by S. E. Hall
Table of Contents
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Exclusive
Princess Presley Duet Book Two
Full Circle Series
©2018 S.E. Hall
©2018 S.E. Hall
Editing – Emma Mack, Ultra Editing and Kellie Montgomery
Formatting – Brenda Wright, Formatting Done Wright
Cover Design – Dana Leah, Designs by Dana
All rights reserved.
This book may not be reproduced in any form, in whole or in part, without written permission from the author.
This book is intended for mature audiences only.
Table of Contents
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Acknowledgments
About the Author
First Of Many
Nine Minutes
We are at our most powerful the moment we no longer need to be powerful.
Eric Michael Leventhal
This is a terrible idea; quite possibly the worst one I’ve had in my entire life, but after wracking my brain for any other options… it’s all I’ve got left. And honestly, I’m sick to death of tiptoeing around, worrying if any, and every, damn thing, will, or will not, piss her off. Presley’s done calling all the shots. It stops now. The guilt, sadness, and shadows chasing my woman, end, die, today — regardless of what she’s fooled herself into believing is best, or what it ends up costing me. I very well may lose her for good over this, but my gut’s telling me I’m doing the right thing, for her, so damn my consequences.
And yes, I swore to myself countless times that the route I’m about to take was out of the question, but it’s time. Long past, actually.
I also made a promise to Presley that I’d never give up on her again; and I meant it. I’m not doing this because I broke that vow, gave up on her. The exact opposite, in fact. I’m risking it all because I refuse to give up on her… even if that means I lose “us.”
Yep, my mind’s made up, and I act before it can change.
“Jesus, don’t break the damn thing; come the fuck on in with your noisy ass. And ya best hope, whoever you are, that you’re on fire, dying, or here to hand me a shitload of money!”
None of the above, and, maybe I did knock, okay, pounded my fist, a little too hard, but desperate times call for I don’t give a shit measures… which is why I not only ignore his barking, but shove open the door and barge into Sawyer Beckett’s office, my fury blowing in ten steps ahead of me.
“Sutton? What the hell’s gotten into you, boy? Beatin’ on shit, stomping in here all puffed-up like your dick hangs to the floor; you lost your damn mind?”
“Since you asked, yeah, I have. And the only way to find it, is to find her. Where is she?”
Many weeks before…
I don’t remember asking for confirmation that the timeless adage is true; but I got it anyway — everything does come in threes… the Kendrick Squad trio here to offer proof.
It hasn’t even been a full week since my big blowout with Sutton, immediately followed by my attempt at “laying low,” far from enough time to myself, yet here they are, descending upon my apartment like a pack of hungry wolves. Or the Three Stooges.
Not that I’m the least bit surprised. My family doesn’t exactly cooperate with a member’s need for solitude, and use their own annoying form of math — calculating any time spent “missing” in dog years. Rabid, blood-thirsty dog years. So really, considering all that… the Kendricks are late.
“You’re short a few,” I bite out as soon as I open the front door to them. Judd and Bellamy fall off the welcome wagon, or did they get lucky and draw the long straws?”
“Oh good,” JT sighs in mock relief, clutching his chest. “Despite the fact you’ve obviously forgotten how to brush your hair, or, ya know, decipher clean clothes, that fit, from dirty ones, that don’t, you didn’t lose that charming wit of yours. Brynny, go ahead and call to cancel the doomsday preppers; there’s still hope.”
“Not bad, smartass; not bad at all. And as much as I love these little verbal spars of ours, I’m not in the mood today. Or tomorrow.”
“Too bad. “ Skylar’s love comes cloaked in scorn. “Get in the mood, because we’re not leaving you like, like this.” She surveys my “situation,” top to bottom, failing to hide her concern… mixed with a small case of the heebie-jeebies.
“Really guys, thanks for checking on me, I love ya for it, but I just need to be alone. You came, saw, and verified I’m still alive, unharmed and not being held against my will in some underground sex slave camp. Your work here is done.” I turn, leaving them standing at the door, and drag my dejected ass back down the hall and to my bedroom.
“Or not.” Sky’s sass sounds from right behind me, meaning she followed me. Goodie.
I ignore her and retreat under “my Fortress of Solitude,” the more becoming title I’ve dubbed the pile of blankets, dishes, food wrappers, and wadded tissues that once was my bed.
“Oh. My…” she stops mid-gasp, unable to find the right words and obviously unappreciative of all the hard work put into my comfort cove. “Y’all, come look at this,” she calls to her siblings. “Presley, honey, this is, I don’t even know. Jesus, take the wh-”
“Save your breath; I already asked him. He declined. Hard pass. Said he’d rather walk,” I drone from beneath the covers, now pulled completely over my head.
“That’s not funny, and neither is your, uh, current state of…”
“Dayumm, P.” JT joins the party, whistling low in the pitch of unimpressed. “Seriously, what the entire fuck? I hope like hell you’re current on your Tetanus shot, ‘cause it’s a damn bio-hazard in here.”
“Both of you, stop it.” Brynn rescues me. “Sarcasm may be the language we were raised to speak, but now’s not the time, or place for it. Nor is it helping. This isn’t a joke; P’s clearly hurting. And your ridicule is tacky and insensitive. If that’s the best you can do, maybe we should go; give her some peace and quiet.”
“Thank you, Brynny,” I mumble, burrowing deeper into my sanctuary.
But Skylar’s not having it, nor did she hear a word her sister said. As the oldest of the three, thus the natural leader, and damn close in rivaling my own tenacity, she’ll come, or be told what to do, about the time Hell freezes over. “I’m not leaving until I get what I came for.” The bed shakes as she rearranges my necessities, cleaning off a spot to take a seat. “Since you’ve entered some rare cone of silence where you share nothing with the class, let’s try this. I’m gonna tell you what I do know, then you’re gonna fill in the part I don’t. Sound goo
d?”
No. Not at all.
“I’ll take your lack of response as a, yes, Skylar, that sounds great. Okay,” she clears her throat and firms up her voice, if any firmer is even possible. I heard what happened at the party, and I’m so sorry, P. I hate that you had such a rough night. Do you want to talk about it?”
Again, no. Not at all.
Her defeated sigh blends with my silence and more shuffling, Brynny now clearing space to join her on the bed. I know it’s Brynn by the gentle, quiet movements — JT would’ve thrown stuff any and everywhere, rattling the frame with his landing. “This lack of response I’ll take to mean, no need, you already know about that, so, move on, please. Which brings us to the part where they then mentioned how Sutton took excellent care of you after the ordeal, because you specifically asked that it be him who took care of you. The next morning however… that’s where things go fuzzy and we’re all clueless.”
“Yeah, P, real fuzzy. He called me, bright and early, grilled me for information on you. And pretty much threatened to kill me if I’d been holding any back, or lying to him. Any idea what the hell he was talk, no, yelling about?” JT asks with the same probing suspicion I’m sure Sutton used on him.
I stick to my silence — they’re doing just fine filling in the blanks for themselves.
“No? Nothin’?” JT scoffs. “Me either. Sky? Brynny? Either of you got a clue?”
“Nope,” Skylar pops. “Can’t imagine how things went from only wanting Sutton by her side, to what appears to be a huge fight between the two of them either. A fight big enough to send Princess Take No Shit, who hides from nothing, into hiding.”
“He told you we had a fight?” I ask before I stop myself, or my curiosity.
“She can speak. It’s a miracle!” Sky pokes harder.
All kinds of freakin’ feeling herself today. She’s lucky I don’t give a damn… about much at all.
“Just answer the question,” I hiss.
JT’s the one who does so. “Not in those exact words, but yeah, I figured out that much from what he did say. And, because I’ve since learned that, just like with the rest of us, you’re ignoring his calls, texts, flowers, and whatever else he’s doing to apologize for whatever he did in the first damn place, I’m gonna take a wild guess that we’re right.”
“But he didn’t tell you why we had a fight?” I ask in two-fold; digging for any other details Sutton shared, and confirming what, deep down, I already know. He didn’t say one thing more than he had to in order to get JT talking. He never would.
And with that certainty comes a painful clenching of uncertainty in my chest. How the hell am I supposed to forget, and move past, Sutton Ellis — the man who betrayed me — the same man in whom I have concrete faith in who he really is… someone who’d never purposely or selfishly betray me. The constant loop of contradictions is too much. All I want to do is roll back up into the ball I’ve been in for days and cry myself to sleep; the only place where I find reprieve from the confusing, lonely, angry ache inside me.
“All he said was that he really fucked up, you might never forgive him, and he wouldn’t blame you if so. I didn’t much care for the sound of that, so I bowed up his ass, but he swore he didn’t hurt you in any kind of way that called for an ass whoopin’. So, before I go back and deliver one anyway, or let him stay off the hook, I’m gonna need to hear, from you, just what in the hell’s going on.”
“Sutton would never put his hands on me, and you know it, so keep yours off him. Besides, you’d just end up getting yourself hurt.” I laugh in the face of sadness. “It’s over. We’re over. Whatever the hell we even were. And, much like every other damn thing in my life, I’ll. Be. Fine. I’ll deal, accept, tuck it away, and move on. Like always. Like a pro.”
“Damn, y’all are more in sync than I thought; that’s almost verbatim what he said you’d say. So he asked me to give you… shit, hold on.” His oafish stomping out of the room can’t be missed, and with my pesky curiosity getting the better of me, again, I uncover my head for a peek at what’s to come.
“Well, hello there,” Sky giggles, tapping the end of my nose. “Nice to see you’re able to escape that heap. And are still breathing. It’s got to smell under there, P.”
JT reappears, my eyes darting from Sky to him… and what’s in his hand. “Had to go grab it, and thank fuck I remembered; he’d have kicked my ass. Here, this is from Sutton. Made me swear I’d make it very clear that he did this for you, so you find, and always stay, your happiest. Not to help whatever lucky son of a bitch you end up finding it with.”
I take what he offers, turning it over and around in my hands, puzzled at first… until I spot the letters written across the front. Then, and all at once, I know exactly what it is. What it means. But I know nothing about the flurry of emotions now at war inside me. And out of nowhere, very unlike me, but whimsically pleasing all the same, I think of a snow globe. That’s precisely what I feel like — a snow globe — that Sutton just picked up and shook, beautiful little pieces of myself swirling everywhere, no telling which will land where.
“What is that?” Brynny whispers, awe its only volume. It’s a certain kind of whisper, one that screams, ‘I don’t know what I’m looking at, yet, but I’m positive it’s monumental, and that no matter what it turns out to be, I want a man to someday give me one.’ Yes, that kind of whisper.
“Um, I think I know this one.” JT raises his hand, mocking up with his tone and confused expression. “Is it… a jar?” No one pays him any mind, or reply, so he reassures himself of his own brilliance. “Yes, I’m right; it’s a jar. So what’s with y’all and the googly-eyes? What’d I miss?”
“Life will never be boring,” I interpret past the twitters in my chest as I trace a fingertip over each letter. “L,W,N,B,B; that’s what it stands for. He made me a life will never be boring jar.” I get choked up, but instantly squash it back down. “I’m guessing, no, actually, I’m not. I’m sure each piece of paper inside is an idea, some new exciting thing to do, like… skydive. Ride a camel. Find a field of dandelions and make wishes all day. Find a soft spot to lay, and count the stars all night.”
“Huh, what?” JT makes a short, unimpressed sound.
I jerk my head his way to properly glare at him in all his unappreciative ignorance. “Huh, what?”
He shrugs. “I just, I don’t get it is all.”
“That’s okay; you don’t have to get it. It’s not yours, therefore, it’s not yours to get. It’s mine, and I do. So do,” my voice breaks with the unique sound of true, unconditional love — that special place, the only place where your heart can sing and sob, be bursting full, yet longing for more, at the same time — love. “As long as your ‘huh’ didn’t mean anything else, like insinuating it’s dumb or something, then… okay.”
“‘Cause that’d piss you off?” He cocks a brow as he asks.
“Yes.”
“How bad, say, on a scale of normal people mad to P mad?”
“Q,” I snarl. “A fuckin’ Q.”
“Sure am glad I didn’t kick his ass,” he laughs.
“Why’s that? Because he’d have wasted ya and made you like it? Thought we already established this?”
“Yeah he would’ve,” he jibes, puffing out his chest. “But it’s interesting…”
“What is?”
“That even from beneath your lil’ dirt pile of despair you got goin’ on there, the one you built because of him, you’re still defending him. And his jar. On the spot. On instinct. Didn’t even stop to think about it, just bit, ready to take my damn head off if I say one cross word about either.”
I say nothing — because he’s not wrong, but I’m not about to confirm he’s right, so silence is my only option — and pull the covers back over my head.
As always, Sky and Brynn have wordlessly watched our verbal spar, the one I could swear I said I wasn’t in the mood to have, but Sky sure speaks up now. “Nice job,” she snips. “We finally we ge
t her out and you send her back into hiding. Why’d we bring you again?”
“Because I’ll say the shit that needs sayin’. The shit you two won’t. Same reason we bring P along to any intervention that’s not hers. She’s done more than her fair share of dishin’ it out; won’t kill her to hear it for once. Isn’t that right, P?”
Brynn fills the gap for me. “Now’s not the time to try proving a point, JT. Don’t be tacky.”
“Fine,” he huffs. “I’ll let her enjoy it while she can.”
“Doesn’t seem like she’s enjoying anything,” Brynn bites back.
“You know what I mean. And you know this won’t last much longer, right, P? Any minute now, the parentals will notice you’re M.I.A., and will most definitely send the bloodhounds out searching. Whatever Sutton did can’t be half as bad as having all of them on your ass, in your business, asking a million questions, at the same time. So why not just meet this thing with Sutton head-on? Talk to him. Scream at him. Fucking sign language. Do something. Besides running from it, that is.”
That does it. My vow of silence is over. “Running?” I shriek, throwing the covers off and sitting up. “I’ve barely moved, in days! I’d be doing one helluva job running, if I was… since you three caught up to me. And I am doing something, I’m thinking. Yes, believe it or not, I finally found something worth thinking about, before going off half-cocked. Now please, just, just leave me alone.”
“You want us to leave, we’ll leave. We came to make sure you were okay, still breathing, not waste our time trying to talk some sense into that thick head of yours. But don’t say I didn’t warn ya; we won’t be the last of your visitors.”
He’s right again… gotta figure out a plan before the rest of them come knocking.
“P,” Brynny’s sweet voice drips with concern, “are you sure you wouldn’t like some company? I won’t ask you anything, won’t say a word unless you want me to. And I won’t even say those like JT.”
“Same,” Skylar confirms, though not quite as gently as her little sister. “And if it’d make you’d feel less ganged up on, we’d be happy to take shifts. Judd could take one too, and you know he won’t talk,” she snickers.