Page 95 of Dotted Lines (Runaway 5)

After I pulled my lips away from Karson’s, I sat up straighter. “One more toast. To the junkyard.”

It had long been demolished, but it lived in our hearts.

“To the junkyard,” nine other voices said in unison.

To the place where our stories had started and the place we’d found a family.

To the place where I’d found the love of my life.

To the place that would bind us together forever.

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Preview to Gypsy King

Enjoy this preview to Gypsy King, book one in the Tin Gypsy series.

BRYCE

“Morning, Art.” I saluted him with my coffee as I walked through the glass front door.

He returned the gesture with his own mug. “Hiya, Bryce. How are you today?”

“Fantastic.” I shimmied my shoulders, still feeling the dance party I’d had in my car on my way in to work. “The sun is shining. The flowers are blooming. It’s going to be a great day. I can feel it.”

“I hope you’re right. All I can feel at the moment is heartburn.” Art chuckled and his protruding belly jiggled. Even in a pair of cargo pants and a light blue button-up, he reminded me of Santa Claus.

“Is Dad here?”

He nodded. “Been here since before I showed up at six. I think he’s trying to fix one of the presses.”

“Damn. I’d better go make sure he hasn’t gotten pissed and dismantled the whole thing. See ya, Art.”

“Bye, girlie.”

At the Clifton Forge Tribune, I was girlie, dear and the occasional sweetheart, because at thirty-five, I was the youngest employee by thirteen years. Even as part owner, I was still seen as the boss’s kid.

I cruised past Art at the reception desk and pushed through the interior door that opened to the office’s bullpen. The smell of fresh coffee and newspaper filled my nose. Paradise. I’d fallen in love with this smell as a five-year-old girl when I’d gone to work with Dad on a Bring-Your-Daughter-to-Work Day, and nothing had topped it since.

I walked the length of the empty bullpen, past the desks on each side of the center aisle to the door at the back that opened to the pressroom.

“Dad?” My voice echoed in the open room, bouncing off the cinder-block walls.

“Under the Goss!”

The ceilings extended high above me, the ductwork and pipes exposed. The unique, musky smell of newspaper was stronger in here, where we kept the giant paper rolls and drums of black ink. I savored the walk across the room, inhaling the mix of paper and solvents and machinery oil as my wedge heels clicked on the cement floor.

My childhood crush hadn’t been on a boy, it had been on the feel of a freshly printed newspaper in my hands. It was a mystery to my parents why I’d gone into TV and not newspaper after college. There’d been a lot of reasons, none of which mattered now.

Because here I was, working at my dad’s newspaper, returning to my roots.

The Goss printer was our largest and main press. Positioned along the far wall, it extended from one side of the building to the other. Dad’s jean-clad legs and brown boots were sticking out from beneath the first of four towers.

“What’s wrong today?” I asked.

He scooted himself free and stood, swatting at his jeans and leaving black streaks of grease and ink on his thighs. “Damn thing. There’s something wrong with the paper feed. It hitches about every tenth rotation and screws up whatever page it’s on. But it all looks fine under there so I don’t know what the hell I’m trying to fix.”