The Gift
Heather Slade
Butler Ranch Book Four
The Gift
© 2017 Heather Slade
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.
ISBN 10: 1-942200-33-1
ISBN 13: 978-1-942200-33-8
Contents
Also by Heather Slade
Part I
I. Brodie
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
II. Maddox
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
III. Naughton
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Part II
IV. Ainsley
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
V. Quinn
Chapter 14
About the Author
Also by Heather Slade
More from Author Heather Slade
The Truth
Fall for Me
Also by Heather Slade
BUTLER RANCH
Available Now!
Book One: The Promise
Book Two: The Truce
Book Three: The Secret
Book Five: The Truth
Coming Soon!
Book Six: The Return
COWBOYS OF CRESTED BUTTE
Available Now!
Book One: Fall for Me
Book Two: Dance with Me
Book Three: Kiss Me Cowboy
Book Four: Stay with Me
Book Five: Win Me Over
Coming Soon!
Book Six: Sing to Me
Two New Series Coming Soon!
WICKED WINEMAKERS
Book One: Ridge
LOS CABALLEROS
Book One: Gabe
I
Book One
I
Brodie
September
1
“I feel like I’m missing everything,” Peyton said when Brodie leaned down to kiss her goodbye. Seven months into what had been a high-risk pregnancy, she knew better than to be out, picking grapes in the scorching heat common in their valley during the month of September, but Brodie understood. Every vineyard owner, winemaker, and their staff were busy with the harvest from before the sun came up until long after it set. Unless you were too, it could be a very lonely time.
“I’d much rather stay in bed with you,” he said, toeing off his boots and climbing back under the covers. “Three is ungodly enough, but this nonsense about picking at two in the morning is inhumane.”
Since a fire had devastated several of the Butler Ranch vineyards right before harvest, they needed to pick as quickly as they could to minimize strain on the remaining vines. Yesterday afternoon, Naughton had called a family meeting to let everyone know they’d start picking at two instead of three in the morning. To get there on time, Brodie had to leave Cambria—and Peyton—at one thirty.
“Would it be easier if you stayed at the ranch?” she asked, snuggling closer to him.
He pulled back to look into her eyes. “You’re kidding, right?”
“You could sleep another half hour…”
Brodie rested his cheek against the top of Peyton’s head, wishing again he could stay. When her breathing evened out and he was certain she’d fallen back to sleep, Brodie eased out of bed, grabbed his boots, and quietly closed the bedroom door behind him.
He crept down the hall to the bedroom Jamison and Finn, Peyton’s two sons, had recently started sharing. He slowly opened the door, wishing he’d remembered to oil the creaky hinges when he came home last night.
Neither boy budged. They’d probably gotten used to sleeping through the noises that came along with an older house that sat only yards from the Pacific Ocean.
He kissed Jamie’s forehead and gently pulled a book out from under his pillow. Its pages were dog-eared like many of the boy’s other favorite books, but this one in particular, he knew was special.
Brodie’s oldest brother, Kade, had given When the Mountain Meets the Moon to Peyton’s oldest son shortly before he left on his last mission, the same one he never came back from. Not only was the book Jamie’s favorite, it was eight-year-old Finn’s too.
Brodie leaned down and kissed the youngest boy’s forehead, before creeping back out into the hallway.
Jamison would celebrate his eleventh birthday the week before Thanksgiving, and Brodie still hadn’t found a present for him. There were gifts that he and Peyton had chosen together, but Brodie wanted to find something special he could give Jamie that would be just from him.
As much as he wanted to go back and check on Peyton once more before he left, he knew that, if he did, he’d end up back in bed with her and in big trouble with Maddox and Naughton, who were counting on his help today.
“Mornin’,” Maddox said, handing Brodie a cup and a thermos of coffee.
“Where are we pickin’?” he asked as he poured the steaming hot liquid.
“Finishing the rest of the whites today.”
“Where’s Naught?”
Maddox shrugged and looked at his phone. “He’s got five minutes.”
“How’s Bradley?”
“Damn, foolish woman,” Naughton said, joining his brothers near the edge of the first vineyard.
“She wants to pick?”
“Of course she does. Out in this heat…she needs to rest and recover. She thinks a concussion isn’t reason to take it easy.” Naughton shook his head. It had only been three days since Bradley was kidnapped and held at gunpoint.
Brodie looked back at the house he’d shared with Naughton until only recently.
“What are you thinkin’ about?” Naughton asked.
Brodie took another sip of his coffee. “This place. I miss living here.”
“I’m gonna miss it, too,” said Maddox. “Alex and I will be at Demetria full-time as soon as we’re through the harvest and the crush.”
Between picking grapes, crushing them to extract the juice, and then finally starting the fermentation process, he and his brothers worked around the clock from September to November.
“What about you? Planning to move off the ranch after we’re done with the harvest this year?” Brodie asked Naughton, who shrugged.
“Don’t know yet. I guess we’ll decide after the wedding.”
“Wedding?” Brodie and Maddox gasped in unison.
“Last day of the harvest,” he answered.
“Who? You and Bradley?”
“Who else would I be marrying, Brode?”
Brodie looked at Maddox who had the same shit-eating grin on his face as usual. For as long as he could remember, he’d never known whether Maddox was privy to things Brodie knew nothing about, or if he just looked like he was.
It sounded as though the brother Brodie had always thought would be the last to marry would actually be the first.
“You getting married, too?” Brodie asked Maddox, who shrugged the same way Naughton had a minute earlier.
“If I am, the two of you won’t be the first to know.”
“Better not be, Mad-man.” Alex wrapped her arms around his brother’s waist. “Are you guys talking about Naught and Bradley’s wedding?”
“You knew about it?” Maddox asked her.
Alex nodded and looked at her phone. “Are we picking today or standing around yappin’? It’ll be daybreak before we know it, and Peyton and I offered to help Bradley plan the nuptials this afternoon.”
“Appreciate your help this year, Alex,” Naughton mumbled.
Alex let go of Maddox, put her arms around Naughton, and kissed his cheek. “I love being out in the vines during the harvest. My brothers never let me help at Los Cab.”
Brodie doubted anyone, even all six of Alex’s brothers, could keep her from doing a damn thing she wanted to do.
“Let’s go, then.” Maddox motioned for Alex to follow him over to one of the ATVs. “Where’s Hawks?” he asked.
“Viognier,” Naughton told him.
“That where you want us?”
Naughton nodded, and Maddox and Alex took off in the direction of the highest vineyard at Butler Ranch.
“Where do you want me?” Brodie asked.
“Walk with me. I need to talk to you,” Naughton answered.
“Everything okay?” Brodie asked after they’d walked for several minutes in silence.
“How’s Peyton?”
“She’s doing well.”
“Glad to hear it.”
“Is that why you needed to talk to me, to ask about Peyton?”
“No. The wedding.”
“Yeah?”
“I’d like it if you’d be my best man.”
He was stunned. More than stunned—he was shocked. If Naughton asked anyone, Brodie thought it would be Maddox.
“Of course I will,” Brodie answered when he realized Naughton was waiting for him to. “I’d be honored.”
“We’re each just gonna have one person stand up with us. The whole thing will be simple. Bradley is asking her aunt to be the bridesmaid, or whatever you call it.”
“I think it’s maid of honor.”
“I did too, but I guess that was wrong. Bradley said they call it something else when the woman isn’t single.”
Naughton shrugged and so did Brodie. It really didn’t matter what it was called, although when he and Peyton finally found time to talk about when they’d get married, he supposed he’d learn more about it.
“What do I have to do?” He’d never been anyone’s best man before, but he figured there were certain things that would be expected of him.
“Show up is about all I know. You have to sign something I think. Like as a witness.”
Skye was the only one of his siblings who was married, but none of the brothers had been in the wedding, only Ainsley had.
“Am I supposed to throw a bachelor party?”
“Nah. There won’t be time. The whole thing is gonna be small and kind of last minute.”
“What’s the plan?”
“Last day of harvest. I already told you that.”
Brodie smiled. As though that was all he needed to know. No doubt there’d be a lot more to it, but Naught wouldn’t be the best person to talk to about this sort of thing. Instead, he’d ask Peyton what she and Alex had planned with Bradley. Surely, they’d be able to tell him what his required duties as best man would be.
“How is Bradley? I know you said she wanted to help pick, but how is she emotionally?”
“Better than I am.”
That made sense. While Bradley was the one Jason Calder had knocked out and kidnapped, and also one of the only people who saw him die, Naughton was the one who would never forget almost losing her. At least that’s how Brodie assumed his brother felt. It’s how he would’ve felt if anything like that had happened to Peyton.
“You ready to pick?” Naught asked, shaking Brodie out of his thoughts.
They picked until ten in the morning when it became too hot for them to continue. Maddox was headed into the winery to crush the grapes they’d brought in that day, but said he didn’t mind if Brodie left.
He didn’t know if it was Bradley’s kidnapping, or the fact it felt like someone had a vendetta against the Butler family, or if it was simply that during the harvest season, there was never enough time to do more than eat, sleep, and pick, but Brodie felt as though he hadn’t had any time alone with Peyton. With her Jamie and Finn at school until later that afternoon, he’d have his chance if he went home now.
They had a lot to discuss, all relatively urgent, but none more than deciding where they’d live and when they would be married. Although he did understand why she didn’t want to have the ceremony until after the baby was born.
“I don’t want it to seem like we’re just getting married because I’m pregnant,” she’d told him the last time they talked about it. “Plus, I’m as big as a house.”
It didn’t matter that he thought she grew more beautiful every day, or that the only evidence she was pregnant was the bump in her belly, which looked like a small soccer ball. He was smart enough to know he shouldn’t try to talk her into planning the wedding until she was ready.
Peyton’s sons had been pushing harder for them to get ready for their baby sister’s arrival than Brodie had. Over the weekend, Jamison had announced that Finn was moving his stuff out of his bedroom and into Jamie’s. “Our baby sister needs her own room,” he had explained when Peyton asked why.
“There’s plenty of time for that, Jamie,” she’d told him. “She won’t be here for another three months, and even then, she won’t need very much room. Both of you slept in a bassinet next to the bed until you were at least a month old. Maybe longer.”
“But it’s a boy’s room,” Finn pointed out. “She won’t like it unless you make it a girl’s room.”
Peyton had shrugged her shoulders then.
Brodie knew something neither Peyton nor her boys knew, and it was time he filled them in.
“It’s sweet of them to want to do something nice for their sister,” she’d said to Brodie later, rubbing her belly when she did.
The time had come; Brodie couldn’t put the surprise off any longer. Even though it wasn’t quite ready, tonight he’d take the three of them to see what he’d been working on.
When he walked into her house, Brodie found Peyton in what had been Finn’s bedroom. She’d moved the furniture to the center of the room and was taping off the baseboards.
“Hey, pretty girl,” Brodie said, watching her from the doorway. “You need some help?”
Peyton put her hand to her heart. “Brodie, you startled me. You’re back early.”
“Maddox furloughed me for the afternoon.” He pulled his phone out of his back pocket and looked at the screen. “And since Naughton doesn’t need me, I may just turn this damn thing off and spend the rest of the day with you.”
She smiled. Every time she did, Brodie felt warm all over. He still couldn’t believe she loved him. Having Peyton in his life was a gift from his brother, Kade, and no matter how many times he looked up at the sky and silently thanked him, it would never be enough.
He walked over, intending to sit on the floor next to her, but Peyton stood instead. “This will wait,” she told him, leading him out of one bedroom and into another.
“Touch me, Brodie,” she said. Peyton pulled her shirt over her head and was about to slip out of her pants, when Brodie put his hand on hers.
“Let me,” he breathed. He stared into her eyes and loosened the tie that held her drawstring pants up, and then knelt in front of her, kissing the skin that was exposed as he lowered them.
She rested her hands on his shoulders when he gently pushed her back on the bed and held himself above her.
When he first tongued one, and then the other, of her nipples, Peyton moaned, her body vibrating with need.
“Does that hurt?” he asked.
“No. Yes. I don’t know. Just don’t stop, Brodie. Please.”
He focused his attention back on the hardened, dark pink nubs, swirling his tongue around them before drawing them into his mouth.
“More,” she pleaded, arching her back and digging her nails into his shoulders. “I need you inside me,” she moa
ned.
“Soon, sweetheart. Don’t rush me.” Brodie caught her legs behind her knees, spreading her open for him, and running his eyes from her pink flesh, up to the curve of her belly, and the larger swell of her breasts. She had no idea how exquisitely beautiful she was with her body carrying the life they’d made together.
He was overcome with emotion and didn’t move until she began to writhe beneath him.
“Now, Brodie,” she demanded, tangling her fingers in his hair and pulling him close enough that her lips could reach his.
He palmed her bottom, raising her enough that he could thrust inside her. She thrashed against him, tilting her hips so he sunk even deeper into her warmth.
“The boys,” Peyton groaned more than a couple of hours later. Brodie had lost track of time while losing himself in Peyton’s body. It had been too long since they’d spent a whole afternoon in bed, worried about nothing other than each other.
He’d needed this time with her more than he realized. He felt as though they’d reconnected, both of them focusing on their love for each other instead of whatever else was happening outside the walls of her house.
“There’s time,” Brodie said after looking over at the clock. “They won’t be done with football practice for another hour.”
“I forgot all about football.” She shook her head. “What’s wrong with me?”
Brodie pulled the sheet back and let his gaze linger on her nakedness. “There isn’t a single thing wrong with you,” he said, randomly kissing different parts of her body.
The Gift Page 1