Are you ready for a teaser of Fierce-Ella? Here is the prologue!!

Prologue

Ella heard the knock at the door and lifted her head from the pillow. “Yes?”

“Can I come in, Ella?” her mother asked.

Her mother normally didn’t ask, but she guessed storming out of the living room and slamming the door was enough for everyone to ask permission if she wanted to be bothered. She didn’t usually lose her temper like she had, as she prided herself on being calm, cool, and collected at all times. Even as a teen.

Someone had to be the stable one of the Fierce Five and it was always her.

She had twenty minutes up here to get it out of her system, but it didn’t seem to be enough with her mother knocking on the door ready to barge in even if Ella told her no.

She flopped her head back down and wiped her tears on the pillowcase, then flipped it over and rolled off the bed. “Just a minute,” she said. She knew her mother was impatient, but she would wait when she thought one of her children needed it.

Walking into her bathroom quickly, she blew her nose, knuckled away a few more stray offenders, and splashed her face with cold water.

It wasn’t helping. She still looked like she’d been balling her eyes out in her pillowcase and she wondered why she was trying to hide that fact from anyone.

Because she never cried. Ever. It was a sign of weakness, and being the only girl of the Fierce Five made her want to be even stronger than them. She wanted to be Superwoman and they could be Batman’s sidekicks.

She went back into her room and looked around to make sure nothing was out of place, not that it ever was. She was extremely organized. She’d had no choice. That was how she was able to figure out if one of her brothers tampered with anything in her room.

“Hi, Mom,” she said, opening the door.

She turned her back and walked to her bed, then sat down and picked her pillow up, hugging it to her chest. She didn’t often show a vulnerable side, but she felt the time called for it since they all knew she was throwing a “hissy fit” as Cade shouted to her when she stormed out after his announcement.

She hadn’t realized her mother had her hands behind her back until she sat down and pushed them out in front of her, bearing her gift like the biggest prize in Charlotte, and said, “I brought us chocolate to share.”

There was a king-sized Hershey bar staring at her. She wanted to growl at her mother for tempting her, but instead reached for the whole thing and opened it up, then broke a piece off. “I’m not sharing.”

Her mother patted her hand. “You’re making a bigger deal out of this than it is.”

“I don’t think so,” she argued. “Why can’t I have anything to myself?”

“Ella. I get it. But you knew that one of the boys was going to go to the same college as you. We’ve been talking about this for a good year.”

She sniffled some more. She was hoping she could avoid it. She’d been so good at talking her brothers and parents out of everything, or talking them into something. No one gathered information and planned it out like her.

“Why Cade? Of all of them, why him? I’ll never get a boyfriend now,” she said as more fresh tears rolled down her face.

“First off, Cade is the best choice because, between you and me, I think he’s the one that might need someone to watch out for him, not the other way around. But don’t you dare tell a soul I said that.”

Ella felt her lips twitch. “Probably. But he’s also the worst of them when it comes to me around guys.”

“Well, now. You did that to yourself, Ella.”

She narrowed her eyes at her mother, who just continued to stare at her with a cocky smirk on her lips. “I don’t need them watching out for me or scaring everyone I like away.”

“You’re the youngest of five. Four older, bigger brothers who are going to protect and watch out for you your entire life. If you find a guy and he can’t handle your brothers, then he’s not worth it.”

She’d always thought the same thing, but it was getting annoying. “I had to all but beg someone to go to the prom with me this year. Do you know how humiliating that is?”

“Again,” her mother said, “that’s your own doing. It’s just a date. Your brothers wouldn’t terrorize a boy for one date. At least I don’t think they would. No, they wouldn’t.” Her mother’s head was shaking side to side after it’d been bobbing up and down.

“It’s not my fault that most guys are intimidated by me. If I use the logic of them having to accept my brothers, then they have to accept that I’m a strong woman.”

“Oh, Ella,” her mother said, patting her leg this time. Her mother was always touchy feely…unlike Ella herself. “You have so much to learn. You’re a strong woman and it’s a great trait to have. One I have myself. But when you find the right man, you’ll find you don’t always have to be so strong.”

“I don’t think so. I’m not ever relying on any man for anything.”

Her mother rolled her eyes. “You’re young. You’ll figure it out. Trust me, there’s time to find a guy, and when you do, you’ll find all these things you thought you wanted to be won’t make a difference.”

She didn’t believe a word her mother was saying. “I doubt it.”

“Trust me, Ella. Your time will come and when it does, it’s going to knock you and that pride of yours on your skinny little butt.”