Guardian Hall #1
In the frostbitten heart of Chicago, a scarred and solitary soldier finds a second chance at love with the man who broke his heart.
Twenty years at war have left Sergeant Jasper "Jazz" Brookes battered, scarred, and haunted. His marriage is wrecked, his daughter barely speaks to him, and the world he fought for has moved on without him. Homeless by choice, Jazz manages until the brutal Chicago winter forces him to seek help from a shelter he doesn’t want to need.
The weathered building in Humboldt Park offers veterans a place to rebuild, but Jazz doesn’t expect to find Alex Richardson there—his first love, the boy who chose money over him, the one he left behind. Seeing Alex again cracks open old wounds and stirs feelings Jazz buried long ago.
For Alex, the sight of Jazz reminds him of everything he’s tried to forget. But neither man has moved on. As they grapple with their past and confront the scars they’ve carried for years, they’re forced to decide if the connection between them is strong enough to survive the pain.
This time, it’s all or nothing.
A new book AND a new series from RJ Scott? Yes, please. Always You, the first entry in the author's new series, Guardian Hall is amazing. I won't say it has a dark element but it definitely has heartwrenching and heartbreaking elements on multiple points. I won't list the points so as not spoil anything but just know this story, these characters will definitely squeeze you through the emotional wringer.
Alex Richardson made a bad choice long ago thinking he'd have a chance to explain it or perhaps manage it the way he planned, needless to say things did not go as the young man planned. Jazz Brookes was left aching after Alex's choice but tried to make the best life possible, unfortunately things also did not go as he planned. Both men had hit their own rock bottom, we learn and see more of Jazz's collapsed state but we learn some of Alex's as well through conversation and internal monologue. Now some might like to have seen more of Alex's but personally I like a little off-page storytelling because there comes a point where it's just too much. Subtlety and readers imagination can be extremely powerful.
When dealing with PTSD in fiction I find there is too often two ways an author goes: short & brief to minimize the angst or highly detailed heavy on medical wordage so you feel like you're studying a medical school book. I'm all for reality in fiction when it comes to health but sometimes less can truly be more but not at all can disconnect a reader from the characters, so balance is key. RJ Scott has found that balance in Always You. As I said above, both characters are dealing with hurt and healing but Jazz is the primary focus on the healing front IMO and we see the hurt, the comfort, and the fallout/side effects but they don't overpower the story and the romance.
To put it bluntly and paraphrase Goldilocks: RJ Scott got it "just right" with Always You. You'll smile, you'll cry, you'll laugh, basically you'll be "ooohing" and "awwwing" all over the place.
Chapter One
JAZZ
Standing across the street, I held the coffee cup close, its warmth providing a brief reprieve from the biting Chicago wind. The old building in Humboldt Park loomed ahead— a weary, weathered structure. Its brickwork was faded and chipped, with windows gleaming on the first floor, but above that, grimy and dark, the windowsills and surrounds needed repairs everywhere. Around the house, the neighborhood stretched out in a patchwork of neglect and survival. Graffiti-covered walls displayed various tags, while trash blew and collected on the snowy sidewalks.
Someone bumped into me, jolting me from my reverie. “Sorry,” I muttered, but the girl glanced back, her nose wrinkling in disdain, before she hurried away, disappearing into the flurry of thickening snow that swirled around streetlamps and piled up in dirty mounds. She might’ve been reacting to the way I looked— homeless, piles of rags, unwanted, and scary. Or maybe the way I smelled— given I hadn’t washed in days— not since leaving the hospital where the cops had dropped me off. My appearance must have been unsettling— hands cracked from the cold, hair unkempt, clothes a mismatched ensemble from some thrift shop clinging to my skinny body, a backpack with all I owned slung over my shoulder. She and other people— the ordinary people of this world— were why I didn’t stay inside the café. I knew no one would want to sit next to me, so I used loose change, ignored the comments, and hurried outside to take my position as a ghost, haunting the fringes of a world that had moved on without me.
Cars inched along the road, their tires crunching over the fresh layer of snow, and I watched them and their drivers, so worried they’d slip and knock their vehicles as if a few scratches mattered. What were they all doing out here, anyway? Didn’t they all have homes to go to, with people who cared about them?
I sipped the dark coffee, its bitterness awful compared to the sugar-laden or salty drinks I’d grown used to in the desert. That arid, endless expanse of sand and heat felt a world away. Here, the air was heavy with the smell of cold— that crisp, almost metallic scent that comes with snow. It mingled with distant whiffs of exhaust fumes and an urban winter's faint, underlying decay.
The desert was silent and had vast open spaces until it was torn apart by explosions and drenched in screams, but here, the city was a constant hum of life, even in its most rundown corners. The sound of distant traffic, the muffled conversations of passersby, the occasional siren in the distance— it was all so alien and tight and close— too much.
I took another sip— my hand shaking, the coffee scalding my tongue— and stared at the building that was supposed to be my refuge. Fear gripped me— not just of the four walls waiting to enclose me, but of what lay beyond them.
I wanted to return to the heat, friends, and having a reason and purpose every day. So, I should head south to Texas, the tip of Florida, the islands, or the ocean. It may not be the desert, but the heat in my bones would be enough to thaw me out, right?
But then, I wouldn’t be near Harper, and whatever my ex-wife, Ava, thought of me now, I deserved to be near my daughter. If only to check in on her from a distance.
She was in Chicago, living her normal teenage life.
I was in Chicago, trying to stay alive any way I knew how.
And maybe one day, I’d talk to her.
One day, when my head wasn’t so messed up and I didn’t smell like five-day-old garbage.
I drew in a lungful of icy air and stepped off the curb, intent on closing the distance between me and the building as the world seemed to slow down. A silver Toyota lost its battle with the slick, snow-covered street, fishtailing wildly. It skidded past me, missing me by mere inches. My heart didn’t race. No adrenaline-fueled shock coursed through me. Instead, there was an eerie calm, a detachment, and I heard music blaring although the car windows were closed. The driver, face twisted in frustration, shot me an angry gesture before steering the car back on track and disappearing around the next corner.
I stood on the road, the cold seeping through my worn shoes, watching the taillights fade into the distance. The lack of fear, the absence of reaction, was unsettling. Once, a moment like that would have sparked a surge of adrenaline, a rush of instincts perfected in far more dangerous situations. But now, there was nothing— just a hollow emptiness, a numbness that had become a constant companion since returning stateside.
“Hey, you’re in the middle of the road, man. You okay?” someone asked, snapping me out of the fugue state I had going on.
I waved a hand as if I were telling him it was okay, then, with one glance left and right, I crossed to the sidewalk and ended up outside the door of Guardian Hall, Private Residence. There was a discreet plate with a button to push, and I stared at it.
Guardian Hall?
I needed to press the buzzer.
I reached for it.
But I didn’t press it.
I couldn’t.
I stared some more, my feet unmoving, my backpack digging into my shoulders, the snow swirling harder around me.
Then, the door opened.
I couldn’t see into the shadows, and until the person stepped into the light, I wasn’t sure it would be him, but I recognized those dark eyes, that ruffled dark hair, and how he dressed was a throwback to twenty years ago. He looked older, wiser, maybe, but, like me he was only a few weeks from his thirty-eighth birthday, so he would never again be the boy I remembered. He was silent and watchful in the way he stared at me.
“Do you want to come in?” he said with a kind, understanding smile.
He didn’t sneer, wrinkle his nose, or judge me; instead, he invited me inside.
“Alex,” I murmured.
He grinned. “That’s me, for my sins.” Then, he held out a hand. “Alex Richardson, manager of Guardian Hall.”
“I know,” I said, and his smile faltered a little, and he seemed puzzled for a moment, probably imagining that I was familiar somehow.
“It’s okay to come in. We don’t ask for names or—”
“Jazz,” I blurted and coughed, remnants of the freaking viral shit that had landed me in the hospital.
He looked confused; then, his hand dropped, his eyes widened, and his mouth fell open. Was he still going to welcome me in after sending me away twenty years ago? Was this the moment he slammed the door in my face again after telling me I was nothing to him? After a moment’s pause, he reached for me, gripped my wet-through coat, and dragged me into the house, closing the door behind me, then setting me back so he could check me out.
He was lost for words.
And I didn’t have a single damn thing to say.
Writing love stories with a happy ever after – cowboys, heroes, family, hockey, single dads, bodyguards
USA Today bestselling author RJ Scott has written over one hundred romance books. Emotional stories of complicated characters, cowboys, single dads, hockey players, millionaires, princes, bodyguards, Navy SEALs, soldiers, doctors, paramedics, firefighters, cops, and the men who get mixed up in their lives, always with a happy ever after.
She lives just outside London and spends every waking minute she isn’t with family either reading or writing. The last time she had a week’s break from writing, she didn’t like it one little bit, and she has yet to meet a box of chocolates she couldn’t defeat.
BOOKBUB / KOBO / SMASHWORDS
EMAIL: rj@rjscott.co.uk
