Impulsion: A Station 32 Fire Men Novel
Read Impulsion: A Station 32 Fire Men Novel Online
Authors: Jamie Magee
Impulsion
A Station 32 Novel
By
Jamie Magee
*****
Kindle
Edition
Copyright © 2013 Jamie Magee
All Rights Reserved
Cover Art by Emma Michaels
Editors: GWE
Todd Barselow
This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer's imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental. All rights reserved. With the exception of quotes used in reviews, this book may not be reproduced or used in whole or in part by any means existing without written permission from the author.
Also, thank you for not sharing your copy of this book. This purchase allows you one legal copy for your own personal reading enjoyment on your personal computer or device. You do not have the right to resell, distribute, print or transfer this book, in whole or in part, to anyone, in any format, via methods either currently known or yet to be invented, or upload this book to a file sharing program. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. Thank you for respecting the author’s work.
For all those who
have felt the burn of a first love…
You were my first love and you will be my last”
Harley Tatum was leading her prized eight-year-old dark bay gelding, Clandestine, into the main barn. Her thighs were burning and her shoulders and arms were tight, almost numb. Her trainer, Camille Doran, was hard-core, a woman that knew this sport inside and out. She could read the horses, the riders. There was little to no softness in that woman. She expected the best and trained the best, which was the only reason Harley’s parents allowed her to be at Willowhaven Equestrian Center.
This was Harley’s third year working with Camille Doran. Harley was barely fifteen when she began to train with her, and now at seventeen there was no doubt that Camille had brought forth the athlete and talent in both Harley and her ride
. Yet, Harley still had a long road before her, for in this sport there is no end, only new challenges around each bend in the road.
The center was not only owned by Camille Doran and her family, but
was also located just outside of the town of Willowhaven, a town that was near a thousand miles from Harley’s home in New York.
Not that Harley would call the home she had in New York a home; she was rarely there, if at all. Her mother had placed her in an all girl
s’ school from day one, and when she wasn’t boarding at the school, Harley was chasing her passion in the equestrian world. An expensive hobby that her father, who was twenty years older than her mother, found no fault in supporting.
Her father, Garrison Tatum, may
have been one of the nation’s leading corporate finance bankers, but his blood was in the south. He grew up in Texas, and oil was in his blood—at least that was what he’d told his only daughter Harley more than once. He understood what it felt like to be outside, how it felt to be sore, hot, filthy—how satisfying and peaceful that could be. Harley’s mother, Claire, was against this adventure from day one, and she argued her point as thoroughly as she could, but when it came down to it Garrison had the final say, and he had the final say because not many dared to counter him—not even his wife.
Harley was entranced with Willowhaven Farms for more than the obvious reasons. The family aspect was what took her breath away. Every night, dinner was served in the main house. Camille’s two sons and one daughter, along with her husband, his brothers, and parents, were there. Harley had never seen her parents touch, laugh. She rarely saw them in the same room, and if she did, it was a social occasion, which included the holidays
; for every event Claire Tatum made a social occasion.
Harley figured out long before she came to Willowhaven Farms that there was no love between her parents. Her mother had married up; even though she came from old money, she managed to find a man with older money, more money. And her father
…honestly, Harley was not sure why he married, though she assumed it was because he wanted an heir. Harley was the only blood family he had left, at least that he claimed. At times, Harley thought she was the only one her father trusted and she did her best never to compromise that trust, the one, singular ally she had in this cold world she found herself being raised in.
Of course, all that did was cause more conflict when she was at home. Her mother was vindictive, saw everything and everyone as a threat, even Harley. There was little to nothing that would ever cause Garrison Tatum to turn his back on his daughter, shut her out of his life, his inheritance. Her mother? For all Harley knew, a shift in the wind would cause Garrison to leave his wife and not think twice about it.
Harley’s heart quickened as she stepped into the grooming bay. Wyatt Doran, the eldest of Camille’s sons, was there waiting on her with a secret smile. They had spent the last three summers together. There were only seven months between them, with Wyatt being the older of the two. He was tall, strong, and to say he was easy on the eyes would be a gross understatement; he was a walking heartbreaker. The sun of the summer always kissed his light brown hair, highlighting it perfectly, and his blue eyes, well, they simply gleamed. His skin was golden, pure.
Wyatt stole Harley’s breath
from the first moment she saw him. To this day, she had yet to understand the pull he had on her. No doubt his image alone was addictive, but there was more to it than that. He wasn’t cold, a mold of his father focused solely on himself like most of the boys she knew, the ones her mother always placed her with during her famous charity events. No, Wyatt had a good soul, something that could be palpably felt in his presence.
Wyatt had a way of being strong and vulnerable at the same time, though she doubted many had seen that vulnerable side. The first time she saw him nervous was three summers ago down by the back creek, on the fourth of July, just before he leaned in and kissed her, a real kiss. A first for the pair of them. She was sure she was in love with him before that night
ended. As that first summer moved on, as the nerves left those stolen kisses that they would fall into when there was no chance they could be caught—there was no questioning that notion. When the summer ended and she had to leave and it felt like her soul was ripped from her body, she knew without a doubt that she’d never get over him. Whatever souls were made of, hers and his were one in the same.
The summer that followed was hotter
—in more ways than one. They dared to sneak away more, to explore more. To share more. They always held back, found a way to stop, to hold on to their virtue, their innocence a little longer.
Harley had told herself that this summer was going to change her life, that this summer she was going to give him something she could never take back, that no matter what, no matter where life took them, they would forevermore live in each other’s memory. They were living in an immortal summer.
The first few weeks of this summer started like the rest, with her deep in her shell, uptight. It was hard for her to move from one lifestyle to the other, for her to let her shoulders down and breathe in, relax. Most times, she made it to Willowhaven Farms in mid-May and didn’t leave until the end of August. Over Christmas break, she would fly in for a week just to ride, and if she was lucky she would find a way to spend at least part of her spring and fall breaks there as well. The time in-between was hard. Doran Farms possessed the two things she was sure she could not live without: her gelding, Clandestine, and Wyatt, the love affair that she had no choice but to keep clandestine.
Wyatt’s mother would kill them both if she ever figured out there was something between them. Not because she didn’t adore Harley, but because she was a woman of her word. She had sworn to the Tatum’s that she could safely board Harley as she trained. Claire, Harley’s mother, pointed out more than once that Camille had two sons near the same age as Harley. Camille took offense to that and clearly voiced that her sons were southern gentlemen, not brood stallions.
Nevertheless, Camille built a two-bedroom apartment over the main barn. Everyone assumed it was for Harley simply because it was no ordinary barn apartment, but built to perfection, built with southern luxury, but in the end the boys took over the apartment and Harley stayed in the main house when she was there. Wyatt and his brother, Truman, didn’t mind, in fact, they loved it. It was their independence, their freedom. Their mother had warned them more than once that it came with responsibility, and daily she walked the apartment, twice, not only to make sure it was clean, but also safely kept.
This side of the farm, this side of the business, was not where Wyatt’s interest
lay. More times than not, he was on the other side of the farm, the one his father managed. That side had the bulls, the broncs, was the wild side as his mother called it, but Wyatt managed to find a reason to be in his mother’s world, in the mix of her endless riding lessons more often than not when Harley was around. That should have made them obvious, but it didn’t.
Clandestine was green when he first came to Willowhaven Farms, scarcely broken to ride much less jump, which was where Wyatt and Truman came in. They had grown up breaking horses, training them. Wyatt’s long, strong legs and build were assets in that heart-racing addiction, not to mention that the ability to bond with horses was instilled
in him from birth. He had a raw respect for the ride, knew the limits, when to push, when not to, a notion he used in more than one area of his life, meaning when it came to Harley.
Girls were just girls before Harley. Wyatt may have had a wayward crush here or there at school, gone to a few middle school dances or hangouts with a girl now and again, but most times he was too into when his next ride would be, into the boy toys the farm was stocked with. Four wheeling, the tractors, fishing, the trucks, all of it; Wyatt’s world was his family’s farm.
Then out of nowhere, Heaven descended on his family’s farm when he was just shy of sixteen and life hadn’t been the same for him since. Every thought, she haunted, more so when she was not at the farm, when she was away at school or home, when they couldn’t even dare to call one another. That was hell on Earth, Wyatt was sure of it.
Wyatt could still remember how uptight his mother was about the
‘Tatum girl’ coming to the farm. Camille had met Harley’s mother and found it offensive the way she looked at their farm as if it were some backwoods redneck playground. The woman seemed disgusted with nature in general. Even the plantation home that had been in Wyatt’s family for near a hundred years failed to impress that woman. Insulting, considering it had hosted several presidents in its lifetime.