Jettie Woodruff
This book is a work of fiction. References to real people, events, establishments, organizations, or locations are intended only to provide a sense of authenticity, and are used fictitiously. All other characters, dead or alive are a figment of my imagination and all incidents and dialogue, are drawn from the author’s mind's eye and are not to be interpreted as real.
All Rights Reserved.
Copyright © 2015 Jettie Woodruff
No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the author.
Acknowledgements
To all my readers. Without you none of this would be possible. Thank you! I hope you love this family as much as I do. You guys are the ones that make it all happen. Don’t know what I would do without you. To everyone behind the scenes, who work hard for me every day to help get my name out there. You guys Rock! Amy Davis, Catharine Gray, Lesley Edwards, Katie Theobald, Connie Thompson, Philomena Callan, Mellissa Ericson, Dana Lynn, everyone on my street team, my beta readers, and all my dirty girls, THANK YOU!
Laurrie, my twin from Florida. We’ve got this!
My little elf helpers and my friends.
Erin McFarland
Nikki Reeves
Sheila Howell
THAN YOU FOR DOING ALL THAT YOU DO FOR ME!
To the blogs, big and small, I love you all!
My amazing editor Jenna Dixon. Thanks for working under pressure for me. I <9 you!
My favorite proofreaders.
Jillian Toth, and Stacy Leier, you guys ROCK!
To all my author friends who help me along the way. There is way too many to list, and I would forget someone. You know who you are. I wish everyone could be like you. The world would be a better place.
To my neglected family. I love you, thanks for sticking by me while I live this crazy dream.
I promise to make it up to you.
DEDICATION
This book is dedicated anyone who wants to live in a better world.
I hate what’s going on and don’t understand it. What if we were all nice? What if we all went out of our way to help someone in need? What if jealousy didn’t exist? What if we wanted to see everyone succeed? What if we worried about our own karma?
Help someone today and screw the ego. It sucks.
To my mom and dad, I love you to the moon and back. I’m sure glad I got stuck with you guys.
Contents
Prologue
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Twelve
Thirteen
Fourteen
Fifteen
Sixteen
Seventeen
Eighteen
Epilogue
Prologue
I was convinced Gabriella was sent to me from heaven at just the right time in my life. I didn’t know she had come from hell. That wasn’t my fault. How was I supposed to know that?
It was shortly after my wife had informed me of yet another affair. That made two that I knew of. The sad thing about it was I would have let her do it again. That’s how much I loved her. I begged and pleaded for her to stay, to move to Florida with me and get away from her family, her friends, and her stupid school girl dreams. I knew if I could just get her there we’d be okay, that we would make it.
Gabriella came in at the end, precisely the time it all started to unravel. I knew as soon as one ended, the other one would begin. Maybe that’s why my failed marriage wasn’t so hard on me. Three unsuccessful relationships, and one marriage. I’d had enough for a lifetime, but she was different. Gabriella wasn’t like any girl I’d ever been with. She was intoxicating from the moment I laid eyes on her. I only had to make her mine, plant my seed inside her, and mold her the way I saw fit. She’d never be able to leave. I would take care of her, and she would take care of me. It was the perfect situation. She had nobody, and I had an eight-month-old with a slut, trashy mom. It was a win, win for everyone involved. Especially me.
Women were sluts, and I had to accept that fact. That’s what they did. If they had a pussy, they fucked, opened their legs for every dick that came near them. This wasn’t my first rodeo. I watched my mother’s boyfriends come in and out of our house for years. I heard the noises, I knew what they were doing. Every single time my dad pulled out of our driveway in that semi-truck. She fucked around on him until I was fifteen, and then divorced him, taking everything her lazy ass fucked on, including my dad’s bank account.
Gabriella was there, right when I needed her to be. The fact that she came to me like a wounded little bird, young and vulnerable, wasn’t in her best interest. She was an instant drug to me, one that I couldn’t control. The urges ignited my fire with the way she did everything I told her to do. Everything. Gabriella needed me as much as I needed her, and I trained her very carefully. She was everything I needed and more. She was mine. To say things worked in my favor would be an understatement. I had the cake thrown in my lap, and I fucking ate it. Every tiny little crumb. I would own her, that much was a fact. The part I didn’t know was how fast and willing she was. She didn’t even bat an eye when I told her, not asked, I told her, we were getting married.
I probably shouldn’t have driven that night, but I did. My neighbor, Lane, and I met up after work. He was celebrating his new partnership, and I was drinking my wife away. Whisky of all things. Like I didn’t know better than that. We weren’t really friends, and for the life of me, I don’t know why I kept trying. Whisky pissed me off, and made me a little mean, yet I chose to order it, time and time again. At least six Jack Daniel’s on the rocks. Just like my daddy used to drink. Drunk fucker.
“Hey, you could get with that girl staying in your cottage. Marry her.” Lane suggested from nowhere.
We were talking about some med student he read about. Some kid that hypnotized an old man, or was it a woman? Anyway, the old person had that disease where they go crazy and lose their memory. He helped the dude find his way home from five states, or five hundred miles, something like that. He just spit it out. Like he’d been waiting for the right time.
“Gabriella? You mean the slut that sucked your dick? The one you fucked the hell out of while your new wife was in Tennessee, picking out new furniture for her new home? That one, Lane?” I asked with a laugh that I didn’t even recognize. A whiskey laugh. Evil with an ego the size of Texas.
“Fuck you, man. I love my wife.”
“Yeah, sure you do. Cheers to you and your new wife.”
“Whatever, you’ve been tapping that ever since she showed up here. I know you have. I only fucked up once. I mean, it’s not a terrible idea. She’s a nice girl, she’s gorgeous, and talk about low maintenance. Dude, Candace just spent twelve hundred bucks on a fucking purse. Why does she need a twelve-hundred-dollar purse?”
Gabriella’s dark eyes crossed my mind at the same time as the stupid idea. If you looked at her from across the room, you would swear her eyes were as black as coal, but when she was close, holy smokes. They were more of a dark pine. Gabriella had the most beautiful eyes on a female I had ever seen. That’s what I noticed first about her. Those damn eyes. I know at no point in time did she ever try to make them look sexy, but they were. Natural sex appeal dripped from the girl. She didn’t have to try.