Page 31 of Brother In Arms

Chapter 10

Bailey

I drowsed against him the sun warm and with his arm around me, I felt safe. I mean, kind of hard not to when you’d seen the guy take out five others in a few quick moments. I thought about what he’d told me and realized he’d opened up to me, likely in a way he didn’t to many people. I wondered about that. Why he would. Why me of all people? He had that sexy tortured bad boy thing going on now and I wanted to go there. I so wanted to go there, but I was afraid to. Not just because of my mother, I loved her, but honestly her and my father had some seriously skewed views of reality.

I blamed the fact that they had both come from money and their relationship and marriage had practically been an arranged one. I know my mother had found love with my father eventually, but I also knew he hadn’t made it easy on her. It was one of the most depressing things about being a child of privilege and knowing it. Knowing that pretty much the exact same fate awaited me…

I lost track of how many dates my mother had set me up on with her socialite friend’s sons. The ladies from her garden club, and that was laughable all on its own considering not a single one of them would know a hoe from a trowel… anyways, they would always crow about their son’s achievements in this sport or that club and the next thing I knew my Friday night when I was home from school would be all lined up for me with whatever function was the going thing. He’d pick me up at eight in his fancy car that was likely a gift for this or that achievement, birthday, or graduation. Hell, one of them had even gotten a car for beating his first DUI! It was all so ludicrous, awkward, and unbelievable.

“Bailey…” My name startled me coming in that low, almost husky growl from between his lips.

“Yeah?”

“What are you thinking about so hard over there?”

“You’d laugh at me.”

“Try me.”

Well, he opened up to me…

“When I was thirteen, my brother got himself in trouble with this girl.”

Rush chuckled, “Got a girl knocked up, eh?” I think I was silent too long because he jostled me a bit against his shoulder and said, “Bailey, what happened?”

“More like a rape accusation, a bad one. He was sixteen at the time, and as a result, I was sent to boarding school.”

“What the fuck is that?” he demanded.

“Um, I think it was my parent’s way of protecting me from the fall out. You know the ass backwards way of the Bible belt, the first born son can do no wrong and women are all basically property to do with what you will. Well, that was kind of how my father ran our house. Mom and I were just ornaments, although, I think he did listen to my mother in private, you know?”

“I like my women with a fire inside, so no, I really don’t know.”

I snorted, “Seems like you’re just like my father in some ways, or did you forget what happened in the barn so soon?”

“A deal’s a deal. I promised I’d try to forget, but we both know encounters like that, those are the things you never forget. Besides, there’s a difference between breaking a horse’s spirit and taming one.”

I rolled my eyes, “Yes, because comparing our sexual encounter to taming a horse is totally making me feel like less of a piece of property or livestock.”

He laughed, “Okay, fair point, but I can’t think of a better comparison that won’t get me into even deeper shit with you, so gimme a break?”

“Just this one time.”

“Cool, thanks, and I think you know what I meant.”

“I do, I had the choice to walk away.”

“But you didn’t, why is that?”

I blushed furiously and ran through just about every possibility I could come up with and immediately discarded it, because you’re the only man to make me come like that. Nope, I didn’t need to inflate his ego any worse than it already was. Because maybe deep down I’m a rebellious little shit and I wanted to stick it to my rich bitch family like my aunt did? Not only no but hell no, all that would do was reinforce his already poor view of me and my family that all we did was use people.

“Bailey?”

“Honestly?”

“It’s the best policy with someone like me,” he said frankly.

Ouch, okay…

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