Total pages in book: 75
Estimated words: 78227 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 391(@200wpm)___ 313(@250wpm)___ 261(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 78227 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 391(@200wpm)___ 313(@250wpm)___ 261(@300wpm)
“He won’t,” I say with conviction.
And that conviction? I feel it in every bone of my body.
“He’d better not.”
“Or what?”
“You know exactly what. He’ll get what Pat Lamone has coming to him.”
“Just…”
“I’m serious, Rory. I’d like to strangle the motherfucker.”
“Keep your aggressions focused on Lamone, then. Leave Brock out of it.”
“Fine.”
“I get that this is hard for you. First, watching Callie fall for Donny, and now me with Brock.”
“Are you sure, Rory? I mean, you and Raine seemed pretty serious.”
“Raine and I were serious at one time, or at least I thought so. I’m not sure she ever was. But I have to be honest with you, Jess. What I feel for Brock… It’s so much stronger than anything I ever felt for Raine, or anyone else. It’s the real thing this time, and believe me, no one is more surprised than I am.”
“And you’re sure he shares these feelings?”
I smile as the warmth of a soft and cuddly blanket envelops me. “I’m sure.”
Jesse rolls his eyes. “Now I guess I just have to wait for Maddie to fall for the one remaining Rake-a-teer.”
I drop my jaw open.
“Oh shit,” my brother says. “Do you know something that I don’t?”
“Maddie kind of has a crush on Dave,” I tell him.
“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”
“Yeah. But it’s nothing, really. They flirted a little at Murphy’s a while back.”
“Crap. I remember that. He was helping her with her pool game.”
“And you allowed it?”
“Hell yeah, I allowed it. I was glad she wasn’t focused on Dragon. I love him like a brother, man, but no way is he getting near any of my sisters.”
“What’s the story with Dragon anyway?” I ask.
“Not my story to tell, sis. Suffice it to say that if you knew, you wouldn’t want him anywhere near Maddie.”
My brother’s words aren’t new. He’s cautioned us all away from Dragon Locke in the past. Funny thing is, I almost ended up in bed with Dragon after a fight with Brock.
The only thing that stopped me? A phone call. Brock calling me in a drunken stupor.
“Is Dragon his real name?” I ask.
“He says it is. But I’ll be honest. I’ve never seen his birth certificate.” Jesse smiles.
“It does seem to fit him.”
“He’s been Dragon as long as I’ve known him.”
Jesse and Dragon met in college. They were in a music business class together, and Jesse recruited him for the band he was starting with our cousin Cage Ramsey.
That’s really all I know.
That and the fact that Dragon is something of a dark prince.
Someone coined that term a long time ago. I’m not sure who it was.
Jesse sighs. “Maddie’s twenty-one. She’s way too young for Dave Simpson or anyone else.”
“I agree with you that she’s too young for Dragon,” I say. “He’s your age. But Dave Simpson is twenty-four, Jesse.”
“So? He’s a grown man. Maddie’s a kid.”
“You just said she’s twenty-one.” I chuckle.
“Twenty-one is a kid, Rory. Don’t you agree?”
“No, I do not agree. Eighteen is a kid.”
Except eighteen is not a kid. Just the mention of that age makes me think of the whole Pat Lamone situation. That’s how old I was when he took those compromising photos of Callie and me. While he can be convicted of child porn if he publishes Callie, who was sixteen at the time, he won’t face any criminal charges if he publishes the photos of me.
Damn.
Why did I have to start thinking of that?
I need to be focused on my father.
“I suppose I should talk Maddie out of the whole Dave Simpson thing,” Jesse says.
“It was one night of flirtation at Murphy’s. There’s nothing to talk her out of—at least not yet.”
“Yeah? Well, I’ll be watching him like a hawk.”
I roll my eyes. “I’m sure you will.”
“Yeah, and I’m going to be watching Brock Steel like a hawk too.”
“There’s a big difference between Maddie and me,” I say.
“And what’s that exactly?”
“Well, seven years, for one. I have several serious relationships under my belt, and I know how to handle myself.”
“There’s a big difference between Raine Cunningham and Brock Steel.”
“One big difference.” I lift my eyebrows.
“Don’t gross me out,” he says.
“I can’t help it. You just made that way too easy.”
“I’m serious, Rory. Isn’t it just a little too convenient that two of the Steels are suddenly involved with two of my sisters?”
“Come on. You’re not really thinking that the Steels want something from us?”
“It’s possible.”
“No, it’s not possible at all. The Steels have everything they could want.”
“Yeah? And my sisters are the only women in Snow Creek who are more beautiful than Steel women.”
I love my brother, but did he really just go there?
“That’s why they want us? For beauty? You think they’re looking at us as breeding stock?”
“Don’t be crass.”
“You’re the one being crass. You basically just called Callie and me egg donors. Incubators for gorgeous Steel children.”