Table of Contents
Jailbait
Dedication
Acknowledgments
Other titles by Lani Lynn Vale
Blurb
Part I
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Part II
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
What's Next?
Copyright ©2021 Lani Lynn Vale
All Rights Reserved
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
To my mom—I couldn’t do any of this without you.
Acknowledgments
Golden Czermak - Photographer
My Brother’s Editor & Ink It Out Editing- My editors
Cover Me Darling - Cover Artist
My mom - Thank you for reading this book eight million, two hundred and twenty-seven times.
Kendra, Lisa, Laura, Penney, Kathy, Mindy, Barbara & Amanda—I don’t know what I would do without y’all. Thank you, my lovely betas, for loving my books as much as I do.
Other titles by Lani Lynn Vale
The Freebirds
Boomtown
Highway Don’t Care
Another One Bites the Dust
Last Day of My Life
Texas Tornado
I Don’t Dance
The Heroes of The Dixie Wardens MC
Lights To My Siren
Halligan To My Axe
Kevlar To My Vest
Keys To My Cuffs
Life To My Flight
Charge To My Line
Counter To My Intelligence
Right To My Wrong
Code 11- KPD SWAT
Center Mass
Double Tap
Bang Switch
Execution Style
Charlie Foxtrot
Kill Shot
Coup De Grace
The Uncertain Saints
Jack & Coke
Vodka On The Rocks
Bad Apple
Dirty Mother
Rusty Nail
The Kilgore Fire Series
Shock Advised
Flash Point
Oxygen Deprived
Controlled Burn
Put Out
I Like Big Dragons Series
I Like Big Dragons and I Cannot Lie
Dragons Need Love, Too
Oh, My Dragon
The Dixie Warden Rejects
Beard Mode
Fear the Beard
Son of a Beard
I’m Only Here for the Beard
The Beard Made Me Do It
Beard Up
For the Love of Beard
Law & Beard
There’s No Crying in Baseball
Pitch Please
Quit Your Pitchin’
Listen, Pitch
The Hail Raisers
Hail No
Go to Hail
Burn in Hail
What the Hail
The Hail You Say
Hail Mary
The Simple Man Series
Kinda Don’t Care
Maybe Don’t Wanna
Get You Some
Ain’t Doin’ It
Too Bad So Sad
Bear Bottom Guardians MC
Mess Me Up
Talkin’ Trash
How About No
My Bad
One Chance, Fancy
It Happens
Keep It Classy
Snitches Get Stitches
F-Bomb
The Southern Gentleman Series
Hissy Fit
Lord Have Mercy
Quit Being Ugly
KPD Motorcycle Patrol
Hide Your Crazy
It Wasn’t Me
I’d Rather Not
Make Me
Sinners are Winners
If You Say So
SWAT 2.0
Just Kidding
Fries Before Guys
Maybe Swearing Will Help
Ask Me If I Care
May Contain Wine
Joke’s on You
Join the Club
Any Day Now
Say it Ain’t So
Officially Over It
Nobody Knows
Depends Who’s Asking
Valentine Boys
Herd That
Crazy Heifer
Chute Yeah
Get Bucked
Souls Chapel Revenants
Repeat Offender
Conjugal Visits
Jailbait
Doin’ a Dime
Kitty Kitty
Gen Pop
Inmate of the Month
Standalones
Something’ About That Boy
For a complete updated list visit: www.lanilynnvale.com
About the Book
The first time I saw her was across the room at a bar. I had no idea at the time that she was only sixteen. All I knew was that she was beautiful, she was sending me do-me vibes from across the room, and I was fresh off a deployment where there’d been nobody but men for nine of the longest months of my life.
The second time that I saw her was at a court hearing that would decide how long I’d be sent to prison for. She was a cute little curly-haired blonde with wide, expressive eyes, a banging body, and the reason that I’d gone to prison in the first place.
The third time I saw her was through a glass divider of the prison visitation room as she waited for her stepfather, my lawyer, to tell me how sorry he was that he lost my case. Especially when I’d been the one to kill the man that was about to kill his daughter.
The last time, the time that I decided enough was enough, was when I saw her at my bar eight weeks after I’d been set free.
Unlucky for her, I’d stopped being a good guy about two seconds after those bars closed behind me twelve years ago. Now all that was left was a shell of a man that didn’t see the good in anything. Anything except for her.
PART I
CHAPTER 1
Did life ever kick your ass so bad that you drive the speed limit home with no music?
-Trick’s secret thoughts
TRICK
“This is the best place there is in town,” my friend, Shawn, declared.
I looked over at Shawn, then looked back at the bar’s front doors.
This place didn’t look like the best place in town. The place looked like a giant shithole.
“Are you sure?” I asked.
The last thing I felt like doing was going to a shitty bar. I wanted to go to a place that would have some ladies in it that were willing. I’d been in the sandbox for nine months now, and I really, really wanted to get my dick into a woman in the worst way.
“They have good beer on tap, it’s not exp
ensive, and I’m fairly sure that I just saw the hottest chick in the world get out of that car. Look at her coming up the walk. She’s behind that truck right now. Oh, holy shit.” Shawn groaned.
I followed where his eyes were pointed and felt like I’d taken a sledgehammer to the chest.
The woman was breathtaking.
The first thing to draw my eye was her hair. It was an almost snow white and so curly that with each step she took, her curls bounced. It was long, down to well past her lower ribs, and she had half of it tucked up into a small ponytail on the top of her head.
The next thing I noticed was her body.
She was wearing black leather pants, a black tank top, and black motorcycle boots.
But holy fuckin’ shit, I’d never seen a woman fill out a pair of leather pants quite so freakin’ well.
“Dibs,” I said quietly, feeling those words deep in my chest.
“Hey, I saw her first,” Shawn interrupted.
“You might have,” I agreed. “But I called her first.”
He snorted. “Let’s let her decide.”
Shawn’s words nearly made me laugh.
“Sounds good to me,” I said. “But just so you know, I’m not throwing this round. I’m going all in.”
The last time we’d ‘let her decide’ I’d given up because Shawn was so determined. But this time, that wouldn’t be happening. There would be no giving up this time.
“You won’t be winning,” he said. “You’re dressed like a loser.”
I looked down at my attire.
I was wearing a simple red t-shirt, worn-out blue jeans from my time before the military when I worked on a farm, and a pair of worn-out cowboy boots that had definitely seen better days.
“What’s wrong with what I’m wearing?” I asked as I started up the sidewalk toward the bar that the woman I’d been eyeing had disappeared into.
“Welcome to Happy Jacks,” the bouncer on the inside of the door said. “IDs?”
I pulled out my wallet and showed him my ID.
He gave it a once over and then jerked his head toward the door that would lead fully inside.
“Have a nice time,” he said as he moved to look at Shawn’s ID. “You sure that you’re twenty-one? You look like you’re fifteen.”
Shawn curled his lip up at the bouncer. “I’m twenty-one, man. Just turned it, actually. Glad you’re being so thorough in checking IDs at the door, though.”
We both had just turned twenty-one.
Ironically, we also both had the same birthday.
When we’d met the first time, we’d bonded over the taste of dirt that the drill sergeant had practically made us eat. During our shared misery, Shawn had shared that it was his birthday. Then I’d shared that it was mine, and that was that.
“Have a good time,” the bouncer grumbled.
I walked into the bar, my eyes immediately seeking out the blonde.
I found her at the end of the bar nearest the door that led into the back. She was belly up to the bar and sucking down what looked to be a lime and Coke.
She turned to survey the room behind her at the same time that I took a step forward toward the seat two down from hers.
Shawn was close to my heels.
But when she turned and saw two men heading toward her, her eyes didn’t go to Shawn. They went directly to me.
The straw that was in her mouth fell from her lips, and she blinked a couple of times.
She had freckles. A lot of them. Not an overpowering amount, but enough that it drew my eyes to her cheeks first, right under her eyes.
Then my gaze caught her eyes, and the breath left my lungs for a short moment in time.
Her eyes.
My God, were they unreal.
She had a dark green eye on one side, and a half a green eye, half an ice blue eye on the other.
The top half was the ice blue part, and my gaze kept jumping back and forth to the two halves.
I hadn’t even realized that I’d come to a halt a few steps from my seat until she said, “I know. It’s weird.”
I found myself grinning. “Not weird, exactly. Just different.”
She rolled her eyes. “If you say so.”
Her voice was husky. Almost as if she’d smoked for a time before quitting. That, or screamed out about a hundred orgasms that day.
Whatever it was, the woman had an intoxicating voice, and it was drawing me in like a moth to a flame.
“Hi.” Shawn grinned as he looked to the girl that’d caught and held my attention. “My name is Shawn. This is Trick. We’re just off of deployment and really in need of a drink. Do you mind if we take the seat beside you?”
The one directly next to her. Dammit, Shawn.
“Sure,” she said hesitantly, not even taking her eyes off of me to look over at Shawn.
“You come here a lot?” Shawn asked as he took the seat directly next to her, forcing me to take the one that I’d originally been planning on taking, putting him between the two of us.
Asshole.
“You could say that,” the woman drawled, inching further away from him.
“What’s your name?” Shawn asked.
“Swayze,” she answered. “Where were y’all deployed to last?”
“Iraq,” Shawn answered for the both of us.
“Oh, that’s no fun. I’ve heard horror stories about there from my stepfather.” Swayze looked sad for a moment. “He really hated it over there.”
“So did this one.” Shawn slapped me on the shoulder. “That’s why he’s decided to go into the Reserves. He’s no longer active-duty after today.”
Thank fucking God.
But that wasn’t why I was going reserve. I was going reserve because I needed to be home to help with bills and shit so that my little sister actually went to school instead of having to take care of my mother—the laziest piece of shit you’d ever meet.
Not that Shawn needed to know that. The less Shawn knew, the less he could share. Seriously, I loved the guy, but Shawn somehow always seemed to share every single detail about my life when he was talking, yet none of his. Which, I supposed, was by design. Shawn didn’t have a much better home life than I did. The only difference was, Shawn seemed to care a whole lot more than I did at this point.
Swayze’s eyes came to me. “What’s next for you, Trick?”
What’s next? What was next was for me to go home to Vermont, help my mother raise my little sister, and hope that I didn’t get sucked back in like last time.
“Going home,” I said. “To school, most likely. I have a job lined up at a bar.”
Her eyes sparkled at my words. “That sounds like a lot of fun.”
She was teasing me.
She was also leaned so far forward on the bar so that she could see me that it was comical.
Shawn needed to take a hint.
Shawn would stick it out to the bitter end, though.
He didn’t like being told he’d lost.
“Tell us about yourself, Swayze,” Shawn urged, leaning forward slightly.
“I…”
The bartender interrupted us.
He was a stout old man with hard, uncompromising eyes.
Former military.
There was no doubt about that.
“What can I get you two?” the hardass bartender asked, shooting Shawn a disapproving look.
Shawn leaned away from Swayze almost on instinct.
“I’ll take a beer. Dark. Whatever you have on tap,” I rumbled.
The bartender’s eyes flicked to me, then to Shawn. “You?”
“Bud. Tap,” he stammered.
My lips twitched.
“I’ll have another, Papa,” Swayze held up her empty glass. “Have you seen Dad? I was supposed to meet him here, but he’s not in the back room.”
Something shuttered over the bartender’s eyes. “Haven’t seen him, honey girl. Just sit right there and wait for him.”
The man was lying.
I knew that without a shadow of a doubt.
The bartender knew where Swayze’s father was, he just didn’t want her to know where he was.
Or maybe what he was doing.
Whatever the reason, I had a feeling Swayze’s father wasn’t a good guy.
My eyes went back to the woman once the bartender left to get our drinks.
She looked pissed.
“Wow, he was intense,” Shawn declared the moment he was out of earshot.
“Former military. Marines,” Swayze admitted. “He’s a lovable guy. To women. Men don’t find him nearly as lovable.”
“I would think not,” I teased.
She shot me a warm smile and then turned her gaze on the bar top, her fingers absently picking apart a napkin.
Shawn got up and slapped me on the back. “You can have her, man.”
Then he was moving toward the end of the bar, leaving the spot empty between the two of us, and heading in the direction of another blonde at the opposite side of the bar. This one looking a whole lot more attainable for him… and looser.
One with quite a few less morals.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Swayze questioned as she glanced in my direction.
I gritted my teeth, wanting to curse Shawn.
He couldn’t win, so he didn’t want me to win, either.
But, since I was honest to a fault, I told her the answer anyway.
“When we got out of our truck, we saw you walking inside.” I shrugged. “I called dibs but he whined because he saw you first. It’s a stupid game that he likes to play. One that annoys the piss out of me.”
“So you weren’t playing any games?” she asked, narrowing her eyes.
“I find that it works out better for me in the long run if I’m completely honest and open about my intentions,” I admitted. “It allows for fewer misunderstandings.”
She tilted her head slightly. “What kinds of intentions are you having right now?”
My lips curled up at the edges.
“Ones that have you in my hotel room at the end of the night.” I shrugged. “I’d offer you more but, as of eight tomorrow morning, I’m on a flight home to Vermont. Unfortunately.”
She blinked owlishly at me.