Text copyright ©2020 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.
Dedication
To my loyal dog that snores outside my door for hours upon hours that just so happens to be the object of my attention as I’m writing this dedication. Love you big guy.
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 twelve times.
Kendra, Diane, Sarah, Laura, Lisa, Kathy, Mindy, Penney, 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.
Table of Contents
Blurb
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
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Epilogue
What’s Next?
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
Whiskey Neat
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
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 (11-3-20)
Depends Who’s Asking (12-8-20)
Valentine Boys
Herd That
Crazy Heifer
Chute Yeah
Get Bucked
Souls Chapel Revenants MC
Repeat Offender (1-12-21)
Conjugal Visits (2-23-21)
Jailbait (4-6-21)
Doin’ A Dime (5-4-21)
Inmate of the Month (6-29-21)
Kitty Kitty (8-10-21)
Gen Pop (9-21-21)
Shakedown (11-2-21)
Standalones:
Somethin’ About That Boy
Blurb
Going from a professional baseball player to a SWAT officer should’ve been seamless. Should have been.
But it wasn’t.
All it took was one single calendar shoot for word to spread that Nathan Cox was not only no longer playing professional baseball, but he was also the man behind saving the life of Reggie Morton, the city of Kilgore’s princess.
***
Reggie didn’t know that by agreeing to provide the expertise and the know-how for the Police Officer’s Ball that she would be required to actually attend the function.
What she also didn’t expect was needing to be saved—again—by the same man that had saved her life a year ago when she hosted her debut event.
This time in a not-nearly-as-spectacular way. The moment she falls into his arms like a modern-day Cinderella and takes him in, in all his three-piece-suited glory, she realizes that she’s been fighting the impossible.
Nathan Cox owns her. Body and soul.
Prologue
Rise and shine, motherfucker.
-Coffee Cup
Nathan
The day before college graduation
“I need you to make a pact with me,” I said as I stared at the woman that was hell-bent on ruining me.
The same woman that I never could quite pull myself away from. Could never quite pull all the claws out of my skin before she sank yet another one in deeper.
“What?” Reggie asked, just as drunk as I was.
She was also not the woman that was hell-bent on ruining me.
That woman happened to be the one that was crying about her life on Facebook. About how she had cancer and was about to go through multiple rounds of chemo and radiation that might or might not help her.
“Don’t let her fuck me over. I will fall for those big tears just like I always do and I know that I’ll lose,” I murmured, glancing one more time at the text message that I’d received from Eerie, my own personal hell, and shoved it into my pocket.
I looked around at the bright sparkling lights that Las Vegas had to offer.
“And how do you propose that I do that?” Reggie snorted. “You have a toxic relationship with her. Just walk away.”
I looked down at the paperwork in my hand that the toxic woman had given me the night before and shook my head. “It’s not that easy, Reg.”
Reggie rolled her eyes. “Listen, I have a solution. But you’re not going to like it.”
Reggie and I had never gotten along. But, despite the fact that we hadn’t, I knew one thing forever and always—she would have my back. No matter what.
Which was the entire point of having this conversation.
Though, maybe if I’d known what she was going to offer, I would’ve maybe suggested she think of something else.
My drunk brain wasn’t firing on all cylinders, though, and I’d never really been able to tell Reggie no.
***
Two years later
“What do I do?” I asked.
“We get a lawyer,” my father suggested. “And you fight her.”
I groaned and rubbed my hands against my face as I tried to make sense of all of this.
“Start over.” My mom pinched the bridge of her nose. “Why did you do
