Any Day Now Read online

  Text copyright ©2020 Lani Lynn Vale

  All Rights Reserved

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Dedication

  The lawn guys are mowing outside my office window right now. I want to write something really fucking special right here, but all I can think about is the time they were mowing and a rock hit my window and broke it. I sure hope that it doesn’t happen again. Also, I don’t really think this is a dedication. Just some random rambling on my part. Second also, two of my toes are numb right now from running a marathon five days ago. How normal do you think that is?

  Acknowledgments

  Golden Czermak – Photographer

  Model – Jacob Wilson

  My Brother’s Editor & Ink It Out Editing- My editors

  Cover Me Darling - Cover Artist

  My mom - Thank you for reading this book eight million two hundred and three times.

  Kendra, Laura, Penney, Jen, Brandi, Lisa, Kathy, Mindy, Barbara & Amanda—I don’t know what I would do without y’all. Thank you, my lovely betas, for loving my books as much as I do.

  Table of Contents

  Blurb

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Epilogue

  What’s Next?

  Other titles by Lani Lynn Vale:

  The Freebirds

  Boomtown

  Highway Don’t Care

  Another One Bites the Dust

  Last Day of My Life

  Texas Tornado

  I Don’t Dance

  The Heroes of The Dixie Wardens MC

  Lights To My Siren

  Halligan To My Axe

  Kevlar To My Vest

  Keys To My Cuffs

  Life To My Flight

  Charge To My Line

  Counter To My Intelligence

  Right To My Wrong

  Code 11- KPD SWAT

  Center Mass

  Double Tap

  Bang Switch

  Execution Style

  Charlie Foxtrot

  Kill Shot

  Coup De Grace

  The Uncertain Saints

  Whiskey Neat

  Jack & Coke

  Vodka On The Rocks

  Bad Apple

  Dirty Mother

  Rusty Nail

  The Kilgore Fire Series

  Shock Advised

  Flash Point

  Oxygen Deprived

  Controlled Burn

  Put Out

  I Like Big Dragons Series

  I Like Big Dragons and I Cannot Lie

  Dragons Need Love, Too

  Oh, My Dragon

  The Dixie Warden Rejects

  Beard Mode

  Fear the Beard

  Son of a Beard

  I’m Only Here for the Beard

  The Beard Made Me Do It

  Beard Up

  For the Love of Beard

  Law & Beard

  There’s No Crying in Baseball

  Pitch Please

  Quit Your Pitchin’

  Listen, Pitch

  The Hail Raisers

  Hail No

  Go to Hail

  Burn in Hail

  What the Hail

  The Hail You Say

  Hail Mary

  The Simple Man Series

  Kinda Don’t Care

  Maybe Don’t Wanna

  Get You Some

  Ain’t Doin’ It

  Too Bad So Sad

  Bear Bottom Guardians MC

  Mess Me Up

  Talkin’ Trash

  How About No

  My Bad

  One Chance, Fancy

  It Happens

  Keep It Classy

  Snitches Get Stitches

  F-Bomb

  The Southern Gentleman Series

  Hissy Fit

  Lord Have Mercy

  KPD Motorcycle Patrol

  Hide Your Crazy

  It Wasn’t Me

  I’d Rather Not

  Make Me

  Sinners are Winners

  If You Say So

  SWAT 2.0

  Just Kidding

  Fries Before Guys

  Maybe Swearing Will Help

  Ask Me If I Care

  May Contain Wine

  Joke’s on You

  Join the Club

  Any Day Now

  Say it Ain’t So (9-8-20)

  Officially Over It (10-13-20)

  Nobody Knows (11-3-20)

  Depends Who’s Asking (12-8-20)

  Valentine Boys

  Herd That

  Crazy Heifer

  Chute Yeah

  Get Bucked

  Souls Chapel Revenants MC

  Repeat Offender (1-12-21)

  Conjugal Visits (2-23-21)

  Jailbait (4-6-21)

  Doin’ A Dime (5-4-21)

  Inmate of the Month (6-29-21)

  Kitty Kitty (8-10-21)

  Gen Pop (9-21-21)

  Shakedown (11-2-21)

  Standalones:

  Somethin’ About That Boy

  Blurb

  Amelia loves her good friend, Avery. So much so that she agrees to do the stupidest thing ever.

  A stranger photoshoot.

  You know the type. The photographer takes photos of two individuals. Two individuals that, until that day, have never met in their life.

  The moment she shows up at the photoshoot, she knows that she made a terrible decision.

  Why? Because the total stranger about to be in an intimate photoshoot with her is the hottest thing that’s ever walked the streets of Kilgore, Texas. If not the entire US of A.

  ***

  Adam wasn’t sure why the hell he agreed to something so stupid.

  Call it temporary lapse of sanity.

  When the photographer who shot his photo for the Kilgore Police Department’s benefit calendar asked him for a favor, he couldn’t say no. Not without looking like a jerk seeing as it was benefitting the Fallen Officer Foundation that he played a rather large part in.

  Whatever it was that made him agree, he quickly realizes that it’s not worth it. Not when he walks into the studio and sees the massive bed with blood-red sheets dominating the middle of the room.

  So uncomfortable is he at the sight, he’s about to head straight out the door and not look back, when she walks in.

  Amelia steals his breath away with just one glance, and all of a sudden, getting this stranger into his arms with his mouth on hers sounds like the best idea ever.

  Chapter 1

  I don’t need a pool to get you wet.

&nbs
p; -Lawn sprinkler

  Amelia

  “Please, please, please, please, please.”

  I looked at my friend, Avery, and wanted to say no.

  A thousand times no.

  But, she didn’t ask me for stuff often.

  In fact, I was honestly surprised that she was doing it now.

  “What’s it for again?” I asked, not wanting to hear the words yet knowing that I had to ask.

  “A college class that I’m taking. Photography. We’re supposed to come up with something unique, a photoshoot. It has to be fun, expressive, and emotional. We can do whatever we want. But, it’s a huge part of my grade. And, it’s of a personal nature. I just figured, with where you worked, you might be more okay with it than everyone else… plus, I don’t think that anybody else will do it. Or… more accurately, be allowed to do it.”

  I frowned. “What do you mean?”

  I ignored the part about ‘where I worked.’

  Where I worked wasn’t bad.

  Really, it wasn’t.

  I mean, working at a strip club as a bartender wasn’t bad.

  I wore what I wanted, made good money doing it, and got the benefit of pissing my brothers and father off. Even more so than my schooling—a social worker.

  They did not, I repeat, did not like the fact that I would be working with druggies—their words not mine.

  They also did not like the fact that I hadn’t caved on any of their demands—i.e., finding a job that kept me safe, protected, and healthy at all times.

  So, to defy them even more, I’d moved to Kilgore—where having one brother around was better than having a brother and a father—both of which were part of an MC that owned that town.

  Sebastian and my father were part of one of the biggest motorcycle clubs in the country. They owned Benton, Louisiana—my hometown—and made it virtually impossible for me to live under their microscope.

  In Kilgore, Texas I only had my eldest brother, Sam Mackenzie, to deal with. Also, I had James, my brother-in-law, but still better than a bossy, overprotective brother or father.

  One was better than three.

  At least, that was what I kept telling myself.

  Luckily, Kilgore was close to my college, and it meant that I could go to school, work toward my master’s degree, and have the added benefit of having family around if I ever needed help.

  Which, I wouldn’t.

  But I liked to allow my alpha family members to think that I would have them in case I needed them.

  “What do you mean by being allowed to do this?” I asked.

  “Well.” Avery bit her lip, looking torn. “See…”

  She looked like she didn’t want to tell me.

  That’s when I knew it was bad.

  “Spit it out,” I ordered as I squatted down and hefted the giant keg of beer into place.

  Or, at least, I tried to. It wasn’t budging.

  Mainly because I was five-foot-three, a hundred and fifteen pounds soaking wet, and barely had time to get a run in, let alone any squats.

  Meaning, the ninety-pound keg wasn’t moving by itself. At least not today.

  “Come around here and help me,” I ordered.

  Avery did, walking around the bar of the strip club that I worked in and grabbing one side of the keg.

  Together, we hefted it into place.

  Then I got to work hooking up the connections.

  “Okay,” Avery started again. “I’m just going to blurt out my idea, okay?”

  I gave her a droll look before starting to line the glasses up the way I liked them.

  Just as Avery was about to open her mouth and start explaining, the door to the bar opened and then banged shut, and I grinned.

  “Hi, Lynn.” I smiled. “You’re early today.”

  “Meeting someone,” my dad’s friend, Lynn, and the owner of The Underground, Kilgore’s—or the outskirts of Kilgore’s—newest strip club, said.

  Actually, it was an old club.

  One that apparently Lynn had won off a guy in a poker game, decided he would like to turn it around, and had restored it to its vintage glory.

  When he’d opened it a few months ago, I didn’t think he expected it to do as well as it did.

  The door banged again, and Bruno walked in.

  Bruno was someone I didn’t know all that well, but when I looked at him, I got the distinct feeling he was of the same caliber as Lynn and my father were.

  My father was ex-CIA and a whole lot of other things. Lynn was a whole lot of other things—those were my dad’s words, not mine. But really, I didn’t actually know what Lynn did.

  I’d heard quite a bit about him over the course of my life, and I still hadn’t quite pinpointed what it was that he did—or didn’t—do.

  Bruno was much the same.

  And someone I tried to avoid at all costs. Not because he was creepy or anything, but just because he was kind of scary, and I tried not to get noticed because getting noticed led to my brothers and my dad poking their noses into my life when I didn’t want them to.

  Both Bruno and Lynn walked into Lynn’s office and shut the door, leaving me once again to look at Avery who was still not telling me what she wanted.

  “I’m not getting any younger here,” I said. “And are we doing lunch or not?”

  I usually worked from ten to twelve at the bar after classes, getting things ready for that night. Then I grabbed lunch, went to two more classes, and then got some studying time in and one of my online classes taken care of before I went to work from eight to twelve.

  Avery and I met for lunch on Tuesdays.

  She was in one of my classes at the college, and we’d hit it off quite well.

  Now we were good friends, and we ate lunch and chatted when we could fit in the time.

  Tuesdays were usually my only days that I could do that, though.

  My schedule was busy as hell—at least for the next six weeks.

  I was drastically rewriting my schedule next year.

  I would not be taking anything over twelve college credit hours.

  I just couldn’t hack it.

  First, I didn’t want to attempt something so difficult. It was an awful idea to try to fit this many college classes in.

  Secondly, I liked sleeping in. I also liked Saturdays and Sundays. Both of which were being consumed by all the schoolwork I couldn’t finish during the week.

  Third, I missed my family. I wanted to see them more.

  And lastly, I kind of liked bartending. It made me exceptionally happy to see the disapproving faces my brothers made.

  “Let’s head out now,” Avery said. “I’ll tell you in the car.”

  I rolled my eyes but grabbed my purse, called out a goodbye to Lynn through the door, and headed out until my shift this evening.

  “Do you have to work this Saturday?” she asked casually.

  I shook my head. “No. I don’t work Saturday or Sunday. That was the deal with my brothers, remember?”

  She snickered.

  I’m glad someone found it funny.

  I sure didn’t.

  “It’s sweet that they love you,” she said. “And Saturdays and Sundays are freakin’ crazy here… or so I’ve heard.”

  “You should come,” I teased.

  Avery gave me a droll look.

  “Do you honestly think that I could get Derek to take me here?” she asked.

  Derek was her man.

  Derek also was a member of the Kilgore SWAT team, and a really sweet guy that loved his wife.

  What he did not love was his wife in danger.

  Not that I blamed him.

  I was only risky with my own life. Not anybody else’s.

  “No,” I admitted. “So… why does it matter if I have Saturday off?”

  She bleeped the locks on her car door, and I dropped inside the passenger seat.

  “I…” she sigh
ed.

  “Oh, spit it out, Avery.” I slapped my hand against my jean-clad thigh.

  “I want you to do a stranger photoshoot!” she blurted out.

  Seriously, I was a pretty laid back person.

  I liked to do what I liked to do.

  I dressed like I wanted.

  Ate how I wanted.

  Worked out when I wanted.

  Went to school.

  Ultimately, I was pretty chill.

  I mean, I worked in a strip club, for Pete’s sake.

  What I did not do well were strangers.

  I didn’t know why.

  That was why I worked behind the bar.

  It kept people away from me.

  I could put on a good front, but honestly, I was not good with people I didn’t know.

  And generally, people coming into a strip club didn’t give a damn about the woman behind the bar. They gave a damn about the woman up on the stage.

  Something which I would never, not ever, do.

  I was just fucking shy, okay?

  I could bullshit with the best of them, but at the end of the day, I still hid behind my daddy when he introduced me to new people.

  “I know what you’re thinking,” she said. “It’s a stranger. I swear to God, if there was anyone else, I wouldn’t have asked you. But everyone is married, soon-to-be married, or pregnant that I know female-wise. You’re it for me.”

  I swallowed hard past a lump in my throat.

  “What would I have to do?” I asked, voice holding steady even though I could feel it threatening to crack.

  “Whatever you wanted to do,” she admitted. “I was thinking that I could bring you to our house. We could do it in our bedroom. Or our kitchen. Wherever. Pretty much, we just throw y’all together and take pictures of you. Please, please. I know you’re about to say no.”

  I was.

  “Avery…” I started.

  “He’s a good guy,” she blurted. “He’s rock solid—both in terms of muscles and personality. He’s a little quiet. He’s on the SWAT team. I’ve pretty much blackmailed him into doing it, too.”

  “How did you blackmail him?” I asked curiously.

  “Well, I think that I’m going to do a photoshoot auction,” she said. “Some of the pictures I’m going to enter into this auction will benefit the Fallen Officer’s Association. The association is something very near and dear to his heart.”

  “Why?” I couldn’t stop myself from asking.

  “Adam had a best friend in boot camp. His name was Doucet. Doucet went all the way through bootcamp with him, only to have him have a heart issue that forced him into retirement before they could even deploy. Doucet went on to join the police department while Adam went on to do his thing in the Air Force. Last year, Doucet died while on shift working a police call. He was hit by a tractor-trailer while on the side of the road.” She paused. “And ever since, Adam has done everything he could to help support fallen officers like Doucet.”