Rita Herron - Last Kiss Goodbye

He stepped closer, so close she could smell the scent of his soap, combined with something more woodsy, all primal male. “Why do you think?”

A muscle ticked in his jaw as he waited for her reply. But she couldn’t find her voice.

“I came to see you,” he finally said.

“Me?” Her voice quivered. “But why?”

He lifted his hand and twirled a strand of her hair around his finger. Tension radiated from every pore in his body, the heat between them igniting a mixture of fear and excitement inside her. He looked so lost and angry. So alone.

The way she’d felt so many times.

His pain drew her. Suddenly she wanted to assure him that life wasn’t all evil.

A bold and sexy look flared in his eyes. Hunger. Lust. The urgent need of a man to take what he wanted.

She backed away, frightened by the potency of that desire. Half wanting it. Half terrified of the desperate need that accompanied it.

“I’ve been waiting a long time for us to meet so you could explain why you didn’t tell everyone what happened that night. Why you let them put me in prison when you knew I was innocent.”

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Dear Reader,

Having grown up in the rural South, where local legends, folklore and superstitions abound, add flavor to small-town life and make the town come alive, I developed an affinity for using those elements in my own storytelling.

There are also Southern scenes that paint such vivid parts of rural life in my mind that I had to use those, as well. For example, the trailer parks (mobile home parks) where some of my own family live. The junkyards sprinkled throughout the countryside where old cars, buses, trucks are left, their parts sold off. And of course, the kudzu vines that grow out of control and take over the dilapidated barns and rotting wooden houses.

In this latest romantic suspense, Last Kiss Goodbye, I tried to paint those pictures for you by way of the legends and myths in the fictitious small town of Kudzu Hollow, Georgia.

When I first began, one thought stuck out in my mind—I knew I wanted the heroine to have witnessed her parents’ murder when she was a child, and that the only thing she remembered about that horrific night was kissing her mother goodbye. That gave me my title.

Of course, for a Rita Herron heart-pounding romantic suspense story, I had to add a strong sense of family, emotional turmoil, murder and small-town secrets, along with a sizzling romance between two wounded souls who desperately need each other!

With this book, I’ve also included guidelines for you and your book club (if you belong to one) to aid you in discussing the story and the metaphors I’ve used.

I hope you enjoy!

Sincerely,

To George Scott, my favorite, fantastic bookseller—thanks for all your support, and for helping to make my single-title romantic suspense debut, A BREATH AWAY, a success!

PROLOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

EPILOGUE

“MOMMY!” EIGHT-YEAR-OLD Ivy Stanton stared at the blood on her hands in horror. There was so much of it. All over her. Her mother. The floor.

“Ivy, Jesus, look what you’ve done!” Her daddy’s gray eyes seared her like fire pokers. Outside the wind howled, rattling the windowpanes and metal of their trailer. The Christmas tree lights blinked, flashing a rainbow of colors across the room.

“She’s dead,” her daddy said, “and it’s all your fault.”

Ivy shook her head in denial, but he shoved her blood-soaked hands toward her face, and she started to cry. Then she looked down at the knife on the floor. And her mother’s lifeless body sprawled across the carpet. Her pretty brown eyes stared up at the ceiling, icy now.

No! Her mama couldn’t be dead. If Ivy just kissed her, she’d wake up. Then she’d smile and hug Ivy and tell her everything was going to be all right. That tomorrow they’d finish decorating the Christmas tree and wrap the presents.

Ivy pressed her lips against her mama’s cheek, but it was so cold and stiff, she shivered.

Then her father yanked her up by the arm. “You’re poison, Ivy. You’ve ruined this family.”

“No!” She struggled against him, but he shoved her so close to her mother, Ivy saw the whites of her mama’s bulging eyes. Ivy’s stomach cramped, and she coughed, choking. All that blood. So red.

No, not red. The color faded. Just yucky brown.

Even the colored Christmas lights disappeared, turned to black dots before her eyes.

He snagged her hair and flung her backward. Pain exploded in her head as she hit the wall. She scrambled to her knees, tried to run toward the door, but he lunged after her, grabbed her ankle and twisted it so hard she thought she heard it snap. She cried out and kicked at his hands until she was free. A bolt of thunder jolted the trailer, shaking it as if a tornado was coming. Two of her mama’s ceramic Santa Clauses crashed to the floor.

Ivy crawled across the glass, felt shards stab her palms. She had to save the Santas. Save them for when her mama came back.

Her daddy reached for her again. No. No time to get the glass Santas. She had to escape.

She grabbed the cloth Santa instead, the new one her mama had just sewed from felt scraps. Clutching it, Ivy vaulted up and out the trailer door. Her ankle throbbed as she hobbled down the wooden steps and darted toward the junkyard. Her father chased her, his screech echoing over the wind. Tree limbs reached like claws above her in the shadows. Lightning flashed in jagged patterns.

It was dark, and she could barely see. She tripped over a tire rim. A stabbing pain shot through her ankle and leg, and she had to heave for air. But she forced herself up, fighting the wind. It was so strong it hurled her forward. Rain began to splatter down, mud squishing inside her sneakers. Behind her, her father shouted a curse. His bad knee slowed him down.

Her chest ached as she dashed through the rows of broken-down cars. Ones people didn’t want anymore.

Just like her daddy didn’t want her.

He’d told her so dozens of times.

Ivy’s legs gave way again, and she collapsed on the soggy ground. The Santa flew from her hands. Mud soaked her clothes, splashed her face.

Then someone grabbed her from behind.

Flailing, she yelled and kicked.

“Stop fighting me, dammit.”

He released her, and she scrambled away on her knees. It wasn’t her father. Bad-boy Matt Mahoney was standing in the shadows. He stood motionless, his chin jutting up, a pair of ragged jeans hanging off his hips. He was soaked with rain and smelled like car grease. And he was so muscular and big he could stomp her into the ground. His black eyes tracked her as if she was an ant he wanted to kill.