by Pepper Swan
“You did it again. It has to be bad luck or something to swear in a chapel. Stop it,” Luke said as sweat beaded on his forehead. The guy was a ball of nerves rolled up so tight he might bust a vein or something.
I patted his shoulder, trying to get him to come on down off that bucking horse. “Don’t worry, big guy. She’ll be here. When has she ever stood any of us up for anything? Never, right? She’s a little late, is all.”
Luke was the tallest of the three of us standing at just under six-four, while both Bobby and I came in at under six two.
Nikki was a little petite thing. Couldn’t have been more than five-foot-four-inches in her bare feet. She hated that she was so tiny, and would get rip-roaring jealous over some of those trick-riding women who rode into town with the rodeo every year. Most of them were well over five-foot-seven. When Nikki was a kid, she always thought she’d grow to catch up to them, but she never did. I loved how little she was. I knew that Luke and Bobby loved it, too. She fit up against us perfectly, especially when she stood on her toes to reach one of our shoulders. Made us want to protect her like nothing else . . . not that she needed protecting. The girl could out-rope Bobby, outride Luke, and could rope a runaway steer faster than I could and I’d won rodeo buckles in that category.
Didn’t bother me, though. I loved the fact that the woman had a fire in her belly. Nothing kept her down. Nothing roped her in. And nothing got in her way when she wanted something.
And we all knew she wanted Luke, only thing was, she was going on twenty minutes late and even I was starting to sweat.
Her mom got up and walked over to us then. She looked better than I’d ever seen her in a pretty pink dress, and white shoes. Her dark short hair had been fixed up, too. Most other times, Nancy worked their small farm so getting all fancied up wasn’t part of her daily routine. “I’m not trying to alarm anybody, but have any of you tried to text or call Nikki? Her dad’s getting nervous. It’s not like Nikki to be late for anything, much less her own wedding.”
She looked up at Luke. “I called her, but she didn’t pick up, and I don’t want to walk back to that room she’s in with everybody already in the chapel. It wouldn’t look right. Maybe you might want to try calling her to see if everything’s okay.”
“Have you tried Julia?” Luke asked her, but I could hear the fear in his voice. It cracked a little, which told me his throat was beginning to tighten up.
I pulled out my phone to make the call. “I got this. Don’t worry about it.”
The chatter in the chapel was picking up and I knew if Nikki didn’t show up soon, there was probably not going to be a wedding . . . at least not today.
But what the fuck? If she didn’t want to marry Luke couldn’t she have picked a better time to tell him?
I tapped on Julia’s number, and it rang just as Julia walked through the front door. I slipped my phone back in my pocket, thinking everything would be okay now, but I was so wrong.
Bobby
I was busy thinking that everything was going to work its way ‘round when Nikki’s younger sister stepped into the spotlight. As soon as she appeared in the open doorway, Bubba and his band began their rendition of the wedding march. Everyone stood, turned and Julia came running up the aisle, heading straight for us.
Running up the aisle wasn’t how this thing was supposed to go. My chest tightened, and I tugged on my collar. I had a feeling something bad was about to befall us, so I settled my hat on my head, spread my stance, and mentally buckled up for the news . . . no matter what, we would handle it.
“She’s gone, Luke,” Julia said once she reached us, her pretty face streaked with tears. “She up and left on Misty Rose about twenty minutes ago. I know I should’ve come told everybody sooner, but I thought it was a joke and she’d show up. I texted her a couple million times, but she didn’t reply. I even called her, but no answer. All I have is a simple text that said she wasn’t coming back. She didn’t say anything else, just I’m not coming back. Then when I talked to Carl, the stable hand here at the chapel, to double check on her, he confirmed that Nikki had ridden off on Misty Rose. I’m scared for her, especially in this weather. It’s cold out there and snowing. This isn’t something she would do. She always answers when I call her. Where would she go? Did she contact any of you guys?”
After the chapel ceremony, the plan was that the wedding party would ride to the reception at the old mission about a half-mile away. We’d all had our horses trailered over early this morning. Despite the weather, Nikki had wanted us to ride over on horseback.
The little chapel had already erupted with everyone’s gasps and loud chatter.
“She didn’t really run out on our wedding, did she?” Luke asked, looking like he was either going to pass out or punch something. I didn’t know which. “She wouldn’t do that, right?”
I wanted to tell him that from everything Julia said, yeah, it looked as though that was exactly what she did, but that reality would only add to his obvious stress.
“Is everything all right?” the attorney uncle asked as he approached our growing group.
“I’m sure it’s fine,” I told him, but my gut said otherwise. My gut said Nikki ran, and now we had to go find her. She had to be running scared, and running scared could lead to trouble.
“This can’t be happening,” Luke mumbled under his breath.
Cody grabbed Luke’s shoulder. “Don’t worry. We’ll sort this through.”
“You boys have to find her,” her mom said. “It’s okay that she left. I only want to know that she’s safe.”
“Maybe we should let her be,” Luke said, pacing the front of the chapel. “I knew this was too good to be true, knew this would happen.”
“No you didn’t,” I told him. “Nikki wanted to marry you. Something must have happened to change her mind.”
I could tell he was about to explode. I needed to defuse this before it all went south.
“What’s going on? Where’s Nikki?” her dad asked as he walked towards us.
“Oh, Daddy. She took Misty Rose and left. She’s not coming.”
“Fine. I knew that girl wasn’t ready to settle. Knew it as sure as I’m standing here. There’s too much fire in her belly. She’s a rambler, that one. Exactly like I was when I was her age.” He turned to Luke. “No offence, Luke, but I told her to think long and hard about this wedding, and what it would mean. Told her that last night. I guess she thought about it and decided she wasn’t ready. Sorry she did it this way, though. Tough on everybody.”
“Well, fine! That’s just fine! But I want to know if she’s okay,” her mom said. “Can you boys please go and find her? And when you do, please tell her it’s all right. To please come on home.”
“Nikki can take care of herself,” Luke said, sounding like a complete ass. I knew he was worried but his big fat ego wouldn’t let him say so.
“She sure can, but we can help,” Cody said, slipping out of his tie and unbuttoning his collar. “We’ll go after her now. She has about a twenty-five-minute lead on us.” He was looking down at his watch. “But that’s not much. There’re only a few places she would go and we know every one of them.”
“Thank you,” her parents both said.
“I want to come with you,” Julia said.
Nikki was the rider in the family. Julia was more into cars than horses. This would never work. She’d only drag us down.
“The hell you are,” her father said. “These boys can track a stray cow down a river. You’re not in their league. Besides, your mom and I don’t need two daughters to worry about. One’s enough.”
“But . . .”
I touched Julia’s arm and whispered. “Your folks need you here. Stay for them. We’ll be fine.”
She wiped her tears away with her fingers while nodding. “Okay, but you’ll text me and let me know what’s going on, right? I want to know when you find her. We’ll be worried if you don’t.”
“I promise,” I told her, t
hen Cody, Luke and I took off for that back room so we could change first.
All I knew was, we had to find her and tell her it’s okay. Whatever she wanted to do would be fine by us. At least that was what I was thinking until Luke finally let it all out once we were back behind a closed door.
“I’m not fucking going anywhere. She can go to hell, for all I care. How the hell could she do this? How could she not show up? I thought she loved me. She said she loved me. I love her. She’s the one, ya know? The one I was meant to be with. Does she have any idea how humiliated I am? How devastated?”
Cody dropped his pants along with his boxers. He didn’t like wearing underwear of any kind. Never did. Probably only wore boxers today because he thought he had to in a chapel. Even when we were kids he slept naked. We all thought it was just so he could have his own bed. Nobody would sleep with him. Now it didn’t bother me so much as long as the naked bastard stayed on his own side of the bed.
“It’s natural for you to feel all those things, but we still have to find her,” I told him, zipping up my jeans, then securing the belt. It felt good to get out of those damn dress pants and that suit jacket and tie.
Cody pulled up his jeans, then ripped off everything else as though he couldn’t get free of those restrictive clothes fast enough. “Look, the way I see it, Nikki’s probably hurting as much as you are. Running took a lot of courage. No wonder she’s not talking to anybody. She’s too busy trying to deal. We need to find her. Talk to her and find out what this is all about. I, for one, want to know why she ran when she could’ve talked to us, any of us at any time. There has to be a good reason she didn’t.”
Luke was pacing again and not changing.
“We’re going with or without you,” I told him. ”So either you get your shit together and cowboy up to the task or you’re going to sit around here and cry in your monkey suit like some little kid who lost their favorite toy. Which is it? Make up your sorry-ass mind. Now!”
I knew he would eventually want to join us. His ego was in his way at the moment and it was going to take some doing to get that monster out of the way.
Both Cody and I were dressed, with our suits back on hangers and zipped up inside black plastic suit bags. Somebody would come get them, I was sure.
Luke continued to pace. Ran a hand over his face and hair a couple times like he was weighing out his options . . . as if there were real options. He stopped. Stuck his fist to his hip. Paced some more, said, “Fuck it all to hell and back. Fuck! I have to know why she bolted and I have to know that she’s all right. Fuck this, I’m coming with you.”
Then he got changed and we were out the door and saddled up before any of us could stop to think one more thought. No way could we let anything happen to Nikki. No way could I let anything happen to her. First and foremost we had to find out if she was okay, then we could sort all this out.
Yeah, okay. I had to admit it. This made me realize I was in love with her. Always had been and probably always would be. I had dated other women, and slept with my share, but no other woman gave me head the way Nikki did. Of course that wasn’t the only reason why I loved her. I wasn’t that fucking shallow. Those other women were fine, but none of them were Nikki.
She was smart and funny, with an amazing personality who took on a challenge and rode it out to its successful finish. I envied her ability to stick with something she believed in no matter what anyone else thought about her ideas.
But when I thought about her mouth around my cock, sucking and licking it like she couldn’t get enough, it only made it more difficult to think that once she said I do, that would never happen again. Not that we’d done it while she was dating Luke. We hadn’t . . . except for maybe that one time in the car after I had to put my favorite dog down. I was upset, and she knew how to make me feel better.
We never fucked. She said that it wouldn’t be right. Wouldn’t be good for our friendship. But she’d been jacking me off and sucking on my cock since we were seventeen. It was just something we did whenever we were alone together. Sometimes she’d let me play with her pussy, put my hand down her pants and tickle her clit until she came, but she never let it go any further than that. Over the years, I learned to accept her limits, and got better at drawing out my time down her pants. Wanting to taste her, fuck her, but she wouldn’t allow it, and I never pushed her past what she wanted. Wasn’t brought up that way.
But there were many nights when I laid in my bed and stroked my cock until I came so hard and fast thinking about her wet pussy and how she could take my whole cock into her mouth. I loved watching her suck me off, drink all my seed, then licking her lips afterwards as though she’d really enjoyed me. It was one of the highlights of my life.
“We’re going to find her,” I told them once Julia had given us Nikki’s general direction. “Now let’s ride.”
You can purchase 3 COWBOYS FOR THE BRIDE here.
Other Books by Pepper Swan
ROYAL REVERSE HAREM SERIES
Pleasured By Her Guardsmen
Desired By Her Guardsmen
Craved By Her Guardsmen
STAND ALONES
Dirty in Pink
3 Cowboys For The Bride
3 Cowboys For The Virgin
3 Cowboys For The Librarian
JOIN PEPPER’S FACEBOOK PAGE
www.facebook.com/pepperswanauthor
If you’re looking for more sexy fun, join my mailing list…
PEPPER’S SNEAK PEEKS
Signup for Free Book Offers, Giveaways, and Release Dates HERE!
