The Other Fish in the Sea

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If you have acquired this e-book from anyone except an authorized sales source or the author, you and the person who gave it to you are committing a crime and are in danger of prosecution to the fullest extent of the law. Moreover, you will incur an exquisitely heinous ass-kicking from the author and her scary-ass bitches who take after Liam Neeson’s character in the movie
Taken
. They have a very particular set of skills; skills they have acquired over a very long career. Skills that make them a nightmare for people like you. If you delete this file now, that'll be the end of it. They will not look for you, they will not pursue you. But if you don't, they will look for you, they will find you, and when they do, you’re fucked.

Delete it now or suffer the consequences; least of which is likely to include being arrested and subsequently prison raped by a burly redneck with halitosis who goes by the name of Nancy.

You’ve been warned.

First Printing 2013

This is a work of fiction (aside from the License Notes—that shit is real). Names, characters, organizations, locations, and events that are portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously solely for the express purpose of telling an entertaining story and are not to be taken otherwise. Additionally, due to language and some adult content, this book may not be appropriate for readers under the age of sixteen. Furthermore, it is a parental obligation and responsibility to know and approve what their minor child is reading. Thus stated, parents of minors will not hold the author responsible for their child being exposed to language or any subject matter herein that parents may deem inappropriate during their child’s reading journey as it pertains to this book.

No part of this book may used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever, including Internet usage, without written permission from the author/publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

F
or K-E-L-L-Y, my BBF & VoR.

Why? Because she’s…

Bacon

Buffy & All Things Joss

Drive Time

Evangelical
Je
sus

Hearses With White Roofs & El Caminos

Hold, please.

FNL

*Giggle*

Dead Body Mondays

Formal Unicorn Fridays

J.J.

Chucks

Well that’s unfortunate.

Cats

What’s this?

Vegas

I don’t know what this hand is doing, but, it’s ready.

Come To The Dark Side

@Towanda RT: @Shaniqua: “Fuckin’ A! The bitch still ain’t home!”

‘Nough said. (Clearly.)

Acknowledgments

Someone who was only trying to help and be supportive suggested I keep this part simple.
Pffft
. Anyone who knows me personally will tell you that I honestly don’t know how to make anything simple or easy, especially for myself, which is part of why this section is so important to me. So, I’ll start by saying that as always with genius, there are teams of people hard at work behind the scenes without whom greatness nor success can be achieved to its full potential. In a book, this is where an author has the opportunity to thank those folks publicly. And man, lemme tell ya, I have been
so
very blessed to have a slew of people supporting me, backing me, and working their tails off to help “author me” become a great success. And when I say slew, I mean you might wanna go potty and grab a snack before you start reading this section, because if I’m gonna do it, you can be damned sure I’m gonna fuckin’ do it right. So, let’s begin…

First and foremost I need to acknowledge and thank my uber-supportive husband, Dave—Sexual Chocolate, Dangle Down, or The Harbinger, as he’s sometimes known to others. This man gets up before God almost every single day, often times puts wrinkled clothes on because I can’t seem to remember to take laundry out of the dryer and put it away, and he goes to work without complaint, even if he’s not feeling well, all because he loves his family immensely. And that’s not even mentioning what he does at home. He is the epitome of someone who’s love language is acts of service and even though we’ve been together 17+ years now, his repertoire in demonstrating his love for us still astounds me to this very day.

Next up are my three children…

First we have Alison, aka; The Cheerleader, a girl who is so beautiful inside and out that sometimes I can’t believe God felt me qualified to be her mother. We also happen to be best friends, even though she’s my kid and she’s only sixteen. Anyone who has a problem with that can bite the both of us. Oh and a quick personal note; Alison, my love, if you keep unintentionally living out what I’ve already written, I think maybe we should seriously consider talking Hollywood into rebooting
The Twilight Zone
, either that or looking into getting some therapy for the two of us because we’re gonna need it.

Second is Faith, or, Faith-dizzle, my scary smart firecracker and my (
shhhh *whispers*
—>) inspiration for Jillian. I really shouldn’t say any more about that because I know what’s good for me and I need to keep her on my side, but I will say that although she just turned thirteen this past April 11
^thand has an enormously compassionate heart, this chick is probably the most competitive person I know and takes the utmost pride in her smarticles. So, if you ever find yourself in a position where you have to go up against her for any reason, watch out. That’s all I’m sayin’…

And last but certainly not least is Erin, otherwise known as Buddy and/or Little One, depending on who’s referring to her. What can I say? She’s my baby and will forever put a smile on my face with her exuberant innocence and ability to throw all the rules of fashion out the window, and not only totally get away with it, but make you wonder why there’s a rule about not wearing stripes, polka-dots, flowers and plaid together in the first place. She’s also the only one I know who can make Doc Marten boots worn with striped turquoise and magenta tights and a tattered and torn lacy petty-coat look completely normal. I’m not even kidding.

Oh and um, I can’t forget Gracie. Again. Mommy’s sorry, you frightening little nut-job, and there’s a can of tuna and some fresh cinnamon in the pantry just for you.

I also need to thank a large chunk of my family and friends, of course, because without their love, support, belief in me, and the occasional shenanigan that results in story ideas for me to develop into books, I wouldn’t have come this far as a story teller. So Mom, Bapa, Nana (I know you can hear me), Auntie M, Derek, Bip, Pop, Mike, Kellie, Megan, Karen, Dylan and Dalton, Darryl, Carrie, River and Spencer, Melanie, Monica, Jeff, Mike E. and the White, Roy, Kemmerer, Brown, Yoder, and Bylbie families en masse, I love and appreciate you all more than any of you can possibly ever know.

Another important group of people who deserve mention here are the folks who beta-read
The Other Fish in the Sea
for me. Quite a few of these ladies beta-read TOFitS
way
early on and some of them read it once I sort of knew wtf I was doing, but regardless, Kelly Mazzonne, Bonnie White, Alison Cooksey, Karen Dobey, Kellie Cooksey, Jessica Johnson, Ashley Dungan, Autumn Hull, Gitte Doherty, Tara Sivec, Samantha Stroh Bailey, Amanda Garibay, Jessica Synarski, Beth Pasley, and Andrea Thompson, thank you all from the bottom of my heart for taking time out of your hectic and crazy-busy lives to read and give me your honest feedback, whether that feedback was positive or negative and regardless of whether it was live, via phone, text and/or email, or if it came from across land as well as oceanic boundaries. Truly, I value each and every one of your opinions and it’s my heartfelt belief that you’ve made me better in more ways than one.

A special shout out and thanks goes to J. Cooper for giving me express permission to use his likeness and personal photos for bookish things such as character profile pictures within Internet sites including but not limited to Facebook and Twitter. I don’t know if my readers’ salacious thoughts and virtual saliva will ever actually reach you, but you might wanna prepare to be swooned over, dude.

And finally, I come to the GYP Bitches, an elite and exclusive club that started small and has seen its membership grow exponentially with the addition of some of the most selfless, giving, and incredibly insane chicks I’m blessed to know and who have proven time and again that, in one way or another, they have my back and that of the GYP series as well. The group was founded when I first published
Shark Bait
back in June of 2012 when just a small handful of my closest friends and I decided to throw an impromptu book launch party. There was cake with a rubber ducky and shark, tears over the fact that I actually published the book and people were actually buying it, but most notably, there were the name tags one of my friends thought to make and bring. The evening ended with all the original members having their name tag laminated which would then serve as their membership card. Now, over the past several months, I’ve tweaked, amended, and added to the original GYP Bitch names and I’ve inducted new members as well, some of whom aren’t even aware that they’re official Bitches yet, but, that is about to remedied. So, keeping in mind these two words: Fear & Respect, please allow me to officially introduce the current GYP Bitches, not in order of importance, as they all mean more to me than my own breath, so this will be in order of indoctrination.

The Bitch Who Writes The Books

(TBWWTB)*

I might be narcissistic to a certain degree, but I’m sure as shit not gonna thank myself here for any reason; I’m just including my Bitch name for reference purposes only.

Stefani Spencer

The Bitch Who Doesn’t Swear And Came Up With The GYP Bitches In The First Place

(TBWDSACUWTGYPBITFP)*

You’re an inspiration in many ways and you help to keep me grounded—not an easy task by any means, yet you seem to do it with ease and always with the grace
Je
sus gives us fallen folks. Plus, you gave me Bacon paraphernalia and “Wake the Fuck Up” coffee for my birthday one year, and even though the latter has an admittedly kickass name, it was even more epic because it came from you. Not only that, but out of everyone, you somehow manage to say the exact thing that’ll make the waterworks behind my eyes turn on faster than when I watch one of those Mother’s Day Pampers commercials. Seriously, dude, you need to quit making my eyes leak…I frighten animals and small children when I cry.

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