Ultimate Small-Town Bundle #2

Here is an excerpt from The Rest of Forever.

I’m experiencing new emotions, ones I never thought possible. For the first time in my life, being alone is…uncomfortable. Jordan Collins apparently broke me. Or fixed me, depending on how you look at things.
Growing up, being alone made sense. I was better company to myself than any of the other military brats were. Hell, my IQ was higher than all of theirs combined, so I didn’t expect an intelligent conversation from any of them. They were too busy running through my father’s base with their water guns or Teacher Barbies to figure out how to hack into the military’s motherboard. I wasn’t, and by the time I was ten, I knew more government secrets than POTUS. Considering he was preoccupied getting head in the Oval Office, I can’t be faulted.
School was easy for me. Well, the academics were anyway, and I ate them up like a man deprived of food, so fast that the teaching staff couldn’t keep up with me. They didn’t enjoy when I pointed out that wasn’t my problem and that maybe they needed to up their games.
Testing, they recommended, and I spent weeks going to private specialists, seeing every school personnel they could convince to try their best at cracking my code, and watching my mother fall apart while my father distanced himself from me. The distancing, I understood, the falling apart, not so much.
With the release of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders IV in 1994 and its revision in 2000, the results of my testing came back with terms every parent dreads.
At that point, my parent’s only point of reference for my diagnosis was a popular comedy from 1988. I’ve seen the movie. If that is what Hollywood considers a comedy, then I’m more fucked up than I thought. But back then, my parents didn’t have the Internet or support groups. Kids with different learning needs were still being placed in special schools or classes. My diagnosis still scared people, it was viewed as a lifelong tragedy.
My teachers tried to talk my parents into sending me to a private school for the academically gifted and socially inept. We’d gone on the tour. I even tried on the uniform, but when the material started scratching at my neck, I knew I wouldn’t be allowed to attend. They were not equipped to handle my outbursts.
Now, while I hole up in Elliot Montgomery’s attic, the collar of my shirt feels like a noose once again, scratchy and tight. Only now, as an adult, I should know how to cope. I shouldn’t feel like ripping at the material and flopping my body on the ground; the coolness of the floor tiles providing me with a little relief, but it’s taking every fiber of my being not to do that very thing.
See, that’s how it is for me. As I’ve grown up, I’ve learned what society requires of me. I don’t always comply. Sometimes, for reasons truly out of my control. Other times, I really just enjoy being an asshole and watching the responses of others.
But there is no one here to react to my bizarre behavior in my best friend’s attic. They’re all down there in his new B and B getting ready to celebrate his marriage to my other friend, Courtney Knight.
Courtney and I began as I have with every other female that has crossed my path since my teenage years. By fucking. Anywhere, anytime, and usually with my other best friend, Ace Lyons.
But all that has changed now.
Ace is married to Bridget, Courtney’s sister, and the four of us haven’t had sex in years. Well, not with each other, together, as a group. Courtney is about to become Elliot’s wife and I’m perched on a beam in their attic not having sex with anyone.
Then I hear her voice.
Jordan Collins.
“Oops,” Jordan says. “We thought you guys were done. Anyway…”
I lower my ear to the floor in hopes of hearing her better. Her voice is like that of a siren to me, and I want nothing more than to jump through the ceiling and take her in my arms. Knowing I have impulsivity issues, I concentrate on keeping my body calm and practice the deep breathing techniques I learned many years ago. They’d come in handy in a similar situation during combat; Jordan Collins and her angelic voice should be nothing compared to what I’ve lived through.
Then she giggles and my dick swells uncomfortably at the sweet sound.
“Yeah, okay. We’ll see about that. It’s me that’ll never have that again,” she says before a loud male voice booms in the space below.
“I’ll put it all over you, bae, right after they say their vows.”
This douche just called my girl “bae”? Really? Could he have found a term that was more douchey? I doubt it. What guy calls a woman that? I’ll tell you…a douche.
The thought of that asshole touching Jordan has me forgetting where I am and jumping to my feet to reach her before he can get his paws on what’s mine.
Big mistake.
I whack my head into a beam and curse my large stature. “Motherfucking cocksucker, shit!”
With my hand going to the back of my aching head and my body folding in half so I can fit in the cramped space, I picture my two best friends below me, laughing their asses off at my expense.
Dicks.
Then I hear Jordan’s name mentioned with mine and it makes me smile. It sounds right.
Jordan and Callan.
Callan and Jordan.
Jordan Black.
Shit! I may have fucked up my life to epic proportions.