Her Loyal Protector: A Strong Family Romance Companion Novel

by Cami Checketts

  “She’s my sugar mama,” Cameron said.

  “Good for you.” Krysta laughed. “And you’re having a baby?”

  “Yes. It’s going to be a boy,” Kaytlyn said.

  “You don’t know that,” Cameron said.

  “Yes, I do, and I’m naming him Jacob.”

  Cameron slid his sunglasses on and reached over, taking her hand. “We’ll see, love. We’ll see.”

  “Yes, we will.”

  Epilogue

  The wedding was more amazing than Kaytlyn could have dreamed, and the honeymoon exceeded her every expectation. The devotion, passion, and love she felt for and from Cameron were unequaled. She’d worried about entertaining their families in Grand Cayman, but Krysta had become fast friends with Cameron’s sisters, who enjoyed flirting with Jeb and Tyler and being on a tropical vacation. She and Cameron had almost enough alone time, and his family was amazing, especially his mom, who instantly adored Kaytlyn.

  When they got back to Sun Valley, everything with the businesses, the charities, Christmas, and the house were busy and demanding as ever. Kaytlyn thrived on it, though, especially with Cameron working alongside her. He might have been one of the most impressive security guys she knew, but he could also run a business with grace and talent, and they were great partners.

  Peter was arrested briefly but sadly released. The good news was his political career was ruined by Larry’s allegations. His party dropped his bid for senate and he seemed to have disappeared. Kaytlyn was just thrilled she didn’t have to see him again, and she still blamed him for destroying Jessica.

  They bought a little house in town, and they spent almost as much time there as they did in the mansion. It was fun to be together, just be the two of them. It was great to have Krysta around too, when she wasn’t in Ohio with Cameron’s family; the girl was flourishing and had decided to start school at Ohio State in the fall. They sent lawyers to Kaytlyn’s parents’ house with money and with offers for her mom to come visit. They were turned away every time. It hurt, but they decided to keep trying.

  Her due date, April tenth, came and went, and she could’ve sworn her body couldn’t stretch any farther. Cameron took such good care of her, always bringing her different herbal teas that were supposed to be good for the baby. He claimed she was the most beautiful women ever, but she knew she was swollen and gargantuan. She’d more than made up for all the weight she’d lost at the first of the pregnancy. She probably looked as miserable as she felt.

  Finally, on April fourteenth, the doctor induced labor. Kaytlyn wanted to go natural, but after ten hours of contractions, the only thing in her life that had felt as good as that epidural was Cameron’s touch. He stood stoically by her bedside, trying to anticipate her every need, holding her hand, feeding her ice chips, and smoothing back her hair.

  After twenty hours, she was finally dilated to a ten and the doctor blessedly said it was time to push. Twenty minutes later, a squalling, red-faced baby covered in white mucus joined the world.

  “It’s a girl,” the doctor said happily, holding the baby up for them to see.

  “It’s a … what?” Kaytlyn stared in happy, exhausted confusion. She’d been so certain the baby was a boy.

  “A girl?” Cameron’s face lit up. The joy in his blue eyes made Kaytlyn grin.

  They wrapped the baby up in a warm blanket, and the nurse rubbed a white substance off her face before they handed her directly to Kaytlyn. Kaytlyn cuddled her against her chest, bursting with rightness and joy. “A girl.” She shook her head, staring in awe at the beautiful, wrinkled face. The baby had Kaytlyn’s lips, but beyond that, she couldn’t say who she looked like.

  “A girl,” Cameron repeated happily. He wrapped his arms around both of them. “I’m so happy right now.”

  “I thought you wanted a boy.”

  Cameron shook his head. “I wanted a baby with you. I don’t care if it’s a boy or a girl.”

  “But we were going to name him Jacob.”

  Cameron chuckled. “The next baby will have to be Jacob.” He gazed at their daughter with love shining in his blue eyes. “I didn’t know it was possible to fall head over heels in love as fast as I did with you.”

  Kaytlyn smiled. “That’s why it took you two years to ask me out.”

  “Hey, I’m a slow military man. Be nice.”

  The doctor delivered the afterbirth and the nurses were waiting to weigh and check the baby, but nobody really interrupted them.

  “So, Jacob won’t work …” Kaytlyn pursed her lips. “Jacqueline, maybe?”

  “Nah. The next baby will be Jacob,” he said stubbornly. “This one needs the name of a princess. She’s going to be as beautiful as her mama.”

  Kaytlyn leaned into him and said, “Okay, my military man. What is it, then?”

  “Isabella, and we’ll call her Belle,” he said decisively.

  “I love it.” She cuddled back against his chest, tilting her head up to smile at him.

  Cameron bent close and gave her a lingering kiss. “I just love you.”

  Kaytlyn held her baby close and snuggled against her husband. She’d never been so blessed, and she was going to raise this baby with all of her love. The anguish that she and Cameron had gone through to get here was definitely worth it.

  About the Author

  Cami is a part-time author, part-time exercise consultant, part-time housekeeper, full-time wife, and overtime mother of four adorable boys. Sleep and relaxation are fond memories. She’s never been happier.

  Join Cami’s VIP list to find out about special deals, giveaways and new releases and receive a free copy of Rescued by Love: Park City Firefighter Romance by clicking here.

  Read on for a quick excerpt of the first book in Cami’s Strong Family Romances: Don’t Date Your Brother’s Best Friend.

  cami@camichecketts.com

  www.camichecketts.com

  Don’t Date Your Brother’s Best Friend

  Ella Strong drove her new Camry down the mountain pass that led to her Colorado valley and sighed with relief, “Home.” The little town of Lonepeak was all there like a postcard in front of her. Downtown still boasted wide tree-lined streets and quant little shops, all cookie-cutter with a faux wrought-iron railing on the second story and their own light post. Houses and farms were spread throughout the valley. Honest, hardworking people she’d known and loved her entire life occupied those spots just like she’d remembered—and, in her mind, just as they should be.

  She strained for a peek at the spot she loved most in all the world, without running her new car off the road. There. Straight across the valley, she could make out the lodge rising above the pine trees, with ski lifts and runs twisting up the mountain behind it. In June, the lifts were used for mountain biking instead of skiing, but she loved that too.

  The Strong family had owned and operated Angel Falls Retreat since before Ella was born. Her mama’s family roots were here, and they’d owned the property and a small ski lift and bed and breakfast. Her parents had met snow-skiing in Aspen as college students. They’d both dreamed and schemed of making the mountain into something incredible. Many years and hours of work later, it was a thriving year-round retreat. Her oldest brother, Gavin, mostly ran the resort now. Ella’s second-oldest brother, Heath, had even expanded the concept and had resorts of his own in Utah, Wyoming, Connecticut, and West Virginia.

  Ella pushed the pedal down. The car responded, and she bypassed town and made it home in record time. She pulled into the main lodge parking lot. There were smaller villas scattered away from the main lodge, and the newer spa and ski and bike shop was to the east. Her family’s home was west, in a smaller canyon. Their canyon was private and gated, hidden from the resort, but she knew Gavin was a workaholic. She’d find him here and maybe Austin and Mama, then go see her papa.

  Sliding into a parking spot, she jumped out and hurried toward the lodge. A man whizzed through the parking lot on a mountain bike. He must not have seen her, as he almo
st buzzed her.

  “Watch out!” Ella called.

  “Excuse me,” he said, braking to a stop. He spun around and pedaled back to her. Stopping right in front of her, he leaned over his handlebars. His eyes swept over her, letting her know he was interested, but it was a little over the top. She didn’t even know him, yet he gazed at her like he had paid for the right to gawk. “I wasn’t paying attention to where I was going.”

  “Apparently,” she sassed back, putting one hand on her hip and tossing her long, dark curls.

  He grinned. “Can I gain your forgiveness by buying you dinner?”

  Ella took a quick inventory, not sure if she wanted to spend more time with this guy or not. He was a built dude and his bike was top of the line, Emonda. His high-end bike clothes reeked of wealth. Not that she was opposed to wealth, as long as the guy had earned it. Hardworking and fun were qualities at the very top of her list for the man who would snag her heart.

  “No, you can’t,” a voice said at her shoulder.

  Ella knew that voice. She loved the depth and timbre of it. Quite often, she heard it in her dreams. She turned slightly, and there he was. Trey Nelson. The man who had defined everything that she’d wanted in a man since the day she’d realized boys and girls were different creatures.

  Unfortunately, Trey had never wanted her in return. He was the best friend of her oldest brother, Gavin, and since he was six years older than her, Trey had always treated her like his little sister. He was protective of her, liked to tease her, and had probably never once envisioned dating her like she dreamt about daily. Correction: used to dream about.

  She was a successful college grad now, all finished with Stanford and three months into her first job, a marketing specialist at a fabulous start-up company based in Salt Lake City. They specialized in electronic billboards and were growing like mad. Her job was to get them even more contracts, and she was killing it, if she did say so herself. Her boss seemed pleased, and she enjoyed the work, though the sprawling Salt Lake valley was too populated for a backwoods girl like her. She’d come home for Labor Day weekend to enjoy family and her mountains, and then she’d be back to the real world. At least the mountains east of Salt Lake had some great hikes and bike paths she could escape to after work and on the weekends, after she navigated through traffic for a miserable hour.

  “I think the lady can decide for herself,” Rich Guy said.

  “Back off, Marcus. This one’s mine.” Trey’s eyes swept over her, and for a second, she really thought he meant it, really wanted her to be his. Then he acted like the annoying, possessive big brother, putting his hand on her lower back and escorting her toward the lodge without giving her a chance to choose for herself. She’d choose Trey every time, but she was an independent woman and he needed to know that.

  The Richie—Marcus, she supposed—grunted something annoyed and not very appropriate behind them, but Ella was having a hard time focusing with Trey’s warm palm on her back, seeping through her thin shirt, and his words. “‘This one’s mine’? What kind of bull crap is that?” she asked.

  Trey smiled down at her, but his blue eyes had something different in them than she’d ever seen. It was almost like he was finally seeing her, but that was probably just wishful thinking on her part. “It’ll get that loser to leave you alone. He’s with a corporate retreat out of Denver, and most of them are stand-up guys, but Marcus Traegger thinks he owns the world and every woman in it.”

  “Maybe I prefer guys like that.” She arched a challenging eyebrow. The truth was that no man had ever compared to Trey, but he didn’t know that. Hopefully, he would never know that. How humiliating would that be?

  He opened the lodge’s door and ushered her inside. “I’d say too bad for you, because Gavin and I are not letting it happen.” He glowered down at her. It was odd to see anything but a smile on Trey’s handsome face. He was just one of those contagiously happy people. Add to that his good-looking face with the slightly longer curly golden-brown hair and the bright blue eyes she couldn’t resist and she could understand why every woman flung herself at him. No matter how jealous it made her.

  Ella stopped just inside the door, taking in the huge open room welcoming her and a pretty blonde she didn’t know manning the front desk. They were far enough away that they still had a small measure of privacy. She whirled on Trey, ready to give him a piece of her mind. He had plenty of women after him, and she could choose if she wanted to go to dinner with some rich yahoo.

  A deep voice said, “What aren’t we letting happen?”

  Ella pushed away her frustration with the bossy, too-handsome Trey and turned. Her oldest brother, Gavin, was striding down the grand staircase as if he owned the world, or at least owned this corner of it. He pretty much did, though her mama still had her hand in everything. From what Ella had seen on her brief trips home, Gavin was taking over more and more. He was brilliant at it, though it had always baffled her that he’d never left the valley. He’d had a full-ride scholarship to Texas A&M, planning to play cornerback and get his undergrad before going on to law school. Ella had only been twelve at the time, so her memory was a little fuzzy, but she did remember her parents going from thrilled and proud to withdrawn and sad. Papa’s accident had happened around the same time, so Gavin never went away to college; he just got his degree online and worked night and day to make the resort even better than anyone could’ve dreamed. Stetson, their twenty-year-old brother, was fulfilling Gavin’s dream, playing defensive end for Purdue and making everybody proud.

  “Gavin!” Ella rushed to the stairs.

  He met her at the bottom and lifted her off her feet, swinging her around. “Hey, Cinderella,” he teased. “Come home to clean the chimney?”

  “Yes, sir. Put me to work, big brother.”

  He released her from the hug and looked her over. “You’re too pretty to be working.”

  “That’s what I thought,” Trey said from behind her.

  Ella caught a glimpse of a warning in Gavin’s eyes before she rounded on Trey. “Like you’d ever look at me as anything but a sister,” she hurled at him.

  Trey’s eyes widened, and she almost faltered. The color of his eyes could go from teal-blue to a more true blue depending on what he was wearing or his mood. His eyes had always mesmerized her.

  “He’d better not,” Gavin growled. He wrapped an arm around her shoulders. Protective and in charge of everybody, that was her big brother. She adored him, but she quite often balked at him telling her what to do. She was very unlike her twin, Cassandra, who was obedient and sweet. If Trey had any inclination to realize she was a woman, she didn’t want Gavin scaring him away.

  Trey said nothing, and that frustrated her even more. So he gave a secondhand compliment, but then when she called him out, gave him the chance to say he didn’t think of her as a little sister anymore, he clammed up. What did she expect? She’d been around Trey all of five minutes, and of course she’d imagined something different in his eyes; she’d been praying to see a glimmer of interest for years. The fact that he’d probably never see her as anything but a little sister made her want to punch him in the gut, but that was unfair. This was all on her.

  “What are you doing here, anyway?” she demanded of Trey. “Don’t you have Instagram videos to shoot for your admirers to gawk over?” Trey was an Instagram and YouTube hotshot. He made videos showing and instructing how to do insane, borderline idiotic tricks on mountain bikes and snow skis. Ella followed him. How could she help it? But she’d noticed that most of his followers seemed to be female and were enthralled with his perfect face and tough body more than learning how to do any of his tricks. She didn’t blame the women, but she could still admit it annoyed her.

  “I hired him,” Gavin said.

  “You can afford him?” Ella asked. It sounded more like something their brother Heath, would do. His four resorts were even more lavish than this one, and he was always doing some kind of interesting promotion.

&nbs
p; Trey chuckled. “I gave him a discount.”

  Gavin cracked half of a smile. “You’d better not have, you idiot.”

  Trey just gave them a self-satisfied smirk and stepped closer. “To answer your question, beautiful Cinderella, Gavin hired me to impress a bunch of corporate yuppies who have booked the resort this weekend to teach them tricks so they can impress their friends when they go home.”

  “So you’re only here for the weekend?”

  “Not long enough for you?” Trey arched an eyebrow.

  No, it would never be long enough for her. She’d be happy to spend the rest of eternity with Trey, but she clamped a lid on that fantasy. Trey was no Prince Charming, and she was better suited to clean the chimney than campaign for Trey’s affections. Judging by the way he appeared to flit from one gorgeous woman to the next, she should be glad he wasn’t interested. He’d reel her in, maybe finally kiss her like she’d always dreamed about, and then he’d dump her and move on. She’d be in a worse position than ever.

  Keep reading here.

  Also by Cami Checketts

  Strong Family Romance

  Don’t Date Your Brother’s Best Friend

  Her Loyal Protector

  Steele Family Romance

  Her Dream Date Boss

  The Stranded Patriot

  The Committed Warrior

  Extreme Devotion

  Quinn Family Romance

  The Devoted Groom

  The Conflicted Warrior

  The Gentle Patriot

  The Tough Warrior

  Her Too-Perfect Boss

  Her Forbidden Bodyguard

  Georgia Patriots Romance

  The Loyal Patriot