His Old-Fashioned Love (Old-Fashioned Series) (2 page)

“You’ve got it good, man,” Brax told him, trying to keep the longing from his voice. He looked out at his family: Tom and
Frankie, with their newborn babies; Bryony, Cam and Kent with their boy Joshua; and finally, his oldest brother Heath with his lovely wife Ava. They now had two children—Jaron, who was from Ava’s first marriage, and Ryder, who was two-and-a-half. Brax was grateful for his family, yet the tiniest bit jealous that they were all so happy.

Cam g
lanced over at his wife who stood talking to Heath. “I know. Believe me, I know.” He turned back to Brax. “So how is Laurel?” he asked casually.

Brax narrowed his gaze.
“We broke up. With my hours at work I couldn’t give her the attention she deserved. Plus, we wanted different things.”

She ha
d wanted someone richer, more sophisticated. Someone who wasn’t an old-fashioned cowboy at heart. Laurel hadn’t been able to handle his dominance outside of their sex life.

Heath
wandered over to sit on his other side.

“
Stop hogging my niece,” Heath grumbled, reaching over to pluck Charlotte from Brax’s arms. “Come see your favorite uncle, precious girl,” he crooned.

Brax rolled his eyes.
“Who are you talking about? She was just with her favorite uncle.”

“
Stop fighting over her, you two. I’m going to be her favorite uncle,” Cam boasted.

“
Can you believe Frankie has a little girl? What’s she going to do around all these boy cousins of hers?” Brax asked.

“Give them hell, hopefully,” Frankie said with a grin as she walked up and scooped Charlotte out of Heath’s arms. “Won’t you, Charlie-girl?” Frankie said softly to Charlotte,
running her thumb over the little girl’s tiny hands. “You won’t let your uncles or cousins get the best of you. You’re going to have them tied around your little finger, aren’t you?”

“
She already does,” Heath said wryly, picking up his own son, Ryder, as he toddled over, putting him on his lap.

“
So, no Laurel?” Frankie asked Brax.

“
No, you’ll be glad to hear we broke things off,” he said, well aware that Frankie had never liked Laurel.

Frankie sighed.
“I’m not happy that you’re upset by it. But am I glad that she’s out of your life? Yes. I can’t lie, Brax. She wasn’t the one for you. Laurel was a—”

“
Bitch, bitch,” Ryder said happily. Everyone stilled and looked down at the little dark-haired boy, the spitting image of his large father.

“
Now I wonder where he would have heard that?” Heath asked quietly, glancing up at Frankie who flushed guiltily and stepped away.

“
Now, Heath, there’s no reason to blame me.”

“
Bitch,” Ryder continued before he started chewing happily on his father’s shirt button.

Heath
calmly extracted his shirt from his son’s mouth and stood. “Come on, kiddo, time for a nap.”

“
I’ll take Joshua up as well,” Bryony said hastily, scooping up her son.

“
Umm, the twins could use a nap as well; I’ll just…” Frankie tried to scoot from the room as Brax glared at her. Brat.

“
I think that’s a very good idea,” Tom said in a stern voice, giving his wife a look that had her biting her lip. “I think we could all use a rest. Come on, Frankie.”

With a sigh, Frankie followed Tom
who was cradling Zeke in his arms, out of the room.

Cam snorted as Kent came over and joined them.
“Someone’s going to find it hard to sit at dinner,” Cam commented.

“
Well deserved, too,” Kent replied.

Brax sighed.
“Laurel always said that Frankie disliked her.” He felt bad now for not listening to her.

“
Frankie tried to get along with her,” Ava told them as she picked up the kids toys. “But Laurel didn’t make it easy to get to know her.”

Brax looked at his sister-in-law in surprise. Ava was the quietest of the bunch. Sweet and serene, she normally got along with everyone.

“What are you talking about, Ava?” he asked.

Ava chewed her lip, looking slightly nervous
. A knot formed in Brax’s stomach.

“
It’s just that, well, whenever you left her with us, the sweet, lovely Laurel would disappear and sarcastic, snooty Laurel would come out.”

Ava glanced up at him apolog
etically. “Laurel was very ambitious, smart and beautiful. “I’m sure she is an amazing lawyer. However, she kind of looked down on us. Nothing we did or said was good enough. Apparently my clothing is prehistoric and Frankie talks like a trucker. She seemed to think that staying home with children was a fate worse than death.”

Ava smiled.
“And that was before Ryder placed his sticky ice-cream covered hands on her designer jeans. I hope Tom isn’t too mad at Frankie—you know what she’s like when she thinks someone in her family is being picked on.”

Frankie could be as fiercely protective as any of her brothers when someone she loved was threatened.

“Oh, Ava, why didn’t you say something?” He felt terrible. It was his job to take care of his family—not hurt them.

Ava looked up at him with a soft smile. “Because you cared about her enough to bring her home with you. She’s the first girlfriend of yours I
’ve ever met and I didn’t want to cause trouble between you.” She shrugged. “I figured you would see through her I’m-so-sweet-sugar-won’t-melt-in-my-mouth attitude.”

Problem was, he hadn’t. Not really. Laurel
had been the one who had broken it off. Not that he’d been all that upset about it. He’d grown tired of listening to her list of complaints and the list had been growing by the day.

“
Ava, honey, come here.” Brax stood and crooked a finger, settling her onto his seat on the sofa. He sat across from her on the coffee table. “You should have told me. If someone, especially someone I bring into your home, is ever disrespectful or rude I want you to come straight to me. Understand?”

“
But this is your home,” she insisted, looking upset. “It will always be your family home. You should feel free to bring home whoever you want.”

She worried at her lower lip. Guilt stabbed Brax.

“This is your home, too,” Heath said from the doorway. All three brothers looked up in relief. “And no one has the right to talk down to you or hurt you here.”

He stepped forward and grabbing Ava’s hand, pulled her up into his embrace. “And baby, you should have come to me about this, don’t you think?”

“It was just a few snide comments—nothing to get upset about,” Ava protested. “Really, the way you guys act, you’d think she slapped me around or something.”

Heath narrowed his gaze, staring at Brax over his wife’s shoulder.
“If it upsets you then it upsets us. Next time anything like this happens, I want you to come to me straight away, understand?” He patted her bottom.

Ava sighed and slumped against her large husband.
“I understand. You know, I’m feeling kind of tired myself.”

Heath kissed her forehead.
“Go and have a nap. I’ll watch Jaron.”

“
Thanks,” she said with a smile, kissing him quickly before leaving the room. Heath watched her leave before turning to Brax. Instantly his face morphed from indulgent to furious. “You going to take care of this?”

Brax nodded.
“Don’t worry. Laurel will never come back here.” He should have known better than to get into a relationship right now. He simply didn’t have the time to devote to building a relationship. He needed to focus all his efforts on building his construction business. At the moment, he had little to offer a woman. His house was small and rundown, he worked sixteen hour days and when he wasn’t working, he was trying to tidy up his land. No, he needed to get his priorities in order.

Tom walked into the room.
“Did you hear what that—” He came to a slamming stop as he saw Jaron still in the room, “…lovely woman… said to Ava and Frankie?”

“
I was just telling Heath I’d take care of it, Tom.”

Tom scowled.
“I think it would be better if you just stayed away from her. Got to say, I came down hard on Frankie when I first heard what she was calling Laurel behind her back. Feeling damn bad about that now.”

Heath snorted.
“You’ve gone soft since she gave birth to the twins. Frankie and Ava should have come to us immediately and you know it.”

Tom raised a brow.
“Oh yeah, and what did you have to say to Ava?”

“
I gave her a stern talking to,” Heath replied.

“
Really stern, it was,” Cam teased. “I was shaking in my boots.”

Heath growled and the others laughed. Except Brax. He didn’t feel like laughing.
He felt sick.

H
e had failed to realize the viper beneath Laurel’s sweet facade. What did that say about his judgment? Even worse, he’d been more than Laurel’s boyfriend, he’d been her Dom. A good Dom should know his sub inside and out. And he hadn’t known Laurel at all.

“
Don’t beat yourself up, Brax,” Tom said as he sat in an armchair. “The girls are capable of defending themselves. It’s not as though Frankie is without her claws.”

No, his sister could be hell on wheels. But that didn’t make him feel much better.

“Want to go hunting tomorrow?” Kent asked, obviously trying to change the subject. “We have to head back home the day after.”

Brax nodded.
“Sounds good. I’ve got some paperwork to do but then I’ll come after.”

“
Seems like all you do is work.” Cam stared at him from worried eyes. “You know what they say about all work and no play.”

“
Yeah, they say that’s the way you pay your bills.”

“
I thought the construction business was doing well?” Heath asked. “You guys seem to be gaining a good reputation. Are Sloan and Case working as hard as you are?”

Brax
might be thirty-one, but he’d always be their baby brother. It made him even more determined to be a success. To show them that he could do this.

He had to do this.

“They are. We’re trying to do as much work as we can ourselves. Once we can hire more people we’ll have more free time.” He hoped. Some mornings he could barely roll out of bed because he was so exhausted and sore from the work. He knew his two business partners suffered through the same.

“You know, I was talking to Roarke the other
day,” Tom said. “An old friend of his just bought a section of land outside Lilyvale. Name’s Derrick Ashdown. Apparently he’s going to build some sort of large resort complex.”

“Yeah?” Brax leaned back, looking at Tom with interest. This was the sort of job he and his partners needed. “He probably has his own crew in mind.”

“I don’t know; Roarke said he was considering taking bids from locals. Roarke mentioned your name to him.”

Brax
knew Roarke, but not well. However, he was a good friend of Tom’s and he had a lot of connections.

“
Worth thinking about anyway,” Tom said.

If it did
work out, it could be the break he’d been looking for.

*****

“You sure you want to build a resort in the middle of nowhere?” Holly asked, looking around at the huge section of land.

“
It’s hardly the middle of nowhere, love,” Derrick chided, looking like he’d just stepped out of a fashion magazine. She didn’t know how he did it. He was only wearing jeans and a shirt, yet he looked pristine. She, on the other hand, was already growing hot and bothered. Her slacks were wrinkled and her sleeveless white shirt had a mark on the front. She had no idea how she’d managed that.

“Lilyvale is only a ten-minute drive away, and it’s a
nother twenty minutes to Waco.”

She raised a brow.
“Interesting names. Have you decided what to call this place? Rosewater? Dahliadream?”

“
Dahliadream? Really?” His lips quirked up into a grin. “So tell me what you think about this guy, Brax Jamieson?”

Holly thought back through
the file of information she’d collected on Jamieson. “Young—by far the youngest contender. Hasn’t been in construction long, but he and his partners have a bit of experience between them. Good reputation.” Hopefully Jamieson turned out to be a better option than Phil Jones, who they’d met with yesterday. He’d been a bit too full of himself.

“
Roarke thinks quite highly of him,” Derrick said, leaning back against their hired Jeep.

She rais
ed her brows. “Just because he’s good at spanking subs doesn’t make him a good builder.”

Oh hell, she
didn’t just say that.