“You better watch it,” Stormy’s mother warned.
“Am I lying?” he said smugly. “Now Stormy, you know I’m not one to meddle in your sex life, I’m glad you finally got one, but all this talk of contracts reminds me too much of Chad. This family ain’t putting up with another Chad…and this one’s ass too big to fight so I probably will have to end up shooting him.”
“Daddy.”
“Arthur.” Stormy and her mother said in unison again.
Mama stood, stepped to Big Country’s other side and angled the phone toward her. “Lieutenant Redmond, I’m Almaya Hendricks, most folks know me as Mama. Big Country is one of my Brood; you may have heard of us.” Stormy’s father didn’t seem impressed. “Until we can understand this situation with Delilah, I believe it’s safer if Stormy goes to Oklahoma with Big Country. Delilah and whoever she’s working with won’t know where they are, and Big Country knows how to protect her; it’s what my Brood does.”
Stormy’s father regarded Big Country silently and Big Country let him.
Stormy ignored the stare down, grabbed his jaw and turned his head, forcing him to look at her. “You don’t understand, me and airplanes—”
Her daddy chuckled and the fine hairs on Big Country’s ass bristled. “No, baby girl, they say he can keep you safe, you get on the plane with the man. If nothing else, we’ll really see if his constitution is better than your weak-assed ex.”
“Had a feeling you’d choose Stormy. I got a commercial flight for both of you leaving out of San Francisco in a little over three hours, enough time to take Stormy to buy a few items and make your flight, which arrives in Oklahoma late tonight. I’ve reserved a rental truck for you at the airport,” Terry said. “Merlee has rooms prepared for you at her fiancé’s house. The return trip will leave tomorrow evening, enough time for you to visit with your sister once your other family is cleared out. When you get back to the mountain, we’ll deal with the Delilah situation.”
Big Country nodded.
“Call us when you get there, Stormy, let us know how the flight goes.”
Stormy gave him a sideways look. “All right, Ma, I’ll call you guys when we settle in. Bye, Daddy.”
The call ended, and Big Country could see Stormy was struggling with her decision to go. He understood, he truly did—the contract didn’t say anything about her walking into a shit storm without a raincoat and that’s exactly what she’d be doing. If he could, he’d keep her as far away from him and his family as possible. He liked his world compartmentalized into the part for his women and the other part for everything else. Stormy was already blurring those boundaries but he’d take her, he had to; if she didn’t go, Mama would send someone else, and Mama was right, Stormy would be safer with him than staying at her house or with her parents.
“Look here, darlin’, just so we understand each other, this ain’t some invitation to get in my head. None of that psychoanalyzing shit. We hold to the original contract, treat this family meeting as a part of the fucking adventure and move on, yeah?”
“Did no one ever teach you the graces, mate?” London asked as he entered the living room from the hidden wall panel that led to the second of four sublevels.
Big Country shook his head. The whole of the Brood seemed hell-bent on exposing their secrets to a woman who wouldn’t even be in their lives a month from now. “Stormy, a woman of intellect, power, and beauty, is not to be treated as one of your basic conveniences.” London walked over and pulled Stormy against him, looping his arm over her shoulder. “He truly doesn’t deserve you, love; you should be with me. Take me to your boutique so I can play with the enticing wonders you have there.” London’s gaze didn’t stray from her breasts.
Stormy had the gall to laugh over London’s innuendo as if he’d said something funny. That shit wasn’t funny, it was just the accent that made it seem that way. London was, in truth, more mercenary in his treatment of women than Big Country ever was.
“You’re breaking my heart over here, Stormy. Yep, I am literally bleeding out,” Lynx said, holding his hand over his heart.
“Enjoy your trip to the afterlife, mate,” London called out. “We’ll grieve your passing in very physical and sweaty ways. In your honor, of course.”
Big Country took a deep breath, closed his eyes and cracked his neck.
“London. Son. I will fuck you up. I will fuck you thefuckup if you don’t back off that woman.” He uttered the warning as heat leached from his body, the familiar cold replacing it.
This wasn’t supposed to happen; he’d never had more than one episode in a day, to say nothing of one within an hour of another. He was half afraid to open his eyes for fear that the elusive blue flame would be dancing somewhere close, waiting to steal his control again.
He bit back a growl.
He never lost control over a fucking woman, whereas they ripped lives apart and celebrated as they did it. Hate and disgust churned inside him as cold promised to harden all feeling and shatter the world into shards of violence that brought respite.
Two warm hands wrapped around his left fist.
The contact hit him like a bolt of lightning, welded the chasm between his mind and body back into one seamless being. Warmth rushed back into the room, and he inhaled, Stormy’s cinnamon and cedar scent washing the bitter taste of jealousy from his tongue.
When he opened his eyes, no flame flittered on the outskirts of his vision. There was only Stormy pressing into his side as she held his hand. No flame, only her heat, her scent, her sienna red skin touching his.
“You flirting with other men, Stormy Sinclair Redmond, that ain’t part of the contract,” he said, voice rough and strained.
“Well, if you wanted that stipulation added, you should have negotiated it in the contract huh?” She smirked, tossing his words in his face.
Cute, real cute—but he’d let her have her moment of glory only because she was right. Problem was, before now it had never been a stipulation he needed to add.
