I find Austyn outside in the driveway, cowboy boots on and nothing else. He’s also peeing on my succulents I planted last week. No wonder they’re dying. “Austyn! No.”
He turns his head, still peeing and urinates on Johnny’s leg in the process.
I slap my hand over my mouth. “Oh my God, I’m so sorry.”
Johnny laughs it off. “Don’t worry about it, darlin’.”
Austyn comes back over to me, his boots dragging in the gravel. “Go put some clothes on.”
He scowls up at me. “No.”
Ah, yes, His favorite words. “Austyn Barron Grady… you better get your butt inside.”
He doesn’t. Instead, his sits down in the dirt and pulls my succulents out of the ground.
Boys. They’re almost as much trouble as Sev.
Johnny takes the girls out for ice cream while I lay Austyn down for a nap. That’s when I hear Barron’s truck pull in the driveway. I smile at the sound, carefully closing Austyn’s door and loving every single detail about my life.
My kids are dirty all the time. I’m barefoot most of the time too, and if my husband comes in the house wearing a flannel, and scruff on his jaw, I still want to rip his clothes off and fuck him. We still live on the ranch, same house he built, just a little bigger these days. I work for the repair shop in my free time but most of my days are spent raising kids. And I fucking love it.
“Where are the kids?” Barron asks, staring at my legs in my jean shorts. I can wear cut-off shorts. Our daughters can’t. Barron’s rules. Not mine.
I waggle my eyebrows, posing in the hallway. I even draw my bottom lip into my mouth and slowly let it out. “Girls are with Johnny getting ice cream and Austyn’s down for a nap.”
“Fuck yeah,” he mumbles, walking toward me, ripping his shirt off in the process. “I’ve been thinking about you all morning.”
“Austyn peed on Johnny’s leg.”
Barron laughs, attacking my neck with kisses. “That’s my boy.” His body makes contact with mine. “Now, show me how much you missed your husband, Ma’am.”
He did that on purpose. “You’re all sweaty,” I note when my hands slip on his shoulders.
“You know you love it.”
He’s right. I do.
Look at us doing it up against the door to our room, unable to wait another second to be inside one another.
“Do you believe in fate now?” I ask him out of the blue as he lays me on the bed.
He smiles, his eyes wrinkling in the corners. “I believe in you,” he whispers against my heated cheek, the warm summer sun shining into our bedroom. “I’d say that’s pretty much the same thing.”
When we’re finished, we dress and Barron opens the door to find Austyn standing there. He hands him his diaper, smirking at his dad. “Hi,” he says, waving.
Barron looks at him and then me. “Do you think he heard us?”
“Oh, probably.” I pick Austyn up. “But he doesn’t know what we’re doing.”
Barron smiles at me, and then Austyn who reaches out for him. “How’s my boy?”
Without words, Austyn lies his head on Barron’s chest and my heart melts when Barron cradles him closer.
This guy, he makes forever more than a word and tomorrow a promise.
RACING ON THE EDGE
Happy Hour
Black Flag
Trading Paint
The Champion
The Legend
Hot Laps
The Rookie
Fast Time
Open Wheel
Pace Laps
Dirt Driven
Behind the Wheel – Series outtakes (TBA)
STAND ALONES
Waiting for You
Everything Changes
For the Summer
All I Have Left
Awakened
Everlasting Light
Bad Blood
Heavy Soul
Bad Husband
Burn
Love Complicated
Untamed
How to Deal
Promise Not to Fall
Blindsided
Revel
Sex. Love. Marriage.
Saving Barrette
Redemption
Room 4 Rent
When We Met
THE FMX SERIES
Shade
Tiller
Roan
Camden (TBA)
Red Lined (TBA)
CROSSING THE LINE
Delayed Penalty
Delayed Offsides
THE TORQUED TRILOGY
Unsteady
Unbearable
Unbound
ANCHORED LOVE
The Sea of Light
The Sea of Lies (TBA)
The Sea of Forever (TBA)
Thank you, to myself. For the long sleepless nights and not being committed for insanity.
Just kidding, I owe a lot of thank yous for this one and it starts with my very patient and wonderful editor, Becky. You constantly support me, even though I know you curse me out when I don’t give you a full version of a story. I love you anyways because without you, my writing wouldn’t be what it is today.
Janet, thank you for being there for me every day. You’re an amazing friend and I can’t imagine my life without you.
My BETA team, thank you for reading this book chapter by chapter and giving me feedback on Barron and Kacy. I was so nervous while writing this one that I couldn’t pull off another single-dad romance. Thank you for guiding me through it.
But… most of the thanks should go to you, my dear readers. For sticking with me all these years and picking up my books. And if this is your first book of mine, thank you so much for taking a chance on my books.
Love,
Shey
Shey Stahl is a USA Today and Amazon best-selling author. Rom-coms and sports romances with a unique writing style are her lady jam.
Her books have been translated into several languages, and if you haven’t laughed, cried, and cursed in the same book, you’re reading the wrong author. Shey lives in Washington State with her adrenaline-addicted husband, a moody preteen daughter, and their asshole cat.
In her spare time, she enjoys pretending to be Joanna Gains while remodeling her house, iced coffee (only the good nugget ice), hiking in the mountains of the PNW, and hanging out at the local dirt tracks.
Follow her crazy life adventures on Instagram:
https://www.instagram.com/sheystahl99/