Staring down at the cell in my hands, I fight the urge to throw it across the room. She put the phone down on me. She put the fucking phone down on me after I warned her not to. My heart is beating at a million miles an hour, she ran, she’s in fucking Buffalo, but at least I know where she is and it’s a hell of a lot closer than Chicago.
“Is she okay?” Teddy asks, moving to sit beside me.
“I think so, she’s in Buffalo. I could fucking kill Roxanne for causing this. I mean what the hell was she thinking saying that baby is mine?”
“Bro, that girl is crazy.”
“I know,” I say wearily.
“I hate to say it, but we warned you not to mess about with her.”
“I know,” I hiss, angry that he’s pulling the ‘I told you so’ card right now.
“What are you going to do?”
Sighing, I let my head fall forward into my hands. “What the fuck can I do? I don’t know where she is, Buffalo is a big place.”
“Has she got Lojack on her car?” Teddy asks.
“No.” Sitting up straighter I turn to look at him. “But she has got find my phone on her cell. She loses it all the time so she keeps it turned on. If I can get into her account, I could track her cell.”
“Bro,” he says warily. “You sure that’s a good idea? Tracking her cell is kind of stalkery.”
“I don’t give a fuck, right now I wish I’d implanted a tracker in her fucking neck, then I wouldn’t ever have to feel this way again. My girls are gone and I need them. When you meet your woman, you’ll understand.”
His eyes go cold for a minute, his face hardening, but in the blink of an eye his expression clears and it’s just Teddy, my sweet baby brother again. “Do you know her passwords?”
“Don’t need to, she signed in to her account from my cell the other day and I bet it did that automatic password save thing it does. It only takes me a minute to open the page and seconds later I’m watching a dot flash on a map showing me exactly where she is. “Got her,” I say triumphantly, jumping up from the couch and stomping toward my boots by the door.
“Bro, seriously think this through. If you go banging on the door in the middle of the night you aren’t going to get a warm welcome,” he warns me.
“Then I’ll sit my ass outside until it’s morning. I’m not going to give her the chance to run again and if I have to haul her ass back over my shoulder, then that’s what I’ll do.”
“Fuck,” Teddy hisses. “Wait up, I’ll come with, someone needs to keep a clear head and make sure you don’t lose your shit.”
Ten minutes later, we’re on the road and with each mile closer I get to her, the better I feel. Lulu needs to learn that she can try and run, but I’ll always fucking chase. It’s the middle of the damn night by the time we pull down the quiet residential street and park behind Lulu’s car outside a redbrick townhouse. The lights are all off inside, so despite my almost overwhelming desire to break down the door and get to my woman, I resist the urge and settle down in my seat to wait until the sun comes up.
Knowing she’s close, my heart slows to a dull thud in my chest and I manage to close my eyes and get a couple of hours of fitful sleep. I wake every ten minutes to check her car is still here, that she hasn’t run again. By the time 7.00am rolls by I’m awake, leaning against the side of my car and waiting for any sign of life from inside the house. I don’t know the friend she’s staying with, she’s never mentioned knowing anyone so close to Montana, but then she never really mentions any of her friends, so it’s not surprising that I didn’t know about whoever is harboring my runaway woman.
When the light turns on downstairs, I push off my car and stride to the front door, banging on it with as much restraint as I can muster.
The door opens and a guy stands before me. He’s shorter and leaner than me and in an instant I decide I can take him if he’s dared to lay even a finger on Lulu.
“Can I help you?” he asks me warily.
“I’m here for Lulu and Poppy,” I growl, not even trying to tone down the possessive warning in my voice.
A smile spreads across his face. “Oh, you must be Penn.”
“Yeah, that’s me.”
“Come on in,” he says, opening the door a little wider and gesturing for me to go inside. “Does your friend want to come in too?”
Glancing over my shoulder I find my brother standing on the sidewalk, his body tense and ready to do whatever he needs to do to either support me or stop me from doing something really fucking stupid. “Teddy,” I call motioning him forward.
“You good?” he asks, eyeing the guy at the door.
“Yeah, you coming in? This is…” I trail off waiting for him to fill in the blanks.
“Sorry,” he laughs. “I’m Bran, I’m Lulu’s friend.”
My back straightens and I grind my teeth, this is the friend Lulu came to, a guy? What the fuck? I assumed he was the boyfriend or husband of the friend. My woman ran from me to another man. “This is my brother Teddy, and obviously you know I’m Penn, Lulu’s man.” I try to be polite, but I have to force the words out from behind gritted teeth.
“Coffee?” he asks cordially, either not noticing or not caring that I’m about ten seconds away from beating the shit out of him for being in the same space as my girls. Without a second glance he leads us both into the house and toward the kitchen. When I spot Lulu sitting at the dining table, all of my attention is drawn to her and my baby girl in her arms.
“Penn?” she gasps when she sees me, standing up from her seat at the kitchen table and eyeing me with confusion. “What are you doing here? How did you know where I was?”
“I came to bring you home,” I say, my voice steely.
“What?”
“You don’t get to run from me.”
“Sounding like a bit of a psycho, bro,” Teddy says quietly, stepping toward Lulu and pressing a kiss on her cheek as he reaches for Poppy. “Here, why don’t I take Poppy so you guys can go talk.”
Lulu makes a sound of annoyance when Poppy happily goes to my brother, but I don’t give her a moment to protest, reaching for her arm and gripping her wrist tight enough to propel her forwards and away from the kitchen just as a woman appears on the stairs.
“Morning—” she starts. “Ohh.” Her eyes widen a little as she sees me, then she relaxes and grins. “You must be Penn. I’m Nina, Bran’s wife.”
Some of the angry tension leeches from me at learning the guy has a wife, but I’m still furious Lulu ran from me to another man, regardless if he’s single or not.
“Morning, nice to meet you. If you’ll excuse us, we’re going to step outside so we can talk,” I tell her, before Lulu has a chance to speak.
“Oh, err, sure,” Nina says, but I just keep on moving, towing Lulu along with me. Walking out of the front door, I close it behind us and steer her to my car, urging her into the passenger side before I get into the driver’s seat, shutting and locking the doors once I’m inside.
“What the hell, Lulu?” I demand.
Closing her eyes, she lowers her chin and inhales slowly. “Why are you here?”
“What the fuck do you mean? Where else would I be?”
“I told you I needed time.”
“I don’t give a fuck what you need. You’re my woman, did you seriously think I’d let you just fucking disappear and not chase after you?” I snarl angrily, wanting to force her face up and her eyes open, hating that she’s refusing to look at me.
“You shouldn’t be here.”
“Then where the hell should I be?” I demand. “Did you expect me to go to work like a little bitch while you convince yourself you don’t belong to me anymore?”
“You were hers first,” she says so quietly I barely make out the words.
Grabbing her chin, I force her face up and turn her toward me gripping her in my fingers and squeezing. “Look at me.”
When she keeps her eyes closed, I tighten my grip, I’d never hurt her, but I won’t let her ignore me either. “Look at me, now, Lulu.”
Her lids slowly part and her hurt filled gaze lands on me.
“I was never hers. I’ve never been anyone’s until you. I’m yours, Kitten, just like you’re mine.”
Shaking her head she tries to close her eyes, but I give her chin a little pinch, warning her to keep her gaze on me.
“You’re mine and I’m yours.”
“You had sex with Roxanne.”
“I’ve had sex with a lot of women, I’ve never belonged to any of them. But you own me, Kitten, just you.”
“She’s pregnant, Penn, I can’t, I won’t…” She trails off as if she just doesn’t know what to say and I hate that this has hurt her, that my past is causing her pain. If I’d told her weeks ago about me and Roxanne, she’d know the truth and she wouldn’t be doubting me like this. This is my own fucking fault, but I can fix it.
“It’s not mine. I fucking swear it. Theres no way it can be because I haven’t touched her in over a year.”
“It doesn’t matter,” she says, yanking her chin from my grip as her shoulders pull back and she straightens in the seat. “You fucked Roxanne, she’s basically my family. This,” she motions between us, “can’t happen.”
“Bullshit,” I shout. “It’s happening, it’s been happening and you must have lost your mind somewhere between Montana and here if you think for a minute I’ll ever let you go.”
“You don’t own me,” she yells, her face flushed, her tits heaving up and down.
“Want to bet?” I ask a moment before I grab her head and yank her onto my lips, forcing my tongue into her mouth and kissing her with a mix of anger and relief and desire. She fights me, batting ineffectually at my shoulders, trying to push me away, but I grab her hair and pull, warning her to behave, to kiss me back.
After a moment I feel her body melt and I start to relax. She can shout and scream and try to run, but her body knows who it belongs to, and no matter how much she tries to fight this, I’ll always have this effect on her.
Reaching over, I part her thighs with my hand and cup her pussy over her pants. Grinding the heel of my palm over her clit, I smile against her mouth when her hips lift and tilt into my touch. “You belong to me, Kitten, and I won’t allow anyone to come between us.”
She freezes, her body tensing as I whisper the words against her lips. “No,” she says, shaking her head and grabbing my wrist, trying to push me away.
I still, but keep my hand where it is cupping her sex. “Stop fighting me,” I warn.
“I can’t, it’s not right, we can’t do this.”
“That’s the biggest load of bull crap I ever heard, Lulu. Don’t let her get in your head. Yes, I fucked her. Should I have told you about it? Yes, I should have, but she is so irrelevant to us I didn’t want to rile up shit that didn’t need to be riled. I fucked her six times, that’s all, I fucked you more times than that the first week we met. Me and her were never a thing, we were never a couple, we weren’t dating. She offered me no strings sex and I took her up on it, that’s the extent of our involvement. We never went out to dinner, we never talked. We met up, we fucked, I left. That’s it.”
Lulu grimaces and I wish I could sugar coat things for her, but surely it’s better for her to know Roxanne was nothing but a warm hole to fill than make it out to be romantic, when it wasn’t. “I used protection every fucking time, then when I found her stabbing holes in the condom I told her I was done and that was it. I promise you there’s no way that kid is mine.”
“She’s my family, Penn, would you want to be with a woman who had sex with one of your brothers?”
Wincing, I cup her cheek with my palm and nod. “I know, I should have told you, but it still wouldn’t change anything. You’re mine, Kitten, have been since the moment I laid eyes on you. I won’t give you up because of her and her bullshit.”
She shakes her head, denying my words. “Enough, Lulu, this is bullshit. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about her, but I am not the father of her kid and I fucking refuse to let you run from me. Get out the fucking car, pack up Poppy’s stuff and let’s go, I’m taking you home.”
“Home to Chloe’s,” she says determinedly.
“Hell no, home to our home.”
“I can’t do that.”
“Did I say I was giving you a choice?” My voice is barely more than an animalistic snarl but I don’t try and tone it down, she needs to see and hear how fucking serious I am about this. She’s coming home with me, nothing else is even an option.
“You’re not giving me a choice?” Her spine goes ramrod straight, her eyes narrowing.
“No, I’m not. You’re mine and you’re coming home where you belong.”
“You planning on locking me in the bedroom too? Because I’m not staying with you, I need to go back to Chloe’s and see if I’m still welcome there.”
“I’ll keep you pinned to the bed filled with my cock if I have to. You’re coming home with me and fucking staying there. I’m not playing with you here, Lulu.”
Rolling her eyes, she tries to turn her face away, scoffing beneath her breath. “I cannot be with someone who is having a baby with my cousin, she will make all of our lives a living hell including the baby’s. I will not be the cause of all of our misery.”
“It’s not mine.”
“Are you one hundred percent sure? She’s crazy enough to be stabbing holes in condoms, and you don’t think she’s capable of persuading you to go fuck her when you’re drunk? She said it happened when you were blitzed at Beau’s bachelor party. Cody might have run her off the first time that night but can you say without doubt that she didn’t try again at some point when there was no one there to save your horny dick from her crazy pussy.”
My lips part to tell her that yes I’m unequivocally sure I didn’t do that, but the truth is that I was really fucking drunk that night. I remember her trying to persuade me to have sex with her, I remember Cody telling her to fuck off before I had a chance to, but there are parts of the night toward the end that are definitely hazy. Could she have tried again? Could Roxanne have taken advantage of my impaired drunken judgement and gotten me to fuck her?
No… no, even out of my mind I don’t think I’d go near her again.
“I’ve already told her I want a paternity test, they can do them on unborn babies now. Come home with me and the test will either prove that baby’s not mine or she’ll confess she’s lying about it. Either way, I’m sorry, Lulu, but I won’t let you run from me. Wherever you go, I’ll follow and I’ll drag your ass back, that’s just the way it is.”
