thuck wif you, Ana Cabana.” He beams, and it’s so hard not to pick him up and squeeze him until his adorable little guts squish out.

  “Aw, thanks, brat. I liketh being thuck wif you, too.” I mock and ruffle his hair once more for good measure. “Now, go do your homework and I’ll bring you a milkshake once the dragon lady is gone.”

  “Thweet.” He jumps off the counter, poking his tongue out at Holly who pokes out her own in return and then proceeds to make monkey faces at him. I swear, sometimes it’s like Holly and Sam are the same age. She makes out like she can’t stand him when the opposite is true—she adores him just as much as I do.

  Sammy bounds over to a booth in the back, pulls out his supplies and gets to work, his tongue poking out in concentration.

  A few minutes later the dragon stalks through the back door and into the kitchen, huffing when she sees Sammy through the giant serving window. She struts over to him, leaving a cloud of cheap perfume in her wake.

  “Sammy baby, you didn’t come and say hi to mummy.” Dragon ruffles his hair the way I do, but he pulls away when she touches him and glares at her.

  “My nameth noth Thammy, ith’s Tham. And I’m not a baby.” He says indignantly and goes back to his studies.

  Dragon shoots me a look. “Daddy and I have a party to go to tonight, so don’t wait up.”

  God, it’s so gross when she calls him Daddy. The mental images those words conjure when they come from her mouth are enough to make me vomit for days on end. The sad thing is he’s almost old enough to be her dad. And now for the second time in as many minutes I’m thinking of my dad having sex, which is wrong on so many, many levels.

  Without even a kiss goodbye for Sammy, Dragon sashays through the shop in her short skirt and too-tight singlet top with the cut outs and her high heeled boots.

  “Do you ever want to crash one of their parties?” Holly pipes up, as we watch Kerry cross the street. She kisses my dad full on the lips and then straddles the seat behind him. He revs the throttle and they ride away into the sunset.

  “And watch a bunch of drunk, greying old bikers boast about how big their engines are while their trampy women drape themselves across their laps? Not my idea of fun, Holly.”

  “Yeah, bu
nch of hussies. Though I wouldn’t mind draping myself across Red Hot Rob’s lap again.”

  “Whath a huthy?” Sam’s little lisp pipes up from beside me.

  “Yo’ momma.” Holly shoots back with a cheeky grin.

  “Seriously Holly? You don’t think he’s going to repeat that?”

  She shrugs. “It’s true.”

  “Hussy is a bad word,” I tell him sternly, giving Holly a pointed look. “If I ever catch you saying it there’ll be no more Banana Chocolate Cream Ana Cabana Surprise Pies, okay?”

  They’re Sam’s favourite. It’s a concoction I made up one night when Dad and the dragon were at one of their booze fests, and Holly and I had raided their stash. Sam had been sound asleep, until we began marauding the kitchen with a serious case of the munchies. I’d pulled it together enough to bake a pie with the only edible things left in the house: chocolate, bananas, beer and mini-marshmallows. The beer was downed before it had a chance to meet chocolate and banana—probably for the best—and after passing out before we had a chance to taste the creation, we woke to Sam covered head to toe in chocolate. He’d devoured the whole thing. The name stuck, and oddly so did the recipe—minus the beer, of course—and now it’s one of our best sellers.

  Sammy’s eyes go wide as saucers and he vigorously nods his head. “Okay.”

  “And I thought I asked you to do your homework?”

  “You thaid you wath gonna get me a milkthake when the dragon left, and the dragonth been gone for a hundred yearth, already.”

  “If I get you a milkshake will you please go and do some schoolwork?” He nods enthusiastically and scurries back to his booth.

  The sound of a bike tearing up the street draws the attention of all three of us. Growing up around a motorbike enthusiast I’ve come to learn the sounds that the engines make. Dirt bikes sound all high and whiny, like something got caught in the garbage disposal unit. Well-oiled machines, like the Harley-Davidsons my dad rides and customises, have almost a growling purr to them. It’s musical and primal all at once. It sends chills up your spine and sets your teeth and nerve endings to vibrate.