Tempting Boundaries

by Carrie Ann Ryan

  He fucking loved it.

  Loved working with his hands, loved making something look like it was cared for rather than neglected. He just hoped he didn’t lose his job because he slept with their sister.

  Jesus, Decker was a fucking selfish idiot.

  “What crawled up your ass and died?” Wes asked before taking a sip of his coffee. He cringed then took another sip. “Tabby’s out for the week since I forced her to actually take a vacation, so the coffee tastes like shit.” Tabby was Montgomery Inc.’s administrative assistant. She ruled the company—and the men—with a manicured fist. Decker was pretty sure she and Wes had a thing going on, or at least had at one point. If not, they were just damn close and knew how the other worked. The result worked well for the company, and Decker didn’t care as long as he could keep his job and work the way he wanted.

  He probably ruined all of that by finally giving into temptation, but Miranda was worth it.

  God, she was so worth it.

  Decker poured himself a cup of coffee and took a sip, shuddering as he swallowed. The bitter taste would probably give him more chest hair, but whatever. “You suck at making coffee, Wes. I thought you’d be better.”

  “Eat me. And why the hell did you have that look on your face when you walked in? Something wrong with the paneling you put up yesterday?”

  Decker shook his head. “Nothing’s wrong,” he lied. Well, lied about himself. The paneling was fucking perfect. “Just not awake yet, and this coffee sure as hell isn’t going to cut it.” He dumped the cup and shuddered.

  Wes gave him a look that said he didn’t believe him, but he’d let it pass.

  “So, what’s on the docket for the day?”

  They went through their plans for the day, and after grabbing a bear claw—he already missed Tabby and her jelly doughnuts—he headed out to his section of the inn. Gunner stayed back in the office, content to snooze the day away.

  Decker went over the paneling he’d put in the day before, happy with the progress, and then went back to the other side of the building where he needed to work on some of the support beams. When he picked up the hammer, he had a quick flashback of his dad and cursed.

  No. He wouldn’t be thinking about that man right now. Not ever if he had a choice. His mom had called two more times, and Decker had answered. He’d told himself not to, but he hadn’t been able to help it. She wouldn’t help herself, and she wouldn’t accept his help, but things could change. He couldn’t risk not listening.

  That didn’t mean he’d face Frank though. That was something he could never do.

  If that made him a bad son, then so be it.

  After a couple of hours of hard labor that left a good sheen of sweat on his body, he went outside to check on a couple of things with his workers. He ate lunch with the crew then worked a few more hours. Wes and Storm were working on other things, so he didn’t have to deal with hiding from them. It sucked to have to face them day after day and not mention the fact that he was with their sister, but he couldn’t do it. Not yet. Soon though. Because Maya, if she hadn’t ready, would spread the news because that’s how families worked. Other than the fact that he was hiding shit from his family, it was a damn good day. They got tons of work done on the place, and when he wasn’t thinking of support beams and drywall, he was thinking of Miranda.

  Good fucking day.

  A car door slammed, and he ignored it since it could have been anyone.

  “You fucking asshole!”

  Decker stiffened, set down the hammer in his hands, and then turned to see Griffin striding up to him. He let the fist hit his face, knowing it was coming. He blinked twice, slowly, and then rubbed his jaw. He deserved it after all. He ran his tongue over his teeth and checked to see if any had loosened. Luckily they were in good shape, and he also didn’t taste any blood.

  He didn’t think that would last for long, not with the look of murder in Griffin’s eyes.

  “You’re just going to stand there and take it?” Griffin asked, his chest heaving. He shook his hand then lifted a lip in a snarl. “We trusted you. We fucking trusted you, and you’re sleeping with Miranda?”

  Wes and Storm ran up from behind Griffin and stood on either side of their brother.

  Well then. At least he knew where he stood.

  It wasn’t like it was a surprise.

  “What the hell is going on?” Storm asked. He looked between the two men like they’d gone crazy.

  Maybe they had.

  “Why did you punch Decker?” Wes asked. “And why the fuck did you take it? Damn it. This is a job site. Work. If you have issues, get the fuck out of here and deal with them. Don’t bring it here.”

  Decker sighed. That was true. “Fine. I’m calling it a day.” He met Griffin’s eyes. “You want to deal with this some more? Follow me to my place. Let’s not do it here.” He’d already tainted the Montgomerys with his presence, and now he was doing it again by bringing his shit to work.

  Their work.

  “You don’t want to tell them?” Griffin asked, murder on his face. “You don’t want to tell them why I hit you? You’re going to try and hide it for as long as you can, aren’t you?”

  “What is he talking about, Decker?” Storm asked, his voice smooth. The man didn’t blow up as quickly as Wes or the others, but when he did, he lived up to his name.

  Decker met Wes’s and Storm’s gazes and raised his chin. “Miranda and I are seeing each other.”

  There. He’d said it. It wasn’t like they weren’t going to find out on their own anyway, not with the way Griffin looked like he was ready to blow.

  Wes’s eyes bugged out. “Seriously?”

  Storm didn’t say anything. Instead, the man looked thoughtful.

  “Yeah,” Griffin sneered. “How long has it been going on?”

  “Griffin, stop it.” Storm sighed. “This will take getting used to.”

  Wes just blinked a few times and shook his head. “Didn’t see that coming.”

  “How long?” Griffin asked.

  Decker sighed. “Not too long, and now we need to leave so we’re not here at work. I don’t want to hurt Montgomery Inc.”

  “By taking advantage of Miranda, you already hurt the Montgomerys.”

  It was like a hit to the solar plexus. Decker swallowed hard, his head pounding.

  “Whoa, man, what the fuck?” Wes said, turning to Griffin. “He’s our brother. You don’t fucking say that.”

  While Decker appreciated what Wes was saying, it wasn’t the truth. It also didn’t soothe the deep cut from Griffin’s words. His best friend’s words. He’d known it would hurt. He’d known that he’d lose everything because he’d taken a chance on the one woman he truly craved, truly loved.

  But he hadn’t known it would hurt this bad.

  “He’s not our brother,” Griffin said slowly. “He’s the man we took in. The man we grew up with together. Now he’s the man who took advantage of Miranda.”

  Decker’s hands fisted at his side. “I let you get away with one punch. I let you get away with saying shit about my loyalties. But don’t say I took advantage of her. She’s an adult. She had choices. So did I. It’s mutual.”

  Griffin tilted his head. “Yeah? And you just swooped right in, didn’t you? Right after that asshole beat the crap out of her, hey, here you are, fucking our baby sister.”

  Decker lost it.

  He slammed his fist into Griffin’s face, pissed off he’d let Grif bait him in the first place.

  “Whoa,” Storm called as he reached for Decker.

  Decker slid out of the way and came nose to nose with Grif. “Watch what you say about her. She’s everything, you asshole. Don’t you make it sound like I took her when she didn’t want it. Don’t you make it sound like she’s something I picked up off the street. You know better than that.” He took a deep breath. “Or at least I thought you knew better than that.”

  Fuck, of all the brothers, he thought Grif would have understoo
d. Or maybe that was just the thing. Of all the brothers, Grif was the one who knew him best.

  He was the one who knew for sure Decker wasn’t good enough.

  “You hid it, Deck.” Grif shook his head. “You fucking hid it. What am I supposed to think? Maya sees you coming out of Miranda’s place early in the morning and you didn’t tell us. If it was something you were proud of, you wouldn’t have hidden her like a dirty secret.”

  Decker punched him again and, this time, took Griffin’s punch as well. Wes and Storm had apparently given up on keeping them from knocking each other down.

  Good.

  Griffin got in a good punch to Decker’s kidneys, and he cursed. The two of them hit the ground, punching and kicking at each other like they were kids again—only this time it wasn’t for fun. The blood and bruises would be real, and he wasn’t sure they could heal from the ones that would be left unseen.

  He’d have taken the hits if Griffin hadn’t disrespected Miranda. As it was, he had to hold back from hitting harder. The rage he felt over the past few months of not being able to do anything about his mom, about Jack, about most things, slid through him, and he kept hitting.

  Grif hit back, though he was smaller than Decker, and if they didn’t stop soon, Decker would regret this more than he already did.

  He pulled back, his chest heaving.

  “We’re new. So fucking new we wanted time to ourselves.” Truth, but not all of it. “You think I would have risked everything I had, everything that I am with you guys, for something I’m ashamed of?”

  Griffin’s face shut down. “I don’t know what to think anymore, Deck. It’s like I don’t even know you.”

  “I’m the same guy I always was.” They were just seeing him clearly now.

  “She’s my baby sister, Decker. You didn’t tell us. You hid it. I just…I just can’t.”

  Decker stood up, his body aching, his knuckles bleeding. He dusted himself off and offered his hand to Griffin. When the other man didn’t take it, but stood up on his own, Decker nodded. He shouldn’t have been surprised. It was over.

  His mouth hurt like a bitch, and he was pretty sure his face bled, and he’d have a black eye to match Miranda’s. Fuck.

  Miranda.

  She was not going to appreciate this.

  But what else was new. He’d fucked up, and he’d keep doing so because that’s who he was.

  “I’m sorry,” he said softly. “I’m sorry I didn’t come to you first.”

  Griffin shook his head. “I need some time, Deck. Don’t hurt her, or I’ll kill you.” He met Decker’s eyes. “You get that? You get that I just said that to my best friend because he’s going to hurt my little sister?”

  “It’s not all about you, Griffin,” Storm put in, his voice devoid of emotion.

  Griffin sighed. “It’s about all of us. And I need to get out of here.” He stormed off, leaving Decker bloody and broken open.

  Wes shook his head then followed his brother, not saying anything to Decker.

  “Why don’t you take the rest of the day off?” Storm said softly.

  Decker stiffened. “I’m not going to let this affect my job.” He’d be damned if he ruined it all.

  Storm sighed. “You’re bloody, bruised, and people saw it all. I don’t care about that since we’re guys and we do that. But this is a place of business, and now people are going to talk. They’ll deal with it. We’ll deal with it. It’s what we do. But you need to go clean up and cool off.” He put his hand on Decker’s shoulder. “For what it’s worth, I like you and Miranda together. She’s always had a thing for you anyway. And I’ve seen the way you look at her.”

  Decker’s mouth dropped, and Storm shrugged.

  “It wasn’t my place. I don’t necessarily think it was Griffin’s either, but that’s on him. And you. She’s ours, Deck. She’s also the youngest of us, so we’ve all had a hand in being overprotective when it comes to her growing up. You’ll figure it out. So will she. Despite the fact we try to forget it, she’s an adult and can make her own choices. Just don’t hurt her.”

  Decker swallowed hard and nodded. He didn’t promise he wouldn’t hurt her; he couldn’t promise that. He’d do his damn best not to, but that didn’t mean much when shit happened all around them.

  He went back to the office, got Gunner, and made his way to his truck. By the time he got home, his hands ached, and his soul felt like someone had ripped it open. He’d fucked up. He’d broken the code or whatever the fuck people called it. He should have told Griffin, Austin, and the rest. By hiding what he had with Miranda, he’d made it seem seedy. He’d done a disservice to them both, as well as to the family that had taken him in. He’d been just so damn scared of their reactions.

  He looked down at his bruised and bloody knuckles.

  He’d been right to expect the pain and the beating.

  He saw the blood on his hands and remembered the feeling of his fist hitting Grif, his best fucking friend.

  Those weren’t his hands. No, those were his father’s hands. The hands that had beaten Francine Kendrick for thirty years and had broken Decker’s arm.

  The sins of the father had nothing on him.

  Despite pulling away and doing his best to deny his nature, he’d turned into the old man anyway.

  He’d fought back to protect Miranda’s name, though she hadn’t needed it. Was she worth him losing everything?

  Yes.

  Hell yes.

  She was worth so much more than him anyway.

  It just meant he wouldn’t be able to keep her.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Sierra was late.

  Well, that was the understatement of the year.

  She’d stayed too long at work because she’d felt she’d needed to make up for missing the morning. Since she’d been at the doctor’s office dealing with her flu-like symptoms, she’d missed opening and had to have her girls take care of things for her. It wasn’t that she didn’t trust them to do it, far from it. It was just that Eden was her baby, and she wanted to have her hand in everything.

  The doctor had wanted her to stay for extra tests due to her medical history, so it had taken longer than she’d planned on. So that had cascaded into her being late for every consecutive thing scheduled in her day. She hated being late. She was the kind of person who needed to be fifteen minutes early, or she felt like she wasn’t on time. Austin made fun of her for it but changed his schedule around to accommodate her.

  That was love.

  Or her being mildly OCD.

  With a sigh, she pulled up to her home and grabbed her things to head inside. A wave of dizziness hit her, and she sucked in a deep breath. She leaned against her car door and closed her eyes. Everything would be okay. Everything had to be okay. Damn, she really needed to start feeling better. She didn’t have time to be sick. She had a wedding to plan, a fiancé and stepson to love, and a business to run. Not all in that order either.

  Austin opened the door before she got there, an odd look on his face.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked before he could speak.

  He shook his head. “Nothing. I just feel like something’s off, and then I come out here, and you look pale, baby.”

  He leaned down and kissed her, despite the fact that she probably contained way too many germs, and then took everything out of her arms. She sighed at the act. He might be all broody, but he still took care of her in the smallest ways. And it wasn’t because he didn’t think she couldn’t do it. No, it was because he wanted to do it. The difference was what made her love him even more.

  She followed him in and opened her arms. Leif ran to her and hugged her hard. She stumbled back a bit, forgetting how big he was. After all, he was his father’s son. He smelled of little boy and chocolate. It seemed Austin had let the kid raid her stash. That was okay since she knew her man only did when Leif had a good grade at school. She kissed his temple and squeezed him again.

  “Hi, Sierra. How was work?” Oh
, how the boy had changed since she’d first met him on that step in front of Montgomery Ink. He smiled more and looked as if he actually cared how her day was. She kissed the top of his head, and he wiggled away. A boy of ten wasn’t too keen on affection, so she’d take what she could get.

  “Work was good. Long.”

  Austin came to her side, cupped her face, and kissed her softly. “Sit down and let us take care of you. You don’t look any better than you did this morning. What did the doctor say?”

  She sighed, but because she was too tired to argue, she toed off her shoes and sat down on the couch. Leif pushed at her shoulder and she laid down. The boy then placed the throw over her, and she smiled.

  “Thank you, honey.”

  He smiled then shrugged. Yep, still a boy.

  “Just be better, okay?”

  She nodded, and he went back to his homework at the coffee table. She watched him work on his math and sighed. He’d lost his birth mother so recently and yet had rebounded the way kids do. She didn’t know how he’d been before the other woman’s death, so she’d never be able to compare, but she liked to think Leif was on the right track.

  “So?” Austin asked when he sat down on the other end of the couch. He put her feet on his lap and starting rubbing them.

  Dear God she was in heaven. Seriously. Could she be any luckier?

  “They didn’t tell me much other than to get some rest, and they would call later with the results.”

  Austin frowned. “Results? I didn’t know it took so long to tell you if you had a cold or the flu. Which, by the way, means you shouldn’t have been at work, woman. You aren’t going in tomorrow.”

  She raised a brow. “I felt perfectly fine today once I got going. I can’t just call in sick. I own the place. Heelloo...you kissed me.” And she’d kissed Leif’s head. Fuck. She was a bad mother. Maybe she should cover him in antibacterial soap or something. Was there a spray to keep kids healthy? Maybe a bubble?