Love Under Two Kendalls

by Cara Covington

“We get it,” Adam said. “It wasn’t us Ginny had to learn to trust. She’d done that weeks ago, or else she wouldn’t have…” Adam closed his mouth, but Jake could easily finish his sentence for him. Ginny did trust them or she never would have let them kiss her, never would have indicated that she was seriously considering taking them both on.

  “It was herself she needed to trust,” Jake said. “She needed to know she could handle whatever life threw at her.”

  “Like she did the day we grabbed Ramos. She saw in his eyes he meant to shoot someone, and she acted to defend herself and her friends.”

  Jake met Adam’s gaze. Then they both looked at their mother. They knew they had it right, but seeing Samantha’s beaming smile confirmed it.

  “The jet’s mostly ready,” Henry said then. “Won’t take long to finish the process and file our flight plan.”

  “I still don’t know if I understand why New Jersey,” Jake said.

  “I do.” Adam took his napkin back, placing it across his lap. “Ginny mentioned once that her mother was from New Jersey, and that, just before Benny was born, she’d learned she had an aunt—her mother’s baby sister—still there. Prior to that she’d believed she had no family alive at all on her mother’s side.”

  Adam closed his eyes, and Jake waited quietly, knowing his brother was searching his very good memory. “Morrison. Margaret Morrison. She runs a motor hotel in Wildwood Crest called…”

  “The Leprechaun,” Samantha said. “Now eat.”

  “I really wish now we’d been able to talk her into taking a cell phone,” Adam said to him. “After that success we had in tracking Julia…”

  “I know.” Jake spooned up some of his dinner. He’d been right, of course, when he’d said his mother’s Irish stew smelled wonderful. It tasted wonderful, too. Too bad he didn’t have very much of an appetite. “I figured we’d have her convinced in another week, two tops.”

  “She has mine,” Samantha said.

  Jake looked up at his mother, and then grinned. He reached into his pocket, pulled out his phone, intending to call Ginny right there and then.

  “No.” Adam put his hand over the top of Jake’s phone. “Let’s leave her be, for now. She’ll call if she needs us. Let’s give her the room she seems to need.”

  “Good thinking. We’ll give her the rest of tonight, anyway.”

  “There, see, you are my sons after all!” Samantha said.

  Tamara leaned over so she could look at Tracy. “I don’t know about you, but I’m taking notes.”

  “I have done so for years. Come over anytime. I’ll share.”

  Jake grinned at his family. “It seems the newest members are fitting in just fine.” He turned to look at Peter. “As I did recognize just who it was who snickered, earlier.”

  “Nice to know my efforts are appreciated,” Peter said.

  “After dinner, I’ll call Matt and bring him up to speed on what we accomplished today—which wasn’t much,” Adam said. “I haven’t taken any vacation time in more than a year. I’m due. He and Jasper can handle things.”

  “How long you plan on staying out East?” His father, Preston, sat back from his plate and waited for his answer.

  “I guess as long as Ginny wants to stay there. We’ll keep our fingers crossed. Maybe while we’re gone, that bast…” Jake pulled back the rest of the cuss word just in time, shooting his mother an apologetic smile. “I mean, fugitive, Walters, will be apprehended again.”

  “We’ll all pray for that,” Taylor said.

  “I’ll arrange for you to have a car when you get to Atlantic City. I’ll also have the rental agency give you a map and directions to the inn,” Charles said.

  “Thanks, dads.” Jake found his appetite had been restored. Adam began eating in earnest, too. Now that they knew where their woman was, and they had a plan, they both felt better.

  “It’ll only take us about fifteen minutes to pack,” Adam said. “Then we’ll head to the field.”

  “When we’re done here, we’ll leave,” Henry said. “Morgan and Tamara are coming, too. The three of us are going to spend a few days in Atlantic City. If you’re not ready to come back to Lusty with us then, I’ll come back for you when you are ready.”

  Jake nodded. He still intended to call Richardson. He was willing to step back for the most part, and let the Abilene PD and the Rangers handle the search for Walters while he and Adam focused on their woman and what she needed.

  But that didn’t mean they had to be hands off—or that they couldn’t pull a few strings, even from New Jersey.

  “I’ll take my laptop. Easier to stay in touch that way,” Adam said.

  Jake exchanged a knowing look with Adam, and knew they were on the same page. Adam would make a few inquiries, too, and they’d both keep their fingers on the pulse of the manhunt.

  That was, after all, how Kendalls did things.

  Chapter 5

  Benny’s delighted laughter took the scowl right off Ginny’s face. She couldn’t help but smile when her little man was having such obvious fun.

  “Mama, did you see? I beat that wave!”

  “I did see that, Benny Rose. You just be careful now. That water’s cold!”

  Benny just grinned, and ran back to the water’s edge to race the waves again.

  Ginny sighed and relaxed into the beach chair Maggie had forced upon her. She’d offered, as forcefully as she knew how, to help her aunt with the cleaning of the rented units. Maggie, maddeningly, had refused. She’d gone on and on about needing the exercise, and there only being a handful of rooms rented out at the moment, anyway.

  Ginny figured she’d been outmaneuvered by a woman who could give Grandma Kate, Bernice Benedict, and Samantha Kendall a run for their money.

  She’d helped Benny build one sand castle already today. She figured she’d let him play on his own for a while—under her watchful gaze, of course—and try and get some relaxation in, herself.

  Ginny closed the book that sat open on her lap as she continued to watch her son play. She’d given up trying to read the novel that had come with the chair. Honestly, she’d never cottoned to romance stories. The heroes and heroines always seemed so unreal. Not an uneducated waitress in the bunch.

  Of course, sheriffs and lawyers always figured prominently in those stories, but still.

  Ginny exhaled deeply and allowed herself to think the truth. There’s only one romance story I’m interested in at the moment, and it’s not one that’s in any book.

  She’d brought Samantha’s cell phone down with her when she’d left their room heading for the beach. Ginny hauled herself out of the chair and then reached into her pocket and pulled the device out. She looked at it for a long moment, recalling the simple instructions Samantha had given her on using it.

  She didn’t know if it was a bad sign, or not, that Adam and Jake hadn’t, either of them, called her. Maybe they were just giving her some space. Lord, she hoped that was it. She hoped they weren’t so mad at her that they didn’t want to have anything more to do with her.

  Ginny shook her head. That was Deke-era thinking. She’d never doubted her self-worth before that man had conned his way into her life. He conned me. Yes, she understood now that’s exactly what he’d done. Maybe he’d thought she’d be an easy mark because she was a young, single mom. Of course, she’d proven easy to manipulate. She knew now that all he’d wanted to do was to dominate her sexually as well as make her slave for him in other ways.

  Virginia Earline Rose was finished with Deke Walters and all the emotional crap that had come with him. It was time she finally flushed it all away. As long as she stayed afraid to move forward, whether he was with her or not, he was still controlling her. Controlling her, and basking in his victory.

  By God, she’d had enough of that! She’d had enough of him.

  And if those two Kendalls thought for one moment they could toss her over just because she’d needed to take a step back from a dangerous situation, well,
they had another think coming.

  She didn’t let herself consider what she was doing. She just selected speed dial and hit the number beside the first name that came up.

  As she listened to the phone ring, she watched Benny building his second sand castle, and began to have self-doubting thoughts all over again. It wouldn’t have hurt her to call Adam and Jake and let them know where she was, and that she was all right. They really had every right to be pissed with her.

  “Ginny.”

  The sound of Adam’s greeting, soft and deep, pulled a sob out of her, a sob she didn’t even know was there.

  “Sweetheart, are you all right?”

  His gentle question, brimming with concern, unlocked the gate inside her. The words came flooding out, one after the other in a nonstop apology. “I’m sorry. I should have called you, should have told you how I was feeling. I was afraid, so afraid I couldn’t think, couldn’t sleep. I was afraid he’d find me and make me go back there, to that dark place where I was before. I had to stop that from happening. I had to leave. But I should have called you and Jake and told you. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. Please forgive me. Oh, please.”

  “Hush, sweet baby, it’s all right. We’re the ones who need to apologize to you. We never even stopped to ask you how you were feeling, or what you wanted to do about the situation. And we really should have done that. We hope you can forgive us. Can you, Ginny? Can you forgive us?”

  Adam’s words became a balm for her shattered emotions, soothing her and making her yearn all at the same time. Oh, God, she needed them! She needed them both so much. She needed to feel their arms around her, holding her. She needed to feel the beat of their hearts under her ear. She needed the heat of their bodies to come into her own and warm her where she’d been frozen for so long.

  “I…yes. Oh, yes. I…I need you. I need you both so much. I wish—”

  “Ginny, turn around, baby.”

  His words sounded strange and didn’t make any sense at all. Turn around? Turn around how? She blinked as her mind tried to understand what he was saying to her. “I…what?”

  “I said, turn around.”

  Aside from the laughter she could hear in it, Adam’s voice sounded different, almost as if there were two of him. Understanding became a lightning strike that shot through her, galvanized her. Her heart thudded once, then twice, joy warring with disbelief as she spun around on the sand.

  And saw them, the two most wonderful men in the entire world, not fifty feet away from her and headed her way.

  Adam closed his phone and tucked it into his pocket just a couple of steps before he reached her. He was wearing the most appealing smile. Ginny felt herself mesmerized by it. She blinked when Jake reached out, laughing, and took the cell phone from her hand.

  Then Adam gathered her in, gathered her close in that slow, deliberate way he had and wrapped his arms tight, wonderfully tight, around her.

  “Shh, sweet baby, don’t cry, Ginny. Please don’t cry.”

  “You’re here. You’re both here. I needed you so much and you’re here.”

  “Of course we are, love. Because here is where you are.” Jake’s words sounded so very close in her ear.

  Adam must have known what she needed because he eased back, ever so gently, and placed a sweet kiss on her lips. He wouldn’t push, and she loved him for that. But she needed more than that little peck.

  Feeling bold and daring, she pressed close to him and laid her mouth on his. She needed to taste him.

  His flavor unlocked a door within her, and she went wild.

  His arms banded around her as his tongue swept out and in, showing her that he needed to taste her, too. Sweet, wonderful arousal flowed through her, a seductive call to her inner woman, and she wished for one wild moment that they were all three of them naked and horizontal. Her pussy grew damp and began to tingle, and wasn’t that an amazing thing?

  Adam once more eased back. The fire in his gaze thrilled her. Then he smiled, a slow and seductive smile that tickled her arousal. And then he relinquished her to Jake.

  Jake pulled her in just as Benny’s shout reached her from the water’s edge.

  “Hey, Mom, look at what…oh yeah! Adam! Jake!”

  Ginny savored the taste of Jake, sucking him in, using her tongue to gather all that she could, and then burrowed into his embrace. He turned them slightly so she could watch as her boy ran fast, oh so very fast, laughing and calling the names of the two men who’d become his heroes over the last several months.

  Then Benny leapt, mid-run, and Adam caught him, laughing himself, and held his small body safe and close.

  Ginny looked at them then, really looked, and finally saw the love on Adam’s face, and Benny’s. How could she have not seen that love before now?

  In the next moment she found herself turned loose as Benny literally launched himself from one brother to the other. Oh, yes, these two Kendalls both loved her son more, far, far more than she’d realized.

  Adam, grinning wider than she’d ever seen him grin, stepped closer and slid his arm around her. He hugged her tight to his side.

  “Did you come all the way from Lusty to have a vacation with us?” Benny asked.

  “You bet we did. We couldn’t let y’all have fun without us,” Jake said.

  “Ahem.”

  Ginny—and everyone else—turned at the sound. She hadn’t even noticed her aunt approach, and tried not to blush as she realized the woman must have seen both of those very arousing lip-locks. Maggie just stood there, a bemused smile on her face, her gaze going from Adam to Jake.

  “Aunt Maggie, this is Jake and that’s Adam. They came to have a vacation with us. Isn’t that cool?”

  “Yes, I suppose it is.”

  Ginny couldn’t help but laugh at Benny’s enthusiasm. “Adam and Jake Kendall, meet Margaret Morrison, who prefers to be called Maggie.”

  “Ma’am,” Adam didn’t release Ginny as he shook hands with Maggie. Jake shifted his load of Benny to accomplish the same task.

  “I suppose it’s a fortunate thing for everyone that the room next to yours is available,” Maggie said to her. Ginny tried, but failed, to stop her blush.

  Maggie just laughed and turned her attention back to the men. “If you gentlemen planned to stay, that is.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Adam said. “We’ll be staying for as long as Ginny and Benny are. And yes, we’d like the room next door to them.”

  Maggie waved her hand. “Just Maggie, please. I doubt I’m much older than either of you.”

  “I’d have said younger,” Jake said.

  “Oh, aren’t you sweet?” Maggie smiled as she said that. “Well then, how about if one of you comes up to the office, and we can do the paperwork on that unit?”

  “I’ll go,” Jake said. “My guide, here, can give me directions.”

  “Why don’t we all go?” Adam reached out and ran his hand down Benny’s back. “Then we can get our bags out of the car, settle in, and see about having lunch.” He turned to look at Maggie. “Will you join us?”

  “I’m on duty here until seven, when my night manager comes in. But I’ll let you take me out to dinner. There’re a couple of pretty good steak and seafood restaurants in Wildwood.”

  “Dinner it is.”

  Ginny felt herself relax in the easy camaraderie between her aunt and the Kendalls. She already knew that Maggie had a way of making a body feel at ease, which she imagined came in handy, in her business.

  As for the brothers Kendall, she didn’t think there was a woman or child alive who could resist their charm.

  At least, she and her son sure hadn’t been able to.

  “Is that all right with you, sweetheart?”

  Adam’s voice, pitched in just that way, sent delicious shivers down her spine. She decided that she loved the way he called her sweetheart. She loved it a lot.

  “That sounds wonderful,” Ginny said. “And because y’all didn’t even have a reservation, I think we shou
ld go to the most expensive restaurant on the island.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  Since both Adam and Jake said that at the same time, Ginny reckoned it was a done deal.

  * * * *

  It didn’t happen very often that Adam liked a person right off the bat. But he liked Maggie Morrison. He’d never tell Ginny, of course, that he’d had the woman checked out when he first learned of her existence a few months back. And because Adam was a sheriff with connections in interesting places, he’d learned more about the woman than, say, would be available to the average person running a credit check—or even the average private investigator hired to do a deep background search.

  He knew that Ginny’s aunt had never been married, and that she’d cared for her severely ill mother—Ginny’s grandmother—for the last six years of that woman’s life. He knew she ran her business well, made a moderately good income, paid her bills on time, and had never been in trouble with the law. She’d had a few speeding tickets, but none serious.

  He knew one more thing, too, something that for him was easy to see. Maggie Morrison genuinely liked Ginny and Benny Rose, and they liked her right back.

  “These two units are the only ones that face the ocean on this floor,” Ginny said as Jake unlocked the door.

  “So that means we’ll have privacy,” Adam said, and enjoyed the blush that statement brought to Ginny’s pretty face.

  “Well now.” she sent him a smoldering look in return that heated his blood and made his cock begin to harden. “Privacy is a relative thing, isn’t it, Sheriff?”

  “Oh, wow, it’s almost exactly like our room!” Benny raced into the space, and Ginny grinned. Adam couldn’t decide if she smiled at Benny’s enthusiasm or his own inability, because of little eyes and ears, to respond the way he wanted to.

  However, their woman did have a point. They’d have limited privacy, because Benny would be with them every waking moment.

  Adam mentally shrugged. He certainly wouldn’t have it any other way.

  “It’s like our room only backwards,” Benny said. “It even has that weird door that goes nowhere ’cept to another door!”

  Jake looked at Adam and then Ginny and raised his eyebrows in a comic gesture. Then he opened the door in question and looked down at Benny. “This door actually goes to your room.”