Brothers of Miller Ranch Box Set

by Natalie Dean

  Ugh. He knew that voice. How could he not know Ben, his older brother? The head of the new generation. The inheritor. He always took everything so seriously. He was such a buzzkill; it drove Bryant crazy. And even worse, he was predictable, which made him boring. He knew exactly what his eldest brother was going to say before the man’s hand rested on his shoulder in that patronizing way of his.

  “I haffa feelin’ this isn’t something I can say no to, huh?”

  “Aw, come on now Bryant, are you drunk?”

  “Aw, get off it, Ben. I’m just buzzed, and you’re ruining it, in case ya were worried ’bout that.”

  “Come on, let’s take a walk, shall we?”

  Bryant hated how his older brother would just boss him around, and yet he found himself following. He didn’t remember always resenting his brother. Once, he’d looked up to him. But somewhere around freshman year of high school that began to change. When Bryant could never measure up and all of the things that he liked just weren’t what Millers were supposed to do.

  “Whadda’ya want?” Bryant asked once they were in a far corner away from everything else.

  Some small part of him, some stupid, logic-less part, hoped that his older brother would open his arms and say he was sorry. But of course, that wasn’t what happened. Instead, Ben looked down at him with that holier-than-thou expression. Bryant felt his temper buck up.

  “Look, I understand that it might have been fun and exciting to tomcat around, but you’re nearly twenty-nine now. Don’t you think it’s time to come home and make things right? You know how much it hurts Ma and Pa to see you ruining yourself day in and day out.”

  Ugh. There it was again. The condescension. The certainty that they were right. It burned into Bryant like rejection, and he felt poison slide down his tongue and coat his words as they left his mouth.

  “Come back home? Why would I do that when I’m twice as successful as all of you good little boys who stayed tied to Ma’s apron strings combined? You settled, Ben. That doesn’t mean I have to, and it doesn’t mean you have the right to judge me.”

  “Bryant, I’m not judging—”

  He held up a finger, growing too close to his brother’s face as he spoke. “Now, now, big brother, it’s not very Christian to lie.”

  That seemed to strike something in him, and he looked from Bryant to the reception behind him. Sighing, his shoulders slumped, and he stepped to the side. “You know, one day I hope you get your head on straight. But in the meantime, not everyone is trying to attack you.”

  “Easy to say when you’re the one who everyone loves.”

  If Ben had anything to say to that, Bryant didn’t hear it, already stumbling to the bathroom. Suddenly he was dizzy. So dizzy, and he couldn’t recall where he saw the lavatory.

  He tried to look for direction signs or a path, but everything was starting to get blurry and confusing. Well, it certainly looked like his light buzz was going a little further than he intended and he was careening straight towards drunk.

  And not even happy drunk, which would have been fun. But that sour, pissy sort of drunk that made him feel… Empty.

  Somehow, Bryant ended up outside, but that was okay with him because the air was cool on his face. Tilting his head upward, he looked at the twilight sky, watching as tones of royal blue and lilac bled into the warm, buttery orange and syrupy scarlet of the sunset.

  If there was one thing he did miss about home, it was the sky. So open and beautiful and fresh, it was a reminder of how small he was in the grand scheme of everything. Of how he was just a tiny piece of a puzzle trying to scheme to make himself grander and larger than he needed to be. And somehow, that was comforting, even though it probably shouldn’t have been.

  The night sky was beautiful, and simple, in a perfect sort of way. Feeling at peace, Bryant stood there and watched until the sun fully sank into the sky, leaving stars to slowly pop into his vision, dotting the thick, obsidian blanket above him.

  He spent quite a while standing there, but at least he could probably excuse himself and go to his hotel. Except he couldn’t really remember what hotel he was even at. Or how he had even gotten to… where was he again?

  Oh right. His brother’s wedding.

  Somehow, he was the only single Miller boy.

  They were all a bunch of suckers.

  Suckers? No, his mouth was too dry for candy. He needed a drink.

  Turning, Bryant furrowed his brows and tried to guess where he came from. He remembered walking, then he was suddenly outside. But that certainly didn’t make sense. He was so confused that he ended up just sort of roaming around until he heard a strange noise from somewhere.

  No, not strange noise. Pretty noise. He liked it. He liked pretty things.

  Smiling, he stumbled after it, realizing it was someone humming an unfamiliar tune. He wasn’t sure what he was expecting, maybe a fairy, or a siren, or a high-quality Bluetooth speaker somewhere, but it ended up just being a woman.

  That woman.

  Bryant stopped dead in his tracks, staring as she loaded wedding presents into a car he didn’t recognize. Judging by the two very full trucks in front of her that belonged to his family, those were probably overflow gifts that wouldn’t fit into his parent’s and brother’s vehicles. No doubt they would swing by her place and pick them up the next day.

  So that meant that she wasn’t just a townsfolk. She was close with his family. They trusted her. Of course, she couldn’t only be a friend of Benji’s new wife. She had to have ties to everything else too.

  That was the issue with a small town. Everything was so incestuously connected. Bryant felt like it was suffocating him.

  And yet, he spoke. “Hey.”

  She jumped, making a startled sound that was far more adorable than it had any right to be. Bryant had enough sense in him to raise both of his hands, although the movement made him lose his balance and totter backward.

  She was so pretty in the dim lights of the parking lot. He had noticed she was hot before, but this was different. She was softer, sweeter, full of hope and sweet things and all sorts of stuff that weren’t in his world.

  No wonder she looked down on him. She was like uh… uh… well, he couldn’t think of it, but it was some sort of important… thing.

  “Don’t you know you shouldn’t sneak up behind anyone like that! Let alone a woman in the middle of the night?”

  “Shouldn’t you know not to be out in the wilderness all alone?”

  Or at least that was what he thought he said. Judging by the incredibly confused stare she gave him, he guessed that it didn’t come out quite right. But what did that matter? He was handsome and rich; he didn’t have to talk good.

  Except the woman didn’t care about that, did she? No, she’d made that abundantly clear. Ugh. He felt himself tipping back towards the downward side of things, coupled with his annoyance that she was ruining his mood without even trying.

  “Is being here so painful for you that you have to be inebriated to tolerate it? Or is it just the fact that you’re all alone and money makes for a frigid companion?”

  Bryant’s mind pulled up short at that. Of all the times his family had ever gotten mad at him for getting tipsy, they’d always accused him of needing attention, wanting to make trouble, or having an addiction.

  But not her. She wanted to know if he was in pain. He was, right? He didn’t know. It was so hard to think. Sometimes the stares and disapproval of his family cut him so deeply that he felt as if his soul had welded itself around the wound, refusing for that dagger to ever be removed.

  Did she know how they had always disapproved of him? How even when he was young, he could never measure up? How they had compared him and compared him, trying to push him into a mold he didn’t fit into, then freezing him out when he refused to comply.

  No. She couldn’t. She was just a girl.

  A woman.

  He shook his head. “M’sorry,” he managed to get out. “I’ll leave you
alone.”

  She didn’t want to be near him anyway. He was some degenerate in all these people’s eyes. They didn’t appreciate his understanding of marketing or social media. His desire to build and create and explore everything life had to offer. They just judged and judged with cold, dead eyes.

  When did it get so cold, anyway? And why was it dark?

  He took a few steps in a direction that was away from Keiko—although all bets were off if it was the way he was actually supposed to go—but then dizziness swamped him. Usually he could just deep-breathe through such incidents, but before he knew what was happening, he was swaying, and the world was turning sideways.

  He didn’t hit the ground, however. Instead, small and delicate hands managed to catch him, slowing his momentum enough for him to recover his balance.

  Huh. It seemed the woman had caught him. She was so little and waifish. How had she managed to do that?

  He opened his mouth to ask her if she was superman, but the words refused to leave his throat. He blinked down at her blearily, sleepiness seeming to coat every cell of his body. As he drifted towards that blissful respite, all he could see were the woman’s honeyed brown eyes, the light dusting of freckles across her pale cheeks, and the deep curve in the cupid’s bow of her full lips.

  She was just so… beautiful.

  In less than a breath, he decided that he was definitely going to seduce her. Show her that the stupid, small little world was nothing but a whole bunch of people keeping each other hostage with faux morals.

  After all, in the end, he always got what he wanted. He was talented that way.

  4

  Keiko

  For possibly the fifth time in twenty minutes, Keiko carefully walked through the bizarre series of events that had led to her having none other than Bryant Miller—the youngest of the Miller brood—unconscious in her back seat as she drove home.

  It certainly wasn’t something she had intended. When she had looked out in the reception hall as things were winding down and found him missing, she had been relieved. After so many hours of his gaze boring into her, she’d finally had a shred of privacy.

  That, of course, had evaporated when he’d startled her so badly that she’d nearly whipped out the pocketknife in her bra and brandished it at him.

  She never used to go around with a weapon, but after everything that had happened with Sophia, she didn’t feel comfortable unless she had some way to protect herself. Knives were pretty dangerous, however, and she usually preferred a taser or mace, but neither of those fit into her bridesmaid’s dress very well, so blade it was.

  A lot of emotions had hit her all at once when she realized who it was and the fact that he was stone-cold drunk. First was fear—was he going to attack her? She had heard such terrible things about how intoxicated people would do things that they wouldn’t normally do—mostly from Missy—and almost everyone who knew Bryant didn’t speak very highly of him.

  But that quickly faded as she took in his body posture and his expression. He wasn’t on the attack. If anything, he looked uncertain but eager to please.

  Of course, that just made her irritated. Who showed up to their brother’s wedding and got so blasted that they were wandering outside completely lost? It was selfish. And mean.

  So, she’d snapped at him, meaning to embarrass him by showing him how she saw right through him. But the look on his face surprised her, as did his reaction. She expected him to be angry, or his chest to puff out as he got defensive. Instead, he looked surprised. And then… relieved? Almost like he was startled but glad that someone understood him.

  That was about the last thing she expected, so when he started to fall, she found herself catching him and helping him back to his feet.

  He had been surprisingly muscled under that expensive suit of his. Not that he looked frail, but his build was more like Bradley than his other three brothers. She didn’t let herself get distracted, however, and started to move him inside.

  Only for him to pass out.

  As she drove along, she knew she should have taken him home to the Millers—she couldn’t find any indication of what hotel he was at on him—but she also knew that he wouldn’t like that. That there was some sort of element of pain between him and his family. And, despite his caddishness, she didn’t want to subject him to that.

  Silly, most definitely, but there was something familiar about whatever it was she felt from him. A sort of ache and un-belonging. Maybe she was projecting, but the haunted look in his eyes was one she had seen in the mirror many times in her slumps.

  So, that was how she ended up pulling into her spot in front of her apartment with the prodigal son of the family that had become such a huge part of her life.

  Funny how things worked.

  But what was decidedly not funny was how difficult it was to get him out of the car. He was so heavy. Even with her strength from yoga, volunteer work, and martial arts, she struggled just to get him to her door, and she only made it because he was just conscious enough to slide his feet for her.

  Goodness, what she wouldn’t give to be like Missy at the moment. A tall Amazon with biceps on biceps and thighs that could probably crush a watermelon. But she dismissed that thought quickly. She knew one of her biggest triggers was comparing her body to other women.

  …but still, it would be really convenient to have stronger muscles.

  Too bad that she had completely forgotten about the stairs.

  “You have got to be kidding me,” she gasped, feeling sweat build along her neck and trickle down into her pretty dress. She was definitely going to need to get it dry cleaned.

  Keiko was aware that most people would give up, or maybe knock on their neighbor’s door to ask for help. But she had a stubborn streak just as wide as Dani’s, so she took the flight of stairs as a personal challenge. She’d gone through so many incredible challenges; she wasn’t going to let a bunch of steps beat her.

  So, slight or not, she kicked off her little wedges, threw the shoes up the stairs, then went about climbing them.

  It was a struggle, that was for sure, but she did manage to get the two of them stumbling into her apartment, before hauling him over to her small couch.

  She had only recently moved out from her parents’ home and into Missy’s old place. And Keiko had chosen it mostly because of her friend’s constant talk about how great the tub was—she was right. As a result, she didn’t have much in the way of furniture, but it wasn’t like beggars could be choosers. If Bryant wanted a good night’s rest on his no-doubt ridiculously expensive and designer couch back at his own penthouse in the city, then he shouldn’t have gotten blasted.

  Heaving a sigh, she allowed herself exactly one moment to enjoy her victory before moving on. She definitely needed some water, which meant Bryant probably did too.

  She busied herself with getting them both drinks, along with her small wastebasket from her bathroom in case he got sick. Crossing to him, she saw the man was sitting upright, head tipped back and breathing so deeply that he had to be asleep.

  Well, she could rouse him in a few minutes.

  Setting the glass down, she went about gathering anything else he might need. A cool washcloth, some dry paper towels, a pillow, and some blankets. Something to soothe his stomach. And a few slices of toast? She’d heard that could help and, although she wasn’t sure on it, she figured it couldn’t hurt.

  She sat across from him in a folding chair that she had “borrowed” from the church, and of course he roused at the smell of the warm bread. Eyes bloodshot, he looked around.

  “I don’t remember this room,” was what she was pretty sure he was saying, although it was somewhat difficult to tell.

  “That’s because you’re in my apartment.” She figured she might as well be upfront with him. She didn’t want him to think that he was kidnapped or something bizarre like that. Especially since he was so rich that that actually was a real threat for him.

  “Oh, yer apartment
? Couldn’t even wait ta buy me dinner ’for takin’ me home?”

  Funny. When he was sober he had absolutely no accent, like he had trained it out of himself. But as a drunkard, his accent was about as thick as Pa Miller, who spoke so rarely.

  “Don’t flatter yourself. This is a kindness because I thought you would not appreciate being carted off to your family’s place in your current state.”

  He grimaced. “Ew, no, I don’t wanna.”

  “Like I said, I surmised as much.”

  “Surmised?” He chuckled and reached for the water she had left him with a shaky hand. “You’re smart, aren’t ya?”

  “Are you surprised by that?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  Keiko raised her eyebrow, surprised at the frankness. “Why? Because I’m a woman?”

  He snorted and gave her a look like that was the most ridiculous thing he had ever heard. “What? No. Lotsa women are smart. Most women, maybe, I think. But no, it’s ’cause you’re from here, and ya run around with my family.”

  “Ah, and only dumb hicks live in Blackfish County?”

  “Ya gotta admit, it is the majority.”

  Keiko wanted to disagree with him. She knew plenty of good people, but she remembered that she also knew plenty of terrible, selfish, and judgmental people, and trying to argue the thin line with a drunk person was only going to leave her frustrated.

  “Whatever you say. Another glass of water?”

  “Yeah, I’d like that. Thanks.”

  She reached for the glass and their hands touched. It was a pretty common occurrence, and not one she felt the need to attribute something to like most romance films, so she just continued as normal.

  But that just seemed to boggle Bryant’s very drunk mind. “We touched.”

  “Yes, it happens,” she said, standing up to cross to her small kitchen. The apartment wasn’t much, but it was hers, and having her own place filled her with a sense of both control and pride. Like she was one step closer to being the healthy, functional Keiko she knew that she could be. “I didn’t feel like it was something worth noting.”