Cockney: A Stepbrother Romance (32 page)
Read Cockney: A Stepbrother Romance Online
Authors: Aubrey Irons
Jolie
is still around; we even pass it infrequently on strolls around our new South Bank neighborhood, which is sort of sweet considering our history there. Of course, it’s not exactly bustling the same way it was a year ago, when Oliver and I were there and before the
Times
review was published.
I didn’t end up reading it until much later, after I’d decided I was an idiot and came running back to the heart I’d left in London. But the review ended up being
decent
for
Jolie
, but
amazing
for Oliver. A “classic case of ego run amok in the management ranks” I believe they said, regarding Barney’s drunken fight with Oliver and subsequent public firing. “An efficient, if not creatively stifling environment for the best thing to hit the London food circuit since Danny Cole, and probably better.”
Yeah,
that
stoked my husband’s ego in ways it couldn’t
possibly
need, but I also couldn’t have been prouder.
Oh, right, yeah;
husband
. I guess I forgot to mention that little detail.
Oliver and I were married less than two months after I came back, in a small ceremony back in L.A., actually.
Barney and Delia, who are apparently and quite unbelievably still together, were not invited.
Danny did come though, grinning the whole time like he couldn’t possibly be prouder of Oliver. Marco managed to come out as well, and ended up being so taken with the food scene in L.A. that he ended up
staying
and landing a pretty great job.
Apparently, there’s something about a girl involved too, but that’s a
whole
other story.
Our
story though, is right where it needs to be. Danny and Oliver are about to go in as investors on another project, which should ideally free up some time for when our baby boy comes, which can’t be soon enough. And honestly, if I hear one more “bun in the oven” joke - yeah, no, I
get
it, and yes you’re
very
hilarious - I might go a little crazy.
So somehow, like random ingredients percolating and mixing together to make something wonderful, two opposites became one, perfect, delicious whole.
Oliver glances up at the grey London sky. “Looks like snow.” I grin as wraps his arms around me in the chilly air as he leans in and kisses me. “I love you,” he murmurs, his hand coming down to rest on top of my swollen belly. “
Both
of you.”
“I love you too,” I say, kissing him. “And I know she can’t wait to meet you.”
“Oh it’s a she now, is it?” Oliver grins. We’ve decided to wait and be surprised, not that it stops either of us from guessing.
“Oh of
course
it is!” I smile at him. “As if the world needs one more male Beckett running around.”
Oliver grins. “
Very
fair point.” He glances at his watch. “Now, get in the car, luv. Let’s go do Christmas.”
“Yes, chef,” I managed to get out, before his lips sear to mine
just
as the snow begins to fall.
~ The End ~
Did you enjoy
Cockney
? Scroll forward for a two-chapter preview of
Crude: A Stepbrother Romance
!
Knox Shepherd is a
total
d*ck. A really,
really
big one.
He’s a swaggering, cocky prick who blows through women the same way he roars around town on that motorcycle of his - fast.
Sure, I wasn’t supposed to be sneaking out to bars or singing at open mics, but that didn’t give him a right to talk to me like
that
. No one’s ever said those things to me before - filthy, raunchy,
crude
suggestions that made me literally run for the door. Suggestions I wish didn’t make me feel so
funny
inside.
But hey, no big deal, right? It’s not like I’d ever have to see that smug, foul-mouthed jerk ever again.
If only he weren’t standing with that cocky smirk on my front porch right now, right next to my father’s new fiancé. His mom.
Yeah, that unbearable prick is going to be my new stepbrother.
OK, he’s gorgeous, and every time he looks at me I can practically hear him whisper deliciously dirty things in my ear. And maybe something about his cocky swagger makes me think I should
break
some rules for once.
...Maybe something about him makes me not so sure I want to go to college still holding on to my V-card.
But I
definitely
don’t want to lose it to my stepbrother.
Ew.
So why can’t I stop thinking about it?
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A B O U T T H E A U T H O R
Aubrey Irons enjoys writing about bold, sassy, and intelligent women and the dominant, cocky, and quite typically forbidden alpha males who love and lust for them; gripping stories, happy endings, and enough heat to keep things extra steamy! In the real world, Aubrey is kept plenty entertained by her own tattooed Marine husband, their precocious and adorable three year old, and one
very
ill-behaved puppy.
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What a DICK!
I can feel my heart practically jump out of my chest as I slam on the brakes, narrowly missing the motorcycle that cuts me off at the foot of my own driveway. The guy on the bike only slows down enough to flip me off though, before he roars off.
My pulse thumping a mile a minute, my hands tight on the steering wheel at their ten-and-two position, and my foot still jamming the brake pedal to the floor. But mostly I’m just
confused
as I watch in shock as the biker goes tearing up the driveway to my father’s estate.
Who the heck is that?
I mean, I know they say most accidents happen within a mile from home, but “the mailbox” is
kind of
pushing it! On top of that, there’s the embarrassment that, as totally cautious a driver as I normally am, I
know
I wasn’t paying attention back there.
The other distractions of the day go tumbling through my head as I frown and start to follow the biker up the curving wooded drive to the main house. The dull, nagging whine in my head about my father wanting to have an “important talk” with me after my piano lessons today about Amanda, the woman he’s been seeing, comes thudding back to the forefront. Amanda, the mysterious woman I’ve only met once, even if I know they’ve been dating for more than six months now. And whatever, it’s fine that he’s dating. Heck, a guy like my dad
should
have been back in the field the day after my mom took off, the way she did.