by Rye Hart
“Your engagement ring. You know, that massive thing you could see from—”
Ethan grasped Kyra’s left hand and felt the bareness of her skin, and I watched his entire face fall. He slowly brought her hand in front of him, his fingers encircling the place where that ring should’ve been. There was the faintest of tan lines, just enough for someone to know something had been there if they looked hard enough, and suddenly, I watched every muscle in Kyra’s body stiffen.
“Well, that isn’t really something I have anymore,” she said.
“What did he do?” Ethan said.
“It’s not important,” she said as she ripped her hand from his. “All that matters is that the wedding’s off, so no one has to worry about it.”
Fireworks exploded in my head. Assuming was one thing, but hearing it from her lips was another. My hands slid into the pockets of my pants as my right hand grazed across the small jewelry box, and suddenly, all my hopes and dreams were finally coming alive again. Hope filled my chest at the idea of being able to tell her how I truly felt about her, how I could give her all the things this asshole ex of hers never would be able to.
She greeted the rest of my brothers in haste before she stepped back and took a deep breath.
“So, who wants beer?” she asked.
Everyone nodded in approval, and I stepped forward from the pack and found my voice again.
“I’ll help you get everything. No use making two trips.”
I followed her into the kitchen, not able to take my eyes off the sway of her hips. She opened the fridge and started pulling out beers, passing them to me so I could open them. I twisted my hand around the cap, popping the tops off and setting them on the table. But then her beautiful giggle rose from behind me as I turned to grab the last one.
“What?” I asked.
“Those aren’t twist-top beers,” she said. “I was about to hand you the bottle opener.”
I smirked at her, and she simply shook her head. The callouses on my hands from rebuilding my father’s shed while I was here were more prominent than I realized, I guessed, but the fact that Kyra was giggling was enough for me.
“I have a gift for you,” I said.
“Oh?” she asked. “What is it?”
I pulled the jewelry box out from my pocket and handed it to her. I held my breath as her eyes looked down into the palm of her hand. Then I watched as she slowly pried the lid open. I watched her beautiful brown eyes light up as she pulled the rose gold locket from the box, and the moment she popped it open, I saw tears rise to her eyes.
“Oh, Owen,” she said, whispering.
Inside was a picture of all of us when we were children. We were all gathered around after her last day of eighth grade, and we had all just got done teasing her about entering high school at an early age. Kyra ended up skipping fifth and sixth grade, which meant she was two years younger than anyone else in her class. She had always been incredibly bright, and I could remember the moment she looked up into my eyes just after that photo and smiled.
She told me it was the best day of her life, and I wanted her to hang that day around her neck for the rest of her life.
“I love it,” she said.
“You do?” I asked.
“‘The best day of my life’,” she said, grinning.
“Would you like me to put it on you?” I asked.
“Would you?”
“Of course.”
I took the locket from her and stepped around to her back. She lifted her hair up for me as I put the necklace around her neck, and I leaned in to get the faintest smell of her shampoo as my skin grazed hers. Her hair smelled like the beach, a scent I would fall asleep remembering tonight as I clasped it around her neck.
Then, I bent down to her ear as my hands traveled around the curves of her shoulders.
“Merry Christmas,” I said.
And I could’ve sworn her body leaned into mine.
I allowed my hands to trail down the softness of her arms before I wrapped them around her body. Her hands crooked up and grabbed onto my forearms, her fingernails lightly tracing the veins bulging from underneath my skin. I allowed my nose to nuzzle up her neck, testing my boundaries while her body physically fell back into mine, but before I could kiss her beautiful skin, we heard someone coming.
And just like that, Kyra stepped away from me and went to go grab the beers.
“You coming?” she asked breathlessly.
My eyes held hers for a beat and a half before I nodded reluctantly.
“Right behind you.”
CHAPTER THREE – ETHAN
“Where the hell’s the beer?”
Mark shrugged, and the guys simply stared at me, so I went to go see what the holdup was. I was ready to share a beer with Kyra and figure out what her ex fiancé did to hurt her, so I could kill the bastard. I walked down the hallway and pushed through the kitchen door, looking around for where her and Owen had gotten off to.
“What’s the holdup?” I asked. “No one likes a lukewarm beer!”
Kyra threw her head back and laughed before she handed me one.
“Here you go, oh impatient one,” she said, grinning. “A cold one just for you.”
“Oh, how thoughtful,” I said.
I took a long pull from it while Owen gathered up the other open bottles. I smiled at Kyra, winking in her direction while Owen pushed past me. I leaned against the kitchen table, my eyes scanning Kyra before stopping off at her left hand one last time.
That ring didn’t suit her anyway.
She blushed underneath my gaze, and I watched as her lips wrapped around the bottle. She was even prettier now than she had been last Christmas, and I had no idea how she did that. How she just popped in after all these months with ragged jeans on her little legs and a shirt that draped over her fabulous curves and simply took me to my knees. Seeing her again filled me with the same lust that grabbed at my cock ever since I figured out what the hell my dick was supposed to do, and all I could do was latch onto the one thing that gave me hope.
The one thing that signaled to me I might still have a chance.
“So… it’s over?” I asked.
I watched the smile fall from her face as she grasped her beer bottle tightly.
“I think so,” she said, sighing.
“What went wrong?” I asked.
“I don’t really wanna talk about it.”
“You know I’m here for you, right?” I asked.
She shrugged, and it killed a part of me inside that she didn’t feel she could talk with me about this.
“He’s a dick,” I said. “You know that, right?”
“You haven’t even met him,” she said.
“Doesn’t take knowing a man to know when he fucked up something good for him.”
She flashed her eyes over at me, giving my body a once-over as a smirk crawled across my face.
“I’m here to enjoy the holidays, Ethan,” she said. “I could really use a break from the drama.”
“Then you’ve come to the right place, beautiful. We specialize in getting away from it all.”
“Being thirty minutes outside of town will do that to you,” she said, grinning.
“See, now there’s that beautiful Kyra I know and remember,” I said. “You remember when we were eleven? How you dared all of us to sled down that hill out behind the elementary school?”
“Butt naked?” she asked, giggling. “I sure do. I remember you and Chase actually had the guts to take off all your clothes in the freezing cold and do it.”
“It was a dare! What were we supposed to do?”
“Keep your clothes on like the rest of the sane brothers,” she said.
“Not a chance when it puts a smile on your face.”
“You both got into a fight at the bottom of the hill because Chase thought you touched his junk, and you both ended up with hypothermia for Christmas,” she said.
“Well, at least I had the upper hand in that fight. Nailed him ri
ght in the dick.”
Kyra almost spit out her beer, she was laughing so hard, and her voice filled me with a warmth that tugged at my balls and rattled my spine.
“You were a scrawny eleven-year-old with a taste for puffing out your little chest,” she said. “Chance was almost twenty, and he was built like a brick house.”
“Yeah well, that just means I’m still young and spry while he’s old and wilting away with his salt and peppered hair,” I said.
She rolled her eyes at me before she took another swig of her beer, and I took the chance to leap into action. I set my beer down onto the kitchen table and lunged at her, my hands dancing all along her stomach and her sides while she giggled and jolted.
“You think you can roll your eyes at me and get away with it?” I asked, smiling.
“Ethan! No! You know I hate this!”
“Apologize,” I said.
“Never,” she said, laughing.
“Apologize!”
The both of us were laughing hysterically, and soon, she collapsed into my arms. I caught her and held her, feeling her chest panting against my arms as I held her closely to me. I couldn’t believe how good she felt. How the excess of her breasts pressed into me while her toned stomach taunted my pelvis. I wanted to hold her like this forever… hold her the way I knew that asshole ex of hers wasn’t.
But the moment was ruined when Chance strolled into the room.
“No wonder the beers are late,” Chance said. “Owen only brought the first four.”
Kyra stepped out of my arms at that very moment, and that was when I noticed it. The rose gold locket around her neck.
“That’s a beautiful necklace,” I said. “Where did you get it?”
“Oh,” she said. “Owen gave it to me.”
I nodded slowly before my eyes darted over to Chance.
“Do you want to talk about your breakup?” he asked.
“Nope,” I said. “She doesn’t wanna talk about it.”
“That’s right,” Kyra said. “So, thanks for addressing me like I’m not here.”
“That’s right, Ethan,” Chance said. “Kyra can speak for herself.”
“The fuck did you say to me?” I asked.
“I said, Kyra is a grown-ass woman and can speak for herself.”
“If you don’t recall, you’re the one that busted in here and rudely ruined the conversation I was having with Tinkerbell. So, if you’d like to grab your libation and back out, that’d be nice.”
I watched Chance cock an eyebrow into the air, and I had to admit I was glad I rendered him speechless. The last thing I wanted to do was fight him again over something stupid while Kyra was standing here.
I was enjoying my time with her, and I wasn’t ready to share her yet.
“No need to be rude, baby bro,” Chance said. “Just coming in to check on things.”
I threw my hands up in the air as he grabbed his beer and came to stand beside Kyra. His eyes were locked onto me, like he was waiting for me to just abandon her with him and leave. He always had to get the last word in. He always had to be the big shot. He always had to get what he wanted, when he wanted it, because he was the oldest and had to set the example. Mr. Ex-Military with his faded hair bullshit on his head and his hunting escapades and his deer antlers or whatever.
I hated Chance sometimes.
“I’m really glad you’re back for the holidays, Kyra,” I said.
“I’m really glad I’m back, too,” she said.
Then, I grabbed the rest of the beers that were sitting on the counter, and I left. I’d rather wait until another time when I could get her alone than try to measure cocks against the big brother of the group.
But we all knew who would win that measuring contest. Only men insecure on shit like that acted the way Chance did.
CHAPTER FOUR – CHANCE
I felt my irritation at Ethan welling up in my body. The way he grated against my nerves was insane, and there were moments where I just wanted to smash his face in. He always acted like the top dog without ever putting any kind of action behind it, and it pissed me off. He was always butting heads with someone, and he was always trying to make sure his voice was heard above everyone else’s.
It was annoying as fuck.
But there was now a beautiful woman at my side; a grown woman we’d all come to know and love dearly. She’d grown even more lovely in the year she’d been gone, and now that I was out of the military, I finally felt like I had my shot. The military lifestyle wasn’t good enough for someone like Kyra. I bounced around a lot and wasn’t home much. I was deployed more times than I wanted to count and came back with new scars and tattoos every single time. I was fucked in the head more than I ever wanted to show her, but there was something about the light in her eyes that made me want to bed down next to her and soak up her warmth.
Her goodness.
Her exotic innocence.
I came back from the military and saw how she had grown into a wonderful, delectable treat. She had been a senior in high school, and I had made the decision to reenlist one last time, but seeing her with her beautiful, honey-blonde hair and the curves she filled out perfectly made me regret my decision. I spent the four years she was in college regretting ever having signed up, especially the moment she announced she was engaged.
But that fucker missed his chance, and I had plans to show Kyra exactly how he should’ve treated her.
I hated myself for having thoughts about her while she was so young. I punished myself in the military by doubling up on physical training just to get her barely-legal body out of my mind. I ran until I couldn’t run and lifted weights until my bones gave out. I stacked on muscle after muscle and trained until I couldn’t train anymore, and all the while, her beautiful curves and her innocent brown eyes haunted me at night.
But the moment she graduated high school and I visited home, I realized what true torture felt like.
All that summer, I had to ignore how fucking sexy she looked. I had to ignore the fact that she sunbathed in bikinis in her backyard. I had to ignore the crop tops she wore and the low-waisted jeans she bent over in. Every day we went to the swimming hole was a new and innovative torture I knew the military could never compete with.
Kyra had been too good for me then, and she sure as hell was too good for me now.
“You’re too good for him, you know,” I said.
“Why is everyone so intent on me talking about this?” she asked.
“Because we give a shit about you, unlike him.”
I saw her bow her head and sigh, and I quickly wrapped my arms around her and folded her into my body.
“Talk to me, Tinkerbell,” I said. “Tell me what happened.”
That was when I felt her snake her arms around my waist, and for a moment, I allowed myself to get lost in the touch of the woman who tortured me and haunted me for years.
“I just don’t wanna talk about it,” she said into my chest.
“Want me to still kick his ass?” I asked. “Because I’ll still kick his ass, even without a reason.”
She giggled into my chest, and I could’ve sworn I’d died on the battlefield and gone to heaven. Not that a man like me, who’d done the things I’d done, would ever get to those pearly gates, but I sure as hell was holding the closest thing to it in my arms.
“Thanks for always being there to fight my battles, Chance, but I’m a big girl. I can take care of myself.”
“Yes,” I said, chuckling. “But you’re not just a big girl. You’re a big, beautiful girl.”
I looked down into her face and saw her blush as her eyes flickered up to me from my chest. She pulled away from me and shook her head, swatting me on the arm as her smile grew into that gorgeous little giggle. Her blush ricocheted down her neck and into her shirt, and I began imagining what her body would look like covered in that same reddish hue.
Maybe with a bit of sweat to make it glisten.
“You dirty old man,” s
he said.
“No matter my age, I’m a Lost Boy for life. You, however, are our tiny, magical creature.”
“I’m not so tiny anymore,” she said, grinning. “I’ve got a few tricks up my sleeve.”
All I could do was smile at her cheekiness and nod in agreement because if I didn’t keep my mouth shut, I’d want to ask her to show me those tricks.
Her brown eyes locked onto my blue ones, and suddenly, the intensity in the room shifted. Kyra stepped back toward me, her body heat radiating outward as I craned my neck to keep her in my view. I could see her lips parting slightly, like she was about to tell me something but didn’t know how to start.
For a split second, I thought she was going to talk to me about her ex. Then, her face was inching closer to mine.
I felt our bodies magnetizing toward each other, pulling one another in as our lips got closer and closer. I could feel her breath against my skin, and I watched while her eyes fluttered closed. The blood in my veins was pulsing in my ears, and I could hear my heart screaming out into my mind.
This was happening.
I was about to feel this perfect woman’s lips against mine.
But just before our lips connected, a voice boomed out into the hallway. Kyra sprang away from me, like a toy wound too tightly, and shot in the other direction. I clenched my jaw and tried to bury my anger as Mark came barging through the damn door, and the second her father’s eyes landed onto me, I felt my entire body tense up.
“I swear, kids can’t do shit right,” he said.
His eyes landed on the beer bottles still on the kitchen counter, and that was when I realized what was going on.
Everyone expected us to bring them their second round.
And like a cork that had been popped, the rest of my brothers spilled in after her dad. They filled the kitchen of the Lancaster home, and I opened the fridge to hand everyone else a beer. We all stared at Owen as he popped the top off with his hand, chuckling and shaking our heads as Kyra’s giggle wafted above the rest of us.
There was no denying that Owen was a monster of a man, no matter how quiet he was in real life.
“I propose a toast,” Rowan said.
