Getting the Goods Read online

  Jesus.

  My dick begins to respond at the memories of earlier today, and I almost follow her into the bathroom, but I force myself to stay in bed.

  “Babes!” I call out, and she glances at me over her shoulder.

  “Dinner is in an hour. My mother expects everyone to be there, and on time. Just a warning.”

  “Well, I definitely wouldn’t want to keep your mother waiting.” She gives me a smirk, as she steps inside of the bathroom.

  “Would you mind picking out a Canadian tuxedo for me to wear? I think that your mother would be thrilled if I showed up in that.”

  “Cute,” I laugh. “As much as I would love to see her face on that one, I’d rather see you in a sexy ass dress, so my hand can trail aimlessly up your thigh during our entire dinner.”

  She blushes, before rolling her eyes.

  “You’re such a pervert.”

  “You’re welcome.” I shrug. “Plus, we already rocked the boat at lunch. I’d rather not rock it any more today, if that’s alright with you.”

  “Suit yourself.” She shrugs. “But when you’re ready to rock the boat, let me know. I’ll sink the whole damn ship.”

  I have no doubt that she would.

  “Sis.” I smile as my sister Alexandria rises from her seat in the parlor, before squealing and running towards me.

  “Conner! Oh, my gosh. Look at you! You look amazing! You’re literally glowing!”

  It’s amazing what a day of sun and sex will do for you. It apparently will even make you glow.

  “I don’t know how I feel about that comment, since glowing is a term usually reserved for women who are expecting, but, I guess I’ll take it as a compliment.”

  “As you should.” She squeezes me tightly, before pulling back from me and studying my face. “Really, you should. You look fantastic. Your normal scowl is gone, and you actually look happy. I suppose that I have you to thank for that.”

  She pulls back from me before pulling Gabriella in for another death grip hug.

  “Um, ok.” Gabriella glances up at me with wide eyes, as my sister damn near lifts her off of the ground.

  “Ah, Lex, I think that you’re suffocating her. Really, doll. Loosen up a bit.”

  “I’m sorry,” Alexandria giggles as she releases Gabriella from her grip. “I guess that I just got excited there for a second. Where are my manners?”

  She thrusts her hand out, and Gabriella takes it.

  “I’m Alexandria Wescott, Conner’s younger sister. This is my husband, Cal.” She motions for Cal, who is just entering the room from my father’s study.

  “Cal, nice to see you.” I nod at him, as he extends his hand to me and shakes it once. “This is my girlfriend, Gabriella.”

  “Girlfriend Gabriella.” His eyes move up and down her, before he finally extends his hand to her. “Nice to meet you, Gabriella.”

  “Likewise.” She nods once at him, before taking a step towards me. I wrap my arm around her waist and pull her snugly against me.

  She seems uncomfortable, and not that I can blame her. Between the coldness of my mother and the bubbly excitement from my sister, I’m sure that her head is spinning.

  “Gabriella, I can’t wait to hear all about how you and Conner met. I’ll bet that your love story is so romantic. It has to be, for my brother to finally be tied down. It has to be epic, I’m certain of it.”

  “Epic?” Cal snorts at my sister, making her frown. “You sound like a poorly bred teenager, Alexandria. Amazing would be the proper word.”

  Alex totally ignores him, but Gabriella doesn’t. She sucks in air before her eyes fly up to meet mine. She gives me a questioning look, and I just shake my head at her. Cal is a dick. Our families have known each other forever, and no matter how old he gets, I will always remember him as the weaselly little kid that Carter punched square in the face when we were twelve. Cal had come to our house, invited by my parents, of course, and had gotten his kicks out of being rude as hell to our butler. After Cal sent the butler back to the kitchen for the fourth time, claiming there to be “too much ice” in his glass, Carter had lost his mind, jumped up, and punched him.

  It was awesome.

  However, karma’s a bitch, because now the twerp is fully grown and married to my sister. Alexandria fell victim to mother and father’s matchmaking, and now, she’s married to the piece of shit standing in front of me, who is such a raging prick that even Gabriella picked up on it immediately. Why she would agree to that, I’ll never understand. Yet, here we are.

  “We should make our way into the dining room,” I lean down and whisper into Gabriella’s ear. She nods against me but remains tucked underneath my arm.

  I give her a squeeze before leading her towards the thick mahogany doors that swing open into the formal dining room.

  We take our seats, and I keep her hand clasped in mine underneath the table.

  Her eyes flutter up to mine, and she smiles.

  My heart tugs in my chest as our eyes connect, and I find myself staring at her for a moment too long.

  Alexandria sighs from across the table, breaking the moment.

  “Love is in the air.” She giggles before winking at me. Gabriella flushes before pulling her hand out of mine.

  Lust is in the air, that’s for damn sure. Because if I didn’t have to be sitting here at this table right now, I’d have Gabriella bent over somewhere while I plowed inside of her and made her scream out for more.

  I shift in my seat as my dick grows from the thought of having that sweet ass gripped in my hands.

  I’m going to definitely have to play that one out later, but for right now, I need to keep it together.

  Not that I have to worry about my near erection staying for long, though, because as soon as my mother and father enter the room, the air turns to ice.

  Without even looking at each other, they take their seats.

  My father glances around the table, and his eyes land on mine.

  He doesn’t even crack a smile.

  “Conner.” He nods at me. “Welcome home, Son.”

  Home.

  It doesn’t even feel like it’s the right word to use. The more appropriate thing to say, would be, welcome back to the house. All this place ever was to me was a house. A home is a place where you come to relax, and to unwind from your day. A place where you can be yourself, and the people inside will love you anyways.

  That does not describe this place at all.

  “It’s good to be back,” I lie between my teeth, but my response seems to suit my father. He nods in my direction, before moving his eyes to Gabriella.

  “You must be Gabriella.”

  “Yes sir.” She nods at him, and he only blinks, before turning his attention away from us.

  He signals to the butler to serve dinner, and everyone remains quiet.

  My niece and nephews sit as still as statues in their chairs, and as I watch them, my heart just sinks.

  They remind me exactly of my siblings and me. Little children, completely programmed to be robots. Not to speak, and not to cause a scene. Not allowed to act like children whatsoever.

  And it breaks my fucking heart.

  As if she reads my mind, Gabriella reaches underneath the table and grabs back onto my hand, before squeezing it once.

  I turn my attention to her, and she gives me a small smile, but the kindness in her eyes says even more than her words could.

  I swallow hard, before pulling my eyes away.

  What in the fuck is happening to me, and why am I allowing a woman that I’m fucking to soothe me in the way that she is, even if it’s only with the touch of her hand?

  Why is it making me feel the way that it is?

  I have no idea what is going on with me, but one thing is certain.

  I need to get ahold of myself, and fast.

  “So, Gabriella,” my mother interrupts my thoughts, as she breaks the silence.

  “It is my understanding that you graduated fr
om Harvard. What was your area of study?”

  “That is correct.” Gabriella nods. “However, I only attended Harvard for my graduate studies. I received my MBA from there.”

  “I see.” Mother nods slowly, as her eyes focus on her. “What generation were you?”

  Gabriella looks confused.

  “Um, I’m not exactly sure what you mean by that.”

  Mother’s mouth flattens.

  “What generation were you in your family to attend Harvard?”

  “Oh.” Gabriella pulls her hand away from mine and sits a bit straighter in her seat. “Well, first generation, then. I was the first in my family to attend Harvard.”

  “That’s interesting,” Mother responds, although, she sounds anything but interested. “Where did your parents attend school?”

  “They didn’t.”

  The table falls even more silent.

  “Your parents didn’t attend college? Well, why in the world not?”

  Gabriella pauses, looking incredibly uncomfortable, as she returns my mother’s stare.

  I am just about to interject, when finally, she just shrugs.

  “Well, my mother got pregnant with me right after she and my father graduated from high school. They got married shortly after that, and my father went to work to support our family.”

  I’m not sure if my mothers’ eyes can get any wider.

  I don’t like that Gabriella’s being put on the spot like this, but at the same time, seeing the shock on my mother’s face is pretty damn priceless.

  Gabriella just continues.

  “My father’s neighbor growing up was a plumber. When my mother got pregnant, my dad knew that he had to figure out a way to support us. He needed to learn a trade. So, he became an apprentice. He then worked as a plumber for several years, before finally building enough client base to start his own company. He now owns Martin’s Plumbing, and has several plumber’s that work for him, although, he does still run calls on his own. My mother never went to work. She was always a stay at home mother for my siblings and I.”

  “How nice,” Mother finally says, although by the tone of her voice, it’s pretty obvious that she does not think that it is nice at all.

  “How’s business, Father?” I interject, knowing full and well that business talk will now dominate the rest of the dinner conversation.

  And I’m right.

  For the next hour, he, Callon, and Cal discuss business. I interject here and there with small tidbits of things that Carter and I are working on, but I don’t divulge much.

  That is one of the things that we agreed about early on, was that our business would be just that. Ours.

  It’s none of my parents’ business what we’re up to. They never took much interest in us, so why in the hell would we want to share anything with them?

  “I can’t do it, alright?” Gabriella fumes, as she storms across the lawn towards the guest house.

  “I cannot fucking do it anymore.”

  We survived yet another meal with my family, this time, it was breakfast. My mother was in even more rare form this morning and spent the first five minutes berating Gabriella for showing up to breakfast in yoga pants and a t-shirt.

  She had opened her mouth and began to cut her down. I had jumped to my feet, and the F bombs had just started rolling out of my mouth. My mother’s face turned bright red, but she shut her damn mouth.

  Unfortunately, her words had already been spoken, though, and she had made Gabriella feel like shit.

  “I mean, seriously. It’s breakfast, and no one in their right minds should be dressing up for breakfast. In my house, you know, my dirty, too small, trash of a family’s house, I would have worn just this, maybe not even, and sat on the damn counter with my legs folded and eaten Mickey Mouse pancakes. Because that’s still a thing in my house.”

  “I always wanted to try Mickey Mouse pancakes.” I tell her, hoping to at least make her smile, when instead, she just snorts.

  “I’m sure that fucking devil wouldn’t have bothered to make you those.”

  “You’re right.”

  “See? See what she does to me? I’m calling your mother the devil, which is rude as hell. My mother would smack me in the face over a comment like that, because it shows very poor manners to diss someone’s mother. But yours? Good lord, Conner. I can’t even handle it anymore.”

  “Gabs,” I exhale slowly, before grabbing onto her elbow. “Baby, I’m so sorry.”

  “Conner.” She jerks her elbow away from me, before shaking her head.

  “I need some space right now, alright? There is no way that I can go sailing with your family today. No possible way. I think that I’m better off just hanging out here and spending the day alone.”

  My stomach sinks.

  I have no desire to go sailing with my family either, however, the thought of having Gabriella there somehow made it seem tolerable.

  Now, I’m going to be on my own.

  “Alright. That’s fair. How about if I just stay here with you?”

  “Nope.” She waves her hand. “I meant it when I said that I needed a break. I’ve just spent the last two days getting snidely slammed by your mother. I need some alone time, to get my head right, so that I don’t snap. Trust me, I need this.”

  “Alright.” I hold up my hands. “Whatever you need, babes.”

  15

  Conner

  Sailing with my family couldn’t have taken any damn longer. Once upon a time, I loved being in a sailboat, but that was many years ago, before I knew better.

  Being trapped in our large home is one thing. There are plenty of places to escape the coldness that just seeps off of my parents, but on a sailboat, not so much.

  My mother immediately started in on me about Gabriella, which I put an end to really quick, but it pissed me off enough to ruin the rest of my time on that boat.

  “How can you even consider dating someone like her?” she had asked, with her normal disgusted look on her face. “Her father is a plumber, for crying out loud. People like her don’t even belong near people like us. She has a motive, Conner. She must have a motive for dating you. I’m not going to allow her to weasel her way into our family.”

  Cal had immediately agreed with mother, and father had sat and just nodded every so often. That’s probably the first thing that they’ve ever agreed upon.

  I had listened for about two seconds, before losing my shit.

  “Gabriella is a wonderful person, and your opinions on her do not matter to me. So, if you don’t have anything nice to say about her, then I would appreciate if you said nothing at all.”

  It was at that point that I moved away from them on the boat, and I spent the next several hours by myself.

  Callon had finally come to sit by me, and then, so did Alexandria. We spend the rest of the time together while my parents talked heatedly underneath their breath to each other.

  No doubt, about my relationship.

  I had to keep my mouth shut, though. I so wanted to tell them the truth and tell them that in fact Gabriella was using me for something.

  Oh, lord. It would have almost been worth it to see the look on their faces. Almost.

  But, getting Gabriella pregnant isn’t anything that I want them aware of. That’s my business, not theirs.

  My mother had also decided to bring up Sarah, my ex, the one whom she believes in her twisted mind is my “soul mate.” As if she even has any idea what that is.

  She droned on and on about Sarah, and how excited she was to see me. As soon as we had begun to head back to shore, I was so ready that I debated jumping off of the boat and swimming the rest of the way back, once the house came into view.

  I held back.

  I’m hoping that Gabriella has had enough time to cool down, so that we can get back to business. You know, baby making business. Because that is literally all that I have been able to think about today.

  Last night after dinner, she wanted nothing to do with me.
This morning, she had seemed a bit better, and was back to herself. That is, until breakfast. After that, she was untouchable, and if this keeps up, I’m not going to be finding myself up in that sweet box of hers, which in all honesty, is the only damn place that I want to be.

  I take a deep breath, before swinging open the door to the guest house.

  Music blasts from somewhere, and I stare inside in awe, as I take in the scene in front of me.

  My niece and my nephews are running around the house, and they’re laughing. My niece has a huge feather boa around her neck as she dances around the living room. My nephews are also dancing, as they jump from couch to couch. The scene is complete and utter chaos, but it doesn’t even bother me. And as I inhale deep and smell of apple pie washes over me, a strange feeling erupts from deep inside.

  This is the smell of a home. This is the scene from a home.

  Even if it’s only for a few days, this is a home, and it is Gabriella that’s making it this way. She peaks her head around the corner, and glances at the children.

  “Hey, kiddos. You can dance all that you want, but no jumping on the furniture, alight?”

  “Ok!” the boys shout in unison before hopping off of the couch and running towards the kitchen.

  “Gabby, is the pie cooled off yet? Can we eat some now?”

  “Yes.” She beams at them as she takes a step around the corner and towards the living room. She spots me standing there, and smiles.

  “Oh, hey Conner. You’re back. I hope that you don’t mind, but the kids and I decided to hang out today.”

  “Of course, I don’t mind.” I can hardly force the words out past the lump that’s now present in my throat. “I think it’s great that you wanted to spend your time today with them.”

  “Well, I made some pie.” She flashes me a sheepish grin. “Actually, I made a lot of pie. I tend to bake when I’m stressed. If you’re hungry…”