Prologue
Chapter 1
Make You Mine
Prologue
Books by Tia Louise
About the Author
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Wait for Me
Copyright © TLM Productions LLC, 2019
Printed in the United States of America.
Cover design by Lori Jackson Design.
Photography by Wander Aguiar.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication can be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, photocopying, mechanical, or otherwise—without prior permission of the publisher and author.
Created with Vellum
Acknowledgments
Gratitude. That word stands out in my mind so strongly as I sit here trying to find the words to thank all the incredible people who helped me get this completed novel in your hands.
My family, most of all, I thank you for your patience, for believing in me, for telling me I can do it, and for being the reason I even try.
My readers, who love my books, who tell me they love my books, who leave amazing reviews, send cards, and tell their loved ones to read my stories… I couldn’t do this without you!
Huge thanks to Ilona Townsel for reading as I wrote and keeping me encouraged… this was a tough one, girl! Thank you for being my rock.
Christine Estevez, who came in like a boss and got my stuff together, organized, and steered the ship while I figured it out. Dani Sanchez for the incredible marketing support—also Kylie McDermott and all the gals at Give Me Books!
So much LOVE to my incredible beta squad… Melissa Sagastume, Tina Snider, Renee Mccleary, Jennifer Wolfel, and KC Caron, and to my awesome editor Kathy Bosman—you ladies give amazing notes.
To my Mermaid VEEPs, Ana Perez, Clare Fuentes, Sheryl Parent, Cindy Camp, Carla Van Zandt, Jaime Long, Tammi Hart, Tina Morgan, and Jacquie Martin. You ladies have no idea how much I love you all!
Every author who helped share and promote with me… What would I do without you? I love you.
Special thanks to Lori Jackson for the masterful cover design, and to Wander for the gorgeous, inspirational photos. Love you two!
To my Mermaids and to my Starfish, Thank You for giving me a place to relax and be silly, and for showing me all the love…
THANKS to all the bloggers and bookstagrammers who have made an art of book loving. Sharing this book with the reading world would be impossible without you. I appreciate your help so much.
To everyone who picks up this book, reads it, loves it, and tells one person about it, you’ve made my day. I’m so grateful to you all. Without readers, there would be no writers.
So much love,
Stay sexy,
<3 Tia
Wait for Me
Dear Taron,
I should have told you this a long time ago…
Dear Taron,
Is there a time-limit on forgiveness?
If there is, I haven’t reached it…
Dear Taron,
I still love you…
A letter never sent.
Heck, I never even finished it.
Taron Rhodes was my brother’s best friend.
He was sexy as sin.
But he was more than that…
He was ponytail-pulling, ice down your shirt teasing, throw you in the lake screaming…
Strong, tanned arms and bright green eyes over a heart-stopping, naughty grin…
Did I mention his tight end?
I gave him my first real kiss, my heart, my everything.
I said I’d wait for him…
I’m still waiting, because Taron Rhodes is still the man of my dreams,
And I have a secret that has his bright green eyes.
Noel LaGrange stole my heart when she was only eighteen—pushing me off a flatbed and calling me a city slicker.
Her brother Sawyer would kick my ass if he knew how many times we made out that summer, how close we got.
Everything changed when Sawyer and I joined the military.
We were honorably discharged, but I didn’t go to her.
Instead, I went back to the city… where no amount of money, no amount of pills can heal this wound.
Only her whiskey eyes and dark hair, her slim arms and her sweet scent, give me hope.
I broke her heart just as surely as I broke mine, but I’m going back to make it right.
If she’s still waiting…
(WAIT FOR ME is a STAND-ALONE small-town, second-chance romance. No cheating. No cliffhangers.)
For lovers of sad songs and sweet surprises…
To my husband, who wanted a story about the peach orchard where he grew up, and to Ilona, my friend.
Prologue
Noel
My momma was too beautiful to die.
At least, that’s what everybody said.
Penelope Jean Harris was the scion of our town’s founder and prettiest girl in three parishes. She was head majorette in high school and homecoming queen and prom queen and every other queen. She was Peach Princess, Teen Dixie Peach, and Miss Dixie Gem. She would’ve gone on to be Miss Louisiana if my daddy hadn’t made her a Mrs.
I was eleven—that strange age between too big to play in the creek in only my panties and too little to sleep without the closet light on. I loved Dolly Parton and butterflies and picking peaches straight off my daddy’s trees and eating them, jumping in the lake and running after jackrabbits with my little brother Leon.
In the summer the trees were rich green, and the sweet scent of peach juice filled the air. In the winter they were sparse, bony hands, reaching palms up to heaven. Branches like fingers spread, grasping for hope.
Momma’s hazel eyes crinkled at the corners whenever she looked at me or my brothers or my daddy. Her sweet smile was warm sunshine when I got cold.
She would wrap me in her arms and sing an old sad song when I was sleepy or cranky or “out of sorts,” which is how she’d put it. I pictured “sorts” as ivory dominoes I could line up and knock down or slap off the table, across the room. I’d pull her silky brown hair around me like a cape and close my eyes and breathe…
Then she was gone.
She went for a walk one crisp winter evening along the narrow, dirt road that runs past our orchard out to the old house on the hill. Frost was in the air; bonfires were burning. The man driving the truck said she came out of nowhere.
He never saw her.
She never saw him.
Six weeks later, in that same orchard with peach blossoms on the trees and dew tipping the grass, on the very spot she died, my daddy took his life with his own gun.
I guess sometimes love makes you forget things can get better.
I guess he didn’t see a bend in the road up ahead.
I guess he only saw a straight line leading deeper and deeper into black.