This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. Copyright © 2020 by Emily McIntire All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or used in any manner without written permission of the copyright owner except for the use of quotations in a book review. For more information, address: [email protected] Cover Design: Clarise Tan - CT Cover Creations Editing: Ellie McLove - My Brother’s Editor Proofreading: Rosa Sharon - My Brother’s Editor ISBN E-book 978-1-7349994-1-9 ISBN Print 978-1-7349994-0-2 Created with Vellum Contents A Note From the Author Preface Prologue 1. Alina 2. Chase 3. Alina 4. Chase 5. Alina 6. Alina 7. Chase 8. Alina 9. Chase 10. Alina 11. Chase 12. Chase 13. Alina 14. Alina 15. Chase 16. Alina 17. Chase 18. Alina 19. Chase 20. Alina 21. Chase 22. Chase 23. Alina 24. Alina 25. Chase 26. Alina 27. Chase 28. Alina 29. Chase 30. Alina 31. Chase 32. Chase 33. Alina 34. Alina 35. Chase 36. Alina 37. Chase 38. Alina 39. Alina 40. Chase 41. Chase 42. Alina 43. Chase 44. Alina 45. Chase 46. Alina 47. Chase 48. Alina 49. Chase 50. Alina 51. Alina Epilogue Thanks for reading Beneath the Stars! Also by Emily McIntire Acknowledgments About the Author A Note From the Author Beneath the Stars is a full-length, interconnected standalone that features strong language, sexual scenes and mature situations which may be considered triggers for some. Reader Discretion is advised. I started this book in February 2020 and Chase and Alina’s story literally poured out of me. They are real, raw and flawed characters. There will be times you may want to scream at both them and me, and that’s okay. I promise I’ll bring you through it. Trust the process. Preface I was eleven when I met Chase Adams. I loved him before I knew what lovin’ was. I pulled, he pushed. I gave, he took. I loved… I lost. Now he’s back. All grown up and sexy as sin. But things changed while he was gone. So, he can show those dimples and flex those muscles all he wants. It won’t change a thing. Chase Adams is nothin’ but a lost memory. I’ll do everything I can to keep him that way. Growing up, there were only two women I ever loved. Neither one of them ever really loved me back. Until her. Alina. My Goldi. She was everything that’s good. I was the bad. She was the brightest goddamn star. I was the black hole shredding her to pieces. I loved her wrong, losing her to my demons. But now I’m back. A better man. I’ll do everything I can to make her remember us, even if all she wants is to forget. For everyone who has loved, will love, and wants to be loved. Prologue It’s when I’m walking to the back office that I feel it. The shift in the air. It’s subtle—a ghost of a chill that flickers down my spine. What the heck? I brush it off, straightening my shoulders and walking through the open door. I don’t see him at first, but when I do—that chill drops like an iceberg, free-falling through my body and freezing me in place. This isn’t happening. This cannot be happening. “Alina! I was starting to wonder if you would even show up,” my boss, Regina, says as she smiles thinly. She’s annoyed, and rightly so. I should respond, but I don’t. I’m not sure I physically can since my heart has stalled in my chest. Chase Adams. I’d love him if I didn’t hate him so much. There’s a pencil behind his ear, a blueprint rolled up in his hand, and another laid out on the desk. But he isn’t looking at that. He’s locked on me, mouth partially open, hand frozen halfway through his silky, dark hair. He swallows, and my traitorous eyes track the way his throat bobs. “Goldi.” The nickname travels across the room and pierces me in the chest, snapping me out of my shock. “Don’t call me that.” He sucks in a breath, but clamps his mouth shut and nods. “You two know each other?” Regina points between the two of us. Chase starts to answer. “Yeah, actually we used—” “Our folks are neighbors,” I interrupt. “We grew up together, but no. I never really knew him.” I stand stoic, my gaze never straying from Regina. But I can feel him. My body hums, reminding me of the first time I saw him at eleven years old, and just like then, I have to clench my fists to keep from reaching out. 1 Alina Eleven Years Old I love dancing. Always have and always will. Been in classes for every type of dancing under the sun since I was four years old. Daddy tells me I’ll dance my way into the worst kind of trouble, but I think that’s a load of bull. Why would I want to get in trouble? I’m eleven now, way too big to be sitting in a time-out chair. It’s just that dancing is one of the only times I really feel free. My older brother Eli will tell you I’ve got two left feet, but don’t believe him. He just gets annoyed Mama tells him to let me pick the music when she sends us outside to play. I pick a freshly burned CD out of my case and pop it in. When Gretchen Wilson’s “Red Neck Woman” blares out of the speakers, I smile big and tap my foot. “Ugh, seriously?” my brother huffs. “Lee, could you pick worse songs to listen to? You know I can’t stand country.” I turn quickly, whipping my long honey-blonde hair around, tangling it behind me. Eli’s shooting hoops in the driveway. I stick my tongue out at him and turn toward the house. It’s nothing fancy, but it’s all I’ve ever known as home. A three-bed, two-bath, one-story right smack in the middle of Sugarlake, Tennessee with blue shutters and the prettiest tulips you’ll ever see. I love picking them when they bloom in the spring, but Mama gets mad when I do because tulips are “a labor of love,”
