“For my entire life I wanted your approval, and you thought I was a whore. Do you know what it felt like to learn that? I’ll never forget that. I didn’t stir anyone up. I wanted to do something I’m good at. And I wanted to do it here, where I could bring in customers and contribute my own thing to Colman. You stirred up your own problems. Whatever your deal is with me, I can’t own it anymore. I can’t make you love me. But I can make my mark in this company whether you like it or not.”

Julie spoke up. “Just to let you both know, as of an hour ago, you’ve been removed from all accounts. You can keep your parking spots. Why don’t you go on vacation? Golf. Relax and think about how it is you might manage to salvage your relationship with your family.” She went to the door and opened it.

“He spent more time on you than he ever did his own children,” Howard said suddenly into the silence.

PJ looked to her father. “What?”

“My father, your precious grandpa. He took you to the track instead of me or Fee. Took you to car shows. Left you the Z28.”

“You’re talking about stuff I did with Grandpa when I was a kid and you never could be bothered to spend time with me? Then? This is some sort of tantrum from a fifty-five-year-old man aimed at his daughter because he has daddy issues? You gave me daddy issues because you had them? Good lord. Go. Take your brother and go golfing for a few months. Maybe think about how if you showed even half the courage and compassion your father did, you could have been a decent parent.”

He and Fee both tried more bluster. Jay showed them the paperwork and in the end, after a lot of arguing, they finally left.

“Okay, kids, get to work. I’m not paying you all to lollygag.” Jay waved a hand at the door and PJ headed out to her shop, where they’d set up her office.

She put on her overalls and painted her own logo on the doors. Because it was hers now.

And then she worked for nine more hours, managing to text Asa here and there about what had happened. PJ was still stunned from watching her mother tell her father she was going on a trip for six weeks and that she planned to have her things moved into storage until her return, when she’d set up her own home.

But as she got into her car, she knew the other end of her journey was a place she could call home because of the man inside it. He made her safe.

Her brawling, ink-covered, motorcycle-riding, race-car-driving badass, who protected just as fiercely as he fought. Through all the turmoil and drama, he’d been there. Letting her work it all through. Helping when he could, listening. Always her number one fan.

That was something good to hold on to.

He heard the garage door open and went downstairs to meet her.

“I stopped by my apartment and brought some stuff. I mean, like I said, I can’t move in for good until my lease is up. But it’ll be nice to have more stuff here in the meantime.”

“Come here.” He took the suitcase, set it aside, and pulled her close. “Hi. Have a glass of wine while I get dinner made. Tell me about it at whatever pace you want to.”

Epilogue

“So really, I’m saying that when it comes to King, I like to see the movie adaptations as sort of a tribute to the work rather than an outright copy of the book. Scary stuff is internal. It’s hard to make something so personal appeal universally, you know?”

He moved her leg to get at the bowl of chips. “I don’t know. How can you read The Shining and then think Kubrick did it justice?”

“You’re going to hell for that blasphemy, Asa.”

She crawled from their very large hotel bed in their very swanky borrowed digs overlooking the beauty that was Vancouver’s huge skyline. “I need more water. Want some?”

“I want more champagne.”

She brought the bucket and glasses over and got back into bed. “Kubrick’s version is fantastic. It’s his take on King’s material. An homage. Like I was just saying. Don’t expect it to be what it can’t be. You’ll be happier.”

“King wasn’t happy.”

“If you wrote the book, you get to be pissed it’s not what you expected.”

“You have a very detailed set of rules about life, Penelope Jean. I don’t know how you remember them all.”

“Basically, it’s be nice to people, don’t show your butt in public, and don’t complain your sack of gold is too heavy. Everything in the rules is based on that.”

He laughed, putting the chips aside again and getting her under him. “You should start your own calendar series. PJ’s Rules for Life. I’d buy it.”

He slid into her pussy easily, like he was meant to be there. Which he believed he was. And because they’d already had sex multiple times, so she was slick and hot.

A year ago he’d had no idea she existed; now he was sure he couldn’t live without her. Funny how the world worked.

His PJ was unexpected. Loud. Funny. A pain in his ass. Uppity. Resourceful. Sexy. So much stronger than she gave herself credit for.

“There is nothing more beautiful than you,” he said, kissing her as he began a slow thrust. He’d seen the youth and the beauty and had overlooked the person inside at first. It scared him sometimes, the idea that he could have missed her and made different choices and he’d be alone, or with some random person he didn’t want to breathe in.

But she got in his face and made him see. Made him understand. Changed him to his very bones. He could race and fight and get grease under his nails and she didn’t care. If he was happy, she was happy. Which seemed so deceptively simple, when really it was that she worked really hard to love him.

She wrapped her legs around him, arching up into each press he made into her body.

“Except being seen as beautiful by you.”

“Damn, we’re sickening.”

She laughed. “So Duke says all the time. I think we’re awesome.”

“Okay then. We’ll go with that.”

He made her come again before he joined her and they napped, still wrapped around each other.

Two days and they’d go back to Seattle. They’d break ground on the new building that would house the Twisted Steel showroom and expand the shop space into the old showroom area. They’d signed the papers to buy the land the week before.

They’d go back and he’d open his eyes to see her next to him every morning. Come home to her every night. In just a year, everything had changed. She’d blown into his life and held on, and he’d been surprised and then oh-so-fucking-grateful for her.

Falling Under

Carmella Rossi has been secretly lusting after her hot, tattooed neighbor Duke Bradshaw for the last three years. His rumbly voice combined with the throaty purr of his custom bike never fail to send thrills down her spine. But when he comes to her with an amazing offer, will she be willing to put herself at risk for a guy who has heartbreaker written all over him?

Please see the next page for a preview of

Falling Under.

Carmella Rossi held the door open for Georgie, who hopped down with a happy look. Carmella understood; she wanted to dance around for joy too now that they weren’t at her mother’s house.

Medication delivered for the next three days – it wouldn’t do to let her mom have any more than that; she’d just use it all and then not have enough and eventually end up in an ER somewhere trying to get pain scrips to get her through.

Carmella had learned the hard way that it was easier to simply dole out a few days’ worth, which kept her mom from overdosing or getting herself arrested trying to hustle pills.