Certainty (RiffRaff Records Book 7) Read online

  COPPING A PLEA...

  MVP means Marley Van Connor. Truth though: she is the most valuable player in a multi-national business that grows and sells high-grade marijuana. Her goal is to prove to the world the healing power of her product. She’s written papers published in medical journals, plans to get her PhD, and she can’t wait ’til she’s eighteen. Yep. She became a mogul in the early years of high school. As with almost all the Devil’s Spawn, Marley kept her secret from her parents for as long as she could. The kicker, she has a bigger surprise, and his name is Talon Roberts.

  GUILTY OF LOVE

  As the lead guitarist of Clashing Swell, Talon Roberts is living his dream. His band is signed with RiffRaff records, and they’re touring the country promoting their album. Everything should be picture perfect. But… He feels like a perv. He’s secretly fallen for Dash Connor’s sixteen year-old daughter, Marley. No effin’ way is Talon touching that. Time and distance allows them to start a friendship, but nothing more. Not until Marley is legal. And when that girl turns eighteen, she’s going belong to Talon. Forever.

  ALSO BY L.P. MAXA

  RiffRaff Records

  Royalty

  Legacy

  Infamy

  Loyalty

  Sanctuary

  Piracy

  The Devil’s Share

  Play Nice

  Play Dirty

  Play Fair

  Play Softly

  Play Hard

  Play For Keeps

  St. Leasing

  Mouth Watering

  Breath Taking

  Jaw Dropping

  Heart Stopping

  Other Novels

  Happy Place

  Stumbled into Love

  Rescued

  CERTAINTY

  RiffRaff Records – Book Seven

  L.P. Maxa

  www.BOROUGHSPUBLISHINGGROUP.com

  PUBLISHER’S NOTE: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, business establishments or persons, living or dead, is coincidental. Boroughs Publishing Group does not have any control over and does not assume responsibility for author or third-party websites, blogs or critiques or their content.

  CERTAINTY

  Copyright © 2019 L.P. Maxa

  All rights reserved. Unless specifically noted, no part of this publication may be reproduced, scanned, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of Boroughs Publishing Group. The scanning, uploading and distribution of this book via the Internet or by any other means without the permission of Boroughs Publishing Group is illegal and punishable by law. Participation in the piracy of copyrighted materials violates the author’s rights.

  ISBN 978-1-948029-97-1

  E-book formatting by Maureen Cutajar

  www.gopublished.com

  To all the girls who are whole all by themselves

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I always thank my little family first: my husband and my daughter. This time around, they both stepped up big time. Getting Talon and Marley onto my computer was problematic. My words didn’t seem to want to flow, and I had more technical difficulties than imaginable. The older my daughter gets, the more she notices my absence. It’s hard to immerse yourself into your characters, to escape and leave your family behind for hours at a time. So thank you to my little girl for understanding that Mommy needs to work. I told my husband I’d stop thanking him for parenting our child though, so…how about thanks for being a good dad. And thank you to my mom and to Amy S. You guys helped me have confidence in myself, and these characters. And to Michelle, my amazing editor: I don’t know if Talon would have survived without you. To my Smitten Kittens, ladies, this book is for you. You’re the ones who wanted him, and you got him. I hope he’s everything that you hoped he’d be.

  CONTENTS

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Epilogue

  Playlist

  About the Author

  “See where we’ve been. Won’t you hold my hand and stay while.”

  –Greta Van Fleet

  Chapter One

  Marley

  After

  The faux living room—the VIP waiting room my uncle Jacks had paid for after Landry had Wyatt—was filled to the brim with the Devil’s Share family, all of us waiting patiently for Halen to give birth to her and Beau’s first child. Well, patiently wasn’t exactly the most accurate term I could use.

  “Dude, I’m bored as fuck.” Jett stretched his long arms over his head, cracking his neck from side to side. “This is the longest labor in the history of labors.” Devin backhanded him lightly, shaking her head, having no problem communicating her disapproval of his loud complaining. God, I loved that girl.

  I rolled my eyes from across the room where I was sitting next to my dad, squashed against the wooden arm of a puffy loveseat covered in corduroy. “We’ve only been here for three hours.”

  Although I sort of agreed with him, I couldn’t tell him that. All Jett needed was a commiserator and he’d be intolerable for the duration. I wasn’t real sure when this tradition had started, or who had decided that sitting vigil in a hospital, no matter how comfy the chairs were, while our family members were trying to push babies out of their bodies was a good idea. When I had a baby, I wasn’t telling anyone until after it was born. Then they could come cry happy tears and bring me flowers.

  Jett pointed to Brody, who was flying Wyatt around like a tiny blond Superman. “Landry’s last labor only took like two hours, start to finish.”

  Brody grinned. “That’s because I know how to pop them out.”

  My uncle Jacks groaned from his seat next to Aunt B. “I will give you a hundred dollars if you don’t talk about having sex with my daughter for the next twenty-four hours.” He pulled out his wallet and waved a crisp bill around in the air above his head.

  Brody laughed, flying Wyatt over to his grandpa and letting the kid grab the money out of his hand. “Deal, old man.”

  Talon was on the other side of my dad, holding a sleeping Weston against his chest. We’d taken the loveseat for ourselves about an hour ago, but when my dad came in, he sat between us as if squishing us apart would keep us away from each other when he couldn’t see what we were doing. Ugh. Hence the reason my right arm was now numb.

  Talon and I had come clean with my parents mere hours ago. Jett, Devin, Talon, and I had stood up in front of my whole family and told them about MJ Botanicals. And then Talon had told them he loved me. I hadn’t been surprised by his announcement. The poor guy had been begging me for months to let him say something to my parents. I hadn’t been ready before, but tonight, everything fell into place. It all felt right.

  Everything
was out in the open. I had nothing left to hide. It felt better than I ever thought it would. Now I could almost see where Beau and Cash were coming from, how light the truth made you feel.

  No more sneaking around, no more avoiding and evading. I could publish all my scientific papers with my name on them. And I could kiss my boyfriend whenever and wherever I wanted.

  “Give me Weston and go take Jett for a walk.” My dad gently shifted the baby from Talon’s arms to his own, waving his hand in the direction of my best friend and business partner. “Try to burn off some of his energy before he starts to climb the damn walls.”

  Talon chuckled as he got to his feet, then held his hand out for mine. “Come on, baby, let’s take the dog to play outside.”

  I ignored my dad’s narrowed eyes and let Talon help me up. Apparently, truth or not, my dad was still going to act like a dad. Forget the fact that he’d known and liked Talon for three years. That the band had been signed with RiffRaff records that whole time, and was making beaucoup bucks. That Dad had commented on more than one occasion how much he appreciated how responsible Talon was.

  I guess his reaction to T and me was better than his initial reaction to Halen and Beau. We’d all lied, but as far as he knew, my lies didn’t span years. And no one, under pain of death, was going to disabuse him of that belief. The image of dad’s head exploding when he learned Talon had had a thing for me long before I was legal was enough to make me nauseous. Even though Talon had never made a move on me or did anything that could even be construed as inappropriate, my father, Dash Connor, former man-whore of the rock world, would have him arrested. And thrown in jail. For life.

  As we passed Jett, I grabbed his hand, and he sputtered, “Where are we going? Who brought a dog?” He reached down, clasping Devin’s palm before I could pull him too far away from her. She got up, pushed him on the back, and then the four of us made our way out of the waiting room like an odd choo-choo train, complete with sound effects, thanks to…you guessed it: Jett.

  Once we reached the lobby, with the exit clearly in sight, Jett’s surly tone became incredibly hopeful. “Do we get to leave?” He started to jump around, disconnecting our follow-the-leader routine. “They told us to come outside. Would they really notice if we went home for a couple hours?” He clutched his hands in front of him, begging us to agree to his plan.

  The three of us ignored him, mainly because we knew we couldn’t go back to the compound, no matter how badly we all wanted to. If we disappeared and Halen had that baby? We’d never hear the end of it.

  “Coffee?” As we exited the wide double sliding glass doors of the hospital, Talon pointed across the street at an old diner with a yellow and black cracked sign. “Maybe some decaf for Jett?”

  Jett scooped Devin up, throwing her over his shoulder and slapping her ass. “I’m not energetic, I’m fucking horny. I was so close to getting the kinky kind of lovin’ and then Halen had to go into labor. Selfish, really.”

  “I agree.” Talon threw a smirk over his shoulder as he kept a tight grip on my hand, our fingers threaded together. “You are acting selfish.”

  Jett threw his head back, letting out a loud fake laugh, and then the four of us stepped into the deserted diner. By this point, it was getting close to midnight, and the only other patron I could see was one lone trucker sitting at the long counter. A waitress with white curly hair and a pink uniform seated us in a large booth, the window next to us facing the front of the hospital. We studied the plastic-covered menus, ordering stacks of pancakes and coffee.

  “Word search? Tic Tac Toe?” Devin held up the children’s menu she’d snagged on the way in along with a stack of crayons. “We have some time to kill.”

  “Nah.” Jett leaned back in the booth, putting his arm around his girlfriend’s shoulders and looking straight at me. “I want to hear their story.”

  “Whose story?” I moved out of the way when our waitress came back with a tray of coffee for the table. “Mine and Talon’s?”

  Jett nodded. “Yeah, I mean, I seriously doubt Talon went from constantly getting shafted to proclaiming his love at the dinner table that quickly. There has to be more to it than you two are letting on. I’m your best friend and I insist on the good stuff.” He studied me over his steaming white mug. “I want the real story, M. The whole truth.”

  The whole truth? That was a long tale, but I supposed we had plenty of time on our hands. According to Brody, Beau hadn’t popped Halen right and it would take hours for that kid to come screaming into the world now. Say what you would about Brody’s over-sharing, but he and Landry got the job done quickly.

  I had never planned to hide so much of my life from Jett, but needs be and all of that. And I knew hearing all the times I lied, all the times I snuck around, would probably hurt him. Hurting Jett would in turn hurt me. His pain was my pain. Always.

  “Come on, MVP.” Jett’s gaze met mine, his going a little soft. “I really do want to know.” His tone had changed, it’d gone from playful to gentle. He wanted to know because he loved me, because I was his best friend. Maybe I owed him this. Maybe I owed him the chance to hear all the things I’d hid from him.

  It’d felt good to tell our parents the truth about MJ Botanicals. I couldn’t deny that. So, in theory, coming clean with Jett should feel even better. He was more than family. He was…my Jett.

  “You two watched us fall in love. It seems only fair that we get to hear your story.” Devin was coloring a humanized waffle on her kid’s menu. “This weird little foursome of ours will never be complete without us knowing.”

  Jett smiled at her, all kinds of emotions running across his face. “Turtle’s right.” He loved it when she spoke up and took her rightful place in our world. I’d always told Talon that one day Jett would fall hard and fast. And I’d been right.

  I bit my lips together, trying to stop the smile that wanted to take over my face. “What do you think, T?” I looked at my boyfriend, one eyebrow raised playfully. “Should we tell him our love story?”

  Talon laughed quietly before kissing me sweetly on the lips. “Sure, baby.” He kissed the tip of my nose before turning back to Jett and Devin, a wistful grin on his face. “I’ll start.”

  Chapter Two

  Talon

  Before

  Maybe Brax was right, maybe the kids standing in the corner were up to no good. I doubted they were actually smoking pot in their parents’ backyard in the middle of their older cousin’s baby gender reveal, like he claimed. But, they were the Devil’s Spawn, so there was really no telling, right?

  The boy I’d met, Jett, was Luke Matthew’s youngest son and he wanted to learn how to surf. He was funny, cocky, which was crazy given his age, the kid had some serious charm. But the girl standing next to him, whom I hadn’t been introduced to, looked bored as fuck. She had dark hair and big dark eyes, obvious even behind black-framed glasses. She was wearing cutoff shorts and roughed-up Doc Martens with the laces undone that looked like they may have belonged to her mom once upon a time. Her top was an altered concert t-shirt from an old Greta Van Fleet tour.

  There was something about that girl, something that had me staring. I couldn’t take my eyes off her. Maybe it was her black glasses or her faded shirt. Or the way that she didn’t seem to give two shits about anyone else at this party. She was cooler than me. Hell, she was cooler than anyone on this damn compound, and that was saying something since we were all rock stars, and doctors, and surf gods. But that girl standing in the corner was on another level.

  It was like she was above us. Like she knew the secret to the universe and she was annoyed that she had to wait for the rest of us to catch the fuck up.

  She couldn’t have been more than sixteen, but I found myself utterly mesmerized by her and her scuffed-up boots.

  “Hey, man, you want another beer?” Dane, our bassist, held out a brightly colored can with ice sliding down the side. “It’s hot as shit out. I need a solid beach breeze.”

  I
nodded absently, dragging my eyes away from Jett and the mystery girl. “I hear ya. I can’t wait to get home.” And by home I meant Cali. One of our upcoming tour stops and where I was born and raised. I took the beer he offered, tossing my empty into a nearby trashcan. “Brody is having a son, dude.”

  Dane smiled, both of us turning to look at our friend. He was covered in blue glitter, standing with his arms around Landry, his palms resting on their growing baby.

  He chuckled, then took a sip of his beer. “I can’t believe one of us is going to be a dad.”

  “I can’t believe Brody is going to be a dad.” The only way I’d be more stunned was if Brax was the one who was settling down. I was pretty sure the fourth member of our band was going to be a bachelor ’til he was old and gray. “But love looks good on him, yeah?”

  “Yeah.”

  The whole afternoon had had this high emotional content feel to it. Brody Frost and I had been best friends since elementary school when some high and tight asswipe had made fun of our long hair. We’d pulled his pants down when he was hanging from the monkey bars, and then ran away laughing like it was the funniest fucking thing that had ever happened in our lives. And now my partner in crime was a man about to be a father.

  Brody met Landry, his baby mama, through her uncle Luke once he’d signed our band to RiffRaff Records. They’d fallen in some hard insta lust that had turned into a slow burn type of love. And resulted in the growing baby bump his hand seemed to be constantly resting on.

  Clashing Swell started as nothing more than four kids who couldn’t decide what they wanted to spend more time doing: surfing or making music. In the end, we kind of got the best of both worlds, and our music career had begun to support our surfing addiction.

  Dane, Brax, Brody, and I were living our best lives, our fucking dream.

  ***

  The sun was setting, the sky turning a beautiful hazy pink. I was a beach bum. Saltwater ran through my veins. But even I couldn’t deny that these Texas sunsets were something to behold.