twisted in her gut. She wanted to tell her father that he didn’t have to prove anything, but she needed to know that their deal was truly a thing of the past.
Connor looked up and met her eyes as he said, “Anything. Everything. She can have my house, my business, everything that I have. I don’t care about any of it. The only thing that I want is her.”
She bit back a smile as she walked over to him, making a show of thinking it over. “What about the bathtub?”
“It’s yours.”
“Will you stop stealing my hot chocolate?” she asked, reaching up to cup his slightly bruised handsome face.
“No,” he said, turning his head so that he could press a kiss against her palm. “But I’ll learn to make it the way that you like so that I can make it for you.”
“Highland Construction is mine?” she asked, already deciding a month ago to combine their companies into one and run it with him.
“Yes,” he said with absolutely no hesitation.
“You’ll work for me?”
“Yes.”
“Fetch my drinks?”
“No.”
“Be at my by beck and call?” she asked, loving the way his poor abused lips kicked up into a grin.
“No.”
She sighed heavily as she said, “You really suck at interviews.”
“Do I have the job?” he asked, giving her that bad boy smile that she loved.
“I’ll have to think about it,” she said with a shrug as she turned to walk away.
“Uh, Rory, what do you want us to do with him?” Johnny called after her.
“Give him the official welcome to the family,” she said, laughing as she walked away.
“Rory?” Connor called after her, sounding uncertain and for good reason. “Rory!”
She paused long enough to look over her shoulder and wink as she announced smugly, “Checkmate.”
Chapter 1
One Week Later…
“Mmmm,” Rory murmured with a sleepy little smile as she slowly sank down into the old-fashioned clawed tub that was now legally half hers and closed her eyes as she savored the scent of lemongrass and mint carried by the steam rising from the tub.
She couldn’t believe how wonderful this past week had been. She’d slept in late every single morning, caught up on her chores, took naps, moved her stuff into Connor’s house, well, their house now, sold her house at a very tidy profit to Andrew, caught up on e-mails, managed to make Jacob’s life a living hell for a few days for all the trouble he’d caused and simply because she could, and just enjoyed herself. All in all it had been a very productive and relaxing week. It was the first time in years that she actually took time for herself.
Then again, it wasn’t really as though she had a choice in the matter, not since all of her brothers and most of her cousins had disappeared over a week ago, taking Connor with them as well as the decision to work out of her hands. Since she’d overestimated the time that they would need to complete Strawberry Manor, they actually had a few free weeks before their next job started. Normally when that happened she would have her guys organize their supplies, manage supplies for future jobs, provide estimates and make bids for future jobs. To her, there was no such thing as down time…
Until this past week when her brothers had stolen her husband that is. Granted, she’d given them permission to give him the official Bradford welcome to the family. Since they’d disappeared, she’d had nothing but down time and she hated to admit this, especially after priding herself for her strict work ethic for so long, but it had felt wonderful to wake up with absolutely nothing to do. Just so she didn’t feel completely lazy she did get a few things done, but for the most part she’d lounged.
She’d lounged in this tub…
On the bed…
On the couch…
On the porch…
And if it hadn’t been so damn cold out she would have bought a kiddie pool and lounged outside in it with Bunny. When she wasn’t watching mindless television and her favorite movies, she was napping, soaking in a hot bath, making chocolate chip cookie batter at two in the morning just so she could eat raw cookie dough in bed while she watched a Harry Potter marathon and just basically doing absolutely nothing.
It was without question the most decadent week of her life and even though she missed Connor and was actually a bit concerned about his safety, it was still the most relaxing week that she’d ever spent in her life and no matter how much she tried, she couldn’t make herself regret this past week. It didn’t hurt that she knew that her brothers and cousins wouldn’t let anything bad happen to Connor, so she wasn’t too worried about him.
Well, that wasn’t entirely true since there was a very good chance that he might come back…different. It had happened before to several of the men that had married into the family and to be honest, she really didn’t like to think about them or what had happened during their “Welcoming.” She certainly couldn’t allow herself to think about it now, because the thought of Connor coming back changed like those other men before him terrified her.
To this day she still cringed when she thought about the first man that she’d seen “welcomed” into the family. That was the first time that she’d ever seen a grown man cry. It hadn’t been a pretty sight and it wasn’t something that she liked to think of, especially now that poor Connor was going through the same level of hell.
Maybe she shouldn’t have egged her brothers on to do it, she thought as panic tried to take over and threatened to send her running for her keys and her cellphone, praying that she could find them before it was too late, but she knew that nothing that she said or did at this point would make a difference to the men in her family. They were doing whatever it was that they did to ensure that the men that married into this family followed their rules and they wouldn’t stop doing whatever it was to Connor that they were doing until they were positive that he was never going to hurt her.
There had only been one man in the history of their family that she knew of who hadn’t made it through the “initiation” and that was Trevor’s father. For whatever reason, they’d decided to put his father through their initiation process before he got a chance to propose to Trevor’s mother. As soon as they’d found out that he’d got her pregnant they’d beat the shit out of him before quietly taking him off to God only knows where Bradfords went when they were making sure that a man was good enough to join the family.
From what she’d heard from her father and the rest of the older generation of Bradford men that had taken part in the initiation, he’d quickly failed to meet their standards. They’d decided that he wasn’t good enough to marry into their family, but because of Trevor, they’d decided to put him through a completely different initiation, letting him know exactly what they expected of him and what would happen if he failed as a father.
Apparently he’d completely forgotten that warning several times over the years, forcing the men in their family to pay him a visit and refresh his memory. The last time that he’d failed Trevor had been the final straw. After Jason had gotten a few swings in, the rest of the men stepped in and took care of him. She’d only been a child at the time and she wasn’t supposed to know, but when they’d heard Trevor’s father call him a “stupid fucking retard,” they’d snapped. Trevor didn’t even know this, but they’d dragged his father off and made sure that he didn’t come back until he was ready to be a real father.
He’d decided never to come back.
Her stomach dropped at the thought of Connor never coming back. She kept telling herself that Connor could take whatever they dished out and more, but…
What if he couldn’t?
What if they’d finally managed to break him? God, she couldn’t stomach the idea of him coming back changed, which was the only way that she could describe how most of the men came back after the initiation. She wasn’t sure that she could handle seeing a strong man like Connor flinching anytime a noise startled him or find h
im curled up in the corner, sobbing and muttering to himself because the memories had become too much for him to handle.
Once upon a time she may have willed that kind of hell on him, but with time and really great sex, she’d been able to get over their shared animosity. Sure, it would probably entertain her to see him dive for cover whenever the doorbell went off, but now that they were married it just seemed wrong to take immense satisfaction out of seeing someone screwing with his head.
Unless that someone was her of course.
Just because they were married didn’t mean that she was going to give up something that brought her such joy. She might take it down a notch or two, but she really just couldn’t imagine going through life without screwing with her husband in that way that always seemed to bring a smile to her face. It just seemed wrong somehow to give up that side of their relationship that had kept them together all these years, but she wouldn’t be able to screw with his head if he didn’t survive the initiation.
With that in mind, she climbed out of the tub, after enjoying five more minutes simply because it felt wrong to let all this decadent hot water go to waste, and reluctantly climbed out of the tub. She wrapped a large pink towel around herself and headed for the bathroom door, trying to decide which brother would cave the quickest and tell her where they were keeping Connor as she pulled her hair free from the loose bun she’d made so that she could soak in the tub without getting her hair wet. She stepped into the hallway and headed for the bedroom, deciding that Bryce was her best bet when she saw him.
Lying passed out in the middle of their bed.
Covered in varying stages of drying mud, leaves, clumps of grass, and twigs was her husband, lying passed out on his back. His clothes, the same clothes that he’d been wearing a week ago when he was released from the emergency room thanks to the beating her brothers had dished out to him, were torn, stained and definitely ruined. His short hair was in the same condition as his clothes, messy, full of bits of leaves, and small clumps of mud, but that did nothing to take away from just how truly handsome he was, even with his face covered in dirt, scrapes and about a week’s worth of whiskers, her husband was still an incredibly handsome man, she thought with a smile as she walked over to the bed, dropping her towel as she went.
She climbed on the bed and threw her leg over his lap in one smooth move so that she could straddle his lap while she got a closer look at the damage. Considering that he’d just spent the past week trapped somewhere with her brothers and cousins, she had to admit that he didn’t look so bad. She’d seen men come back worse from an “initiation,” a hell of a lot worse, so maybe they’d lucked out and weren’t going to have to spend a fortune on therapy to fix whatever her relatives had done to him.
At least she hoped they didn’t, she thought with a long drawn out sigh as she leaned over and gently ran her fingers through his messy hair and felt her lips pull up into a wobbly smile as she leaned down, unable to help herself, and softly brushed her lips against his.
“Missed me bad, huh?” he asked, smiling against her lips as his arms came around her and held her close so that he could kiss her back.
“Maybe,” she mumbled, theatrically squishing up her face with disgust when she caught his scent.
It wasn’t bad, but it also wasn’t something that she would want to wake up to every morning. He smelled like mud, pond water, fresh cut grass and for some odd reason…Christmas trees?
He chuckled with that bad boy smile that she loved as he released his hold on her. “I guess I should probably go take a shower, huh?”
“Probably,” she murmured teasingly, brushing her lips against his one last time before she climbed off his lap, but he didn’t let her go far.
“Join me,” he said, taking her hand in his as he ran an appreciative eye over her.
Having absolutely no willpower when it came to him and that wicked smile of his, she gave his hand a squeeze and let him lead her out of their bedroom.
“Do you want to tell me where you’ve been?” she asked offhandedly, doing her best to hide her curiosity, remembering all too well how much he enjoyed screwing with her head whenever the opportunity presented itself.
He turned around and walked backwards, cocking his head to the side, studying her with a curious tilt of his brow. “You really don’t know?”
“Do you think if I did I would have left you at the tender mercy of my brothers and cousins?” she shot back, kind of hurt that he thought so little of her.
Okay, granted there had been a time when she might have sat back with a big cup of hot cocoa and savored the moment, but things were different now. A year ago she would have treated her brothers to dinner and a round at McKay’s Bar, but not now. Now she was already planning her revenge, because Connor was hers.
It was as simple as that.
He shook his head, his smile never wavering as he said, “No, I know you wouldn’t.”
“Good,” she said, immensely pleased that he believed her. “Now tell me where they took you,” she demanded, too curious to pretend otherwise now, especially since the men were usually hogtied and left on the front step where they usually stayed until someone stumbled across them sometime the next morning after their release.
“Hmm, I’m not sure that I can tell you that,” he said, that devastatingly sexy smile of his turning mischievous as he led her across the small hallway and back into the bathroom of her dreams.
“And why’s that?” she asked, returning his smile as she released his hand, walked over to the large stone shower stall, slid the glass door open and stepped inside.
“I’ve been sworn to secrecy,” he said, shooting her a wink as he grabbed his toothbrush.
She blinked at him. “You’re kidding me, right?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know?” he asked, chuckling as he turned around and focused on brushing his teeth while she stood there, hating to admit that yes, yes she really would like to know.
Chapter 2
“Are you planning on pouting all night?” he asked, chuckling even as he somehow resisted the urge to grab her and make a strategic retreat while they still had the chance, but after a week of being away from her, he just couldn’t force himself to do the right thing, not when she was standing naked in the shower, wet and waiting for him.
God, she was so fucking beautiful, he thought in a daze as he rinsed his mouth out, tossed his toothbrush aside and headed towards her, pausing only long enough to toe off his boots and tear off the clothes that he was going to have to incinerate. But, that was a problem for later, because right now he had the most beautiful woman in the world waiting for him.
“Are you planning on telling me what happened?” she asked, absently adjusting the temperature of the water as she waited for him to join her.
“Depends,” he murmured absently as he shoved his boxers off, finally stepped inside the large shower stall and wrapped his arms around his wife, closed his eyes and simply savored the feel of her in his arms.
“Depends on what?” she asked, smoothly turning in his arms even as she maneuvered him beneath the spray of hot water and man, did that feel good after spending a week stuck out in the woods.
“Many things,” he whispered as he leaned down and pressed a kiss to her neck as he let his hands glide over her body, reacquainting himself with her body as she reached over and grabbed a bottle of shampoo.
When she moved to step back in his arms, he allowed it and simply stood there, savoring her touch as she began washing his hair, running her fingers through his hair as he simply stood there, watching her. When she was done, he simply closed his eyes and dropped his head back, allowing the hot water to rinse his hair clean while she shifted her attention to the rest of his body as he told himself that they would put an end to this in a few minutes and go before it was too late.
He licked his lips hungrily as she ran her soapy hands over his shoulders, down his arms, over his chest, his back and down to his ass where she gave him an apprec
iative squeeze and used her hold to bring him closer. The move caused his erection to brush up against her flat stomach and had him instantly forgetting that they needed to leave and soon. All thoughts of self-preservation went flying out the door when she released a hungry little moan.
“Oh, fuck,” he groaned, leaning down and taking her mouth in a hungry kiss that had all thoughts of leaving the state for an extended period of time evaporating as he pulled her tightly into his arms.
“I missed you,” she admitted on a needy little moan that had his heart racing and reigniting the fire inside him that had him fucking over every single one of her brothers and cousins so that he could return to her.
He’d never been so fucking desperate in his life than he’d been over this past week to get to her. He’d missed her so damn much that sometimes it had been difficult taking his next breath without feeling that sense of panic that came along with not knowing that the person that you loved most in this world was okay. A whole week without seeing her, talking to her or knowing that she was safe had taken its toll on him.