Father’s Day
The King’s Rogues/ Heart of the Corsairs Crossover Novella
Kit Hardacre from Heart of the Corsairs meets his father, Adam Hardacre from The King’s Rogues. We see the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree but two men who are so much alike have a long way to go before they find they’re family.
This is not a romance per se, but it is a love story of family and hope.
Father’s Day, a special Christmas crossover featuring characters from The King’s Rogues and The Heart of the Corsairs. Purchase here: https://www.amazon.com/Fathers-Day-Kings-Rogues-Book-ebook/dp/B07SGHXJVM
It’s not Christmas, it’s Father’s Day
Father’s Day Blurb
Long believing himself an orphan, Privateer Captain Kit Hardacre is persuaded by his wife to learn more about his family. At the same time, Naval veteran and retired spy Adam Hardacre learns he has an adult son he never knew existed.
Thrown together one Christmas, by circumstances beyond their control, father and son must find mutual ground on which to come to terms with the past. Life is too short to hold on to regret, and a greater regret awaits if the two men cannot work together to save a life. Love comes in many forms… and none more strongly than the love from father to son.
Father’s Day Excerpt
Despite his confident words to Kit, Adam did not feel at all well. His head hurt like blazes and there was ringing in his ears. His stomach roiled. Concussion – or as near as damn it. He’d seen enough of it and experienced enough of it to know.
The weather had turned as bad he had ever known. The top portion of the scaffolding was beginning to fall away. It was not going to hold. A vertiginous glance down told him Kit had lowered Ross by hand, not rope, and dropped him into the sail cloth below. The scaffolding swayed ever more wildly as Adam climbed down to join him, working his way across until he reached Kit and the remaining two boys. Kit grasped the wrists of one and swung him out. The frame rocked back and forth. If Kit chose the wrong moment to let go, the boy would miss the outstretched canvas and fall onto the rubble of timber and masonry below.
Adam got close and hoisted himself up between a section of cross-struts. He raised his legs, bracing his feet against the brick of the clock tower.
“What the hell are you doing?” yelled Kit.
“What the hell does it look like?” Adam yelled back. “Stop arguing and just drop the bloody boys down!”
He felt the strain on his shoulders as he fought the sway. Every ounce of concentration and strength went into keeping the crumbling structure steady.
Adam heard Kit reassure the last boy. He squeezed his eyes tight and recalled what his son had told him of the corsairs, of the women and children he and his men rescued. He imagined that Kit would use the same reassuring tone of voice, one that conveyed empathy and compassion as well as trust.
He fought undeserved paternal pride. He had done nothing to shape the man Kit Hardacre had become, but he couldn’t wish for a better one to call his son.
“Watch out!” yelled someone from below.
Adam opened his eyes in time to see a length of planking falling towards him. A second later he felt the impact. His feet slipped off the stone wall and he managed to fall onto what was left of the platform with Kit.
“Get yourselves down here now!” shouted Ridgeway. “She’s falling apart!”
Adam struggled for purchase. He could no longer feel his hands, numbed by the freezing, driving rain.
“Easy old man,” said Kit. Adam couldn’t see him but heard the younger man panting and out of breath.
“Less of the old,” Adam snarled.
Kit’s voice was full of humor as he replied. “Chastise me when we get down from here in one piece, father.” Now let go of the beam and let me take your weight.”
“Too heavy for you.”
“Don’t argue, just do it.”
Adam put his trust in his son and let go of the cross struts. Every joint ached. He heard Kit scramble for purchase, trying to hold him over the edge as he had done with the children, but there was nothing for him to brace against and Adam was a full grown man, not a child.
“Let me go,” he said.
“No!” Kit replied.
“You have to.”
“It’ll be a bad landing.”
“It will be worse if I take you down with me.”
Adam ignored the pain in his head and raised it to look at Kit.
“There’s no choice… son.”
The agony was writ large on Kit’s face. He turned his head away and screamed, “God damn it Ridgeway! Get some men under here! Break his fall!”
Then Kit let him go.
Father’s Day Buy Link:
Read for free on Kindle Unlimited: https://www.amazon.com/Fathers-Day-Kings-Rogues-Book-ebook/dp/B07SGHXJVM
