Meet Cohen & Danielle in the newest stand alone
in the Hope Town Series by Harper Sloan!
Releasing: February
17th
Pre-Order
Synopsis
(Stand alone)
Have you ever felt like you
were living your life for a future that was predetermined? Like there was some
bigger picture you just prayed you would someday see clearly? That picture has
been crystal clear to me since I was old enough to recognize it for just what
it was.
Or I should say recognize
him for who he was.
I’ve loved Cohen Cage since
I was a small child. He’s been my everything for the last twenty-two years.
I’ve loved him through every girlfriend he’s ever brought home. Through his
college years and then mine. I’ve loved him through two deployments. And ever
since the day I told him how I felt, he’s acted like I’m a stranger.
My name is Danielle Reid,
and it’s time for me to get my man.
Our future is an unexpected
fate, and no matter what our parents, siblings, and friends say…it’s going to
be worth every second of the fight to make it happen.
Prologue
“Axel Reid, don’t you
dare!” my mom exclaims. Then she yelps
when my daddy charges through the front door.
“Don’t I dare what,
Princess? No way that boy is going near my girl.
Look at him! He looks like he
can’t wait to creep on my daughter!”
“Well, there is no need to
scare him to death!” she mocks.
My cheeks heat instantly
when I see Dane start backing away from the porch. My hopes of being able to actually go to my senior prom are starting to go
up in flames.
Poof.
Just like that.
Not that I should be
surprised about it. Mom did her best to
calm Daddy down, but we should have known better. He took one look at me and stormed over, only
to return ten minutes later looking like he does now.
So embarrassing.
“You need to stop this
nonsense right now, you big lug, or you’ll be sleeping on the couch,” Mom
fumes.
“Like hell I will, woman!”
Daddy roars at my mom.
I watch her face get
sharp. He stops long enough to sling one
of—that’s right, ONE of—the rifles he’s carrying over his shoulder, where it
lands next to the other one he already has over his other shoulder.
Only my mom would be brave
enough to deal with him when he’s in “Protect Dani from everything with a
penis” mode. He looks absolutely
ridiculous. He has two hunting rifles
now hanging by their leather straps over each shoulder. He has two handguns strapped to each thick
thigh, two on each side of his belt, and various knives along the way. His shirt, which he thinks is hilarious to
wear when I attempt to go out on a date, says I kill things…and eat them.
I know it’s a hunting shirt—for animals, not teenage boys—but Dane
doesn’t.
Mom moves in front of him,
standing in the front doorway and blocking his path, where Dane is still slowly
retreating. She’s been dealing with this
way before they even had me.
He’s…protective. I guess that’s
the nicest way to put it. Well, she
calls him protective. However, I call it
possessive, overbearing, controlling, demanding, and jerky.
“This is her senior prom,
Ax. You wouldn’t let her go last year.”
She pauses when he grunts. “And I’m sorry, but you won’t be stopping her this
year. She has a right to experience this. And Dane is a nice boy. Right, Dane?” she yells over her shoulder.
“Uhh…” he stammers, causing
my daddy to grunt some more.
“The boy doesn’t even know
how to talk, Izzy. I bet he will be
nothing but handsy and think with his little pecker. Nope.
No way. Not near my baby girl.”
Oh. My.
God. I wish I could just fall
into a hole right now. I try to see over
my parents to find out if Dane heard that, but with Daddy basically being a
giant, that’s not happening.
“You did not just say
that!” I yell at his back.
Daddy turns around, his
movements awkward with how many weapons he has strapped to his body. His green eyes, so like my own, slant and
harden. He looks down at my dress for
the thousandth time since I came downstairs and doesn’t even bother hiding his
displeasure that it’s showing too much of my body. Even if it is about as tasteful as it gets.
My strapless, red dress has
a sweetheart neckline, and everything he calls my “girly bits” is covered. There isn’t really any cleavage. Well, okay, there is some, but surely with my
lack of being busty, you couldn’t even call what is showing “cleavage.” His
first problem was with how much of my legs was showing. Then I made the mistake of turning around
without my wrap on. That’s when he saw
that the dress was completely backless to my bra line. Well, what it would be if I had been wearing
one. Which is clearly when he lost his
mind.
“You look just like your
mother did that night twenty years ago when we finally came back to each
other. Right down to those strappy shoe
things. And I guarantee you, Danielle Reid, any teenage boy who doesn’t bat for
the other team will be thinking thoughts I’ll cut his dick off for. No.
You aren’t going with that boy, and that’s final.”
I harden my eyes, and his
narrow even further.
I put my hands on my hips,
and he squares his shoulders, his rifles clinking together.
I raise one brow, and he
mirrors the action.
“Daddy.”
“Dani.”
“I’ll cry.”
“No, you won’t. You have more balls than that.”
“Want to bet?” I attempt to muster up some tears, knowing
that he won’t be able to handle them, but before I can force the first one out,
my brother jumps into my line of sight and blocks our standoff.
“Yo, Dane! You just run along now. Dani is unfortunately feeling a little under
the weather. Ebola. Or the flu. I don’t
know. It’s really ugly and you probably
don’t want to be around this. The
boils—they could pop at any moment.”
“You did not just do that,”
I heatedly whisper, fuming at his nerve.
Nate turns and smirks at
me. “Oh I just did.”
“I can’t believe you
two!” I spin to look at the one person who
can help me. “Mom, seriously?”
Her expression softens, and
she just shakes her head. “I’m sorry,
Dani. I tried.”
“You two,” I start,
pointing between my older brother and father.
“You just can’t leave it alone?
I’ll be eighteen in a few months.
What are you jerks going to do then?”
“You’re not dating,
Danielle. Not ever.”
“Oh yeah, Daddy? And how realistic is that crap?”
“Watch your mouth, little
princess.”
“Mom?”
“I’m so sorry, Dani.” She walks over and wraps me in her small
arms.
I could probably really cry
now a lot easier than when I was trying to fake it, but I’ve never been one of
those girls who weep constantly. It
would be easier to just go upstairs, take off the dress mom and I spent hours
looking for, scrub off the light makeup she helped me apply, and pretend this
night didn’t happen.
***
An hour later, I’m sitting
in my bedroom, still wearing my perfect dress.
My makeup is still done and my hair is still flowing in long waves. And I’m no less mad at the men in my life
than I was earlier. I’ve considered
climbing out my window. I’ve considered
asking my best friends, Lyn and Lila, to come help me escape. But what would be the point? Rambo-Dad already scared away my date, the
only boy left in school who had been willing to ask me even though his friends
had warned him about my father.
I lie down on my bed and
stare up at the ceiling. Maybe I should
go away for college. I planned on living
at home while I attended Georgia Tech, but there is no way I can deal with this
stuff any longer. If my father had
things his way, I would be shipped off to become a nun. Or he would buy an island and make it an
all-girls cult.
“Uhggggg!” I yell to the
empty room.
“Seriously, Dani-girl,
things can’t be that bad.”
I jump up when I hear the
deep, gravelly, insanely sexy voice coming from my bedroom door. That voice.
My lord. The things it alone does
to me should be classified as illegal.
My hair slaps me in the
face, a good handful landing in my open mouth, and I hastily pull it out before
I turn to where he is standing.
My lord, he’s
beautiful. He’s always been. My heart speeds up when I take in his
smirking face and the mischief dancing in his brown eyes.
“Cat got your tongue?”
I shake my head.
“Speechless?”
I shake it again.
“Do you really have some
flesh-eating, boil-slash-Ebola-like sickness?” he laughs.
I narrow my eyes at him,
and his rich laughter booms through the room.
“I’m just kidding,
Dani-girl. Come on. Get yourself ready
and let’s go rock this prom.”
My jaw drops again. “What?”
For the first time, I
notice that he’s dressed in a perfectly tailored tux. My eyes travel down his tall form to his
shining, black dress shoes. On the way
back up, my eyes hit the corsage spinning around his finger before I look back
up into those gorgeous eyes.
“Let’s go, beautiful.”
“Does Daddy know you’re
here?” I ask, not moving from my spot.
He sighs, steps into my
room, and walks over. His cologne, Gucci
Black, wraps around me. He’s worn the
same scent for years. I perversely sniff
it every time I hit the mall with Lyn and Lila.
That scent—it’s my undoing.
He grabs one of my hands
and gives my knuckles a kiss before placing the corsage around my wrist. He gives my hand a squeeze before letting
go. Placing his strong hands on my shoulders,
he presses down until I’m seated on my bed.
Kneeling before me, he takes my feet one by one and fastens the straps
of my black heels before standing and grabbing my hands, again, to pull me to
my feet.
The whole time, I act like
a freak and just gape at him.
What in the hell is going
on?
“Ready?” he asks.
“Uhhh…”
“Right. You’re ready,” he
laughs, grabs my hand, and pulls me through the house, down the stairs, and
into the entryway of the house, where my parents are waiting.
Mom has her camera ready,
forcing us to take some pictures, for all of which I’m sure I’m just standing
there in a daze. I think I smiled in
them, but I was too busy trying to figure out what the hell is going on. Daddy smiles big and triumphantly the whole
time, like he’s won some battle here.
“Oh, good. You got here,” Nate mumbles through a
sandwich he’s stuffing down his throat.
I shake out of my stunned
stupor and look over at him. “You did
this?” I ask with disbelief.
“Well, duh. Can’t have my little sister miss her prom
because of some boils. Plus, I knew this
guy,” he says, pointing at our father, “wouldn’t mind him.” He takes another bite
before he looks over my shoulder. “And I
know he isn’t going to try to pet the
cat.”
“Nathaniel Gregory!” Mom
gasps.
“What? Why do you think Dad acts like he does? Just because I’m willing to say the words
doesn’t mean you have to freak out.”
I look over at my mom, who
has turned bright red.
Daddy laughs at her
embarrassment and pulls her into his arms.
“Are you sure we didn’t drop that one a few times as a baby?”
She slaps his hard stomach
and shakes her head. “You look beautiful, honey. Have fun, okay?”
I smile at her and move my
eyes to Daddy to judge his mood.
He just smiles at me. “I
trust him. He won’t let any of those pimple-faced,
prepubescent boys touch a beautiful hair on your head. Have fun, sweetheart.”
I walk over and give them
both a hug, standing up on my toes as far as a can to whisper my gratitude in
his ear. He’s annoying, overprotective,
and possessive of his girls, but I love him and I know he comes from a good
place.
“Uh, excuse me? Do I not get any little-sister love
here? I’m the one running this show, you
know?”
“You’re such a dork, Nate,”
I laugh and give him a hug before turning back to my date.
He’s standing by the door,
talking in low tones to my daddy. I
can’t hear him, but he’s still smiling, so I’m guessing there isn’t any talk
about dismemberment going on. He looks
over, his smile deepening and the lines around his eyes crinkling. Something moves behind his eyes that darkens
them slightly, but he looks back over at Daddy, finishing up their
conversation.
“Ready, Dani-girl?” he asks
a few minutes later, making my heart speed up again.
Holy. Crap.
“Yeah. I’m ready.” Or at least as ready as I’ll ever be.
**
That night, while dancing
to Brett Young’s “Kiss by Kiss,” I knew I would never be the same. I could feel the jealous waves coming off
every female in the room as he held
me in his arms. Of course, I had a man
and not a boy as my date. Five years
older than I am and very obviously not a teenager.
Being held in his arms was
a dream come true. His scent invaded my
lungs with every inhale. His eyes
twinkled as his smile held me hostage. I
knew I would never love a man as much as I love him.
Yeah. That was the night I confirmed what I had
always known. What I had always felt.
Cohen Cage owned my heart
and I never wanted it back.
About Harper Sloan
Harper lives in small town Georgia just
a short drive from her hometown of Peachtree City. She (and her 3 daughters)
enjoy ruling the house they dubbed 'Estrogen Ocean', much to her husband’s
chagrin. Harper has a borderline unhealthy obsession with books; you can almost
ALWAYS find her with her eReader attached. She enjoys bad reality TV and cheesy
romantic flicks. Her favorite kind of hero--the super alpha kind!
Harper started using writing as a way to
unwind when the house went to sleep at night; and with a house full of crazy it
was the perfect way to just relax. It didn't take long before a head full of
very demanding alphas would stop at nothing to have their story told.
