by C. M. Steele
“Don’t worry about that, Mrs. Cooper. And prepare for a wedding for the new year.”
“Yes, Ryan.”
“Thank you, ma’am. Excuse me, ladies, but I’ve got to get my ass on a plane.”
Chapter 5
Ryan arrived in Dallas and had a bad ass rental pickup truck waiting for him. He had to thank Matt later. This was going to be hard enough, having everything ready for him would make it a lot better. Adding the address to his navigation, he was there in an hour. Ryan didn’t want to give her a chance to run again, so he didn’t tell her when he was coming. The sprawling ranch with the large, beautiful main house told him that July probably didn’t have to work and yet she did. And why pick Boston? He was grateful that she did. The engine of his truck didn’t leave much room for making a stealthy entrance, but it wouldn’t matter to him because she couldn’t leave.
As soon as he popped out of the car, he grabbed the roses and wine and walked up to the porch where three large males stood and then his lovely July made her way past them and down the stairs. She didn’t look happy to see him and she eyed the flowers and wine with the roll of her eyes.
“I can’t have wine, you know?”
“No, you can’t, but this wasn’t for you, little miss.” He walked past her and up to her mother. “Ma’am, these are for you.”
“Please come inside, Ryan. I’m sorry, I don’t know your last name.”
“Ryan Kane. Thank you for welcoming me inside.” Ryan turned to the man of the house whose stone cold glare only hardened his determination. “You must be July’s father. Sir, it’s a pleasure to meet you.”
“I don’t know why you’re here, but the fact that she’s been moping around and sick, I have a feeling you have something to do with it.”
“The moping is on her. I didn’t tell her to run away without a word. The sick, well, that I’ll take credit for.”
“Credit for being sick? That’s stupid,” Marcus Cooper said.
“What he means is that she’s having his baby, dumbass,” the older brother Aaron said.
Mrs. Cooper stepped between the boys and Ryan, who looked ready to protect their sister. “Thank you, Ryan. But after your attention to other women, that may not have been smart.”
Ryan was truly confused and looked between her and the little woman who had returned to the house. “Other women? I’m in my thirties, of course there have been other women.”
“Well, I don’t think that one was talking about your history before her.”
“There’s been no one for months, maybe even a year before I met her.” Ryan stared at July.
“And I’m supposed to believe that?” July asked as she crossed her arms. “Ryan, this won’t work between us. I won’t keep you from your baby, but we can’t be together.”
“You won’t be keeping my kid away from me because we’ll be married.”
“Just because I’m a southern girl doesn’t mean we’re getting married.”
“I’ve wanted to marry you since March, so don’t give me that shit. I don’t know what made you run, but it’s bullshit, and if that fucking cowboy boyfriend of yours has a problem with it, I’ll knock his ass out like I should have that day.”
“You’re an idiot. He’s not my boyfriend.”
“I’m the idiot? You were on a date with him at my favorite damn restaurant, sitting in me and my family’s favorite booth. Then you leave him for me only to run off with him the next day. The only thing I’m an idiot about was not tying your ass to the bed.” Ryan’s hurt was clear in his words, but by the time he finished them, the alpha male in him was ready to prove that he’d tie her up this time.
“Whoa. That’s a conversation that’s not for everyone.” Marcus shook his head and covered his ears. July blushed, but Ryan wanted to have this out now. They could leave or hear more than they’d care for.
Ryan tilted his head, trying to get them to get out of there, but every Cooper family member had a stubborn streak a mile wide. Wow, they are in for it if they don’t leave, he thought to himself. “No offense, but then she and I need to have a conversation in private.” He gave another warning.
“No, I don’t want to talk to you—alone.” He looked like she smacked him across the face with those words. His head jerked back in surprise and clearly confused and upset.
“Are you scared of me?” he asked. He had been rough on the phone earlier, but he’d never gave her any reason to be afraid of him.
“Not the way you think,” she muttered, avoiding his gaze with a blush washing over her cheeks. Ryan and everyone else who saw knew exactly why she was afraid to be alone with him. She couldn’t resist him physically. The sexual tension had been there from the start.
Ryan smiled wickedly, knowing that he had the upper hand in that area and he wasn’t going to let on that she controlled him that way, too. He had to keep the proverbial ball in his court. Fuck, what I would love to do to her at the moment. Her eyes with their green irises shining with unshed tears brightened her face and her body was still as sexy as ever. He shook his dirty visions away before he showed everyone how much July affected him sexually. “Okay, let’s have this talk right now. I can’t let you just give up on us.”
“Give up on us? You didn’t try that hard. If it wasn’t for my mother and this baby, you wouldn’t have found me.” She got a little riled up and moved forward, attempting to express her rage, but Ryan gave her another smirk. That only hardened her face, but Ryan was the one who should be pissed and he wasn’t going to let any of the Coopers intimidate him because, at the end of the day, she was his and he was taking what belonged to him home.
“Ha. Let yourself think that. But since my assistant decided to bail on me, I had a lot of work to catch up on after I came back from the business trip and Thanksgiving with my family. I thought finding you would be easy, but when I came down to the address you had on your application it was an old factory about twenty miles from here. No one heard of you. Then I had to get back to train your replacement…” She gasped. “In the office. I sent someone to come look for you. And he texted me this morning that he had a hit on your location. I told him it was no longer needed.”
“You’ve replaced me already?”
“Yes, and but as it happens, I’m sure the job will be open soon.”
“Why? You’re going to sleep with her and let her go, too.”
That caused Ryan’s jaw to tighten. She’d known him for months and he’d never given her a reason to believe that he had women who he was seeing. “What is with that and why do you even…” A feeling hit him like a ton of bricks. One name came to mind in all of this. “Mara?” he asked, slanting his head slightly to the left.
Ryan watched as her fists opened and closed several times before she huffed and said, “Yes, she told me what happened that day in your office and with the rest of your assistants and the girls in HR.”
“That day in my office wasn’t what you think at all, but you people are going to force me to take the damn door off. First it was Matt, thinking I was doing something with Candy, and now you think I was with Mara. Nothing happened in either case, but since that bitch let that seed sow in your brain, I’m even more grateful that Spencer fired her.”
“Spencer fired her?” she asked in genuine surprise.
“I tell you all that and you’re only concerned about what my brother did?”
“No…it’s just.”
He stepped a few inches closer to her, needing to emphasize that he was telling the truth. “No, listen to me, July. None of what that bitch said was true at all. Nothing. She’s been after every single one of us, but we ignored her because Matt thought she was great at her job. She’s the one who told Matt that she caught me and Candice together. My brother was ready to kill me and it was all total bullshit. Spence had enough of her shit, and when Candice told us that she said that Rose was with Matt first and Matt was still in love with her, well, that was it.”
“She said that you were with
Rose, too.”
“Damn, I’m so glad I didn’t learn this shit when I was in Boston.”
“There’s nothing between you two?”
“She’s my sister-in-law and that’s it. Spencer stole her from Matt, but that’s another story. And no, they were never together in any way.” Ryan made it clear he was referring to intimacy with a simple hand gesture. “I’m sorry that you believed her. I don’t know why you would have, but I wished you would have told me.”
“Ryan, men like you, they can persuade women to believe whatever they want with their charm.” That was it for the rest of the room. They heard more than they cared to and scattered into the kitchen and outside. Ryan moved closer to her, watching as the pulse in her neck increased.
A grin stole over his face. “You think I’m charming? That’s shocking because I tried to be an asshole as much as I could.”
“It’s pretty obvious. I couldn’t resist you, and I already believed that you’d been with Mara.”
“I’m sorry, sweetheart. I hope that you can never resist me, but we’re not all like that. I don’t know where you get that from.”
“Most men in power are roaming from woman to woman, even after they find ‘the one.’” She emphasized with air quotes.
“I can’t speak for anyone else or say it’s not true because I know men like that, but I’m not and neither are my brothers or my father. After seeing Spencer with Rose and my dad and mom, I thought you’d know that.” He paused for a moment, thinking of how to phrase his question. “If you stayed with me that night, what changed your mind that morning?”
She shook her head and Ryan wondered what could it have been. “Mara called your phone and started telling me what happened in your office that day.”
“Fuck, you know I wanted to fire her that day. I knew what she was trying to do when you walked in. She was trying to cause trouble, but because I was trying keep you at arms’ length I didn’t say a thing. I should have corrected the stupid situation as soon as you walked in the room. It wasn’t what you thought at all. She only walked into my office a minute before you and plopped her ass on my desk.”
“So why was your shirt untucked if nothing happened?” she challenged him, taking a step back and crossing her arms.
He looked around to make sure no one was in earshot when he pulled her into his arms. “I thought I locked my door to my office when you went to lunch. Then I did the same thing I did every time you went to lunch. I took my cock out of my pants and stroked it to thoughts of you on your knees in front of me taking me down that slender throat of yours or bent over my desk, making you pay for me wanting you. I’d come all over my hand and the waiting tissues, moaning your name within a minute. It was the only thing that kept me from taking you. Every day I fought off the need to be inside of you claiming you as mine.” The heat revved up between them, the distance almost non-existent.
“Really?” He read the vulnerability in her eyes.
He nodded with a sheepish half-smile. “Really. You don’t know how hard you made me, or how jealous you made me when a male client or employee showed up. Then the other day you were bent over cleaning that spill and I almost knocked out every one of those fuckers for staring at your ass or saying how they wanted you to bend over for them.”
“That’s why you yelled at me?” A smile of satisfaction and joy crossed July’s face with her ability to make Ryan jealous.
“Yes, I was beyond jealous and hard as fuck, watching your ass move back and forth as you scrubbed with that tight ass blue skirt.” He closed his eyes, picturing the sight that day. That day I should have taken her home and fucked her like she deserved.
“Oh, I thought you were embarrassed that I was cleaning it up. I just didn’t want the people to think bad of you with a stain on the floor.”
“Well, sweetheart, if you ever feel the need to clean up a stain on your hands and knees in our home, I’ll gladly show you how bad I want to fuck you.”
“I feel like a dumbass.”
“Don’t. I just wished you would have said something before running. I would have been happy to prove to you that you’re mine. Didn’t you notice that you replaced the tissues on my desk a lot, but I’ve never had a cold?”
“I thought you didn’t like to show weakness so you sneezed in private.”
“No, I came in private. July, I’m in love with you. I’ve been in love with you from the first day. I don’t want to be without you and now our little one. I wish I’d broken company policy and taken you a long time ago.”
“Is that why you said you needed to hire a new assistant?”
“No, if we’re married it’s not a big deal, but what I was talking about was I wouldn’t be able to concentrate if you worked for me. I’d be in you more than I would be working and you’d be pregnant all the damn time. I’d need someone anyway.”
“You can be a caveman, you know that?”
“I wasn’t until the day I met you, and it really came out when you started dating someone else.”
“I wasn’t dating him. He’s a family friend who happened to be in town. My heart belonged to you from the moment you smiled at me as I got off the elevator. He’s got a thing for a girl back here anyway. And that dress…I wore that for you. I hoped that you’d somehow show up with your brother or something and see me.”
“Well, I lied about that, too. I heard you on the phone making your date.”
“Fucking, Ryan and you called me a liar.”
“Yes, but it doesn’t take away from the fact that you lied. That whole two wrongs thing,” he answered, smiling at her, looking for a bit of leeway.
She shook her head softly, then muttered, “We’re a pair, aren’t we?”
“That we are. Now. Can you tell me how you’re feeling?” Ryan pressed his hand to July’s still flat belly. “You look like you’ve lost weight.”
“I’m feeling okay. The morning sickness thing is no joke. Except it’s not just the morning.”
“I’m sorry that I missed this. I won’t any more. If you need anything, you tell me. I don’t know what to do, but I promise to do my best.”
“It’s my fault that you weren’t here or rather that I wasn’t back in Boston. It was childish for me to run away. I wanted to stay, but even a slight bit of her words being true tore me to pieces and I was afraid I would feel resentment over time.”
“There’s nothing we can do to change the past. If I’d not been a little pussy and waited, then you’d been over my desk getting dicked months ago. Our baby would be almost here already. Let’s move past this. She’s out of our lives and Spencer made sure that she was far from us. He had enough with the games. Fingers crossed the threatened lawsuit and potential mental hospital time keeps her crazy ass away.” He held her close, loving the feeling of having her back in his arms.
~~~~
July looked up into his eyes and wondered could this all be real. She loved him with everything in her. She knew she’d been a fool, but her love for him was so strong she was scared of it and what it would do to her if he left.
“July, I love you,” he said as he looked down at her. The rapid heartbeat she had already, kicked into overdrive. She didn’t respond right away because it was overwhelming. Instead she continued to stare up at him with a smile that she couldn’t hide from all of Texas.
When he was about to say something else she practically shouted, “I love you so much, Ryan Kane.”
“Thank the fucking stars for that. Now, can I kiss those lips that I’ve missed so much?”
“Only if you promise to never stop.”
“Oh woman, you’re going to be in trouble if you keep that up. I’m trying to be a gentleman so your father doesn’t take me out back to pasture, but you’re pushing it.”
“He won’t. Truth be told, my dad is very old-fashioned. No working outside the house for women. They are too valuable to the house to stay away. Men should work to care for their families.”
“I can’t say I don
’t agree because I feel the same way.” July had a feeling that he was going to push the barefoot and pregnant thing and a big part of her didn’t mind the idea at all. Maybe I was more old-fashioned than I thought.
Chapter 6
The family all gathered around for dinner that night in Texas. “For some reason, I thought it would be a lot warmer.”
“A little farther south and you’d be in shorts, but here we get a mild winter.”
“Good to know.” He finished his plate and just then, July and her mother got up to clear the table. “I’m sorry, but we have a big tradition in my family. Mr. Cooper, Aaron, and Marcus, pick up the dishes and let’s go into the kitchen. Ladies, thank you for a lovely dinner.” Ryan leaned down and gave July a soft kiss on her lips before grabbing her plate. Everyone’s mouths dropped open, but they all got up and grabbed the dishes.
“Boy, I like you. Knuckleheads could learn a thing or two from you.”
“It’s something my father instilled in us. My mother did everything for us, and this was the least we could do after a long day and great meal.”
After dinner, they sat outside with a bonfire. Mr. Cooper pulled his wife onto his lap. It didn’t bother Ryan because he pulled July right on top of his lap. “I love you,” she whispered in his ear.
“I’m sorry it took so long. I love you, July.” Ryan wrapped his arms around hers and gave a soft squeeze.
“What’s going to happen with the two of you?” her mother asked. She was staring at them anxiously waiting for an answer. With the baby coming, Ryan was certain that they would want a quick wedding, so no one could say anything about the family or July. If he heard someone say anything negative about her, he’d show him that he wasn’t just a businessman and that he’d spent many nights in the gym.
“Well, I know that we’re getting married as soon as possible. My family won’t be available until Christmas is over, so I’d say after the new year.” He smiled up at July and kissed her on the cheek.
“Where are you all going to live?” her father asked. The answer was obvious to Ryan. It wasn’t like July didn’t like his hometown.