Not Quite Married Page 5
She hissed and shut her eyes for a second. “Okay,” she replied.
“I’m taking care of you and the girls. You’re my responsibility. I love you. We’re a family, and I need you to do something, Julia.”
She went to pull away, but Logan wouldn’t let her.
“Hey, listen to me,” he said. “No more running, no more starting a fight. We work things out together. We’re all in this together.”
She seemed to relax a bit, and her eyes were a little shiny. “Logan, the girls are mine. I don’t want to lose them.”
“The girls are ours, and you’re not going to lose them,” he said. “We’re not going to lose them.”
“Logan, Kevin is…”
He could feel her pulling away, and this time he couldn’t stop her from sitting up. “Kevin is only interested in money,” he said. “Julia, you don’t need the child support from him or his alimony. You have me. I can take care of you.”
“What does that have to do with trying to take the girls?”
“It’s about money, Julia! He doesn’t want to pay anything. I’ll get Samuel to draft something. If you sign it, and Kevin comes out paying nothing, he’ll drop this.”
Julia was watching him, and he could see her thinking. She looked away in disbelief. The intensity in her green eyes when she stared back told him that this woman, whom he loved and would spend a lifetime with, raise a family with, was definitely not a woman who would roll over and play dead. “And how do you know this, Logan?” she asked.
“I called him last night. You can be furious with me, but I’d do it again to protect you and the girls and to end all this silliness. I won’t let someone try to hurt you, Julia, or the girls.”
She shook her head. “So money to Kevin is worth more than his girls? Good to know. Draft it, and I’ll sign it, but you tell Samuel that Kevin has to sign over all his rights.”
She started to get up, but Logan slid his arm around her and pulled her down with him. “No, we’ll talk to Samuel together,” he said. “Just so you know, Julia, I’ll find a way to make those girls mine legally, and in every other way that counts.”
“You’d do that for me?”
Logan shook his head. “No, I’m doing it for those girls, for us and for our children. We’re a family, Julia, and, from now on, I’m the only husband you’ll ever have. No other man is going to have any say in this house ever again.”
Julia slid her hand over his face as she lay sprawled on top of him. “I love you,” she said, and she pressed a kiss to his lips as he rolled her beneath him once again.
Chapter 14
“Here they come, everyone!”
Glasses clinked as Samuel, dressed in a suit and a gold tie, his dark hair slicked back, stood among the hundred guests in the McKay community hall, which was festooned with bows and ribbons and flowers on all the tables.
Julia, in a white, strapless wedding gown that flowed from the waist, and a lace veil pinned to her short, dark hair, stepped into the hall, holding Logan’s arm. This was her fairytale, and she looked up at her husband, who was wearing a tux that made him look even more handsome than she’d ever thought possible. He put his other hand over hers, holding her to him as they stepped into a room filled with friends and family who’d witnessed their vows an hour ago in the small town church.
“Julia, you look so beautiful,” Samuel said. “It’s not too late to tell my brother to get lost and run away with me instead.”
Logan put his hand on Samuel’s shoulder and gave him a gentle shove. “Get lost!” he said with a laugh. “Keep your hands off my wife.”
Every one of the Wilde brothers was tall, broad shouldered, and totally alpha; they seemed to take over the room—perhaps even the town—just by the way they walked.
“Hey, you,” Ben said, kissing Julia on the cheek. She was pleased to see the second Wilde brother, the oil executive who had helped find Trinity. He winked down at the girls and then tossed Trinity over his shoulder in her long, pink flower-girl dress. She squealed, and he lifted Dawn under his other arm as she giggled. “You two troublemakers look gorgeous in those beautiful gowns—like princesses.”
Julia couldn’t get over how he talked to her girls and how comfortable he was with them. He could have stepped off the cover of GQ, and his personality was such a contrast—in her eyes, anyway. “Your brother sure is good with kids,” she said to Logan.
When she glanced up at him, he leaned down and kissed her nose. “He’d better be, since he’s staying with them while we go off on our honeymoon.”
“Yeah, where are you taking me, anyway?” she asked just as his brother Joe and his very tall, dark-haired wife, Margaret, joined them. Joe’s son, Ryan, stepped up as well, and Samuel tousled his hair. The youngest Wilde brother, Jake, stood on the other side of him. He, too, was dark haired, broader in the shoulders than the other brothers, and he had brooding eyes. There was a tension she couldn’t put a finger on between Samuel and Jake.
“Yeah, where are you taking your wife, Logan?” Samuel asked in an amused way. Julia was puzzled by the expression on Joe and Margaret’s faces.
“Let me give you some advice from one sister-in-law to another,” Margaret said as she stepped in and hugged Julia. She then put her hands on both of Julia’s shoulders. “If he says he’s taking you camping—say no.”
Every one of the brothers burst out laughing—except Joe, who winced. Julia looked up to Logan, confused.
“Long story,” Logan said. “I’ll fill you in later, but let’s just say that some of my brothers are a little thick in the head.”
“That is absolutely true, Julia,” Logan’s mother piped up as she joined them. She was a short, gray-haired lady with a plump figure, and she was followed by a tall, solid man. He was charming, and distinguished; Julia could see where Logan and his brothers had gotten their looks. “Make no mistake, though, the Wildes are all about family, and there’s one thing that we do well—we stick together. We always have each other’s backs. This grandchild of mine you’re carrying…Julia, we’re so happy!”
“Yeah, and just maybe this little one will keep Logan out of our business,” Samuel added, as he leaned in closer so that only the family could hear his next words. “Kevin signed off on your agreement. He’s no longer pursuing custody, but he wouldn’t sign away his rights to see the girls in the summer. We’ll work on it, Julia.”
He exchanged a meaningful look with Logan, and Julia took in the family and their sober expressions as they listened to Samuel. The love that flowed through them, from them…Julia had never experienced this kind of support before, and she realized that whatever happened; this family would fight with her, have her back, and never let her down.
THE END
Next in The Wilde Brothers stories is A Matter of Trust, available Summer 2014, click here to sign up for Lorhainne Eckhart’s Newsletter.
About the Author
Lorhainne Eckhart is a 2013 Readers Favorite Award winner, frequently a top 100 bestselling author on Amazon in Romance, Westerns and Police Procedural. Author of 25 titles which includes novels, collections, and short stories. She writes three genres, western romance, romantic suspense and military romance and has sold more than 250,000 eBooks since her bestseller The Forgotten Child landed on the Amazon #1 Bestseller list for Westerns and Western Romance.
The German Foreign rights for The Forgotten Child have since been acquired by a major publisher, retitled The Forgotten Boy and released March 18, 2014, now a top 100 overall bestseller on Amazon. Lorhainne lives on sunny Salt Spring Island with her family where she is working on her next book.
Lorhainne Eckhart loves to hear from readers!
Contact at
Email: Lorhainne@LorhainneEckhart.com
Twitter: @LEckhart
Facebook: LorhainneEckhart
Sign up for Lorhainne’s Newsletter
Links to Lorhainne Eckhart’s Booklist
The following Lorhainne Eckhart titles are availabl
e in electronic format. Please scroll down the for the links or visit my website at www.LorhainneEckhart.com for available retailers.
Finding Love ~ The Outsider Series
The Forgotten Child
A Baby And A Wedding
Fallen Hero
The Search
The Awakening
Secrets
Runaway
The Unexpected Storm
Overdue
The Wedding
Or Grab all the books in The Outsider Series in One Boxed Set Collection:
The Outsider Series – The Complete Omnibus Collection
The Friessens: A New Beginning
The Deadline
The Price to Love
The Wilde Brothers
The One
The Honeymoon, A Wilde Brothers Short
Friendly Fire
Not Quite Married
A Matter of Trust (*Coming Summer 2014)
Walk the Right Road Series
The Choice
Lost And Found
Merkaba
Bounty
Blown Away: The Final Chapter
Or Grab all the books in Walk the Right Road Series in One Boxed Set Collection:
Walk the Right Road: The Complete Collection
The Saved Series
Saved
Vanished
Boxed Sets & Collections
Finding Love ~ The Outsider Series Volume 1
Finding Love ~ The Outsider Series Volume 2
Finding Love ~ The Outsider Series – The Complete Collection
Walk the Right Road: The Complete Collection
Copyright Information
Not Quite Married, The Wilde Brothers
COPYRIGHT © Lorhainne Ekelund, 2014, All Rights Reserved.
No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Cover Design: Steven Novak
Contact Information: Lorhainne@LorhainneEckhart.com
Editor: Talia Leduc
ISBN: 978-1928085133
Table of Contents
Main Menu
About the Author
Links to Lorhainne Eckhart Booklist
Copyright Information
Chapters:
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
To return to the Main Menu, click here.