It was Nico speaking up that surprised me.
“Good for you,” he said. “And shame on your brothers for trying to diminish your accomplishments.”
I blinked.
Hearing that from a man that I looked up to for quite some time now made me feel things I wasn’t sure that I wanted to feel.
“You’re smart, Darby,” Georgia said. “Don’t let them make you feel bad for choosing yourself.”
My sister’s words made my ire not quite so overpowering.
“And Ace will come around,” she continued. “He’s just used to having to take care of you, and now you’re all grown up on him and he doesn’t know what to do.”
I didn’t know if that was the case or not, but her words did make sense.
“You were a little troublemaker in your youth,” Nico said. “But you haven’t done anything bad in years.” He turned to my sister. “I don’t think he needs to give it time. I think he needs to do whatever the fuck he wants, and your brothers need to get over it.”
I sure did like Nico.
And obviously Waylynn did, too, because she was beaming at my brother-in-law as if his words were gospel.
“He’s agreed to move in with me,” Waylynn announced. “And help me with repairs to my house. I have a spider problem, too, he’s promised to eradicate for me.”
Georgia began to chuckle.
“Funny, that’s what Nico does for me, too,” she teased. “Waylynn, what do you do for a living?”
There was a long pause before she said, “I graduated with my degree in architectural engineering with Darby. I’m still looking for a job, though. For now, I’m helping Gibson get the Apache up and running again.”
“The Apache?” Georgia asked. “What’s that?”
“Come on, Georgia,” Nico chuckled. “You don’t remember the adult drive-in theater?”
Georgia frowned, eyebrows lowered as she thought.
Then understanding hit her.
“The one that shows porn!” she crowed. “You’re working there?”
Waylynn didn’t look embarrassed in the least as she explained what she was doing and how she was helping Gibson.
By the time she was done, Georgia was convinced that she needed to go check the place out.
“We’re not going to that,” Nico said. “No way.”
“But why not?” Georgia asked. “There’s nothing wrong with going to an adult store. Why would there be anything wrong with going to a drive-in that showed porn?”
Nico didn’t have anything to say to that, and I honestly didn’t want to think about porn and my sister in the same thought.
So I changed the subject.
“Nico, do you care if I stable a couple of horses at your place?” I asked. “I need to get a rescue out of the barn at the farmstead, but it needs more attention than I can give it right now, so I was hoping you’d work your magic on her.”
Nico’s eyes went hot.
“I heard about the one you rescued last week,” he said. “And for sure, anything you need. We’ve got plenty of room.”
I was already nodding.
“I’ll be out there to clean out her stall after I get my work done at the homestead. Also, she bites. I should’ve told you that earlier. So when you go to give her a treat, beware. Because she straight up almost took my finger off the first time I fed her out of my hand,” I explained.
Nico and Georgia both chuckled.
“That’s not surprising,” Georgia teased. “You make many females want to bite you.”
I snorted at my sister’s attempt at humor.
“Amen,” Waylynn agreed under her breath.
I reached over and pinched her.
“I heard that,” I whispered quietly.
She turned her gaze to me and shrugged. “I wasn’t trying to hide it.”
Lips twitching at her indifference, I changed the subject once again to Georgia’s work.
An hour later, we’d consumed half of our body weight in carbs, and were on the way outside when my brother—Ace—pulled up outside the feed store.
“Do you think they noticed you over here?” Waylynn asked curiously.
“Maybe not him, but definitely her,” Nico hooked his thumb in Georgia’s direction. “She had to have that flashy thing. It sticks out like a sore thumb.”
‘That flashy thing’ was actually a bright, blood red truck. It was lifted with thirty-five-inch tires and had color-matched wheels.
Nico was right, though. There definitely was no hiding that truck from anyone.
So no, it wasn’t a surprise when Ace turned his gaze to where we were standing out front.
“And that’s our cue to go,” I said as I held out my hand for Nico to shake.
He gave me a quick handshake, and I turned to my sister.
Grabbing her up in my arms, I squeezed her tight.
“Love you, George,” I teased.
She pulled back and placed her hand on my cheek.
“I like her,” she said, glancing at Nico and Waylynn. “You did good.”
I opened my mouth to tell her that we weren’t anything yet, yet being the operative word, but was interrupted by my brother arriving.
Looking pissed.
“Where the fuck have you been?” Ace barked.
Georgia grinned at Ace.
“Why, if it isn’t Mr. Ace. The man who can never make a breakfast date with his sister now that he’s married,” Georgia teased.
Waylynn poked me in the side. When I looked at her, she was gesturing to an alleyway.
I looked back at my truck that was parked in front of the restaurant, but decided ‘fuck it.’
Following her and slipping away unnoticed by everyone but Nico, Waylynn made her way down an alley.
“Do you know where you’re going?” I questioned.
She shrugged, leading me deeper and deeper into the shadows.
I could make out light on the other end, but I couldn’t place where we were.
“I’ve seen this before,” I admitted. “But I can’t remember why.”
Then we came out the other end, and I remembered exactly why it was familiar.
This was where Gibson and I used to spend a lot of time. Not in the alleyway, but at the park that was just beyond the alleyway.
“I remember this place,” I finally said. “Gibson and I used to buy alcohol from that store right there and drink it on the swings.”
Waylynn snorted. “The gas station would sell you beer?”
I nodded once. “Yep. Gibson knew the owner. He was a good guy. Died about five years ago, though.”
Waylynn looked flabbergasted that anyone would sell us beer underage.
“I just… every single time I tried to get beer when I was a kid, they’d tell me no. I was never able to sneak in anywhere, either,” she continued. “I tried to get a fake ID once, and the bouncer saw straight through it because I blushed like a damn cherry. It was so embarrassing. He kept my ID and told me to go home.”
I snorted.
“You gotta appear confident when you use those, otherwise they will see right through you,” I teased. “I remember this one time that GQ and I snuck in somewhere. I’d stolen Callum’s ID and used it to get in. Only, what I didn’t know at the time, Callum was already in the bar. So when I showed him the ID—one he’d already seen once that night because I didn’t realize Callum had gone to the DMV to get a new one, I got my ass handed to me by my brother.”
She snickered. “You totally deserved that.”
I had.
For sure.
I really had been an asshole when I was younger.
I’d deserved all the beatings that I’d gotten for sure.
She walked over to the swings then, her face closed off.
“Sometimes I wish that I were born to different parents,” she said softly, kicking her feet. “Then I feel like an asshole because my dad gave
me the best he had to offer. Which was more than some kids ever got.”
I walked to the swing directly next to her and took a seat, kicking my feet out in front of me, back and forth, as I gained speed and height.
When I was where I wanted, I lazily pumped my legs and said, “You know what happened to my parents?”
She looked over at me.
“I do,” she confirmed.
Everybody knew.
It was hardly a secret.
From the night of the accident on, life hadn’t been the same for me.
At first, everybody tried to be understanding when it came to me, the now youngest in the family.
But that understanding had only gone so far.
That understanding had quickly turned to disgust at how I was acting, which then turned to annoyance, and finally to indifference.
“Before my dad killed my mom, two of my brothers, and attempted to kill the rest of us, I would’ve said no way. I don’t want a different life,” I said. “But now? I kind of wish I’d grown up normal. That I’d had the stability that a young kid needs when they’re at such an impressionable age,” I explained. “But I can’t complain about where I ended up. I have a college degree. A job lined up. A roof over my head.”
I looked at her when I said that, causing her to grin.
“Damn right you do, spider killer.” She fist pumped.
I stopped then, staring at her with worry.
“Just how many spiders are we talking about here?” I wondered.
She widened her eyes. “So many.”
***
She wasn’t joking about the amount of spiders.
She did have a lot.
Outside.
I didn’t see many inside.
The one and only one I’d found was a small one the size of a small grain of rice. It was on the ceiling and so harmless that I would’ve never given it a second thought.
Waylynn on the other hand?
She was still wanting it dead.
“You have to kill it,” she said. “Now that I know it’s there, it has to die.”
I took the broom off the floor where it was propped up against a counter, and then twisted it bristle side up, and smashed the spider.
The moment it was dead, I heard her audible sigh of relief.
I looked over at her with amusement on my face.
“What’s with your aversion to spiders anyway?” I asked quizzically.
She moved her lip up into a silent snarl, then went to the floor with a paper towel that looked as if it’d magically appeared into her hand and wiped it off of the broom.
“When I was twelve, I had a spider crawl into my ear,” she said, shaking violently when she admitted that. “When I realized something was in there, it took my dad three days to get home. And all the while I could hear it crawling around in there.”
I shivered right along with her at that thought.
“When my dad finally got back, he took me to the hospital and they pulled a spider out of my ear. A black widow,” she widened her eyes. “It was the most awful experience of my life.”
I could imagine.
“How… why… what the fuck?” I finally settled on.
She was shaking her head.
“I don’t know,” she said. “And it’s like… I could hear it. For three days. So I’m abnormally sensitive now to all spiders, not just black widows. I see one and I freak out. Yesterday, I saw a spider on the bed, and I had to sleep with one eye open.”
I caught her up with an elbow around her neck and touched my nose to hers.
“I’ll take care of any spider you have a problem with,” I promised. “That’s my solemn vow for you.”
Chapter 8
I don’t know who needs to hear this, but I didn’t view your story. I was watching the one before yours and it rolled.
-Darby’s secret thoughts
Darby
“Where do you want me to sleep?” I asked, taking a quick look around.
There didn’t look like there was much here. I saw a couch in the corner of the room, but that was a big no-go for me seeing as there was a spring sticking out the middle of the middle couch cushion which I’m guessing is why I moved to her bed the first night. There were no other beds in the entire area, and to top it off, the one and only thing that I saw there that I might be able to sleep on that wasn’t her bed was the counter. And I wasn’t sure I was desperate enough to sleep on the counter.
Which left me with one of two options. My truck cab or the bed with her.
And I could tell you right now which one I would’ve wanted.
“Uhhh,” she said, taking a quick darting glance around. “How about…” She bit her lip, looking torn. “There’s…” She trailed off as she saw the usual places one would sleep, then quickly dismissed them as unacceptable.
She did this a few times before sighing. “You can sleep with me for one night… I guess.”
I snorted at her words. “You guess? Wow, that’s brutally honest and you certainly don’t sound too thrilled about it.”
“Well, it’s either one night or you sleep in your truck until we can find and get you a bed,” she countered.
She was right.
I wouldn’t grin or laugh.
I would smile, though.
“Perfect,” she said quietly. “You can stay with me one night. Tomorrow you can help me move you a bed into the spare room. Then you can stay as long as you want.”
I wouldn’t be staying much longer than necessary. Honest to God, I didn’t think I could do it past one night with her.
Then there was the fact that I’d be testing my limits on my ‘one’ night. Each fucking second I spent with her, the more I wanted to do questionable things to her.
I wanted to corrupt Waylynn Jennings. I wanted to do bad, bad things to her. I wanted to ruin her until no other man would get close.
But… that would make me bad.
I wasn’t bad anymore… right?
“You okay?”
Waylynn’s soft, melodic voice had me blinking in surprise.
“Yes,” I croaked. “You care if I take a quick shower first?”
Please say no. Please say no. Please say no.
“Actually,” she said. “If you wouldn’t mind, I’d like to take one first. I just… I feel really dirty in places that shouldn’t be dirty.”
She’d been on her knees helping clean up the Apache today. She’d been up and down a ladder. Down and back across the rooftop helping set up lights. Then she’d interviewed three people while GQ and I had repaired the large screen.
Then, when she was done with that, she’d helped us weld the new gates.
She couldn’t actually do the welding, but she’d brought us tools, held shit in place, and ultimately been the perfect gopher.
And every single time she’d walk away, I’d watch her ass sway, only looking back when she turned her eyes back in my direction.
“Sure,” I said. “There were a few things that I wanted to check out on the outside anyway. I could do those while I’m dirty.”
She grinned widely at me and offered me a thumb’s up.
“Okay, sounds perfect!” She clapped.
I swallowed hard and tried not to pay attention to how her breasts swayed when she clapped.
I also tried not to look at her smile, because damned if that wasn’t making me feel things that I shouldn’t be feeling, too.
After parting ways, I went outside to try and escape the sounds she made while showering.
The more sounds she made, the more I was able to picture exactly what she was doing.
Like when she dropped the soap, I could just picture her bending over to retrieve it. Her pussy lips parting, exposing her clit and slick entrance to my gaze.
Her thighs soft and supple, and her asshole winking…
I cursed and kicked a rock, stubbing my toe.
“Fuck me,” I muttered, rounding the side of the house.
The thing that I wanted to look at was actually the window that was over the kitchen sink. From the inside I could see a break in the glass. From the outside I could tell that the break in the glass was actually a gap about a quarter inch wide. Big enough for plenty of cold air to escape through.
I pressed on the glass, then decided that I could likely fix it myself if I just bought a pane of glass from the store in the right size.
The only problem I could see was that the glass was a good replacement for now, but not forever.
All of the windows needed replaced. Not to mention all of the doors.
It looked like the entire place hadn’t been updated in this decade.
Or the last century for that matter.
It was as I was inspecting the glass that I heard the sound of water running.
Thinking it was from a loose pipe that ran outside, I went to inspect the sound, only to be stopped short when I found the reason for the sound.
It was the pipes that fed the lines to the shower. They came straight through the side of the house.
Oh, and also there was a big ass window right next to the bathtub. The bathtub that Waylynn was standing in the middle of, water splashing down on her, naked as the day she was born.
“Fuck,” I breathed, unable to look away.
Then, I watched, mesmerized, as she shaved her legs. Then her armpits. Followed by her bikini line.
I watched even more as she soaped up her hair and rinsed it free of any suds.
Oh, and when she started to masturbate. Definitely watched that, too.
I sat in the shadows and watched, like the disgusting pervert that I was, and thought about being in that shower with her.
Which then turned to me, pulling my own cock out and stroking it while I watched her.
And when she started to come? Yeah, I might or might not have come with her, too.
My cock jerked as splashes of release arced out of me and landed on the overgrown grass.
And when I was done, I looked up and she was staring out into the dark yard.
Right.
At.
Me.
I froze, staring at her and hoping if I stayed still, she wouldn’t see.
Get Bucked (The Valentine Boys Book 4) Page 7