Uncontrollable

Book 7: A Country Roads Novel

by Shannon Richard

Genres: Coming of Age; Women's Fiction; Contemporary Romance

Synopsis

THE THIN LINE BETWEEN LOATHING . . . AND LUST It's been a tough year for Beth Boone. She's lost the person she cared about the most: her big sister. But Beth isn't grieving alone. She's now guardian to her sister's three children and though she loves them fiercely, so far she's not exactly winning at parenting. In this noisy, peanut-butter-everywhere chaos, there is no calm. None. So Beth has zero patience with the infuriating guy next door-not to mention his destruct-o "puppy"-wreaking more havoc in her life. Except that Tripp Black is all muscles, deep brown eyes, and lips that promise way-too-delicious things. Every time Tripp and Beth confront each other, there's an undercurrent of red-hot sexual tension, one that threatens to break down all her carefully constructed walls. She's been burned before, and Tripp is a self-proclaimed bachelor for life. There's no way that Beth's too-hot-neighbor-from-hell could ever be the man for her-until their uncontrollable attraction becomes so much more . . .

Release date: November 1, 2016

Publisher: Forever Yours

Print pages: 404

Sample

Chapter One

The steady knocking was only getting louder, ricocheting against the inside of Tripp Black’s skull. He hadn’t gotten a full night’s sleep in four days and it was beginning to catch up to him. Who the hell was he kidding? It had already caught up to him.

Normally he was up and at ’em at the crack of dawn, out of bed and working through his first cup of coffee before the sun was even up. But not today. He’d been hoping when he’d finally crawled into bed after five that morning that he’d get to sleep in.

Apparently that had been too much to ask for.

It was unseasonably warm for early spring, and a string of thunderstorms had rolled through over the last week. Not a single night had gone by without some crisis pulling Tripp from bed. But that was what came with the job when you were the town’s resident Fire Chief.

Mirabelle was a relatively small beachside town right on the Gulf of Mexico. Tripp had moved here three years ago in hopes of a quieter life…though it wasn’t all that quiet at the moment.

The knocking turned into banging.

What the hell?

He pulled his head from where it was buried in the pillow, cracking one eye and blearily looking over at the alarm clock. It was almost eight in the morning. Three hours…he hadn’t even gotten three hours of sleep. He’d been at the Wilkins’s for most of the night trying to get the family out of their house, which had been almost split in two by a tree.

It took more effort than he was prepared for to pull himself from bed, probably because almost every inch of his body felt like it had been worked over with a two-by-four. The tightness in his arms was courtesy of fighting with the hose during the warehouse fire on Sunday, the twinge in his lower back from carrying Mr. Phillips down four flights of stairs on Monday, the soreness in his legs from the three car pileup that had happened on Tuesday, and so on and so on.

He could keep going, but just thinking about the last week made him hurt even more. So instead he focused on navigating through his dim bedroom. The thick navy blue curtains on the windows did a decent job of blocking out the light, but a few rays of sunshine managed to peek in through the sides, outlining the furniture in his room.

He just made out the pair of athletic shorts hanging from a chair in the corner, pausing only long enough to pull them on. After a quick shower when he’d gotten home, he’d collapsed onto his bed bare ass naked, his preferred way to sleep. He had no idea who was currently trying to knock down his door with their fist, but giving them a little show wasn’t exactly on his morning agenda.

Another round of thunderous blows echoed in the air and he wrenched the door wide before the noise split his head in two. But there was no helping the pain behind his eyes, because the second the door was open he was blinded by the light.

He squinted out into the sunshine, the only thing he could see a splash of hot pink directly in front of him. “For the love of everything good and holy, what do you want?!” Yup, yelling had been a mistake; it just made his head hurt even more.

“What. Do. I. Want?” The words came out clipped, a barely controlled rage behind each and every syllable.

Tripp closed his eyes and groaned at the voice that filled his ears, then rubbed at his temples. Whatever was about to happen wasn’t going to be pleasant. It never was when it involved his neighbor. He’d bought the house he was now residing in almost four months ago, and it had taken him about a week to figure out he’d made a very bad choice of location.

Appearances could be deceiving, and the prime example of that was standing before him.

Beth Boone was a tiny little blond thing, five-foot-three? Five-foot-four? Tripp had met her on a number of occasions before he’d moved in next door. They had quite a few friends in common and had become acquainted with each other over the years, but he’d had no idea what he was getting into when he’d become her neighbor.

None at all.

The woman was a pain in the ass, but she wasn’t the only problem. Nope. Her three wards were just as big of an aggravation.

Beth’s sister and brother-in-law, Colleen and Kevin Ross, had died in a car accident last year. And okay, he had to give the woman a certain amount of credit and respect, as she’d moved back to Mirabelle to take care of her two nieces and nephew. And he’d be a cold-hearted bastard if he didn’t have any sympathy for the family that had been left behind, because he totally did. He’d dealt with too much death in his life to not be fully aware of the pain that came with a loss like that.

Didn’t change the fact that Beth Boone was a pill.

Tripp opened his eyes again and the woman before him came into focus, along with the creature at her side…a creature that belonged to him.

His dog, covered in mud.

Shit.

“Your damn dog got into my yard again,” Beth ground out through clenched teeth.

Duke—as in The Duke, named after the one and only John Wayne—was a rescue puppy who’d been abandoned at the firehouse last summer. Though puppy should be used loosely; Duke was over a hundred pounds and still growing. Normally his fluffy coat was a fifty-fifty mix of white and light brown, but at the moment he was entirely the dark brownish black of whatever muck he’d rolled around in.

Tripp’s sleep-hazed brain was having a hard time processing the scene in front of him, especially when his eyes landed on Beth. For the first time since he’d opened the door, he really looked at her.

Her blond hair had been thrown up in a messy bun, but a good portion of it had fallen out. A glob of brown mud plastered her bangs to her forehead, and there were streaks on her cheeks, like war paint.

His eyes moved down, landing on the multiple paw prints stamped on her T-shirt. The hot pink cotton material was soaked and plastered to her body like a second skin.

Dear Lord, she wasn’t wearing a bra. Absolutely nothing was left to the imagination. Nothing. He’d seen the woman in a bathing suit before, so he knew full well what she was hiding under those baggy nurse scrubs that she wore every day. Soft curves and perfect breasts. Perfect breasts that would be a pretty good handful and were in no need of a bra to be perky.

And that was just what he needed first thing in the morning, for her clearly displayed nipples to make him tongue-tied. Not that speaking was going to help him, because it was at that moment when Duke decided it was time to shake, splattering mud on everything within ten feet.

Beth let go of the dog, probably instinctively fearing being thrown around like a rag doll with the movement. Because really, Duke outweighed Beth by a few pounds. He was surprised she’d been able to drag the dog back over to his house in the first place.

But Duke had absolutely no bite in him. When it came right down to it, he had pretty much two modes: scared of everything or spaz. Option one had him cowering in the corner at the sound of the vacuum, or sprinting into the house when Tripp mowed the lawn, or eating through a door when he was home alone during a thunderstorm. Option two had him tripping over his too long feet as he tried to chase a ball, or knocking things over with his rapidly moving tail, or attempting to lick someone to death.

No more evidence was needed as to what mode Duke was in at the moment. He was currently rubbing his head against Beth’s thigh, painting her skin with even more mud. Tripp had to give it to the dog, though, because he’d bet good money there wasn’t a person in a hundred-mile radius who wanted to play less in that moment than Beth did. But Duke was oblivious to the fury radiating off the woman.

Tripp, on the other hand, was not.

It couldn’t have been more than twenty seconds since he’d opened the front door, twenty seconds of Beth glaring at him with daggers in her blue eyes. The visible portions of her face and neck were turning red hot with rage.

“I’m sorry, Beth. I don’t know how he’s getting out of the yard.” Which was the truth. Tripp had gone over his backyard more times than he could count trying to figure out an escape route from the fence. He’d come up with absolutely nothing.

Duke wasn’t exactly used to the freedom that this backyard provided. For the first six months of the dog’s domesticated life, he’d been confined to a postage stamp–size piece of grass attached to the townhouse Tripp had rented. Now he was getting access to about half of a football field, complete with a pool that he loved to take daily dips in.

There was a doggy door to the backyard to give the pup the ability to come and go. But because of that easy access, there’d been more than a few mornings where the trail of water on the kitchen tile from an early morning swim had left Tripp flat on his back and staring up at the ceiling. It had taken a month, but Tripp had gotten Duke to break that habit, and he now only dove in when he was given permission. The dog was capable of listening…sometimes.

“Duke,” Tripp snapped his fingers.

The dog pulled his attention from Beth—and stopped rubbing all over her—as he looked over to his owner. But that was about all of the focus Tripp was going to get. A squirrel jumped from the roof to a tree in front of the house and the dog tore off like his ass was on fire, barking madly.

“You need to figure out how to keep that dumb beast under control.” She pointed to Duke, who was unsuccessfully trying to climb the tree as he attempted to get to the squirrel. “He destroyed my flower beds, ripped up everything. So close up that doggy door, put him on a leash, maybe actually train him, or give him to someone else. I don’t care, but I’m sick and tired of dealing with this. He’s an obnoxious menace and has absolutely no concept of boundaries.”

Okay, so yes it was true that Duke had in fact gotten into her backyard…again, and that he’d done something with a whole hell of a lot of mud included. It was also true that the dog wasn’t always the brightest crayon in the box. But no one called Tripp’s dog dumb.

This was the portion of the morning where little Miss Perky Tits crossed the line.

“Ha! Boundaries! You want to talk boundaries, Beth? How about the fact that I’ve caught your teenage niece and her friends in my hot tub. Or what about the fact that I’ve had two flat tires on my truck because of various toys that I’ve run over on my driveway. Or what about the fact that there is peanut butter everywhere. On the door handles. On the mailbox. In my garage. And I hate peanut butter, so it sure as hell isn’t coming from me.”

Her eyes narrowed as he’d gone through the list, her mouth getting tighter and tighter.

“You think you’re the perfect neighbor?” he asked. “Think again. I’ve had to deal with plenty myself. Maybe you should figure out how to use a leash, too.”

As soon as the words were out of his mouth he knew he’d gone too far. But he didn’t have a chance to take them back.

Beth took a step away, her nostrils flaring as she breathed deep through her nose. “God you’re an asshole.”

All right, maybe he didn’t want to take it back. So he said nothing as she turned on her heel and headed down the pathway.

It was then that he got a good long look at the back of her. Her cotton shorts weren’t even discernible at this angle they were so covered in mud, and the backs of her legs were just as bad. Duke must’ve knocked her down into all of that mud. And really, he should feel bad about what had just happened but he was hard pressed to, considering everything. His dog wasn’t the only one who was a “menace.”

A loud bark rent the air, pulling Tripp’s gaze from the retreating woman. Duke was now rolling around in the yard, scratching his back on the grass like it was the greatest thing in the world.

Spaz. But he was Tripp’s spaz, and he wasn’t going anywhere. Well, he wasn’t going anywhere besides to get a bath. Stat.

*  *  *

“Arrogant.”

Slam!

“Asshole.”

Slam!

“Egotistical.”

Slam!

“Dickhead.”

Slam!

Six hours. It had been six hours since Beth had walked away from the neighbor from hell—and the demon dog that was determined to make her life miserable—and she was still fuming. So much so that she was taking it out on the filing cabinet in front of her. If she had a baseball bat she’d crack the sucker open like it was a piñata.

Maybe you should figure out how to use a leash, too.

God, he was such a jerk. She needed to keep reminding herself of that fact…and not think about the way his thick dark brown hair had been tousled all around his head, and how it had been so damn sexy it should be illegal. Nor should she be thinking about how the lovely scruff on his face was in that land just beyond five o’clock shadow and going into beard. She loved a good beard.

Loved. It.

And she really shouldn’t be thinking about how his shorts had hung perilously low on his hips. Or the dusting of hair across his abs—abs that had abs—and how it reached down beyond the waist band of those perilously low-hanging shorts.

Then there was the tattoo inked on his left side and down his ribs. She really shouldn’t be thinking about that either, but she was a sucker for tattoos if there ever was one. His was a shield with crossed axes, a side profile of the patron saint of firefighters at the center, and the words “St. Florian Protect Us,” written around it.

From his chocolate brown eyes to the chestnut of his hair, all the way to his tanned toned skin, he was all shades of warmth. Too bad he was a cold bastard. Not even his sexy sexiness could make up for that fact that he was a…

“Prick,” she mumbled to herself as she slammed another drawer shut.

“What did the filing cabinet ever do to you?”

Beth turned and looked over her shoulder to find Denise Morrison standing in the doorway, eyebrows raised high above her hazel eyes and hands on her slender hips. It would’ve been an intimidating pose if it was anyone else making it.

Beth knew better. Denise could be sassy with the best of them, but she was the queen of politeness and about as nice as they came. Besides, how could the woman be intimidating when she was currently sporting light pink scrubs?

Denise and her husband Trevor had retired before they’d moved down from Philadelphia six years ago. They’d lived in Mirabelle for two years before Trevor’s death. The pancreatic cancer had been swift and unforgiving.

These days, Denise found that being busy was the best policy. She’d gone from volunteering to getting a full-time nursing job at the hospital. Then there was the fact that she had her hands full with her three grandchildren. Her daughter Paige and son-in-law Brendan King had a three-year-old, Trevor, named after the late Trevor Morrison, and twin girls. Sarah and Molly had entered the world last September. Denise babysat as much as possible and absolutely loved having her family so close.

Over the last year, Denise had become one of Beth’s very good friends and a pretty excellent confidant. They got each other, part of it being that they both understood how hard it was to lose someone they loved.

“It’s not the filing cabinet.” Beth sighed, tired of it all. She was so beyond sick of the line of jerks who’d paraded through her life, each one worst than the last.

Though no one could top her ex Mick. It wasn’t a coincidence that “Mick” rhymed with “prick,” because that man was King of the Pricks—wore a fucking crown and held the damn scepter, a scepter he could stick straight up his…

“Uh oh.” Denise’s eyebrows rose higher. “Who is he and what did he do?”

“My jackass neighbor and so many things.”

“What happened with Tripp now?” Denise asked as she leaned against the doorjamb, folding her arms across her chest and settling in for the conversation. She knew full well everything that had happened since Tripp had moved in. And just like everyone else she thought that he was a nice guy.

“Living next to him—and his dog—is not just another friendly day in the neighborhood. Everyone is under that man’s spell except for me.” Beth didn’t fall under spells…well, not anymore. She’d been disillusioned good and proper over the last year. And really, what with the fact that she was now responsible for three other people, she couldn’t afford to be disillusioned by anyone or anything. It wasn’t just her she had to worry about these days.

“Okay…so let’s hear it. What happened?”

“I’m only going to tell you if you promise you will be on my side no matter what.”

“Cross my heart.” Denise moved one of her hands and made the motion over her chest.

And with that Beth launched into her morning…which had been on the heels of a ridiculously long night…which had occurred during an even longer week.

Oh, who the hell was she kidding? Days? Weeks? Months? It had been the longest most difficult year of her life.

Thunderstorms didn’t go over very well in the Ross house, hadn’t since Colleen and Kevin had died in a car accident during a particularly horrible one ten months ago. And whenever a bad one rolled in, the kids slept with Beth. Much like they had the night before…and the night before that…and the night before that.

Nora always commandeered the left side of the king-size mattress, needing a little bit more space than the other two as she was a fully grown seventeen year old…though, her “fully grown” was exactly five feet tall. And by morning all sixty of those inches would be sprawled out like a starfish.

Grant occupied the lower right side of the bed. As he was eight years old, he didn’t require as much space. But he slept on Beth more than he did the actual mattress. His arms wrapped around her waist while he used her stomach as a pillow. Who needed blankets—which were always stolen anyway—when she had her own personal heaters?

And last, but certainly not least, was Penny. The three-year-old claimed the top of the bed, her tiny toddler body buried in the pillows. The second she got settled, she’d stick her foot out and whisper, “hold please.” It was the only way she’d be able to fall asleep.

None of the three children were stationary sleepers, and without fail Beth always woke up with knees in her back, an elbow in her stomach, a foot in her face, or all of the above. That morning had been no different. If she’d gotten two solid hours of sleep she’d be shocked.

She’d just gotten all the kids out the door and on their way to school when she’d gone into the kitchen for a very much needed second cup of coffee. And that was when she’d spotted the damn dog.

Freaking Fido from Hell was in her backyard, again. He was rolling around in her flower beds, flower beds that she’d dropped two hundred dollars to fix up the previous summer. Flower beds that were now good and thoroughly destroyed.

“So what happened?” Denise asked when Beth got to the part where the demon dog had made a meal of her rose bushes.

“Well, when I tried to get him, he thought I was playing and started running around the yard.” A yard spotted with mud puddles from all of the rain over the last few days. “I think I fell about half a dozen times before I finally caught him.”

“So you marched over to Tripp’s house covered in mud?” Denise bit the corner of her lip to suppress a laugh.

“Oh no.” Beth pointed to the treachery on her friend’s mouth. “Don’t even. My side, remember? You aren’t allowed to be amused by this. I’m fully aware of how ridiculous I looked.”

Denise held her palms out in surrender. “I’m sorry.” She waved a hand through the air in a please continue motion as she settled into the chair across from Beth.

“I banged on his front door for a couple of minutes until he could be roused from his sound sleep. And, get this, he had the nerve to yell at me. He’s sleeping in, oblivious to all of it, while I’m chasing that bear of his around the yard and he gets angry with me. And then he tells me to put my kids on a leash. Can you believe that?”

Denise was silent for a moment, chewing the corner of her lip, but this time it wasn’t in amusement.

“What?” Beth narrowed her eyes.

“I didn’t say anything.”

“You didn’t have to; that expression says it all. You’re about to make excuses for him, aren’t you?”

“Look, I’m not on his side about the dog. Not by any means. He should keep his animal on his side of the fence. And that comment about the leash…that was…uncalled for and way too far.”

“But…?” Beth folded her arms across her chest as she leaned back in the chair.

“Is this real-time talk? Or am I still supposed to just agree with you?”

Beth thought for a second before she sighed. “Real-time talk.” She knew that Denise had her best interest at heart…even if it was going to be something she didn’t want to hear.

“Your kids have been known to go over onto his property.”

Okay…so this was the one part of the argument from that morning that Beth had flat out lost. Her nieces and nephew had been playing with the borders of the boundaries as well…Nora being the worst.

That had been a fun encounter in December. Tripp had been standing on the front porch at three in the morning with Nora and two other girls Beth had never met before. They’d all been wrapped in towels and shivering in the cold night air.

“I believe one of these belongs to you,” he’d frowned at her. And that was the day she’d discovered just how attractive surly could be.

Not that she thought about that a lot…no, not at all. She shook her head, pulling herself back to the conversation with Denise.

“They’ve had their moments,” Beth admitted more than a little grudgingly.

“Now you know I’m not saying you weren’t more than justified to be upset about what happened this morning. I would’ve been fuming mad if someone or something was responsible for messing up my garden.”

Of that Beth had no doubt. Denise’s garden was an oasis if Beth had ever seen one. It was a passion that both Denise and her late husband Trevor had shared. Denise had told Beth many times that being out there was the best sort of therapy for her, even if it was bittersweet. This was yet another thing the two women had in common, as Beth felt the same way about gardening because of her late mother.

“What are you two chatting about?” The voice of Vanessa Cartwright wafted through the room about a second before her Chanel perfume.

Beth pulled her eyes from her friend and turned to the doorway, where the receptionist for the women’s health wing of the hospital stood. Her long auburn hair stretched down her back in a curtain and her super model long legs were only half covered by her silvery gray Dior wrap dress that went perfectly with the black Louis Vuitton pumps on her feet.

Beth didn’t get to wear shoes like that very often. Her footwear was all about the practical and what didn’t have her feet screaming for release at the end of the day. Case in point: the hot pink and lime green tennis shoes she was currently sporting.

But Vanessa and Beth lived very different lifestyles. Where Beth was the one going home at the end of the work day to take care of three children, Vanessa was the one getting taken care of. Her current boyfriend was a former investment banker who’d retired at the age of forty-five and moved to the Gulf Coast to spend his days on his boat. These days he also thoroughly enjoyed lavishing his twenty-seven-year-old bombshell girlfriend with gifts.

There were three things that Vanessa loved the most: expensive things, rich men, and good gossip. Beth liked Vanessa just fine, the girl was as sweet as pie…but a vault for secrets she was not.

“Beth is having gardening problems.” Denise immediately diverted from their main topic of conversation.

“Oh.” Vanessa wrinkled her nose at the distasteful thought of dirt getting underneath her pretty pale pink manicure. “I can’t help you there.”

No shit, Beth thought…and was proud she hadn’t voiced those words out loud. Besides, it wasn’t Vanessa’s vault that Beth was having a supremely shitty day. So she kept her mouth shut and finished filing the last of the folders while Vanessa and Denise started talking about the latest episode of a reality TV show they both watched.

“I mean I would’ve picked the cop over the lawyer,” Denise said. “He was adorable and super sweet.”

“No, it was the lawyer all the way for me. He had the looks and the money. I mean don’t get me wrong; the cop was cute, but cute doesn’t always cut it. Maybe if he had a few more muscles like some of our public servants…well, that would’ve changed my vote. Speaking of public servants…Beth, I heard what happened with your neighbor this morning.”

“What?” Her head came up as she looked over at Vanessa. What the hell had she heard? What was Tripp telling everyone? That she’d barged over to his house raving like a lunatic?

“A massive tree crashed down through the Wilkins house around three last night. Landed right across the hallway separating the master bedroom from the rest of the house. They’re on the second floor so they couldn’t exactly climb out the window to get to their kids. Jefferson is, what? Two? And Mary is only a few months. They were both crying up a storm in their cribs for twenty minutes or so before anyone could get there.”

Oh dear…a sinking feeling started to settle low in Beth’s stomach. Why did she get the feeling she was going to come out of this conversation feeling like a jerk?

“Dorothy was beside herself and Bobbie was about to jump out the window to get to the kids. Tripp was the one who got to the house first. He made sure the kids were safely out and then got Dorothy and Bobbie out, too.”

So Tripp had been out in the middle of the night saving babies…and here she was complaining about a messed up garden.

No, she didn’t feel like a jerk…she felt like an asshole.

Chapter Two

Beth pulled into her driveway at 6:03. She shut off the engine of her white Trailblazer and leaned back in the seat, taking a deep breath and rubbing at her throbbing temples.

From start to finish the day had sucked and her exhaustion was emotional, physical, and mental. The thought of cooking had been pure misery so she’d ordered two pies from Papa Pan’s Pizza and picked them up on the way home. One a thin crust with extra cheese and mushrooms for her and Grant, the other a deep dish with pineapple and ham for Nora and Penny. The Hawaiian had been Colleen’s favorite, too.

God, Beth missed her sister.

Her eyes popped open and she focused on the house in front of her. It had been Colleen’s dream home from the very start. Even though half the inside had needed to be remodeled when they bought it, she’d seen every part of its potential at first sight. There was a massive front porch and a beautiful brick staircase that led up to the bright red front door. It had a bit of a plantation feel to it with its white columns, but as it was only one story it wasn’t ostentatious.

Beth’s favorite part was the backyard that looked out to the lake. Nothing sounded better than curling up in the hammock on the screened in back porch and enjoying a beer while watching the sunset.

But as another storm was rolling in off the horizon, making everything as gloomy as possible, that wasn’t going to be a reality. The sun was nowhere in sight, covered up by the big black clouds that hovered low.

Odds were it was going to be another long evening of Beth sharing her bed with three scared kids. It wasn’t all that shocking that ten months since their parents’ death, they were still having difficulties with storms…especially at night. Nope, not surprising at all, as they’d been asleep when the sheriff’s department had shown up on the doorstep to tell them that their parents were gone.

Kevin and Colleen had been driving back from dinner to celebrate their nineteenth wedding anniversary. Lightning had struck a tree and snapped it in half, leaving part of it lying in the middle of the road. Kevin had slowed the car as he’d rounded a bend in the road, but the driver of the SUV behind him had not. Four people had been involved in the accident. None of them made it out alive.

Nora had been babysitting and had fallen asleep on the sofa waiting for her parents to get home. The Attic. . .