The Locklaine Boys: the complete series Read online

  The Locklaine Boys

  the complete series

  Jessica Prince

  Copyright © 2019 by Jessica Prince

  www.authorjessicaprince.com

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Contents

  A Note From the Author

  Discover Other books by Jessica

  Fire & Ice

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Epilogue

  Opposites Attract

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Epilogue

  Almost Perfect

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Epilogue

  Sneak Peek of Chance Encounters

  Meet the Locklaine Boy who started it all

  Discover Other Books by Jessica

  About the Author

  A Note From the Author

  The Locklaine Boys is one of the funniest, steamiest, swooniest (I’m making that a word) series I’ve ever written. Not only are the men hot as sin, but the women are absolutely AMAZING!

  This series will take your through the lives of the Locklaine men and the women who drive them crazy while turning them on.

  It’s going to be one hell of a ride, so buckle up, brace yourself, and hang on!

  Love,

  Jess.

  *P.S. - this series is a spin-off from my book, Love Hate Relationship.

  Discover Other books by Jessica

  HOPE VALLEY SERIES:

  Out of My League

  Come Back Home Again

  The Best of Me

  Wrong Side of the Tracks

  CIVIL CORRUPTION SERIES

  Corrupt

  Defile

  Consume

  Ravage

  THE PICKING UP THE PIECES SERIES:

  Picking up the Pieces

  Rising from the Ashes

  Pushing the Boundaries

  Worth the Wait

  THE COLORS NOVELS:

  Scattered Colors

  Shrinking Violet

  Love Hate Relationship

  Wildflower

  THE LOCKLAINE BOYS (a LOVE HATE RELATIONSHIP spinoff):

  Fire & Ice

  Opposites Attract

  Almost Perfect

  THE PEMBROOKE SERIES (a WILDFLOWER spinoff):

  Sweet Sunshine

  Coming Full Circle

  A Broken Soul

  GIRL TALK SERIES:

  Seducing Lola

  Tempting Sophia

  Enticing Daphne

  Charming Fiona

  STANDALONE TITLES:

  One Knight Stand

  Chance Encounters

  Nightmares from Within

  DEADLY LOVE SERIES:

  Destructive

  Addictive

  Fire & Ice

  Book 1

  Pepper O’Malley isn’t one to be toyed with. Fool her once, shame on you. Fool her twice, and they’ll have trouble finding your body. She used to dream of white picket fences and happily-ever-afters, but now she lives in the real world. As the saying goes, “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned,” especially when that woman is a redheaded spitfire.

  Griffin Locklaine always viewed commitment as a four letter word. He was clear about what he wanted from the start and made no apologies for it. He didn't care if he came off cold as ice. He lived for his job, his family, and his friends. He had no desire for a relationship. That was, until he saw the once-young-and-scrawny Pepper all grown up.

  They’re like oil and water, fire and ice. A volatile combination that should never work together. Unfortunately, fate has other ideas. A spark like theirs left ignored has a tendency to burn out of control, leaving everyone to wonder who will be left standing when it finally explodes. Only one thing is certain. When they finally come together, it’s going to be epic.

  keep reading for their story

  Prologue

  Pepper

  I’d seen the love of my life approximately four times in the span of nearly a decade. And every single time I laid eyes on that picture of male perfection my heart rioted in my chest, my skin grew clammy, and my stomach flip-flopped so many times it could give a gold-medal gymnast a run for her money.

  The first time I met Griffin Locklaine I was only twelve years old. He was friends with my older brother, Dexter. He and his cousin, Rowan, had come home with my brother for Thanksgiving break. It was love at first sight. My tiny, pre-teen heart went all a-flutter the moment he walked through our front door. He was everything a girl could ask for in her dream man. Tall, muscular, with a face so beautiful it belonged on a magazine. His brown hair was so dark it looked almost black, and the unruly waves that flopped over his forehead made him look almost innocent. I knew he had to be intelligent if he was going to NYU with Dex. They didn’t let just anybody in there, after all. Or at least that’s what my mom loved to say every time she bragged about my big brother.

  But it was his eyes that drew me in the most. From the moment his icy blue gaze hit me, I knew that was it. He was The One—capital letter worthy—and in my little girl imagination I was already planning our wedding, complete with a horse-drawn carriage and doves releasing the moment we kissed. It was all grotesquely romantic, completely unrealistic, and kind of nauseating whenever I thought back on those particular fantasies.

  Unfortunately for me, there wasn’t much a twelve-year old girl could do to hold the attention of a twenty-one year old man. I was still in a training bra for God’s sake! So there I was, suffering in silence for an entire week, holding my love deep inside so no one could have possibly guessed how I felt.

  Oh, and just an FYI, if you hadn’t yet figured out that I was an overly dramatic kid, let me just clear up any misconceptions.

  I totally was.

  Anyway, back to the topic at hand.

  I was in love. And the object of the slightly obsessive, somewhat misguided fantasies barely even knew I existed. The only words he spoke to me the entire week were, ‘What’s up, Red?’ causing my pale skin to glow as brightly as the fiery hair I’d inherited from my father’s Irish side. It was in moments such as those that I cursed my handsome brother for getting everything from our mom’s side while I was stuck with hair that shined like a glowing beacon under any and all florescent lighting.

  I wanted to run and hide in my room—which was basically what I did most of the time, only coming out when my mother practically dragged me down the stairs, insisting I socialize.

  It should also be said, that at that point in my life, I kinda hated my mother. But I digress.

  I did the best I could to avoid being in Griffin’s presence for the rest of their stay, only finding comfort in the rare times I was able to watch him, unknowingly, from afar.

  Like a total creeper, but whatever. Unrequited love would do that to a young girl, after all.

  * * *

  The second time I saw Griffin I was fourteen, having my first period w
hile experiencing the worst breakout in history. And wearing braces with neon colored rubber bands.

  It was a travesty the likes of which humanity had never seen before.

  He was twenty-three, fresh out of the police academy, even better looking than the last time I saw him, and with his girlfriend.

  With.

  His.

  Girlfriend.

  Her name was Heather. I hated Heather. I wanted to throw her out in the frigid Buffalo winter and watch her slowly freeze into a ditzy, blonde dumbsicle. I hadn’t thought it was possible, but watching him kiss her or lean in and whisper in her ear, or hell, even smile at her, hurt like tens of thousands of tiny paper cuts. My heart was broken. My melodramatic, hormonal teenaged world had come to an abrupt end. There was nothing in life worth living for if Griffin Locklaine didn’t know I existed.

  Okay, yes, so I was a teensy bit overemotional. But I was a young girl, premenstrual for the first time in my life. Add raging hormones and a whopping dose of adolescent angst together and the combination was catastrophic

  * * *

  The third time I saw Griffin was pure happenstance… or fate, depending on how you looked at it.

  Just a heads-up, I totally saw it as fate.

  I’d moved to New York City shortly after graduating high school, determined to fulfill my dream of opening my very own high-end clothing boutique, so I was going to school for business and fashion merchandising, living in the same city as my brother and my forbidden crush.

  I might have changed substantially over time, physically and maturity wise, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t reduced to a bumbling idiot when I just so happened to stumble into him and his date on a random sidewalk after seeing a movie with a few friends.

  “Pepper? Is that you?” I nearly choked on my tongue as his familiar voice broke through the laughter of me and my friends as we made our way home from a late show. “Holy shit! Is that really you?”

  I didn’t know whether or not to be offended or flattered by the bewildered look on his face. Yes, I looked different. Gone were the knobby knees and pointy elbows, and in their place were curves that rivaled ones I’d seen in women in magazines. I’d discovered a smoothing cream that managed to tame my wild, frizzy hair that no longer glowed neon orange, thanks to the deeper red and brown lowlights I added. I wore makeup—correctly. I dressed in clothes that fit my frame. I’d come out of my shell, grown up. I’d developed my own style and personality. I wasn’t that same shy, nerdy little girl I used to be.

  That was, until I crossed paths with my unobtainable crush after almost five years… while his arm was wrapped securely around a blonde that barely deemed me worthy of acknowledgement.

  “H-hey, Griff,” I stuttered as my two girlfriends gawked at him with undisguised longing.

  “No fuckin’ way!” he laughed excitedly, and I nearly dropped dead right there on the sidewalk as he released his life sized Barbie doll and wrapped me in a tight hug. “Look at you, red. All grown up.” He grinned affectionately as he placed his hands on my shoulders and held me away from him so he could get a better look. My heart tripped over in my chest at the gleam I caught in his frosty blue eyes. If I squinted juuuuuuuust right, it looked a teeny-tiny bit like lust. I was sure of it.

  “Come on, babe,” the blowup doll behind him whined in a nasally voice. “We’re going to be late for the movie. You know how much I like watching the previews.”

  It took everything in me to suppress the urge to lunge for her and snatch the extensions from her hair as Griffin let go and stepped back.

  He shot me a friendly grin as he pulled the blonde against him. “It was good seeing you again.”

  I wanted to die as I forced a smile of my own. “Yeah, you too.”

  “Well, see you around, kid.”

  With that, he was gone.

  Kid?

  Kid!

  Yep, I was most definitely dying inside.

  * * *

  The fourth time I saw Griffin was the night everything would change. I was twenty-one years old and in the middle of the grand-opening celebration for my boutique, Fire & Ice. I’d done it. I was living my dream. I had my own shop where I sold some of the finest clothes in the city. I was on cloud nine, so euphoric that I didn’t even cringe at the sight of Griffin walking in just behind Dex. I was totally blissed out and slightly buzzed from the glasses of champagne to even care about the whole kid incident from three years earlier.

  That night was nothing short of magical. As the hours ticked by and the party grew livelier, to my ecstatic surprise, Griffin actually seemed to notice me. I couldn’t have imagined feeling happier than I was right then, standing in the shop of my dreams with the man I’d loved for nearly a decade by my side. I was convinced that this was as good as it could get.

  I’d been wrong.

  It got even better later that night when I gave my virginity to Griffin, knowing, deep down in my bones that it was the start of something epic between us. I finally had everything I’d ever wanted.

  So imagine my surprise when I woke with the sun the next morning and rolled over, wanting nothing more than to snuggle against my man, only to find the sheets cold and empty and myself completely alone.

  Chapter One

  Griffin

  I had to have been getting sick. That was the only feasible explanation. Hitting a club or a bar for a guys’ night out was something I usually loved after a long, exhausting week of seeing shit that only the lowest dregs of humanity could be responsible for. Shit that was burned into my fucking brain.

  Going out with the guys usually meant tons of drinks and a guarantee of finding a hot, willing piece of ass to keep me company for a few hours and exhaust me to the point where I’d be able to do nothing more than collapse into my bed and pass the hell out once I got home.

  But for some strange reason, I wasn’t feeling it tonight. Maybe it was the start of a head cold, or perhaps a migraine was brewing? I couldn’t pinpoint exactly when my interest in the fairer sex had taken a steep decline, but ever since it happened, I’d been freaked the hell out. Whatever illness was poisoning my body had to be pretty fucking serious. And instead of being concerned for my wellbeing, the assholes I called friends were too busy busting my balls. For all they knew, I was only moments away from keeling over, but did those bastards care about the life-threatening illness I could’ve potentially had? Hell no. It was official. I needed replacement friends.