HOT MEN: A Contemporary Romance Box Set

by Ashlee Price

  "Now!" I cried, and the front door burst open as Michael and the detective sprang through the front door of the Stephenses' house where they'd been hiding. They caught the man - Michael's dad, of course - just as he was bending to lay flame to the gasoline he'd laced around our stone cottage. As I watched from the window, there was a brief struggle, but it ended quickly with the detective leading away Mr. Shannon in a set of handcuffs.

  Michael flew back in through the door. "Everyone okay?" he shouted. Josiah awakened to the noise.

  "We are now, thanks to you, Michael," Dad said as I headed in the direction of the nursery.

  I came out with Josiah in my arms. It was the first time Michael had ever seen him. I could tell by the look on his face that he'd been curious about Josiah, and now, faced with a flesh and blood baby, he took a couple of steps backward and the whoosh of his expelled air could be heard across the room. I set Josiah down and he took some steps in Michael's direction, then began to cry and toddled over to Dad's chair and climbed up.

  "Michael, what if you hadn't thought ahead? What if he'd come while we were in bed over there and burned us alive?"

  "Let's not go there now. You're all fine, and it's only a matter of less than a half hour and you'll never have to worry about him again, I swear. I'm so sorry that he took it this far. He needs medical help."

  I nodded. "I think so, too. Let me make us some coffee while we wait. Dad, you okay?"

  "Just fine, Callie. Michael saw to that."

  I retrieved a bottle of juice from the fridge and handed it to Josiah, who immediately quit crying and drank the sweet liquid, gurgling with happiness. "Da-Da?" He was trying to learn to talk, and he heard me regularly call my father "Dad." That would be his first word, apparently.

  Michael was staring at Josiah, a look of wonderment on his face. I knew he was imagining having a child with me. If only he knew, but I couldn't tell him. Not yet.

  We sat down with our coffee, and before long, the clock over the mantle was chiming twelve times.

  "Happy birthday, Michael," I said and wrapped my arms around him to give him a kiss.

  "Happy birthday, Michael," Dad called from his chair.

  There was a knock at the door and Michael rose to answer it, just as he'd planned. He opened the door wide, and a group of men entered the room, carrying out boxes and luggage that contained all our belongings.

  I took the baby and Michael pushed Dad's chair. We were met outside by a limousine and were safely put inside. That's about all I knew about "the plan." I was content to hear the rest later.

  A small moving truck followed us down the drive, followed by a pickup hauling a horse trailer with Hector munching safely inside. We didn't have far to drive and pulled into the entrance of the gated driveway just ten minutes later. A guard came out and looked us over, signaling the guard inside the small building with a thumbs-up. The gates slid open smoothly and our caravan pulled through. The pickup with the horse trailer went in the direction of the barns, while the moving truck and our limo went up to the door.

  As we pulled up, the front door opened and the light framed a woman and a man.

  Michael took the baby and then handed him to the woman, who promptly turned and went inside. The man, who Michael introduced as Rodney, helped Dad out of the limo, and the group of us walked into the entry hall of what had to be the most beautiful house I'd ever been in.

  "Welcome home, Callie," Michael said and kissed me.

  "Are you sure?"

  "I keep my promises, remember?"

  I nodded and hugged Dad, who looked exhausted. "Please, can we get Dad situated first?"

  Michael signaled Rodney, who wheeled Dad's chair to an elevator at the side of the entryway. I watched as it opened onto the upper mezzanine, and Dad waved as they disappeared down the hallway.

  "I'm beat. Are you sure the people you hired will look after the Stephenses' place until they get back and we get this all resolved?"

  "You have my word on it."

  "Good. I'm tired. Where's my room?" I asked, looking around.

  "Well, you have your choice of two," he grinned with a wink.

  "I'll take the one that lets me sleep alone," I said with authority.

  "As you say, lassie. Follow me."

  We ascended the broad stairway and turned the opposite direction from where Dad had been wheeled. "We'll be staying in this wing," Michael told me, and I followed him down the hallway.

  He stopped at a door and opened it, reaching inside the doorway to trigger a light switch. The glow of a dozen lamps spilled over the carpets and upholstery of a female dream come true. A cherry four-poster bed with matching bedside tables dominated the room. There was a huge floor-to-ceiling window with an arched top, and before it waited a pair of loveseats and a lounge chair for reading. The walls were covered with closet doors, and a bathroom filled with white tile and a crystal chandelier hanging over a Jacuzzi tub were to my right.

  "You want a shower?"

  I smiled and winked. "Yes, but I think I can handle it myself."

  "As you say, lassie. You'll find clothes in the closets and dressers. I gave them your size. I'll see you in the morning, and we'll talk about where to go from here." He bent and kissed me softly but firmly. "Don't worry about anything. There are a dozen guards outside this house and the entire property is surrounded by a ten-foot wrought-iron fence. You'll see it all in the morning."

  I nodded, and he turned to leave. "Michael?"

  "Yes, lassie?" he looked over his shoulder.

  "Happy birthday."

  "Now it is, lassie. Now it is."

  Chapter 26 - Michael

  I awakened with a sense of being on top of the world. Strange that I should feel that way when my own father had just tried to murder three innocent people. All was in hand, though. The detective I'd hired to intercept Dad worked strictly for me, strictly off the record. The entire episode had been filmed with nighttime video equipment, so I had Dad where I wanted him. One word from me and his future would likely be behind bars. At the very least the revelation would be so scandalous as to make it impossible for him to do business locally ever again. As it was, it would be kept private and he would know the guillotine was always hanging over his head.

  In my weaker moments, I felt guilty for having pulled this on him, but he'd been running the clock, not me. If he'd left well enough alone, there'd have been no need for such drastic measures. I knew he was getting desperate. Desperate men can do cruel things.

  I rolled from the bed and showered, pulling clean clothes from the wardrobe before I went in search of Callie or someone else in the household. I found her out the back door by the pool, feeding the baby as he sat in a booster chair at the table. What a beautiful picture they made.

  "Good morning, lassie."

  "Happy birthday again, Michael."

  "Thank you. And how are you this morning?" I asked young Josiah as I tousled his short locks. He grinned at me, and I felt the burn of jealousy. I knew I could eventually come to love the child, but Clayton's memory would forever eat at me when I saw what he'd chosen to leave behind.

  "Did you sleep well, Callie?" I asked her, and she smiled.

  "I slept just fine," she said in a somewhat defensive voice, to mock me for inviting her to share my bed. "Dad's still in his room, though. I think it was a bit too much excitement for him. I asked that nice woman in the kitchen if she could make him up a tray and I'll take it up to him."

  "She can do that. That's what she's paid to do, Callie."

  She put down the spoon and wiped Josiah's chin. From nowhere, the nanny appeared and pulled him from the booster chair, carrying him upstairs to discover the joy of new toys. I was supremely happy.

  Callie laid the napkin down onto the table and looked up at me. "Now, would you possibly tell me what's going on and what sort of devious plans are rolling around in that head of yours?"

  "In a minute, but I need to ask you a question first."

  "Okay...?" />
  "Will you marry me?"

  Her hand went over her mouth and she fell back in the chair but said nothing.

  "Well? Would you like me to get down on my knees, or shall I take your silence as a rejection?"

  "Are you really serious?"

  "Of course I'm serious. I'd be a pretty big jerk if I asked you to marry me and then made a joke out of it, don't you think?"

  "I suppose so, but Michael, I don't understand. What's changed? You've never even mentioned marriage before."

  "I love you. I know I've mentioned that. Do you love me?"

  "Well, of course I do, but marriage is something else altogether different."

  "Isn't that what people do when they love each other? Don't they get married?"

  "Yes." She was leaning closer toward me now, and that made me hopeful.

  "Is that a yes that you'll marry me?"

  "Yes, Michael, I would love to marry you." Her face was flushed and tears formed in her eyes. I got up from my chair and went around the table, pulling her to her feet and kissing her as I pulled her against me.

  "Not to sound like a stereotype, but you've made me the happiest man on earth. Are you surprised?"

  "Frankly? Yes, I am. To tell you the truth, I hoped you might ask me when we graduated high school. Of course now I know why you couldn't have, but at the time we were so close. We've gone through so much since then, and we've spent most of that time apart."

  "Well, I'm asking you now, and you just said you would, so it's all decided. When you have time, get a calendar and we'll pick out a date. You're going to have the biggest wedding you can imagine, and definitely don't worry about the expense. The Michael you see before you is a different man than you've known prior to this. But you know what the most important change is?"

  "No, what?"

  "It's you. You thought you needed me in high school, when we graduated, in the times that you reached out in between. But all along, Callie Tucker, you've been taking care of yourself. You never did need me. So now I know it's safe to ask you to marry me. You won't feel as though I'm doing it for any other reason than because I love you and want to spend my life with you."

  "Michael, that's so beautiful, thank you for saying that. Gosh, you take me by surprise. I hardly know what to say."

  "You've already said the most important thing. Not to rain on the parade, but we need to talk about something else more pressing. I want you to understand what you're getting into and what I'd like to see you do."

  "Okay, go ahead. I'm ready." She refilled her coffee cup from the decanter on the table, laid her napkin across her lap and settled back to listen.

  "I don't have to tell you that midnight was critical in my plans. I think I mentioned to you before that I had hired a law firm to look into my inheritance and they'd discovered that someone had been moving my funds into long-term investments, strangling me, essentially, with an absence of liquid cash. We both know who that person was. At my instruction, they froze those assets until midnight today so that no one, including myself, could touch them."

  "I see why you're becoming a lawyer, Michael. That was brilliant."

  "Well, I don't know about that, but it was necessary. Now, let me go on. I've made some major changes. For one, I've ended my classroom attendance at U of L and am finishing out my degree online, so I will be around here most of the time."

  That made her smile.

  "Now, with regard to my father. He had dipped into my inheritance to acquire the finer horseflesh he's raising over there. He's been to Keeneland and taken my cash reserves to shop with - that was one way he could pretend he was investing for me and yet all the time he was draining my liquidity. So there are some very nice yearlings that need to be trained and ridden. This is where you come in. I will be moving those animals here - as a matter of fact, they should be en route already. The sheriff went in with a court order this morning, and of course, as you know, my dad isn't in a position to argue."

  "I don't even want to think about what would have happened if you hadn't realized he was sick enough to do such a thing."

  "Let's not even go there, lassie. I'll also need your guidance to run this farm and to build it up. I want more horses, a track, more stables, and a complete equine fitness center. You and your dad know this stuff - me, not so much. Will you help?"

  "Of course I will!"

  "One more thing, well, actually three. First, your dad will always have a home here with us, so don't you worry about that. Second, I want you to train and ride one of our horses in the Derby if we can get him through qualification. Third... after we're married, I'd like you to consider allowing me to adopt Josiah and raise him as my own son and heir."

  "Michael! I... I don't know what to say. Truly?"

  "Lassie, I told you, I have your back, and we're going to become a family in the right way."

  "I really do love you, Michael," she exclaimed and came to sit on my lap. I didn't mind a bit, as it afforded me a very healthy view of her breasts through the three buttons that were open at the top of her blouse.

  "Michael, that's a lot to ask of me. How can I run a farm, become a jockey, and be a wife, mother and daughter all at once?"

  "It's called delegation, lassie. You pick and choose what you'd like to do and hire people to do the rest or to help you. We already have a nanny for Josiah, assuming you approve of her. Rodney is going to help your dad, and when he's not needed for that, he'll do maintenance around the house and help with errands, etc. He'll also be in charge of taking your dad wherever he wants to go, including to physical therapy."

  "You've thought of everything, haven't you?"

  "I've thought of nothing but you, lassie. For almost eight years, not a day has gone by that I didn't wish I could do more for you. Believe it or not, until midnight, I probably had less money than you. Everything I had was given to me by my father, like an allowance. I've never held a job, remember."

  She nodded. "True. You think you can handle the bankbook?"

  I laughed. "I'm sure you'll teach me if I can't. Anyway, we have a cook, and you're free to hire whomever you want for both inside and outside the house. But I want you to focus on what you want most - becoming a jockey. Because as soon as you win the Derby, if not the Triple Crown, you're going to be busy giving me babies."

  She blushed and kissed my ear, blowing in it and nipping at the lobe with her tongue. "Yes, sir, I accept. With pleasure."

  Chapter 27 - Callie

  I will forever marvel at the speed with which life can change. Only a few months earlier, I was a young mother with no one to care for her child while she worked or went to school, a father who was on the precipice of death, no house to come home to, and nothing in her foreseeable future that was going to change all that. But it did change, dramatically. It was all due to Michael Shannon.

  The house - well, I couldn't even begin to describe how unbelievable it was. Our entire original house could've fit in one room of this mansion. Michael's agent has purchased it in his own name pending the midnight birthday, at which point it reverted to Michael. It had come furnished and staffed, but I was given free rein to change any aspect I didn't like. There were eight bedrooms, each with a bath, and a separate playroom for Josiah with a small adjoining room for his nanny. Downstairs were two kitchens; one for baking and canning and the second for daily meal preparation. There was a formal dining room that could seat twenty-four and a smaller family dining room with windows that overlooked the gardens. Michael had an office and a separate den for entertaining or meeting with his business associates. I also had an office, although mine was furnished in feminine colors and fabrics. The center part of the house had a huge living area banked by walk-in fireplaces and window doors that opened out onto a wrap-around deck that covered the back of the house and overlooked the swimming pool, barns and grounds. Downstairs were quarters for the staff who lived at the house, an in-home theatre that seated twenty-four, billiard tables, a wet bar, an indoor pool with spa furnishings, and
an exit that led beneath the ground to the barns and to the garages. There was no need to even get wet if it stormed. It was so large that it made me feel uncomfortable, as though I were living in a hotel. I had to think of my room and the baby's as being my space and not go any further than that.

  Michael had, with my permission, gotten rid of most everything we'd brought. I was given a stocked bank account, credit cards and house accounts, and a new baby blue Thunderbird convertible. Dad got a new Silverado pickup. My closets and dressers were filled with clothes for any occasion, along with shoes, jewelry and luggage. It seemed that Michael was keeping a small private jet that accommodated twelve at Standiford Field, so the world was literally ours.

  There was so much, and I was so totally fortunate, that I had trouble grasping it. Michael laughed when I protested, telling me that he had more money than I could possibly hope to spend in a lifetime.

  Then came the real treasures. As I planned for our wedding, the Keeneland sales approached. Michael had already acquired boxed seats for us, and I was given free rein to buy five horses. Money aside, training them was going to be a huge investment for me, and I wanted Dad's eagle eye along. He was only too happy to accompany me, and the day after the sales, five semi-trucks pulled up to the barn, which Michael had recently remodeled, and out came five of the most beautiful, rambunctious and pure-blooded yearlings our money could buy. Dad was so excited that he asked if his quarters might be moved into the barn so he could be near them.

  For a horse breeder, yearlings were like crops yet to be planted. Each had to be carefully groomed for its strengths and weaknesses, just like an athlete. They wouldn't be eligible for the Derby until they were three-year-olds, so plenty of time remained for Dad to groom and perfect each one in turn.

  My attention, however, was on a stallion named Jewel who had come with the farm. He was very tall, wild, and his mane covered my face as I let him gallop over the pasture with me atop. He had a brave heart and seemed to take to me immediately - something the farmhands said was unbelievable. They said the previous owner had been ready to geld him to calm him down, but I saw no need for that. I wanted him just as natural as God had made him.