Never Say Never Again

by Tori Carrington

  Bronte immediately melted against him, a moan building deep in her chest. Oh, how often over the past week she had dreamed of kissing him again. Of feeling his body against the length of hers. Of having evidence of his arousal pressing against the soft, quivering flesh of her stomach. He thoroughly plundered her mouth, stealing her breath, and making it impossible to do anything but receive.

  Finally, he pulled away, the searing heat in his eyes undeniable.

  Bronte licked her lips. “My, you have a way with words.”

  His naughty grin made her toes curl in the tips of her shoes. “Your turn.”

  “Marry me,” she blurted.

  She stood staring at him as if he had said the words rather than she. But she could tell by his stunned expression that she, indeed, had just essentially proposed to him when only moments before she had convinced herself she could accept living only for today.

  “Bronte, I—”

  She clamped her hand over his mouth, trying to ignore how the moist heat of his lips seemed to burn her palm. “No, wait. I know why you think marriage isn’t in the cards for you. At least, I think I do. After having spent so much of your life looking after others, you don’t believe you have room in your heart for anything more.” She smiled tremulously. Where had all her cowardice disappeared to? “But I have to ask you this. Do you love me?”

  Talk about laying everything on the line…. What was she doing? Was she insane? Wasn’t it enough that he was here? Admitting that he wanted her and that he’d been wrong?

  No, it wasn’t enough. She wanted him—now, tomorrow, and forever. She knew that as certainly as she knew her own name. And she wanted him to know that. More importantly, she needed to know he felt the same way.

  “I…” he faltered, looking like he would have backed up if he’d had anywhere to go except up against the door. “For God’s sake, Bronte, where did all this come from?”

  She tried to still the wild beating of her heart. “Just answer me, McCoy.”

  His eyes shifted as he gazed into first one, then the other of hers. She was surprised by his wide grin. “Is this how you get criminals to come clean?”

  “As a matter of fact, it is. Are you saying you’re a criminal?”

  His grin vanished, and the gravity of his expression made her stomach contract. “Yes, I guess I am. Because rather than telling you what I did the other day, I should have said what you needed to hear. What I needed to tell you but was too much of jerk to say. Words I’ve never uttered ever in my life.” He reached out, cupping her cheek. “I love you, Bronte O’Brien…truly, deeply, madly. And I can’t go on with my life without you in it.”

  Her throat closed with emotion and her eyes flooded with tears. “Boy, when you decide to do something—”

  He interrupted her. “And my answer to your first question is an unqualified yes.”

  “Yes?” she asked, sucking in her lips to try to staunch the flow of tears.

  “Yes.” He grasped her hips, bringing her flush up against his arousal. “Oh, and another thing?”

  After the heartwarming, nearly overwhelming, change in events from only a few minutes ago, she was almost afraid to ask. “What?”

  He claimed her lips in a kiss that could be called nothing short of soulstirring. “I’ve changed my mind on the kid thing. I want to have as many as you’ll let me.”

  Her brows shot up and she stared at him as if seeing a different man. And she realized she was. She wasn’t certain what had happened to him in the past few days, but whatever it was looked very, very good on him. “As many as I let you, huh?”

  One of his hands crept up under her blouse, the other slid down over her bottom, making her gasp. “Uh-huh.”

  Bronte tried to catch her breath, but failed. “Tell me again,” she whispered huskily.

  His eyes were filled with a mixture of teasing sexiness. “Bronte O’Brien…I love you and can’t bear to live another day of my life without you in it.”

  She sighed against him. “It’s even better hearing it the second time around.” She bit roughly on her bottom lip. “But promise me one thing, Connor.” She carefully glanced over his face. “You’ll never say never again.”

  His kiss was all the answer she needed….

  Epilogue

  CONNOR STARED DOWN AT HIS simple platinum wedding band, then straightened his tuxedo jacket. Seemed a shame that, now that he’d gotten this best man thing down to an art, he likely wouldn’t be playing the role anymore. Hell, he was even getting used to wearing these stiff monkey suits, though he doubted he’d ever actually like wearing them. But at least now he owned his own. The girl at the rental place had shaken her head when he came in again and told him to take it. Lord knew he had rented it enough times to pay for it three times over.

  Connor caught sight of Bronte. As always happened when he looked at her, his throat tightened, his heartbeat accelerated and a weird, weightless feeling settled in the bottom of his stomach. She didn’t even have to do anything. Just stand there and let him look at her.

  Right now she was talking with the rest of the McCoy women near the front of the main McCoy place. He allowed his gaze to skim leisurely where the deep blue of her bridesmaid dress hugged her high, curvy bottom. As if sensing his gaze, his wife of four months turned and gave him a completely wicked wink.

  Applause began. Tearing his gaze from Bronte, Connor turned to find the couple of the hour appearing in the front doorway to the house.

  Melanie’s mother, Wilhemenia, had just officially become Mrs. Sean McCoy.

  Connor stood stock still as the small gathering of friends and neighbors in Manchester, Virginia, tossed pink-colored rice and congratulated the new couple. He waited for remorse to hit him or disappointment that his father had replaced his mother. But neither emotion came. Instead, a completely different feeling rushed through his bloodstream. Pure joy. Happiness that Pops had someone he loved, and that someone loved him back. Completely. To recognize that, all one had to do was look at their faces. The way they gazed at each other and constantly touched one another. Often it was downright embarrassing just being around the affectionate couple.

  “They make a cute pair, don’t they?”

  Connor shifted to find his wife standing next to him and the joy he felt melded into pure bliss. “Yeah. I guess they do.”

  He smiled warmly at her. No longer needing to hide his emotions from her. No longer caring whether or not she knew how much he loved her; hoping she did. He trusted this woman more than he trusted anyone. Including his brothers. And that was saying a lot. Bronte O’Brien McCoy had stolen his heart, his love for her indelibly etched on his soul.

  “All right, everyone!” The woman Wilhemenia had hired from Maryland to take the wedding photographs clapped her hands. “Portraits over here. All McCoy and Weber family members, your presence is required. Chop chop!”

  Bronte laughed, increasing that weightless feeling in Connor’s stomach. “Don’t look now, but the camera Nazi is bearing down on us,” she said, tucking her hand in the crook of his arm.

  He covered her fingers with his and squeezed. “Well, we’d better get a move on then, hadn’t we?”

  They followed the long line of others to stand in front of the house and take their places where the photographer indicated. Connor glanced around his familiar surroundings, only they weren’t so familiar anymore. Maybe because he now saw them through different eyes, or perhaps because they truly had changed. Gone was the old barn, in its place a thriving thatch of wildflowers the McCoy women had spent an entire day planting a couple of months back. A little ways away, the new barn housing Mitch and Liz’s horse-breeding operations shone warmly in the midday sun.

  “No, over here,” he made out Kelli’s voice beside him and looked to see her tugging David to stand next to her. “And keep your hands to yourself or your expression in the picture will mirror the pain I inflict.”

  Connor quietly chuckled as his gaze slid to where Marc and Melanie stood far
ther down, little Sean animatedly chomping down on his mother’s necklace even as his parents heatedly discussed something of import. Next to them, Lili was tugging on baby Sean’s brand-new shoe, trying to gain his attention while Goliath had his jaws locked on her frilly blue skirt. But Jake and Michelle didn’t seem to notice. Michelle was smoothing down the front of his tuxedo shirt and smiling up at him in a way that was all too provocative, and none too subtle.

  “Quite a bunch, huh?” Mitch whispered, coming to stand on the other side of him.

  Connor grinned and nodded, noticing where Liz was chatting with Bronte. Mitch had yet to convince Liz to have the five kids he wanted, but word had it he was wearing her down. Connor was pleased with the thought that there might be a whole brood of new McCoys running around the place soon.

  “Places everyone, places!” the photographer shouted, rushing around, frantically straightening a collar here, fixing a smear of lipstick there.

  Connor grasped Bronte’s hips where she stood slightly in front of him. He eyed the back of her neck, recalling one of the first times he’d ever laid eyes on her, remembering how much he’d wanted to play connect the dots with her freckles.

  It was hard to believe that just a short time ago he and Bronte had been at Kelli and David’s wedding reception. Harder still to recognize the man he’d been then.

  He bent slightly to brush his lips against the skin just below her ear. “Have I told you how wonderful you look today?”

  Her answering shiver made him grin. “Thanks. You don’t know how much I needed to hear that.” She grasped his hands, moving them from her hips to her belly and pressing them flat. Just that morning he’d caught her standing in front of the mirror, horrified and pleased that she was beginning to show.

  Yes, that’s right. As incredible as it sounded, he and Bronte were four months’ pregnant. Twins, the doctor had told them yesterday. The first two of what he hoped would be many. Enough to fill the six bedrooms of his grandparents’ old place, where he and Bronte had moved after they married.

  “I love you, Bronte,” he murmured.

  She increased the pressure of her hands against his, briefly closing her eyes. “Not any more than I love you.”

  “Smile, everybody!”

  And Connor did. Because at that moment he was the happiest man in the world.

  ISBN: 978-1-4268-6136-9

  NEVER SAY NEVER AGAIN

  Copyright © 2001 by Lori and Tony Karayianni.

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