I'm so excited to announce the publication of Jett and Keanna's last novel! Forever and a Day will feature their wedding, and I'm writing it to be a standalone novel so you can read it if you haven't read the entire series. It will release on January 22, and the pre-order will go up soon. Until then, check out this excerpt from the book!
Chapter One
Keanna
My teeth bite down
on my lip as I hold the nail up against the drywall. No matter how many times
I’ve done this, I’m always afraid I’ll smash my thumb with the hammer. Coordination
isn’t exactly a talent of mine, which is why I don’t ride dirt bikes like the
rest of my family. After a few timid taps, the nail is secure and I remove my
fingers and then drive the nail further into the wall. I reach for the framed
document and line it up, making sure it’s perfectly straight. This wall
decoration is more important than a piece of art. It’s an accomplishment.
Stepping back, I
can’t help but crack a smile as I admire it. This feels exactly as cool as Bree
said it would. My name is on an official diploma.
Sure, it’s just an
associate’s degree, but it’s better than nothing. I’ll get my bachelors in a
couple of years and I’ll hang that on the wall, too. After all, that’s what an
office is for, right?
I’m so psyched that
I recently got my own office at The Track. While the facility has a very
uninspired name—I mean seriously, who names a dirt bike track The Track—it’s my favorite place in the
world. It’s where I plan to work until my parents retire and then the place
will be handed down to my boyfriend and me.
The Track is the
motocross facility that was founded by my dad and my boyfriend’s dad, who are
both former professional motocross racers. I guess Jett is my fiancé, but it
still feels weird calling him that, and I find myself calling him boyfriend instead of fiancé. He proposed a while back with
the most gorgeous ring ever, but then we never talked about it much. Life has
been too busy. I’ve been in college classes and he’s been traveling the country racing dirt bikes for
Team Loco. I’m actually at The Track far more than Jett is, and he grew up
here.
We’re a top-notch facility that has four different
motocross tracks, a gym that’s open to the public, a daycare for when parents
are riding or racing, and a little shop up front that sells motocross gear. The
world of motocross was totally new to me when I moved here to Lawson, Texas,
but now it’s my life. Sometimes it feels like a little too much of my life, but I’m grateful for it nonetheless.
My office used to
be a storage closet, but after my dad and Jace agreed to promote me to
assistant manager of the entire facility, they also decided that I needed a
real office. The construction only took a few days, and now I have my own place
with my own diploma, and an actual salary that goes with it. No more working
hourly for me.
I’ve only been in
here for a few months, and my office still isn’t perfectly set up the way I’d
like it to be. That’s the thing about Pinterest inspiration photos. They look
so beautiful and cozy but when you try to implement the same exact design, it
looks off. Like a little girl wearing her mom’s high heels. It doesn’t fit
right because you have no idea what you’re doing.
But at least it’s
mine. These last few years of living here with my adoptive parents have been
the most amazing years of my life. I finally feel secure. Safe. Having grown up
with Dawn, my biological mother who was so incompetent at raising me that we
often lived in our car or some random man’s house, it feels good to finally be
settled. My new parents, Becca and Park, have done everything possible to make
sure I feel like a part of the family. And I do. Most days I don’t even think
about Dawn anymore. It’s been a couple of years since I last heard from her,
when she called me up on New Years to ask for some money after abandoning me
with Becca and Park. Yep. She abandoned me. She met Becca, who invited us over
to lunch, and then my mom just left, leaving me to fend for myself. It wasn’t
long after that I was adopted by the very couple who took me in after Dawn
abandoned me.
That was my old
life.
Good freaking riddance.
This is my new
life.
With classes over,
the summer break is starting and I’ll get a little time off from college. I try
to travel with Jett to some of his races, but I’m also needed here at my job.
It’s a complicated balance, but I do what
I can.
Jett is a sponsored
motocross racer for Team Loco, which means they travel around and race the
supercross and motocross circuits every year. Each season is around 25 races
long, and at the end of it, whoever has the most points wins the overall series.
Jett and the other members of Team Loco have collectively earned way more
points than the other racers, as per usual. Jett is amazing. He’s kind and warm
and thoughtful, and he’s a badass racer too.
I love him so much
and can’t wait to marry him. But for now, we’re just taking things slow, I
guess. He has racing, and I have work and
school. There’s plenty of time to settle down and live the married life later
on. I’m only twenty-one, after all. I
don’t have to get married right away. But sometimes it is weird knowing that
we’re engaged and we’re not even planning a wedding.
Jett didn’t have to
give me a ring to make me want to stay in a relationship with him. He pulled me
out of a dark time in my life and made me see that life could be happy, fun,
and beautiful. I would stay with him no matter what—rich or poor, ring or not.
He is one hundred percent my soul mate.
My office phone
rings, pulling me out of my thoughts about Jett. I lean over and answer it,
seeing on the caller ID that it’s only the front desk calling me and not a
customer.
“What’s up?” I say.
“Have you been
online lately?” Morgan says in this weirdly high-pitched voice that sets my
senses on high alert. She’s the girl my mom hired to replace me when I moved
from working the front desk to being a manager. We’re only about a thirty second walk away from each other, but
she can’t leave her spot at the front desk to come talk to me in case a
customer walks in, so she calls me.
“No,” I say,
sitting in my desk chair. “Is it something about The Track?”
She pauses for a
split second and that’s all it takes to make my stomach tighten. We live in a
glass bubble. Sure, it’s just a glass bubble that only the world of motocross
pays attention to, and it’s not like we’re worldwide celebrities or anything,
but it’s enough to make you stressed out. My boyfriend is famous in his line of
work, and his dad, Jace Adams, was also famous back when he was younger.
They’ve graced the cover of motocross magazines, DVDs, posters, and t-shirts.
The sport of motocross worships Team Loco.
By association, The
Track is also pretty popular since it was founded by two former professional
motocross racers. My dad was also famous back in his day, and he’s Jace’s best
friend. While most of the attention we get is from the fans, there’s always
jealous, hateful people and internet trolls who try to take us down. Especially
me, a motocross girlfriend.
So when Morgan
pauses just for a second, a familiar dread builds up in my chest. I know it’s
about me. It has to be. “It’s not about the track,” she says.
I let out a long
breath and slink further down my chair. The screensaver on my computer is
showing a slideshow of photos, most of them featuring Jett and me. A few show
my little brother, or pictures of our past vacations. All I have to do is pull
up the internet and search my name and find out what’s going on. But ugh, I don’t want to.
“How bad is it?” I
ask.
“Not too bad,” she
says, but I don’t believe her. “Just some stupid article.”
“Where?”
“Motocross Girls.”
“Thanks,” I say,
hanging up the phone. Motocross Girls is supposed to be all about empowering
women in the sport of motocross and lifting each other up. At least that’s what
their website claims to be about. In reality, they love to post articles
tearing down the girlfriends of motocross racers. Because I guess they only
care about women when they’re talking about themselves. Not anyone else.
I’ve had this talk
with every girlfriend on Team Loco. As soon as one of Jett’s teammates starts dating someone, I’ve felt it
is my duty to warn them about how toxic and heartbreaking it can be to be a
motocross girlfriend. It shouldn’t be like this, but it is. The fans get
jealous. They hate you because you’re dating their celebrity crush. They turn
you into some monster in their heads and then try to find any way possible to insult
you online.
I wish I could
ignore this news, but I know I need to look it up. I have to know what people
are saying about me, what the customers who walk into the building will be
thinking when they see me.
I pull up the
website and the first thing I see is the title of their newest blog post.
Keanna Park – Legitimate Fiancé or Hired Pawn?
I roll my eyes at
the absurdity of that title. Then I read.
It’s no secret that talented hottie Jett Adams has been off
the market for a while now. After earning a reputation as a player, the bad boy
racer settled down with a mysterious new girl that no one had heard of before.
Millions of hearts were broken, but we thought she’d go away sooner or later.
The southern girl from a broken home doesn’t have much to offer Jett, after
all.
But then they got engaged, and those broken hearts shattered
to pieces. Was this it? Was Jett Adams actually going to tie the knot with some
backwoods girl who doesn’t deserve him?
Ladies, I think the answer is no.
I don’t know the reason – maybe
focusing on his career? – but Jett clearly just wanted to take himself off the
market, or at least make it look like it. So he found a girl to be his
“girlfriend.” Now she’s his “fiancé,” and it’s been over a year since the
massive Tiffany diamond ring appeared on Keanna’s finger, but guess what? No
wedding has been planned. Sources close to the couple (if you can call them
that) have confirmed that no Save the Dates have been sent out, no wedding
planning has taken place, and there’s absolutely no talk of them actually tying
the knot.
We’ve all been bamboozled.
That’s good news, girls. Jett only wants us to think he’s off
the market. Clearly he’s not.
I wonder how much Keanna got paid to go along with this ruse?
It’s a story like something straight out of a pathetic Hallmark movie. Only in
the real world, Keanna, he’s not going to fall in love with you. You are just a
business transaction.
Case closed.
