Text copyright ©2018 by the Author.
This work was made possible by a special license through the Kindle Worlds publishing program and has not necessarily been reviewed by Aurora Rose Reynolds. All characters, scenes, events, plots and related elements appearing in the original Happily Ever Alpha remain the exclusive copyrighted and/or trademarked property of Aurora Rose Reynolds, or their affiliates or licensors.
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Until Leo
Happily Ever Alpha Kindle World
Rochelle Paige
Contents
Dear Readers
Note From the Author
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Epilogue
Happily Ever Alpha Kindle World
Also by Rochelle Paige
About the Author
Dear Readers
Welcome to the Happily Ever Alpha Kindle World.
I personally chose each author participating in the Happily Ever Alpha Kindle World because I love their books, and the way they tell a story. That said, this book is entirely the work of the author who wrote it, and I didn’t have any part in the process of writing the story.
Enjoy the BOOM!
xoxo
Aurora Rose Reynolds
Note From the Author
When Aurora told me the news about the Happily Ever Alpha Kindle World, I think I actually squealed over the phone. I'd been hoping for a long time that she'd do one because I loved the idea of being able to write a story in the amazing fictional world she created. And then I got even more excited because she said I could write a story for Leo, the hot cop/single dad from Until Nico!
This was a big deal for me since Until Nico is my absolute favorite book of hers. Nico is also one of my favorite book boyfriends ever! And I've always wanted Leo to get a story. Plus, several years ago we did a tiny crossover between one of my heroes and Nico. In Until Nico, Sophie overhears a phone call between Nico and Drake (my hero from Push the Envelope.) In my follow-up novella, Summer Nights, Drake has the other side of that phone conversation. The crossover is small, but it was so much fun to do!
Happy reading!
Rochelle Paige
Chapter 1
Leo
“Have a good weekend. You’ve more than earned it,” my partner, Nico, grumbled as I pushed away from my desk.
“I don’t know why you’re so damn cranky, man. You’re off duty the same as me. Your woman and the kids are at home waiting for you. Get the fuck outta here already.”
He groaned and ran his fingers through the dark blond hair of his fauxhawk. “Between our caseload this week and Bax teething while the girls are getting more molars in, I feel like I haven’t slept in forever. I’m fucking exhausted, and I still have to finish up this last report.”
I smirked at him, and it had nothing to do with the bet we’d made that’d left him with our paperwork today. “If you’re that tired, maybe I should swing by your place and see if Sophie needs help with anything before I head home.”
“You’d better get the fuck outta here before I kick your ass,” he growled.
I laughed as I strode through the squad room on my way out the door. Nico was predictable when it came to his wife, and I loved yanking his chain. It was good for him though because most people were too intimidated by Nico to give him a hard time. But the extra inch he had on me and all those tattoos didn’t worry me because I knew how good of a guy he was. Trust was the most important thing to have between cops who were partners, and I wouldn’t have wanted him working with me if we didn’t have it.
I’d always dreamed of being on the police force. From the first time I’d held my pretend badge, a set of plastic handcuffs tucked in my pocket and mirrored sunglasses covering my eyes, I’d wanted to carry the real thing. Anytime I’d played cops and robbers as a little boy running around my family’s huge farm, I’d been the good guy. It didn’t matter how often my childhood friends told me it was fun being a robber; I played the cop every time.
That desire didn’t go away as I grew up, and I sacrificed to make it happen. After playing football in college while earning my degree in criminal justice, knowing I was a sure bet to be drafted by a pro team didn’t tempt me off my chosen path. Neither did my parents’ reaction or their threat to the trust fund my grandparents had setup for me—although they’d eventually come to understand how much being a cop meant to me and supported my decision.
And then there was the strain it put on relationships—or at least that was the excuse my bitch of an ex-fiancée had used for cheating on me. She’d mouthed off some bullshit about how I was never around when she needed me and that’s why she’d been sleeping with her high school sweetheart behind my back for six months before I figured it out. But I didn’t regret becoming a cop, and I wasn’t pissed I’d wasted so much time on Jenna because it gave me Lynn, my beautiful baby girl.
It’d been more than two years since she’d fucked me over, and I’d only made a few half-assed attempts at dating since then. Being a cop and a dad were more than enough for me for now. With Jenna out of my life, my weekdays were about protecting and serving my community and my weekends were all about Lynn. As much as I loved being a cop, I looked forward to when I picked her up from after-school care on Fridays even more.
It felt like a piece of my heart was missing when she was at her mom’s place during the week. My house was too empty without her gone, so I busted my ass at work during those days and tried to limit how much it interfered with the time I had with her. It didn’t always work out for me since crime didn’t take the weekends off, but Cap’ was understanding of my situation and Nico did what he could to cover for me if something came up on one of our cases when I had Lynn. And when it couldn’t be avoided, my baby girl got to spend time with her grandparents out on the farm—something both she and they loved.
It only took me ten minutes to make the drive from the station to Lynn’s school. The second I pushed through the doors into the gym where they kept the kids after school, she raced towards me and threw herself at me.
“Daddy!” she yelled, her thin arms wrapping around my neck after I lifted her up. “I missed you.”
“I missed you too, baby girl.”
“Of course you did, silly,” she giggled. “’Cause you love me most in the whole wide world.”
She didn’t wait for my response, scrambling out of my hold to run over and grab her shiny purple backpack before saying goodbye to her friends. Then she skipped back to me, the sparkly pink shoes on her feet lighting up each time they hit the floor. She slid her hand into mine when she reached me, and I took her bag and slung it over my shoulder as I walked her out to my truck.
“How was school this week?”
“Good.”
“C’mon, baby girl. You’ve got to give your daddy more than a one-word answer,” I teased, helping her up onto the booster in the back seat of the extended cab.
She offered me a sweet smile that melted my heart. “I liked that I got to play with my friends a lot.”
I set her backpack on the seat next to her and waited for her to buckle herself in. I wanted to make sure it was securely fastened, but I was subtle about it because she was in a stage where she thought she could do everything by herself and I didn’t want to crush her growing self-confidence. “I can see why that’d be your favorite part o
f school since friends are important, but what’d you like least about your week?”
Her little nose wrinkled and she shrugged her shoulders as she answered me softly, “The stupid picture we had to draw for art.”
“Really?” I was surprised since she usually couldn’t wait to show me everything she’d made during art. “Why didn’t you like it? You’re great at drawing.”
“Because,” she sighed dramatically, “we had to draw a picture of our family, and I knew Momma would be mad if I didn’t put her and Jason in it. But I just wanted it to be of you and me, with Granny and Grandaddy. So I did one to give to her and I’ll make one for you when we get home.”
This was the part of what Jenna had done that absolutely killed me. She hadn’t just hurt me; she’d hurt our daughter too. Put her in a place where she had to worry about shit no five-year-old little girl was supposed to think about. And forced me in a position where I had to act like I supported the bad decisions she’d made so our daughter didn’t feel dragged into the middle of it any more than she already was. Like how Jenna moved that douchebag she’d cheated on me with into the house I’d bought and paid for so my baby girl had a safe place to live when she wasn’t with me, and now I had to deal with the fact that Lynn spent her weekdays in the same home with him and felt obligated to add him into drawings of her family at school.
Pictures without me.
Her father.
But I also had to accept my part in it too—for picking the wrong damn woman. “I’m sure it’s a beautiful picture, and your momma is going to love it.”
“Yeah, I think you’re right,” she sighed. Her frown didn’t disappear until I pressed a gentle kiss against her forehead and she smiled up at me. “Wanna see it?”
“You know I do.”
She dug into her backpack and pulled out a piece of cream paper with the picture she’d drawn on it. I ooh’d and aah’d over it, even while clenching my fists because it pissed me the fuck off to see a family picture drawn by my daughter without me in it.
“You better tuck that back in your folder and keep it safe so you can give it to your momma when she picks you up from school on Monday.”
“Okay, Daddy.” I had the car door almost shut when she squealed, “Oh! I almost forgot!” She grabbed a sheet of bright pink paper and thrust it at me. “You need to take this class, Daddy.”
“A class for me, huh?” I quickly scanned the flyer and chuckled. “What? My ponytails and braids aren’t good enough for my baby girl?”
“I know you try hard, but the teacher has to fix ‘em for me when I get to school on Mondays.”
I tapped her nose with my index finger. “Well, then I guess I’d better plan on going to this class next week so I can learn how to do ‘em right. I don’t want my pretty girl going to school with her hair not done right.”
Chapter 2
Carrie
“Barrettes, headbands, bow hair-clips, elastics,” I mumbled to myself, rifling through my big shopping tote to make sure I wasn’t missing anything for the class I was going to teach...which was set to start in about five minutes. I hated running late. It made me anxious, and now I was wasting even more time because I couldn’t get it out of my head that I’d forgotten something important. Not that it’d do me any good if I figured out what it was because I couldn’t just run out and grab more supplies. I was barely going to make it inside before the class started as it was, without any time to set my stuff up since odds were good there were already people waiting inside for me. Which meant I needed to get my butt moving before they got antsy waiting for me and thought I wasn’t going to show.
“I guess this is going to have to do.” I yanked the bag off the front seat of my car, swiveled on my heel as I slammed the door closed, and promptly crashed into the guy who must have parked his truck and gotten out while I’d been distracted by my search through my tote.
How I’d missed him or his truck was beyond me. Even being laser focused on counting frilly hair accessories while freaking out about running late didn’t account for me missing a big, black, extended-cab truck as it pulled up right behind me. And it certainly didn’t explain how I didn’t spot the brick wall of a guy I’d just practically bounced off. He towered over me, at least eight or nine inches taller than my perfectly respectable five foot five inches. And then there was the extra hundred and sixty pounds he had on me. Add in his cropped dark hair, tightly trimmed beard, and intense blue eyes and you had a man no woman would miss. Nor would she want to because he was the kind of guy you usually only saw on television or in magazines.
When I took a quick step backwards, I started to trip over my own feet. His big hands wrapped around my arms to steady me, and I felt the warmth of them through the double layers of my long-sleeved shirt and light jacket. “Careful, darlin’. You don’t need to hurt yourself trying to get away from me. I’m one of the good guys. A cop.”
Of course his deep voice matched the rest of him, and he was a cop. Because a guy like him wouldn’t have a girly voice or a lame job. It’d be a crime against womankind if he did.
I took a deep breath to help settle my racing heart, but it didn’t do me a lick of good because his masculine scent filled my nose and made my panties feel like they were about to combust more than they already had. “I’m good, thanks.”
His blue eyes darkened a shade as he scanned my face. “You sure? You look a little shaky.”
Only because he made my legs weak, but I wasn’t about to blurt that out loud. “Yup, I’m A-okay.”
Gah! Had I really just said that? Out loud? To a totally hot guy? I’d thought I’d grown out of my dork phase from high school and college, but apparently I was wrong. Or maybe it was just that being touched, even innocently, by an incredibly hot cop brought it out in me. One whose mouth twitched up at the edges in apparent appreciation of my dorkiness.
“Sorry. I’m just in a rush to get inside.” I hitched my tote higher up on my shoulder, struggling a little with its weight since it wasn’t all bows and ribbon. There were also some blow dryers, curling wands, and straightening irons in there adding extra weight in an awkward jumble.
“I’m heading that way, too.” He let go of my arms, and then one strong hand tugged on the bag. I let go, and almost groaned in relief at the loss of the weight on my shoulder. But then I got distracted by the way his bulging bicep stretched the material of his sleeve—until his deep chuckle registered in my brain and I dragged my gaze away to look up at him. “I’ll carry this in for you.”
I probably should have told him I could do it myself, but I found myself nodding and offering him a shy smile instead. The uptick in his lips turned into a full-fledged smile, and I had the sneaking suspicion he was trying not to laugh at me. Not that I blamed him since I was being completely ridiculous.
I talked to men all day long at my job, and I never had a problem acting like a normal person around them. Then again, none of them were crazy hot like this guy. And thank goodness for that, or else I probably wouldn’t ever get anything done. Like now, since I was standing here gawking at him when I needed to get my butt inside.
“Sure. Please. But I have to hurry because I’m late.”
His low chuckle sent shivers down my spine, but I worked hard to ignore them while we walked across the parking lot towards the front doors of the school. “You going to the daddy and daughter hair class?”
“Yup, I’d better be since I’m the one teaching it.”
“You know how I mentioned I was a cop?” I nodded, and he jiggled the bag with my supplies. “I kinda already figured out you were at least helping with the class.”
“Oh. Right. Obviously.” He grinned at me again, and I hurried to explain. “I’m pretty good at hair and love kids, so I figured offering these mini-classes would be a good way to give back. Little girls like to look their best, too, and sometimes they need a little help.”
Those deep blue eyes flicked upwards to take in the long, dark curls cascading down my back.
>
“Are you new to Nashville?” he asked as he opened the door and gestured me ahead of him.
“Yeah.” I swiveled my head to squint up at him. “How’d you guess?”
He smiled down at me, those blue eyes of his sparking with humor, and my heart felt like it skipped a beat since it made him even more attractive—if that was even possible. “’Cause you aren’t moving on Southern time yet. Five minutes late is considered early around here.”
“I can see how that’d give me away, then,” I laughed. “Although I’m not sure I’ll ever adjust to the idea of any minutes late being early.”
“I bet if you give it enough time, you’ll find yourself loosening up like the locals who’ve grown up around here.”
“You sure about that?” I pointed towards the group of men standing near the doors to the gym. The school’s after-care program ended right before I was supposed to start my class, and I was using the same space as them. If those guys were there to pick up their kids they would’ve been on their way out, not hanging around. And there was only one reason I could think of for why they’d be doing that—they were waiting for me to arrive.
“Lining up in droves before they even got a look at you. I can only imagine how much worse it’s gonna get now that they’ve seen you,” the hot cop muttered, closing the distance between us so we were walking almost hip to hip.
“Pardon?” I had no idea what he was talking about. But judging by the firm set of his jaw and the glare he was sending towards the guys at the door, it wasn’t anything good.
Happily Ever Alpha: Until Leo (Kindle Worlds Novella) Page 1