Love, Laughter, and Happily Ever Afters Collection (65 page)

As he pushed inside her, feeling the woman he loved tight and hot around him and her arms holding him close and her breath warm against his lips as she whispered his name, he stopped wondering if things were going to keep getting better.

Of course they were, because Maddie was his, finally his.

“You feel so good,” Jamison murmured, pulling back to the end of her, only to slide right back into her sweet heat with a groan. “God, I love you.”

“I love you,” she said, breath coming faster. “I’m so glad I let myself get tangled in your smolder web.”

“It was
your
smolder web.” He cupped her thigh in his right hand, guiding her leg around his hips. “You’re the one who wanted to go skinny dipping.”

“Thank God for whiskey,” she said, her laugh becoming a moan as Jamison thrust deeper.

“Thank God for you,” Jamison said, quickening his pace as he brought his fingers to tease the top of her, bringing her over seconds before he lost himself, coming so hard the world blurred and his ears rang and his heart fell out of his chest and into Maddie’s hands where it was going to stay.

Until death did them part.

OTHER TITLES BY JESSIE

Always a Bridesmaid Series

Betting On You

Keeping You

Wild For You

Catching You

Taking You

Wild Rush Series

One Wild Night

This Wicked Rush

One Perfect Love

Cupid Island Series

A Cupid Island Christmas

Auditioning You

Daring You

Cupid Island Wedding Anthology

Fire and Icing Series

Melt With You

Hot For You

Sweet To You

Saving You

Perfect For You

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

www.jessieevansauthor.com

Jessie Evans gave up a career as an international woman of mystery to write contemporary Southern romances and sexy, boundary-pushing New Adult reads. She enjoys sweet, small town romances, and fictional walks on the wild side, and can't imagine a better job than playing pretend for a living. She's married to the man of her dreams, and together they're raising a few children in a cabin in the boonies. She grew up in rural Arkansas, spending summers running wild, being chewed by chiggers, and now appreciates her home in a chigger-free part of the world even more. When she's not writing, Jessie enjoys playing her dulcimer (badly), sewing the worlds ugliest quilts to give to her friends, going for bike rides with her house full of boys, and wandering the woods, glass of wine and camera in hand, on the lookout for Bigfoot. A southern girl, born and bred, Jessie loves writing romances with sizzle, and hopes you'll enjoy her stories set in the south.

Facebook
Twitter

E-Newsletter Sign-Up
For new release info, giveaways, & exclusive content

UNAFRAID

By

Melody Grace

© 2013 Melody Grace All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations for reviews. No part of this book may be scanned, uploaded or distributed via the Internet, without the publisher's permission and is a violation of International copyright law and subjects the violator to severe fines and/or imprisonment.

Interior design by Angela McLaurin, Fictional Formats

Cover photograph copyright Jessie Weinberg.

BOOK DESCRIPTION

"The first time I saw her, I knew this girl was wilder than any stallion I’d ever trained. She was headstrong, wounded, passionate and free. And I had to have her…"

Brittany Ray doesn’t care about her bad reputation. Growing up in a sleepy beach town with a junkie mom and a runaway dad, Brit’s learned the hard way that the people you love will only let you down. It’s no use hoping for love or happiness. Some dreams aren’t meant for girls like her.

Hunter Covington is one of those dreams.

Gorgeous, charming Hunter is damn near perfect—and it’s killing him. Son of Charleston royalty, he’s been trapped in a gilded cage since the day he was born. Now he’s breaking free. He’s quit law school to restore his grandpa’s old horse ranch, trying to soothe the demons in his soul. But Beachwood Bay is full of old ghosts, like the mysterious girl who spent an unforgettable night with him—and then slipped away before dawn. Brit.

Everything about her screams danger, but Hunter doesn’t care: he’s never felt a connection so deep. And try as she may, Brit can’t resist the desire consuming her —or the safety she finds in Hunter’s arms.

A reckless passion. An undeniable bond. Scarred by their pasts, Brit and Hunter fight to heal old wounds. But will dark secrets tear apart their new beginning? And when love is the biggest risk of all, can they find the courage to face the future unafraid?

PROLOGUE

HUNTER

MY GRANDPA TRAINED horses his whole life. He had a gift; people say he was the best they’d ever seen.

We used to visit his ranch out in Beachwood Bay every summer. I’d watch in awe as the horses would be led in to that old dirt paddock, their eyes wild, nostrils flaring. They fought the lead, shied away from every touch, damn near killed a couple of ranch hands trying to get away. But Grandpa never quit. It would take him all summer long, working his magic, pacing slowly in that ring, learning what it was that made the horses tick, until by the end of it, even the craziest ones were eating peppermints from the palm of his hand.

The first time I laid eyes on Brittany Ray, I knew this girl was wilder than any stallion I’d ever seen. She was headstrong, wounded, passionate, and free. And I had to have her.

“Some horses will never be tamed,” Grandpa used to tell me. “The only way you get through is to earn their respect. You’ve got to learn what they’re so scared about, because the wildest ones… Well, those are the ones that are the most scared of all.”

I didn’t listen to him, not at first. I was eighteen, I thought I had the world all figured out, and hell, I was so desperate for her, I took any chance I could get. One night together, one brief taste of her beauty. But when morning came, she was gone.

That’s when I realized, one night with her would never be enough.

The world kept spinning after that summer, taking me far from Beachwood, and changing my life in ways too tragic to comprehend. Grandpa’s gone now too, the old ranch is crumbling to disrepair, and some nights, it feels like my time with Brit was just a fever dream. But that’s the thing about dreams: they can keep you going, even through the bleakest nights and the darkest of days. Give you something to believe in, when everything else in your world is guilt and sadness and pain.

She saved me, that girl. She saved me, and she never even knew it.

I always swore to myself, I’d make her more than just a dream. I’d go back to that town, I’d take the time to earn her trust, the way my grandpa taught me, until I know every secret lurking in those beautiful dark eyes, every hope she holds, deep in her soul.

Until she trusts me enough to stay.

My truck cruises round the bend in the road, and I see the sign loom closer, out on the edge of the windy highway as I cross the county line.

Welcome to Beachwood Bay.

I smile, feeling like myself again for the first time in damn too long. Yeah, I’m going to do it right this time.

I’m going to make her mine.

CHAPTER ONE

BRIT

IT’S FRIDAY NIGHT in Beachwood Bay, which means there’s only one place to go: Jimmy’s. By eight, the bar is already packed, full of tourists and locals all wanting a cheap beer and some loud music to get their weekend started right.

“When are you going to change the name?” I ask Garrett, slamming down another order. He’s behind the bar, pouring beers as fast as he can to keep up. “I’ve had three tourists ask to meet Jimmy, and it’s too much hassle to explain the whole thing.”

“Hey, you don’t mess with history.” Garrett just gives that lazy shrug. He’s dressed in his usual uniform of a plaid shirt, jeans, and two-day stubble; he’s the boss now, so he gets to wear what he wants, while I’m stuck in my black Jimmy’s tank and cutoffs.

I roll my eyes. “Maybe history can move a little quicker,” I suggest, flicking back a sweaty strand of hair, dyed a dark brown this month. “I’m still waiting on those cocktails for the sorority girls in the corner.”

Garrett glances over to the group of girls in skintight cutoffs giggling in the booth. “Nah, you go ahead, I’ve got them.”

“What about Melissa?” I remind him, loading up my tray with waters and cutlery. I look up in time to catch a sheepish look flit across his face.

“Yeah, Melissa said she wouldn’t be in tonight. Or, any other night.” Garrett mumbles.

“No!” I cry, swatting him with my dish-towel. “You can’t keep doing this.”

“Doing what?”

“Screwing all the waitresses.”

“Not all.” He points out, with a grin.

“Eww. That’s disgusting.” I glare. Garrett is like a big brother to me, and with my real brother, Emerson, off in the city, he’s the only family here I’ve got. “I’m serious,” I warn him, “they keep quitting when you break their hearts, and then there’s no one left to help me serve!”

I head out across the bar, cursing the fact that Garrett can’t keep it zipped. At this rate, we’ll be blacklisted by every waitress in the state before fall.

Not that I should care.

The truth is, I’ve been telling myself that helping out at the bar is just a favor. A short-term, stopgap kind of thing until I figure out what I’m going to do with my life. But it’s been a year since I graduated high school, and I’m still here: serving burgers to the folks who wouldn’t look twice at me in the street, like somehow being a waitress is part of the plan, and not just treading water as time slips on by.

“I forgot,” Garrett tells me, when I head on back to the bar after taking another round of orders. “Mail came for you, I left it in the office.”

“Thanks.” I go check it out when there’s a lull in the crowd. The envelope is propped on the messy desk with my name printed in neat black type.

Charleston postmark.

I stop, my heart suddenly clenching in my chest. The letter is slim, weighing next to nothing, and before I can get caught up in wondering whether that’s good news or bad, I rip it open and pull out the single sheet of paper.

Dear Miss Ray,

Thank you for your interest in our company. We regret to inform you…

The words blur with a sudden sting of tears. I angrily swipe them away, crumpling the letter into a ball and hurling it to the ground before I can read another word.

I don’t need to. They’re all the same.

I’ve been secretly applying for internships for months now, sending out my portfolio to every designer and clothing line I can find. I’m not crazy, I know the best I can hope for is a basic assistant gig––fetching coffees and running fabric samples––but that’s just fine with me. Anything to get my foot in the door, and start working my way up to one day designing my own line. But every single application comes back with the same, impersonal letter. Sure, they’re polite, but after reading the first dozen, I got the message written between the lines: you’re not good enough. You don’t have the skills, or the qualifications, or the fancy fashion school credentials to even get a foot in the door.