by Scott, J. S.
For some unknown reason, my mind screamed in protest at the thought of Mason taking the dark-haired seductress to his bed.
“She’s gorgeous,” Mason admitted, seemingly reluctant to say that he found a woman attractive. “She looks like a damn angel.”
“The brunette?” I asked, startled. The woman looked more like the devil’s creation to tempt a man until he went insane.
But I sure as hell wouldn’t call her an angel.
She was sensual.
She was seductive.
And she looked at me like she could see straight through me—which she definitely didn’t. If she could, she’d be running.
Her dark hair had a touch of cinnamon that made me want to plunge my hands into the mass of curls and find out if they really felt as silky as they looked.
My attraction to her had been immediate, and it wasn’t all just physical. There was something about her that was…different.
“Not the brunette,” Mason answered in a strange baritone I’d never heard before. “The blonde.”
Damned if I didn’t heave a sigh of relief when my brother acknowledged that he liked the pretty blonde next to my temptress. “Should we introduce ourselves?” I asked.
My brother tore his eyes away from the female he was apparently attracted to and looked back at me. “I’m not into stalking women, Carter.”
“It’s not stalking,” I scoffed. “It’s called being social.”
“Then I guess I’m not social,” he rumbled as he downed half his drink. “I’m heading for the office.”
I glanced at my expensive watch. “Now? It’s after ten.”
“I have clothes there, and I have work I need to do,” Mason answered.
“No, you really don’t,” I disagreed. “Mason, we hired a CEO so we could all slow down.”
After our younger brother, Jett, had gotten engaged, we’d all agreed to stop working twenty-four-seven most of the time. The idea was to get together with our two sisters in Colorado more often, and have a life.
Lawson had made me and my two brothers billionaires many times over, but not without sacrificing everything else in our lives, including family. My sisters were married and settled. Jett was engaged, and he wanted to free himself up to spend more time with his fiancée, Ruby. My younger brother also wanted his family back. Even though Mason, Jett, and I ran the same business, we very rarely spent any time doing family things. It was all business, and we ran different areas of Lawson, which meant we rarely saw each other, even though we worked at the same address.
Jett was the visionary and the cyber-security expert.
I was the marketing behind the company.
And Mason was pretty much everything else that had to do with growing our tech giant. He’d made us global, and he was still working to conquer the countries where Lawson wasn’t a household name.
“I’m going to Jett and Ruby’s engagement party,” Mason said, like he was accomplishing a major feat. “Although I still don’t get why they’re having it now. They’ve been engaged for months.”
“Ruby is still pretty young,” I drawled. “But Jett wants to celebrate. And he doesn’t want to marry her too quickly because of her past. He wants to give her time to find herself.”
If you asked me, my younger brother was having one hell of a time not tying the knot. But I had to respect the fact that he didn’t want to push his twenty-three-year-old fiancée because she came from a life of abuse and homelessness.
Not that Ruby didn’t know her own mind. I’d discovered that when I’d tried to break the two of them up. I’d thought she was just using my wealthy but scarred little brother.
But for once in my life, I was actually wrong.
I’d gotten a wake-up call from Ruby that I’d never forgotten, and probably never would. Despite the fact that Jett limped when he overexerted, and he lived with the scars of a near-fatal helicopter crash a few years ago, Ruby loved him with all her heart.
And I believed that now without a doubt.
What had seemed illogical and unlikely actually made sense now.
My younger brother and his even younger fiancée belonged together.
“She loves him,” Mason grunted, sounding satisfied. “Ruby is good for Jett.”
“Agreed.”
“But I still don’t get why they need a party,” he said, and then tossed back the rest of his drink. “It’s a waste of time. The engagement is already done.”
I smirked. I was pretty sure Mason never saw a reason to celebrate. “You don’t have to understand,” I informed him. “But you need to show up. Danica and Harper are coming into town with their husbands for it, and you won’t be forgiven for missing the event.”
“I’m going,” he said, looking slightly pained. “I won’t miss the chance to see the whole family together.”
I believed him. Once Mason gave his word, he never broke it. “Go home,” I advised him, noticing that he looked weary. “Leave some of the business to our CEO and the executives. We don’t need to keep working every moment of the day that we aren’t sleeping anymore.”
Mason shrugged his broad shoulders. “What else is there to do?”
I polished off my drink and sat it on the bar, and then folded my arms in front of me.
My elder brother had always been the serious one. But he hadn’t always been this detached. No doubt that spending every waking hour at Lawson had made him this way. But it was beyond time for him to slow things down.
He looked completely wiped out, and he needed to find some kind of pleasure in his life other than stressing over a company that could run just fine without all of us if it needed to.
Hell, I wasn’t asking him to give up being part of Lawson. All three of us had nurtured our company into a worldwide juggernaut.
Back then, it had been necessary.
Now, it wasn’t.
Truthfully, I was starting to feel the need for our family to pull together again just like my brother, Jett. Not that I admitted that to him, but I could see how far we’d all drifted apart.
We’d all grown up in Rocky Springs, Colorado. But when our parents had died in a car accident, we’d all handled their deaths differently.
We’d all done our grieving in very different ways.
Now, it was fucking time for us to be a family again.
I knew damn well that we all missed each other, even though we’d never drawn together to get through the tragedy of our parents’ deaths. Maybe we’d needed our space to lick our wounds separately. But dammit, we were family, and it was time for us to act like one.
Yeah, we were there for each other when we needed to be. But what the hell had happened to us all being there for the good stuff, too?
“There’s plenty of other things in life except work,” I advised. Not that I really knew that many of those particular activities myself, but I wanted to make a life outside of work, too.
“What exactly?” Mason asked, one brow up in question.
“Love?” I asked. “Maybe what our sisters and Jett have now? Maybe caring about something except our damn company.”
Maybe I shouldn’t talk. I’d been a workaholic right along with my two brothers. But something had happened to me a few years ago, and it wasn’t good. When Jett had gotten into his accident, and we were waiting to see if he was going to live or die, I’d realized how little I’d paid attention to the world around me.
Unfortunately, I’d turned into an unhappy dick, looking for my pleasure in alcohol, women, and shit that got me into nothing but trouble.
I’d hated myself for not protecting my little brother better, so I’d gone into overdrive protective mode to keep him safe once we realized he was going to live, but that he’d be scarred and damaged for life. I’d tried to draw a wedge between him and Ruby because I didn’t want to see Jett get used
by a woman who could drain him dry and leave him even more broken.
Problem was, Ruby had changed Jett’s life in the best of ways. I’d just been too stupid to tell that the woman loved him unconditionally.
I was doing everything I could now to make up for the mistake I’d made.
Maybe I’d ended up falling a little bit in love with Ruby myself. Not in an intimate way, but in the same way I cared about and admired my own sisters.
“Love is for men like Jett,” Mason said unhappily. “Fuck knows he deserves it.”
“Does that mean we’re too jaded for that?” I asked.
I was a lost cause. I was too far gone and way too cynical for something like Jett had with Ruby. But maybe I could learn not to be quite as big of a dick as I used to be.
“I am,” Mason said gruffly. “The verdict is still out about you.”
I shrugged. “I’m not the type to fall in love. It will never happen. But I’d like to see our family happy and together again.”
“I suppose I would, too,” Mason answered with a hint of regret in his voice.
“We’ll get there eventually,” I told him. “All of us just got too involved in our lives and forgot we were part of a family.”
Mason folded his bulky arms across his chest. “Can we fix it? Hell, I’m thirty-four years old, and you’re just two years behind me. We’ve missed a lot.”
I grinned at him. “We’re not exactly old. And yes, I think if we want to put our family back together again, we can.”
Was there even an age when it was too late to mend a family? I didn’t think so. Maybe a year ago, I would have had as many doubts as Mason. But after a few come-to-Jesus moments with Jett over the last few months and right after his accident, I was pretty sure we could all be a family again.
We just needed to figure out how to do it without our parents.
But I think we’d all had enough time to realize that our parents were never coming back, and all we had was each other.
We’d all been close as kids.
But we’d…lost each other.
Mason slapped me on the shoulder. “I’m out of here.”
“Go home,” I insisted.
“We’ll see,” he answered vaguely.
I was pretty sure that meant he was going to the office.
“I think I’ll stay for a while,” I answered, my eyes drawn to the vivacious brunette again.
There hadn’t been a single moment tonight that I wasn’t aware of her. Not from the instant I’d seen her.
“You’re going to keep stalking?” he asked.
“Observing,” I corrected.
“Keep your eyes off the sexy blonde,” he insisted. “She looks way too sweet for you.”
“She’s all yours,” I informed him.
“I wish. She’s definitely too angelic for me,” he grumbled as he turned and walked away.
I smirked as I watched him make his way to the entrance and then disappear, pretty sure that his interest in the blonde woman would fade as soon as he got to his office and started working.
I had to wonder again if my brother ever got any action. If he didn’t, it was no wonder that he was so damn irritable.
Turning away from Mason’s departing figure, I went to focus on my mission, which was to meet the only woman who had caught my eye in a very long time.
I wanted her in my bed.
And I was used to getting exactly what I desired.
“Fuck!” I cursed, realizing that while my attention had been on my older brother, the woman I’d wanted to meet all damn night was gone.
Brynn
Later that evening, I sighed as I looked out the enormous picture window of my new condo.
I’d just moved in, and I was completely content with my choice. I was only a few blocks from the boutique, and looking out the huge window in my living room, which was so high above the city, was incredibly peaceful.
Silent chaos.
The hustle and bustle below was soundless on the top floors of the condo high-rise. There was something magical about seeing all the lights and commotion of the city, but not hearing it.
The condo had a beautiful western view of the Puget Sound, and the city was spread out for miles beneath me.
Here in my home, I felt safe. I was just an observer when I was this far above the madness of the city.
Laura’s condo wasn’t far away, and I’d enjoyed staying with her until I found my own place, but I was happy to finally find and purchase my own condo that I could call home.
The walls were now filled with pictures, years of experiences I’d had in different countries all over the world.
I smiled as I looked over the images of me and my mother in my younger days of modeling.
One of the pleasures I had from my long, successful modeling career was knowing that my only close family member was safe, and in a beautiful house in my home state of Michigan.
My heart hurt just a little because I hadn’t seen my mother in over a year, but I’d get back to Michigan soon to visit.
I’d tried to convince her to relocate to Seattle with me, but Mom had spent her entire life in Michigan, and she didn’t want to leave.
I understood why she hadn’t wanted to move, but we’d spent so much of my adult life apart that I guess I’d been hoping we’d finally be in the same city.
But Michigan was familiar to her, and she was happy there. Honestly, I was pretty sure she’d hate living in a big city after a lifetime of being in a more rural area.
Unfortunately, even knowing she was content, I still felt the pain of missing her sometimes. But at least I had those memories of traveling with her early in my career.
I’d been discovered for modeling at the age of sixteen, and she’d sacrificed everything to make sure I could get to my jobs while I’d been underage, no matter where those assignments were located.
Those later teenage years had probably been some of the happiest times of my life.
We’d gone from location to location, and seen things we never thought we’d be able to see when I went to shoots.
Unfortunately, soon after I turned eighteen, she’d been diagnosed with breast cancer, and she couldn’t travel with me anymore.
Mom had gotten the best of care, and she’d had my aunt, her sister, to help her. But as her daughter, I’d wanted to be there, too. But my mother had done nothing but encourage me when my career took off. Yes, she’d let me pay to take care of her because she didn’t have any other options. However, she’d insisted that my life not stop because she had cancer, and a model’s life didn’t allow me to spend a lot of my time in a small town in Michigan.
After a very long, six-year battle, Mom had finally won her battle with cancer, and she was still clean from the soul-eating disease that had ravaged her life.
So when I’d finally decided to slow down and put down some roots, I’d wanted nothing more than for her to join me here in Seattle because I still had a career to chase. The money still needed to come in so I could take care of my mom. But being the stubborn woman she was, my mother had insisted she was fine where she was, and that she wanted me to go to Seattle to keep reaching for something more with my career. She was happy with having her sister live with her. My Aunt Marlene had lost my uncle to a heart attack five years ago, and not only did the two of them live together, but they were thicker than thieves.
I grabbed my phone and plopped down on the sofa, and then dialed my mom’s number. Seattle was three hours behind Michigan time, but my parent tended to be a night owl.
“Hi honey.” My mother picked up the phone after the first ring. “Everything okay?”
“I’m good,” I acknowledged. “I was just missing you.”
“I miss you, too, Brynn,” she said softly. “But I’m so proud of you.”
I smil
ed. Mom had always been my biggest fan. “You sound wide awake,” I observed.
“I just got home. I went out for coffee and pie with Mick.”
“You’re still seeing him?” I asked, concerned.
Mick had been in my mother’s life for over a year. She said they were friends, but I had to wonder if there was something more there for both of them.
Even though I wanted her to be happy, I was skeptical of any male who was hanging out with my mom. Not that she wasn’t still beautiful, and she was a bright light that a man would notice.
But her past history made any man suspect in my eyes.
“Mom, are you sure this isn’t something more than a friendship?” I didn’t want anybody to hurt her.
I’d learned to hide my own insecurities deep inside me, but my mother had never changed. She was still an open book, and wore her emotions on her sleeve all the time.
“And if it is?” she asked cautiously.
I sighed. “Then I’d be worried.”
“Brynn, Mick has his own money. That’s not what he’s looking for.”
“It’s not that,” I confessed. “I just don’t want to see you disappointed.”
“Oh, honey,” she crooned. “Please don’t let what happened—”
“I’m not,” I said hurriedly, well aware that I was lying.
“Are you seeing anyone?” she said skeptically.
“No, Mom. I’m too involved in my career. I travel. I’m busy.”
“You’re not traveling as much, and you’re settling down,” she reminded me. “I’d really love to see a grandchild before I get too old to play with him or her.”
“Don’t hold your breath,” I said lightly. “There’s nobody.”
Really, there never had been. I dated, but when things got too serious, I sprinted from the relationship.
I liked sex as much as any woman did, but the entanglements of having a relationship were way too stifling.
“Not all men suck, Brynn,” she nudged me.
In my experience, they did. But I answered, “I know, Mom.”
I hadn’t let a man get close to me for well over a decade, and I didn’t see it happening anytime soon. Honestly, I didn’t think I’d ever see it.