Town of Chance: Sweet Caroline [The Dare Series 5] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting)
The Dare Series 5
Town of Chance: Sweet Caroline
Caroline wants a new start. Her sister took off for her own reasons a year ago and found this place called Chance. She’s not too sure if she’ll be safe there, but the town and its people have their charms. Plus they engage in some very special relationships that seem to provide a woman with constant protection and love. It’s hard to resist the charms of such relationships, or avoid the rules of the town that keep women safe. It seems a few men have their eyes on her, but she’s not too willing to take a chance after being hurt so badly once before.
Perhaps when her broken arm heals and she’s back on her feet again, she’ll give dating a chance. Specifically, with three mighty fine residents, who want to show her what love really is all about. But her troubles follow her and could land them in the middle of her nightmare, or it could put them in their grave. She has to end this once and for all...even if it means dying.
Genre: Contemporary, Ménage a Trois/Quatre
Length: 43,564 words
TOWN OF CHANCE 5:
SWEET CAROLINE
The Dare Series 5
Dixie Lynn Dwyer
MENAGE EVERLASTING
Siren Publishing, Inc.
www.SirenPublishing.com
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A SIREN PUBLISHING BOOK
IMPRINT: Ménage Everlasting
TOWN OF CHANCE 5: SWEET CAROLINE
Copyright © 2016 by Dixie Lynn Dwyer
E-book ISBN: 978-1-68295-051-7
First E-book Publication: February 2016
Cover design by Les Byerley
All art and logo copyright © 2016 by Siren Publishing, Inc.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED: This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part, without express written permission.
All characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.
PUBLISHER
Siren Publishing, Inc.
www.SirenPublishing.com
Letter to Readers
Dear Readers,
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Regarding E-book Piracy
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The author and the publisher work very hard to bring our paying readers high-quality reading entertainment.
This is Dixie Lynn Dwyer’s livelihood. It’s fair and simple. Please respect Dixie Lynn Dwyer’s right to earn a living from her work.
Amanda Hilton, Publisher
www.SirenPublishing.com
www.BookStrand.com
DEDICATION
Dear readers,
Thank you for purchasing this legal copy of Sweet Caroline.
Love is a very powerful emotion. Some people never truly get to experience it. Some may experience so much pain and sadness in their lives that when it comes to love they can’t even recognize it.
Caroline is one of those people. All her life she has experienced sadness, pain and abandonment. Her fears are so deep that even when she involves herself in an abusive relationship she doesn’t tell her boyfriend about her sister in an attempt to protect her. She sacrifices herself regularly and sees this behavior as normal.
Then she flees this unhealthy relationship and comes to the Town of Chance, where she learns pretty quickly that love does exist. That people do care and don’t always have ulterior motives.
May you enjoy Caroline’s story as she learns about what true love is and finds out if it is powerful enough to save such a sweet, yet, battered, saddened soul like her.
Happy reading.
Hugs!
~Dixie~
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
About the Author
TOWN OF CHANCE 5:
SWEET CAROLINE
The Dare Series 5
DIXIE LYNN DWYER
Copyright © 2016
Prologue
“You must be so excited about your sister moving out here. When do you expect her?” Marlena Courts asked Shelby Ann. Shelby exhaled. She felt so nervous about her sister getting here safely. She couldn’t wait to hold her in her arms and hug her tight. The last several months had been hell for her sister, but she was finally getting away from Cameron.
“Hopefully before dinnertime. I’m a nervous wreck,” Shelby said as she wiped her sweaty palms on her dress skirt. She’d stepped into Rita’s diner to grab lunch with Marlena. They had become friends when Marlena worked at the diner and they hung out a few times with other friends like Eliza Grace. Eliza Had a photo shoot today out of town and couldn’t make it. Shelby had moved here on a whim a little more than a year ago. Similar to her sister Caroline, she had been in an abusive relationship. She swallowed hard and her chest tightened just thinking about the hell she went through, which made her wonder why the same thing had to happen to Caroline. All she could think was that it was their poor upbringing and their desperate need to feel loved and special. No one in Chance knew Shelby’s secret, and no one would know about Caroline’s. She would be safe here. Cameron would never find her because Caroline had never told Cameron that she had a sister she was close to. It was best that way. Shelby was in hiding and nothing would change that.
She swallowed hard, feeling a bit guilty. Marlena and just about everyone in Chance were good, trustworthy people. The sheriff, one of Alicia’s men, was a force to reckon with. They had resources and people who lived in town or nearby that helped anyone in trouble, but they couldn’t help Shelby. If Skip found her, she was as good as dead. Nothing mattered more right now than her sister Caroline. She’d sounded desperate, scared, and sh
e felt that fear through the phone line. Caroline’s voice penetrated Shelby’s gut instincts and a familiar feeling that remained with Shelby even now, nearly two years later. Caroline was hurting, and her boyfriend Cameron was to blame.
Shelby Ann felt the hand on her hand and looked up at Marlena. She smiled.
“She’s going to be just fine. She’ll get here in one piece and you’ll help her to move on with her life, with a better life.”
Her chest tightened.
“Oh God, I sure do hope so, Marlena. It’s hard to concentrate at work. I worry all the time, waiting for that phone call that she’s in the hospital, or dead. She’s the only family I have. I guess I’m just a little overprotective of her.” The tears filled her eyes and Marlena squeezed her hand again.
“It’s going to be just fine. You’ll see. She’s headed here. She’s hours away now. That protective big sister instinct of yours will ease up once she is here. Then you two can spend lots of time together. You won’t have to worry so much. Remember, if you guys need anything at all, if there’s more to your concern, that we’re all here for you.”
“Marlena, I told you, Caroline just had a falling out with her boyfriend and she’s sad and brokenhearted. I’m just being silly. Ignore me. Like you said, once Caroline is here, everything will be perfect.”
Marlena gave her an expression that told Shelby she wasn’t buying her story. Shelby was sticking with it, just like she stuck to her story when she moved here. Single, white female, twenty-six, looking for a change and yearning for warmer days and cool nights in a southern state. Of course she never expected to find Chance, but the job offer was just too good to pass up and she had been desperate.
“I know. You’ve said that before, but it’s the way you worry, especially now, and it’s like there’s more to her story. I may be reaching, but it sounds like you’re trying to hide the fact your sister may be in danger. You can tell me, Shelby. I can help you, and her.”
Shelby panicked but somehow she remained calm.
“We’ll be just fine. I appreciate your offer, but mostly I appreciate your friendship, Marlena. If things get sticky, I know you’ll be here for me and Caroline, just like Eliza Grace and Missy Ann.”
Marlena smiled and nodded, dropping the questions for now. She’d bought herself more time. All she seemed to do the past year and a half was buy time, tell fibs to cover her life story, and remain under the radar.
The sound of the bell ringing above the entrance door to Rita’s drew their attention in that direction.
Shelby tightened up, her eyes widened, and her heart hammered inside of her chest. She quickly turned away and lifted her glass of ice tea. Marlena gave her a sympathetic smile. Her friend wondered why she never reacted to any of the Pace men flirting with her. Her boss’s brother, Detective Bender Pace, walked in with a few other men. He squinted at her and she quickly looked back at Marlena, who smiled.
“Why do I get the feeling that it’s not only waiting on your sister that makes you nervous, but your boss and his two brothers?”
She squinted at Marlena. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, they have their eyes on you. They try talking to you and you blow them off.”
“I don’t blow them off.”
Marlena leaned back and raised an eyebrow up in challenge to her statement.
She suddenly felt guilty. She didn’t want to come across as some coldhearted stuck-up snob, but she was too scared to even talk to them.
“Are you scared of them because of your past?” Marlena asked her.
“Marlena,” she said and turned away. Her friend knew she didn’t like to talk about it. Plus she only gave Marlena and her friends some information. Well, very little information. Just the basic bad relationship and needing a break for a while. Men are dogs. Men can’t be trusted. The basics to keep them from pushing her to go out on dates. It was way more than that. Plus now she had Caroline to protect, too. It was a lot to digest and handle.
“Hey, they’re good men, and they watch over you whether you like to acknowledge that or not.”
“I don’t need looking after, and especially by any men. I’ve been taking care of myself for quite some time. I’m not interested in anything but working, making money to support me and now Caroline. She’s my top priority. I couldn’t even think of wanting anything for myself, Marlena.”
Marlena smiled.
“Well maybe once Caroline is here and back on her feet again, you can worry about you, and having some of your own happiness.”
“Maybe.”
Shelby Ann looked at her watch. Caroline would be getting here by dinnertime. She should leave work a little earlier. It wasn’t like she could concentrate anyway. She did get a lot of work done already. She felt so sick to her stomach, and as she looked at the turkey sandwich on rye toast, she knew she couldn’t finish.
Get here safely, Caroline. Chance is the best place you could run to and hide.
* * * *
Caroline Cummings was driving down the highway. She was so tired but had a little while longer until she would hit the town of Chance. She loved the name of it. It signified so many things for her in that one word. Chance. She had thought she was all out of chances. Out of time before Cameron hurt her worse. She stretched her fingers best she could with the cast on her arm. Wait until Shelby saw that. She was going to flip.
She sighed as she held the steering wheel and headed toward the last exit before the highway ended and the back roads began. It was so much warmer out here. The sun was beginning to set. Darkness would roll in but hopefully not until she was in Chance and with her sister. She hated the dark. She had never really been intimidated by much because her childhood was rough. It hardened her heart and made her think she was so brave and so strong, but all that hard work, all the determination to not wind up like her mother fell to shit fast. One well-off military soldier who came from a family of law enforcement officers, and she fell for it all. The uniform, the sexy muscles, the military experience, and the well-off family he tried so hard not to associate with. She thought he was like her in so many ways. A child who’d endured verbal abuse, too. He witnessed his father abuse his mother, cheat on her, and then act all high and mighty because of his social class and law enforcement position. It was a small town.
She didn’t think Cameron would ever hurt her. Not by the things he said and the promises he made. She gave him her virginity, her soul, and all. She gave up her job, a potential career in restaurant and hotel management, where she shined and was moving up quickly. All because he was jealous. He didn’t like her working long hours, helping coordinate business events at the hotel where men from around the country came and flirted with her. Perhaps it was partially her fault as she told him everything. Every event, every conversation, and every comment or show of praise from her male bosses or clients. He always twisted those comments around and made her feel guilty, dirty, like she was flirting or leading a man on. Cameron made her pay for all of it. He owned her in every way. In a way that made her feel dirty, corrupted, and damaged. He took her innocence, was lost without him and his control she grew accustomed to. Trust was something earned and to be respected, but with Cameron it was another tool used to control her.
She exhaled and felt the tears fill her eyes. She was always on edge now. Always shaking, looking over her shoulder or feeling vulnerable, like a potential victim no matter what she did.
She thought about what it took to get here. The lies, the selling off her car, closing her bank accounts, ending her lease early, and paying off the rent. All under the radar. Cameron’s radar. She clenched her teeth. God please don’t let him find me. I need to live a normal life. I don’t want to be scared anymore.
She looked at her cast. She had broken things off with him as she went through the process of selling stuff. She didn’t trust that he wouldn’t find out and try to stop her and follow her. He had been suspicious when he heard she went to a car dealership a few towns away from theirs.
Who would have known he had a friend who worked at that dealer? She lied and said the car was acting up too much and she wanted to save for something better and more reliable. He wanted to buy her a car. She refused. That led to an argument about him taking care of her. Really it meant he wanted her to depend on him, even to get to and from work. It gave him an excuse to show up whenever he wanted to and stake his claim that she was his.
That cost her big time. He wouldn’t let up that night. He lost control and made accusations and threats.
Her arm ached just thinking about it. That fight led to him accusing her of cheating on him, which was so insane. He’d done that so often because he wanted her to beg him to believe her. Then he would take from her body. Have his way with her. That night he was even more rough than usual. When he grabbed her arm and pulled it up to restrain her, he broke it. She felt the crack, screamed out, and cried about the pain, but he just continued to do what he wanted.
Tears rolled down her cheeks. She wiped them away and as her vision blurred a moment she saw the tire light come onto the dashboard.
“No. Please let me get to Chance and to Shelby Ann’s house. Please.”
She was shaking as she continued on the highway and knew there was one more exit. Another ten minutes and she would be on the back roads. It would be worse to get a flat tire there. Maybe she should pull over?
Just as she said that, she heard the pop. The steering wheel pulled to the left and she snagged it back to straighten out the wheel as she slowed down and pulled onto the shoulder.