I’d have rather curled myself around Summer, but if I have to be out here bonding with her brothers, this is a fucking fun way to do it.
We crash out of the thick forest into a mud pit. The trees make a thick canopy overhead, but the ground has been cleared of debris. Black mud oozes from the ridges our tires cut through the pit.
The brothers circle me with their quad bikes. Mud sprays up from their tires, covering me from head to toe.
That was my fault. I forgot what we were out here for and let my guard down.
I wipe big globs of thick, stinky mud from my face before I climb off the four-wheeler. I strip off my T-shirt to use it to wipe my face, but it’s entirely soaked. “Should we have it out now or would you like to haze me more first?”
“I’m all for hazing you,” Kale calls out.
“Shut up, Kale.” Owen dismounts and lumbers across the grooved tracks of mud. The wet dirt sucks at his boots with each stride. He makes a show of reaching up to take his hat off and shoving it into Jett’s hands.
The toe of his boot touches mine as he stares me down. His voice is cold and as clear as the animosity in his gaze. “I’ve read up on you, Hollywood. Newspapers, gossip mags, online. You have a bad temper. You’re violent. I’ve seen far more of you thanI ever fucking wanted to, including one tawdry video I hope my baby sister doesn’t know about.”
She does. My kitten did her research before she tackled talking me into working with her. She’s always known my bad side. It took much longer for her to find my softer side. That’s not something he needs to know. It sure as hell won’t make him like me.
“You’re a criminal.”
I’m not surprised that would be a problem for him. It was obvious from the first time I overheard him on the phone with Burke the night Summer’s second eldest brother ambushed the two of us in Los Angeles.
I’d scored brownie points with Burke that I’d hoped might transfer to the other brothers. Apparently, that’s not the case.
“If we’re talking about Alec Hawthorne...” Everything that happened with Alec Hawthorne and Rochelle is public knowledge. My reasons for doing what I did... “What happened—”
“You’re still a criminal,” he thunders. “No matter how minor the other vagrancies.”
“Owen,” Jett butts in.
I flick him a grateful look, and he shakes his head, like I shouldn’t be quick to thank him. But surely the brothers have partaken in their fair share of folies. With the way Summer talks about them at least one of them must have spent a night in a cell at some point.
But Owen’s problem with me is bigger than that. “Why don’t you tell me what’s actually bothering you.”
“Bothering me?” He runs his thumb across his lip and huffs.
“Damn, Hollywood.” Henry cackles. “Bad move.”
“If it had been up to me, you would never have gotten close to our sister.” Owen pushes me back a step. “You sure as shit would not have knocked her up. You don’t deserve her.”
“Here, here,” Storm calls out.
“It’s not up to you.” I stand my ground, my heels sinking in the mud. Owen’s scary, because he’s a fucking human mountain, but I’m not about to let him run me off from the woman who is my whole life. “It’s up to Summer.”
As long as she loves me and wants me in her life, I’m here. Loving her with my every breath. Getting in her brothers’ faces about their boorish behavior.
“Whether I deserve her or not is something she gets to decide. I can promise you I’m aware that I’m one lucky son of a bitch, and I will do everything in my power to make sure she’s happy.”
“Well, you’re fucking it up.” Owen’s voice is dangerously low.
My heart thuds. “What?”
“You haven’t noticed? Your head is so far up your own fucking ass, Hollywood.” He shoves me back with his chest. “You’re not able to see that she ain’t happy.”
“She’s been tired. Unwell.” That’s to be expected with being pregnant. “She’s a little overwhelmed and not smiling as much. That’s no—”
“It’s not pregnancy hormones.” He shoves me again.
I lose purchase on the slippery mud. My ass hits the wet surface with a slap. A chill seeps through my jeans and into my flesh. My insides flood with the kind of heat that has me clenching my hands where they’re buried in the mud.
