“Oh good, you’re ready to go,” Rory said, smiling when she spotted him.
Frowning, he looked down at his bare chest and boxers and had to wonder what she was talking about. He moved to open his mouth, but no words came out as he watched more men crawl through his window, a lot more. A few he recognized, but most of them he’d never seen before. He knew by their builds, their dark hair, and bad-boy looks that they were all related and they were all looking at him.
“W-What’s going on?” Andrew asked, hating how weak he sounded.
Rory gestured a few of the men forward. “Nothing much. We’ve just come to get you and end the bullshit.”
“Oh, shit,” Andrew mumbled when they came for him.
Chapter 37
October
“Get the hell away from me with that, you psychotic harpy!” Andrew shouted, making Connor smile as he headed downstairs, more than ready for this morning’s battle.
It had been almost a month since Rory and her cousins kidnapped Andrew. Well, “talked him into leaving his house and coming to live with her,” as Rory had explained it to the nice police officer that showed up when Andrew managed to get his hands on a cellphone and called for help. The two of them fought day and night and they seemed to hate each other more than ever, but Rory didn’t let that stop her from making sure that Andrew was cared for. She took care of him in the morning, came by several times during the day to check up on him and even had that little snot rag of an assistant of hers help out, and she took care of him at night.
Andrew, who’d been ready to give up, hated every last second of it. He bitched and whined and tried to make several escape attempts, but unfortunately for him, the Bradfords decided to take a special interest in him. They now had three Bradfords a week, two to work on Strawberry Manor and one to hang out at Rory’s during the day and keep an eye on Andrew. He’d only managed to sneak past a Bradford one time, but he didn’t get very far, not with Bunny on the job. One vicious growl and Andrew was making his way back to the bedroom that Rory had set up for him on the first floor.
Thanks to Rory taking over, Andrew had gained back some weight, had health insurance, and all his medication. He also made it to all of his medical appointments and Rory somehow managed to browbeat the man into putting his name on the waitlist for a transplant. He had a very rare form of leukemia and was somewhat lucky that a bone marrow donation could heal him. The only problem was that he had a very rare blood type, but that wasn’t stopping Connor from praying for a miracle.
“Take your medication!” Rory snapped.
“Go to hell!” Andrew shot back.
“Take it!”
“Make me!” Andrew snapped, making Connor cringe on his behalf as he stepped over Bunny and headed for Andrew’s room.
When he stepped inside Andrew’s room and discovered that Rory had his best friend in a headlock and was trying to shove a pill in his mouth, he wasn’t all that surprised. Andrew had set down a challenge, after all.
“Would you two cut the shit? We have to get going or you’re going to be late for your appointment,” Connor said, ignoring the power struggle going on behind him and grabbed some clothes for Andrew.
“Actually,” Rory said, pausing just as Andrew muttered and made a few gagging noises, “if you have room for one more, I need a ride to the medical center, too.”
Frowning, Connor tossed the clothes he’d grabbed for Andrew, who was chugging down a bottle of water as he glared at Rory. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah,” Rory said, waving it off like it was no big deal, “I just have a checkup.”
“Then, why do you have to come with us?” Andrew asked, watching Rory suspiciously, probably because Rory had a tendency of taking over Andrew’s appointments and interrogating his doctors and making Andrew feel like a five-year-old.
Rory rolled her eyes as she snatched the tee-shirt out of Andrew’s hands and returned it to the drawer, only to pick out a different shirt and toss it to him. He tried to bite back a smile as Andrew shot him an “I told you so” look. The man bitched day and night about Rory babying him and even though Connor told Andrew that he was imagining things, he wasn’t. Connor wasn’t about to interfere, for several reasons. One, he knew that Andrew secretly liked the attention. It had been a long time since anyone took care of him. Secondly, it entertained the hell out of him and her cousins. It lightened the mood and helped relieve some of the stress of trying to get the manor done and kept their minds off of what would happen if the doctors couldn’t find a match.
“Because I lent my Jeep to Max so that he could check up on some orders in town for us and help with the manor. Now, stop your bitching, eat your breakfast, and get your ass dressed or you’ll make us late,” she said as she walked out of the room, only pausing long enough to give Connor a kiss and then, she was off, probably to double-check Andrew’s afternoon pills.
“I hate her,” Andrew said evenly as he picked up the toast that Rory slathered with butter, peanut butter, and jelly, part of her effort to put some weight back on him.
Connor chuckled. “No, you don’t.”
Andrew released a long-suffering sigh as he took a big bite, knowing the little general would just shove it down his throat if he didn’t eat it. “You’re right. I don’t. But if she tries to check on me in the bathroom one more time, I’m going to throttle the little pain in the ass!”
“I’ll let her know,” Connor said, chuckling as he headed out the door to give his friend some privacy.
“You be sure to do that,” Andrew mumbled, and Connor didn’t need to look back to know that his friend was smiling. Rory was a hell of a woman and he’d been damn lucky to snatch her up before some other asshole realized how great she was.
Damn lucky.
“What the hell is taking them so long?” Andrew asked as he fidgeted in the waiting room chair.
