CLOSING MY EYES, I TOOK a deep breath in and slowly let it out as I told myself not to whack my idiot brother upside that empty damn head of his. “You couldn’t for once in your life just keep your frigging mouth shut?” I grumbled.
Arron shrank down in the emergency room chair, holding the icepack over his broken nose, as I held the other icepack over what I was sure would be a broken wrist.
“I promised Dad I could look after you this time. You’re seventeen years old. He shouldn’t have to hire a bloody nanny to keep you in check while he’s on deployment.”
“I don’t fucking need a nanny, or my sister who’s only four damn years older, to babysit me.” Arron’s fierce dark brown eyes that almost looked black glared at me.
“Ha! Well right now you just shit all over that, because I, your sister, who is only four damn years older than you, had to leave my new job so I could pick my brother up from school, and take him to the emergency room, because he got in a fight at school, with not one guy, but two.” Arron’s cheeks tinged with red. I sighed. Arron wasn’t one to fight people for no reason. He was a good kid and even though he used to hang out with the wrong crowd, he wasn’t one to start fights. “What did you get in a fight over anyway? We haven’t even been here for three months.”
“I hate it here. Why did we have to move again? You could have stayed in Darwin. You’re old enough to be on your own. You finished technical and further education (TAFE) and had your apprenticeship. I would have happily stayed there with you. Do you know how much it sucks to start a new school senior year? Not even the start of the year but with only a couple of months left before you do the High school certificate (HSC)?”
I could have stayed, but my dad needed me. Arron needed me, even though he thought he didn’t. We’d lived in Darwin for five years. The base was a big one and my dad went where the Army told him. I’d finished high school in Darwin and had made some great friends. When Dad told me he was being transferred, he said I could stay and finish my apprenticeship, but I knew he needed me and there were a lot of job options for me in Brisbane. Arron hadn’t wanted to leave and had begged to stay. The transfer, my dad said, couldn’t come at a better time. He hated my brother’s friends. So three months ago, we moved to Brisbane, Queensland. I loved it here straight away. I even had friends who had moved down here to go to Uni or get jobs. There wasn’t much to do in Darwin and there were so many more options here. I’d gotten a job at a hairdresser’s soon after we moved.
“I’m sorry. I know it’s hard to start later in the year and so close to your HSC, but Arron you know why you couldn’t stay.” Arron had been pissed when Dad said we were moving because he didn’t like the choices Arron was making. “Dad wouldn’t have let you stay with me in Darwin anyway. He wants you with him.”
“He’s not even around to care.”
I winced at the pain and truth in his voice. “He’s only away for four more weeks. Then he’s back for at least six.” Leaning over, I hugged my brother. I loved Arron. He was all I had besides my father. Our parents had been foster children and met at a group home event. When my mother died eight years ago from a brain tumor, my dad fell apart and sank all his energy into his work, rising in the Army ranks and taking any deployment they offered. We had a nanny until I turned eighteen. Then I took over and it became just me and Arron most of the time. “He cares. I care.” I kissed his forehead. “Wanna tell me now why you got into a fight?”
Arron’s face turned bright red and he groaned. “I can’t stand these rich kids. There’s these two Silverman guys, who think their shit doesn’t stink.” His shoulders dropped. “I ignore them most of the time, but um…er… fuck, they saw you this morning when you dropped me off to school and I forgot my bag and you came back and got out of the car. One of them took a frigging photo of you, and well, let’s just say he wasn’t being very respectful.”
Reaching over, I hugged my brother again. “I love you Arron. Thanks for being protective, but I’m a big girl. I can handle a little boy.” I winked at him. “I’m my father’s daughter after all.” Our dad had drilled into us from an early age that we needed to learn how to protect ourselves. I’d taken self-defense class every year from age eight and Arron was an awesome boxer, but he’d never used his skills outside of the ring until today. I even did some boxing classes myself and loved it. Boxing was my relax time. It was also something that helped me to meet and make new friends wherever we moved.
Arron laughed and relaxed back against the chair. “Do you think if Dad hears about this he’ll stop Micky teaching me? He’s one of the things I actually like about moving down here. He reckons I should enter some comps. Says I have a killer right hook.”
Even though my brother held an icepack over his nose, I could see the smile on his face as he talked of his new boxing coach Mitchel, Micky. Arron’s old coach had referred him to Micky and I couldn’t deny that Arron loved his new coach and had improved in leaps and bounds.
“Nah, I won’t tell him. I’d be more worried about Micky finding out you got into a fight. You know his rule. No fighting unless it’s in the ring.”
Arron went white, his eyes went wide and I saw fear. “You don’t think he’d stop training me?”
I shook my head. “Nah. Don’t worry I’ll talk to him.” Arron visibly relaxed. I’d do anything for my brother and he knew he could always count on me. If boxing made Arron happy, I’d do anything to make sure Micky understood what had happened and didn’t kick him out of his program.
Getting comfortable in the chair for what, by the looks of the packed emergency room, was going to be a long wait, I grabbed my iPad, opened my Kindle app, and started reading.
The day couldn’t get any fucking worse. My cousin Richard rang me in the morning to tell me that Bailey, his soul mate and wife, was in labor. That meant Aunt Gillian would be in a mood making sure everything went perfectly for her daughter-in law. If any of us Silvermans had a choice, we would stay away from the maternity ward until the baby was born, but we didn’t. We would all go and show our support. My mother would be the one who had to help deal and listen to Gillian complain when even the tiniest thing didn’t go as planned or she wanted.
The second thing to go wrong with my day was that I was called into the precinct because three people had overdosed and died all in one night and in different places in the city, but all from what looked to be the same drug. My Captain thought I’d be the perfect detective for the case as I’d helped Richard, who had had the problem of people overdosing in his clubs.
But instead of waiting in maternity with the rest of my family, I was standing out the front of the emergency doors at Brisbane hospital with my brother Oakley and cousin Andrew.
Glaring, I slowly counted backwards from ten to calm myself before speaking to the two idiots before me. “Tell me again why the fuck I’m taking you two to the emergency room and not calling mum and Aunty Gillian?”
Oakley winced at my demanding tone, and Andrew stopped before we could go into the emergency department. “He’s in there bro, and the kid is fucking crazy. I mean look what he did to us.”
I was looking, and I was finding it hard not to have a little respect for this kid that they were talking about. My brother had a black eye, he was limping and I’d have bet my next pay check his arm was broken. Andrew didn’t look like he’d fared much better than Oakley. He may even look worse with two black eyes. My brother and cousin had training too, so I knew they were no lightweights. I’d spoken to Philip, their security, on the drive to the hospital and asked why he didn’t step in and help my brother and cousin. He’d told me the guy who’d fought them was just a seventeen-year-old kid, a boy the same age as them. Philip hadn’t said why this kid had beat the shit out of my brother and cousin and that alone had me suspicious.
“I can see what he’s done. Why the hell do you need me with you and not Dad?”
Oakley gazed into the emergency room and mumbled, “Philip is pissed at me and I um…I don’t want Mum or Dad involved in this, especially now Bailey’s in labor.”
“Yeah,” Andrew added. “Can you imagine if I called my mother or even Dad right now? Dad needs to be with Mum or Richard will strangle Mum.”
I groaned because I could just imagine how upset Aunty Gillian would be if for any reason she had to leave Bailey. And if something went wrong she would be unbearable. Aunt Gillian was a handful at the best of times, but I knew right now she would be beyond crazy.
Soulmates, ha. I resisted the urge to roll my eyes. I didn’t believe in the Silverman gypsies’ curse. Well, I hadn’t until it happened to Uncle Carl too. The tale went in the old country, we helped a group of gypsies flee, and for helping them, they gifted us with the ability to know our soulmate. But there are draw backs that they forgot to mention. Like the fact we Silvermans turned into controlling, possessive, domineering men. Basically cavemen. My parents and two uncles had fallen to the curse and this last year my young cousin Stephan and Richard too, but the shock was my uncle Carl. I didn’t believe in the curse either until my family started dropping like flies. My uncle Carl, who had avoided it to the ripe old age of forty-five, in the last ten months had found his soulmate, gotten married and had twins. One of which was a girl. Silvermans didn’t have female children.
Thinking of the supposed curse always pissed me off. I tried not to believe, and I told myself I didn’t, but I couldn’t ever stay with a woman because the stupid ‘curse’ was always there like a frigging whispering temptation telling me the grass is and will be greener on the other side, or once I’ve found my soulmate.
Stomach churning at my thoughts, I returned my focus to the problem before me, my brother and cousin. “Fuck.” I ran my fingers over my head. Not many people messed with a Silverman. We had way too much money and a lot of connections. So my brother and cousin must have done something bad for this kid to do what he’d done. “God damn it, Oakley, what the fuck did you do?”
He avoided my gaze. “I may have taken a picture of his sister and photo shopped images of what I wanted to do to her and mouthed off,” he rushed out.
Reaching over I whacked him upside the head. “You damn idiot.”
“It was just a bit of fun and his sister is hot,” mumbled Andrew.
I turned and whacked Andrew, too. “Get your arses in there now. And delete that shit off all your devices because what you fuckwits did is illegal.” Grabbing the scruff of both their shirts I dragged them through emergency and over to the nurses’ triage.
Before we even got to wait in line for the nurse, I heard the sexiest voice I’d ever heard yell, “Goddamn it Arron, sit your arse down now. Leave the dickheads alone.”
Spinning, I searched for that voice and saw a woman with jet black hair falling to her arse. And what a nice round shapely arse it was. She had her hands on the chest of a tall teenager, who was currently staring daggers over my way.
“That the kid that did this to you two?” Both my brother and cousin nodded, but I noticed their gazes didn’t leave the woman’s arse. An urge to beat both of them washed over me at the sight of them staring at what only moments ago I had been staring at. Huh, that was weird. Mentally shaking off the feeling, I gave a glare to both Oakley and Andrew. “Stay in line. I’m going to go over and see if I can smooth things over.”
Without waiting for their reply, I made my way over to the couple. The woman was now quietly talking to the teenager who still hadn’t stopped staring my way. The closer I got the stronger my sense that something wasn’t right, that I wanted to beat the shit out of my brother and cousin for treating the woman the way they had. At thirty-two years old, I knew the need to beat my brother and cousin was stupid. However, the feeling that was running through my veins wasn’t one I had ever had. After taking a few deep breaths, I pushed the feeling aside knowing that I would have to examine it after I finished with this situation.
“I promise if you ignore the dipshits, even though you only have a month or so until HSC, I’ll move you to a new school if you want. One without rich little pricks.”
I stopped just out of reach from them. I was close enough now that a vanilla scent surrounded me instead of the hospital disinfectant. I took in a deep breath of the heavenly scent and almost moaned as my whole body hardened.
“What the fuck do you want?” the teenager snarled.
The vanilla-scented woman spun around to face me and I took a step towards her. Damn, she wasn’t just beautiful, she was stunning. Super long black lashes fluttered, revealing dark brown eyes that looked almost black enough to match her hair. Her nose was straight and perfect with a slight point. Her lips weren’t too full, but they weren’t thin. They were perfect, just like the rest of her. She was a tiny thing, I bet barely five feet tall, with light olive skin and a body to die for. Damn. My heart beat faster than I’d ever felt it beat before. I opened my mouth to reply to the kid, but nothing intelligent came out. “Mine. You’re mine.”
“What! What the hell kind of answer is that?” the kid growled.
My mate, my soulmate, who I’d given up hope of ever finding, groaned and her gaze went from her brother to me and back before she mumbled, “Men.” She stepped in front of her brother and narrowed her gaze on me. “Look, I’m sorry my brother kicked your um…brothers?”
I nodded. I knew if I spoke it wouldn’t be anything but caveman talk.
“Arses, but they were being douches. Arron was just protecting me. Can we just forget about it and put it all behind us? No one will press charges.”
Oh, she was using the threat of pressing charges to keep everything quiet. I couldn’t help the smirk that spread over my face. I crossed my arms over my chest and stared down at my one, my soul mate. “Really?”
Her relaxed stance changed. She straightened herself up and eyed me up and down, a smirk of her own spreading across her beautiful face. “Yes. Really. Now,” she nodded her head in the direction of my brother and cousin. “It looks like they found a nurse and you’re going in instead of waiting with us ‘normal people.’” She raised her hands in air quotes.
Huh, what? What did she mean by normal people? I looked over my shoulder and sure enough, a nurse was guiding my brother and cousin through to the rooms. Sighing, because I knew the Silverman name had gotten us priority, I looked back at my mate, whose name I didn’t even know, and debated what I should do. Did I follow my brother and cousin, who were still under age at seventeen, or did I wait and get to know my mate?
The choice was taken from me when a nurse walked over to me. “Mr. Silverman, if you could please come with me as your brother and cousin are both minors and need an adult or guardian with them.”
My mate turned her back on me and I fought the urge to spin her around, throw her over my shoulder and take off with her. Without saying a word though, I followed the nurse. I’d find my soul mate again, and soon.
What an arsehole. A beautiful, tanned, tall, muscular, hot, god like arsehole. He wasn’t what I expected from the little I learned from Arron. I’d met rich guys before, and they usually didn’t look like the man that came over. I’d gone to a private school and the brothers and fathers of friends didn’t look like the olive-skinned muscular guy I’d just stopped Arron from attacking. I wasn’t one to go all weak at the knees over Mr. Hottie. Gorgeous, muscular guys were a norm for me. With my father in the Army and my brother boxing, I’d seen my fair share of built, handsome men, but the guy I’d just seen had my stomach doing weird flips and flutters. His dark hair was military short and I saw the beginnings of tattoos peeking out of the collar of his suit. His cheeks were high and his jaw square. The stubble added to his manliness. Then I’d seen his eyes. They were green, but not just any green, a rich, rainforest green that had me losing myself in them for a moment.
I thought I was a goner until he spoke. “Mine,” and he stared right at me. “You’re mine.” The first had snapped me out of his green gaze and the next one I fought my body’s reaction as tingles spread over me. Arron’s response spurred me into action and I knew I had to calm my brother down and ignore whatever was going on with me.
My mind went over the short encounter for the next couple of hours while we waited to see a doctor. I couldn’t figure out my response to this man. I didn’t understand why I couldn’t stop thinking about him. What was wrong with me? I’d never obsessed over a guy. I’d had boyfriends. I’d only broken up with my last a month before we moved down to Brisbane.
The man had been hot, but not my type. I usually went for men…less domineering, muscular, powerful, and well, just less. Even meeting the Silverman for that short time, I could feel all those things radiating off him. He reminded me a little of my father. I shivered and not the good shiver. My dad was someone you didn’t cross or go against. He was in shape and wasn’t one to take no for an answer. I was sure that was what the guy I’d met was like too.
“Stamon. Arron Stamon.”
Groaning as I heard my brother’s name and realized I was still obsessing over the encounter, I stood with my brother and promised myself once I walked through the doors and into a room, I would stop thinking of the Silverman. Hopefully I’d never see him again.
So it turned out there was somewhere that didn’t care that I was a Silverman. The Army base. They wouldn’t let me onto it without a family member or a friend that lives on it to escort and be responsible for me. I wasn’t on official police business and the men at the gate had rung my precinct when I tried using that. So now I sat across from the base entrance waiting like a creepy stalker for my soulmate to leave.
My brother told me Arron’s last name and I’d run a search to find out all I could on “my one.” Her name was Divinity Stamon. She was twenty-one years old. Five feet and half an inch. Sixty kilograms. A hairdresser and beauty consultant. She had an apprenticeship at Golden Locks and Beauty and had a brother, Arron Stamon, of whom she was the legal guardian while their father was on deployment. That was the information I could find out on her. I’d rung Zeck and asked him to dig deeper.
I hadn’t gotten to see Divinity again since the first meeting at the hospital. After going in with my brother and cousin, we’d left emergency and gone straight up to maternity just in time to find out that Bailey had given birth to a big nine-pound baby boy. Even just born you could tell the kid was going to be a clone of Richard, with blond hair and big blue eyes.
Little Sebastian almost overshadowed what my brother and cousin had done and that I’d gotten them fixed up. My mother was stilled pissed at me for taking over and not contacting her. She became furious when she found out what Oakley and Andrew had done to Divinity that caused Arron to beat them up. I had debated if I should tell my mother what Divinity was to me, but I wanted to see her again before I told anyone.
My mother was making my brother and cousin do an elaborate apology. I smirked, because even my mother was having trouble getting in contact with Divinity, but she had a plan. And if there is one thing my mother, or any Silverman for that matter, is good at, it’s planning things. So, I figured if I couldn’t see Divinity again before Monday, well then, I would just gatecrash whatever my mother was going to think up.
Rich people were not only arseholes, they thought the rules didn’t apply to them. I’d had the gate security call me so many times over the weekend, I was sure they were now at the stage where they were getting pissed off. I giggled when Arron told Kyle—one of the men posted at the gates this weekend—that the next time a Silverman asked to see, or speak, with us to give them our father’s Skype information and contact him. Our dad wasn’t someone who was happy to have his time wasted on what he called ‘silly childish bullshit.’ He wouldn’t reply kindly to what any of the Silvermans had to say and he wouldn’t care who they were.
Getting off the sofa, I went to my brother and hugged him, careful of his cast. He had a broken wrist and nose. Micky hadn’t been happy with Arron, but I’d worked my charm. The old man was wrapped around my pinky and after taking to him, I’d convinced him not to punish Arron too much. Micky was still teaching him, but Arron had to devote time now to teaching children twice a week. I loved my brother, but he wasn’t what I would call a role model, or good with children in anyway, so I thought his punishment was fitting. He’d been complaining since Friday, and three days later he was still whining, no matter how many times I told him it could have been worse, that Micky could have quit training him altogether.
Thanks to the harassment from the Silvermans we hadn’t left the house all weekend. Neither myself, nor Arron, had wanted to run into any of them, not that he was allowed to leave the house because I’d grounded him for the weekend for his actions. I wasn’t happy though about the Silvermans. I had planned to go out clubbing with some of the girls from my work, or even my bestie Lucy, but no, I’d spent Friday night in hospital and last night and tonight I was reading.
“Monday, I’ll go into the school and we’ll get everything we need so you can move schools.”
Arron’s good arm came around me and he leaned his chin on my head. “Thanks. I know I only have a little over a month left, but I just can’t be around them. I love ya sis. You’re the best.” He sighed. “You good to deal with Dad? You know he won’t be happy about the money he paid for uniforms and fees.”
I squeezed Arron’s waist. “Don’t you worry about that. I’ll sort out Dad. You just get by until we can get you transferred to a new school.”
“Thanks, sis.”
Giving Arron one last squeeze, I let him go and sat back on the sofa and picked up my Kindle. “No problem. Go play some violent game on Xbox. I’m reading.” I snuggled into the sofa and didn’t even bother turning to see if my brother did what I told him to.
I tried to get back into my book, but I had a sinking feeling in my stomach that this weekend was just the beginning of my dealings with the Silvermans.