Prologue
Eden
A promise can lift you if it’s never broken. They can let you down if they are.
Shatter you in pieces without a clue how to put yourself back together.
My husband and I made several to one another. Long before we were married, the day we became husband and wife and the years that followed.
I kept mine, and I thought, until the day he crushed me, he did too.
He’d broken my trust, the one thing that solidified us for longer than I can remember.
Most couples build off of that solid foundation, and we created so much together because of it.
I had faith in him since the language of our love spoke as much as it lived inside us.
It all vanished within a blink of my tear-filled eyes.
It’s left me stricken with sorrow. Devastated with heartache as I’ve never known before as I propel myself forward in a sprint — the hot salty tears streaming down my face.
Choking back sobs, I gasp when I fall onto the sidewalk. Scraping my knees, my palms, and peeling the skin off my big toe.
“Get up Eden, it’s blood, and you’ve seen plenty of it in your lifetime,” I whisper as I push myself to stand and dash around the back of the cottage, desperate to release a fragment of the pain raging like a violent storm inside of me.
A shrilling howl leaves me as I hit the sand and raise my fists toward the morning sky, shaking them and begging for an answer that I know will never come.
“Why? Tell me why you would allow this to happen? Why did you rip my life from under my feet? And now this? How could you allow this to happen? How could my husband do this?”
I was never one to feel sorry for myself like I do now because I fell in love with a boy at six-years-old. I knew I would marry him, and now like so many things forgotten, I don’t know if either of us understands what marriage means anymore.
I believed our fates had always been destined to collide. We had worshipped the ground one another walked on.
And now? “Oh, God, what do I do now?”
I pull in a breath, my chest heaving, shoulders shaking, loud sobs tearing from my throat, fingers finding their way into my hair, and tugging.
A gust of wind whips, bringing with it the smell of salt-water and the comfort this place used to give me. It’s with that I decide I can never go back to the home I shared with my husband.
Never.
Chapter One
Eden
One month earlier
“I’m going to tell the little shit to piss off. Better yet, I’m going to tell our son he has permission to pop the little twerp in the mouth. The damn woman is lucky; it’s the last day of school. We bloody better not see them around town; if we do, I might have to slit tires. Maybe I’ll key a car of five while I’m working in their yard, and charge them triple when I invoice. No, I have a better idea, I’ll take Pixy with me and have him take a shit right on their doorstep. Pray to God that sourpuss face woman is the one who slips in it.”
I suppress my laugh by chewing on the inside of my cheek as I witness my best friend Aubrey and her husband, Chance little dispute. Well, it’s more like a rant from Chance than anything else.
Aubrey has her hands on her hips, one jutted out and her head titled back ready to go toe to toe with her beast of a man, who is, obviously quite angry. I can’t quite see Chance’s face, but knowing him as I do, I’d imagine there’s a cocky smirk that doesn’t quite match his spitting words of fire.
“Now listen here, you cocky bastard, you’ll do none of those things, especially using our family pet. I guess you could always make a shit bomb if you wanted, but no way are you taking our goat. Get in the van. I’ll handle it the adult way.” Aubrey sasses, lips are pursing to hold in her laugh.
That last remark is about to get her a slap on the ass, which is likely what she wants. I know her, she’s winding Chance up. He won’t fall for it. He’ll have her heated up and sipping her lip in no time.
Still, without being able to see Chance, I know her comment about a bomb has turned the light bulb on inside his head. I can almost see it glowing from here. He’ll make a shit bomb somehow, I know it.
“Cocky bastard, huh? If I recall, the first time you called me that was right after you were checking out my package while I was lying on my back under your car. Do we need to get a hotel instead of staying at my sister’s so I can place you under me, on top of me or you can stand up, hell I don’t care as long I’m able to show you just how cocky I can be? I have no problem with that princess, you know I don’t. If not, then I might be headed back to prison for beating someone to a bloody pulp, or bombing the shit out of them.”
I should have said I told you so on all accounts.
Even though the issue behind them arguing isn’t funny, I can’t help to let out a laugh at how thick Chance’s Australian accent is when he’s razzing Aubrey. I’m used to it. He gets that way when he’s angry too, which he does with me in a roundabout way, every time I hand him his check from selling a piece of his junk art at Nuts & Bolts, my quaint store by the ocean.
My husband, Mason, and I own an art gallery in Hermosa Beach. We showcase local talent, and it’s quite popular to not only the residents but to vacationers and Californians up and down the coast. It’s the beginning of fulfilling my dreams. It’s been open a year now, and I’m slowly working on setting up my online store.
And, even though the drive back and forth the four days a week that I work took some getting used to, it makes me happy to help others fulfill their dreams. Not to mention, their talent is crazy good.
We’re open Monday through Saturday and closed on Sundays. I have a local artist working full-time for me. Mason and I love her.
Naomi Madison is a sixty-two-year-old lifer of Hermosa who paints from memory. Her studio is right as you walk in the door, and sometimes when I’m there, she takes her work outside where people gather around and watch.
We also own a boxing gym and training facility. We bought an old building on the west side of Los Angeles. Gutted the entire thing and named it Whitaker’s Gym. Our last name. Mason’s always wanted to open a place for kids interested in not only boxing but to keep in shape as well as keeping them off the streets.
“If only you could be so lucky. You go back to prison, and you can guarantee there won’t be a third chance, buddy, and you’d never have me underneath you again. It would be all about the hand for you. Now get into the van and do a YouTube video with the kids or something while I take care of this. Hang on, Eden, I have to shut my husband up before we’re late for our flight to New York.” Aubrey says softly, then squeals when I notice Chance’s arm come into view as he wraps it around her and palms her ass.
“Something tells me, he’s going to shut you up,” I mumble right before she mutes our facetime chat then turns her phone to where I’m unable to see them.
Years ago, Chance spent a few years behind bars for beating a man half to death. He was trying to track down his sister’s rapist. The one they are flying to visit. I commend him for it, but he hid it from Aubrey and took off to serve his punishment, leaving her without a word.
She gave him a second chance, and now they are happily married, much like my husband Mason and me.