AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“You should come home. Leave him already. Come back to live with me and Dad again.”
I shook my head. “It’s not that easy.”
“Yes, it is. Just pack up your stuff and come home. Or won’t Tam allow it?”
“It’s not about what Tam won’t allow. Maybe I just don’t want to.”
“Well, well, well,” a deep male voice said from behind me. “If it isn’t my potential future brother-in-law.”
Shit.
“Jayden was just leaving,” I said.
Jay bristled. “No, I wasn’t. I think you should buy me a drink.”
I took hold of his arm, planning to usher him back out of there. “You’ve had enough.”
Jayden shook me off. “You can’t tell me what to do.”
“For God’s sake, Jay, please, just go.”
“No, I want that drink.”
“It’s okay, Hallie,” Tam said in a cool, smooth tone that radiated danger. “It’s not a problem.” He motioned to the barman.
The guy behind the bar raised an eyebrow at Jayden’s obvious youth.
“Don’t worry, he’s over eighteen,” Tam confirmed. “Give me a bottle of tequila and two shot glasses.”
I had a bad feeling about this. “I thought we were going home, Tam.”
“The young man wants a drink, and a drink he shall have. In fact, I think I’ll join him.”
Tam had fifteen years’ experience on Jayden and had a good couple of stone extra body weight as well. Plus, I knew Tam had only had a glass of champagne with me, while Jay had clearly had a lot more. If this was going to turn into some dick swinging competition via downing shots of tequila, I had no doubt about who would lose.
I was tempted to say that I’d match them for shots, in the hope that it might bring out the protective side of the pair and they’d refuse to drink as well for fear of me making myself ill. However, I had the feeling they’d just let me join in, and then I’d end up even more drunk than them, and if things kicked off, I’d be in no state to calm them down again.
“Salt?” the barman offered. “Lemons?”
“I don’t think we need to bother with all that shit, do we, Jay?”
Jay squared his shoulders. “No way.”
I wanted to grab both their heads and smash them together. Instead, I got in between them and faced Tam, since I hoped he would be the more reasonable of the pair.
“Tam, my brother is still a teenager, and you’re a man in your thirties. Don’t you think you’re behaving like a child?”
He arched a thick, dark eyebrow. “By drinking? I don’t know many children who drink.”
“Sarcasm isn’t going to help this situation. Please, I’m begging you, as the woman who will one day be your wife, just let Jayden have his one drink and then let him leave.”
“He doesn’t want just one drink, do you, Jay?” He raised his voice for the last part, so my brother would hear over the steady thump of the dance music.
“In fact, Jay thinks this place is practically his now that his sister is going to be married to the owner, isn’t that right, Jay?”
Dear God, please let him give the right answer,I silently begged the universe.
But I knew my brother well enough to see him walk right into the trap that Tam was laying for him. I remembered how Tam had been when we’d been in Estonia and that man had been talking to me at the bar. Tam had gone from calm to viciously violent in a split second, and I desperately didn’t want the same thing to happen now. Would Tam actually hurt Jay? I hoped not. Surely, he’d realise that if he did, whatever fragile truce had been between our two families would come crashing down, or had that already happened after the disastrous dinner party earlier? There would be no way I’d be able to marry a man who’d hurt my brother. But could the same be said for Jay? The problem with my brother was that he was nineteen and thought he was invincible. It didn’t matter to him that the person he was squaring off against was older and bigger than he was. In Jay’s mind, he saw me here and believed he should have the same rights and respect. Jayden Wynter was Marlon Wynter’s only son, and he was used to people doing as he asked and getting his own way. But that was in our territory, not in the Cornell’s, and right now he was overstepping his mark.
