Regret (Never Waste a Second Chance Book 2)

by Janice M. Whiteaker

  This time it was Nancy’s turn to smile. She reached into Carol’s rental car and twisted the headlights on, illuminating the tragedy playing out in the moonlit night.

  Carol spun around, the disabled gun still clutched in her hand.

  Nancy gave her a little wave. “Hey Carol. How’s your night going?”

  Her sister froze, her mouth hanging open.

  “Nothing to say? That’s weird.” Nancy walked around the door, toward her dead husband and cheating sister. “Cause you were feeling pretty chatty a few seconds ago.”

  Carol narrowed her eyes and pointed the gun, their father’s gun, at Nancy.

  Nancy laughed. “You just tried to shoot that thing like five times. It doesn’t shoot Carol. I had them all disabled when I started watching the girls.” More accurately when Liza figured out how to pick the lock on the gun safe.

  Carol gave her a little grin. “You mean my granddaughters?”

  Nancy’s face went cold. Suddenly all her focus went back to her original plan.

  She was going to kill Carol.

  Nancy started running toward her. It was one thing to steal her husband and fake his death, but if she thought for one second she would take those little girls away—

  Lights flashed across the field and an engine revved as a vehicle plowed toward them. Nancy looked up to see a deep orange flash as it zoned in on Carol, her hand still pointing the gun at Nancy.

  Nancy ran toward her sister, this time not intent on beating her to death with the pistol. She hit Carol full speed, knocking her flat on her back and out of the way of Paul’s GTO.

  Nancy heard the engine rev again and rolled off Carol just in time to see the look of terror on her former husband’s face as he was caught in the beam of Paul’s headlights.

  Paul hit the gas again making the motor roar, the sound echoing through the field. Sam turned and started to run with Paul hot on his heels.

  Carol was wheezing beside her, trying to regain the breath Nancy knocked out of her during the takedown. Nancy stood up, not really sure what to do, watching as Sam scrambled across the uneven ground. She gasped as he lost his balance and fell face first into the dirt. The GTO slowed down, giving Sam time to get up and start running again.

  Nancy breathed a small gasp of relief. If Paul wanted to hit Sam, he would have done it by now. Instead, he was simply chasing him through the field as his old high-school buddy ran in circles, screaming his head off.

  “He’s going to hit him!” Carol started to get up, her eyes glued to Sam as he ran through the field.

  Nancy turned to her sister in completer disbelief. “You were just going to shoot him.” She reached out just as Carol was almost back on her feet and shoved her face first back to the ground. Hard.

  Nancy sat on Carol’s back, one leg on each side of her shoulders and fished her cell phone out of her pocket. She dialed Thomas’ number. The police would have to be her next call. She needed someone who could get here fast.

  Before Paul ran Sam to death.

  TWENTY-FOUR

  Nancy opened the door to her new home just as the only man who’d ever really loved her came up the sidewalk, his hair still dusty from working on her son’s house. “Hey handsome.”

  Paul gave her a smile as he swept her into his arms, giving her a drywall dust scented kiss. “Hello sweetheart. How was your day?”

  He kicked his boots off onto the tray beside the front door as she shut it behind him. “It was good. I got most of the market set up and made a pie.”

  She followed him as he made a beeline into the kitchen he’d so lovingly crafted, always with her in mind, even if she didn’t know it then.

  Right after Carol and Sam were arrested, Paul insisted on moving her into his house. It was an excuse with them locked up, she was the safest she’d ever been, but he jumped on it, insisting he just didn’t feel safe knowing how easily they were able to get inside her house.

  She could have told him the locks were never changed as long as she’d lived there and Carol still had a key, but she didn’t want to. She wanted to be here. With him. Laughing as he searched like a madman for the pie she made him for dessert.

  “You need to take a shower first anyway.” Nancy turned him by the shoulders in the direction of the stairs. “I will get dinner on the table while you do that.” She smacked him on the butt as he walked off, the slap of her hand making him jump as he grinned over his shoulder at her.

  She watched him disappear and went back to the kitchen. Just as she was stirring the basil into the spaghetti sauce, her cell phone rang from the counter beside her.

  She picked it up and tucked it against her shoulder. “Hey honey.”

  Paul wasn’t the only one who’d been a little paranoid lately. Thomas called her at least twice a day every day since she’d found Carol in the field trying to frame her for Sam’s murder so she could step into the vacancy Nancy’s absence would leave. And the inheritance she thought she would then be the beneficiary of.

  Carol planned to make their family’s money her next pile of cash to blow through. Turns out Nancy’s sister was quite the financial swindler with Sam’s parents as her willing and completely informed accomplices.

  Because they’d known all along that Sam was still alive.

  Collected the life insurance he took out with them as the beneficiary and sent it straight to where he and Carol were living commitment and responsibility free on the other side of the country.

  Then they croaked and left her all their money too.

  All so their precious angel baby could live the life he deserved.

  Too bad for Carol their own dad wasn’t a generous toward her. And why would he be? Nope, Jim Dalton did the right thing and left everything to his beloved grandsons. That was a fun day. Watching Carol discover she would never have gotten a dime of their father’s estate. No matter who died.

  “How are you?”

  Nancy smiled. “I’m fine. Just like I was three hours ago when you called.”

  “That’s good. I just wanted to let you know we got those locks replaced and the motion lights installed on the farmhouse.”

  “Who’s we?” Nancy stopped stirring the sauce.

  “Don helped.”

  Nancy smiled. Maybe no one else understood little Donnie Jenkins, but she did, and it did her heart good to see her son giving him another chance. “I’m glad.”

  “It was a little bit of a hard sell, but Mina finally caved. I had to bring you into it. I told her you felt bad for him.”

  “I do feel bad for him. Not everyone is like you Thomas. Not everyone knows their worth.” The kid had a hard life and was just trying to find his way. Now he’d lost everything he’d managed to scrape out from the horrible life he was given. It was all gone. His job, his home, his reputation. She wanted something good to come of all that happened and maybe helping Don would be it.

  “Well, we’ll see. As long as he stays in line and helps get the work done, things will be fine.” Thomas sounded unconvinced.

  “Things will be better than fine. I promise.” Nancy heard Paul’s heavy footsteps on the stairs. “Honey, I’ve got to go. I’ll call you tomorrow so we can set up a time to get Beth moved in.”

  Given all three options, Mina’s house, the new house being built or Nancy’s place, Beth chose to move into the farmhouse and Nancy couldn’t be happier. Now that no one could argue about the security there, it would be the perfect home for Beth and the girls.

  Paul wrapped his arms around her waist as she set her phone back on the counter. “That smells good.” His voice was low and growly in her ear as he nipped at her neck.

  Nancy smiled as the hair on the back of her neck stood up and her belly flipped. As worried as he was about certain things being an issue, the man had been more than able to make up for what he perceived as his shortcomings.

  She let her head fall to one side as he continued teasing the sensitive skin of her neck with his tongue. “You taste so good.”

/>   She giggled. “Hopefully dinner will taste better.” She tried to scoot away from him to dump the pasta into the pot of boiling water. He grabbed her by the hips and spun her to face him.

  Her legs clenched together when she saw his face. A level of intensity she’d never seen before filled his darkening eyes. “I’m not hungry for dinner right now.”

  She swallowed hard. “You’re not?” Her voice was hoarse.

  He shook his head. “No.”

  Paul dipped his head and covered her lips with his. Nancy whimpered into his open mouth. This was so unlike him. Normally Paul was sweet and tender, but the man pressing his body against her now was passionate and… and…

  Hard.

  “Oh my God.” Nancy whispered against his mouth as she felt a rush of wetness join the ache building between her legs.

  Paul’s hands were scraping up her shirt, dragging the fabric over her head. He grabbed the straps of her bra and pulled them down her arms, exposing her tightly puckered breasts, leaving the black lace garment dangling from her ribcage. With a frequent audience, she’d taken more interest in her undergarments.

  He undid her pants and shoved them down before wrapping his hands around her waist and dropping her bottom on the granite counter top, the cool rock chilling her heated pussy.

  His mouth covered her breast, raking the sensitive tip with his teeth while he kneaded the other nipple between his calloused fingers. Her head was swimming, the passionate way he was acting and the possibility of having him inside her making her dizzy with need.

  “Paul. What—” She gasped as he nipped at her breast just as he slid two fingers inside her body. “Oh my God.” Her head fell back as he continued to stroke her, both with his mouth, and his hand.

  The second his thumb touched her clit, she felt her thighs begin to quake. “Paul, I’m going to--”

  He pulled his hand off her body. “Not yet baby.” She heard a zipper raking open. “Not like that anyway.”

  He pulled her legs around his waist. She moaned as she felt the thick tip of him pushing into her. She felt his eyes watching her intently as he slowly pressed his dick deep inside her, inch, by agonizingly pleasurable inch. When he was completely buried within her, he growled against her ear. “I don’t know if I can hold back.”

  She opened her eyes, staring into his dilated pupils. “I don’t want you to.”

  And he didn’t.

  She moaned as he began to move. It had been so long since she’d had a man inside her she’d almost forgotten how good it felt. The fullness of his body, stretching the tightness of hers, rubbing against places inside her in a way nothing else could.

  Her hands clenched at the edge of the counter as he fucked her, sucking hard on her nipples as he groaned her name.

  “You feel so good baby.” He moved faster, his dick becoming even harder, pushing even deeper.

  She grabbed at his shoulders as she began to come, the feel of his mouth on her and his cock inside her too much. The ringing in her ears almost drowned out the sound of her screams as she came harder than she ever had.

  With one last impossibly deep thrust, Paul moaned into her breast as he filled her, finding his own completion.

  Nancy slumped forward against him panting. “What in the hell was that?”

  Paul nuzzled into her neck. “If you don’t already know, I’m not going to be the one to tell you.”

  “I mean, you said…” She tried to string a coherent sentence together, but was struggling to organize her thoughts. “I thought you couldn’t do that.”

  Paul leaned back, his face nonchalant. “Turns out there’s a pill for that.”

  Nancy wanted to slap him. “You mean you hadn’t already tried that?”

  Paul shrugged.

  “You’re a pain in the ass you know.” What kind of man doesn’t go to a doctor for something like that?

  One like Paul.

  She shook her head at him. “Pain in the ass.”

  He grinned at her. “And I’m all yours.”

  Thank you so much for reading REGRET. It is the second book in the Never Waste A Second Chance trilogy. As an independent author reviews are vital and I would be more grateful than you can imagine if you would take a few seconds to leave yours, good or bad, on Amazon or Goodreads.

  Keep your eyes out in May 2017 for the third and final installment, Redeem, which tells Beth's story.

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