She is ...: I Ain’t Ya Mama Collab Read online

  She is ...

  I Ain’t Ya Mama Collab

  Chelsea Camaron

  Contents

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  Foreword

  She Is …

  Introduction

  Prologue

  1. Elle

  2. Elle

  3. Sullivan

  4. Elle

  5. Sullivan

  6. Elle

  7. Sullivan

  8. Elle

  9. Sullivan

  10. Elle

  11. Sullivan

  12. Elle

  13. Sullivan

  14. Elle

  15. Sullivan

  The End

  You made it to the end!

  About the Author

  Also by Chelsea Camaron

  Also by Chelsea Camaron

  Also by Chelsea Camaron

  Also by Chelsea Camaron

  Also by Chelsea Camaron

  Also by Chelsea Camaron

  Also by Chelsea Camaron

  Also by Chelsea Camaron

  Excerpt from Hellions Ride On Prequel

  Copyright © Chelsea Camaron 2019

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of Chelsea Camaron, except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976.

  * * *

  This is a work of fiction. All character, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  1st edition published: May 2019

  Created with Vellum

  Thank you

  Thank you for purchasing this book. This book and its contents are the copyrighted property of the author, and may not be reproduced, copied, and distributed for commercial or non-commercial purposes.

  Content warning:

  This book contains mature content not suitable for those under the age of 18. Content involves strong language and sexual situations. All parties portrayed in sexual situations are over the age of 18. All characters are a work of fiction.

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  Foreword

  Dear Reader!

  I ain’t your mama is a collaboration comprised of 9 authors who have come together to bring you brand spanking new stories where strong, leading ladies show exactly good they can do it! Women are incredible beings, filled with beauty and grace, and these heroines will have you cheering them on as they go after their own slice of happy!

  Each book is a standalone and can be enjoyed while sipping an ice-cold drink, spiked or not that’s up to you! So, one-click, pull up a comfy chair, and dive into these fun reads where women end up on top!

  She Is …

  She is fierce.

  She is loyal.

  She is sarcastic.

  She lives.

  She breathes.

  She breaks.

  She hurts.

  She smiles.

  She is beautiful.

  * * *

  She is my best friend’s sister. She is everything I never thought I wanted. The reality is she is everything I need. Only she wants nothing to do with me.

  * * *

  She is stronger than any man.

  She is independent.

  She doesn’t believe in love.

  She is ... Elle.

  She is ... you.

  She is ... me.

  * * *

  He wants to give me happily ever after. Except, I long ago gave up on fairy tales and dreams.

  Introduction

  Elle

  He’s everything I never wanted.

  Sullivan Marks, third generation master distiller for Kentucky’s largest bourbon manufacturer and overall dickhead to most.

  He’s everything I despise. Old money mixed with new all swirled together in a life of luxury. He doesn’t know what a hard day’s work is if it bit him on his perfectly round ass.

  Or so I thought.

  He’s also everything I crave. Devilishly handsome with southern charm and charisma, I find I can’t resist him. He carries himself with an air of confidence that borders on arrogant.

  The harder I fight my attraction, the more he seems to be right here tempting me.

  This is what happens when a billionaire works his way into my working class life.

  Prologue

  Sullivan

  “Bourbon boys, it has served the Marks’ family well.” Grandpa Vance’s voice booms over the family table. With a raise of his glass, everyone follows suit and toasts the business.

  The plantation style mansion is overbearing much like the twelve-person table we sit at. All of it firmly in place with the man who runs it, Vance Marks. My grandfather who took the family hooch business from the illegal to the legal side after prohibition ended. The legacy of the Marks brand of bourbon grows with each passing year. The old money earned from the trunk runs has become a real company. The history of the family recipe is now being put to use in the legit money made today.

  As a teen boy, I don’t really care about the family business other than sneaking a shot or two of the amber liquid when I can. I have more important things to give my attention to like exams and getting in Susie’s pants.

  In my family though, business is everything, no matter how old we are. My brother and I have been molded to carry on the legacy. Nothing matters beyond that.

  Donovan nudges me to turn my attention to his latest conquest, the new maid. My brother, aging me by only two years has a thing for older women, especially the help. It started with his piano instructor when he hit puberty and has only gotten wilder the more he realizes he has a dick and likes it to get wet.

  Southern manners have me turning the other way. What he does is his business, but Grandpa Vance would not like to hear his oldest grandson was having sex with the help. While we have been raised to have grace, compassion, and present ourselves appropriately for the situations, we have never been held back from associating with those who work for our family. As I’ve grown older, I realize that’s more about our mother trying to instill humility in us to not be above anyone, whereas, the rest of my family only speaks to our caretakers when necessary. While we may not get in trouble for being friendly, I doubt good old grandpa would like to know he was paying the girl for more than her ability to shine the floors.

  “We need to find you a woman. Not one of those groupie girls from prep school with those plaid skirts, but a woman who can roll her hips and teach you what a woman wants.” My brother whispers to me and I fight not to choke on my water.

  He smirks, knowing he’s got me on edge with the family here. Donovan is a dick. He always wants to push the limits. Me, I just want to do what’s expected of me and if I’m lucky enough have some time out on the lake to fish then that’s a good day. I don’t get caught up in defying the rules like he does. I don’t necessarily agree with all of them, that doesn’t mean I’m going to go out and break them just for the hell of it.

  One day, I’ll b
e out from all of the pomp and circumstance my grandfather’s business has brought on us. One day, I’ll get to be the country boy hunting, fishing, and having the love of a good woman beside me.

  Sixteen-year-old dreams seem so easy … until life slaps you in the face.

  One

  Elle

  Shimmy, shimmy. Click my boots, three times, heel-toe, heel-toe and turn. In my head, I go over each step as I make up my own words to the song playing throughout the dive. This is my night … every night. In my mind, I change the words to the country tune blaring in the space around me as I do the choreographed dance on the bar top.

  Work, work, work, all day long,

  Pretending to love all these songs,

  Shimmy, shimmy,

  Wink at ol’ Jimmy,

  Toss my hair,

  Cuz baby I don’t care,

  Swish my hips,

  To the right with a pop,

  Pout my lips,

  To the left with a pop,

  And then pray like hell,

  So the tips will tell.

  I’m a hard working girl!

  I continue to dance on the bar top to my own shitty made up song making sure to side step the rough patches in the wood. Sticky shit makes my boots heavy as I lift them and continue the dance. Another day, another dollar, the life of a college graduate. If dear old gramps were still alive, he’d yank my daisy duke covered tail right off this old wooden bar.

  The Run Down is by all means run down. The dive bar in the heart of bourbon country that is a run down version of Coyote Ugly. Night in and night out, I don my corset top, short as sin denim shorts, and cowgirl boots. With a little glitter bronzer to accent my cleavage, some floral perfume, and Texas big hair, I doll up to dance and serve.

  All in the name of the almighty dollar.

  This is what college has gotten me. Years of gramps and granny raising me, taking me from one dance class to another, all for my partial scholarship to the University of Kentucky. Go blue! Freshman year, gramps had a heart attack and was gone before I could even find my footing in life. The only family I had left after granny passed in high school from cancer suddenly was no more.

  My mom had the spirit of a gypsy gramps would say. She left me with them as a toddler and never looked back. The last time we heard anything she was traveling with a circus. Seriously, my mother traveling from town to town like a roadie for the clowns seems crazy, but that’s the last update we had from her when I was ten years old. The thought alone makes me laugh, that’s my luck. As for my father, who knows his name because it sure as shit isn’t me.

  Student loans—stuck for life, that’s what they are. Unfortunately, that was my only way to finish what I started. The last thing I would do was fail when gramps had pushed me so hard to make it.

  I’m a college educated, bar serving, can’t keep my head above water twenty-four-year-old woman. Sometimes I think I should go back to school just to defer the payments and get a break. Except, I don’t have the extra time in a day to take classes between my jobs. Yes, jobs because this bartending gig is only one of two sources of income. One day I won’t have this hustle.

  I got the idea to defer my payments by going back to school because I have a roommate who has become a professional student in life just to keep from paying back the loans. It’s cheaper to stay in school and defer, then drown in the moment. She swears one day she’ll be in a better financial situation and be able to pay it all back, but right now this is the only way she can make it.

  I can see her point.

  On the flip side, I see it as a lot more debt. I have enough to last what feels like my lifetime right now so no need to pile more on top of it.

  Double edged sword, that’s my story day in and day out. If I could get a job using my MBA, then I could pay back my debts and not be in a room share or working two jobs. For now, I’m living on a prayer that the right job will come along sooner rather than later.

  I’m on my way though, I have a day job with Marks Beverage Distillery. The largest bourbon distribution company in the state, hell, I dare say the country.

  Sure, currently I am only a mail clerk, equipped with a cart and all, but I have my foot in the door. It took months of applying multiple times to even be seen, four interviews, a drug screening, and aptitude test later, I earned my badge. Yes, it’s an ID card with a magnetic strip that opens the doors and even gets the elevators to make it up to the executive offices for me to push my cart with their mail to them. It’s crazy the way they have things set up just for me as a mail clerk to get my job done. Then again, as a top corporation in the country financially I guess they have to protect everyone. One day, I’m going to have an office on the executive floor where someone else brings me my mail.

  For now, I have a diploma in a frame that I sleep with under my pillow all so I can get up day in and day out and push a cart. Oxymoron is the word to describe my life. Funny thing is I met so many girls along the way who dreamed of dancing making them famous. I love to dance, it’s my passion, and I’m forever grateful for my partial scholarship. I’m a realist though, so I never expected to dance my way through life. It’s why my education was important. Now that pretty piece of paper sits under a discount store fluff stuffed inside a seam, known as my pillow.

  Until I can make my way into a cubical or really earn an office—I’ll even skip having a view—I spend my nights here, serving the drinks and earning my tips. Mail clerks don’t make enough to cover life. Bartenders don’t either. Put the two together and I can manage to get by.

  For me, life keeps on kicking me every chance she gets, so I never quite get ahead.

  The flash of a red baseball hat catches my eye. We bleed blue here in the great state of Kentucky, this man should know better! I watch the man move through the crowd making his way to the bar. He’s tall and broad shouldered making him move easily to my area. The red hat is on backwards with shaggy dark hair sticking out everywhere. He’s in a fitted light blue t-shirt that is tight across his chest not hiding the definition of his muscles. His faded jeans are well worn and fit him like they were expertly tailored for his build, yet the wear shows they are just simply broken in that damn good. The tips of brown cowboy boots peek out only for a moment before they are hidden under the lip of the bar as Mister Tall, Dark, and Delicious settles on the stool.

  His presence alone brings the temperature up by ten degrees or more. I wish I could pull my hair up off my neck, but I’ll have to deal with it. After all, the prettier I am, the prettier the tips come in. Although, there is something about this man which has me willing to serve him more than drinks.

  Popping the top to the longneck in my hand, I slide it over to Ellis as my eyes meet the ball-capped stranger. I have to blink as the depths of his emerald green eyes shock my system. He smiles in a way that says he’s confident and knows he just knocked my inner slut on her proverbial ass.

  Leaning over for my cleavage to pop a little, I give him a wink. “Hello darlin’ what’s it gonna be for ya tonight?”

  “Marks Bourbon Spiked Arnold Palmer, sweet thang,” he says with an air about him and southern drawl that makes me want to giggle like a damn teenage fool.

  “Startin’ a tab or paying as they come, sugar?”

  He slides a twenty on the bar to me, “I’ll see how the night goes. Keep the change on this one.”

  “Sure thing,” I answer taking the money to the register and pocketing the change. With a quick flip of a mason jar, I mix the lemonade, sweet tea, and bourbon, garnishing with a sliced lemon, I serve the man with a smile.

  “Thanks.” He says with a rumble to his voice that hits me in my lower belly giving me butterflies.

  I see attractive men and women nightly. I do my job and move on. Ball-cap man will be another dollar in my pocket, nothing more, nothing less. Maybe, if I let myself, he’ll be a fantasy I can find myself a release to, but in the end it will be nothing more for the two of us. I don’t have time in my life for anyone.
/>   Ellis, one of our regulars, tips his beer up to me before he takes a long pull reminding me to get back to work. He’s ready for his next round. This is his pace. For the next hour and half, one by one he will down each bottle. At precisely eleven, he will stand, give me a nod and head to the door. Outside, he will wait without a word to anyone for his prescheduled cab to arrive. Other than a quick hello and request for a cold one Ellis doesn’t ever say much.

  The Run Down isn’t the classiest of places but it’s been around for ages. Our other regular is old man Clinton. The old wooden bar is said to have been the back of the pew old man Clinton sat on with his wife week after week in a Baptist Church down the way. After thirty years of marriage, she had enough of his drinking and left him. In his version of a celebration, he went to church and unscrewed the pew from the ground and brought it home to his barn. With the help of his drinking buddies, they turned this old place into a regular spot for people of all ages, well twenty-one on up to ninety-two.