Forgetting Jack Cooper: The Outlaw Edition Read online

  Jack Cooper, current Hollywood It man, has a blockbuster new movie in the works all about redemption—only he’s never had to apologize for anything in his life, and he knows how lucky that makes him.

  To prepare for the role and score some publicity points along the way, Jack undertakes a round-the-country tour to make amends with those whose lives he’s inadvertently harmed. What Jack doesn’t realize, however, is that fate is taking a ride-a-long on his redemption tour, and each of his long-overdue apologies will lead to unexpected romance…

  Forgetting Jack Cooper: The Outlaw Edition

  Always hanging out on the edge of trouble, Chantal Green didn’t so much mind taking the fall for Jack back in high school—it was worth it to get under the hood of old man Hassel’s prized Ferrari. Fast forward ten years, and Chantal’s racked up a string of misdemeanors and a whole lot of miles under her chromed-out wheels. She’s now the successful owner of Sex Machina, a high-end custom motorcycle and gear shop that has her on the road constantly, where she most wants to be. Sure, she wonders what it’d be like to have a real home and sense of community, but that’s not on the horizon for her.

  When Chantal gets Jack Cooper’s redemption-tour invite, her first thought is to ignore it. But the publicity would be sweet, so…

  For military vet Luc Martin, home has special meaning. He never expected to be caring for his great aunt and uncle—or taking over their French bakery in Panama City Beach—after his second tour of duty, but he can’t deny he loves it. He’s traveled the world over and he’s ready to stop and watch the sunset more, even if it’s a little lonely watching it all by himself. Then a vision in spiked motorcycle boots roars into his shop, and Luc suddenly finds himself wondering if maybe his definition of home is all wrong…and if maybe a tough-talking biker with a heart of gold is worth chasing, even if she’s mostly running from herself.

  See for yourself how hard it is to try Forgetting Jack Cooper--five different times! The Forgetting Jack Cooper series features NYT and USA Bestselling authors Erin McCarthy and Jennifer Bernard, and award-winning authors Lizzie Shane, Elizabeth Bemis and Jennifer Chance.

  Copyright © 2017 by Jennifer Chance

  All rights reserved.

  ISBN-13: 978-1-943768-30-1

  Cover design by Liz Bemis, Spark Creative Partners

  This book is a work of fiction. References to real people, events, establishments, organizations, or locations are intended only to provide a sense of authenticity, and are used fictitiously. All other characters, and all incidents and dialogue, are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in encouraging piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase/Download only authorized editions.

  Also by Jennifer Chance in the Gowns & Crowns series

  Courted

  Captured

  Claimed

  Crowned

  Cursed

  Charmed

  Chosen

  Wedded

  (coming in 2017)

  For Liz

  Living proof that dreams can come true.

  Read the Prequel!

  In case you haven't read the free prequel, we've included it in the back of this book!

  Click to read it now!

  Chapter One

  She should never have agreed to this.

  Chantal Green leaned back on her bike and pulled off her custom painted phoenix helmet, shaking out her hair as she glared at the cute French bakery she’d been given as the meeting location. It’d been a short ride from their collection of trailers at the motorcycle rally, and the rally itself didn’t start for another few days. So really, she had no good reason to avoid Jack Cooper, no matter how ridiculous all this was.

  She squinted at the dark-grey sided building with sweet buttercream trim, its windows filled with overflowing flowerboxes and its gracious front porch weighed down with yet more cheerfully painted flower pots. Everything about this little shop—from its carefully manicured landscaping to its side patio kiosk festooned with local fliers—screamed respectability, tidiness, and deep ties to the community.

  No wonder she felt so out of place, she thought. She might as well be on Mars.

  The hand-painted sign above the front door proclaimed the shop as La Boulangerie, and Chantal felt the usual surge of defensiveness over her unusual name. Surely Jack hadn’t chosen this goofy little French bakery because of that.

  Chantal had spent most of her childhood getting in fights over people calling her by her first name, whimsically chosen by her mother after she’d seen a commercial for JC Penney’s perfume department when she was nine months pregnant. Now Chantal didn’t mind her name so much, of course, but she was twenty-seven years old. There was a lot she didn’t mind so much anymore—and most people didn’t make a big deal about it anyway.

  But this was Jack Cooper: Hollywood It boy, born performer, currently on a one-man mission to right every tiny little wrong in his unreasonably charmed life. Hell, yes, he’d chosen the bakery on purpose. Just freaking great.

  Still, she was already here. Might as well go through with it.

  “Just get in, get out, and get on with your life,” she muttered.

  Chantal threw her leg over the back of the bike and locked down her helmet, then peeled off her gloves, sticking them into the back pocket of her jeans. She’d sensed trouble when Jack had phoned her out of the blue two months ago. Then, when he’d explained he wanted to apologize for the Hassel job as part of some weird-ass publicity stunt he was using to prepare for his newest movie, she’d almost hung up on him. But she’d always been a sucker—which explained the Hassel job in the first place—and eventually, he’d worn her down.

  It hadn’t taken a genius to figure out the reasons behind Jack’s next flurry of questions, all surrounding Chantal’s current profession as owner and head motorcycle magician at Sex Machina, the custom bike and gear shop she’d owned for the last five years. The boy she remembered from high school back in Phoenix had always known a good camera op, and he’d clearly decided Chantal’s rags to riches story had some merit. He’d even been willing to bring his road show all the way to Panama City Beach, Florida to get the video segment done. Partly to fit her schedule, sure, but partly to film B-roll of the bike rally that was Chantal’s reason for being in town. The rally was part of the summer circuit, would probably end up as one of her biggest feeders for clients over the winter months. And apparently, it fit in great with whatever story Jack was spinning for his own publicity.

  Ultimately, though, Chantal understood the value of going along with Jack’s idea. He was a big deal now, finally getting the career that the Hassel job and any of a number of other minor screw-ups when he’d been an idiot kid would have ruined. She was happy for him. Besides, not to put too fine a point on it, but the publicity of having Sex Machina, Inc. as part of a Hollywood star’s feel-good press bonanza couldn’t hurt. There were a lot of actors and film people who paid ridiculous money for custom bikes, and she was all about taking their cash.

  Even if she had to go through a French bakery to get it.

  Moving quickly up the stairs to the shop, Chantal was glad to see it looked only about half full at this hour of the morning, the breakfast crowd having moved out and the lunch crowd not yet streaming in. With any luck, she could do what she had to do, then get back to the guys in under an hour with croissants or muffins or whatever they sold here in tow. Dare to dream.

  The store’s bells were the first thing tha
t struck her, a string of cheerful tinklers that would have driven her crazy inside of three minutes if she had to listen to them on a regular basis.

  After that, however, she was hit with the aroma of pure, unadulterated joy. Christmas cookies and home-made bread and Saturday morning cinnamon rolls all wrapped up in one.

  “Holy…crap,” she muttered, her eyes practically watering as she riveted her gaze on the counter at the back of the restaurant. Behind a handsome guy who was helping a petite older woman in a blue dress and comfortable shoes, crowded a mash-up of enormous ovens, prep surfaces, shelving and cabinets—all of them laden with pastries and cakes and breads and pies and—

  Her stomach rumbled ominously.

  “Mademoiselle?”

  Chantal blinked, surprised to find her boots had carried her all the way to the counter without her fully realizing it. The old woman with the sensible shoes was gone. Instead, the tall, improbably beautiful man standing behind the counter with the thick accent and warm brown eyes was smiling at her like the sun rose and set in her face, and Chantal didn’t have any idea what he’d said.

  “I’m sorry?” she managed, suddenly way too warm inside her motorcycle jacket.

  Her brain caught up a second later. “Oh! Right. My order. Um, I’m meeting someone here, but when that’s done, I’ll want a dozen of…” Her words trailed off as she glanced over the gleaming shelves weighed down with baked confections that looked nothing like doughnuts. “Something muffiny, I guess. My guys are kind of basic eaters.”

  “Of course,” the man said in an accent so thick you could cut it with a knife, his smile deepening on his lean face. “Could I interest you in something while you wait for your guest?”

  She stared at him a moment, caught up in the sound of his voice. Could he actually be French? He seemed too…young, somehow. He really was cute, too. Even better, his eyes were the color of maple syrup, Chantal decided, their corners already crinkled beneath his short-cropped sandy blond hair. He wasn’t burnt to the color of old leather like so many people in this city, but he was sporting a tan, so apparently he didn’t spend his entire day slaving over an oven, either.

  Not that she cared one way or another, of course.

  Belatedly, she realized he’d asked her another question, and she fought the blush. “Sorry, yeah. That’d be great—um, coffee for me. Black is fine. I don’t need anything to eat.” Her stomach protested more loudly this time, but there was no way she was going to eat on camera.

  “Of course,” he said, again with the accent that sounded completely out of place on the Florida panhandle. “And the name?”

  “Chantal,” she said automatically. “Or Green is fine.”

  To her surprise, the man’s eyes lit up, and when he spoke again, there was no trace of his accent anymore. “Miss Green! Of course. I should have known. Let me show you to the sitting room.” He half turned. “Patrice?”

  A small, plump woman wearing a tidy pink dress and white apron scurried forward, beaming beneath a puff of white hair. Her lined face still managed to look young, and her smile was bright enough to be seen from space.

  “Yes, yes!” she said eagerly, and the man behind the counter nodded at her with an indulgent wink.

  “I’ll be right back, Tante.” Chantal looked between the two of them. Tante? And where had the flat American-sounding accent come from all the sudden?

  Before she could say anything more, the man moved out from behind the counter and she realized that beneath his spotless blue apron he wore a soft white cotton shirt and dark tan slacks, a thick steel Tag Heuer peeking out from the cuff on his left sleeve. Chantal wasn’t a clothes horse in the traditional sense, but she knew an expensive watch when she saw one.

  “Are you the manager here?”

  “Owner, actually,” he said, chuckling when her eyes widened. “It was my aunt and uncle’s shop before, but they can’t manage it so well anymore. When they asked me to help, I came.”

  “From France?”

  His quick, wide grin made her stomach flip over, but when he spoke again, his accent was still American, through and through. “Sorry, I get caught up in the role when I'm at the shop. I was born in France, but I’ve been in the states since I was a kid, more or less. We'll head right through here.”

  He pushed open a door and gestured her out onto a beautiful screened porch set with several tables that overlooked the pretty, flower-choked side patio, complete with a dozen tables and chairs filled with dining customers. “We use this room for club meetings and parties. When Mr. Cooper called and asked about the venue for your interview, I thought it'd work best.”

  “Oh,” Chantal said, her gaze immediately traveling to the setup at the far end of the porch. There were two scaffolds festooned with lights, three different cameras on tripods, and in the middle—was Jack Cooper. Unaccountably, her heart sank. She hadn’t expected him to be here so soon.

  “You know him well?”

  The question was so unexpected, Chantal darted the bakery shop owner another quick glance. “Look, Mr.—”

  “Martin,” he said, and the thick inflection was back for a moment before he caught himself. “But please, call me Luc.”

  “Luc.” She nodded. It suited him. “Truth is, I haven’t seen the guy since high school, and this whole thing is suddenly seeming like a really bad idea. So any time you want to interrupt, you feel free, okay?”

  To his credit, Luc shook his head. “Mr. Cooper may be the movie star, Miss Green, but you're going to steal the show. Trust me on that.”

  Chantal blinked, but before she could say anything else, a woman with enormous glasses and a clipboard stuffed with papers suddenly appeared at her side. “Chantal Green? Hi, I’m Ruth. Let’s get you ready to go—oh, Luc, more coffees all around? Thanks.”

  Then with a sharp, no-nonsense turn of her heel, she rushed off again toward all the lights and cameras.

  “Go,” Luc said, giving her a push. “I’ll be right back.”

  Now it was Chantal’s turn to grin, her sense of humor finally returning. “If I had a dollar for every guy who’s said that to me…”

  Not waiting for the man’s response, she turned and stomped her motorcycle boots toward Jack Cooper’s Hollywood-ready Retribution Tour.

  By the time Luc edged back onto the porch with a tray of coffees and a plate of his signature croissants, he’d told himself a dozen times over that he was doing this only for the promotion the bakery would receive. From everything his great aunt had been saying with breathless excitement for the past three weeks, Jack Cooper was on the verge of becoming a big star, and this next movie of his might well push him over the top.

  Tante Patrice had been buzzing since Luc had first gotten the call from Cooper’s people, in fact. She’d told everyone who would listen in her still-broken English that a movie star was coming to their own petite boulangerie to apologize to the girl whose heart he’d broken so many years ago.

  Funny, Chantal Green didn’t look like a girl whose heart would have been broken all that easily. She looked like she’d be the one doing the breaking. Radiating attitude from the tips of her blonde hair to the toes of her shit kicker boots, she had the kind of killer body that dipped in then eased out in all the right places, and the motorcycle she’d rode up on bristled with chrome spikes and custom paint. Her biker look hadn’t seemed to faze the producer, so clearly they’d expected it, but Luc certainly hadn’t expected the embroidered “Sex Machina” stitched across the bottom of Chantal’s jacket, just above her impressively curved ass.

  Not your type, he reminded himself. Not that he really knew what his type was, anymore, but this woman definitely wasn’t it—no matter how much her name felt like home.

  His mother had been French, had taught Luc both her language and a flawless accent, neither of which he’d ever expected to need. They’d lived overseas until Luc was ten, while his dad moved around from job to job as an Air Force contractor. When his mom had gotten sick right as his dad had b
een reassigned to Tyndall Air Force base in Florida, her aunt and uncle had come along to help out. They’d opened this bakery under his father’s name, then worked there free of charge until his mom had passed away. Luc had joined the military that same year, and he’d assumed his aunt and uncle would go back to France. Instead, they’d stayed, gotten their citizenship even...and remained in Panama City Beach after his father had been reassigned again.

  Eight years later, they were still there. He’d told them he’d only stay in town for the summer when he’d gotten out of the air force, but his aunt and uncle had truly seemed to need him. Plus, he’d found he had a knack for the work, and business had boomed. That summer had turned into fall, one year had turned into two, then three, until suddenly…the beach and the bakery and the neighborhood and the people had all felt like home in a way Luc couldn’t quite explain. Looking at the same sunset from the same stretch of pristine white sand day after day after day, and always finding it a little bit different, just…worked for him. It was a good place, he’d decided. The right place.

  At least it had been until thirty minutes ago, when Chantal Green had blown through his front door.

  “Café?” he asked, his nerves getting the best of him as he dropped back into French—ridiculous, since he hadn’t lived in France since he was ten.

  Still, the look on the faces of the bustling video crew was satisfying—as was the way they dived at his tray. He handed it off, barely able to secure the item he was holding in reserve and angle toward the couple sitting beneath the bright lights. Chantal had unzipped her jacket and was enduring a woman with an enormous powder puff, while Jack sat opposite her, looking as relaxed and charismatic as the movie star he was.

  “Chantal, you look fantastic, really,” Jack said as Luc approached, the warmth in his voice unmistakable. A thread of irritation snaked through Luc, but he merely held up the mug when Chantal looked his way. Her gratified expression made him happier better than it should, and he sat down the cup, the coffee within as black as pitch.