Locked-Down Heart
Combat Hearts #2.1
Combat Hearts #2.1
Tarina Deaton
Genre: Contemporary | Military Romance
Denise Reynolds’s tightly controlled life is thrown off kilter when she’s given custody of her young cousins. There are days she has a hard enough time getting herself out of bed, never mind two precocious kids.
If that wasn’t enough, Chris Nolton comes strolling back into town as suddenly as he left it. She’d broken her own rules and given him a chance once before, only to have him ghost on her. But he’s not there for her this time. No, he’s leading the FBI Task Force intent on capturing the kids’ biological father. A man who was sent to prison for manslaughter. A man who was released five years too early. A man who wants his kids back.
The past has a way of repeating itself and once again, Denise finds herself defending the innocent against the evil of world. One wrong decision, one second guess, could have devastating consequences. To protect the most important people in her life, she’ll need to trust the one man with the power to break her.
Chris reclined the driver’s seat back a few more inches. He’d been sitting in his truck for almost three hours. Bree’s car had been in the drive when he arrived, so he’d parked a few houses down to avoid her spotting his truck. Denise had walked her to the door thirty minutes ago and a few lights had gone off. Glancing down at this phone, he dimmed the brightness and opened his ebook app. Rereading Pet Sematary would keep him awake, even if it made him damn glad he didn’t own a cat.
The phone rang, Denise’s name appearing on the screen. “Hey.”
“Hey.” She didn’t say anything else.
“Everything okay?” He looked up the street toward her house.
“I’m not sure.”
He sat up straight and scanned around the house for anything unusual. “What do you mean?”
“I think I should call the cops.”
He couldn’t see anything from where he was parked. Was something going on at the back of the house? He thumbed the control to raise the back of his seat. “What’s going on?”
“I think there’s a creeper parked down the street.”
He paused with his hand on the ignition button. “A what?”
“You know…a creeper. Stalker. Weirdo.”
He relaxed back into his seat. “Why does it have to be a weirdo?” Guaranteed she’d spotted him and was fucking with him.
“Well, he keeps shifting around in his seat like he’s rubbing one out.”
“I’m—” A knock on the passenger side window interrupted him. Sighing, he ended the call and unlocked the doors.
Denise climbed inside and pulled the door shut. “Whatcha doin’?”
“Not rubbing one out.”
“So I can see.” She glanced down at his lap.
Tarina has spent her entire life in and around the military - first as a dependent and then as an enlisted Air Force member.
In 2015, a friend challenged her to complete NaNoWrimo. She dusted off one of the many stories she'd started over the years, threw it in the trash, and started all over.
Her debut novel, Stitched Up Heart, released in September 2016. She draws heavily from her own military experience to create authentic characters and to give a realistic perspective of the challenges they face.
Tarina is still active duty and a single mom of four-year-old-twins. Her favorite hobby is sleep. She has delusions of retiring from the military to be a full-time writer and stay-at-home mom.
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