Epilogue
Rose
Six years later
“Peter, watch out for the little girl,” I shout across a busy park.
“Jane, be careful,” a voice says as the kids collide in the sandpit and go down in a heap of tears and flailing limbs. Peter gets to his feet and offers the little girl a hand. She takes it and he pulls her up, only when she’s standing, and her pale pink dress is all smoothed out by her chubby little fingers, she turns on him.
“You douche canoe!” she shouts, and shoves my son back. He lands on his ass and I catch my breath, because instead of arguing or shouting back at her, he smiles, and for a second my heart stops. He’s so much like his daddy that for a moment I’m struck dumb.
For a beat too long, I’m glued to the spot, and then I find myself running toward them, just as a man on the other side of the sculpture shouts, “Jane, no!”
I bend over and help Peter to his feet. I brush the sand from off his arms and give him a onceover. “Are you okay, honey?”
“I’m so sorry,” the man says from behind me, and I still because I know that voice. “Rose?”
Heat claws at my cheeks because I'm bent double, my ass is up in the air and I’m really hoping that this is not how he recognized me. Slowly, I straighten and turn around to face him. “Dermot, what are you doing here?”
There’s a little more gray in his hair now, a few fine lines around his eyes, but he’s still as handsome as ever as he gives me that charming smile. “We were just killing a few hours in the park.”
“I see that. And who is this?” I ask, gesturing to the little girl holding tightly to his jeans.
“This is Jane. My niece.” He gives her a tap on the shoulder and a stern look. I remember being on the receiving end of that expression a time or two, and it still manages to pull a thrill from me. He prompts, “Who is very sorry she pushed your boy over.”
“Sorry,” Jane says, sounding anything but.
“That’s okay,” Peter says, and I run my fingers through his soft, sandy blond curls.
“And who is this?” Dermot asks.
“This is Peter, my son.”
His smile dims just a little. “I didn’t know you were married now.”
I nod again. “Going on six years.”
“He’s a lucky man,” Dermot says. My face crumples, and I swallow back the sting of tears as they prick my eyes. Six years later and it still doesn’t get any easier.
“He was, and I was an even luckier woman,” I whisper, more to myself than to him. Dermot’s brow furrows and his eyes search mine. He opens his mouth, but I shake my head and silently plead with him not to say it. He glances at Peter and nods, and I give him a tight smile. “Well, we better get going.”
“Of course,” Dermot says, resting his hands on his niece’s little shoulders. “It was really great to see you, Rose.”
I smile. “You too.”
I take my little boy’s hand and lead him from the park. He walks along the sidewalk and hums to himself, and I wrap my sweater around me to ward away the January chill surrounding this city.
Peter stops walking and glances up at me. “Mom?”
“Yeah, honey?”
“Was that man my daddy?”
I stop and look at my son, getting jostled from behind as pedestrians shuffle past us. “No, sweetheart. Harley is your daddy.”
He chews his bottom lip and stares at his feet with a troubled expression. “I know, but you looked at him the way you sometimes do with Daddy’s pictures.”
I let out a nervous laugh. “Dermot’s an old friend.”
“Are you gonna marry him?”
“No, Peter.”
He grabs my hand and squeezes. “It’d be okay if you did. Get married, I mean. I don’t want you to be alone.”
“I’m not alone, silly. I have you.”
“Yeah,” he agrees. “I bet you were real lonely before I came along.”
I wince, because he’s right, I was, but I’m not any longer. I take a deep breath and swallow back my sadness.
“I was; my heart was broken.” I crouch down and cup his face in my hands. “But you, little man, you fixed it.” He places his chubby little fingers over my own and smiles. It’s heartbreakingly familiar, and I’m teleported back in time thirty years to a different playground in this city, when a boy first grinned at me in that very same way and it took me but a second to fall in love with him.
I lean forward and kiss Peter’s hair, and I take his hand and begin walking home through the streets of the city I love. A city that is filled to bursting with memories of a tawny-haired boy with aquamarine eyes and the girl next door who loved him. “Now come on or we’ll be late. Grammy Evelyn’s cooking dinner, and Grammy Rochelle is making that chocolate dessert you like.”
“Mom,” Peter says. “I kind of liked her hair.”
“Whose?” I stare down at him in confusion. “Grandmas?”
“No, Jane’s. She had princess hair. Maybe I can sneak into her window like Pan and steal her away to Neverland.”
“Well,” I say with a quiet laugh. “It would be an awfully big adventure.”
Acknowledgements
To my darling non-husband Ben, you are my EVERYTHING! Thanks for being my confidante, my soul mate, my sounding board, my “Pan”. You see a side of me that not everyone else gets to see. When I’m stressed and broken, deliriously tired and cackling like a crazy person or sobbing so hard I can barely breathe because of what my characters are putting me through, you are there through all of it. You remind me to laugh, and breathe and you kick my bum when I feel like I can’t keep going, and I’m forever grateful. Seriously though, read my damn books already!
Ava Rose and Ari Danger, I love you more than the sun, and more than the stars, and more than the moon, and more than mars, and WAY MORE THAN … CHICKENS!
To my gorgeous family both blood and extended, I LOVE YOU!
To my beautiful beta readers Ali Hymer, Kristine Barakat, and Kristina Zolnar. You girls rock my freaking world! Each of you are so valuable to my beta process and I’m honored to have your eyes viewing my words before the rest of the world. Thank you for being so patient with me, and for your willingness to drop whatever you were doing and read more chapters. I cannot thank you enough. I’m sorry I made you all cry … okay, not really. Mwhahahaha, I made you cry! ;)
Lauren McKellar from McStellar Editing, thank you for pushing me to give a little more, I couldn’t be happier with how this book turned out and a huge part of that is thanks to you and your thorough editing eye.
To the ridiculously talented Hang Le, this cover! This cover is LOVE! I can’t even with how creative you are. This is by far my favorite book cover. It’s a joy to work with you, and I’m so glad I can finally hold this beauty in my hands, place it on my shelf and stare at it all day long. Don’t ever leave me … because I will find you. ;)
Heartfelt thanks to Be Designs for the awesome formatting. You, sir, are a superstar. Here’s to many more beautiful interiors together.
To my Sugar Junkies, who give me so much love and support and who constantly promote my work without ever having to be asked. THANK YOU! You girls are the reason I continue to write, and I can’t tell you what it means to read your reviews and kind words and know that someone out there loved something I created.
To the lovely ladies of The Rock Stars of Romance, thank you for hosting Harley & Rose blog tour. You girls have supported me from my debut novel right through to the tenth, and I’m so honored to be one of your rock stars.
And finally a huge, heartfelt THANK YOU to the readers, bloggers and fellow authors who read, support, pimp, review, and who follow me faithfully no matter which genre I write or how much I make you cry. Without you the stories in my head would just be tales I tell myself that would likely have me committed.
Books by Carmen Jenner
Welcome to Sugartown (Sugartown Series #1)
Enjoy Your Stay (Sugartown Series #2)
Now Leaving Sugartown (Sugartown Series #4)
KICK (Savage Saints MC #1)
TANK (Savage Saints MC #2)
REVELRY (Taint #1)
Finding North
Toward the Sound of Chaos
Coming Soon
The Way Back Home
The Trouble With Us
CLOSER (Taint #2)
HURT (Taint #3)
JETT (Savage Saints MC #3)
GRIM (Savage Saints MC #4)
KILLER (Savage Saints MC #5)
About the Author
Carmen Jenner is a thirty-something, USA Today and international bestselling author.
Her dark romance, KICK (Savage Saints MC #1), won Best Dark Romance Read in the Reader’s Choice Awards at RWDU, 2015.
A tattoo enthusiast, hardcore makeup addict and zombie fangirl, Carmen lives on the sunny North Coast of New South Wales, Australia, where she spends her time indoors wrangling her two wildling children, a dog named Pikelet, and her very own man-child.
A romantic at heart, Carmen strives to give her characters the HEA they deserve, but not before ruining their lives completely first … because what’s a happily ever after without a little torture?
www.carmenjenner.com
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www.twitter.com/CarmenJAuthor
www.goodreads.com/CarmenJennerAuthor
www.amazon.com/author/carmenjenner
Harley & Rose
Copyright © 2016 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.
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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 pirating this book. Pirates suck!
Harley & Rose Published: Carmen Jenner October 18h 2016
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Editing: Lauren McKellar
www.laurenkmckellar.com/hire-an-editor/
Cover Design: © By Hang Le
www.byhangle.com/
Formatting: Be Designs
www.be-designs.com.au/
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