Total pages in book: 91
Estimated words: 85876 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 429(@200wpm)___ 344(@250wpm)___ 286(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 85876 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 429(@200wpm)___ 344(@250wpm)___ 286(@300wpm)
Newly divorced with a young son to raise Tucker Beckett is the last man Miranda Owens should be itching to figure out, to make smile, and hear laugh. Still there is something about the detective with haunted blue eyes and a dirty mouth that draws her in from the moment they meet.
If only life were so simple.
As Tucker and Miranda begin to navigate their new relationship, Tucker is tasked with solving the murder of a young woman, while their ex’s begin to play games in an attempt to split the two of them up.
Before they fall, these two will need to figure out if the only thing tying them together is the circumstances that brought them together in the first place or if it’s something more.
Love isn’t complicated but sometimes life is.
*************FULL BOOK START HERE*************
CHAPTER ONE
miranda
I’m going to be sick.
Holding my balled-up hand against my stomach, I read the text that just popped up on Bowie’s computer again and try to convince myself that I’m misunderstanding what I’m looking at.
It doesn’t work. No matter how many times I reread the message, it still says the same thing.
What time do you think you’ll be here? Tucker is working late, so we don’t need to worry about him.
The simple question seems innocent enough, but the photo attached to the message of a beautiful woman with dark hair who’s wearing a red lace nightie proves I haven’t made the wrong assumption.
“Mommy!” Kingston shouts, making me jump, and I slam the laptop closed and watch my beautiful boy with his dark hair and brown eyes—both traits from his father—hop-skip from the living room and into the kitchen. “Can we go outside now?”
“Yeah.” I slid off the stool I pulled out so I could look up a recipe for dinner tonight, not having a clue that doing so would change everything. “Let Mommy get on her shoes.”
“Okay,” he sings, following behind me to the front door.
“How about we walk down to the park?” I suggest, putting on his coat first. It takes me a few tries to get it zipped, because my hands are shaking so badly.
“Yes.” His tiny arms shoot into the air, and I can’t help the smile that curves my lips.
“All right, let’s go.” I open the door after I’ve got my shoes on, and he bounces out ahead of me, then waits for me to lock up before he reaches for my hand.
Holding onto him tightly, I move on autopilot down the sidewalk, past house after house, all of them similar to the one Bowie moved us into just weeks after we found out we were pregnant with Kingston. Our boy was a surprise gift from our honeymoon in Jamaica and a complete shock to me, because I had been on birth control at the time and was not planning on being a mom.
Or not at that moment in my life anyway.
At that time, I was working at a hair salon as a stylist with a goal of opening my own shop within the next couple of years, but getting pregnant changed that. For the first five months, I was so sick that I could hardly get out of bed, and for the last four, I was put on bed rest, because my doctors were concerned I would miscarry.
Bowie was great about everything and had no problem stepping up and taking care of us when I could no longer work. And after we had Kingston, we just decided I would stay home until he started preschool. And with Bowie’s job as a police officer, he was able to take an extra shift here or there, so we never struggled.
Now, I wonder if it was too much, if the responsibility and stress of him being the sole provider for our family changed the way he felt about me, about us.
With my throat tight, I shove that thought away. I might not work outside the house, but being a stay-at-home mom is a twenty-four-hour, seven-day-a-week gig. I do not get time off. Heck, I can’t even remember the last time I went to the bathroom on my own, let alone left the house by myself. And when Bowie does have a day off, I always make sure he never has to worry about Kingston or anything around the house.
Just last weekend, he went out of town with friends to go fishing.
Or maybe he didn’t. Maybe he spent the weekend banging another woman while I was home with our son.
Did I miss the signs? How long has it been going on?
Things between us have been… well, if I’m honest, not great. But that happens, right? The ups and downs in relationships, the times where you feel completely disconnected from your spouse. I know I’ve been feeling like that for a long time—longer than I’d even like to admit. I just convinced myself that things would get better when Kingston got a little older and he didn’t need me so much.
“Mommy, can I go on the slide?” Kingston asks, dragging me from my thoughts, and I look around, realizing we’ve already made it the five blocks to the park.
“Yeah, just be careful on the way down.”
“I know,” he groans like he’s had sixteen years of me annoying him with my overprotectiveness and not just three.
I watch him run across the mulch that covers the ground to the jungle gym with a slide attached, then I take a seat on the bench. Taking my phone out of my pocket, I tap the screen and see a message from Bowie letting me know he’s going to be late tonight and not to wait up for him.