A Year in His Life Read online

  A Year In His Life

  He leaves her heartbroken. Can he save the relationship before its too late?

  A sexy romance by Eunice Hart of BWWM Club.

  After her ex-husband walked out, Elena Matthews is left doing the best she can working as a barmaid and raising her 8-year-old daughter.

  Her past has left a deep trauma in her life, making her distrustful of all men…

  Until she almost got hit by a car by a particularly handsome Justin Chin!

  Justin is a Chinese billionaire, gorgeous and charismatic, and with too many exes than he can count.

  Yet when he meets the hard-working Elena, he can’t keep her out of his mind!

  They begin a whirlwind romance that transcends anything Elena has ever hoped for!

  But with Justin’s attachment issues, is Elena just walking down the same path she’s been before?

  Or will she find healing at last?

  Find out in this emotional yet sexy romance by Eunice Hart of BWWM Club.

  Suitable for over 18s only due to sizzling hot sex scenes!

  Tip: Search BWWM Club on Amazon to see more of our great books.

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  Copyright © 2019 to Eunice Hart and AfroRomanceBooks.com. No part of this book can be copied or distributed without written permission from the above copyright holders.

  Contents

  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

  Epilogue

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  Prologue

  TAKE A WALK…OUT OF MY LIFE.

  It’s been nearly a decade since Elena Matthews last went on a date. Boring, right? You have no idea.

  And it’s all because her ex-husband Darrel left her in a time of need. With the resolve to maintain only relationships between family and friends, she continues to live her life as a bar-maid, occasionally giving everyone a taste of her musical talent. But when she nearly gets run over by the most gorgeous man she’s ever laid her eyes on, she knows things are about to start changing. Will she be able to get into a relationship after all she’s been through?

  Billionaire. CEO. Hot in a suit. Justin Chin is a lot of things, but stable is not one of them. None of his relationships has ever lasted very long. With Elena, though, things will be much different. They’ve got to be, right?

  Right?

  Chapter 1

  Run Me Over, Jackie Chan. Wait, Don’t!

  “Gimme another beer, Michaels,” said the man with the huge beard and the round belly.

  “It’s Matthews,” Elena corrected him.

  “Whatever. Just give me my beer.”

  He let his gaze drop, staring at Elena’s chest, his eyes so clouded with what Elena figured could be lust, but could also be the effect of having too much alcohol in his system. She hesitated for a moment, staring at him. How many beers had he already had? Five? Six? Elena was already having difficulty keeping count, but one thing was for sure: he’d had way too much to drink. She wouldn’t be surprised if she turned around for a second and returned to find him passed out on the floor.

  Still, he was a customer. As much as she wanted to tell him to forget about the beer and go home, she knew she couldn’t. Heaving a sigh, she reached for another bottle, uncapped it and slid it across the counter.

  She looked around at the other customers in the bar. The place was almost empty this afternoon with the exception of a couple of bikers in leather jackets that sat in a corner, talking loudly while two other waitresses, Martha and Giselle watched them from a distance to make sure they didn’t “accidentally” break anything. The Sparkling Spout was almost always like this in the afternoons. At night, it was a whole different story. Sometimes, even with two other women to assist, Elena found it hard to attend to everyone who stepped into the bar on time. Not that she was complaining, though. She needed the money they made from the business. All three women did.

  Elena, Martha and Giselle ran the bar together. They’d all pooled funds to start the business a couple of years ago, when times were much harder for them. It wasn’t the perfect business, but as far as Elena was concerned, it was definitely something. At least she could better take care of Madison now. If there was one thing that gave her joy, it was her eight-year-old daughter.

  The bearded man, whose name was Gary, as far as she knew, was in his mid-forties, and he had a permanent scowl on his face so it was sometimes hard to tell whether he was in a good mood or not.

  “What a rack,” he mused, his eyes still at the level with her chest.

  Elena tried not to show her discomfort. She wasn’t exactly wearing anything revealing. She had on a regular white shirt and blue jeans, and a black apron with the words The Sparkling Spout printed on it. Nothing that warranted the look Gary was giving her. She knew she was beautiful, even got more compliments than she could count, but she hardly ever thought of herself as sexy.

  “You know, if you’re not too busy tonight, I could show you what it feels like under the sheets,” Gary slurred. He shot her a wink, then gulped down a considerable amount of beer and belched loudly.

  It took a lot of her willpower to keep from letting out a groan. He’d said this to her literally every single other day he’d come here in the past three years. How many times did she have to remind him that she wasn’t interested in sleeping with him?

  He wouldn’t be the first to ask her out. A long time ago, Elena had stopped keeping count of the number of men she’d turned down. She simply wasn’t ready for another relationship yet. But that didn’t seem to stop the men from approaching her. Did she have to stamp the words NOT AVAILABLE onto her forehead before they got the message?

  Six years had gone by since she’d last been in a relationship. That had been with her ex-husband, Darrel. Looking back on it, maybe she should have foreseen what happened before it did.

  Not too long after Madison was born, Darrel started acting distant, staying away from home much, much longer. At first, Elena wondered if he might be cheating on her with some bimbo, but she soon found out it wasn’t anything like that. He wasn’t cheating. He was just deliberately staying out late.

  The reality of the matter soon hit her, and it hit her hard. Darrel was afraid; of having a child, a family of his own. He has never been particularly fond of the idea of having Madison in the first place. Elena wasn’t surprised when she finally confronted him and he came clean to her.

  They had a huge fight and she told him he was a terrible father and husband. She used a lot of words that would have earned her a mouthful of soap back when she was a kid.

  He surprised her by moving out of the house the next day. The divorce papers came two weeks later.

  Madison cried for weeks. To make matters worse, things started to crumble around them. She lost her job as a marketer and no one else hired her. As a last resort, she took Madison to her mother’s place to live for some time while she tried to look for any available jobs. Madison was thrilled at th
e idea of living with her “Granny” Pat, which took some weight off of her mother’s chest.

  Over the years, she managed to make things relatively better for herself and Madison. She avoided dating throughout that period. Naturally, her mother wasn’t too thrilled by that.

  “You need to go out there and find someone,” Granny Pat had told her daughter, earlier this year. “You’re already thirty years old. Darrel isn’t coming back.”

  “I know that,” Elena had replied through gritted teeth. “I’m just not interested in anyone at the moment.”

  “You’re afraid of getting abandoned again.”

  There. She’d hit the nail on the head with just a few words. Elena was stunned to even say much. She hung up not too long after, her mood already worsened.

  She knew she couldn’t afford to let anyone else betray her the way Darrel had betrayed her. She couldn’t afford to go through all that pain again. She couldn’t bear to put Madison through anything else. The kid was just eight years old, for goodness sake.

  She looked at Gary and her stomach nearly gave a lurch at the thought of being in bed with this man, but she merely smiled at him. “I’m sorry, Gary, but I’m gonna be quite busy tonight. Besides, you have a wife.”

  He gave a dismissive wave of his meaty hand. “Oh, please, Michaels. Don’t even mention her. She wouldn’t know about it, she never leaves the house. Anyway, what’s got you busy tonight?”

  “Same thing that’s got me busy almost every other night,” she replied with a casual shrug. “I’m performing again.”

  Singing had always been a favorite pastime of hers, but she only got into it after her divorce. She mostly wrote sad songs about loneliness and pain, though sometimes she switched to cheerful ones. When she and her friends started running the bar, she saw an opportunity to perform in front of an audience. And so, she sang and played the guitar at night to everyone who cared to listen. It wasn’t as great as performing in front of thousands, but it was something all right. Every journey began with a single step.

  “Alright, alright.” Gary took another gulp from his bottle and slammed it down onto the counter. “You know my friends and I could use someone like you to entertain us sometime. You down for that?”

  Over my dead body, Elena thought. Gary’s friends were pretty much clones of him. All had ugly beards and bottomless guts that they filled with as much beer as possible. What was worse was that there were five of them. If she ever did a private performance for them, it would end rather badly. Elena didn’t even want to think about it. The sight of this man leering at her was enough to make her uncomfortable.

  “No,” she told him firmly. “I only perform at the bar. If you and your buddies want to hear me sing, you’ll have to come here.”

  Gary muttered something about proud bimbos, which Elena knew had something to do with her. The thought filled her with mild annoyance. She wasn’t just some dumb chick! Sure, she was quite curvy and all, with dark skin and black eyes, her dark hair smoothed into a bun behind her head. A couple of people had joked in the past about how it had to do with her being African-American, though she didn’t put much thought to it. Elena attracted the gaze of a lot of men. But she wasn’t dumb. She was not a bimbo. She was a respectable woman who was trying to make ends meet. Nothing more.

  Gary downed the rest of the contents of the bottle and belched again. “You gonna get me another beer or what?”

  Elena opened her mouth, ready to give him a piece of her mind, but just then, Giselle showed up at the counter.

  “I think you’ve had enough drinks for today. Maybe even for a week,” she added, wrinkling her nostrils in distaste and taking a couple of steps backwards. “You reek of booze.”

  Giselle was quite tall, the tallest of the three women, with dirty-blonde hair and big, hazel eyes.

  Gary flashed her a drunken grin. Giselle rolled her eyes and faced Elena. “This guy bothering you?”

  “Not really.” Elena rested her elbows on the counter and propped her chin up on her knuckles, staring at her friend. “I’m a little bit tired, though.”

  “You’ll be completely drained by the end of the day, then. The customers will be pouring in like rabbits in a couple of hours. Martha reckons you should pay more attention to them today and sing less.”

  Elena groaned. “Is it that bad?”

  “No, it’s that good,” Giselle corrected, her lips curving into a smirk.

  “Maybe I can sing and attend to the customers. I need a drink. You want one?”

  “Sure.”

  Giselle watched as she set two glasses onto the counter and got a bottle of vodka, pouring some for each of them. They clinked their glasses together and emptied the contents into their mouths.

  Gary looked from one woman to the other, his eyes narrowing to slits. “Hey, where’s my drink?”

  “It’s right in front of you, Gary, can’t you see it?” said a voice, and Martha appeared beside Giselle. All three women burst into laughter as the drunken man began looking for a bottle of beer that wasn’t there.

  “We were just talking about tonight,” Giselle told Martha as she took a seat on a stool beside her. “Elena wants to sing again tonight.”

  “Before you say anything,” Elena said before Martha could open her mouth, “it’s a really good song. I’ve been working on it for a couple of weeks. Trust me, you’ll love it.”

  “I wasn’t going to say anything until you spoke, chica,” Martha told her, her dark bangs and gold hoops shaking as she spoke. “I see your point. The bigger the crowd here, the more likely you are to be offered a record deal.”

  Martha was the most practical of the three, which was quite surprising when you considered the fact that the Latina was the youngest.

  The three women had been friends since they were in college. They had their shortcomings together, but that hadn’t marred their friendship. Sometimes, Elena wondered where she would be without them. The bar was a symbol of the bond they shared. It was a sign that they would always be together in spite of any challenges.

  “Bingo,” Elena said.

  “Hey,” Gary said, still searching for the bottle, “does anyone of you want to hang out with me tonight? I promise I’ll make it worth your while.”

  Both Giselle and Martha recoiled in disgust.

  “I’m not ready to grow a third eye just yet,” Giselle said.

  “Or six more fingers,” Martha chipped in.

  Gary mumbled something under his breath and went back to searching for his bottle.

  “So,” Giselle said, leaning against the counter, “what’s new? How’s the family?”

  Elena shrugged. “My mom’s alright, I guess. She still lives alone. I keep telling her to come live with us in Manhattan, but she doesn’t want to. And Madison is…at school.”

  All of a sudden, she glanced at the clock on the wall behind her. It was 4:02.

  “Dammit!” she exclaimed, so loudly that the bikers stopped their yammering and turned to face her. “No, no, no…”

  “What’s wrong?” Giselle wanted to know. Both she and Martha were staring at her, concern plastered onto their faces.

  “Madison’s still at school. I’m late! I have to go and get her!” Elena said hurriedly, heading out from behind the counter and making her way toward the exit.

  “You want me to drive you there?” Giselle offered. Giselle was the only one of the three women who owned a car. Sometimes Elena and Martha carpooled with her to or from work.

  “No, no, I can get there myself,” Elena told her friend. “It’s only a couple of blocks away. See you guys later!”

  “There’s no beer here!” she heard Gary yell, just before the entrance door shut behind her.

  The streets were warm this time of the year. Even a whiff of the freshness in the air could tell you that it was July. Most people were already returning from work and were either walking or riding in vehicles. Elena figured she was an odd sight, running like a madwoman. It would explain the s
tares she was attracting.

  This wouldn’t be the first time she was late to pick her daughter up from school. She was late lots of times before. But this was the latest she’d ever been. By now, Madison was probably worried that something had happened to her.

  She rounded the corner and suddenly leaped to the right to avoid crashing into a man carrying groceries. Apologizing as quickly as she could, she tore her way down the street, pushing past people as gently as she could, trying to make her apologies heard over the insults some of them hurled at her. A couple of men wolf-whistled as she darted past them, but she paid them no attention.

  She was almost there. Madison’s school wasn’t too far from where she was now. All she needed was to cross the road and cover the next block.

  “Hey, don’t cross yet!” someone shouted, a little too late.

  For her next act, Elena tripped over her own feet and hit the ground with a heavy thud. Pain flared in her elbows and knees and she let out a deep grunt.

  “Dammit,” she muttered.

  A quick glance at the black asphalt and white lines told her that she was lying in the middle of the road. All of a sudden, the sound of a car approaching at top speed reached her ears. She looked up to see a sleek grey car speeding towards her. She couldn’t make out what kind of car it was, but she was pretty sure it was a sports car.

  It was going to slam into her at top speed. And there was nothing she or anyone else could do about it. There wasn’t enough time.

  I love you, Maddie, Elena thought, squeezing her eyes.

  The screech of tires against the asphalt made her reopen them. The car was sitting inches away from her face. She could see, from the gleaming symbol on its hood, that it was a Mercedes. It took her a couple of seconds to realize that everyone on the street was gazing in her direction. A couple of people whipped out their phones to take pictures. She was still too shaken to care. Her heart was beating almost as fast as a Ferrari could move.

  The driver’s door opened slowly and a man climbed out, making his way towards her, and her heart beat even faster.