Blog Tour: Where There's Smoke by Kathy Coopmans
Title: Where There’s
Smoke
Author: Kathy Coopmans
Genre: Contemporary
Romance, Rockstar Romance
Don’t miss Where There’s Smoke, an
emotional Rockstar Contemporary Romance from Kathy Coopmans!
The lives of Dean Wagner and Tatum
Fields have been ruled by the hand of fate.
The past six years of my life have been
consumed by guilt. Since we lost Landon to a fire, I’ve done
everything in my power to protect my daughter, Leila, from finding
out the truth about how her twin brother died. Nothing in my life
means more to me than her.
Not my band, not my reputation.
Nothing.
Until I see Tatum, the woman I saved on
the beach the same night she dealt with a loss of her own.
~
The daily routine I’ve settled into
is what keeps me going. Work at my chocolate shop, pay the bills,
repeat. I don’t date. I don’t trust. And I have never forgotten
the man who walked away from saving my life without allowing me to
thank him.
I know how to reach him, but I avoid
him at all costs.
Until fate decides to make another
appearance.
This is a story of how destiny ends up
bringing these two souls back together, and how fate, the word very
little people believe in is really their friend, after all.
PROLOGUEFive years ago
Dean
As I gaze across the endless dark water
of the ocean, the fiery sun begins to set. Waves lap against the
shoreline creating an intricate pattern along the smooth sand, and as
I lift my face to the half-lit sky, I try to listen for the voice
that assures me he’s doing okay.
I can hear his laughter against the
waves as they crash against the shore. I can feel the warmth of his
tiny hand touching the side of my worn face, and I can smell the
sting of the saltwater; it burns and reminds me of a time in my life
I never want to forget. I love this peaceful beach, but it’s what I
see when I come here that makes the guilt leave a trail of hot fire
up my flesh.
I remember his young life as if it were
yesterday, a little boy laughing along with his twin sister as they
buried me in the sand. Two little toothless kids filled with
excitement, bright-colored ribbons trailing behind them as they took
off running with kites in one hand while holding hands with the
other.
My kids were like night and day, but
they had as much love for this beach as they did for each other.
Landon always the protector and Leila the one he thought needed his
protection. He stood up for her even when she stood up for herself.
Which was daily with her being below average in both weight and
height. She grew out of it, and eventually the kids who teased her
did, too. Landon, though, he watched his sister like a hawk. I’ve
never seen two kids glued to each other as those two were. And
visualizing how they’d be if he were here is buried under the
poisonous guilt spilled all over my dark and secluded mind.
With a heavy sigh that stabs my chest,
I observe the familiar beach. There are a handful of people sitting
around. Soon, families will fill this place up. Dads will be helping
their children show off their colorful kites the same way I used to
with mine, and the annual week-long kite fest will be underway, and
not a single one of them will know I’ve been here.
Today, it’s just the way I like it.
Quiet and peaceful. Still, I’d give everything I have not to be
sitting here wondering where in my life I went wrong.
I come to this spot where I vacationed
with my kids on the coast of the state of Washington several times a
year. It was my son’s favorite vacation spot. The place where my
daughter, Leila, and I watched the urn holding his ashes float until
it slowly sunk to the bottom of the deep blue water, and now parts of
him are scattered everywhere. It’s the way he would have wanted to
be.
My boy has been gone one year today,
and this place is where I feel closest to him. It could be the
memories of a little boy who would throw a fit when it was time to
leave are vivid here, could be because here is where I said my final
good-bye. I’m not really sure why; all I know is, I feel his spirit
soaring when I sit here. It’s the one place that brings me as close
to him as I will ever be again.
Landon loved kites; he loved anything
with the vibrancy to soar. He was a free-spirited teenager, a good
kid who, despite his mother being a junkie and me fighting my own
demons of a tortured past through living with an uncle who damaged me
more than the abandonment from the woman who gave birth to me did,
was tougher, stronger. And unlike his sister, he was determined to
find the mother he once knew. At least that’s what he told me, and
at first, I believed him; until he started showing signs I recognized
all too well.
He was fourteen when I started missing
concerts or taking him with me because I thought he was high. I
refused to let him see his mother until I could test his blood and
his piss. He was squeaky clean. We fought practically every day over
my suspicion. Me in his face wanting to know how he hid it every day
he denied it, and the parent part of me that believed my son wouldn’t
do drugs because of the downhill battle his mother struggled with
eventually won. I believed him until that knock came at my door.
Several police officers and CPS standing on the other side to give me
news no parent should ever have to receive.
I shake those thoughts away. Today
isn’t the day to let anger twine its way around my chest and choke
me. Except it does. It swirls and mocks, drops seeds of guilt in my
veins, and they spread. A disease I’ll never be rid of.
“Damn, I miss you, kid.” There
hasn’t been a day gone by that I haven’t thought about him.
Wondering what kind of man he’d be growing up to be. If he would
have kept up with his love for playing the drums like me, or if he
would have chosen a different path to spread his wings and fly.
When I lost Landon, my world collapsed.
Shadows took over the light, and the pain has left a constant ache in
my chest. It goes on and on like the rippled waves across the sand.
And my mind; it calls out for me to
come back to the man I once was. A continuous fight of trying to fit
together who I used to be. It’s wrung me out and left me hanging to
dry.
Losing a child is a loss I wouldn’t
know how to begin to explain. There will always be a hole in my soul
that will never again be completely filled, and I’m a resentful man
because of it. Losing him stole the man I was away from my daughter.
It took me from my friends, and on behalf of the life I have yet to
live, I haven’t a Goddamn clue how to get it back or if I even have
the strength to try.
The kids’ mother and I were never
together. Landon and Leila were created during a drunken night I
don’t remember. I mean, I was nineteen, met some random chick at a
party I was having. Fucked her and went on with my life. That is
until she showed up to give me the news. And like most men, I denied
it. Made her get a paternity test. Reality snuck in when the results
came back saying they were mine, and they are without a doubt the
best thing that’s ever happened to me. I’ll never accomplish
anything greater than being their dad.
I press my hands to my temples. I can’t
think of the way my kids came into this world. Not when what I did
brought me the only two people I love unconditionally.
“Talk to me, Landon. I need to hear
you and get these painful memories out of my head.”
Silence rings in my ears. Guilt claws
at my throat. I usually find a sense of peace here, but for some
fucked-up reason, all I can think about is what eventually took my
son’s life.
Somewhere along the way, the kids’
mom, Kate, got hooked on prescription pills; those turned to weed,
and it escalated to the heavy stuff from there. She was out of
control and blamed everyone but herself. One day it was my fault
because I wouldn’t have a thing to do with her; the next she
complained the kids were too much for her to handle. She was a
fucking wreck waiting to happen.
I tried getting her off the drugs. I
paid for several trips to rehab, and then the day came where I took
her to court. Won full custody of the kids and settled into a routine
with a nanny to take care of them after I hooked up with Roman and
with a stroke of luck we found Miles and Brock. Together we took
ourselves to fame.
I wasn’t the perfect parent, but I
made sure to fly home whenever we had a break from the tour. I flew
the kids to me on the weekends they didn’t spend with their mother,
and things were going fine up until Kate claimed she was pulling her
life together and asked for more time with the kids. I called
bullshit, and so did Leila. But Landon, he went to stay with her as
often as he could. A kid set out to save a woman who didn’t want to
be saved. And up until the day he died, I still felt that gnawing
ache in my chest he was doing something.
The guilt ate me alive when the truth
came out of how they were both killed.
“I should have made you go into
rehab.” Then what? Would he have gotten out and started right back
up like his mother did? “Fuck!” I scream, gaining the attention
of a family walking the beach. I close my eyes, suck in a breath, and
bow my head between my drawn-up knees.
My son was a drug addict like his
mother. They were high the night they died. The forensics experts
told me they were making meth and it blew up, caught the house on
fire and killed them both.
“I fucking hate you for what you did
to him. You were his mother, for fuck’s sake. Flesh and blood, and
you dragged him to hell with you. Put our daughter through the worst
nightmare she will have in her life.” Regardless of not ever
allowing the anger to bubble to the surface whenever I come here, for
some reason today it does.
My heart and brain become a game of tug
of war—anger versus heartache—and I begin to shake. The tart
taste in my mouth turns bitter, and every nerve ending dares to
explode.
If she hadn’t died alongside my son,
I would have killed her.
I glance around the beach that has been
my solace and wish the sand would calm me down like it usually does.
It doesn’t do a thing for some reason, except make me angrier. It’s
a damn good thing Leila isn’t here to see me like this.
My blood rushes to my head, and my
fists ball at my sides. I need to stop and find the man I once was
again. Some kind of fucking calming of the soul is what I need.
Something besides beating the hell out of my drums. Which I won’t
be doing for a while now that we’re done recording our album and
the band is taking some much-needed time off.
Every positive emotion I’ve tried to
find is spread across the wide span of this ocean. I fake my way
through the happy times with the happy disposition I’ve perfected.
The problem I’m having now is, all the space inside of me is
overflowing with negativity. I’m finding the bad in the good, and
every day it’s becoming so much harder to ignore. The gap in my
chest and the inner pain are almost too much to bear. It’s a lame
and deadly excuse, but not even the rush of a cigarette calms me
anymore, or watching Leila turn into the loving woman she was meant
to be. My head is fucked up, and my guilt is slowly killing me.
“Damn it,” I grumble and turn my
head when I see a woman frantically stripping out of her wedding
dress at the shoreline. She tosses it into the water and crosses her
arms over her chest. Her long black hair is blowing in the wind.
“Christ, what the hell is she doing?”
I study her for a silent beat. There’s
something about the way she’s gazing out into the ocean as she
stands there in a white strapless bra and lace panties that grips me
in the chest. I should pay more attention to her because despite
whatever has her beaten down, she is absolutely exquisite. I wish I
could hold on to the beautiful profile of her face, because it’s
obvious she’s troubled over something, but the man standing several
feet behind her in a black tuxedo spikes my anger. I dig my hands in
the sand to stop me from standing up and walking toward him to knock
him on his ass.
His tall frame is bent over with his
hands on his knees as if he’s trying to catch his breath, and when
he glances this way, every part of me begins to shake.
Sam Borst, a reporter for Hollywood
Living. A young punk in his mid-twenties. I hate him nearly as much
as I did Kate. The last thing I need is for him to see me and pop his
mouth off. The guy is the biggest gossip talker this side of the
Mississippi. Gives his opinions freely and exploits celebrities with
misguided information. The fucking world eats out of the palm of his
hands. He hosts a two-hour radio show where he asks their opinions,
has them call in and stir the pot even more. Hollywood gossip. It all
makes me fucking sick.
I’ve kept my personal life hidden
since the day half of it was stolen from me, yet this man has never
given up on trying to dig up the truth of why I buried my son.
The bastard didn’t come along and
stick a thorn in my side when he first started talking about their
deaths; he stuck a Goddamn knife in me, twisted it, and left it there
when he opened a forum on their website for opinions on how the
public thought it all went down. Our publicist told me to let it go
when all I wanted was to kick his teeth in.
He didn’t give two fucks I was
mourning and at the same time trying to bring my daughter back to
life. For months, all I did was make sure she was going to be
alright. I might have been slowly dying every day, pretending I was
strong, but I had a responsibility much larger than taking care of
myself, and that was her. So, I let him rattle off and ignored the
prick the best I could until the rest of the paparazzi started coming
around, digging for the one piece of dirt they they will never find.
I beat the shit out that motherfucker
six months ago. Broke his nose, fucked up his jaw, and spent a solid
thirty days behind bars. The worst part of it was, I lost my temper
in front of my daughter.
It was hard as hell trying to explain
to Leila that she had to stay with one of the guys while I sat in the
hole wishing I had let it go like I was told. She ended up staying
with Miles because his apartment was closer to her high school.
At the time, I was thankful Leila
didn’t watch the news or listen to gossip, so, at first, she had no
idea what the hell was going on. It drained me to make up some
lame-ass excuse as to why I fucked him up and to make sure she stayed
away from anyone with a camera or microphone, and to this day, she’s
the only one close to me who doesn’t know the truth about Landon.
But I’d bet my ass this fucker here would plow her over if he knew
death wouldn’t come to him the minute I found out he talked to her.
Protecting Leila is the reason why everyone close to me took a vow to
keep quiet and stay away from the paparazzi.
I’ll do whatever it takes to protect
my daughter from people like him, and when I say that, I mean it with
a vengeance that would cause the earth to shift.
The vindictive assholes who stalk us
would sell their soul to the devil for a good story, and the truth
behind my son’s death would have every one of them lining up to see
which one the devil would take first if word got out. My bet would be
on him.
It was bad enough she watched her
mother whittle away, but to have her think poorly of her brother or
blame herself because she didn’t see the signs would kill me. Leila
loved Landon more than she loved anyone, anyone, and I need to keep
her heart from tainting his memory.
I pull my ball cap lower over my head
and exhale. Pisses me off that my time with my son was already ruined
by my anger, and now it’s doubled that he’s here.
I’m up on my feet when the woman
catches my eye again as she starts walking into the water, the waves
coming up to her knees, her waist, and then her neck. “Shit, she’s
going to drown.”
“Damn it, Tatum, you’re my fiancée.
Let me help you. Stop!” Sam’s voice that reeks of panic and fear
loops around my feet. I start running toward the freezing water.
I couldn’t save my child, but I’ll
do whatever it takes to save her.
USA Today Best Selling Author Kathy
Coopmans is a Michigan native where she lives with her husband, Tony.
They have two son’s Aaron and Shane.
She is a sports nut. Her favorite
sports include NASCAR, Baseball, and Football.
She has recently
retired from her day job to become a full-time writer.
She has always been an avid reader and
at the young age of 50 decided she wanted to write. She claims she
can do several things at once and still stay on task. Her favorite
quote is “I got this.”
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