by Dale Cadeau
Braden Security 4
Releasing Raven
Brad is the cool unshakeable member of Braden Security. Being a sniper, he doesn’t allow anything or anyone to unnerve him. That is until he rescues Raven off the floor, where she has fallen wheelchair and all. Brad’s connection to Raven is swift and his instinct to protect and claim come to the forefront immediately. Thrown for a loop, he sets out to make this very cautious woman part of his life.
Raven is a very solitary woman, who is very leery of Brad’s interest. Raven’s brother has always reminded her that her disability only attracts vultures. Brad is determined to make Raven trust him. When Brad is accused of trafficking drugs to kids, that trust is tested. All the men of Braden Security band together to prove Brad’s innocence, clear the firm's name and show Raven that some men can be trusted.
Genre: Contemporary
Length: 62,228 words
RELEASING RAVEN
Braden Security 4
Dale Cadeau
EROTIC ROMANCE
Siren Publishing, Inc.
www.SirenPublishing.com
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A SIREN PUBLISHING BOOK
IMPRINT: Erotic Romance
RELEASING RAVEN
Copyright © 2014 by Dale Cadeau
E-book ISBN: 978-1-63258-740-4
First E-book Publication: December 2014
Cover design by Harris Channing
All art and logo copyright © 2014 by Siren Publishing, Inc.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED: This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part, without express written permission.
All characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.
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www.SirenPublishing.com
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DEDICATION
For my family
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
About the Author
RELEASING RAVEN
Braden Security 4
DALE CADEAU
Copyright © 2014
Chapter One
Raven pulled the curtains of the front window wider so she could see better from her vantage point. She was doing her most favorite thing, people watching. Her hobby had taken a turn for the better three months ago, when the bungalow across the street had been sold. The eye candy that she witnessed the first week after the house sold made her heart beat a little faster every time she got a glimpse of the men coming and going. Not many people would have noticed, they were very discreet and kept funny hours, but she had learned to be patient and spotted them time and again. Seven men and four women had been staying at the house. With that many people, Raven was surprised that there wasn’t a lot of noise and outside activity. If she hadn’t been at the window lost in thought, at her favorite spot that night, she wouldn’t have known that anyone had moved in. The men looked to be all over 6 feet and all were handsome and muscular. The women she had only spotted once and that was when they arrived. Musing to herself, something she liked to do to pass the time and plot out new story lines, she thought maybe they were a ménage family, like the stories she read in her favorite books. That’s the only thing her mind could come up with, seeing so many good-looking men, and the women weren’t too shabby either. Damn, what a shame. If she ever met one of the women, she would have to tell them that she would take any one of the men off their hands anytime. Raven laughed at herself, she knew she could never be that bold, but god she envied their life. Out there living life, surrounded by men that looked like they could protect and keep a person safe. What she wouldn’t do to have a man like the ones across the street. She especially noticed the hunk with long blond hair, he grabbed her attention every time he appeared. He reminded her of a surfer, a little leaner than the other men, but just yummy to her.
Pulling her wheelchair back from the window, she allowed the curtains to drop back in place. What was she thinking, no man, not as good looking as the men over at the house, would want a broken sparrow like her. Her brother had liked to tell her that every time he came over for his weekly visit. He made it clear that she should be moved into assistant housing so that could look after her and see to all her needs. She knew he really didn’t care, but if she did move, he said he would look after everything for her. Yeah, her money hungry brother would look after her. She knew her money would disappear and would be added to his campaign funds. She had gotten the house and he a money settlement when their parents had died in the same automobile accident that had left her needing a wheelchair. He had blown through the small inher
itance in no time, hobnobbing with the right people, who had helped and placed him in a position that he could now run for council. He really didn’t like visiting her, but the will also included a trust set up with a stipulation attached. As her older brother, he had to look out for her and in doing so, he would receive a month stipend. It allowed him to live beyond his means and supplemented the income he made at his government job. If he wanted the money he had to visit, her parents had a good lawyer and he kept abreast of everything.
Wheeling over to the table, she pulled herself close to her computer table. At least the people across the road had given her a lot to write about. They didn’t know it, but they had become her muses. She wrote them into her newest book. She had never written about a ménage before, but with her active mind and glimpses of the eye candy every once in a while, the words had come easy to her. It was almost 2 o’clock in the morning when she heard the sound of a motorcycle, she had been so involved in her work that time had flown. Pushing back from the table, she wheeled herself over to the window again. She had done this so many times since they had moved in that her chair was starting to leave tracks in the living-room carpet. Putting a hand out, she moved the curtain just enough so her view of the house across the street was clear.
She could see in the driveway that a man was just getting off a bike. He stepped back and took off his helmet and shook his long hair out. Raven would never complain about her hydro bill again, she would have to thank the city for placing the street light just in the right spot for her to see clearly. As his head came up from shaking his head she could tell he was the blond one. He was more streamlined that the others and may be a bit shorter, but not by much. She watched as he looked around and seemed to pause facing her place. She held her breath, she didn’t think he could see her, as the lights were out in her living room and the computer monitor wasn’t too bright. Slowly he continue to look around the silent street, then took something, probably keys, out of his pocket and made his way to his front door and into the house.
Raven just sighed and wheeled herself away and into the kitchen. Opening the fridge, she grabbed some lunch meat, butter, and bread and put them on her lap and made her way to the kitchen table. She started making a sandwich to satisfy her sudden hunger. She had forgotten supper, becoming so involved in her story. But she knew this would only satisfy one of her hungers, the other hunger made parts of herself tingle. Parts that she had thought were dead since the accident. The blond hunk, without knowing, had reached something deep inside her. The men were all eye candy of the finest kind, but something about the blond made her catch her breath.
Chapter Two
Brad threw his keys on the small table in his front hall and walked into the living room, laying his jacket and helmet on a wing chair. Wiping a hand through his too long hair, he sighed and walked into the kitchen for a beer. Pulling the cap off, he slouched down on the couch and took a sip. God the house was quiet with everyone gone. He had gotten used to the noise of having his friends around. The silence was deafening, so he reached out and picked up the remote and turned on the flat-screen TV that James had insisted that he buy for the house. Flipping through the channels, he finally settled on a sports game on TV and settled down to watch. He would have to get to know the neighborhood now that he had time. Every one of his team mates except Grant and himself had a mate now and better things to do than hang around. He was happy for his friends, but envious of them also. He wanted someone to come home to, someone to share his day with.
He thought he had it with Brenda, a cool blonde that he had stopped seeing a year ago. The guys right off the bat had told him that she wasn’t for him, but he didn’t listen. But they turned out to be right, when it became obviously she was just in the relationship for the perks. Being a partner in Braden Security came with some benefits, charity events, invitations to celebrity functions. Not that he liked that kind of lifestyle, none of the guys did, but they all had to take turns every once in a while to keep the company’s facade. They had built Braden Security into a Fortune Five Hundred company, and with their success came certain responsibilities. What he wouldn’t give for the time when no one knew them and he could walk around with holes in his jeans and a comfortable T-shirt and not be judged. The only time he got to be himself nowadays was when he was home. Maybe he needed a dog. It didn’t look like his love life was going to take a turn for the better any time soon. With those thoughts in mind, he closed the TV down and went to his solitary bed.
The next morning Brad awoke to the sunlight coming through his bedroom window and the birds chirping. It sure was different living in a house instead of an apartment. Looking at the bedside clock, he pushed the covers off and sat on the side of the bed. Stifling a yawn, he grabbed his pants from the end of the bed and pulled them on, not bothering to button them up, and made his way to the kitchen. Turning the coffee pot on, another item that James said he needed, but he was grateful for it now and waited for the coffee to perk. Looking out the kitchen window, he looked at the house surrounding his. It seemed like a nice neighborhood, maybe he would have a jog around and take in the sights.
After finishing nearly a pot of coffee, Brad went into the bathroom and took a quick shower and put his jogging pants, a sweatshirt, and his running shoes on and made his way out the door. The area was quiet, as it was just seven o’clock and only a few people seemed to be stirring. He watched blinds raise in the other houses and one guy down the block get in his car and leave. Looking at the house directly across from his, he saw that the curtains were still pulled shut. He and the guys had noticed that someone had seemed very interested in their coming and goings, as the curtains moved every time. Grant had checked it out, but had found out only a single lady lived there and was no danger to any of them, probably just another lonely person. Brad decided to have his jog around the streets surroundings his area and see what kind of neighborhood he had moved into.
Coming back from his jog, he took in all the neat and tidy homes surrounding his. As he got closer to his house, he noticed a car was parked in the driveway across from his and a woman was getting out. The middle-aged woman was wearing a nurse’s uniform and she smiled at him as he neared her. Taking in the uniform, Brad stopped and asked, “Is anything wrong? I’ve noticed you here before. Is the person in the house sick?”
“No, everything is okay. I’m just doing by bi-weekly visit. I haven’t seen you around here. Did you just move in?”
“Yes, just a couple of months ago, but I’ve not been around much. Well, nice seeing you, I’m sure we’ll meet again. If you need anything just come over.” Brad pointed to his house as he made his way to his own side of the street and stood in his driveway stretching. Brad watched the nurse go up to the front door and open it.
Next, he was jarred by a scream from the woman. Sprinting into a run, he made his way up to the woman’s side, she stood there holding the door open. Looking around her though the door, he could see into the kitchen of the house. There, in the middle of the floor, was a wheelchair overturned with a woman lying beside it. She seemed to be crying, with both her arms over her head covering her face.
“What’s going on? What can I do to help?” Brad asked the nurse.
The nurse just looked at him, then at the woman on the floor and made her way into the house and knelt beside the woman on the kitchen floor. Brad followed the nurse into the house and stood at her back, looking at the woman lying there. Now he could see the woman, he felt his protective instincts kick in. She seemed to be racked with sobs, with her back heaving every now and them. The nurse reached over to try and lift the woman, but Brad just took her elbow and moved her out of the way, as he picked up the woman off the floor and into his arms. She was a little tiny thing and her head fit under his chin just right, her body was still shaking and Brad looked at the nurse, not knowing what to do.
“Let me get the chair righted and you can set her down,” the nurse said as she righted the chair.
“Here, put
her down now.”
Brad looked at the woman in his arms and back at the nurse. “Don’t you think maybe we should take her to the hospital?”
“Oh, I think she is okay. Just set her down.” The nurse came over to him and reached out and brushed the hair off the woman’s face and smiled at her.
Once Brad could see her face, he realized that she wasn’t crying, but laughing, and set her down in the wheelchair.
The woman squirmed around until she was comfortable, then reached up with one of her hands and pushed her hair back over her shoulders and looked up at them. She wasn’t laughing now, but her face was still flushed as she turned bright blue eyes up at the nurse, then over to him. Before she could say anything, the nurse bristled around her, pulling her shirt down and making sure her feet were secure on the pedals.
“And what were you trying to do?” the nurse asked the woman with a stern look on her face. “Haven’t I told you to wait until I’m here, if you need anything that’s not handy?”
The woman took her eyes off Brad and smiled back at the nurse. “I was just trying to reach the popcorn on the top shelf and I dropped my grab stick when the popcorn bottle flew off the shelf at me. I turned so fast that the chair just tipped over. Don’t scold me, Mary. I know better, but I just had an urge and couldn’t wait.”
“Popcorn at eight in the morning? Well, Raven, you know better, so I won’t say anything, but I think you could have waited until I got here. You scared me and this nice man from next door. I’m sorry, son, I don’t know your name? This is Raven Windfield and I am her home nurse, Mary Ellis.”