Page 1 of Make Her Mine

CHAPTER 1

JEFFERSON

“Jackass alert.”

My brother looks to the side, and sighs. “You still have beef with Zach Nelson? It’s been years.”

I nod and lift my beer. “I will always have beef with Zach Nelson.”

My arch nemesis stops inside the door, grinning like the cocky asshole that he is. A few people call out to him, and he raises a hand like he’s Miss Fucking America. Then his gaze lands on my brother.

Now it’s my turn to sigh. “Incoming.”

Carver grins. “Of course. I’m the man of the hour.”

“Yeah, yeah, you finally decided to marry the woman who has put up with you since you were what? Four years old? I don’t see why you should get drinks on the house and all these pats on the back. You’re only doing what you should have done years ago and what any even halfway intelligent man would do.”

He smirks. “Your jealousy is showing.”

I chuckle. Honestly, everyone should be jealous of my brother and his fiancée, Kaelyn. They are a perfect couple. The only reason it’s taken Carver this long to officially marry the woman who has been his since before they even went to kindergarten is because she’s been working on her PhD and didn’t want to also plan a wedding.

Somehow, my dorky older brother managed to lock down an amazing, gorgeous, funny, intelligent woman. I think all the men in town like him in spite of that because it gives them hope.

Kaelyn Spencer decided long ago that my brother Carver needed her. I don’t think at the ripe old age of three she really understood all the ways that he needed her, but something told her that the sweet nerd was going to need some help getting through life and she appointed herself his guardian angel.

Fortunately, my brother is an actual genius, and even though he is socially awkward and takes after our father in many ways, he did understand that he wanted to keep Kaelyn close.

They’ve been inseparable their entire lives, started dating as soon as either of them really understood what that was, and have essentially been an old married couple since they were about thirteen.

But finally, my brother put a ring on it. They’re getting married next weekend. And not only are they practically royalty in this town, they decided to say their vows in the town’s gazebo on the Saturday of our annual town festival.

So now it’s a week-long party complete with snow cones and a Ferris wheel and every person either of them has ever met will be in attendance.

“Riley!”

Even jackasses we all went to high school with like Zach Nelson.

Zach claps Carver on the shoulder. “Congratulations!” He raises his voice. “A round for the bar on me in celebration!”

I fucking hate this guy.

This is just like him.

Go off to college and become a huge football star for the beloved state university team, go on to medical school to become a rich orthopedic surgeon, and then stroll back into town to throw his money around and grace us all with his presence.

This has very little to do with celebrating my brother's upcoming nuptials. Carver is only a year older than us and Kaelyn was in our grade, so Zach knows a ton of people who are coming back this week for the festival and wedding. It’s basically a high school class reunion with a fancier party at the end. This is the perfect way for a guy like Zach to show off.

He’s probably been in town for about ten minutes. That’s how long it would take him to want to get everybody looking at him and ooh-ing and ahh-ing over him.

“Glad to see you, Riley,” he says. Then he looks at me. “And Riley. How the fuck are you, Jefferson?”

About a thousand times more annoyed than I was two minutes ago. “Zach,” I say flatly. “What are you doing here?” He hasn’t been back for a festival in about five years.

Not since he started medical school.

“I couldn’t miss this wedding. I hear everybody’s coming back for it.”

Exactly. I give my brother a side-eye. I blame him for this. They didn’t even really send invitations out. They just told everyone to be in the town square Saturday at six.

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