“Love isn’t like milk. It has no expiration date.” ~ Nonna RussoMaddox CruzSingle dad. Tech billionaire. Genius. That is what people saw when they looked at me. Those adjectives might all be true, but inside I was still a kid who grew up in the system and was raised by the streets. Which was why I had no plans to attend my 20 year high school reunion. The last thing I wanted to do was make small talk with people who only wanted to talk to me now because of the success I’d achieved... more“Love isn’t like milk. It has no expiration date.” ~ Nonna RussoMaddox CruzSingle dad. Tech billionaire. Genius. That is what people saw when they looked at me. Those adjectives might all be true, but inside I was still a kid who grew up in the system and was raised by the streets. Which was why I had no plans to attend my 20 year high school reunion. The last thing I wanted to do was make small talk with people who only wanted to talk to me now because of the success I’d achieved.But when I got a text saying that the woman—who had been nicknamed Totga (The One That Got Away) by my friends—was going to be there, small talk was the price I was willing to pay to see her again. She disappeared from my life twenty years ago, and I’d never gotten over it. I told myself I was looking for closure. But the truth was, I didn’t want to close the book, I wanted to write a new chapter.Peyton RussoPeople pleasing. Nonconfrontational. Overthinker. That is how I would describe myself. Those adjectives were not anything I was proud of. I’d spent years in therapy trying, unsuccessfully, to change them. Those traits dominated my life and were the reason I’d spent the past decade in an unhealthy situationship. They were also how I found myself attending my high school reunion.After my Nonna tricked me into flying across the country to care for an “injury” she didn’t have, only to reveal she’d RSVP’d yes to my reunion, I tried to tell her I didn’t want to go. But she guilted me into attending. At least my ex, the only man I ever loved, wouldn’t be there. And that was for the best. As much as I’d love nothing more than to see him again, our walk down memory lane would be through an emotional minefield of pain and regret.Author’s Note: Heartache & Playdates is a first love, second chance, single dad, billionaire standalone romance. This tale of high school sweethearts reunited comes complete with a charming/sexy/single father, a reluctant heroine who would rather leave the past in the past, a feisty (plotting) 90-year-old Nonna, friends and family who all think they know best, fan-yourself-foreplay, swoon-worthy schmexy time, and an ending that puts the happy in happily ever after. less
#1
