If You Could Only Feel
Copyright 2018 Monica Clayton
Published by M.E. Clayton at Smashwords
All Rights Reserved
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This book is a work of fiction. The entire content is a product of the author’s imagination and all names, places, businesses and incidences are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons (living or dead), places or occurrences, is entirely coincidental.
No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned or distributed in any manner whatsoever without the express written consent from the author, except in the case of brief quotation embodied in critical articles or reviews.
Formatting: Smashwords
Cover: Adobe Stock
Warning: This book contains sexual situations and other adult themes. Recommended for 18 years of age and over.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgements
Dedication
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
Chapter_19
Chapter_20
Chapter_21
Chapter_22
Chapter_23
Chapter_24
Chapter_25
Epilogue
Playlist
About_the_Author
Other_Books
Contact_Me
Acknowledgements
The first acknowledgement will always be my husband (unless we ever divorce, then probably not so much after that), but seeing as how I can’t imagine that day ever coming, I can’t ever put myself out there without thanking him for all his love, support and belief in me.
Second, there’s my family; my daughter, my son, my grandchildren, my sister and my mother. They are the people who love me the most, and know me the best, and love me dearly, despite, of all they know…LOL!
And, of course, there’s Kamala. She insists that I don’t have to thank her in every book, but my love for her and gratitude for all her support and enthusiasm, claims otherwise. She’s the first person (outside my family) that I shared this dream with, and she’s been by my side every step of the way. Kam, you really are the best kind of friend!
And, finally, I’d like to thank everyone who’s purchased, read, reviewed, shared and supported me and my writing. Thank you so much for helping make this dream a reality and a happy, fun one at that! There are not enough ‘Thank You’s in the world….
Dedication
For my son –
Your loyalty, for those you love, is unwavering and a beautiful thing!
Prologue
Jesus H. Christ!
I’ve looked bad the next morning, after partying up a storm before, but this was ridiculous.
I stared into the bathroom mirror and cringed. I looked like a gang-banged porn star at the end of a taping. Well…except for my face.
My face was clean of…stuff.
It’s the little things.
The entire weekend had been one big blur of poor choices and reckless decisions, and while I wasn’t a stranger to having a good time, even I had to admit, this weekend had been beyond the pale.
I’ve never drank my weight in alcohol before like I did last night.
I’ve never been so drunk I went out and got a tattoo like I did Friday night.
I’ve never been so turned on that I let a man take me in a dark alleyway like I did Thursday night.
Or up against the back of the casino like I did Friday night.
Or offered up my ass, begging and pleading, like I did last night.
I never should have answered my goddamn phone. That had been my first mistake.
I had flown to Las Vegas to get the hell away from Gabriel Buchanan and what do I do? I answer his call like a complete, lovesick-besotted fool. I answered his fucking phone call and spent the last three days in an alcohol-induced sex-a-thon with the man.
The man I was trying to break away from.
The man I was trying to forget.
The man I had given my virginity to.
The man who broke my heart with every phone call, every conversation and every touch of his body.
We weren’t children anymore.
We weren’t young adults searching for our way through college, either.
I was still Justice Hillman, high school graduate, who went on to work as a clerk for Dr. Daughtry, who just happened to be the biggest pervert on the planet.
I made enough to live on, but I was nowhere near close to being in Gabriel Buchanan’s league.
I was never close enough to be in Gabriel Buchanan’s league. But, then, few people were.
I continued to stare at myself in the mirror. My hair looked like an explosion of colors matted on the top of my head; you could hardly see any of the natural blonde. My eye makeup looked like I was going for the zombie look. My face pale, my blue eyes bloodshot.
I really did look like a porn star after a gang bang.
But to be fair, Gabriel fucked like a porn star.
However, no matter how horrible the image was that stared back at me; the matted hair, the bloodshot eyes, the clown makeup, the godawful hickeys that lined my neck and chest, none of it was distracting me from the shine and weight of the stupid, idiotic, unbelievably giant ring that sat on my ring finger.
No matter how many times I closed my eyes, only to reopen them, it was still there.
Laughing at me.
Taunting me.
Torturing me.
All I could do was pray that Gabriel didn’t have one on his hand. Maybe this was all a joke, and the ring was a souvenir, or a toy out of a coin machine.
I mean, it looked real.
It felt real.
Felt like a real fucking stupid ass mistake.
Okay, I couldn’t put it off any longer. I had to go back out there and see if Gabriel was wearing a ring too and if there were any papers lying around to confirm how stupid I was over this man.
I cracked open the bathroom floor and crept my way towards the bed and the naked man that was sleeping on his stomach in it.
Standing over the bed, my eyes fell on what sickingly looked like a wedding certificate. Gabriel moaned and stretched, and when he rolled himself onto his back, his arms flying out beside him, that’s when I saw it. The matching ring to my wedding set. I fucking married Gabriel Buchanan last night.
Sonofabitch!
Chapter 1
Justice~
I felt my phone buzzing in my back pocket, but I ignored it.
I ignored it because I knew who it was and I knew what he wanted, and while for a very long time, what he wanted was the same thing I had wanted, but I didn’t want that anymore.
I wanted more.
I wanted love.
I wanted…maybe not forever, but a chanc
e at forever.
My phone buzzed again, and again, and I continued to ignore it.
Besides, I was at work and Dr. Daughtry didn’t appreciate...now, let me get this right…‘the younger generation who don’t know how to do anything other than stare at their phones’. Yeah. So, I was not going to be that ‘younger generation’ and irritate him enough to lose my job.
Thomas Daughtry owned a rather successful dental practice, and he had originally hired me as a part-time bookkeeper while I was still in high school (I think mostly out of pity), but he had kept me on and hired me full-time when I graduated because it turned out I was a whiz at accounting. I didn’t have any formal schooling or mentoring, but he had been so pleased with my efficiency and accuracy, he let the fact that I didn’t have a degree slide.
He paid me enough to live off of, and while there might not be any Prada handbags in my closet, I lived comfortably enough to support myself and occasionally buy a beer or two.
The only downside to my job was that Dr. Daughtry was a straight up perv. A married perv, at that.
He was great at straddling the line between appropriate work behavior and risqué comments about my body or outfit. He had never crossed the line though, and while still very inappropriate, none of his antics were enough to make me give up such a good paying job.
Well, a good paying job in my eyes.
I grew up the epitome of your stereotypical trailer park trash. My father was a dirty drunk who barely held down a job and my mother was an unhappy, verbally abusive harpy. I was an only child (thank God) and so I was usually the sole recipient of their bad moods.
My parents’ focus was primarily on making each other miserable, so I started working part time as soon as I legally could while still going to school. It wasn’t until my senior year of school that I found the job with Dr. Daughtry through a teacher recommendation.
I had bought my own clothes, school supplies, food, hygiene necessities…you name it. My only saving grace was that my parents didn’t take my money from me. They were content enough with the fact that they didn’t have to come out of their own pockets to provide for me.
It took me a lot of years and saving up to be able to get a one-bedroom apartment in a decent neighborhood and I loved that I had done it all on my own. I wasn’t going to risk it all just to answer my phone for a booty call time and place.
Even if that booty call came with a nine-inch dick as wide as my wrist.
Gabriel Buchanan was the man attached to that magnificent piece of man meat and the bane of my existence.
How did he earn a title as important as The Bane, you wonder?
Because I was madly in love with him and it didn’t matter. My feelings of love were irrelevant and made no impact on anything other than my makeup whenever I got caught up in my feelings and threw myself epic pity parties.
The Buchanan brothers were royalty in the town of Square Garden, Indiana. It was a decent size town an hour’s drive away from the city where Buchanan Industries helped run the world. It was a powerhouse business where the reigns were handed down from generation to generation. There was Mason Buchanan, the oldest, then Aiden Buchanan, and finally, the twins, Michael and Gabriel.
I was the same age as Gabriel and Michael and had gone to school with them. We had graduated in the same class, and while Gabriel went to Blaineview (one of the most elite, private colleges in the country), I stayed back in Square Garden working. I knew I was never destined for college. I would never have been able to afford it and my grades weren’t good enough for full ride scholarships.
My phone buzzed in my pocket again, so I looked up at the clock on the wall to see how close I was to the end of my shift. It was Friday and Dr. Daughtry always closed up shop at midday and it was close enough to one o’clock that Gabriel could wait until then for a response. If I was going to start a new direction in my life, I might as well start now.
Dr. Daughtry poked his head into my shoebox office that was more a closet than an actual office. “Start shutting it down, Justice,” he said, smiling. “It’s time to start the weekend off.”
I smiled back because, for once, he seemed to sound genuine. “You don’t have to tell me twice, Dr. Daughtry.”
He shook his head. “Are you ever going to call me Thomas, Justice?”
“Nope,” I said, popping the ‘p’ as I shut down my computer and started locking up my desk drawers.
He chuckled and, thankfully, left it at that. “Okay, okay. See you Monday. Have a great weekend.”
I gave him another smile. “Thank you,” I replied. “You, too.”
As soon as he cleared the doorway, I hurried to gather my purse and jacket so I could walk out with the other employees. I learned the hard way how creepy the good doctor could be when left alone with him and I was never going to put myself in that position again.
I waved to Lori, one of the dental hygienists, and Hannah, the receptionist, on my way through the lobby and out the front door. The second I cleared the doorway, I pulled out my phone and saw the four missed texts from Gabriel.
Starting BI on Monday, so I’ll c u this wknd.
??????
Is there a reason ur ignoring my texts?
Just noticed the time. Hit me up when ur off.
I took a deep breath as I leaned up against my white, used Nissan Maxima. I knew he and Michael were supposed to take their rightful places at BI on Monday now that they’ve graduated and earned their degrees. I’ve known the path all the Buchanan Brothers were going to take since the first day I ever understood who they were. But the heartache at this new turning point in Gabriel’s life still felt heavy in my chest.
I’d been sleeping with Gabriel Buchanan since our junior year of high school, and now here we were, 22 years old, and we were still just sleeping with each other.
Hell, we didn’t even sleep.
We had sex.
That’s it.
That’s all.
If we slept, it was because we’d nod off between rounds of sex. If we woke up in the same bed together the next morning, it was because Gabriel wanted to start his day balls deep inside some vagina, not because he couldn’t bear to part from me.
I wasn’t confused about my purpose in Gabriel Buchanan’s life. I haven’t been since the day I handed over my virginity to him. The problem was, back then, I was positive I could take what little pieces of Gabriel he wanted to give me and not get caught up in a whirlwind of feelings for him. And it worked.
For a little while, it worked. But the longer we continued to sleep together, the more difficult it was not to fall for him.
See, while Gabriel might be only using me for sex, he wasn’t a jerk about it. He always treated me as if we were real friends and he was always respectful…well, unless we were naked. When we were in bed together, all bets were off. Gabriel Buchanan was a dirty bastard in between the sheets.
The thing was, that except for his brothers (because they were abnormally close), no one knew Gabriel and I had been sleeping together. I had been Gabriel’s dirty little secret, and six years later, I still was. And now six years and one day later, I realized I didn’t want to still be.
I never questioned Gabriel about what he did when we weren’t together, and I wasn’t so naïve as to believe that he hadn’t been knee deep in females when he went off to Blaineview, but all this time later, Gabriel Buchanan was still the only man I’d ever slept with.
I looked down at my phone, and steeling my spine, sent off a text that would change my life.
No matter how much I loved Gabriel, it was time to experience what it was like to be in a real relationship with someone who loved me back.
Chapter 2
Gabriel~
I stared down at the text that came across my phone and figured it was a mistake. Justice must have been texting someone else, and the messages got crossed over.
At least, that’s what I was telling myself as I tried my hardest to ignore the hallowing out I felt in the pit of
my stomach.
Busy this wknd. Got errands 2 run. Talk 2 u ltr.
I reread the text and ignored how my thumbs trembled over the screen’s keyboard. I’ve been seeing Justice Hillman since we were sophomores in high school. That was over six years ago, and never once, has she ever not agreed to see me or make time for me.
Never.
I texted back.
Busy doing what?
I waited.
And waited.
And waited some more.
Almost a half hour later, her reply came through.
Going n2 city with Beatrice 2nite. Cleaning top 2 btm 2morrow all day.
What the fuck?
She’s going into the fucking city tonight? What the fuck for?
And, so what, if she was cleaning her apartment all day tomorrow? That still left all of Saturday night free. I could spend the night and then head back home on Sunday and get ready for my official first day at Buchanan Industries. With Michael, my twin, and I finally graduating and getting our degrees, we could finally join our older brothers, Mason and Aiden, in the running of BI that’s been in our family for generations.
I felt a slap on my back right before I heard, “Jesus, Gabe. What did that phone ever do to you?”
I looked over at Michael and scowled. “When did you get here?”
“Snuck in last night after about two,” he answered as he made himself at home in my kitchen. I smirked but didn’t comment. We’ve lived in the same house all our lives, so it wasn’t a surprised that we were still trying to adjust to solitary homes.
And it didn’t matter if we didn’t. I’d live with my brothers forever if that’s how things had to be. We were extremely close, but growing up the way we did, our commitment to one another had always been a good thing. Our father was a tyrant and our mother had been neglectful, so we relied on each other a lot.
Mason was the oldest and, really, the patriarch of the Buchanans. Our father liked to pretend that he still had a say in how we lived our lives and what went on at BI, but we all knew the truth. Mason ran shit, and he ran it with our best intentions at heart, always.
If You Could Only Feel (Buchanan Brothers Series Book 3) Page 1