Honeymoon from Hell V
(DannyandJodi’sstory)
by
R.L. Mathewson
A Smashword’s Edition
Other titles by R.L. Mathewson:
The Pyte/Sentinel Series:
Tall, Dark & Lonely
Without Regret
Tall, Dark & Heartless
Tall, Silent & Lethal
The Hollywood Hearts Series:
A Humble Heart
A Reclusive Heart
The Neighbor from Hell Series:
Playing for Keeps
Perfection
Checkmate
Truce: The Historic Neighbor from Hell
The Game Plan
The Neighbor from Hell Collection I
Double Dare
Double Feature: The Game Plan/Double Dare
Honeymoon From Hell, I-IV
The EMS Series:
Sudden Response
The Cursed Hearts Series:
Black Heart
Misc. Titles:
The 2014 Chronicle Collection
Nonfiction Titles:
How to Write, Publish and All That Good Stuff…
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations and events described in
this novel are either products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously.
Edited by R.L. Mathewson, Necie Navone
Cover designed by Rochelle McGrath
Honeymoon from Hell V © Rerum Industries, Inc. 2015 All rights Reserved.
e-book ISBN:
9781310172670
This book like every book that I have ever written or will ever write is
dedicated to my children, Kayley and Shane, who have been with me on
this journey from day one.
Thank you for purchasing this book.
Sign up for my newsletter and receive the latest news about the Neighbor
from Hell Series as well as my other series at:
Dear Reader,
I’d like to start off by saying thank you for all your support and kind words over the
years. It’s because of you that I am able to do be there and take care of my children by
doing what I love. So, on behalf on my children, I wanted to say thank you.
Now, moving onto to this mini-series. I never planned on writing the Honeymoon from
Hell series. It started off as a Chronicle or two on my website, which is how I continue
giving life to the characters that I’ve created and fallen in love with. When I wrote a
teaser about Jason and Haley’s honeymoon I was hooked and immediately wanted to
write the whole story out as well as the honeymoons for the rest of the Bradfords, but
I wasn’t sure how it would turn out or if it was even something that you would be
interested in reading about.
So, I decided that I would write the series and release it in December 2015 after I was
able to get out the books that I promised you. At the same time iBooks was doing
what iBooks does best, helping self-published authors like myself get a chance to show
readers what they could do. iBooks helped me out, gave me my real break and
honored me with the first title of Breakout Author, so I decided to make my already
busy schedule even busier and write this series early so that I could say thank you to
iBooks for everything that they did to me and release this mini-series early through
them.
Some readers are upset about the wait, and I am sorry about that, but I wouldn’t be
who I am if I didn’t step up and show my appreciation and gratitude to those who
have helped me and my children when we needed help. With or without this early
release through iBooks, this series would not have been released at Amazon.com or
anywhere else before December because of my workload, so please don’t feel slighted,
because that was not my intention.
Now, as for this HFH, you will notice that the prologue is one of the last chapters of
The Game Plan. That was done so that you wouldn’t need to go back and re-read the
end of the book to figure out where we left off. It also leaves you with the choice to
skip it and move on to the rest of the story.
With that being said….
I hope you enjoy the Honeymoon from Hell mini-series.
Yours,
R.L. Mathewson
Prologue
Let’s recap from where we left off, shall we?
“You left me,” Danny whispered hoarsely when he finally managed to open his eyes.
“You didn’t leave me with much of a choice,” she said, trying not to cry or show him
how relieved she was that he was finally awake.
“Had to,” he said, glancing around the room as she poured him a small cup of water.
“Where is everyone?”
“It’s three in the morning so I’m guessing that they’re either sleeping or getting kicked
out of a buffet,” she said, earning a weak smile from him.
“Take a sip,” she ordered, holding the cup in front of him with her good hand.
“Yes, ma’am,” he said, obediently taking a sip.
After a minute, she pulled the cup away and placed it on the tray, wishing that his
father was here to help with this, but around an hour ago Mary had finally managed
to browbeat her husband into going back to the hotel and getting some sleep. Now,
she was sitting here by herself, terrified that she was about to find out that Danny
was paralyzed.
She should call a doctor, but instead she found herself climbing into bed with him and
curling up by his side. She needed this after everything they’d been through over the
past two weeks, she needed a moment before their lives went to hell and stayed there.
“What happened?” he asked, pressing a kiss against the top of her head as he reached
over and placed his hand carefully on her cast.
“I beat the shit out of your brothers,” she admitted with a sniffle.
He chuckled weakly as he pressed another kiss against the top her head. “That’s not
what I meant.”
“You beat the shit out of your father,” she said, still regretting that she hadn’t been
there to stop that. “Your brothers had to pull you off and in the process your back was
broken and the scar tissue from your old injury and surgeries tore, pulling free and
caused some internal bleeding. They were able to stop the bleeding and remove the
scar tissue, but your back-”
“I had weak spots in my vertebrae from the shrapnel,” he said matter-of-factly as she
struggled not to cry again. “I was supposed to take it easy.”
“They broke,” she said, her voice breaking.
He was quiet for a long time before he asked, “Was my spine compromised?”
“Can you move your toes?” she asked, repeating the question that they’d been asking
him every time he regained consciousness and terrified of his answer.
“Yes,” he said, and just to prove it, he brought his leg up slowly, bending it before he
slowly returned it back to the bed and just like that, she lost it.
“Shhhh, don’t cry, Tinkerbelle. I’m fine,” he said, soothingly.
“I’m sorry,” she said, trying to stop, but heaven help her, she couldn’t.
He’d scared the hell out of her!
“Did you really beat up my brothers?” he asked, kissing her head again and obviously
trying to distract her.
“Yes,” she admitted with a sniffle.
“Why?”
“Because they hurt you.”
“It was an accident,” he said, but she didn’t miss the amusement lacing his tone.
“I don’t care,” she muttered, trying to ignore the throbbing pain in her hand. She
could take one of the painkillers the doctors had prescribed her, but she’d been out of
it enough over the last two weeks to last her a lifetime.
“I shouldn’t have hit him,” Danny said, sighing heavily. “He started talking and I just
lost it.”
“Your father’s not mad.”
“That’s great, but that’s not really what I meant. I want to know why you left me.”
“Because you were pulling away,” she said around a small sob, and wow, did she sound
pathetic.
“I wasn’t pulling away,” he promised her.
“Yes, you were,” she said, because she knew the signs. She’d seen it before with Jerry.
When she’d felt Danny do it, she’d decided to leave before he could hurt her. She
hadn’t been able to stomach the idea of going through that with Danny.
“I would never leave you, Tinkerbelle,” he said, gently cupping her chin and tipping
her head so that she was looking up at him. “Never.”
“Then what were you doing?” she demanded, wanting to know what kind of bullshit
reason he could come up with for the way that he was acting. He said that he hadn’t
been pulling away from her, but-
“I was planning your abduction,” he said, blinking innocently down at her.
She opened her mouth, but couldn’t quite find the words to respond to that
declaration.
“I had to make a few phone calls and call in some favors to get the ban temporarily
lifted from Vegas just long enough for me to drag you off and marry you before you
got a chance to run away,” he explained calmly as she continued to lay there, staring
dumbly up at him.
“I’m sorry, what?” she finally managed to get out.
“We’re getting married,” he said, shrugging like what he’d just said was no big deal.
“I told you that I didn’t want to get married,” she reminded him.
Another shrug. “I chose to ignore that.”
“Okay…….,” she said, because really, what else was she supposed to say to that?
“As soon as they release me, we’re going to get married,” he announced and yeah, now
she was wondering if they’d missed a head injury when they’d examined him.
“And why exactly are you so determined to marry me all of a sudden?”
“Because I love you,” he said with another shrug as he nodded towards the cup of
water. “Can I have another drink?”
“D-did you just tell me that you love me?” she asked, staring at him and unable to
help herself, because now she was pretty sure that he was suffering from a brain
injury. It was either that, or the drugs in his system making him say this.
“Yes,” he said, closing his eyes. “Figured it out the day at the reptile zoo. It pissed me
off that you didn’t love me back, but I figured in ten years or so with enough mind
blowing sex, you’ll end up falling head over heels in love with me so it’s okay.”
She chuckled, she couldn’t help it. “You’re planning on using sex to make me fall in
love with you?”
“Mmmhmmm,” he mumbled sleepily. “I’m willing to make that sacrifice.”
“Wow, you’re a giver,” she said, smiling down at the man that she loved.
“That I am,” he said, smiling that sexy grin that drove her crazy. “And you’re
marrying me. Soon,” he said, firmly even as he started to nod off.
“I am,” she said, nodding her head solemnly in agreement, sniffling as tears started to
roll down her face, “because I love you.”
He stilled for a minute, that sexy grin of his turning into a frown. “What about all the
mind blowing sex?”
Smiling, she leaned down and kissed him. “I’m still willing to have all the mind
blowing sex.”
“That’s very big of you,” he said, grinning against her lips.
“It really is.”
*-*-*-*
“She finally fell asleep, huh?” his father asked softly as he glanced down at
Tinkerbelle, who was snuggled up by his side.
“Yes,” he said, smiling down at the woman who loved him.
Not that he was surprised, he was a fucking catch after all.
“Looks like we finally found the right combination of pills,” his father said, picking up
a blanket off the other bed and carefully placed it over them both.
Frowning, he looked down at the woman softly snoring in his arms. “You drugged
her?”
“Put it in her apple juice,” his father said with a shrug. “She was in pain and refused
to take anything for it so I drugged her.”
“I see,” he mumbled and just like that, the silence became awkward.
That is until his father decided to pick up where they’d left off.
“I’d raised you to face your mistakes, Danny.”
“Don’t start this shit again,” he said, grinding his jaw as he looked up to face his
father.
“You ran off, Danny,” his father said, rubbing the back of his neck as he shook his
head, looking a little lost. “You just ran.”
“You didn’t give me much of a choice,” he said evenly.
His father met his gaze as he said, “No, I didn’t. I kept pushing you when I should
have just accepted the fact that you weren’t perfect, Danny.”
“I never said that I was.”
“No,” his father said softly, “you didn’t, but in my eyes you were. You were a smart
kid, a great brother, a wonderful son, a cocky little bastard, but to me you were
perfect. When you proved me wrong, I lost it. I’ve never been so scared in my life as I
was that morning, Danny. I thought I was going to lose you and when you pulled
through and I thought about how easily I could have lost you over something so
stupid,” he paused, shaking his head, “I just lost it.”
“Things worked out,” he said, surprised by just how much it hurt him to hear his
father admit that he’d fucked up. For years he’d imagined this moment, imagined his
father taking the blame, but right now, for the first time since he’d come out of that
coma, he wished that his father would stop talking.
His father nodded. “For the most part, they did. The Marines did for you what I never
could, but at a cost.”
“Why did you stop talking to me?” he forced himself to ask.
“Because I didn’t know what to say to you without pushing you away again, Danny. I
just…..,” he shook his head, looking away, “I just didn’t know what to say that would
make what I did to you okay.”
“You didn’t do anything to me,” he said, sighing, because his father wasn’t to blame
for how his life had turned out. “You were right. I was cocky and when I fucked up I
acted like a spoiled brat and ran off, thinking that I was taking the easy way out with
the Marines. They taught me a great deal and helped me grow up.”
“I still pushed you away,” his father said, looking tormented. “I never should have
done that. I never should have done that…”
“Yes, you did, but so did I. We both fucked this up.”
His father raised his hand and laid it over his where it rested on Jodi’s hip. “I won’t
make that mistake again,” his father promised, giving his hand a squeeze.
He opened his mouth to promise his father the same when the small woman in his
arms cut him off.
“If you girls are done talking, I could really use a double chocolate donut.”
He looked up at his father just in time to catch the panicked expression on his face.
“Oh, shit…….,” his father mumbled, swallowing nervously as he released his hand and
stumbled back away from the bed as Danny sighed, resigning himself to the next
twelve hours of hell with the woman that he loved.
Chapter 1
Orlando, Florida
“You shouldn’t be carrying that,” Ethan said with a smile and a wink as he took the
large bag from her and carried it the rest of the way to the rental car she’d been using
for the last couple of months.
“Thank you,” Jodi said, trying to force a smile for him, but unfortunately it came out as a
grimacewhenthebabiesthatshewascarryingdecidedtostartkicking,whichunfortunately
hitherbladderinjusttherightway.
“What’swrong?”heaskedashissmilequicklymorphedintoalookofconcern.Hedroppedthe
baghewascarryingandrushedbacktoherside,placingahandoverthelargebabybump,
thatwasactuallystartingtoconcernher,andoneonherback.
“It’s fine,” she said with a heavy sigh as she looked back over her shoulder and nearly
whimpered, because she was going to have to walk all the way back to the house and
use the bathroom, again. “I just need a minute,” she explained with a sad little pout
that had Ethan chuckling, earning a murderous glare that was quickly changed into a
wince as the boys kicked her bladder, harder.
“I’ll wait,” he said, gesturing back to the house and looking amused, which was either
gonna get his ass kicked or make her start crying.
And crying it was…
With a sniffle that she may have done on purpose to make him feel bad for laughing
at her, she slowly turned around and started the long walk back into the house.
Twenty minutes later and two additional trips to the bathroom, she was finally in the
car and heading towards the hospital.
“Whatareyourplanswhenyougethome?”heasked,bringupthetopicthattherestofthe
Bradfords,andDannyforthatmatter,hadbeenavoidingsinceitwasdiscoveredthatshewas
pregnant.
She had absolutely no idea.
Well, that wasn’t exactly true. She knew what she wanted to do, but since Danny
hadn’t brought it up and he was going to be busy recuperating when they went home
she didn’t think that was going to happen. Danny was a sweet guy, who loved her and
was excited about the babies, but he also needed time to heal and it wouldn’t be fair of
her to expect to deal with her and two newborn babies. She’d keep her apartment,
take care of Danny and allow him some time to do what he needed to do in order to
walk again.
She wasn’t going to make any suggestions or ask him for anything. She’d work until
she couldn’t any longer and then…
Sighs, she really had no idea what she would do, because she really didn’t want to
continue working at the library. It was a boring, stressful and a tedious job that made
her hate going to bed at night, because she knew that she had to go to work the next
day and it depressed the hell out of her.
“Are you going to move in with Danny?” he asked casually, making her frown a bit.
“No,”shesaidslowly,unabletohelpbutwonderwhyhewasaskingheraboutshakingupwith
hissoninsteadofsuggestingmarriage.
Didn’t most parents push for marriage when there was a baby on the way? Her father
had certainly been pushing for marriage since the moment that she found the courage
to call him and tell him that his unmarried daughter was knocked up. That phone call
hadn’t gone so well, which she’d been expecting. She’d expected a few comments about
him being disappointed in her and a few suggestions of what she should do.
Instead there was sobbing.
A lot of sobbing, which made it difficult to hear what her father was trying to say, but
she was able to piece enough of his blubbering and sobs to know that he was terrified
for her and wanted her to come home so that he could help take care of her. By the
end of the conversation, his sobbing had shifted and he’d told her that he couldn’t wait
to be a grandfather. Every day since that first phone call, he’d called twice a day to
make sure that she had everything that she needed.
“I picked up the anti-nausea medication for you, so you should be all set for the plane
ride,” Ethan said, making her sigh with relief, because she really hadn’t been looking
forward to see how motion sickness would affect her morning sickness.
“Thankyou,”shesaidwithasmallsmileasshesatthere,staringoutthewindow,tryingto
decidewhatsheshoulddoforherandtheirboys.
She should have never let that asshole have access to her bank account and credit
cards. It was by far the stupidest thing that she’d ever done. Well, besides agreeing to
go out on a date with him in the first place. God, she’d been so damn naïve to think
that he’d changed for her. It was definitely a life lesson, one that she never wanted to
repeat.
*-*-*-*
“What the hell did you do to her?” Danny demanded with a glare for the bastard
carrying his woman.
Jason snorted at that as he carefully placed Jodi on his lap, careful of the arms on the
wheelchair, which probably saved the bastard’s life. Danny pulled her closer and
cradled her in his arms. Keeping his eyes locked on the bastard who already looked
bored, he pressed a kiss to Jodi’s forehead. She mumbled something in her sleep as she
shifted in his arms and curled up closer to him.
“It wasn’t me,” Jason said, glancing around the terminal.
“Then who the hell was it?” he demanded, but Jason was too busy starring at the
small bakery down the hall to answer him so he shifted his glare onto the other
bastard.
“Wasn’t me,” Trevor said, following Jason’s gaze and licking his lips hungrily as his
eyes locked on the sight of extra large muffins and donuts.
“Thenwhowasit?”Dannysnapped,strugglingnottofollowtheirgaze.
“It was me,” his father admitted as he joined them, carrying a large white bag from
McDonald’sashedevouredwhatlookedlikeaneggsandwich,makingDanny’sstomachgrowl,
demandingthathewrestlethebagawayfromhisfatherandseewhatotherdeliciousmorsels
wereinthatbag.
“Whatdidyoudotoher?”hedemanded,strugglingnottolickhislipsandmakeamadgrabfor
thatbag.Itdidn’tmatterthathewasinawheelchairorthathisfatherwasoutofreach,he
wantedthatbag,hadtohaveit.
“I gave her a sedative,” his father announced with a careless shrug, making
everything inside him go still as he slowly, ever so slowly, looked down at the woman
sleeping in his arms and swallowed hard, wondering how long he had before
everything went to hell.
“Howlongagodidyougiveittoher?”hesomehowmanagedtogetoutashisheartspedupin
terroratthethoughtofthisbeautifulwomanterrorizingeveryoneontheplane,becausehis
fatherhadfoolishlydecidedtodrugher.
He couldn’t imagine what his father had been thinking when he gave her medication.
God, they’d be lucky if she didn’t try opening the emergency door and make a jump for
it, simply because she had a craving for a double chocolate donut. There was no way
that this was going to end without them landing on the “No Fly List.”
“Don’t worry,” his father said with a shrug as he reached into the bag and pulled out
two wrapped sandwiches and handed them to him, “she’ll be out for the entire trip.”
Shaking his head, he took the sandwiches, placed one on top of the large swell of Jodi’s
stomach before shoving the wrapper down on the sandwich in his hands and took a big
bite, not really tasting it as his mind raced with thoughts of everything that could,
and probably would, go wrong.
This definitely wasn’t going to end well, he thought absently with a groan of pleasure
when he realized that his father had given him an egg and bacon sandwich. After five
months of hospital food, this was like devouring a perfectly cooked steak with all the
sides. When Jason licked his lips and reached for his other sandwich, Danny shot his
asshole cousin a glare that said it all.
Danny would kill the bastard if he touched his Egg McMuffin sandwich.
“No,” his father simply said, earning a glare from Jason, who reluctantly dropped his
hand and took a step back.
“Selfish bastard,” Jason mumbled as he returned his attention to the bakery. When he
saw Trevor heading in that direction, his eyes narrowed to slits and he would swear to
his dying day that the asshole actually growled.
“Whythehellwouldyougivehermedication?”Dannyaskedhisfatherashedevouredthefirst
sandwichandmovedontothesecond.
“It will be fine. Trust me,” his father said, sounding smug as he bit into another
sandwich.
“Whywouldyougivehermedicationwhenwe’reabouttogoonaplane?Youjustfuckedusall
over!”hesnappedathisfatherashefinishedhissandwichinonebite.Keepinghisarmlocked
aroundJodisothatshedidn’tfalloffhislap,heheldouthishandinsilentdemand.
When his father shook his head and grabbed another sandwich, Danny did what he
had to do. “I’ll tell mom,” he threatened, earning a look of disgust from his father even
as he reluctantly handed over the last two sandwiches.
Narrowing his eyes on his father, he gestured with the sandwiches in his hand to the
large bag in his father’s hand. “What’s in the bag?”
His father’s eyes narrowed dangerously on him as he said, “Nothing.”
“He’s lying. I can smell hash browns, pancakes, bacon, maple syrup, eggs and orange
juice,” Jason said accusingly even as he licked his lips and reached for the-
“My bag!” his father snapped, hugging the bag to his chest as he took a step back.
“Really?” Danny asked casually as he tossed his cousin one of the sandwiches and bit
into the other one as he considered his father.
“Yes!”his father hissed as he hugged the bag tightly against his chest as he shifted his
terrified gaze between Danny and Jason.
“I’m not sure mom would feel that way,” Danny said with a shrug as he shoved the
last bite in his mouth.
“You know what?” Jason asked no one in particular as he pulled out his phone.
“Maybe we should call her to see what she thinks?”
His father’s horrified gasp startled everyone around them, but Danny didn’t care, not
after his father had given Tink medication, guaranteeing them a flight that they
would never forget.
Chapter 2
“See?” his father said smugly from the seat across the aisle from him. “I told you that
there was nothing to worry about.”
“It’sstillearly,”DannypointedoutabsentlywhileheplacedhishandonJodi’sbellyandgently
rubbedcirclesoverwheretheirbabyboysweremoving,wonderingwhenshewasgoingto
wakeupandifthepilotwasgoingtohavetomakeanemergencylanding.
“She’s fine,” his father said, gesturing to the flight attendant for a drink.
“We’llsee,”hemumbledasheshiftedhisgazebacktothedoorwherepassengerswerestill
ilingthrough,tryingtodecideifitwassafertogetherofftheplaneandintoahotelroom
wherehecouldkeepherlockedupforthenexttenterrifyinghoursofifheshouldjustgiveher
afewminutestowakeupandgetthemallthrownofftheplanebeforeithadachancetotake
off.
Twenty minutes later he was still surprised that she hadn’t opened her eyes, but by
the time the plane landed in Las Vegas he was absolutely terrified, because she was
still out cold.
*-*-*-*
Las Vegas, Nevada
“I’m going to need to know what you gave her, sir,” the head of airport security
demand, looking seriously pissed, but not as pissed as Danny was at that moment.
“Get the fuck out of my way!” Danny snapped, seconds away from ramming his wheelchair
intothedumbfucktryingtokeephimawayfromJodi.
“Sir, I need you to calm down,” the security officer said, but Danny was done
listening.
He locked the brakes on his wheelchair, grabbed hold of the arms and pushed himself
up, determined to get to her, but before he could move his legs that felt like dead
weight, his cousins were next to him, shoving him back in his chair. Before he could
yell at them, Trevor was stepping behind his wheelchair and pushing him towards the
stretcher where Jodi was curled up on her side, still passed out. When the officer
didn’t get out of the way, Jason got in his face, glaring down at him and giving him no
other choice but to arrest Jason or to back off.
He backed off.
As soon as Danny was close to her, he was reaching out and cupping her face in his
trembling hands, terrified that he was going to lose her and their babies. She hadn’t
woken up, not once in the last eight hours and he was out of his mind with worry. She
should have woken up by now, caused a scene that required him to hold her on his lap,
but instead she’d just sat there on the plane, resting her head against his shoulder as
she slept.
“I’monlygoingtoaskyouonemoretime,sir.Whatdidyougiveher?”theof icerdemandedas
the EMTs pulled an oxygen tank out of one of the large green bags they’d carried into the
securityroomandbeganpreparingafacemask.
“And I’m going to tell you for the last fucking time,” his father snapped, gesturing
towards Jodi, “I only gave her baby aspirin!”
“She wouldn’t be out this long over baby aspirin, sir,” one of the officers pointed out,
which only pissed his father off.
“That’sDoctortoyou,asshole,”Jasonsaid,steppinguptoEthan’ssidewhileDannysatthere,
tryingnottopanic,butitwasdamnnearimpossible.
Christ, he couldn’t imagine his life without Jodi, without their babies. They needed to
pull through this, they needed to-
“Stop talking,” Jodi groaned, carefully turning on her side, grabbed the blanket one of the
EMTshadplacedontopofherandpulleditoverherhead.“Someofusaretryingtosleep
here.”
“What the hell?” one of the EMTs mumbled, looking just as shocked as everyone else.
“As I was trying to explain to you earlier, she does not react to medicine normally.”
“Apparently,” the other EMT said, shooting his partner a questioning look.
“Sleepy!” the woman that drove him out of his fucking mind growled, making him
chuckle, because he knew without a doubt that she was going to keep him on his toes
for the rest of their lives.
*-*-*-*
“Tink,youhavetogetoffthestretcher,”Dannysaid,butshejustignoredhimandsnuggledup
withthethinblanketthatsomeonehadthrownonherandtriedtogobacktosleep,butthe
persistentbastardrefusedtoallowhertogobacktosleep.
“Sweetheart, you have to get off the stretcher now.”
“Go away,” she muttered into the paper-thin pillow beneath her head.
“Sweetheart?” Danny said, giving her a gentle shake that she really didn’t appreciate,
not when she was this comfortable.
So, she did what she had to do. She reached back and started slapping weakly at his
hands to get him to go away. Instead of frightening him off with her deadly assault,
the large bastard merely laughed, taking her crankiness up another notch.
“I’msleeping!”shesnapped,soundingkindofwhinny,butshedidn’tcare,notwhenthejerk
thatshelovedwascomingbetweenherandmuchneededsleep.
“They need the stretcher now,” he explained as he slid his arms beneath her and carefully
pulledheroffthestretcher,instantlywakingherup.
“No,Danny!Yourback!”shesaid,terri iedthathewasgoingtohurthimselfandlandhimself
backinthehospitalforanotherfivemonths.
He smiled as he carefully placed her on his lap, careful not to place her too close to the
armrest so that it wouldn’t hurt her back. Once he had her in his lap, he put his arms
around her and kissed her neck.
“Are you still tired, sweetheart?”
“No,”shemumbledevenasshesnuggledinclosertohimandallowedhereyestoclose.“I’m
fine.”
*-*-*-*
“I want to hit a buffet,” Jason whined from the couch where he continued to flip
through the channels, looking for something to watch.
“You’re both banned from the buffets,” Danny pointed out absently as he reached over
and gently pushed back a strand of Jodi’s hair.
“We’re also banned from Las Vegas,” Trevor pointed out. “Yet, here we are,” he said,
sighing heavily as he reached over and stole the remote from Jason.
“As long as we stay out of trouble we should be fine,” his father said as he took his
stethoscope out and carefully placed it on Jodi’s stomach to check on the babies,
making sure to jump out of her way when Jodi slapped at him in her sleep and tried to
roll over.
“We’re going to get caught,” Jason said, reaching back over and snatched the remote away
from Trevor, earning a glare from the large bastard, but Jason simply ignored him and
returnedhisattentionbacktoflippingaimlesslythroughthechannels.
“We’re fine as long as we stay here and don’t draw attention to ourselves,” his father
said, chuckling when he placed his hand on Jodi’s stomach and the babies began
pushing against his hand.
“Basically, we’re going to starve to death,” Jason said with a glare in his direction.
“Man the fuck up,” Danny said, raising himself up on his hands so that he could scoot
down the bed and lay down beside his beautiful wife.
Not that she was probably going to remember that they were married, not since
they’d sort of rushed from the airport to the nearest all night chapel and convinced the
Justice of the Peace, or whatever the hell they were called in Vegas, to ignore the fact
that Jodi was sleeping and marry them with a little intimidation and five hundred
bucks.
Whenever the JP needed her to answer a question, he managed to jostle her just
enough to make her mutter something about chocolate donuts and jelly. When he
asked her to repeat herself, his father and cousins reassured him that she’s agreed to
everything and was overwhelmed with joy. When the JP hesitated, Jason and Trevor
simply folded their arms over their chest and glared until the JP was able to see their
side of things and continued the ceremony.
Fifteen minutes later, they were married and Jodi was curled up on his lap softly
snoring while his father paid off the JP and Trevor and Jason made a run for it when
casino security, who’d just happened to be walking by, spotted them and yelled,
“Bradford!” tripping over his own two feet as he attempted to get away. His father
may have made an attempt to get away as well, leaving him to fend for himself, which
he was fine with since that was the Bradford motto when it came to possible bans and
restraining order violations.
By the time the police showed up, all they’d found was a man in a wheelchair holding
his exhausted pregnant wife in his arms and the JP quietly sobbing in the corner,
trembling and telling himself that everything was going to be okay.
Thankfully the cops didn’t ask for his ID. When they saw the Marine tattoo and his
special ops team motto on his arm they relaxed. At that point they’d realized that he
was an injured vet and had made sure that they got to their hotel safely where he’d
been forced to use Jodi’s ID to check in since he was technically banned.
Okay, it wasn’t “technically” since he’d contributed to the ban that got every Bradford
in the world banned from Las Vegas, but he hadn’t been the one that started it. The
large bastard pouting on the couch had started it all just because a five year old had
taken the last Oreo at the chocolate fondue station at a buffet. Not that he wouldn’t
have the done the same thing, but at least he would have been prepared for the kick
to the shin the kid had dished out after he’d swiped the cookie from his plate.
Then again, he also wouldn’t have tried to cut in front of that old woman with the
walker. God, he still cringed to this day when he thought about what she did to Jason
with that walker and the shrimp skewer. At least it hadn’t left a scar. Not that he’d
actually asked Jason to drop his pants and show him or anything.
“Can we order food? I’m starving,” Jason asked, giving up on trying to find something
to watch and tossed the remote over to Trevor.
“Youjustate,”Dannypointedout,notmentioningthathecouldusealittlesomethingtoeat,
too.
Had it really been an hour since they’d eaten? They were all going to fucking starve at
this rate.
“And your point is?” Jason asked with a long-suffering sigh that let them all know
that the bullshit was far from over.
“We can’t draw attention to ourselves,” his father said, pulling the covers up and
tucking Jodi in.
She murmured something in her sleep, rolled over onto her side and snuggled up
against him. She reached over and curled around him as she released a sweet little
sigh that had him wishing that they had their own room so that he could curl up
behind her and hold her. But, they couldn’t risk it.
They’d come here to get married, hop back on a plane and have a quick honeymoon in
California next year, but that couldn’t happen until Jodi was able to stay awake for
more than thirty seconds at a time. Which reminded him…
“Whythehelldidyougiveherbabyaspirin?”heaskedhisfather,wonderingthehelltheman
wouldgiveJodimedicine,knowinghowshenormallyreactedtomedicine.
“Ihadahunch,”wasallhisfathersaidbeforethingssuddenlytookaturnfortheworse.
One minute his wife was sound asleep and the next…she was…she was…oh, God, she
was…
“Get her off of me!”
Chapter 3
“Tink, get off him!”
“You son of a bitch!” she said, ignoring Danny as she tightened her hold around the large
bastardandtriedtobringhimdowntothegroundsothatshecouldbeattheshitoutofhim.
“Get her off me!” Jason yelled even as he placed his hands on her sides to keep her
safe as she continued her assault, but sadly her belly and the fact that she really
needed to use the bathroom kept her from giving him the beating that he deserved.
There was a putout sigh, and then she was carefully plucked off Jason and placed on
the floor. Eyes narrowed on the bastard, she moved to continue her assault when one
of the babies chose that moment to shift a little too far to the left and pressed down on
her bladder. Torn between killing the large bastard and really needing to use the
bathroom, she stood there for a few more seconds until she gave up and snapped,
“Bathroom?”
When Jason pointed to the door behind her, she shot him one last look, making sure to
put all the murderous thoughts into that expression before she turned around and
moved her ass, muttering absolutely everything that she was going to do to the large,
sneaky bastard after she was done.
Eager to return back to the room so that she could kick his ass for drugging her after
she’d refused the pills from Ethan, she used the bathroom, washed her hands, looked
in the mirror and groaned when she saw the state of her hair and clothes. Shifting
anxiously, she shot a glare at the closed door, anxious to renew her attack on the
bastard and then back to the mirror before shooting another quick glance at the door,
the need for revenge nearly overwhelming her need to take a shower.
Nearly.
It was close, but in the end she settled for shooting one last glare at the closed
bathroom door before she pulled off her clothes, tossed them aside, turned around and
came to a halt when she realized the bounty that awaited her. She’d never seen such a
beautiful sight, she thought was she took in the large, two person garden tub to the
left before allowing her eyes to shift the right where a glass shower stall big enough to
fit at least ten people inside awaited for her. She looked from one promising escape to
the other before she decided with a sigh that she was just going to have to simply
enjoy them both before she beat the living hell out of Jason for sneaking the medicine
that she’d refused to take into the yogurt he’d tricked her into eating.
She should have known better than to accept food from a Bradford, especially Jason.
But that was okay, because she would get the little bastard back, but later, much
later. Right now she had a decadent shower to take, followed by a long soothing bath
and a delicious dinner, she thought with a smile when she spotted the telephone by
the bathtub.
*-*-*-*
“We need to leave,” Jason stressed as he continued to wear a path in the rug.
“As soon as she comes out of the bathroom,” Danny promised him, shooting another
nervous glance down at his watch, more than aware of what could happen if they
didn’t leave soon.
“She’s been in there for over an hour,” Trevor pointed out, looking just as nervous as
the rest of them and for damn good reason.
They’d already been here too long and if they didn’t leave soon, the Bradford curse
would kick in and they’d all be fucked. This wasn’t their honeymoon and they’d taken
great pains to make sure that it wasn’t mistaken for one, anything to avoid the curse
that seemed to hit every Bradford that was foolish enough to take his wife on their
honeymoon before the year mark was up.
While most of the men in his family thought that the Bradford curse was bullshit, he
knew better. He’d seen the curse hit his uncles and cousins enough times over the
years to know better than to risk it. When he took Jodi on a honeymoon it would be
well after the one-year when the curse couldn’t touch them and he could take her
anywhere that she wanted to go without having to worry about one of them ending up
in the hospital or stranded out in the woods being chased by coyotes.
That wasn’t happening to them.
No fucking way.
That’s why he’d taken precautions and made sure that this trip was in now way
interpreted as a honeymoon. He’d brought his dad, pain in the ass cousins, rented only
one hotel room, slept on the other bed and only allowed himself to hold her when they
weren’t alone, terrified that he’d do something that would be misinterpreted by
whatever the hell this thing was that had fucked with their family for generations.
It was the same reason that he hadn’t followed his wife into that bathroom when he’d
heard the shower being turned on, because being alone in a room with his wife after
all these months when she was naked and wet was definitely going to cause him to do
something that would turn this into a real honeymoon.
He shifted uncomfortably in his wheelchair as he tried to think about something
besides Jodi, naked and wet and so fucking tight that-
“Weneedtogetgoing,”Jasonrepeated,cuttingintothedirtythoughtsrunningthroughhis
mind, which unfortunately were the only things he’d been allowed to have these past few
monthssincesexhadbeenoffthetableforhim.
Then again, it really wouldn’t have mattered if sex hadn’t been placed at the top of the
list of restrictions since he’d been stuck in a hospital bed. Not that he hadn’t
considered paying off one of the custodians to keep the nurses away from his room so
that he could have a little alone time with Jodi, but every time he went to make his
move, one of his relatives that was staying in the rental house with her would show
up and destroy his plans.
So, it had been five months, five very fucking long months since he’d felt her silky
walls close tightly around him and some days he’d thought he’d fucking die if he went
another five seconds without experiencing that again. He could do that right now, he
realized, licking his lips in anticipation. All he had to do was ask his father to give him
a few minutes, tell his cousins to fuck off and he could finally have her again.
He could roll his wheelchair into that bathroom, pull his clothes off, start the tub and
invite his wife to sit on his lap and finally give them both what they’d been craving
since the moment he woken up in the hospital and saw her. Okay, maybe not the
moment that he’d first woken up since he’d been in pain, drugged out of his mind and
out of it and she of course had been high on Tylenol, threatening to beat the shit out of
his brothers and cousins and wiggling that beautiful little ass of hers in his face.
God, he loved her ass, he thought, licking his lips hungrily as he thought about just
how round it was now. Softer, curvier, fuller, he thought, shifting uneasily in his seat
as his thoughts shifted to her breasts. They were fuller now, hanging a bit lower and
just begging for his hands and mouth.
He licked his lips, just thinking about how good it would feel to wrap his lips around
one of her full nipples as he slid a finger inside her wet, welcoming pu-
“Someone needs to get her so that we can go!” Trevor said impatiently as he shoved his
ingersthroughhishairandonceagaintorehimawayfromhisthoughts,whichwasforthe
best,hetoldhimselfevenashemadeamentalnotetokickhiscousin’sassoncetheygotback
home.
“We’regoingtomissourplane,”Jasonadded,shiftingaroundnervouslyasheglancedaround
theroom,lookingasthoughheexpectedsomethingtojumpoutoftheshadowsandattack
thematanysecond.
Since he knew exactly what would happen if he came within five feet of that
bathroom door, he glanced over at his father. With a nod of understanding, or perhaps
it was fear, his father walked over to the door and after a slight hesitation, he
knocked on the door.
“Jodi, sweetheart? We have to get going,” his father said, clearing his throat
uncomfortably as he waited for her response.
She didn’t make them wait long, which as it turned out was rather unfortunate,
especially since he was stuck in a wheelchair and wasn’t able to make an escape as
fast as the others.
And God, how he wished he’d been able to run at that moment.
When Jodi opened that bathroom door, looking seriously pissed off in that towel that
was showing him a lot of cleavage and hip, his hands went to the wheels of his
wheelchair, prepared to roll himself away to safety, but that look of warning that she
was giving him stopped him from making any sudden movements.
“Is there a reason that I’m wearing a wedding band?” his beautiful, loving, sweet, and
hopefully forgiving wife asked through clenched teeth with her eyes narrowed to slits,
making her eyes look somewhat terrifying.
Wow, was she pissed, he numbly mused as he watched her raise one dainty foot to
move in his direction, most likely to kill him or go for his balls…
He’d prefer that she kill him, he decided as his mind raced to find something, anything
that would save his ass from the beating that in retrospect he probably had coming
when he decided to take the coward’s way out like any sane man would when facing
his pregnant, hormonal and seriously pissed off wife.
He placed a hand over his stomach where a fresh scar now bisected the others and
groaned in pain, knowing and really not caring at the moment that he was most likely
going to hell for this, but if it saved his balls then so be it.
Chapter 4
“Oh, shit,” Danny said, placing his hand over his stomach as he cringed in pain,
startling her into rushing to his side.
“Are you okay?” she asked nervously, trying to resist the urge to move his hand aside
and place hers over his scar so that she wasn’t standing here feeling so damn helpless.
When he shook his head, she opened her mouth to tell him that everything was going
to be okay and that she was going to go get his father when she saw it. The movement
was small, but it was more than enough to let her know that the large bastard was
faking it to save his ass, which shouldn’t have amused her, but sadly, it did.
He shot another peek up at her to see if she was buying his bullshit story so of course
she decided to play along. She wasn’t exactly sure why she’d decided to play along
with this little game of his, but it probably had something to do with the fact that
after five months she was finally in a room alone with him without having to worry
about nurses, doctors, orderlies and Bradfords walking in on them.
Speaking of Bradfords…
“Let’s get you on the bed,” she said softly with a reassuring smile that he seemed to
buy since he reluctantly nodded with a long drawn out sigh that nearly made her roll
her eyes.
He really had nothing on Jason, who’d made making annoying sounds into an art
form, she decided as she carefully rolled his wheelchair over to the bed that she’d
found herself sleeping in not too long ago and set the breaks. Keeping one hand
pressed against his stomach, he slowly raised one leg and then the other and pushed
the foot pedals aside so that he could place his feet on the floor. As he stood up and
carefully pivoted to the side so that he could lie down, he made another attempt at
sounding pitiful, which nearly had her sighing, because really, this was just pathetic.
“Are you okay? Can I get you anything?” she asked with a tender smile as she casually
unlocked his wheelchair and rolled it to the other side of the hotel room, well out of his
reach.
“No, I’ll be okay. I just need to lay here for a little while,” he said, making sure to
sound appropriately miserable as he laid there with both hands over his stomach,
groaning in misery as she walked over to the door and casually set the locks, making
sure that they weren’t going to be disturbed.
“You poor thing,” she said with a sympathetic frown as she turned around and headed
back towards the bed where Danny now lay, groaning miserably even as he continued
to sneak quick glances at her to see if she was still buying it.
“Why don’t you close your eyes and take a nap?” she suggested, which of course
earned a sigh of relief that he tried to bite back, but not fast enough.
“If you think it would help,” the big fibber said, sounding unhappy about it, but that
little smile of satisfaction as he grabbed another pillow, stuffed it under his head and
closed his eyes said otherwise.
Shaking her head, because he really just couldn’t pull it off like Jason could, she
double-checked the locks on the door. She reached over and dimmed the lights, idly
wondering where they were. Not that she really cared, she thought as she ran an
appreciative eye over Danny’s body.
She should care about a lot of other things right now as well, like why they were
there, why Ethan and Jason felt the need to drug her, what day it was, why there was
a wedding ring on her finger-
Okay, so she definitely cared about that one, she decided as her gaze landed on the
matching one on his ring finger. She paused halfway to the bed and glanced around
the room, noting the two double beds that looked well used, the mini bar, the folded
blankets and pillows on the end of the long couch behind her, the floor to ceiling
curtains that were closed before finally returning to the man on the bed.
They apparently had a lot to talk about, but it could wait until later. Right now she
had other things on her mind and none of them had to with talking.
*-*-*-*
No one would believe that he’d once led an elite force of Marines if they saw him now,
lying on the bed, pretending to be asleep just to escape his pregnant wife’s
unpredictable mood swings. Then again, the first thing that he’d been taught in
training was to know when to retreat. He just wished that he’d used some of that
training wisely and had made a hasty retreat out the door with his father and cousins
instead of putting himself at the mercy of his pregnant wife.
God, please don’t let her start crying, he prayed, not normally a very religious man,
but if it would save him from hearing her cry then he would do absolutely anything.
There were few things in life that he couldn’t handle and seeing Jodi cry was one of
them and unfortunately for him and all the men in his family, who also couldn’t
stomach the idea of a woman crying, she cried a lot.
He really wasn’t sure if this was normal or not, but he wasn’t willing to risk his balls
by mentioning it to her. Whenever she cried he felt like the biggest asshole on earth,
mostly because his brothers and cousins would shoot him glares telling him that they
thought he was the biggest asshole in the world for making her cry. He felt so fucking
helpless when she cried, which probably had more to do with the fact that everything
he said and did to make her feel better usually resulted in making it worse.
Every time she saw a baby, she cried.
Every time he smiled at her, she cried.
Every time she had ice cream, she cried.
Every time she was tired, she cried.
She tried to fight it every fucking time. He saw it in the stubborn set of her jaw, the
way that she tried to focus on something else, but nothing worked. Absolutely
nothing. He’d learned months ago to just shut his mouth, open his arms and let her
quietly sob against his chest while she apologized for crying. One time he’d made the
mistake of telling her that it wasn’t her fault and that it was normal for pregnant
woman to feel a bit emotional…
That hadn’t ended well for him.
It was also something that he tried not to think about, mostly because it still gave him
nightmares. It was probably something that he would need years of therapy to recover
from, but he’d most likely just work through the emotional pain by binge eating, he
absently thought as he laid there, noting that it was quiet.
Really quiet.
She wasn’t crying, which was all that mattered, he told himself, but even as he
continued to lay there with his eyes closed, waiting for her to make a sound, any
sound that would clue him into her mood, he couldn’t help but promise to turn his life
around if he made it through this in one piece.
That was of course after he hunted his father and cousins down and killed the
bastards for sacrificing his ass so that they could make a clean get away. Seriously,
what kind of asshole left a disabled vet alone with a hormonal, pregnant woman, who
in theory had every right to be pissed off when she found out that they’d not only
drugged her, taken her across state lines, but also managed to marry her all without
her knowledge?
Only an asshole in his family would do something this fucked up, he decided, debating
whether or not he should risk cracking open one eye to see what she was doing. If she
was grabbing something to turn him into a eunuch then it would probably be for the
best if he saw that one coming so that he could roll off the bed and drag himself to the
door with the hopes that someone walking by would hear his cries for help and save
him before it was too late.
Yet, even knowing that there was a very good possibility that he might end up singing
soprano for the rest of his life if he didn’t move his ass wasn’t enough to help him
overcome the terror that kept him frozen on the spot. He’d dealt with a lot of fucked
up things when he’d served in the Marines, but none of the shit that he’d gone
through during the war had ever terrified him as much as not knowing what his wife
was about to do to him.
He was fucking pathetic, but even knowing that wasn’t enough to make him man up
and open his eyes. Maybe if he played dead she would take pity on him and leave him
alone? But, he knew better than to wish for the impossible.
Forcing himself to open his eyes, after several long seconds of debating the pros and
cons of living the rest of his life as a coward trapped on this bed, he slowly opened his
eyes and groaned when Jodi’s soft lips gently brushed against his.
“I missed this,” she whispered against his lips, sighing with pleasure as she moved
over him until she was straddling his lap and the smooth curve of her belly brushed
against him.
“I missed you,” he found himself whispering back, loving the way that her lips curled
against his as he placed his hand on the swell of her stomach and groaned when he his
hand was met warm, bare skin.
“I didn’t go anywhere,” she reminded him as she teased his bottom lip as he traced her
curves that were a hell of a lot fuller than he remembered while she continued to
brush her lips teasingly against his.
“No,”heagreedwithachucklethatwasofapainedgroanasheslowlytracedhis ingertips
overthesmallofherbackanddownthecurveofherbottom,“butyouwereontheverytopof
my‘OffLimits,’list.”
“Iwastakenoffthatlistamonthago,”shepointedoutwithalittlemoanofpleasurethatas
shesettledmorecomfortablyontopofhim,causingthepartofhimthathadmissedherthe
most to harden, desperate to feel her sheath tightening around him as he slid inside her
beautifulbody,butunfortunatelyhecouldn’tallowthattohappen.
Not if he wanted to get her home safely.
They had to stop now before it was too late, which unfortunately, it probably already
was, but he had to try to stop this before it went any further. When she turned her
head to deepen the kiss, he already knew that it was probably too late, but even
though he knew that it was probably pointless to try and stop this before something
happened that they couldn’t come back from.
Since telling his extremely pregnant wife, who was known to sometimes overreact to
the smallest things, that he wasn’t going to make love to her after waiting all this
time probably wouldn’t go well. He decided to take another approach, one that was
guaranteed to fuck them all over, but one that was going to give them a chance to
make it out of this thing alive.
“Welcome to Vegas, Tink.”
Chapter 5
“We have to go!” Danny snapped impatiently from where he sat on the other side of the
showerdoorinhiswheelchair,stillglaringatherashetriedtorushhertomoveherbuttso
thattheycouldleaveandheadtotheairport,butthiswasVegas!
She’d never been to Vegas, but she’d always wanted to and now that they were here,
he wanted to leave?
Not a chance!
Not that she was a hardcore gambler or even had any interests in gambling. She’d
already learned her lesson not to about parting so easily with her money and promised
herself a million times a day that she would never do it again. So, finding a casino and
emptying out the meager savings that she’d been able to save thanks to Ethan’s help
was not on the agenda.
No, what she wanted to do, well, more like needed to do, was to find a buffet and
thankfully Las Vegas was famous for them. As much as she’d like to say that she’d
never been this hungry before, sadly, she couldn’t. It seemed as though every single
minute of the day she was on the verge of starving. It didn’t matter how much she
ate, if she was tired, sleepy or crying hysterically because she’d made the mistake of
going on YouTube to watch cute animal clips, she felt like she was always starving.
She could be eating a large pizza along with a family order of meatballs and spaghetti,
garlic bread and she would still be starving, wondering when the main course was
going to be ready. No matter how many times Danny or one of his relatives told her
that this was normal, she was terrified that she was going to end up being the
spokesperson for a Richard Simmon’s video.
Of course there that other part of her, the part that lived in every woman, that was
ecstatic over the possibility of being able to eat whatever she wanted, whenever she
wanted without worrying about getting fat. It was a dream come true, one that she
fully planned on taking advantage of, regardless of the man trying to rush her
through her second shower of the day. Not that she felt like she needed it, but it
seemed to calm the babies down so that she could focus on other things…
Like exploring Las Vegas, something that the men who’d dragged her here seemed
hell-bent against happening, especially the man demanding that she move her cute
little ass so that they could go home.
She considered arguing with him, but thanks to the last five months she’d spent
sharing a rental home with Bradfords she knew that the direct approach was never
going to work with him. She’d learned a lot from his family and she was going to use
every single trick that she’d picked up from them over the last few months to get
what she wanted now.
And right now she needed to hit at least five buffets in order to appease the babies
making their demands known by taking turns nudging her. One thing she’d learned
over the past couple of months, every Bradford male could sense when there was food
around. It didn’t matter if it was in a plastic container, in the fridge, in a box or in an
airtight sealed bag, if there was food around and it was still semi-edible, a Bradford
would find it and since she was carrying two Bradfords…
They were on high alert and letting her know exactly what they wanted, which meant
that she was going to have to do whatever it took to get it. Taking everything that
she’d learned about dealing with Bradfords, she did what she had to do.
*-*-*-*
“Do something!” his father snapped, looking completely helpless while he sat there
doing his best not to roll his eyes while his beautiful, very pregnant wife sat on his
lap, wearing one of his shirts and gym shorts as she laid her head against his
shoulder, rubbing her stomach and quietly, oh so quietly, cried.
“Thisisfuckinginsulting,”Jasonsaid,sighingheavilyasherubbedthebackofhisneckand
gaveJodiapityinglook.
“What can we do, sweetheart?” his father, apparently the biggest pushover in the
world, asked as he dropped to his knees besides Danny’s wheelchair and took Tink’s
small, dainty little hand in his. “Tell me what I can do?”
“This is fucking embarrassing,” Trevor added, shaking his head in disgust as he sat on the
edgeofthebed,givingJodialookthatclearlysaiditall.
She was trying to play the wrong men.
A small sniffle.
“What is it?” his father asked, sounding desperate to do whatever it took to put an end
this sad display.
“Well,” Jodi said with an over-the-top sniffle that he just couldn’t ignore any longer
and rolled his eyes, because this was seriously fucking pathe-
“Iwashopingthatwecouldgotooneofthebuffetsandgetsomethingtoeat,”shemumbled
with another one of those over-the-top snif les as she looked up, letting her bottom lip
trembleatadtoomuch,butthatwasokay,becauseJasonandTrevorweremorethanhappy
totakeover.
“When’sthelasttimethatsheate?”Jasonasked,kneelinginfrontofDanny’swheelchairwith
aconcernedexpressiononhisfaceashecarefullyplacedhishandoverJodi’swhereitrested
onthelargeswellofherbelly.
“Poor thing must be starving,” Trevor added with just the right amount of concern as
he took a knee besides Jason and placed his hand on the other side of Jodi’s belly.
“I am,” Jodi whispered with another sniffle that really was just too much, because
there was no fucking way that his father was going to take a chance of getting them
arrested, not with Jodi pregnant and him in a wheelchair.
“We can grab something on the way to the airport,” he said firmly with a glare for his
asshole cousins who already knew better.
Hell, they’d already been through this themselves and knew better to prolong this
trip. He needed to get her home immediately before anything seriously fucked up
happened. He’d already come close to fucking this up an hour ago when he seriously
considered yanking his zipper down, freeing him himself so that he could fuck her, not
giving a damn about the repercussions. This was only supposed to be a quick stop, a
fun way for them to get married before heading straight home before the curse could
get them, but now…
Now it might be too late.
*-*-*-*
“Anotherscoopplease,”shesaid,keepingonehandpressedagainstherlowerbackandone
gentlyrubbingherstomach,promisingherbabiesthatthewaitwouldsoonbeover.
Jason chuckled as he scooped more mashed potatoes onto her plate. Without being
asked, he added corn, barbeque chicken and biscuits to her plate. When he couldn’t fit
anymore on her plate, Trevor stepped up to his side and started filling another one for
her. With a wink and a smile, he said, “Zoe always needed two plates at a time when
she was pregnant.”
“Thank you,” she mumbled with a watery smile that he unfortunately knew was all
too real. His incredibly beautiful, pregnant wife was overly sensitive these days and
the littlest things seemed to set her off, he thought, unable to help but smile as his
realized that she was finally his for good.
There would be no more shouting matches with nurses or doctors about visiting hours
because they weren’t married, no more nights of falling asleep alone, willing to give up
his very soul just to feel her in his arms, or living in terror that she would realize the
full implications of being with a Bradford and make a run for it. She was his now and-
“Somethingfeelswrong,”hisfatherannouncedashesteppedupnexttohim,whichinitself
wasn’t at all alarming since Bradfords were a bunch of paranoid bastards when it came to
buffetsandplacesthatthey’vebeenbannedfrom.
No, what alarmed him was the fact that his father was standing next to him at a
buffet without a plate of food in his hands when most Bradfords would be loading as
much food as possible onto their plates before the manager figured out who they were.
Telling himself that his father was just being overprotective, he glanced back at his
wife and cousins to find them talking and smiling as they moved onto the pasta
station.
There was nothing strange about the way they were behaving, but he couldn’t shake
the feeling that his father was right. Something felt…off.
“Did you do something to initiate the curse?” his father asked with a frown as he
continued to watch the trio load various pasta entrees onto their plates.
“No,”hesaidslowlyashethoughtabouthisnakedwifestraddlinghislap,kissinghiminaway
that should be a sin as he ran his hands over her generous curves that he fully planned on
acquainting himself with as soon as they were safely back home and didn’t have to worry
aboutthisfuckingcursegettingthem.
“Are you sure?” his father asked, his frown deepening as he glanced around the large
restaurant.
No, he really wasn’t, but since admitting that wouldn’t exactly be helpful at the
moment, he decided to keep his mouth shut and hope for the best. Hoping to change
the subject, he grabbed two plates off the end table and gestured towards the carving
station.
Thankfully his father was a Bradford and didn’t exactly require much prompting to
get him to shift his focus back onto the food surrounding them. As his father pushed
him along the line, filling their plates to the brim with food, Danny kept a close eye on
his wife, looking for any signs of the curse.
When Jodi sat down a few minutes later, smiling at something that Trevor said, he
felt himself relax. There was no way that this trip could be mistaken for anything but
an errand. They’d come here to get married before they went home where Jodi’s
father was waiting with a Priest and a church full of people to see them get married in
uncomfortable clothes and to toast them with overpriced champagne.
That simply wasn’t the Bradford way.
No matter how many times he’d explained how a traditional Bradford wedding
happened, Jodi’s father, a really stubborn son of a bitch who’d promised to kick his ass
one second for knocking his daughter up and the next threatened to get a shotgun and
blow his balls off if he didn’t do right by Jodi, refused to listen to reason. He wanted
his daughter to have a proper wedding and was willing to do whatever it took to make
that happen no matter what Danny or any of his relatives told him.
Bradford weddings were tricky, which basically meant that if the marriage didn’t
occur through a desperate act such as your basic Bradford kidnapping, then the
marriage didn’t have a chance in hell of making it past a year. Over the past two
hundred years any Bradford that had made the mistake of proposing and actually
going through with a church wedding where everything was planned, invitations were
sent out and a small fortune had been spent had regretted it.
The marriage either didn’t happen, because the bride was caught fucking someone
before the reception, the groom was too drunk to go through with it, or the rest of the
Bradfords decided to knock some sense into the dumb bastard and stop him from
making a huge mistake. The few marriages that occurred through a traditional
wedding hadn’t lasted even a year, most ending before the first month was over.
Since Danny fully planned on keeping Jodi, he’d refused to allow his father-in-law to
fuck this up for him. There was a tradition to uphold and he’d made damn sure that
he’d done everything by the book to make damn sure that this marriage wasn’t going
to end in divorce, or worse, in the ICU. Bradfords might only be capable of marrying
when they were out of their fucking minds, desperate to make whatever woman was
foolish enough to fall in love with them their wives, but they didn’t take any risks and
taking a honeymoon before the year mark was definitely a fucking risk.
It was a risk that he hadn’t been willing to take.
So, when he’d schemed and planned this elopement, he’d made damn sure that there
was absolutely no way in hell that this trip could be mistaken for a honeymoon. Not
only had he brought his father and cousins to ensure that they were never alone, but
he’d also managed to keep his hands to himself.
For the most part, but since he’d stopped himself before he’d seriously considered
consummating their marriage, they should be safe, he reasoned as he pulled his
wheelchair up to the large table where his wife and cousins sat, focusing completely
on their plates and ignoring each other, which definitely worked for him since it gave
him a little more time to figure out how to explain why they were here to-
“So,” Jodi said, pausing to take a sip of chocolate milk before she placed her glass on
the table and locked her eyes on him, “are you ready to tell me exactly why we’re here
and why we’re suddenly sporting matching wedding bands?”
And just like that, he knew that his carefully orchestrated plans had just gone to hell
and they’d be fucking lucky if they didn’t follow.
Chapter 6
Sighing, because she really wasn’t sure what else there was to do, Jodi carefully
pushed her chair back and decided to get another plate of food while Danny and the
rest of the Bradford men sat there, trying to avoid making eye contact with her and
looking absolutely terrified.
Not that she could blame them since she did have a tendency to cry over the littlest
things these days. Not that she was proud of this or anything, but it was kind of
interesting to see a bunch of Bradfords fall all over themselves to get her to stop
crying, or when that didn’t work, watching them beat the shit out of each other as
they tried to get away, more than willing to screw each other over in an attempt to
get away from her before she turned her sad eyes filled with tears on them.
Since they clearly expected whatever they were keeping from her to make her cry, she
decided that it would probably be a good idea to prepare herself for the worst with the
help of the dessert tables. They’d obviously taken advantage of her drug intolerance,
brought her to Vegas, helped Danny marry her and for whatever reason they were
now doing everything they could to avoid talking about it.
She considered sitting there, quietly crying with a sniffle here and there to screw with
their heads until they finally caved and told her what was going on, but she decided
that whatever they were hiding from her could wait. Besides, she’d been craving a
slice of that triple chocolate mouse cake since the moment she’d spotted it when she’d
walked inside the large restaurant.
Since she was starving, a bit cranky and admittedly amused by the way that all the
men were walking on eggshells around her, she decided not to push the subject any
further and just sit back, eat a slice of cake or two and simply enjoy the show. She’d
eventually find out what was going on, but until then…until then…
She swallowed hard as the rich scent of warm chocolate teased her senses. She shifted
her attention to the new table being rolled out and nearly whimpered with pleasure as
her babies shifted approvingly in anticipation as her eyes locked on the large fondue
surrounded by every tasty morsel known to man. Shifting nervously, she glanced back
at the large chocolate mouse cake that was waiting for her and found herself take a
step towards the large decadent treat that she’d been craving for the past hour only to
stop and glance at the chocolate fondue table with a sigh.
Heaven help her, but she couldn’t make up her mind.
Oh, she would have both, there was no doubt about that, but she wasn’t sure which
one she should start with. It was then that she realized that she didn’t have to choose,
not while she was carrying Bradfords.
*-*-*-*
“He can’t tell her,” Jason argued as he shove his plate of food aside and joined the
conversation.
“He has to,” Trevor bit out, reaching out and grabbed Jason’s neglected plate and
immediately begin to dig in, his glare locked on Jason who was against keeping their
mouths shut.
“I’m not going to lie to her,” Danny said, shoving a spoonful of mashed potatoes in his
mouth, wishing that he could actually allow himself to enjoy the bounty that
surrounded them, but he had much bigger problems to deal with.
“We need to leave,” his father repeated absently as he sat down with two large plates
of food overflowing with food.
“Yes, we do,” he said with a pointed look for each them, glaring at them until they got
the message, but since two of them were still focusing on their food out of fear of what
his hormonal pregnant wife would do to whoever was foolish enough to make eye
contact first.
Giving up on the cowards hiding behind their food, he shifted his gaze to his father to
find him calmly eating his dinner, looking almost peaceful when they should all be
panicking out of their fucking minds. They’d been here too long and even with the
three of them tagging along, there was still a very good chance that the curse would
take notice and decide that this was a real honeymoon. They needed to grab Jodi, get
in a cab and get their asses to the airport, praying that the damn plane didn’t get
struck with the curse and make this a truly fucked up trip.
When his glare went unnoticed, he decided to shift his attention to his wife and see
what she was…oh…fuck…no.
“Get up,” he said hoarsely, unable to take his eyes off the scene in front of him,
terrified that if he looked away even for a second that it would get worse.
A whole hell of a lot worse.
“What?” his father asked, reaching for the salt.
“Get up,” he said, unable to take his eyes off the scene unfolding in front of him,
telling him everything that he needed to know.
The curse had started.
*-*-*-*
“What the hell are you talking about?” she snapped, stepping out of reach when the
officer went to grab her again.
“You violated the ban,” the officer said firmly, gesturing for her to turn around with a
pair of handcuffs.
“What ban?” she demanded, crossing her arms over her chest as she glared at the
officer.
“The one you violated when you entered Las Vegas,” the officer said, sounding
annoyed while she stood there trying to figure out how one second she was filling her
plate with every chocolate treat known to man and the next she was surrounded by
police while Danny, his father and cousins were shoved down to the ground and
handcuffed. The odd part was that none of them had looked particularly surprised to
find themselves on their knees with their hands handcuffed behind their backs.
“I’m not banned!” she once again pointed out with a glare that shifted on Danny, who
was cuffed to his wheelchair and noticeably cringing as he did anything and
everything to avoid making eye contact with her, but he did manage to mutter an,
“Oh, shit,” and “fucking hell,” every few seconds whenever someone mentioned “the
ban.”
“Are you Jodi Bradford?” the officer in charge asked, cocking a brow in warning as
though he expected her to lie.
She opened her mouth to tell him no, but the guilty look on Trevor and Jason’s faces
made her hesitate. She looked down at the wedding band on her finger and then at
the one on Danny’s hand. With a groan, she closed her eyes and nodded, accepting the
truth of the matter.
She was now one of them.
She was a Bradford.
Which apparently was a crime in this state, she realized with a small groan as she put
her arms behind her back and waited to be handcuffed.
“Don’t. Even. Fucking. Think. Of. It,” Danny snarled, yanking on his cuffed hands as
the officer reached for her.
Jason, Trevor and Ethan, who was now her father-in-law it seemed, all glared at the
officer, looking ready to get to their feet and rush the officer if needed. When the
officer caught their glares, he hesitated and even took a step back away from her as
all four men followed the movement with their eyes.
Wanting to get this over with without ending on the ten o’clock news, Jodi put her
hands in front of her and held them out to the officer and waited. With a nod of
understanding and a nervous glance towards the four men watching his every move,
the officer carefully handcuffed her hands together and gently placed his arm, leading
her towards the exit where a curious crowd was waiting with their phones out, taking
pictures and ensuring that she never forgot this trip.
“Are you okay, ma’am?” the officer asked with a kind smile as he walked beside her.
“I’m fine,” she said with a small wince when over two-dozen cellphones went off,
clicking lights in her face and making her realize that she had the start of what
promised to be one hell of a headache. “Just a small headache,” she said, as she was
escorted outside into the bright Nevada sunlight.
“Don’t worry. I’m sure that we can find you something at the station to help with
that,” the young officer promised.
She opened her mouth to argue, to explain how she reacted to medication, but in the
end she simply mumbled a, “Thank you,” and continued walking towards the police
cruiser parked in front of them, too tired to argue right now when all she wanted to do
was go to the police station, get processed and take a long nap on a lovely wooden
bench that she would call all her own until she could make bail.
Chapter 7
“Oh, my God!”
“No, please, God, no!”
“Somebody help us!”
“Not the face! Not the face!”
“Mommy!!”
“I’ll never do it again! Please, just let me go!”
“Help us! For the love of God why isn’t anyone helping us?” one of the officers
screamed as he ran past the holding cells, stumbling and tripping along the way as he
frantically glanced over his shoulder to make sure that
shewasn’t coming after him.
“Maybe we should rent two cars and drive back,” Jason suggested, looking a little
bored as he leaned against the bars and continued to watch as all hell broke lose
around them.
“That might be the best idea,” his father agreed with a cringe when Jodi managed to
make a two hundred and fifty pound officer drop to the floor in a fetal position and sob
quietly to himself.
“Flying would be faster,” Trevor pointed out from his spot on the bench where he was
trying to catch a few minutes of sleep before the SWAT team was called in.
“We’re banned,” Jason reminded him with a lazy gesture towards Jodi, who was now
utterly fascinated with a box of donuts.
That earned a frown from Trevor. “For what?”
“Drugging Jodi,” his father answered with a shrug.
“We’re on the ‘No Fly’ List?” Jason asked, sounding genuinely worried, which was
understandable since that would make things a hell of a lot harder on the father of
three.
“No, we’re just banned from the Vegas airport,” Danny explained, watching as his wife
jumped up on the edge a desk with a jelly donut in her hands and a smile on her lips
as she closed her eyes and took a bite of her donut sighing with satisfaction while the
officers that hadn’t made their escape yet, ran for the door.
“Maybe we should take a bus?” Trevor suggested only to snort in disgust at his own
suggestion and shook his head a few seconds later when he realized what being stuck
on a bus for over twenty hours with Jodi, who was not only pregnant, but seriously
pissed probably wasn’t the best idea.
And yes, he knew without a doubt that she was pissed at him since the glare that
she’d shot him when they’d placed him in the back of the squad car with her had said
it all. It also didn’t hurt that she refused to say anything to him. Instead she’d simply
sat there, staring forward with her jaw clenched as she pointedly ignored everything
that he said to her.
Well, that part wasn’t exactly true. She did seem to get particularly pissed whenever
he tried to apologize to her. When nothing he said or did seemed to help, he decided
that it would probably be for the best if he kept quiet at the point and gave her some
space while he tried to figure out another way out of this.
Four hours later and he still had no fucking clue how to make this up to his wife. His
cousins and father had shared their infinite wisdom with him, but since crawling to
her on his hands and knees and begging for forgiveness was probably out the question
at the moment, he decided to use this time tucked safely behind bars to figure out a
way to fix this. The fact that they’d drugged her and all hell had broken lose wasn’t
exactly helping with the situation.
“Renting two cars is probably our best bet,” his father said with a nod.
Trevor sighed heavily as he closed his eyes and settled in for the long haul. “It should
definitely give the asshole enough time to get out of the dog house.”
“I’m not in the dog house,” he said just as his wife, doped up on liquid Advil, chose that
momenttoglareathim,puttingeverythingintothatonelookandlettinghimknowthathe’d
befuckingluckyatthispointtobeinthedoghouse.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you!” Jason yelled to the plump detective reaching for the
box of donuts, obviously needing the comfort that only the sugary treat could provide
him, but unfortunately for him, he wasn’t able to grab a donut and run away fast
enough.
The man barely got out a mumbled, “Oh, God, help me,” before Jodi’s head snapped in
his direction, her eyes narrowed dangerously on him and before the man could blink or
mutter another prayer for help, Jodi had his donut and he was curled up in a corner,
hugging himself and rocking himself as he mumbled, “It’s not real. It’s not real.”
Yawning, Danny shifted his attention back to the bench where Trevor was curled up,
softly snoring and considered shoving the large bastard off and getting a nap in before
he was forced to deal with his wife. Unfortunately for him, that’s when the police chief
finally decided to ask for help.
“Please,” he said, looking as though he’d aged twenty years since he’d shoved them in
here an hour ago, “save us!”
*-*-*-*
“Maybe we should separate them,” Jason suggested as she sat there on one of those
hard plastic chairs, sipping water and trembling as she slowly came down from a
Tylenol high.
Trevor laughed without humor. “Do you really think that’s going to help now? There’s
no way in hell that they’re getting out of this now.”
“Out of what?” she mumbled, slowly swallowing a sip of water as she prayed that it
wouldn’t make her already queasy stomach worse.
Instead of answering her, which they seemed unable to do since yesterday at the
buffet when she’d innocently inquired about the matching wedding bands, the men
continued to talk as though she wasn’t there. Normally that would piss her off, but
right now…
Ah, who the hell was she kidding?
It still pissed her off, but fortunately for them her stomach decided that it really didn’t
appreciate that last swallow of water that she’d forced upon it and demanded that she
find the nearest bathroom. Knowing better than to sit there and see if it would pass,
because she knew that it wouldn’t, she shot the men ignoring her a glare only to once
again be ignored and stood up, placed her bottle of water on the seat and went in
search of a bathroom before she-
“Oh, God,” she said when she barely made it five feet when the water and everything
else she’d eaten in the last five hours decided to make an appearance.
“Oh, shit,” she heard Danny curse as Ethan, Jason and Trevor descended upon her,
putting large arms around her and guided her to the bathroom, which was sweet,
really it was, but unfortunately she wasn’t quite done and left an embarrassing trail
behind her, marking her way back to the chairs in the suddenly quiet rental car
waiting area.
She was thankful when they brought her to the family bathroom, but that soon
changed when all three of them decided to stand there, hovering over her as she
continued to get sick, adding that special touch to this trip from hell.
“I’m fine,” she managed to get out as leaned over the toilet, struggling not to
embarrass herself any further, but of course they once again ignored her.
“Maybe we should take one vehicle,” Jason suddenly suggested, throwing her a
nervous glance.
“We’llbeabletogetthemhomefasterthatway,”Trevorsaidinagreement,shootinghera
pityinglookthatshereallydidn’tcarefor,notatall.
“I think the best bet is to get them out of Las Vegas and to the nearest airport so that
we can put an end to this fiasco quickly,” Ethan suggested as he grabbed a handful of
paper towels and poured cold water on them before applying it to her head and giving
her a small amount of relief so that she could once again ask what was going on, but
apparently they were still hell-bent on ignoring her.
It was either that or they hadn’t heard her over her body’s renewed attempts to
cleanse itself of every last drop in her stomach. It was probably the later, she decided
as the men continued to discuss the best way to get them home before the curse, and
she made a mental note to ask about that later, could do any more damage.
Once she was done, which wasn’t for another ten minutes or so, she was helped to her
feet, led over to the small sink and manhandled by three large Bradfords that meant
well. By the time they whisked her out of the bathroom and into the hallway where
Danny sat waiting, looking worried, she was too tired to argue or ask any questions.
So, instead she allowed them to place her on Danny’s welcoming lap. She closed her
eyes and laid her head against his shoulder, deciding that it was probably for the best
if she left the details up to the men for now. But once she was rested and had
something to settle her stomach, they were going to have a very long discussion about
all the bullshit they’d put her through over the last couple of days.
Chapter 8
“You dumb bastard,” he groaned, closing his eyes in resignation as he sat there,
staring in disbelief at his father, who was actually fucking blushing.
“You dumb fucking bastard,” Jason reiterated, shaking his head while the blood
drained from his face as he stared at Ethan, unable to look away from him as Ethan’s
fuck up just caught up to them all and bit them in the ass, effectively fucking them all
over and ensuring that this nightmare wasn’t going to end anytime soon.
“It wasn’t my fault,” his father stressed as the understandably pissed off police officer
gestured for his father to turn around and place his hands behind his back. With a
resigned sigh, his father turned, put his arms behind his back and waited to be
arrested for the second time that day…in a separate fucking state!
“Then whose fucking fault was it?” he snapped, barely resisting the urge to reach up
and strangle the son of a bitch that was making ending this nightmare nearly fucking
impossible.
His father pursed his lips up in thought as the first cuff locked in place. “Hostess
Cupcake.”
And yup, just like that, he went for his father’s fucking throat. Unfortunately, or
rather fortunately for his father, the fact that he couldn’t fucking stand on his own
two feet yet, and the fact that his cousins were holding him down, kept the son of a
bitch breathing. As his cousins held him down, he narrowed his eyes on his father,
imagining all the things that he was going to do once he got his hands on him and
nearly smiled in satisfaction, but it was the fact that his wife of only two days still
wasn’t talking to him, looking at him or acknowledging his existence in any way that
instantly destroyed the miniscule amount of joy that he’d been able to find in his
fantasies.
There was a heavy sigh as the second officer reached into his back pocket and pulled
out another thick white envelope. “That reminds me. You’re in violation of a second
restraining order.”
His father sighed heavily as he shook his head that told everyone there, every
Bradford at least, that his father wasn’t taking this seriously.
“I have to come within one-hundred yards of their corporate office in order to violate
that restraining order,” his father said, sounding bored while he sat there, trying not
to panic, but it was a quickly losing battle.
“Besides,” his father continued with a careless shrug, oblivious to the nervous glances
that he was sharing with his cousins, “this whole thing will be cleared up in the
morning when it goes in front of a judge.”
“Tomorrow?” he snapped, right along with his cousins as they shared a horrified look
before glancing back at the small woman sitting across from them with her arms
folded over her ample breasts, glaring at them and clearly not willing to accept any
more of their bullshit stories any longer.
Not that he really thought for one second that she was buying any of the half-assed
bullshit stories that they’d been feeding her since they’d left Vegas. But since she
hadn’t called them on their bullshit, mostly because she was too busy ignoring them as
she glared at them, he figured that he had plenty of time to figure out how to explain
this mess to her later, when they were safely home and this fiasco was officially over.
Thanks to his father’s unhealthy obsession with Hostess products, they were once
again fucked. They couldn’t afford to stay overnight and risk anything else happening,
especially with Tink pregnant. He would rather die than risk anything happening to
his wife or children.
He didn’t give a flying fuck if the curse was nothing more than just bullshit stories
passed down from generation to generation to fuck with their heads. The only thing
that mattered was his family and he wasn’t going to take any risks, which meant that
they needed to continue heading home tonight. They couldn’t afford to add an extra
day to this fucked up trip, especially with the rate that things were going.
“We can’t stay,” he stressed, meeting his father’s bored glare with a murderous one of
his own, reminding the father what was at steak here.
With a frown, his father shifted his attention back to glaring pregnant woman behind
them, cringed, cursed under his breath and then finally in typical Bradford fashion,
sighed heavily. “Someone needs to help Danny get Jodi home before it’s too late.”
“Too late for what?” his inquisitive wife asked evenly with a suspicious glare that had
his balls pulling up tight in an attempt to hide in terror.
“To find a hotel for the night?” Trevor said, trying to help, but sadly there probably
wasn’t anything at this point that would save his ass.
“Really,” she drawled heavily with sarcasm. “At five o’clock at night?” she asked,
cocking her head to the side as she considered them and the officers, who were
starting to squirm nervously from her glare.
“Very busy weekend,” he suggested, struggling against the urge to swallow nervously
and avert his eyes, but then she would have him by the balls and that was not a place
that he could afford to be right now.
“It’s Tuesday,” she pointed out dryly.
Swallowing hard, he slowly nodded. “Yes, yes it is.”
“Are any of you gentleman finally going to tell me what’s going on or do you want to
keep on pretending that I don’t know anything about this curse of yours?”
As one they blinked, “What curse?”
*-*-*-*
Closing her eyes, she shook her head, because she’d finally had enough. “That’s fine,”
she said, grabbing her bag, threw it over her shoulder and decided that enough was
enough.
She was getting her ass home, taking a hot bath and ordering as much takeout as her
credit card could handle.
“Tinkerbelle, stop!” Danny yelled, shoving his cousins away so that he could push his
wheelchair after her, but seriously, after waking up from a baby aspirin hangover,
getting arrested, banned, a police escort to the city border and then one to the state
border where the Governor awaited to give them a warning not to fuck up his state
and cause another state of emergency, being ignored, exhausted and dragged from
here to there and every damn where, she was so done.
“Jodi” he yelled, coming after her, but she knew that if she didn’t get away from him
right now and get a chance to calm down that she was going to so say or do something
that she was going to regret, and sadly, kicking him in the balls probably wouldn’t
make her feel bad right now.
So, with that in mind, she continued to walk towards the exit, ignoring the curious
looks as well as the ones of disgust because she was walking away from a man in a
wheelchair. Yeah, she’d admit that she was acting like a bitch, but she really didn’t
care at the moment. She was too damn tired and too damn hungry to give a damn
what anyone thought.
Doubling her steps, she walked through the exit, past the tired looking travelers and
headed for the line of taxis. Within seconds she was in a car and heading towards the
nearest hotel with twenty-four hour room service.
The boys could have their secrets.
That was more than fine with her, she told herself trying not to cry or feel sorry for
herself, but with so many hormones surging through her body and the fact that she
was tired and hungry, it was impossible. By the time they’d arrived at the large hotel
she was a mess, barely able to say thank you to the taxi driver as he helped her with
her meager possessions or the doorman who held the door for her as the concierge ran
to get her a box of tissues.
Since she wasn’t able to communicate without hysterically, they settled for nods,
shakes of her head and holding up fingers to let them know how many rooms she
needed, nights, etc. Twenty minutes later with a new understanding of mortification,
she was finally in a room, the door locked behind her and a large room service order
placed.
Knowing that she had time for a warm bath to settle her nerves before the food
arrived, she started a large bath in the two person garden tub, took off her clothes,
grabbed a twenty dollar bottle of orange juice from the mini-bar and settled into the
nice, hot bath and felt herself instantly begin to relax.
This was exactly what she needed, she told herself as she took a sip of the overpriced-
watered-down drink. She just need a night for herself to think things through and
figure out some things for herself. She already knew that she would do whatever it
took to make things work with Danny.
That really was a no brainer.
She loved him more than anything and wanted to spend the rest of her life with him.
No, her problem was this secretive business between the cousins, the fact that he
hadn’t even mentioned that they were now married even though they were both
wearing matching bands and she’d found the Las Vegas marriage certificate in the
bottom of his duffle bag the other day.
The problem she had was this highhanded bullshit that apparently went along with
being a Bradford.
Well, that and she had a craving for pumpkin pie…
Chapter 9
“I’m sorry, sir, but I can’t release that information,” the desk clerk said with a
professional, friendly smile, but the look in his eyes said it all…
He thought Danny was the biggest piece of shit to ever disgrace his hotel lobby. That
was fine, because he wasn’t all that thrilled with himself either at the moment. That
didn’t mean that he was going to sit here and let some asshole keep him away from
his wife.
It just wasn’t happening.
“Tell me which room my wife is in,” he bit out between clenched teeth as he grabbed
onto the armrests of his wheelchair, prepared to shove himself to his feet, uncaring
that he couldn’t walk on his own yet, just so he could grab this prick by the throat and
force him to tell him where his wife was.
“I’m sorry, sir, but we respect our guest’s privacy,” the man said with that damn polite
smile that was going to get him killed even as the look in his eyes told Danny how
much the little prick was enjoying this. He’d bet every last cent that he had that his
wife had been crying by the time she got here, which only made him that much more
desperate to get to her.
He would have been here sooner, but since his father was currently indisposed that
left him with Jason and Trevor to help him and since both of them were full of shit…
“You’re going about this all wrong,” Trevor pointed out as he idly tapped his fingers
against the marble countertop as he glanced around the small, empty hotel foyer.
“You’re wasting your time,” Jason added from where he leaned against the wall
behind him.
“No, I’m not,” he bit out, damning that bike messenger to hell and back for cutting
him off before he could get in the cab and away from his cousins.
“You really are,” Jason said with a shrug as he pushed away from the wall and helped
himself to a small cup of lemonade by the courtesy desk. “If you were smart,” Jason
started to explain only to pause to take a sip of his juice, “you’d let one of us take her
home so that the curse would end sooner.”
Trevor shook his head with a disgusted snort. “That’s not going to work.”
“If we separate them, the honeymoon ends,” Jason said, gesturing towards Danny
with his cup, “End of story.”
“You think so?” Trevor asked, chuckling without humor while he sat there, wondering
how he kept getting stuck with assholes.
They were great guys.
They really were and if they weren’t his cousins, they’d probably still be two of his
best friends, but God, some days he just wanted to beat the shit out of them and
throw their bodies down a deep fucking well and today was definitely one of those
days. While he was trying to get to his wife and make sure that she was okay, they
were arguing about this fucking curse, trying to decide “their” next move and making
this a hell of a lot more difficult than it needed to be.
All he wanted to do was to find his wife, pull her in his arms and hold her before he
broke the bad news to her that she was now a Bradford, which meant that she was
going to have to deal with some seriously fucked up shit for the rest of her life.
That was it.
“The curse only fucks with us during the first year of marriage and only until we get
home. Once we get them both home safely, this fucking curse will end and they can
get a fresh start,” Jason argued.
“How do you know this won’t follow them if we intervene?” Trevor snapped and it was
in that moment that he realized that his family was fucking crazy.
Well, he’d already figured that out before, but that wasn’t the point. He’d been lucky
enough to marry the woman that he wanted to spend the rest of his life with and
instead of savoring that victory, he’d been doing everything he could to protect her
from a curse that he suddenly realized might be nothing more than Bradford bullshit
that they’d all made come true over the years as a result of their paranoia.
He was truly a fucking moron.
“Where are you going?” Trevor asked, but he ignored his cousin and focused on the
prick manning the desk.
“My. Wife,” he bit out, sounding every bit the marine that he’d once been. “Where is
she?”
*-*-*-*
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Bradford, but we’re going to have to ask you to leave.”
“I’m sorry, what?” she asked a bit distractedly as she frowned at the nervous man in
front of her, almost positive that this had been the overly-polite man that had handed
her a box of tissues when she’d checked in a few hours ago.
He shifted nervously as he wrapped his arms around himself, but the move didn’t hide
the fact that he was trembling. He looked over his shoulder, towards the elevator as
he cleared his throat. “We need you to leave,” he repeated hoarsely, looking close to
crying.
“Because…,” she said slowly, having a pretty good idea about what had terrified the
middle-aged man.
Keeping his eyes locked on the elevator, he admitted, “I’d rather not say.”
“I see,” she mumbled, following his gaze to the elevator and then to the stairway door
where another employee stood waiting and looking like the tiniest noise would set him
off into a full out run.
“Does this have anything to do with a very large man in a wheelchair?” she asked, and
yup, just like that, the man standing near the door made a run for it.
“I-I can’t say,” he said, turning an interesting shade of green as he watched the other
man run with away, telling her absolutely everything that she needed to know.
“I see,” she murmured thoughtfully as she considered her options.
“Please leave,” the man whispered, pleadingly.
She opened her mouth to refuse, but the sheer terror that she saw in his eyes had her
sighing and nodding her head, because sadly, she knew exactly how determined a
Bradford could be, which was absolutely terrifying to most people.
It really didn’t bother her, but then again she also knew how to screw with a
Bradford’s head for her own enjoyment, something that she’d learned from Haley and
Zoe over the past few months. It wasn’t exactly something that she could put on her
resume, but it was a useful skill to have when she was pissed or well, bored.
She should tell him no and refuse to leave until checkout, but that wasn’t fair to the
hotel staff and honestly, at this point she just wanted to get this over with and if that
meant that they had to have it out now, then so be it. They’d talk, she’d let him know
that she wasn’t going to put up with anymore of this Bradford bullshit and hopefully
they’d find a dinner that had pumpkin pie…and blueberry pie…and they could put this
whole mess behind them.
Once he understood that the next time that he tried to make decisions for her that she
would make his life a living hell, they’d be fine. Grabbing her bag, she walked out into
the hallway, past the nervous employee and-
“There you are,” Trevor said with a smile as he swept her off her feet before she could
get a startled gasp out, turned around and carried her to the elevator where Jason
stood, waiting for her with a grim expression on his face.
That’s pretty much what scared her the most, because no matter what life threw at
Jason, he could usually manage a smile.
“What’s going on?” she asked, trying to act casual as Jason reached over and took her
bag from her.
She waited for Trevor to put her down, but he never did. Not even when the elevator
doors opened, revealing an empty foyer, or when he carried her out of the hotel. She
thought once they reached the parking lot that he’d put her down, but once again she
was wrong.
He kept his arms locked around her until she realized what was going on, and by
then, it was too late.
Chapter 10
Massachusetts…. Two Days later…..
“Can’t we talk about this?” Jodi asked as she shifted nervously on his lap, trying not to
appear as though she was looking for a way to escape, but he’d been trained by the
military and was a Bradford by birth so he knew how to spot the signs of someone
desperate to get away from him.
It was a gift, he mused with a satisfied smile as he continued to absently caressed the
large swell of her stomach, loving the way that his boys nudged up against his hand in
approval.
“I think we’re past the point of talking, don’t you?” he said, barely paying attention to
where they were going since all of his attention was on his skittish wife who’d made a
total of twenty-three escape attempts since they’d kidnapped her from the hotel last
night.
Well, kidnapping might be a strong term since all they did was carry her against her
will out of the hotel, place her in a car and drive her straight through the night,
ignoring all of her requests that they let her go. There were other requests, like they
could go fuck themselves and an adamant plea that they rot in hell, but since he knew
that she really didn’t mean any of it, he decided to ignore her murderous glares and
enjoy the long ride home with her in his arms.
He knew that she was just incredibly pissed at him, because he’d kept her in the dark
and refused to tell her anything more than he loved her and just how beautiful she
looked, which to him she did. To the rest of the world she looked tired, bitter, on the
verge of committing murder, but the rest of the world had absolutely no idea how
incredibly fucked up the last few days had been for her.
Not that it could have been avoided, because…
Well, it probably should have, he mused while he absently tightened his arms around
her and held on when she tried to make another escape, most likely to dump him out
of his wheelchair so that she could kick his balls into submission. He probably should
have sat her down and calmly explained everything, explained why they’d kidnapped
her, the whole sordid family history, why he was rushing her, the arrest and bans
were probably something better left discussed for later, but he could have at least
done whatever he could to make this easier for her.
He could have, but…
Well, let’s just say that he was being cautious about what information he gave her
right now, mostly because he hadn’t wanted to delay their return home by answering
a hundred questions as well as the time it would take to convince her that he wasn’t
crazy, which probably would have added a few days to trip.
Now he had nothing to worry about, he thought, fighting the urge to sigh with relief
because he knew that it wasn’t over just yet. He still needed to get her across the
threshold of the house that his father and Trevor had purchased for them to lease
before he could stop worrying about the curse. Not that he was still worried about it,
he wasn’t, really, but he didn’t want to fuck this up anymore than he needed to, which
was why he refused to answer her questions until they were safely inside.
“Ready?” Trevor asked with a grim expression as he took a deep breath.
“Ready,” he answered with a firm nod, tightening his hold around his wife and making
sure that she didn’t make her escape and prolong this damn curse any longer than
was necessary.
Nodding once firmly, Trevor pushed him towards the wheelchair ramp that someone
had added onto the house recently and headed for the front door where Jason stood,
holding the front door open and keeping his eyes locked on Jodi to make sure that she
wasn’t able to make a run for it.
What felt like a lifetime later, they were crossing the threshold into the large house
that was theirs to use. As soon as they were safely inside and the door was locked
behind them, he released his hold around Jodi and grunted when her elbow slammed
into his side as she scurried off his lap and smiled.
It was finally over.
They were home and out of reach of the curse. Granted, his father was still awaiting
bail and trying to fight the charges, his cousins were exhausted, they were out six
thousand dollars for the car rental they’d fucked up getting home, had over a
thousand dollars worth of speeding tickets to take care of, were exhausted, starving,
still wearing the same clothes since last week and felt disgusting, but at least they
were home, at least they were safe.
“I’m out of here,” Jason said, giving his shoulder a firm squeeze as he nodded towards
the door. “Give me a call if you need anything.”
“Zoe and Haley stocked the kitchen. Everything’s in reach so you should be okay,”
Trevor added even as he looked around the large old house that had been recently
renovated. “But if you need anything, we can be here in less than five.”
“We’ll be fine,” Danny said with a relieved sigh as he decided to make something for
his wife to eat before he grabbed a shower and some sleep.
Jason paused by the door. “Do you want help explaining everything to Jodi?” he asked,
gesturing with a nod in the direction that she’d disappeared.
“No, I’ll be fine,” he said, confident that everything would be fine now that they were
home. He’d make Tink something to eat, finally explain everything to her and when
he was done they’d probably have a good laugh, curl up in bed and sleep for a week
and try to pretend that none of the bullshit from the past week had ever happened.
As far as he was concerned the only thing that mattered was that they were married,
finally home after spending the last few months in the hospital and a beautiful future
to look forward to. Nothing else mattered, especially that trip from hell that he’d like
to forget, something that he was sure that his wife was more than happy to do as
well.
*-*-*-*
“Open the fucking door!”
Since he’d refused to answer her questions or even acknowledge her existence over the
last couple of days, besides the kidnapping that is, she decided to continue the trend
and ignore him as she settled in more comfortably in the large garden tub that she’d
discovered only moments ago.
Normally, baths really didn’t do much for her except offer a short reprieve after a long
day, but since she’d started showing and the boys had proved exactly how much of a
handful they were going to be, she’d come to enjoy her baths more and more.
Unfortunately the house that they’d rented in Florida had only one bathtub and it had
been a shallow tub that barely allowed the water to reach above her hips.
It also didn’t help that the water had been hard water that reeked of chlorine,
effectively killing her enjoyment anytime she tried to take a bath. This bathtub
however was absolutely perfect. She wasn’t like her husband’s cousin, Rory, who was
obsessed with baths, but she could definitely see herself falling in love with baths
thanks to this beautiful tub.
God, this felt good, she thought as the wet heat wrapped around her and seeped into
her bones, erasing the aches and pains from traveling the last couple days. She really
could fall in love with this bathtub, she decided as she closed her eyes, sighed,
releasing all the stress that had built over the last few months and just enjoyed
herself.
It was so nice not to have to worry about Danny, late night calls from the hospital,
fighting with Bradfords for food, or the call that she dreaded, the one where the doctor
called her in so that he could tell her that Danny was never going to walk again. Just
like that all of her worries and fears were gone, but instead of smiling with relief, all
she felt like doing was crying.
She pulled her knees up to her chest, wrapped her arms around her legs, closed her
eyes and pressed her forehead against her knees, releasing a shaky breath as she tried
to remind herself that everything was okay now. They were fine. Danny was home
and as long as he listened to his doctors and followed through with his physical
therapy then he would be fine. He’d be walking in less than a year, they’d have
children and everything would be fine.
Just fine, she told herself, wishing that she could believe it, but she couldn’t. She’d
never been this happy in her life and she was terrified that something was going to
happen and destroy this moment. At any moment, things were going to go wrong,
something would go wrong with the babies, Danny would get hurt again and her heart
would break and this time, there would be no coming back from that kind of pain.
So, when she realized that she was crying, she just let go. She needed this, needed to
finally let go of the pent up terror that something would happen to Danny or their
babies and let go.
Chapter 11
“Do something!” he yelled, terrified out of his fucking mind as he was forced to sit
there while his wife sobbed hysterically in his arms, unable to much more than shake
her head or nod against his chest when they asked her a question.
“Jodi?Sweetie,canyoutelluswhat’swrong?”Aidanaskedwithakindsmile,butDannycould
seeitinhiseyesthathewasjustasscaredoutofhisfuckingmindashewas.
For two hours she’d been sobbing hysterically and no matter what he said or did, she
wouldn’t stop. If he told her that he loved her, kissed her or told her how excited he
was to be a daddy, she would bury her face against his chest, sob harder and hold on
to him tighter like she was afraid that if she didn’t he would suddenly disappear.
He’d tried to calm her down, but absolutely nothing worked so he’d called his brother,
praying that they weren’t losing the babies. It would kill him to lose their babies, but
it would absolutely destroy him to lose her.
“Areyouinpain?”AidanaskedasherecheckedhervitalswhileDannysatthere,prayingthat
theanswerwasno.
He nearly sagged in relief when she shook her head against his chest.
“Then what’s wrong, Tink?” he asked softly, praying that she couldn’t tell just how
badly she’d scared him, because-
“Mother fucker!” he yelped with a gasp when the vicious brat grabbed his nipple and
twisted it.
“You bastard!” she snapped around a loud sob as she-
“Ow!” he snapped when the vicious woman successfully grabbed his nipple for another
twist, making his eyes water.
He considered setting the woman down and scooting away from her before she could
go for his other nipple, but realized that the move would give her access to his poor
defenseless balls. So, instead he tightened his hold around her, careful of their babies,
and made sure that she couldn’t continue with her malicious attack.
“You arrogant bastard!” she yelled, but before he could ask her which one of them she
was referring to, she was trying to wiggle her way off his lap, but he wasn’t having it.
Mostly because he was terrified about the damage that an extremely hormonal
woman could do to his balls, he kept her exactly where she was as he shot his brother
a look that said it all.
“Right,”Aidansaid,clearinghisthroatwithafirmnodashebackeduptowardstheirbedroom
door.“I’lljustleavethetwoofyoutotalkthisover.”
Keeping his eyes narrowed on his wife, he waited until he heard the door click closed
behind his brother before he asked, “Are you done yet?”
Stupid question.
Really stupid fucking question, he decided as she shook her head and-
“Goddamn it, woman!” he snapped, resisting the urge to let her go so that he could rub
his poor abused nipple. “Stop attacking me!”
“No!” she said with a pout that he absolutely refused to find adorable, especially while
his nipples throbbed from their most recent attack. “You have this coming!”
“For making you the happiest woman on earth?” he demanded in outrage, wondering
for the life of him why she wasn’t on her hands and knees thanking god for her good
fortune instead of maiming him.
Had to be the hormones, he told himself as he glared at the small woman in his arms.
There really was no other way to explain her ungrateful behavior. She had absolutely
no idea how much work and planning went into kidnapping someone, otherwise she’d
start showing some goddamn appreciation!
Just thinking about all those long hours he’d spent scheming, calling in favors so that
certain officials would look the other way when they saw the name Bradford on the
flight lists. It had taken him a lot of time and effort to make this happen, but that
didn’t seem to matter to the annoying woman trying to make another grab for his
nipple.
“You kidnapped me! Drugged me! Dragged me around Vegas! Didn’t bother to wake
me up for our wedding! You’ve avoided me for most of this trip, ignored my questions,
pissed me off and then when I had enough of your bullshit, you kidnapped me again!
Dragged me back across state lines, fed me nothing but stale junk food, and forced me
to sit in a car with three Bradfords who couldn’t seem to stop arguing about which ban
was whose fault, further confusing me and making me want to go for your nuts!” she
finished on a rant, confirming his suspicions that she’d made plans to go for his balls
as well as making him reconsider his decision to wait until later to do a junk food run,
because clearly she needed sugar soon or she was going to kill someone.
Since that person was going to most likely him, he decided that perhaps now would be
a good time to check out the kitchen and see if there was any chocolate that might
help soothe the wild beast within his normally sane, beautiful wife.
Careful not to make any sudden movements, he wrapped his arms around her, sort of
thankful that she’d stopped crying, but since she was now focused on violence he sort
of wished that she’d return to the crying since he would leave his balls intact and it
was probably something that he could fix with a box of donuts and a chocolate
milkshake.
Christ, he could go for a chocolate milkshake and a box of donuts, he thought with a
heavy sigh, wondering if his cousins had been considerate enough to leave them fully
stocked, but knowing his cousins they’d probably eaten every fucking thing in the
house each time his mother or one of his aunts went shopping.
Selfish fucking bastards, he thought with a grumble as he gently placed his wife on
the bed next to him, reached over and grabbed hold of his wheelchair and slowly, or so
very fucking slowly, shifted away from her and closer to his wheelchair, his only
means of escape.
“You finally feel like talking?” his seriously pissed off wife asked in a tone that did not
convey the overwhelming love and affection that she should be feeling for him. But, it
did make him move his ass faster, sensing that it could end badly for him if he didn’t
get out of there right now.
“Umm, sure,” he said absently as he tightened his hold on the wheelchair and used his
hold to drag himself off the bed as casually as he could manage it and sat down.
“So,” Jodi said, unfortunately following him so that by the time his ass hit the chair,
she was straddling him and had her arms wrapped loosely around his neck, but he
was no moron.
She could turn on him at any moment.
His only hope was to get them into the kitchen and distract her with a shitload of food
before she could remember that she was pissed at him and renew her vicious attack or
worse, start crying again. God, please don’t let her start fucking crying. He’d take
anything else, do damn near anything else if it meant that he wasn’t forced to sit
there helplessly while his wife cried her heart out.
“Why don’t we talk about Vegas?” she suggested in a light tone as he felt the arms
around his neck tighten slightly, but it was enough to let him know that he was going
to make it out of this room alive if he didn’t start talking.
“Sure,” he agreed casually, making his body relax as he placed his hands on the large
wheels, hoping it wouldn’t tip her off to his intentions. “What would you like to talk
about?” he asked as he gave the wheels an experimental push to see what she’d say,
but they moved a foot and she didn’t respond, he decided to keep playing along.
“Oh, gee, I don’t know,” she said with a slight shake of her head a sigh, “maybe we
could discuss the kidnapping?”
He blinked at her as he asked, “What kidnapping?” right around the time that he gave
the wheels another, firmer, push towards the door and what he hoped was his
salvation.
“Oh, you know the one where your father and cousin drugged me, somehow got me on
a plane to Vegas, somehow managed to find someone to marry us even though I’m
pretty sure that I was still unconscious at that point and then for shits and giggles you
decided that it would be fun to add ignoring me to list of fun things to do to pass the
time. Does that refresh your memory, hmm?” she asked with an endearing smile as
she ran her fingers lovingly through his hair, but he wasn’t fooled.
Not one fucking bit.
This woman was pissed and out for blood.
His blood.
Since she was obviously pissed and there was absolutely no way to make her forget
about the “kidnapping,” drugging, and the hundred little things that they’d been
forced to do to her to get what they wanted, he decided to take a different tactic, one
that would put him on every Bradford’s shit list, but was guaranteed to save his ass.
“It was Jason’s idea,” he said even as he sent a silent apology to the annoying bastard
who’d stuck his neck out for him.
He hated to do it, hated to fuck over someone that he cared about so much and had
gone through so much shit to help him, but then again, what choice did he have?
“Really?” she said absently, looking a little distracted and not really sounding like she
believed him as she continued to toy with a short lock of his hair.
“Yes,” he said firmly with a nod as he pushed the wheels ever so slightly in the
direction of the bedroom door, praying that they’d find something, anything to distract
his wife in the kitchen before it was too late.
“I see,” she murmured, sounding thoughtful as he sat there, trying to resist the urge
to squirm in his chair.
“I’m glad that you do,” he said, swallowing hard as he tightened his grip on the wheels
and-
Oh, fuck no…
She set the brakes.
Chapter 12
“So, you’re a victim in all this?” she asked, barely resisting the urge to roll her eyes as he
lookedherintheeye,lettinghisbottomliptrembleandsaidwithheavy,torturedsigh,“Yes.”
“I see,” she said, forced to look away before she started laughing, because there was
just something so unbelievably cute about a large man like her husband trying to pout
his way out of trouble.
It was definitely the Bradford pout, she thought even as she couldn’t help but compare
it to Jason’s, who’d most likely perfected the pout before he’d left the womb. Jason
could probably pout his way out of anything, but not Danny. For some reason the
large ex-marine just couldn’t pull it off. It was adorable even if he couldn’t pull it off.
“They made me do it,” he said in a mock whisper that had her biting her lip and
struggling not to laugh.
“I’ve never felt so dirty before…so used…”
“And this, um, ban?” she asked, relaxing her hold around him as she settled more
comfortably on his lap as she managed to keep a straight face as she looked him in the
eye.
All humor vaporized from his expression as he bit out, “Political bullshit meant to
keep us down.”
She couldn’t help but frown at that as she slowly said, “From a buffet?”
“Yes,” he said without any hesitation.
“And from Vegas?” she asked, unable to hide the doubt in her voice, because really,
how did an entire family manage to get themselves banned from a city?
“A simple misunderstanding,” he murmured as he looked away.
“I see,” she said with a frown, trying to figure out how that was even legally possible.
“Besides,” he said, bringing her attention back to him and away from all the terrifying
possibilities running through her head, “it’s not important.”
Since that ban apparently applied to her now, she thought it was kind of important,
but since it was also something that was probably going to terrify her, she decided
that it was probably a conversation left for a later time. Right now they had other
things to focus on.
“Okay, so how exactly would that explain you ignoring me and refusing to touch me
since you left the hospital?” she asked, not realizing how much his disinterest had
really hurt until that moment.
He sighed heavily as he wrapped his arms around her and hugged her for the first
time in days. “The curse,” he said unhappily as though that explained it all.
She waited for more, a better explanation, something that started off with, “We’re not
fucking crazy, but…”, however, nothing else followed except for a sigh of relief that
told her that he was not only done, but that a huge weight had been lifted off his chest
by telling her.
Unfortunately for her, having him wrap all the bullshit over the last couple of days
with the phrase, “The Curse,” really wasn’t all that enlightening. It definitely didn’t
explain things like the kidnapping, the quick elopement that she really couldn’t
remember, why they were all stuck sharing the same hotel room with his cousins and
father or why he did everything that he could to make sure that they were never
within touching distance.
On top of that they’d been forced to flee the state like criminals, surviving on
whatever stale junk food they could find in vending machines, out of the way
convenient stores and fast food joints that should have been condemned years ago,
which sadly, she was pretty sure that a few actually had been. When they hadn’t been
scavenging for stale food to fight over, they’d all been jam packed in a rental car that
smelled like feet and ass.
It had made the trip truly memorable.
Not that she was ever going to forget about the time that she got kidnapped, dragged
across state lines and came back married to a man that was apparently paranoid.
Granted, it appeared that the majority of men in his family were paranoid, but that
was a problem for another time.
Right now they needed to settle a few things, find something to eat and hopefully
sleep for the next month without having to worry about doctor’s appointments, trying
to figure out a way to eat non-stop to appease the very demanding babies shifting
anxiously inside her, reminding her that it had been at least an hour since the last
time she’d ate, and just relax and enjoy being in his arms without worrying about
hospital staff or his family barging in and ruining what little time they had together.
“Any chance that you could explain this whole curse thing as well as the need to drug and
kidnapmetogetmarriedwhilewerollintothekitchenandmakepancakes?”shesuggested,
undecidedwhetherornotshewasgoingtosharethepancakesoncetheyweredone,butthat
reallydependedonhowwellwasheabletosatisfyhercuriosity.
Otherwise…
She’d probably have one cranky Bradford on her hands, but on the bright side, she’d
be pleasantly full and ready for a nap. Grinning that sexy grin of his, he reached
down, released the brakes on his wheelchair and carefully pushed them towards the
extra wide bedroom door and down the hallway towards the large country-style
kitchen that his brothers and cousins had designed for them.
As soon as he’d rolled them off the polished wood floor and onto the smooth, shiny
kitchen tile, she was climbing off his lap and headed towards the cabinets, searching
for everything that she needed to make her famous fluffy buttermilk pancakes and
nearly weeping with relief when she found everything that she needed and more.
Setting a large mixing bowl on the kitchen island, she grabbed the eggs and a whisk
and gestured for Danny to continue, hoping that something he said would help her
make sense of this past week or at the very least make that paranoid side of her that
demanded that she say goodbye to everything in the world she owned and make a run
for it, but she figured that she owed it to their babies for her to hear him out.
Besides, she was starving and the pancakes wouldn’t be done for twenty more minutes
so she figured she’d give him a chance to explain what happened before she ate all the
pancakes, grabbed her stuff and made the walk of shame back to her father’s house
where she would have to move back in, knocked up and in need of her daddy to make
everything better.
“Will there be bacon or eggs?” he asked with a cocking of his brow, obviously deciding
that some negotiation had to be done before he explained his behavior.
“For me?” she said as she opened the refrigerator door and selected the delicious items
and set them on the kitchen island near the bowl. “Yes, but I haven’t decided if I’m in
a sharing mood quite just yet.”
“I see,” he murmured thoughtfully with a calculating look in his eye as he shifted his
gaze from her to the food, obviously trying to decide just how much he was going to
have admit to in order to get what he wanted.
In the end, it was the drop pure vanilla extract that she added to the pancake batter
that helped him make up his mind. With a heavy sigh, he said, “We were supposed to
be married, back on a plane and home before the curse kicked in,” he said, licking his
lips hungrily as she started laying the strips of bacon one by one on the cool cookie
sheet.
“And this curse of yours?” she asked, prompting him to begin his story if he wanted
even a single morsel of the delicious meal that she was about to make.
“Started a few hundred years back,” he said absently, liking his lips as he reached for
a handful of blueberries only to end up pulling his hand back with a glare when she
tapped it with the back of her spatula and shook her head.
“Keep going,” she said, letting him know that he wasn’t getting anything until she had
all of her answers.
Even if they terrified her, which it probably would since she was dealing with a
Bradford.
Sighing heavily, he pulled his hand back and let it drop on his lap even as his eyes
narrowed on her, watching her every move as she continued to whip together the
pancake batter and grab more food to make a late night feast.
“My great-great grandparents broke tradition and got married, left England and came
to America to start our family,” he said with a shrug as he reached for a banana and
because he’d piqued her interest, she allowed him the sweet treat.
“What makes their story so special?” she asked, grabbing a few potatoes and deciding
that some home fries would be a nice touch to this meal.
“They hated each other,” he admitted with a shrug as he peeled his banana and
devoured it in one bite.
“And that made their story special?” she asked as the historian in her reminded her
that falling in love wasn’t normally a requirement for marriage back then. Most
people married for land, end family rivalries and to form loyalties.
“They’d hated each other since they were children, tormenting each other and made
their lives a living hell until they’d finally had enough and refused to have anything to
do with each other. Years later they’d stumbled upon each other at a dinner party and
one thing led to another and…”
“She became pregnant,” she guessed with a nod, already figuring out how two people
who hated each other could end up getting married. It was the same reason that a lot
of couples married today, to give their child security and the protection of a name.
“Yes, she did,” Danny agreed quietly before he added, “And that’s when the first
Bradford tradition started.”
“Which is?”
“Forced elopement,” he said with a shrug like it was no big deal, but before she could
open her mouth and comment, and God, did she want to comment, he explained.
“A Bradford has to be out of his fucking mind to get married,” he said, pausing to
yawn just long enough for her to stop what she was doing to glare at the son of a bitch
as the insult slowly sank in, but before she could get good and mad and throw the
bowl of batter at his head, he continued explaining, which in the end, probably saved
his life.
“If a Bradford isn’t out of his mind in love with a woman and willing to do anything
and everything to make her his, including kidnap, extortion, blackmail and risk life in
prison, then he wasn’t ready to get married and the marriage is doomed,” he explained
with a small shrug as he reached for another banana.
“And you couldn’t have just asked me to marry you or mention it in passing at some
point?” she asked sarcastically as she reached for the sugar.
He looked thoughtful as he began to peel the banana until finally he shook his head
and took a bite. “No.”
“Not even a little warning?” she asked, thinking that it would have at least been nice
to know that they were getting married, which would have made the whole
kidnapping thing unnecessary.
“No,” he said, with a shake of his head as he finished off the banana, “not even a little
warning.”
“Because…,” she said leadingly, trying to understand Bradford logic and terrified that
she was starting to understand it.
“If I was thinking clearly enough to ask you, then I wouldn’t have been ready.”
“What if I had said no?” she asked, even though she never would have said no to him.
She loved him so much and couldn’t wait to spend the rest of their lives together,
raising a family and waking up in his arms every morning.
He shrugged. “That wouldn’t have stopped me.”
“I see,” she murmured, because sadly she was afraid that she really was starting to
understand.
“It’s the same way with the honeymoon,” he added, making her blink because she was
pretty sure that there was no way that they could have called the trip they’d just gone
a honeymoon. A horrible nightmare? Yes, but there was no way that anyone could
have mistaken the trip with his father and two cousins as a honeymoon, especially
since he’d barely touched her.
Besides, you have to consummate a marriage before you could go on a honeymoon and
they definitely hadn’t done anything, she absently thought as she let her hungry gaze
run over him.
It had been so long since she’d run her hands over him, tracing his muscles with her
fingertips and her tongue. Her breath caught as she remembered how good it felt
when he slid inside her, stretching her, filling her and making every nerve ending in
her body come alive with pleasure.
She’d never felt anything so good as Danny’s body sliding inside her…
And now that he was finally hers, she didn’t want to wait any longer.
Chapter 13
Licking his lips, he absently shoved another piece of under ripped banana in his
mouth, uncaring about the tart taste or too firm texture as his mouth watered for the
large hard nipples pushing against his wife’s tee shirt.
He’d missed her over the past few months, missed touching her, holding her, running
his tongue over every square inch of her body as he slowly sank inside the wettest,
tightest hold he’d ever experienced. Every fucking day he thought about it, thought
about how it felt to have her wet pussy welcoming him inside and doing everything in
its power to keep him there.
There were times that he thought he’d die if he didn’t feel her body wrapping around
his cock again. Some nights he’d wake up to find his hand wrapped around his cock,
stroking it as he thought about how tight or wet and welcoming her pussy would be
for him and Christ, he knew it would be fucking soaking wet. He thought about how it
would feel to have her lips wrap around his cock, the way her tongue would tease the
underside of his cock, caress his balls, how-
“Oh, fuck yes,” he groaned as imagination suddenly came to life.
He had no idea when she stopped cooking, or when she’d walked around the kitchen
island, dropped to her knees and freed his cock, but he knew the instant that her
warm lips wrapped around the tip of his cock and gently sucked. It was so good, so
fucking good, he thought, closing his eyes as his head dropped back and a groan of
pleasure as he focused on the feel of her mouth sliding up and down his cock,
something that he’d fantasized about for the past few months and now that it was
happening he couldn’t believe how fucking good it really was.
It was
toofucking good…
“Tink, baby,” he said, gasping as pleasure soared through the tip of his cock. “You’ve
gotta stop. Baby, you’ve gotta stop,” he said even as his hands tightened around the
arms of his wheelchair and prayed to God that she would never stop sucking on his
cock, because he was pretty fucking sure that he would die if she did.
At that moment he would have happily sold his soul if she continued and thank
fucking god that she did. Within seconds every muscle in his body had tightened
painfully, his back bowed and he shouting her name as she sucked every last drop of
pleasure from his body. She was still licking and sucking his over sensitized cock when
he reached for her.
He had her sitting on the edge of the table and was practically tearing her pants off as
she lifted her beautiful ass to help him. When he reached for her baby pink panties he
stopped playing around. He grabbed the waste of her panties and ripped them clean
from her body, exposing the needy little pussy that he’d been fantasizing for months
now.
When she leaned back and spread her legs, he didn’t hesitate. He buried his face
between her legs and slid his tongue up her core, fucking her hard with his tongue as
he savored the flavor coating his tongue. Christ, he couldn’t get enough of her, he
thought as he shifted his head at a different angle, needing to slide his tongue in
deeper.
“Oh, God,” Jodi moaned as she ran her fingers through his hair, encouraging him to
continue while he prayed that she never stopped rocking her pussy against his tongue,
taking what she wanted and making his cock harden painfully again.
He needed her.
Now.
He wanted to bend her over the table and fuck her there until she begged him to fuck
her harder and harder and he would. There would be nothing on this earth from
taking her to the floor, placing her on her hands and knees and fucking her there, too.
Then he wanted to press her against the wall and fuck her there until his body
couldn’t take anymore and his balls threaten to explode, but he couldn’t do any of that,
he realized.
Because he was still stuck in this fucking wheelchair without a way to show her how
badly he wanted her, how badly he needed her and God, did that fucking sting. Until
this moment, he hadn’t realized that he might very well have to face a lifetime of
lying on the bed, praying that his wife would take pity on him and climb on top of him
and give him a mercy fuck.
That was unfucking acceptable, he screamed at himself, snarling against her wet
pussy as he pushed his tongue deeper inside her, fucking her with everything that he
had and showing her that he was still a man, he was still her man and he would do
whatever it took to make sure that she never forgot it.
*-*-*-*
“Bed,” was all she could manage to say as she struggled to catch her breath.
He shook his head stubbornly as he turned his head more to the left, slid his tongue
back inside her and prepared to drive her over the edge with another orgasm, but she
wanted more. She wanted him.
Taking a deep breath, she said, “Bed,” not caring that she could barely make out what
she was saying or that she was light headed from screaming his name. All that
mattered right now was feeling him inside her and as much as she loved his tongue, it
wasn’t what she really needed.
“Busy,” he growled against her pussy, the vibrations teasing her clit and threatening
to send her over the edge again, but she was determined.
“Bed,” she breathed, pushing him back so that she could carefully climb off the table
and straddle his lap where his large erection was standing erect with an angry red
tint, looking as though it had been years since the last time it had found release
instead of minutes.
Unwilling to waste something that she craved more than her next breath, she
wrapped her arms around his shoulders, leaned down and kissed him and shifted until
that firm cock between his legs was teasing her slit and threatening to send them
both over the edge.
“Mmmm,” he groaned as he wrapped his arms around her.
“Bed,” she stressed tightly, wondering why they were still in the kitchen and wasn’t
fucking her.
He shook his head as he gripped her ass and used his hold to rock her wet pussy
against him, driving her out of her damn mind and making it more difficult to stay
determined and make him take her to bed. She wanted him in a bed where she could
lay back, spread her legs and scream his name as he fucked her, showing her just how
much he loved and missed her.
She needed this, needed him and she-
Gasped as he shifted her on top of him, teasing her clit one second with the tip of his
engorged cock and the next he was sliding inside her. The air caught in her throat as
she felt him stretching her, sliding deeper inside her and making it impossible to
ignore just how good he felt and how badly she’d missed this. Before she could come
back to her senses, she was riding him, moving up and down, feeling his cock slide in
and out of her as she leaned down and kissed him, savoring the flavor of herself on his
lips as he reached up and palmed her breast.
“That’s it, baby,” he groaned approvingly as he shifted, giving her better access to his
cock and making her want to scream in pleasure as he slid inside her at just the right
angle.
“Oh, God, Danny,” she moaned, whimpering in pleasure as she tightened her hold
around him, shifted her legs and rode him harder.
“That’s it, Tink. Take what you need, baby,” he growled as he gripped her ass and
helped guide her, moving her harder and faster on his cock.
“Please, Danny! Please!” she cried against his lips, not really knowing what she was
asking for or what she needed, but knowing without a doubt that he would give her
absolutely everything that she needed.
There was a loud, pained groan as she slammed down hard on his cock and then there
was…nothing.
One second she was riding him, on the verge of one of the most powerful orgasms that
she’d ever experienced and the next she found herself lying across the kitchen table
with her legs spread, her breaths heaving in and out of her chest and her sheath
practically screaming in misery at the loss of Danny.
Licking her lips, she struggled to form a coherent sentence, to beg him to come back to
her, to fuck her, to take the pain away, to do anything to take this misery away, but
before she could say anything, not that it was actually physically possible, Danny was
setting the locks on his wheelchair, grabbing hold of the table and pushing himself to
his feet.
“Danny, no!” she said, the orgasm that threatened to bring her to her knees instantly
forgotten as she watched her husband grip the kitchen table, take a deep breath and
reach over her so that he could grab the edge of the kitchen table and pull his body
over hers.
His response was a groan as his cock slid right back inside her. He didn’t waste any
time explaining what he was doing or trying to reassure her that everything was
okay. Instead he used his hold on the edge of the table and began fucking her in a way
that had her gasping for breath and her arms wrapping her arms around his shoulders
as he slid inside her.
“Tink,” he groaned as he shoved his cock in further inside her, making them both
moan with pleasure as the new move sent his cock sliding inside her at a different
angle.
“Love you, Jodi,” he said, shifting his hands so that were pressed flat against the table
and he was raising himself above her, fucking her with shallow thrusts that drove her
out of her mind as she looked up and locked eyes with the man that she loved.
“I love you, Danny,” she whispered, gasping for her next breath as she continued to
roll his cock inside her, making it harder and harder for her to hold back as he fucked
her, careful of her swelling stomach.
“Love you so damn much, Tink,” he said, smiling as he leaned down and kissed her,
taking her pleasure to a new level and triggering an orgasm that made it impossible
for her to catch her next breath, but somehow allowed her to scream his name until
her voice was hoarse and she didn’t think she’d ever be able to talk again.
Danny groaned loudly as his back bowed and his cock swelled inside her, sending her
over again and this time guaranteeing that it would be quite sometime before she was
able to talk again, but she didn’t care, not as long as she had Danny in her arms.
With a groan and a small grunt of pleasure, he lowered himself on top of her as he
tried to catch his breath. He kissed her forehead, her nose, her chin and then finally
her lips as she sighed with pleasure, which incidentally ended once she realized that
the large bastard lying on top of her was laughing.
Glaring up him, because she was pretty sure that she’d lost the power of speech, she
waited for the bastard to stop laughing, but instead he shook his head as he continued
to chuckle and admitted, “I have no fucking clue how I’m going to get off this table.”
As his words sank in a snort of laughter escaped her until she found herself pressing
her lips against his and laughing with him.
That is until Duncan came in the kitchen carrying grocery bags and spotted them.
“Thisde initelywasn’tinthefuckingjobdescription,”Duncangrumbledwithalong-suffering
sigh as he dropped a bag of groceries on the kitchen island and strolled out of the kitchen,
shakinghisheadindisgustwhiletheylaidthere,unabletostoplaughing,becausethiswas
de initelygoingbeaninterestingexperiencelivingwithtwoBradfords,shekissedhimagain,
vaguely wondering what it was going to take to get Duncan to come back in here and help
themoffthistable.
Coming in November 2015
Darrin and Marybeth’s Honeymoon…
About the Author
Writer, Facebook stalker, mother of two and hot cocoa addict, R.L. Mathewson lives
life to its fullest.
When she’s not chauffeuring her children to and from school or their various
activities, she runs a Lego Club for a bunch of chocolate addicted children, blasts
Sirius XM’s The Highway, writes, edits, cooks, cleans and oh yeah, she even watches
movies on Netflix.
It’s safe to say that she does it all…………..
Intrigued?
Of course you are.
If you would like to know more about this author, her latest books or information on
the latest methods to stalk people on Facebook, visit her site:
Or you can email her directly at,
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