Page 43 of Dirty Hot Valentine
How can Dusty and Cammie come back from this, if ever? Hold tight and grab your copy of Nine Minutes Xtra now to find out.
Nine Minutes Xtra is a bad boy MC biker romance with dark themes and many triggers. Part psychological thriller, part new adult coming of age dark romance. Not for the faint of heart.
Reading order
Nine Minutes Later
Nine Minutes Xtra
Nine Minutes Forever
1. Cameron
I had only slept for two hours last night. It was impossible to concentrate on the relationship between modulus of elasticity and strength Professor Lahey so passionately was explaining. I couldn’t help but zone out.
Last year, I lost everything.
My college scholarship, a huge chunk of my soul, the last member of my family, and almost my life.
But I survived.
That must have counted to something. Or so I kept telling myself as I searched for a way to move forward.
To live.
So…as soon as I could, I left all the dysfunction of my past behind, turned my back on the places, the people, the pain and ran toward my future.
Getting back to college wasn’t very difficult. Stanford didn’t take me back, but, among a few other places, Cal Poly accepted me. It was the perfect choice. Far enough—four hours—from home but not too far for Dusty to visit.
I was a semester and half away from getting my bachelor’s degree, and I couldn’t be happier—drowning in student loans and enormous amounts of sheets but happy.
“Annie…”
Someone whispered next to me, and a pang set in my chest.
I was happy except at moments like these. When I accidently heard my sister’s name, or when Ashley, my roommate, would ask me to braid her long, black hair, or I saw an old blond man on a motorcycle…
Sometimes, I didn’t even need a trigger. The ugly memories would sneak up on me unexpectedly. In the classroom. In the shower. At lunch with my college friends or the occasional party Ashley dragged me to a couple of months ago.
In the middle of the night, keeping me up or yanking me out of my sleep.
Lingering, like a disease.
I wished I had been able to lay down the unfortunate baggage I was forced to carry into my future. I tried everything to forget. Bury myself in my studies. Drink. Smoke. Go on long rides on the new Harley Dusty bought me when I moved here.
But the memories stayed. Always there. Indelible.
Unforgivable.
Eventually, I learned I couldn’t forget, no matter how much I’d try. The best way to cope with the dreadful past was accepting it and counting my blessings.
I was able to get out alive.
I went back to engineering school.
I was in love—with a very tall, very handsome, packing, all-muscle hotness.
Who is also a motorcycle gang president and the son of your sister’s murderer.
