What the Heart Wants Read online

  “Fly free.”

  For ten years those words, written on pink parchment paper in her mother’s beautiful handwriting, have been Suda Kaye Ross’s guiding star. Every year on her birthday, Suda Kaye opens another of the letters her mother penned before she passed, heeding the advice inside as she fills her life with experiences. From Italy to Australia, from Rio to Russia, she’s slaked her wanderlust. And then, on her twenty-eighth birthday, she opens the letter that sends her home.

  Returning to Colorado means confronting everything—and everyone—she left behind, including her cherished sister, Evie, and her first love, Camden Bryant. Suda Kaye and Cam spent four years and one unforgettable night together. Given the way she ran out on him, it’s no surprise that he’s wary, resentful...and engaged to someone else. Evie, hardworking and überresponsible, just wants her sister to put down roots at last.

  For Evie’s sake, and her own, Suda Kaye is trying to build a new life, all the while wondering whether it’s too late to come back home—or if the most important part of her never really left.

  From the #1 bestselling author of the beloved Calendar Girl books comes the first in a witty, wise and emotionally compelling new series, where coming home is just the beginning...

  Praise for What the Heart Wants

  “A wonderful story about building a dream and loving your life, home, family, and more.”

  —Kylie Scott, New York Times bestselling author

  “Audrey Carlan has created a gem of a story about sisterhood, love, second chances, and the kind of wanderlust that won’t be silenced, reminding us that sometimes the most important journey is the one we take home.”

  —Lexi Ryan, New York Times bestselling author

  “This book pulled at my heart in all the ways! An emotionally charged story of friendship, sisterhood, and love that shows us what it means to fly free.”

  —Elise Lee, owner at Away With Words Bookshop

  Praise for Audrey Carlan’s Calendar Girl series

  “Sinfully delicious from start to finish!… Smart, and so unique! I was completely immersed in Mia’s journey.”

  —Katy Evans, New York Times bestselling author

  “Fast-paced, and downright addictive… I devoured every word of Mia’s journey.”

  —Meghan March, USA TODAY bestselling author

  “This was a KILLER start to Ms. Carlan’s monthly series!”

  —Give Me Books

  “Audrey did it again! Made me smile, made me laugh and made me cry with her beautiful words! I am in love with these books.”

  —Hooks & Books Book Blog

  “This story was exciting, quick, but well-paced and full of loveable characters. I haven’t met a character in this series that I haven’t liked yet!”

  —Nice and Naughty Book Club

  Also by Audrey Carlan

  The Wish Series

  To Catch a Dream

  What the Heart Wants

  For a complete list of books by Audrey Carlan, visit her website, www.audreycarlan.com.

  Audrey Carlan

  What the Heart Wants

  To Jeananna Goodall...

  Thank you for sharing your mother’s essence with me. I’d like to believe the real Suda Kaye Ross would be thrilled with the outcome of this book. May her beauty live on through you, your children and the generations to come. She left us all such a beautiful gift in you. I, for one, am grateful to her.

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Epilogue

  Audrey Carlan Titles

  Acknowledgments

  About Audrey Carlan

  Hello New Ends,

  Excerpt from To Catch a Dream by Audrey Carlan

  Prologue

  My eighteenth birthday

  Fly Free.

  I trace the two words, written in black ink by a hand more beloved than my own. The color is stark against the pale pink of the parchment paper it’s scrolled on. This was so her. Something she always did. Write letters. Mostly to my sister, Evie, and me over the years during her times away. Sometimes it would be a postcard from one of the faraway places her wandering soul would take her. Other times, it was a quickly scribbled note on a bar napkin enclosed with a ticket stub from a concert she’d seen on her adventure.

  Once she sent us these incredible jeweled necklaces from a German glassworker that were blown glass and hand painted. Every time the mailman came to the reservation where we stayed with our grandfather, I’d pray there was a message or package from Mom.

  From the time I could speak and understand, I’d hang on every word of the fantastical stories she’d tell us upon her return. Her stories took us everywhere from Istanbul to Iceland and all the way to a Burning Man festival in the California desert. That time, she gave us tiny finger cymbals that belly dancers used. After that gift, Mother signed us up for our first round of belly dancing lessons, something Evie and I still love doing together.

  The reality in our home was that our mother, Catori Ross, went where the wind blew her.

  I adored my mother and envied the life she lived. Still do, even after she left us for her final journey. Her one last adventure, she liked to call it. One she promised Evie and me would make her happy for eternity.

  Never worry about me, beautiful girls, she whispered, each of her hands outstretched, my hand in one, Evie’s in the other. Her body sunken in, nothing but skin and bones, in the bed she’d not left in months. She smiled and shifted her dark gaze first to Evie and then to me. I’ve never been anywhere there wasn’t beauty. With a squeeze of our hands, she closed her eyes, exhaled, and was gone.

  It was the last thing she said to us. What’s amazing, though? I believed her. Death would be Mom’s final stop whether or not she wanted it to be. Even then, I knew in my whole heart that she’d find beauty wherever her soul flew. It was her way.

  The one saving grace in all this sorrow was that Mom truly lived. She never settled. Always kept one foot outside the door, hands tightly gripping the wheel of life. With every breath she took, she exhaled freedom, spirit, and love. Wanderlust oozed out of every pore. Nothing could hold her back. Not her military-driven husband or her two daughters. A fact that has hurt Evie deeply.

  Me, I’ve always understood. I’m just like my mother. My feet are constantly itching to dance, to run, to fly. Which is why, scanning the last paragraph of my mother’s words to me on this, my eighteenth birthday, I’ve come to the revelation that I, too, can’t settle. I won’t be held back by obligation, responsibility, or even...love.

  I shuffle through the stacks of sealed pink envelopes beside the satin ribbon that held them together when my grandfather handed these letters to us after my mother died six months ago. Each envelope carries a date or specific event in our lives indicating when we are to open them.

  Evie and I share the same birthday, so she opened her first letter marked with the same date as my own. Today’s date. Her twentieth birthday, my eighteenth.

  Evie sniffles from the papasan chair she’s snuggled into and folds her letter into thirds before stuffing it back into the envelope. She presses the flat of her hand along the front and lifts it to her nose.

  “Smells like her.” Evie clears her throat as a tear slides down her cheek.

  I sniff my letter and note the subtle hints of citrus and earth, maybe even patchouli. “Mom always said if you’re going to smell like anything, let it be natural. Fruit and spice.”

  “And everything nice!” Evie chuckles, then lets out a long sigh. “I miss her. Sometimes I pretend she’s just gone off on another one of her adventures, you know? Then I can be pissed off and plan out all the catty things I’m going to say to her when she finally returns with a suitcase full of dirty clothes and presents to smooth over the hurt of her absence.”

  My throat tightens, and I suck in a harsh breath. “Evie, she didn’t want to leave...”

  “Not this time, Kaye, but what about all the other times? Years and years of time lost. And for what?” She huffs and stands up to pace, clutching her letters to her chest. “Fun. Wild experiences. Adventures!” Her irritation grows along with her volume. “It killed her. This need to see the greener things on the other side.” She points at me with a mighty scowl and indignation seeping from her. “Well, that won’t be me. No way. No how. I’ve got my feet firmly planted on terra firma. I’m going to finish school, get my bachelor’s in finance, then my master’s and make something of myself. And I’m going to be happy!”

  I watch my sister’s golden-blond hair swish back and forth down her back in a tumble of beachy waves. Her blue eyes are blazing with determination when she tosses her letters to the chair and flings herself on the bed next to me in a dramatic heap.

  My sister is light everywhere I am dark. Mom never said much about my real father other than that his name was Ian and I look exactly like him. Coffee-brown hair and amber-colored eyes. Evie and I both got our mother’s Native American bone structure, including the high rounded cheekbones, thick hair, long bodies, dark golden skin tone, and warm hearts.

  Unfortunately, we didn’t get her or our grandfather’s awesome, pitch-black, pin-straight hair or super-dark espresso eye color. Our eyes are the same almond shape, which I’ve always thought was one of our most attractive features. Although we have different biological dads, our shared genes still make us look very much alike.

  Slowly, I stroke my sister’s hair until she turns over.

  “What did your letter say?” she asks.

  I lick my lips, wondering if I should share. It’s hard when my sister and I have never kept secrets from one another. Ever. It’s always been Evie and Suda Kaye against all odds. Knowing I can’t hide from her, I hand her my letter.

  “‘Suda Kaye, my little huutsuu.’” She covers her mouth and closes her eyes. “Little bird,” she croaks at the endearment Mom always called me.

  I smile. “Always and forever, taabe,” I use my mother’s nickname for her, Comanche for sun.

  Evie quickly reads the letter, her hands shaking as she passes it back to me, her face a mask of worry. “You’re not going to do it, are you?”

  I bite down on the inside of my cheek and nod.

  “Kaye...you can’t do that. What about Camden? He won’t understand. A guy like that. The life he wants to give you. No way. You just...” She lets out a breath, grabs my hands, and squeezes them. “What are you going to do?”

  My heart pounds inside my chest, and I stare into my sister’s eyes, my soul readying for the challenge ahead. “I’m going to fly free.”

  * * *

  “Suda Kaye, baby, are you sure? We can wait.” Camden hovers over me, his face so close to mine I can taste the peppermint on his breath. He moves one of his hands along my bare shoulder and down my arm where he laces our fingers together. He lifts and holds my hand up by my head against the blanket we’re cuddling naked underneath. We’re in the loft of the old barn on his family’s farm.

  I shake my head and lift up until my lips touch his. He kisses me slowly, nibbling on my bottom lip before dipping his tongue into my mouth. We kiss until my jaw hurts and I can’t breathe. I pull my head away, gasping for air while staring into his handsome face. I’ve never in my life met a more beautiful boy. Wavy, dark blond hair, sexy hazel eyes that burn with lust.

  “It has to be tonight. Now,” I urge, lifting my hips up and glorying in the naked ridge of his length along my thigh.

  He takes a deep breath before nodding and shifting his hips until they fall between my thighs. The first contact of his manhood and my center is electric. Arousal and excitement rush through my nerve endings, and a fierce need throbs inside of me.

  “Please...” I whisper against his cheek near his ear.

  Camden is breathing heavily against my neck. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

  I smile and kiss his cheek. “Evie swears it only hurts for a minute, and then it’s nothing but bliss. For us both. Now, please, make love to me, Cam.”

  His arms are trembling as he lifts his big body over mine and reaches for his jeans, the ones we discarded in our haste to make out. Only tonight, I planned to take it all the way and wanted to surprise him.

  The blanket falls to his hips and I look down my body at his muscular form kneeling above me. The long hours he’s worked this past year in his father’s steel company, learning the job from the ground up, have sculpted his body into a work of art. I trace his box-shaped abs until he lets out a pained groan when I wrap my hand around his length and give it a healthy stroke. His penis is long and thick and glistening at the tip with his excitement. I lick my lips, wanting to put him in my mouth.

  This is not the first time I’ve seen him naked. We’ve been together for four years, since I was fourteen and a freshman in high school, and he was a sophomore. The first day of school, he picked me out of a crowd in the cafeteria and asked if he could eat with me. I looked into those hazel eyes and fell in love. Right there. Back then, it was puppy love. Four years later, it is the kind of love to build a life on.

  Cam’s hands shake as he rolls on the condom and strokes his length once again. I moan and lift my hips, wanting him to do something, anything to make the need stop. It’s our final step sexually, and I’m more than ready for it.

  He eases his hand between my thighs and sighs when he encounters my flesh.

  “Wet,” he whispers, rubbing his fingers back and forth.

  “Yes.” I moan when he presses one long digit inside and uses his thumb to circle the bundle of nerves that makes me lose my mind every single time. Over the years, he’s perfected this move. Only now, it’s not enough. “Cam...please,” I beg again, needing him, wanting this one last connection to the man of my dreams.

  Cam removes his fingers and centers himself between my thighs. He leans over so that his body is hovering over mine. “You know I love you, right?” His words are guttural, as if they’ve surfaced straight from his soul.

  “Yeah.” I nod frantically, lifting my hips until the head presses inside.

  He firms his jaw and speaks through clenched teeth. “You know I’m going to marry you someday?”

  I grin and grip his hips. “Do it. Come inside.”

  He gives me an inch more while I open my legs wider, making entry easier. Instantly, I feel a pressure I can’t explain. It’s tight and hot and hard. So much bigger than two of his fingers.

  “Tell me you love me?” He presses his forehead to mine. “Tell me you’ll always love me, Suda Kaye,” he demands, on the brink of losing it.

  I swallow as tears prick the backs of my eyes, knowing what I’m about to do and how utterly selfish it’s going to seem. But I can’t move forward without this. Without having experienced Cam’s love to its fullest, just this one time.

  “I’ll always love you, Camden. No matter what happens.” Which is the truth, just not the whole truth.

  He smiles , presses his lips to mine and thrusts all the way inside. I cry into his mouth, into his kiss where he holds steady as the piercing pain shimmers through my body and steals my breath. He holds me, staying perfectly still until my body adjusts and the tension slowly ebbs away, leaving a burning, needy sensation between my thighs.

  He lifts his head and peppers kisses along my cheeks, forehead, and eyes. “You okay? Want me to stop?”

  I swallow down the bite of pain between my legs and shake my head. “No. I’m perfect. You’re perfect,” I assure him.

  “God, so are you.” He kisses me, eases out slowly, and thrusts back in. This time it feels warm, not hot. The pain has receded and the wetness between my legs has grown, easing his way in and out more smoothly. Cam picks up a slow rhythm, and I wonder why the hell we’ve never done this before. It feels too amazing to describe.

  Cam tucks his hand at the nape of my neck, the other around my shoulder while he leverages his hips in a faster, more erratic rhythm. My body is alive with sensation and tingling ripples of pleasure as our bodies mist with sweat. A buzzing feeling warms throughout my limbs and fires up from my core to my chest. I wrap my arms and legs around Cam in a fierce grip as he starts to slam his hips against mine.

  He’s holding on to me so tight, his muscles and body rigid with the control he’s holding on to. “It’s so good, sweets. Baby, it’s so good,” he grinds out through clenched teeth. He presses in and holds for a long moment. “Never thought it could be this good. I love you. I love you,” he declares into my ear as he picks up his momentum.

  My entire body goes electric and fills with the need to burst, to explode, to something, and then it happens. He slips a hand between our bodies and spins firm circles around my clit with two fingers. I lose all focus as I skyrocket into pure nirvana, stars flickering behind my closed eyelids and my body on a never-ending loop of ecstasy.

  Three more thrusts and Cam mashes our lips and hips together as his body goes tight as a drum, every muscle I touch straining and bulging as he groans in relief at what I hope is one of the most memorable moments of his life.