Having It All Read online

  Unexpected Love

  HAVING IT ALL

  Jenna Byrnes

  A Total-e-bound Publication

  www.total-e-bound.com

  Having It All

  ISBN #978-1-906590-80-2

  ©Copyright Jenna Byrnes 2008

  Cover Art by Lyn Taylor ©Copyright June 2008

  Edited by Janice Bennett

  Total-e-bound books

  This is a work of fiction. All characters, places and events are from the author’s imagination and should not be confused with fact. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, events or places is purely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any material form, whether by printing, photocopying, scanning or otherwise without the written permission of the publisher, Total-e-bound eBooks.

  Applications should be addressed in the first instance, in writing, to Total-e-bound eBooks. Unauthorised or restricted acts in relation to this publication may result in civil proceedings and/or criminal prosecution.

  The author and illustrator have asserted their respective rights under the Copyright Designs and Patents Acts 1988 (as amended) to be identified as the author of this book and illustrator of the artwork.

  Published in 2008 by Total-e-bound eBooks 1 The Corner, Faldingworth Road, Spridlington, Market Rasen, Lincolnshire, LN8 2DE, UK.

  Warning: This book contains sexually explicit content which is only suitable for mature readers. This story has been rated Total-e-burning.

  Dedication

  To Barbara Baldwin, through good times and bad. Thanks for being a friend.

  Trademarks Acknowledgement

  The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of the following wordmarks mentioned in this work of fiction:

  Calvin Klein: Calvin Klein Company

  Fear Factor: Endemol Nederland B.V.

  Little House on the Prairie: Little House on the Prairie, Inc.

  Obsession: Sopret S.A.

  Playstation: Kabushiki Kaisha Sony Computer Entertainment TA Sony Computer Entertainment Inc.

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  About the Author

  Chapter One

  The outside temperature was brisk and frosty, hovering around twenty degrees. Not fit weather for man nor beast, Mandy Stevens thought wryly, nor for a woman who’s locked her keys in her car.

  She stomped her feet a few times out of frustration and walked around the little hatchback, trying to decide what to do. Mandy carried a cell phone, but whom could she call? Her mom kept an extra set of keys but lived two hours away. Sarah Buchanan would freak out if Mandy phoned her. She couldn't call her. I'm twenty-one years old, I need to figure this one out myself.

  Her roommate back at the dorm would be no help. Dee Anderson had been Mandy’s best friend since elementary school and they'd been college roommates for the last two and a half years. Neither was particularly mechanically-minded. Dee had three brothers who took care of her. Mandy had been an only child for years until her baby brother arrived, but her step-father was pretty handy, and what he couldn’t fix, her uncle could.

  She needed a locksmith, Mandy finally deduced. So, how to get the phone number for one? She could go back into the post office where she’d just mailed a University of Illinois sweatshirt home for her step-dad’s birthday. They certainly had a phone book she could use. That’s what she would do.

  Mandy blew on her hands to warm them and took a step towards the building. A sporty black convertible zipped into the parking space next to hers, causing her to jump. The two guys in the front seat watched as the one in back climbed out over the top of his door.

  “Right back!” he called, trotting into the post office.

  “Hurry up!” the passenger yelled after him.

  The driver looked Mandy up and down and gave a small grin. “Hello.”

  “Hey." She averted her eyes, surprised at the tingle his voice sent through her. He was gorgeous, but her irritation rankled at his reckless driving, and she refused to smile back.

  “Pretty cold to be standing around out here.” He gazed at her, eyes moving slowly up and down her body.

  No, leered. Leering was a much better word for his carnivorous gaze. Mandy shrugged, maintaining a cool exterior while his stare steamed her up on the inside. “Pretty cold to be driving around in an open convertible.”

  “It’s exhilarating!” He grinned wider, warming his hands in front of his automobile heating vent.

  “Exhilarating?” Mandy snorted. “Try locking your keys in your car. That’ll get your blood pumping.”

  He shut off his engine and turned to his passenger. “She’s locked her keys in her car!”

  “We don’t have time for this,” the second man grumbled.

  “We can’t leave her stranded,” the driver insisted. He opened his door and exited his car the usual way. His fluid movements seemed more athletic than those of the guy who'd jumped out.

  Mandy's stomach tingled, and she forced herself to look away. He stepped in front of her, and she couldn’t help noticing how good he smelled. Calvin Klein’s Obsession. The scent was too enticing, and she gazed back at him.

  He was better looking up close, with short brown hair and a three-day beard growth. But his fancy car and expensive leather coat spoke volumes about the man—he didn’t travel in the same circles Mandy did. She spotted a fraternity sticker on the window of his car. Shoot, their circles weren’t even in the same hemisphere.

  Mandy stomped her feet, ostensibly to ward off the cold. Mentally she kicked herself for the reactions he stirred inside her. I'm such a fool.

  He moved closer, and she inhaled again. Oh well. It can’t hurt to look. Her stomach tingled at his nearness.

  “Let’s see what we’ve got here.” He looked in her car window. “Oh, no worries. I just need a coat hanger.”

  The passenger in his car spoke up. “Coat hangers don’t work anymore. It’s the way they design locks on cars now.”

  Mandy glanced at him. He was stocky and muscular looking with shaggy blond hair. Not nearly as attractive as Calvin Klein.

  ‘Calvin’ looked at his friend and smiled. “It’ll work on this car. It was designed a few years ago. Quite a few years ago.”

  Mandy felt her face blush in embarrassment. “I can handle this, really. I was just going inside to call a locksmith.”

  “A locksmith?” ‘Calvin’ hooted. “Do you have any idea how much that’ll cost?”

  “I have money,” she said icily, still embarrassed by the situation.

  “She was going to call a locksmith!” he repeated amusedly to his friend in the car.

  “Let her,” the other man replied in irritation. “We can get out of here.”

  The first man came out of the post office, shoved his hands into his pockets and looked at them. “What’s going on?”

  “We need a coat hanger,” the driver told him.

  “I don’t have a frigging coat hanger.” He started to hop in the backseat.

  Mandy watched him. He had shaggy dark hair but was thin and wiry, a beanpole compared to the man she’d nicknamed ‘Calvin’.

  The driver looked around the block and nodded his head. “Dino, right down there is a dry cleaner’s shop. They’ll have a hanger. Go get one.”

  “Are you fucking kidding me?” Dino made a move to climb in the car and then apparently realised his friend was not joking. “A coat hanger,” he said dully.

  “A wire coat hanger.” The driver nodded and watched Dino head to the dry cleaner’s.

&
nbsp; “You don’t have to do this,” Mandy insisted, slipping her hands in her pockets. Dino did not look happy as he stomped off. She was embarrassed to be a burden. Freezing all of a sudden, she just wanted to go back into the post office.

  “I told you, no worries.” The man smiled at her. “Once he gets back, it’ll only take me a sec.”

  “Well, all right.”

  He’d really left her no choice. They stood there awkwardly, staring at each other for a moment. She wanted to say something interesting, but he pretty much left her speechless. Almost breathless. She could only stare and hope her face wasn't beet red.

  The man in the car spoke up. “Nick, we’re supposed to be someplace right now.”

  “Keep your shorts on,” Nick snapped back at him and then smiled at Mandy. “I guess I should make introductions. I’m Nick Westchester. The impatient one in the car is Karl Browning. And the gopher is Dino Manetti.”

  She studied him for a minute, debating if she wanted to give her name or not. For a brief second she contemplated making something up, an exotic name like Vivian Wallingford. She finally decided to go with the truth. “Mandy Stevens.”

  “Hello, Mandy,” Nick said with a nod of his head and a bow at the waist. “It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

  “Yeah, you too.” She tried not to smile at his goofy behaviour, but he made it tough. He was very smooth, a feature that usually intimidated her. For some reason this guy didn't—he was so charming, he made her squirm with unusual, slightly uncomfortable, tingles.

  Karl, in the car, obviously wasn’t amused. He scowled at her and kept an irritated look planted firmly on his face.

  “Here you go.” Dino returned, tossing a hanger to Nick. “You owe me a buck.”

  “A buck!” Nick exclaimed. “For this?” He shook the flimsy hanger in the air.

  “I’ll pay for it.” Mandy dug through her purse.

  “Absolutely not.” Nick touched her arm. “He owes me a lot more than a buck. Don’t worry about it.” He stood there with the hanger in his hand.

  She looked at him and then motioned to her car. “Do you think you could…?”

  “Oh! Yeah!” Nick straightened the hanger and moved close to the driver’s door. He inserted the wire between the window and the frame, and in just a moment the lock popped up. Opening the door, he slid into the seat and started the engine.

  Mandy saw him turn the heat and defroster on, then step out of her car. “Wow, that was fast,” she said gratefully. “I really appreciate it.”

  “Should be warm in just a minute for you,” he told her with confidence. “Seems to have a pretty good heater.”

  “It’s a good car.” Mandy set her shoulders proudly. “Even if it is ancient.”

  “I never said that.” He smiled at her, waving the wire hanger. “Would you like to keep this?”

  “Don’t know why. If I need it again, it’ll probably be locked in my car.”

  “You need to find someplace to stick it,” he told her.

  “I’m sure you can think of a place to stick it.” Mandy smiled at him sweetly and, as she got in her car, she heard Dino and Karl whooping.

  Nick held her door so she couldn’t close it, an irritated expression on his face. “I was just trying to be helpful.”

  She looked at him, noticing another expression in his dark eyes. Embarrassment. She’d embarrassed him in front of his friends. “I’m sorry,” she answered softly. “You were very helpful, saving me a lot of time and money. I really do appreciate it. I’ll have another key made and hide it somewhere so I shouldn’t have a need for the hanger, but thanks.”

  Nick’s expression softened. “All right, then. You’re welcome.”

  She reached for the door which he still held firmly. Mandy smiled and raised her eyebrows, and he finally let go. He seemed reluctant to do so, which surprised her. She thought they had someplace to go. “Thanks again,” she said and backed out slowly.

  In her rear view mirror, Mandy saw Nick standing on the side of the street, watching her drive away.

  * * * *

  Mandy’s dorm room was in Ford Hall, smack dab in the middle of the U of I campus. There was a parking lot close by. She secured her car and removed the keys before locking it. She rarely drove it during the week because all her classes were within walking distance. It was nice to have a car for grocery shopping or errands, and it made going home on the weekends much easier.

  She and Dee had plenty of friends at school, but usually once a month they drove back to their small hometown of Perry, Illinois. It wasn’t that there was much to do there, but both girls were close to their families and enjoyed going home to visit.

  Her dorm room was empty when she arrived, so Mandy kicked off her shoes and dropped on her bed, dialling her cell phone at the same time. The phone range twice, then a small, high-pitched voice answered.

  “Buchanan residence, Tyrone speaking.”

  Mandy chuckled at her little brother. His greeting came out more like, BuchananresidenceTyronespeaking. Someone who didn’t know would have no idea what the child said. But Mandy spoke his lingo and replied happily, “Hey Ty-bo! How’s my little buddy?”

  “Mandy!” he squealed into the phone. “Are you home?”

  “No sweetie, I’m still at college. I called to talk to mom. How are you?”

  “Hungry! Daddy’s making vegetarian ‘sagne.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that. Ask mom for a peanut butter sandwich.”

  “Okay!”

  Mandy heard the phone hit the table and voices in the background. “Hey, come back! I didn’t mean right now! Ty, this call is costing money, you know!”

  There was a scuffling sound, and then a masculine voice spoke into the phone. “What do you mean, peanut butter sandwich? This is a new lasagne recipe, and I think it’s going to be fantastic.”

  “Hey, Sam,” Mandy chuckled at her step-father. “I remember your other attempts at vegetarian cooking. Tofu sucks, I hate to break it to you.”

  “You won’t be able to taste it. Are you coming home this weekend? I’ll save some.”

  “Gosh, that’s tempting. I wish I could, really. But my English teacher assigned a big project already. Can you believe it? Only a few weeks into the semester and they’re already dumping huge amounts of stuff on us.”

  “Yeah, they should wait until the semester’s almost over and dump it all on you then. Why don’t you suggest that?”

  “You are, like, no help whatsoever,” she teased. Sam was a terrific step-father, and in the five years he’d been in their lives, Mandy had grown to love him. She knew her mom was over the moon about him, and it was easy to accept him for that reason alone. She also thought he was a very cool person. “You’ll never believe what I did today.”

  “You made your bed? You’re right, I won’t believe that.”

  “Sam,” Mandy laughed. “You suck. Where’s my mother? She’ll take pity that I locked my keys in the car.”

  “You’re kidding. Did you have to call a locksmith?”

  “I was going to call you. I’ve never done that before in my life. I wasn’t exactly sure what to do.”

  “It’s definitely not like you. So what happened?”

  “I had just decided to call a locksmith when some guys came along. One of them said he could get in with a wire hanger, and there happened to be a dry cleaner nearby, so he took care of it.”

  “The dry cleaner?”

  “No! The guy in the car! One of them was friendly and he opened my door for me.”

  “How friendly?” Sam asked suspiciously.

  Mandy laughed again. She didn’t have much experience with men, and her family knew it. Her life was pretty much an open book as far as that was concerned. “Just friendly enough,” she told him, then added, “There were three of them, so it took me a while to repay them with sexual favours after they got the door open.”

  “Amanda Jean!” he raised his voice.

  She giggled. “I’m kid
ding, Sam. They were nice enough, opened the door and then I drove away.”

  “Don’t tell your mother that joke, please. I doubt she’d think it was very funny.”

  “You’re right, of course,” Mandy agreed. Her mother was a bit on the overprotective side. “I just like yanking your chain.”

  “Yank away, kiddo. I’ll save some of my vegetarian lasagne for you, I’m sure it’ll freeze just fine. And the next time you’re out, have another car key made and hide it somewhere. They sell these little boxes that fit inside your tire well, and you can stick the key in there.”

  “Yes, sir, will do. I suppose I should go. This call is costing you your hard-earned cash.”

  “Yeah, being a librarian is a tough job,” Sam joked about his line of work. “We’re checking into another cell phone plan with more minutes. We’ll let you know when we get it.”

  “Thanks. So mom’s not around?”

  “No, she and your Aunt Bailey ran over to visit Mrs. Lewis from church. The old lady broke her leg and they took dinner to her.”

  “Leaving you home to make vegetarian lasagne? Has mom gone crazy?”

  “I’m hanging up now,” he teased.

  “Yeah, yeah. Okay then, give mom a kiss for me.”

  “Count on it.”

  “No, I said for me. Not one of the hundred kisses you were going to give her tonight anyway.”

  He chuckled. “All right, kid, I’ll give her one hundred and one tonight. And I’ll tell her you called. She’ll probably call you back.”

  “Have her make it tomorrow, okay? I really need to study.”

  “Will do. Night, Mandy.”

  “Goodnight, Sam.” She smiled as she disconnected her call and lay back on her bed. Mandy knew her mom hit the jackpot the day Sam Buchanan walked into their lives. It took the couple just a few weeks to fall in love, and within a matter of months they were married. Sam moved in with Sarah and Mandy.