Free Roustabout (The Traveling #3) by Jane Harvey-Berrick Page A

face and stared up at the stars, listening to the sounds of the sleeping carnival.
    Nearby I could hear one of the rodeo horses snickering quietly. Creaks and groans from wood and cooling metal sounded loud in the night. Smoke drifted on the air, our ritual bonfire burning the final embers. Somewhere I could hear a guitar playing, one of those sad fucking songs that Luke always liked. I guess that was because he knew his boyfriend Zach had a permanent hard-on for Kes. I didn’t understand why people did that—be with someone when they were in love with someone else. Being second-best sucked. Maybe I wasn’t the only person who needed to get their shit together.
    This was my home. This was where I belonged, where I felt free. But it wasn’t where I’d started out.
    My world had been small, dark and cruel and there was no fucking way I was going back.
    I wondered if it was Jackson or Jason who’d called, then decided I didn’t care. They were both assholes.

    I must have fallen asleep because the next thing I felt was the toe of Kes’s boot in my ribs.
    “Morning, fucker.”
    I squinted up at him and grinned. “I keep telling you my name is Tucker, but I guess that’s too complicated for you.”
    “Aimee’s making pancakes. Better apologize to her or she’ll burn yours.”
    I sat up slowly, groaning as my body protested at the hard ground and the two mean little men stomping around inside my head.
    I needed wake-up water: coffee, hot and strong.
    “Yeah, okay,” I said. “Sorry, man.”
    “Tell her, not me,” he said, shrugging as he walked off.
    I shuffled into the RV’s kitchen. From the stiffness in Aimee’s shoulders, I could tell she knew I was there.
    “My two favorite things,” I said, “a beautiful woman who’s cooking me breakfast.”
    She turned around and glared at me while I smiled back. When she turned away, she stabbed at the pancakes with her spatula. Yeah, I was going to have to try harder.
    I walked across and wrapped my arms around her waist, leaning my chin on her shoulder.
    “I’m sorry, Aimee. You know me—if my mouth was any bigger I’d have a foot in each cheek at the same time.”
    “You’re such an asshole,” she said, but I could tell she’d accepted my apology.
    “But a cute asshole?” I prompted.
    “No, you smile too much,” she snapped.
    “I can’t help it. I was born smiling and they had to smack my cute ass to see if I really could cry.”
    “You’re so full of shit, Tucker,” she said, laughing reluctantly.
    “Run away with me, Aimee,” I begged, falling to my knees and holding my hands up in front of me. “Leave that loser behind and . . .”
    My throat closed up as Kes grabbed me in a headlock and wrestled me to the ground. He wasn’t being any too gentle either.
    “Hands off of my girl, fucker,” he growled.
    Seeing as I couldn’t breathe too well, I tapped out ‘uncle’ admitting that he’d won, and Kes grudgingly let me go.
    Aimee stood over me shaking her head and smiling.
    “You can take that as a no, Tucker.”
    “I know you want me really,” I wheezed, and Kes gave me an angry stare.
    “Just eat your pancakes,” Aimee sighed, throwing a warning glance at Kes.
    Zef arrived just as I was forking delicious hot pancakes with sweet syrup into my mouth.
    He tossed his cell phone on the table.
    “They’ve started calling me now, bro.”
    I didn’t have to ask who he meant. Suddenly the pancake tasted like old cheese and I had a hard job swallowing past the brick in my throat.
    Aimee sat down opposite me. “You have to go, Tucker. She was your mother.”
    Kes frowned. “It’s up to him what he does.”
    “This isn’t just about him,” she pressed quietly. “His family needs him, or they wouldn’t be calling all of us.”
    “I’m not going anywhere,” I said fiercely. “We’ve got a show tonight. The show must go on, right?”
    “We can do a two-man show,” Kes said carefully. “You guys did that all last season to save my