Honeymoon from Hell IV (3 page)

Elizabeth threw a pillow at him so she
could scramble off the bed, desperate to make an escape. It was
like that piece of his anatomy was in charge. He crawled after her.
She didn’t bother with a nightgown or a wrap as she ran to the door
and started pounding on it.

“Mrs. Brown!”

“Oh, thank the lord!” came Mrs. Brown’s
worried voice from behind the door. “We were afraid you’d both
perished.”

She looked back to see her husband
trying to escape from the tangled sheets his foot got caught
on.

“Mrs. Brown, listen I haven’t much
time. Can you arrange for a large tray of food and drink to be
delivered,” she looked over her shoulder to discover that Robert
was close to getting free, “and water for a bath as well.
Please!”

“Certainly,” Mrs. Brown said, sounding
amused.

“Robert?” James suddenly said as he
joined Mrs. Brown in the hall.

A soft growl behind her was the only
answer he could manage. Elizabeth slowly turned around, plastering
her back against the door. James knocked on the door. “Robert? Come
down with me to the tavern, I’m bored. Robert?”

“I’m busy,” Robert answered in what
sounded mostly like a snarl.

James’ answer was a pained sigh. “Come
on, you’ve done your duty. Let’s go.”

A loud whimper escaped Elizabeth as he
pounced on her. He was handsome, wicked and all hers. No matter how
tired or weak she was at the moment he still had this strange
affect on her body after all these years and in that moment, she
wanted him more than anything.

“Robert?” James asked, sounding
unsure.

Robert couldn’t answer at the moment.
He was busy licking the water from Elizabeth’s skin. She was pinned
tightly against the wall, her arms wrapped around his shoulders and
her legs around his waist.

In one quick move, he was sheathed
inside her. He wrapped his arms around her, protecting her from the
door as he thrust inside her. The door groaned its protests as its
hinges and frame were put to the test. If the position hurt
Elizabeth, she wasn’t saying.

Just the opposite, in fact.

She demanded him to move harder and
faster. At that moment, Robert didn’t care that his brother and
Mrs. Brown were standing outside the door or that he was on the
verge of starvation. He only cared about her, about his minx. He
slammed into her, once, twice, three times and then she began
screaming his name and doing her best to milk him dry.

“Lucky bastard,” he thought he heard
his brother mutter, but he didn’t really care as he lost himself in
the woman that he loved.

“Happy anniversary, Mr. Bradford,” his
minx said minutes later as she pushed him to the floor to give him
his gift all over again, making him wonder if he should call
another truce before they ended up killing each other.

Chapter 1

Present Day

“Oh, my God! Why won’t you leave?”
Marybeth demanded, close to crying and not really caring as she
pulled the pillow over her head, wondering why he wouldn’t just
leave them alone.

“Are you hungry?” Uncle Jared asked
from where he sat…

Between them.

On their bed.

At two in the morning.

“I’m hungry,” Uncle Jared muttered and
she didn’t need to look up to know that he was pouting.

“Then go home and raid your own fucking
kitchen!” Darrin snapped from the other side of the bed, sounding
just as aggravated as she was.

Actually, he sounded kind of pissed.
Not that she could actually blame him since Uncle Jared had chosen
the perfect moment to saunter into their room, unannounced and
apparently on a mission. Personally, she was just thankful that
he’d chosen to show up after she’d stopped screaming Darrin’s name
and begging him to fuck her harder.

“Not until after we have this talk,”
Uncle Jared said, sounding determined and letting her know that
this night from hell wasn’t going to end anytime soon.

Well, it really hadn’t been all that
bad considering that Darrin had managed to make her scream his name
at least three times before Uncle Jared had managed to barge in and
put an end to their night. Darrin on the other hand probably wasn’t
as understanding as she was since that she may have teased and
tormented him to the brink of orgasm for over an hour. She’d just
been on the verge of finally giving him what he wanted when Uncle
Jared strolled into the room and threw a pair of shorts at Darrin’s
head and tossed her one of Darrin’s shirts and a pair of his boxers
before he granted them exactly thirty seconds to get
dressed.

Knowing better than to argue and waste
precious seconds, she’d quickly got dressed and dove under the
covers, deciding that it was for the best that she pretend that the
man that had always stepped up, prepared to kick her ass when she
screwed up and was there for her when her father wasn’t hadn’t just
walked in on her while she was on her hands and knees giving her
husband a-

“So, why don’t we take this downstairs
and get a bite to eat while we talk, hmm?” Uncle Jared suggested,
sounding hopeful and making her cringe as she pulled the pillow
tighter over her head and prayed that her burning cheeks didn’t set
the bed on fire.

She was just about to see if it was
humanly possible to burrow into the mattress when she heard the
unmistakable sound of a pair of handcuffs clicking shut and a heavy
sigh that she was all too familiar with. It was followed by a brief
silence and another familiar sigh before Uncle Jared asked,
“Really?”

“Really,” she heard Darrin say firmly
as she felt the bed shift seconds before her pillow was taken from
her and tossed aside.

Without a word, mostly because she was
trying to avoid making eye contact with Uncle Jared, she wrapped
her arms around Darrin’s shoulders as he picked her up, buried her
face against his bare shoulder and tried to pretend that she was in
her happy place.

“You can’t avoid this conversation
forever,” Uncle Jared said, not really sounding all that angry that
for someone that had just been handcuffed to the bed by his
nephew.

“I’m willing to give it a shot,” Darrin
drawled, tightening his hold around her as he headed for their
bedroom door.

She kept her face buried against his
chest as he carried her downstairs and into the living room,
carefully avoiding the boxes that took up most of the space and
made his way to the only available seat since the couch had been
the first thing that they’d brought in. She had been the second.
Darrin had carried her inside their new house, laid her down on the
couch and told her to keep her ass there as the men in his family
unloaded the boxes and stacked them around the house. That was two
months ago and they were still unpacking the damn boxes and trying
to get the house ready for their babies.

Their babies…

She still couldn’t believe that in a
few months they were going to be parents. She thought this day
would never come, but thanks to Zoe and Trevor, they were going to
have a family of their own very soon.

Darrin chuckled as he sat down.
“Thinking about the babies?”

“How did you know?” she asked, not
bothering to lift her head, but instead simply closed her eyes as
she relaxed in his arms.

“Because,” he said, pausing to kiss the
top of her head with a smile of his own, “I can feel you
smiling.”

“I can’t help it,” she admitted,
turning her head so that she could press a kiss against his
shoulder as she hugged him tighter, so unbelievably happy that she
was actually tearing up.

That is, until she heard the
long-suffering sigh.

“He’s down here, isn’t he?” she asked,
closing her eyes in defeat as she pressed her forehead against his
shoulder and accepted the inevitable.

They weren’t getting rid of Uncle Jared
until he did what he’d come to do and unfortunately for her, she’d
already heard this tale of Bradford bullshit a million times before
thanks to the fact that she’d grown up with them.

“How’d you get the handcuffs off?”
Darrin asked as he began to caress her arm and shoulder with his
fingertips.

“Picked the lock,” Uncle Jared answered
casually as though they were talking about the weather as she did
her best to pretend that she was invisible.

“We already know the story,” Darrin for
some reason decided to remind him when they both knew that there
was nothing on this earth that was going to stop Uncle Jared from
retelling this story.

“Then you’re not going on a honeymoon?”
Uncle Jared asked in a challenging tone, practically daring Darrin
to try and bullshit him.

“Once the babies arrive we won’t have a
chance to go on a honeymoon,” Darrin said evenly, deciding that
arguing with Uncle Jared was the way to go.

She sighed heavily as she settled in
for the long haul, because if there was one thing that she knew
about Bradfords, it was that they were all stubborn, especially the
males.

But especially Uncle Jared.

“You’ll have plenty of volunteers to
watch them when the time comes,” Uncle Jared shot back.

Darrin was quiet for a moment before he
said, “The stories are bullshit.”

“You really think so?” Uncle Jared
asked, sounding amused, which was not a good thing, because that
meant that he would do everything he could to prolong the torture
now just for shits and giggles.

“Yes,” Darrin said with absolutely no
hesitation as she tried, and failed, to resist the urge to pinch
the bastard to stop him from making this worse.

“Ow! What the hell?” the big baby
snapped as she shifted on his lap, careful to keep her face averted
since she’d decided that she’d probably die or mortification if she
made eye contact with Uncle Jared ever again.

“You know what!”
she hissed softly for his ears only, trying to get
the stubborn bastard to stop before things got worse.

“It’s bullshit!” her husband snapped,
obviously deciding that continuing arguing with his uncle at three
in the morning when he had to be at work in three hours was an
excellent idea.

“Is it really?” Uncle Jared asked with
a hint of challenge in his voice, which of course prompted Darrin
to snap, “It is!”

By this point she knew that it was a
losing battle. So it was with a heavy heart, and her gaze shifted
away from Uncle Jared, that she climbed off Darrin’s lap,
“accidentally” stepping on his foot in the process, multiple times,
and headed towards the kitchen, deciding that she might as well
make breakfast.

She’d just decided to make pancakes
when Uncle Jared said, “Once upon a time,” which was cut off with,
“Oh, give me a fucking break,” from her husband.

“I’m trying to tell you a goddamn story
here!”

“Then tell it and drop the bullshit!”
Darrin said, finally accepting the fact that they weren’t getting
rid of his uncle anytime soon.

“I will if you’d shut the hell up and
let me get to it!”

“Then get to it!”

“Fine!”

“Fine!”

Rolling her eyes, she shook her head
and sighed heavily as she reached for a large mixing bowl while she
heard Uncle Jared theatrically clear his throat from the other
room.

“As I was saying, Once upon a
time…”

Chapter 2

The Start of Yet Another Bradford
Tradition…

The First Honeymoon from
Hell

Eleven months after the start of the
first Bradford tradition:

The Bradford Wedding

“Shut up.”

“I’m bored,” James said with a
long-suffering sigh as he picked up a wood shaving and began
peeling layers off it.

“You could always help me,” Robert
pointed out, chuckling when his brother leveled a horrified glare
on him.

“And you could always finish this
tomorrow and go with me into town for a drink tonight,” James
suggested, which was the same suggestion that he’d made every night
for the past six months even though he already knew that it was
pointless.

“I can’t,” Robert said, leaning over
and tilting his head to the side to make sure that the initials
he’d carved on the top of the trunk were perfect.

“You really could,” James pointed out
absently as he gazed around the candle lit workroom.

“I could,” Robert admitted with a smile
as he stood up.

“But, you’re not going to,” James
finished for him, shaking his head in disgust, because he really
couldn’t understand why Robert would rather spend the night with
his wife and children instead of in town, drinking, playing cards
and flirting with every woman that looked his way.

“No,” he said, tilting his head to the
other side as he ran his hand over the top of the trunk, making
sure that the finish was smooth, “I’m not.”

“I’m only going to be here for another
two weeks,” James reminded him with a pout that had him chuckling
as he tossed the rag he’d used to apply an oil finish to the trunk
aside and finally deemed the project finished.