Raging Hard: A Stepbrother SEAL Romance (With bonus novel Based!) (27 page)

One Year Later

“I
should have seen this coming.”

I was nervous, practically shaking, as my dad stared at us from across the table. Never in my entire life had I dreaded a conversation more than the one we were having. Even when those men took me over a year ago, even that wasn’t as bad.

But at least I had him. I looked over at Nathan and he smiled at me, squeezing my hand.

“I know, Jonathan,” he said. “It wasn’t something we planned.”

Dad sighed and looked down at his hands. “I suppose it doesn’t matter now. The divorce is only a matter of time.”

“I know, Dad,” I said softly. “It wasn’t your fault.”

“Damn right, Jonathan. Lucille is a complete wreck of a human. You had no chance.”

He nodded thankfully at Nathan. “Well, I guess I can’t stand in your way. What do I know about love?”

My heart suddenly swelled. It wasn’t the glowing endorsement I had secretly hoped for, but it also wasn’t the total freakout I had really expected.

“Thank you, sir,” Nathan said. “And believe me when I say this: I love your daughter more than anything. She’s safe with me.”

Dad gave him one long look. “You know,” he said finally, “I never did ask you what happened with Joshua and his people. They just disappeared one day.”

“I figured you didn’t want to know.”

“I heard some rumors, some salacious stuff. Nothing that could be true.” Dad paused and smiled slightly. “You wouldn’t know anything about them, would you? About some psychotic ex-Marine, or maybe he was a Navy SEAL? Either way, he took out a bunch of guards and saved some poor kidnapped girl.”

Nathan smirked and shook his head. “Sounds completely made up, sir, like a stupid fairy tale.”

“Well.” Dad smiled broadly. “We haven’t been bothered since that day, at least.”

“And I hear your hotels are doing better than expected.”

“Damn right they are.”

We all laughed, and I felt my entire body relax in a way it hadn’t since the moment I first met Nathan.

So much had happened since that day in the warehouse, and yet it felt like nothing had changed at all. I’d gone back to school, and Nate had been called up on a mission. We spent a few months apart, and then suddenly he was back, waiting on my doorstep. It was horrible living without him, and every day I imaged that he had been shot to death in the desert somewhere.

I’d never forget what he said to me when he appeared out of nowhere: “I’m back, princess, and I’m not going anywhere for a long time.”

He hadn’t been lying. I didn’t know what had happened, but he found an apartment near mine, and we didn’t go a single day without seeing each other. We had still been hiding our relationship from our parents, right up until the divorce was all but final.

Dad seemed to take it well over the phone. Nate said he had tried to tell his mother, but she didn’t answer his calls, and he didn’t give enough of a shit to force it. He figured she’d find out eventually.

Dad stood up, and we followed. “I guess I’ll leave you two kids alone.”

“Thanks so much, Dad.” I walked around the table and gave him a hug.

“You’re sure about this?” he whispered in my ear. I could hear the slight disapproval in his voice.

Dad had always expected me to end up with some rich business executive just like him. He wanted me to be taken care of, to never have to worry about money. He wanted what was best for me, and I completely understood that.

But Nathan was the best thing for me. Nathan made me feel safer than anyone else in the entire world. Without him, I could have been taken much sooner and kept for much longer. I would never forget Nathan breaking into the room where I was being held, covered in blood, looking like he felt a fury unlike anything I’d ever witnessed before. He had looked like a demon from hell, and yet I loved him.

“I’m sure, Dad. He’s the right thing.”

Dad nodded and pulled away. “I’m happy for you two,” he said.

“Thank you,” Nate replied.

They shook hands, and then Dad left.

“Hold on a second,” Nate said. “I’ll be right back.”

“What are you doing?”

He grinned at me, kissed my cheek, and then ran out the door after my dad.

I shook my head to myself as I collapsed down onto the couch. Nate was always doing stuff like that, making up his mind in a split second and following through with his decision. He was the most decisive person I’d ever met, though sometimes that meant he did some unexpected things.

It didn’t take him long before he returned, grinning ear to ear.

“What’s the matter with you?” I asked him, laughing.

“Nothing, just had some business with your father.”

“What kind of business?”

He ignored my question and sat down next to me. “Are you happy here?”

“Where’s this coming from?”

“Just answer.”

I shrugged. “I guess so.” I was living in the same apartment I had always lived in ever since moving out to college. My roommate had left, and Nathan had basically moved in, though he was still paying for his other place. He barely went there, though, mostly just to get a change of clothes and a shower when I was hogging the bathroom.

It had been a few months since I’d graduated school, and I had no clue what I wanted to do. I was working, not doing anything interesting, but paying the bills. Nathan would bring the future up occasionally, wondering if I had any plans, but I kept telling him that I had none. When I asked him the same question, he would get all mysterious and ignore me. It was frustrating, but he was like that. He loved to push my buttons.

And there was the matter of the Navy SEALs. Ever since his last mission, he hadn’t talked much about them. As far as I knew, he was still involved and still a member, or whatever they called it, but that was another question he didn’t feel like answering.

Suddenly, he grabbed me by the hips and pulled me into his lap. I wrapped my arms around his neck and kissed him deeply, his hands holding onto my waist. I could feel his heart beating and knew mine was beating fast, too, though I didn’t know why.

It was like that every time with him. Every time we touched, every time we kissed, I couldn’t help myself. Excitement would flood through my body, spiking through my pussy, making me soaking wet. It was because I knew what he could do to my body, even after a year of continual, body-shattering fucking. Because he was around all the time, we basically spent most of our days in and out of bed.

I was much less of a virgin. Really, I’d all but forgotten what it was like before sex. With Nathan it was constant, our bodies in constant want and need, and there had been a few times where I was late to class because Nate wouldn’t stop trying to get me off.

“We should talk about the future, babe,” he said.

“I like it here. I guess I really wasn’t thinking too far ahead.”

“My commanding officer called me up yesterday.”

I stared at him. Those were the words I had been dreading for months. “And?”

“And we have a mission. I don’t need to leave for another week, but I’ll be gone for a few months.”

I nodded. I knew what I had been getting into, loving a Navy SEAL. He had a job to do, an important job, and although I was going to be a mess every single second he was gone, worrying about his safety, I knew he would be okay.

Nathan was invincible. He was my man, my everything, and I was his. Ever since that day in the warehouse, I had known. I couldn’t be with anyone else, and he would never, ever let me down.

“Okay,” I said softly.

“Hey,” he said, kissing me, “don’t start the damn waterworks already.”

I took a deep breath. “I can’t help it.”

“It’s going to be okay. But I’d like to know where you’re going to be a few months from now.”

“I’ll be wherever you want me to be.”

He grinned. “That’s what I wanted to hear.”

Suddenly, he stood up, picking me up into the air. He placed me down in front of him, and I marveled again at his strength.

“Because you know,” he said, getting down onto one knee, and my heart was beating too fast, and my breath was barely coming, and I felt dizzy as hell as he pulled a small black box from his pocket and flipped it open, and I nearly fell onto the floor, but his hand was strong on mine as he held the ring up, “you know I want you to be mine, forever. Marry me.”

I opened my mouth, closed it, opened it again. “Yes. Holy shit, yes.”

He grinned and slipped the ring onto my finger.

“You’ll be mine always, and I’ll be yours always. And you’ll never have to worry about anything again.” He stood up and kissed me deep, so deep, my head was a whirl of emotion. “Because you’re going to be my wife.”

“Is that what you wanted with my dad?” I said suddenly.

He laughed and nodded. “Seemed quick to give me his blessing. I guess although I’m not rich, I’m good enough.”

I threw my arms around him, around his tough body, his rough chest, and hugged him tight. He laughed loudly, his voice booming, filling the room.

“You’re more than good enough.”

“I know.”

––––––––

Six Months Later

T
he wind whipped my dress and my veil. It was a beautiful day, sunny with a slight breeze, and the sand felt warm beneath my toes.

“Fuck, bitch, your wedding day!”

I laughed at Lydie. “I know, right?”

“I never thought it was going to happen. Hell, I thought you were going to own ten cats and write letters to your local newspaper every day.”

“Me too, honestly.” We laughed together, enjoying the amazing weather. I felt on top of the world, like nothing could stop me. It was like a dream, like I was walking through a dream, except I was awake and it was happening.

“And him? Never seemed like your type, honestly. But damn does he clean up.”

I felt a thrill run through me and smiled, catching Nate’s eye. He smiled back, looking incredible in his tuxedo. My toes laced through the sand, and everything felt right. I looked out over the water, the private beach empty except for us and the guests. I caught sight of a boat floating slowly in the distance, bobbing up and down with the waves.

The ceremony and the receptions were held on the beach in the Outer Banks near my father’s house. It was the perfect place with the perfect people, and I was finally meeting so many of Nathan’s SEAL friends. They were all an intense bunch but funny and incredible. His mother hadn’t shown up, despite the fact that I had sent her an invitation and personally left her a few messages. Ever since the divorce from my dad, she had really spiraled. Apparently she was hiding out with some movie producer doing coke all day and trying to get into acting. She didn’t seem to want anything to do with her son or his future wife. Nate said good riddance, and that was that.

Meanwhile, my whole big family had shown up: aunts, uncles, grandparents, everyone, plus my dad’s business associates, friends from school, and more. So many more. I barely knew all of the people, but I didn’t care. I was too busy floating on air.

Everything was white, so incredibly white, clean and smooth and modern. My dad had gone all out for the wedding, hiring anyone I’d wanted, buying anything we had needed. He had said that I was his only daughter and that he wanted to give me the most incredible wedding possible. Frankly, I could have married Nate in a run-down motel in front of strangers and it would have been amazing, but I couldn’t complain. The day was perfect.

Lydie had been an incredible maid of honor, taking care of anything I had needed and smoothing over any problems as they had risen. I had been worried that she was basically just going to be too drunk to function at all, but she had been surprisingly sober and incredible. I guess she was probably starting to grow up.

I looked down at my finger, at the rings, and my heart skipped a beat.
Mrs. Nathan Magnus,
I thought to myself. I really was his and always would be.

“Drinks!” Lydie handed me a shot, pretty much out of nowhere, and I threw it back.

“Can’t be sober at your own wedding reception!”

Suddenly she grabbed my hand and tugged me over to the dance floor where a live band was playing. We danced and I lost myself in the music. Soon, Nathan showed up, and we danced together like we had in the club, all those nights ago. Maybe not so sexual, since we were at my wedding, after all, but the intense focus and chemistry was still there.

“How’s it feel?” he whispered in my ear.

“What?”

“Being married.”

“It feels . . . right.”

“Yeah.” He grinned at me, that heartbreaking, incredible smile. “It does.”

We danced together, out bodies pressed close. Lydie made plenty of jokes, of course, and we lost ourselves in the party.

I had never expected it, any of it. I had disliked Nathan, despite being attracted to him. But as time went by, I had found myself spiraling further and further into him, needing him, wanting him.

And then suddenly the party was over way too fast, and he was carrying me off, away from the reception. People cheered and laughed as he walked up the familiar path back toward my dad’s house—ours for the next month.

“Ready to make this thing official?” Nate said in my ear as he carried me upstairs.

“I think it was official when the priest told us to kiss,” I said, giggling.

He threw me down onto the bed, and I laughed. “Not what I meant.”

And then his hands, his fingers, his tongue and lips and more were all over my body.

He was mine, my ex-stepbrother the SEAL, my husband the SEAL. It was our first sweaty night as a married couple, but I knew there were many, many more to come.

Life with Nate was exciting, uncertain, and incredible. He made every breath better.

That was how I wanted to live: with him and for him, forever, together.

Thank You!

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