Table of Contents
Legal Page
Title Page
Book Description
Dedication
Trademarks Acknowledgement
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
New Excerpt
About the Author
Publisher Page
A Total-E-Bound Publication
www.total-e-bound.com
Perfect Fit
ISBN # 978-1-78184-812-8
©Copyright Taige Crenshaw 2013
Cover Art by Posh Gosh ©Copyright October 2013
Edited by Rebecca Douglas
Total-E-Bound Publishing
This is a work of fiction. All characters, places and events are from the author’s imagination and should not be confused with fact. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, events or places is purely coincidental.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any material form, whether by printing, photocopying, scanning or otherwise without the written permission of the publisher, Total-E-Bound Publishing.
Applications should be addressed in the first instance, in writing, to Total-E-Bound Publishing. Unauthorised or restricted acts in relation to this publication may result in civil proceedings and/or criminal prosecution.
The author and illustrator have asserted their respective rights under the Copyright Designs and Patents Acts 1988 (as amended) to be identified as the author of this book and illustrator of the artwork.
Published in 2013 by Total-E-Bound Publishing, Think Tank, Ruston Way, Lincoln, LN6 7FL, United Kingdom.
Warning:
This book contains sexually explicit content which is only suitable for mature readers. This story has a heat rating of Total-e-burning and a sexometer of 2.
This story contains 140 pages, additionally there is also a free excerpt at the end of the book containing 13 pages.
Singleton
PERFECT FIT
Taige Crenshaw
Book Two in the Singleton Series
When your love for someone is tested, how do you get beyond the silence and pain to get back to what made you become an us…?
After a busy day, Regina Jacobs gets home to the empty house she used to share with her husband. The sight of the divorce papers waiting for her devastates her. She loves her husband and although they have not lived together for a while or even really talked, she’d thought they could work it out. She pushes off the hurt and embraces the fury. She won’t give up her ‘us’ without a fight. Determined to reclaim the man who she has known was hers from the time she was a teenager, Regina seeks out her husband—the man who knows her heart, soul and body, and sets each aflame.
Spencer Jacobs knows he is doing the right thing in filing for divorce. It is painful but he knows it is necessary. He loves Regina but sometimes love is not enough. When Regina comes to him after receiving the papers, Spencer doesn’t know what to make of her words that he was giving up so easily on them. He’d already fought for them, and is bruised and battered from the loss of the woman who makes him forget all else but being hers. It will take everything he has to return, and this time he know failure means the end.
Can two people who have let the silence between them linger too long find each other again? It will take opening the wounds that led to the silence and getting back to the basic belief to rebuild what has been broken. For these two there is no one else that matches them. Together they are the other half of a…Perfect Fit.
Dedication
To my mother, who has always been my number one fan. Because of you, I love to read and write. To my big sister and second mother who has always believed in me.
Trademarks Acknowledgement
The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of the following wordmarks mentioned in this work of fiction:
Subaru Tribeca: Fuji Heavy Industries
Bones: Fox Broadcasting Company
Subaru Forester: Fuji Heavy Industries
War Paint: Lorrie Morgan and Tom Shapiro
George Foreman: Spectrum Brands, Inc.
We Gon’ Fight: Durrell Babbs and Antonio Dixon
One: Bono
Trust: Keyshia Cole and F. Taylor
Toyota Sequoia: Toyota Motor Corporation
Mirrors: Justin Timberlake, Timothy Mosley, Jerome ‘J-Roc’ Harmon and James Fauntleroy
Escalade: Cadillac, General Motors Company
White Palace: Universal Pictures
Chapter One
Regina Jacobs rubbed her temple, grateful to finally be home. The duffel bag and purse on her shoulder felt like they weighed a hundred pounds, but Regina knew it was just her tiredness. The three-day event for the Locke family gathering had been fun, but a lot of work, so now on the last day she was feeling tired. The event was held annually, on Labor Day weekend, and she and her partners in Moments—the event planning company she co-owned—always looked forward to planning and attending. They also couldn’t wait to start their sort-of break. Although they still worked at the offices, they had no functions scheduled for three weeks after the Friday before Labor Day, and this year they’d extended the break to four weeks—Regina was looking forward to the time to rejuvenate and getting ready for the rest of the year.
She walked up the steps to the porch then paused, thinking about the news of Julianne Locke and Keenan Callaghan’s engagement. Regina was happy her best friend Julianne had found someone to love again. Regina pressed her hand against her chest as she felt a pang of pain and regret for her own situation. It had happened earlier too, when Julianne had shared her news at the gathering. The joy she felt for Julianne was tempered by her own estrangement from her husband, Spencer Jacobs. Regina wondered for the umpteenth time how had it become so bad that she’d ended up living apart from the man who had her heart and soul.
Just the thought of him lit her body with want. He was less than ten minutes away from their home, but he could be on another planet for how large the space between them was. She pressed her palm against her stomach, the fluttering sensation increasing. Regina shook off thoughts of her husband and headed to the door of the house. She opened it and went to step in, but stopped when she spotted an envelope that looked as if it had been pushed under her door. The house alarm beeped a warning, and she stepped over the envelope and punched in the code to disarm it. She placed her duffel on the floor by the entry table beside the front door, and her purse on the surface.
Unsure what the envelope could be, she went back to it and squatted down to look. Her breath caught as she recognised the scrawled writing on it as her husband’s. Her heart ached as she saw ‘Regina’ instead of Reggie, what he usually called her. She took a breath then picked up the envelope and opened it quickly, expecting a letter.
Maybe he wants to work things out. That w— Shock and hurt filled Regina as she read the top of the sheaf of papers. In the next moment, she shook as rage blossomed through her, pushing every other emotion out. She shut down, thinking what the papers meant. Rising, she reached to retrieve her purse. She turned the lock on her front door, then pivoted on her feet, stepping outside and slamming the door behind her. With rapid steps, she descended the stairs and strode to her vehicle. In moments, she was inside, starting the SUV and driving around the circular drive back towards the entrance of the property. She made a right onto Simmons Avenue, then gunned the engine. There wasn’t far to go, but the minutes felt like an eternity. She tightened her hands on the wheel, then released as she breathed in and out, working to calm her temper. Finally, i
n ten minutes, she turned into a road, stopping before the gates. She had forgotten about them. How was she going to get in?
“Damn, I did—” She watched as the gates opened. “Humph. So he was expecting me.” Regina drove through the open gates and up to the house.
The sprawling, two-storey, ranch style house was very similar to the outer exterior of her own, but the differences, especially inside, showed the tastes of their owners. The house in front of her was more organised and contained, while hers was more comfortable and homey. She parked, grabbed the papers, then was out of her vehicle, rushing across the drive to the steps and up them to the front door. She raised her fist to knock, not caring to press the doorbell. The door swung open before she could.
“I didn’t hear the bell.” The man who had opened the door was looking behind him. “What do you mean the door is fo—” He turned his head and blinked.
Although she was pissed off, Regina’s knees went weak as she viewed the familiar, deep blue-eyes. Unconsciously, she studied his blond hair that fell in messy disarray around his sexy face. His porcelain skin was paler than usual. He looks so tired. Is he not sleeping? Oh, Spencer, you always work yourself so hard that you forget to sleep or eat. His lean frame was even skinnier than usual.
“Regina—”
At the sound of her full name, Regina’s concern dissipated and she focused on why she was here. She slapped the papers against his chest.
He took them and gazed at them, shaking his head.
“You coward. Dropping this off when you knew I wasn’t home.” She pushed past him into the house.
She didn’t see who he had been talking to when he’d opened the door, but she knew they were smart enough to make themselves scarce. Regina crossed her arms over her chest and turned, waiting for him to say something.
“Don’t make this difficult, Regina. I—”
“You don’t get to say that. Don’t get to call this just ‘difficult’.” Regina advanced on him. “You left divorce papers under my door, Spencer.” She said his whole name, since he was using hers. “Divorce papers,” she spat the words out, shaking at the thought. “Under my door, when you knew I would be at the gathering.”
The guilt on his face showed he knew what he had been doing.
“If you want a divorce, you should be man enough to say it to my face.” Regina lifted her hand, pointing at him. “Not this way. So cold and detached. Like we meant not—” Her voice broke, and she cleared her throat, battling back tears. “Nothing. The years we had meant less than the shit on your shoes.”
“Regina. I couldn’t”—he took a step towards her—“face you. I can’t look at you and ask for this.” He held up the papers.
Hope filled her, and Regina stepped to him.
“But we have to do this. We’ve put it off long enough.” Spencer’s tone was firm.
She stopped and stared at him in disbelief. “Long enough. Is that all our marriage means to you? A long enough time?”
“You’re twisting my words, Regina. We haven’t been man and wife for a couple of years.” Spencer rubbed his hand over his face, and when he lowered it, he looked even more tired.
“Spencer, we have some problems, and we can wo—”
“How would we work thorough them? You won’t talk with me,” he said quietly.
Regina flinched at the softness. When Spencer lowered his voice it was equivalent to a shout, since he rarely lifted his voice when angry or making a point.
“I’m not the one who wouldn’t talk when we went to therapy,” she defended.
“That was a last resort, Regina. We’d lived in silence for a year before we tried therapy. I gave it a shot for a year, but I couldn’t any longer, so I left a year ago. Three years of this. Isn’t that enough, Regina?” He briefly closed his eyes and when he opened them, the sadness in them made her throat clog. “Shouldn’t we move on and be happy again?”
Regina took a shuddering breath and shook as she realised that she was losing everything. “I… Don’t you love me anymore?” She held her breath, waiting for his answer.
Spencer averted his gaze, and Regina locked her knees as she faced the reality that she had lost the man who was her soul mate.
“Love has nothing to do with this.” Spencer looked back at her then shook his head. “Sometimes love isn’t enough.”
“Love is always enough. Spencer, we’re the perfect fit for each other. From that first moment when I met you when we were both fourteen, I knew we were.” She smiled wryly. “You, on the other hand, took some convincing.”
“That is the past, Regina. W—”
“Our past. You’re trying to make me believe that you don’t think it matters what we had.” Regina stepped to him and, with a shaking hand, cupped his cheek. “You didn’t say that you don’t love me, Spencer.” He hadn’t said the words, and that gave her hope that he did.
“Lov—”
“Don’t say it again.” Regina placed her hand on his chest, and when she felt him shudder, she stifled a smile. He wanted her. “I know you, Spencer, and even as you said it, I could tell you didn’t believe it.”
“I can’t, Regina.” He circled her wrists with his fingers.
Regina shivered, lust filling her. She hadn’t felt his touch in so long. Her body craved to be near him. Regina fought her instinct to press herself against him. “You can. All you need to do is give us a chance to work through this.”
“We had chances, Regina.” He shook his head.
“We did, but at that time, neither of us were ready.” Regina pressed her hand, palm flat, against him more firmly on his chest, over his heart. She tapped her finger on his chest. “I’m ready now.”
“Are you sure?” Spencer looked doubtful but thoughtful before he spoke again. “Are you really ready to talk about everything? And I mean everything, Regina. The reason why we let silence linger so long that it caused the end of us.”
Regina flinched and hesitated. She was ready…but ripping open the wounds that almost killed her was something she didn’t want to do. She didn’t know if she had the strength to face it.
“Let us go, Regina.” Spencer gently removed her hand and pressed the papers into them, then moved her hand off his face. “Sign the papers and find happ—” His voice cracked, then he blinked, his eyes slightly reddened. He stepped back, releasing her. “Happiness with someone else.”
“How can you say that to me?” Regina stared at him, shaking her head.
“Because one of us has to.” Spencer touched her check gently. “I wish you had just signed instead of putting us through this. Let it go.”
“Spencer…I…don’t…” She couldn’t form a coherent thought. She was shaking. Regina folded her arms across her body, the papers almost burning her as they touched her skin. “How can I let you go?”
Spencer didn’t reply—he stepped back and waited by the door. Regina walked to him and stopped in the open doorway. She placed her hand on his chest.
“You don’t want to fight for us. Is it really so easy to let us go?” Regina fought to keep her tears at bay as she walked out of the house.
She went to her vehicle and got in, then started it and pulled out. Not really registering anything, she drove home. With her mind in turmoil, she wondered what she would do. While they’d been living apart, she’d had hope that they would find their way back to each other. They were still married, and time would heal what was wrong. But today that had changed. Bleary-eyed, Regina saw her turn and took it, driving up to her house. She parked, grabbed the papers from the passenger seat then went up the steps to her house. Mechanically, she unlocked the door and went in. Closing the door, she set the alarm, then walked through the darkened house, moonlight filtering in through the windows and bathing the hall in light. In the living room, she flopped onto the couch. She put the papers on the centre table, then leant back and clasped her hands, hanging them between her spread knees. She sat in the silent house she had built with Spencer and felt the emp
tiness echo. It was something she’d have to get used to. Blinking quickly, Regina’s eyes burned as she gave into the tears.
“Oh, God, it’s over…really over…” The thick sound of her tearful voice filled the room. Wetness dampened her cheeks as she wept. Sliding forward, she dropped to the floor, shaking her head, rocking back and forth and hugging herself.
What am I going to do now?
* * * *
“What the hell am I going to do now?” Spencer stared as the deep indigo Subaru Tribeca went down the circular drive and the taillights disappeared through the gates. Pain filled him, and he fought his need to roar and rage at the unfairness of life. He knew life wasn’t fair, but it sucked to know it. To live with the realisation that he was now losing the woman he loved more than anything in the world. He touched his chest where she had placed her hand over his heart. He felt as if it had been ripped out.
“Get your head out of your ass and go after your wife,” a man spoke behind him.
“Interfering son of a bitch.” Spencer slammed the door closed, anger filling him, and pushed away the pain. He turned, clenching his hands into fists.
“Our parents, if they were still alive, would take offence to that statement.” Driscoll Jacobs, his brother, crossed his arms over his chest and leaned against the wall of the hall leading to the back rooms.
“Mom would call you the same thing.” Spencer mirrored him, crossing his arms.
He studied his brother and felt pang of loss as he saw a lot of their dad in him. Driscoll had their dad’s darker colouring—his skin looking like he had a permanent tan—while Spencer had the porcelain colouring like their mother. They both had the blond hair that their mom and deep blue eyes and lanky frame came from their dad. Driscoll was like their dad in other ways—for one, he thought he was always right.
“She probably would. But in this case, she would agree with me. You’re a fool to let Regina go. I never thought you would be a coward, Spencer.” Driscoll lowered his voice, the throaty growl that had sold millions of albums vicious and direct. “For over a year, I’ve let you stay here with me without interfering.”
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