Published by HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd
77–85 Fulham Palace Road
Hammersmith, London W6 8JB
First published in Great Britain by Harper 2014
Copyright © Jennifer M Voorhees 2014
Cover layout design © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2014
Cover photograph © Ute Averkamp/Getty Images
Jennifer M Voorhees asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.
Source ISBN: 9780007579075
Ebook Edition © October 2014 ISBN: 9780007579082
Version 2014-09-12
Dedicated to anyone who is trying to figure out where they are supposed to be. Don’t worry, friends, the universe has a plan for you; you just need to listen to what it’s trying to tell you and you’ll eventually end up exactly where you were always meant to be.
Contents
Introduction
Prologue . . .: Salem
Chapter 1: Rowdy
Chapter 2: Salem
Chapter 3: Rowdy
Chapter 4: Salem
Chapter 5: Rowdy
Chapter 6: Salem
Chapter 7: Rowdy
Chapter 8: Salem
Chapter 9: Rowdy
Chapter 10: Salem
Chapter 11: Rowdy
Chapter 12: Salem
Chapter 13: Rowdy
Chapter 14: Salem
Chapter 15: Rowdy
Chapter 16: Salem
Chapter 17: Rowdy
Chapter 18: Salem
Chapter 19: Rowdy
Chapter 20: Salem
Epilogue
Author’s Note
Rowdy and Salem’s Playlist
Acknowledgments
Keep Reading
About the Author
Also by Jay Crownover
About the Publisher
For anyone who doesn’t know my backstory, the long and short of it is I thought I had my life figured out. I thought I was on the path I was supposed to be on. I thought I was doing what I was supposed to be doing and in return I was going to live the dream and have the typical happily-ever-after.
Not so much. The path I was meant to be on was vastly different. My happily-ever-after didn’t involve love and marriage but instead a new career and a grand adventure I had only ever dreamed about when I was much younger. Really, what I thought I was supposed to be doing was just the status quo, the day-to-day rhythm I had fallen into because I didn’t know any better, and frankly because I was scared of what lurked outside the comfort of what I had known for so long.
Well, screw that. What I was meant to be doing was so much better, so much more challenging, so much more enlightening and fulfilling than the status quo. I wake up every single day thankful that my path has changed so drastically. Sure, it sucked at the time. It was one of the lowest points in my life and one of the most terrifying journeys I have ever traveled, but coming out of it on the other side stronger, totally independent, and absolutely creatively fulfilled, all I can do is tell the universe thank you for shaking things up.
It’s okay to be scared, I really think that’s how you know that whatever it is you’re meant to be doing matters, but it’s not okay to not find that thing you’re supposed to be doing because you’re afraid of something new, because the path less traveled is daunting and dark. Embrace the change, find your passion, know what your true joy really is about, and pursue it until the end of time. Live the life you were always meant to live. Honestly, nothing on earth will make you happier or more grateful for every single moment you have.
Just get out there and do you. The universe loves that shit!
I don’t have a lot of great memories from my childhood.
There were too many rules. Too many regulations. Too many disapproving looks from my father and not enough support or backbone from my mother.
We lived in Loveless, a tiny Texas town with an achingly accurate name. I was the minister’s daughter, and if that didn’t come with enough inherent expectations, the man who was beloved behind the pulpit but a tyrant in our home heaped them on ever higher. I was meant to be quiet, compliant, and conventional. Problem was . . . that was never me.
When I was nine, I convinced my mom to let me try out for a very exclusive dance team. I longed for something different, something that would make the day-to-day less agonizing. I was so proud, so excited when I made the team, only to have my father tell me dancing like that wasn’t permitted and no daughter of his was going to make a spectacle of herself. He wouldn’t stand for it. It was how everything in my life went, and my mom never seemed willing to take a stand and defy him, even if it meant giving her daughter something she so desperately wanted. Anything that went against my father’s wishes or was deemed inappropriate and shameful got kicked to the curb along with any sense of uniqueness and enjoyment. My parents wanted to squeeze me into a