by Wright, Erin
Stetson knew he was pressing Wyatt’s biggest button with a sledgehammer but he couldn’t bring himself to care.
The words were barely out before Wyatt launched himself at his youngest brother.
Stetson was ready. The brothers collided like a train running into a mountainside. They tumbled to the ground, fists flying as they fell. The two angry men rolled around on the dusty barn floor, each man was blinded by rage. Some blows missed while others found their mark.
Somewhere in the distance, they could hear Declan yelling for them to stop, but neither paid him any mind. The air was split with the sounds of fists striking flesh. Blows were punctuated with a litany of swear words.
For the first time in either of their lives, Stetson gained the upper hand in a fight. Pinning Wyatt to the ground with his knees, Stetson’s fist connected with his brother’s cheek. Wyatt’s lip split as his face contorted from the punch.
The single blow was almost victory enough for Stetson. Almost.
Cocking his arm back, Stetson readied to strike again if Wyatt pushed the issue.
“You can harvest your grain without my help,” Stetson said, his voice still menacing. “Now get the hell off my farm.” He rolled off Wyatt and onto his feet in one smooth motion.
Dusting himself off as he stood up, Wyatt glowered at Stetson for a long, considering moment before he spat blood on the floor and stormed out of the barn.
Declan and Stetson shared an awkward moment before Declan shrugged and followed Wyatt.
“We’ll talk later,” Declan said, before closing the door behind him.
Chapter 16
“I swear, every time you go out to the barn, you come back bleeding. I’m not going to allow you to continue to go out there if this keeps up,” Jennifer joked as she dabbed at the cut over his left eye.
Wyatt had managed to land one really good punch during their tussle in the barn, damn him.
Stetson was feeling bad, but not because of the fight. He was actually feeling pretty good about that. He knew what he was doing when he said those words to his brother about his wife and daughter, and he did feel bad about it. However, he’d never come out on top in a fist fight with Wyatt before, so that part felt good. Awfully damn good, if he was being honest with himself.
No, what he was feeling really bad about was that he’d ruined Jennifer’s mood when he walked in the door with blood streaming down his face. When he’d come back to the house, she’d bounded out of the office when she had heard the backdoor open but her giddiness vanished when she looked at him. She had dragged him into the kitchen and plopped him down at one of the stools that surrounded the cooking island, then proceeded to dote on him. Stetson had visions of having to turn a corner of the kitchen into a first-aid station if the injuries continued.
“What happened?” she asked gently.
“Oh, you know how brothers are,” he answered, hoping to downplay his condition and return this beautiful woman to the mood she had been in.
Her hair bounces when she is happy. I’ve never liked bouncy hair before. Hell, I have never noticed bouncy hair before.
“I am an only child, so no, I don’t know about brothers.”
“We show each other our love by wanting to kill each other. It’s complicated.”
“Sounds like a dangerous relationship.”
“It usually is,” Stetson agreed blandly.
“You might need stitches. We should go have that checked out,” Jennifer said, real concern spreading over her face now that she had a good look at the cut.
“Nah, it’ll heal just fine on its own. Besides, chicks dig scars.”
“Oh we do, do we?” she said, laughing. Her laughter reminded him of her earlier happiness.
“What had you in such a good mood, right before I came in and ruined it?”
“Oh, I just had a good idea for dinner,” she said flirtatiously, grinning at him. He had visions of her serving herself up for dinner…in lingerie. “You can talk to me while I cook if you’re done being a farmer for the day.” Damn, she was serious about cooking.
He decided he’d done enough damage for one day - after all, Wyatt looked a lot worse than him by the end of the fist fight, and wasn’t that all that mattered? - and spending the rest of the evening in the kitchen with this sexy woman sounded like a good way to stay out of trouble.
Or, get into the right kind of trouble…
“I was wondering what happened to Carmelita. You’ve only been here a couple days, and you’re already managing the staff,” he said, winking. “Ouch!” His swollen eye didn’t appreciate the movement.
“Tough to be funny when your winker is broken, huh, Romeo?” Jennifer said before applying the last bandage and a kiss to his damaged brow. She reached into the freezer and handed him an ice pack. He put it up to his left eye and then proceeded to use his good eye to ogle her. Watching her move around washing, slicing, chopping, and mixing, Stetson gained a fuller appreciation of a nice-fitting pair of jeans.
“So, what’s the deal with your brother?”
“Oh, the usual sibling rivalry mixed with a business partnership.”
I really wish she wouldn’t dig into this. This relationship is way too new for her to get sucked into the family drama.
“Not good enough, mister. I’m asking seriously.”
Stetson chewed his lip while he thought.
Hell. Might as well tell her now and give her the option to run away before things get really serious.
“Every family has their own problems, and we’re no exception,” he started, still trying to figure out how to explain this. “For my family, I am the problem. I was a surprise to my parents, whereas Wyatt and Declan were planned. Declan is eight years older than I am and Wyatt is another two years older than that. So I never really fit in with them. They always considered me to be a pain in the ass - an unwanted pain in the ass - and I always blamed them for my feeling left out.”
Jennifer had stopped cooking and was leaning on the island looking at him as he talked. She didn’t say anything - just looked at him with those brilliant green eyes, encouraging him on without words.
“Then when I was eight, Mom died. Declan had just left for college, and Wyatt had bought his own farm by that point. I was still at home with only Dad and Carmelita to raise me. My brothers have never really given me credit for being so young and having to deal with some very heavy issues. They think that Dad was overprotective after Mom passed and because of that, I never learned to work or appreciate what advantages I have been given.”
“Did your brothers remind you of how they felt out in the barn, and that’s why you guys decided to settle your differences like men?” She finished her question with a teasing tilt of her lips, and Stetson’s stomach did a backflip in response. For a moment, he lost himself in the idea of sucking her lower lip into his mouth and nibbling on it, and then kissing his way down her neck to…
But with an abrupt start, he returned to the present and realized she was still waiting for an answer. God, he was like a horny teenager!
He cleared his throat and started speaking again. “Kind of. I decided to tell them the full truth about why you’re here. It sorta confirmed what they’ve been thinking about me. Well, it did for Wyatt, at least.”
“You told them everything?” Jennifer asked, sounding mortified. She stirred some bubbling concoction on the stove, and his stomach rumbled in response. Whatever she was cooking, it smelled amazing.
“Oh no, they don’t need to know about that part,” Stetson rushed to reassure her. “That’s none of their business and if they knew, Wyatt would probably accuse me of trying to sleep my way out of debt.”
Her eyes grew big. “You really think he’d be that vicious?”
“You bet. There’s not a button that we won’t push. That’s what got me punched.”
“Oh!” Stetson could tell that she hadn’t expected him to admit that he’d had any part in causing the fight. “What…what did you do?”
>
“Wyatt was getting pretty vicious and…” Stetson paused, deciding to change directions. “You have to understand that when Dad got sick, Declan and Wyatt were so wrapped up in their own lives, the way they dealt with Dad’s cancer was to ignore it. Sure, they came around to visit and stuff, but they didn’t help keep the farm going, and they didn’t help with the costs.”
“So you said something about that? That’s what made Wyatt mad?”
“Well, yeah I brought it up, but that wasn’t the only thing that made him mad,” Stetson said, and then felt a flush of shame wash over him. All of the pride he’d felt earlier at having come out on top in a fist fight with his oldest brother was gone now, replaced by pure mortification. “Ummm…so Wyatt was being a jerk, like always, and I lost my temper…” He paused, trying to find a way out of admitting this, but couldn’t think of anything so he plunged on blindly, “And so I decided to push his most sensitive button.”
“Oh.” She paused for a moment and Stetson hurried on, determined to get this off his chest.
“A few years before Dad got sick, Wyatt got married. They had a daughter together. One night, Shelly and Sierra were coming back from town when a drunk driver coming the other direction crossed the center line. They…didn’t make it.”
“And you brought that up in your fight?”
“Yeah.”
“That sounds like sacred territory.”
“I was so angry, I was just trying to hurt him as much as possible. I probably had this coming,” he said, indicating his eye. “Fair is fair, though. He brought up Michelle.”
“Who’s Michelle?”
Crap! Oh well, I’m this far in. No other way but through it.
“She was the woman I was engaged to about three years ago,” Stetson said, and then waited for her reaction.
“That relationship didn’t work out, I take it.”
Stetson appreciated her understanding tone.
“No, not really. She grew up in Boise. She was a chef at one of the restaurants that buys our beef. It seemed like it was going perfectly, but then she decided she couldn’t handle living the farm life.”
“Was the breakup bad?”
“I don’t imagine it could get much worse, actually,” he said bitterly.
“What happened?”
“Dad made arrangements to leave the hospital early so he could be there. It was his second round of chemo,” Stetson started distractedly as the memory played out in his mind. “Anyway, we just stood there for over an hour before…”
“You were at the church?” Jennifer said, the shock apparent in her voice.
“Yup. She…uhhh…never showed up. That was that.”
They sat in silence for a long time. Finally, the oven timer interrupted the painful lapse in conversation. She put the chicken on a plate next to some roasted vegetables before spooning a thick cream sauce over both. She served them both and then sat down next to him on a stool. He dug in, his stomach thanking him for finally feeding it.
Apparently, it was a lot of hard work to beat up your brother.
“What about you?” Stetson finally asked.
“What about me, what?”
“What about you? How does a woman like you not have a hundred men following you around like a caravan?”
“Oh, well I’ve been concentrating on my career. I haven’t been much interested in a relationship for about two years. My last boyfriend kinda took me for a ride.”
Jennifer paused for a moment, and Stetson could tell she was doing the same mental calculations that he had - how much to reveal so early in their relationship. Finally, she continued her story.
“I thought he was The One. You know, things weren’t perfect, but they looked like they would turn out perfectly. Paul was just about to finish medical school and start his residency. Financially, residency is tough on medical students. They don’t get paid much, but they work long hours and still have expenses like room and board, fees for certification testing, and tuition.”
Jennifer paused but Stetson just sat quietly, waiting for her to finish in her own time and at her own pace. Her pink tongue darted out to wet her lips, and Stetson struggled to distract himself from the idea of sucking on that pink tongue and lips. He had started this conversation - he was going to let her finish it.
“I was in nursing school - that’s how we met - but we decided that I would stop taking classes and go to work full-time until his residency was over. Then he would be making ‘real doctor’ money - that’s what we called it - and I could go back to college then.”
“That plan didn’t work out?”
“It probably would’ve worked out great if I’d been willing to tolerate him sleeping with the other nurses as well as me,” Jennifer answered, without attempting to hide the bitterness in her voice.
“So, what did you do?”
“I moved in with a friend and went back to school getting a degree in accounting - I took double credits so I could finish faster and get off my friend’s couch. I no longer had any desire to work in the medical profession. After that, I went to work for the bank.”
Stetson stared at Jennifer, thinking. He had felt vulnerable, telling her his family’s secrets and her understanding was incredibly soothing. Now as he looked at her, he felt her uncertainty radiating across the space between them.
He wanted to heal her pain. He wanted her to know he understood. That he was grateful.
He needed to be close to her.
Stetson did the only thing he could think to do - he reached his hand out to her. She took it. Her smooth and soft skin was cool against his. She curled her fingers around his and squeezed. He felt the squeeze shoot straight up his arm and into his heart, where it thumped loudly. This woman was so goddamn beautiful and amazing and giving; he just couldn’t fathom what this doctor dude had been thinking. No nurse could hold a candle to his Jennifer.
Before he could process that thought - his Jennifer?! - she spoke.
“Could we go to bed?” Jennifer said softly.
Not releasing her hand, he stood up and pulled her to him. He ran his hands up and down her spine for just a moment, breathing in her scenes and her curves and her rightness before pulling her towards the stairs without another word.
They were slower this time. More deliberate. Their eyes locked even as Stetson eased her t-shirt over her head. They found each other’s gaze the moment the fabric was gone. His world narrowed to just this point in the universe - nothing existed but her. He wanted nothing else.
Slipping under the blankets, Stetson pulled her to him, her warm, soft skin massaging his soul. His fingers slid through her hair. He loved every delicate strand. So soft and fine, the hairs tickled his work-worn hands.
Jennifer buried her head against his chest and Stetson breathed in the scent of her shampoo. The floral notes filled his mind and healed his hurts in a way he couldn’t have guessed he needed. Last week, he had been dreading her arrival - would have given anything to keep it from happening. He hated her before he knew her.
And now…
Time slipped away without notice as they indulged in the sheer pleasure of being close to each other.
Eventually, they moved. Small gestures at first - Jennifer slowly running her fingers through the hair on his chest, Stetson slowly rubbing his hands up and down her spine. His fingertips traced the curve of her spine delicately, his gentle touch raising goosebumps on her skin.
She tilted her head back and he bent down, their lips meeting, the kiss lingering. No tongues darting in and out, just lips pressed together, speaking a million words that had no sound.
At long last, they shifted so that Stetson’s long, strong frame hovered over her. Her knees bent and parted to make way for his body and Stetson lowered himself by wrapping his arms under her.
As he entered her, Stetson tightened his embrace, binding her body against his. He couldn’t hold back any longer and began thrusting into her, his shuddering cries in harmony with her moans of
excitement.
“I can’t—” Jennifer gasped and then dug her fingernails into his muscled back, arching and crying out from her release. Stetson felt her tighten around him and came too, his hoarse cries mingling with hers.
Eventually, he rolled onto his side and pulled her against him, spooning against her soft thighs, his heavy arm draped around her waist. With contented sighs, sleep overtook them.
Chapter 17
Jennifer woke up alone again, but this time, she didn’t panic as much. Waking up to an empty bed when she was expecting a companion had always been an unsettling experience for her and probably always would be, but this morning, she was feeling very proud of herself that she was able to control the panic long enough to shake the sleep off and remember that she was sleeping with a cattle rancher and farmer. The important part of that statement being that cattle liked to be fed - the earlier, the better.
Finding a tank top and pajama bottoms in her suitcase was all she needed to do before she headed downstairs for a cup of that wonderful coffee. Carmelita poured a cup for her and promised that breakfast would be ready soon. She had a giant grin on her face that Jennifer couldn’t help returning, even as a blush reddened her cheeks. She hurried to her office to escape the meaning of that grin.
She settled into her dilapidated chair and began preparing her plan of attack for the day.
It is Saturday and no matter how much that slimy little weasel of a boss wants this farm, he will never work on a weekend. I can get ahead of that bastard.
She’d been working her way through the listing of the farm’s assets for nearly an hour when time slowed down. She felt the world tilt a little.
“Breakfast is ready,” a voice said from a million miles away.
She heard the words, as if spoken through a layer of cotton, but they didn’t register. She just stared at the ledger sheet.