Honeymoon from Hell IV (5 page)

It was probably the reason why she
pretended that some of the things that they did didn’t terrify her,
like the silent way they communicated when they planned something
out, the look they shared just before they did something that had
run off more than a few of the village girls that she’d been able
to convince to ignore the rumors that had spread through town like
wildfire about the twins and Robert’s insatiable appetite and work
for the Bradfords for a few hours a week, just to lighten the
workload on Elizabeth, who was determined to be the perfect mother
and wife.

It wasn’t possible, not with a husband
like Robert and babies that could eat more than most men. A shiver
tore through her just at the thought of how much those boys could
put away. While most babies their age were just learning to sit up,
crawl and starting to make the switch to solid foods like porridge
and mashed vegetables, the Bradford boys were already the size of
two year olds and could put away more food in one sitting than all
her sons and nephews combined.

Sometimes at night when she was in bed
and the house was quiet and the only thing that she had to keep her
company were her thoughts, it was a struggle not to grab her bag
and make a run for it, but the reminder that the twins were sweet
boys that adored her, and probably wouldn’t resort to eating her if
they had a really bad winter and ran out of food, kept her there.
She couldn’t imagine spending her days without the
Bradfords.

With that being said…

She really couldn’t imagine how
Elizabeth had lasted this long before she’d finally cracked under
the pressure of keeping up with the twins. They were cute, but very
demanding. Every hour, sometimes twice an hour those boys were
hunting their mother down, demanding to be fed and snuggled while
Elizabeth did her best to be the perfect wife, something that she
knew damn well that Robert didn’t expect or want.

He only wanted Elizabeth…

She would love to say that her own
husband had loved and adored her the way that Robert cherished
Elizabeth, but she couldn’t. Never once had Roger looked at her the
way that Robert looked at Elizabeth. She knew that he had grown to
care for her and had adored their children, but he never loved her,
not the way that Robert loved Elizabeth. She’d never seen a man
look at a woman the way that Robert looked at Elizabeth, like every
dream that he’d ever made had come true.

It was something that made her smile
every time she saw it.

She only wished that Elizabeth realized
just how much she meant to Robert and how little he actually cared
if things were perfect. As far as she could tell, the only thing
that he seemed to care about was that she was healthy and happy,
which at the moment was a problem…

“I can make fresh ones,” Elizabeth
mumbled almost desperately, looking seconds away from passing out,
which again, was to be expected considering how hard she’d been
working over the last few month to make everything
perfect.

“No, sweetie, that okay’s. I’m sure
that-”

“Elizabeth?” Robert said brightly with
that smile that belonged solely to Elizabeth as he walked through
the back door, making Mrs. Brown cringe and damn near made her
whimper, because any chance of stopping this before it got worse
was gone now.

“Oh, God,” came the soft mumble,
followed by a terrified gasp as Elizabeth, who was probably
surviving on less than an hour of sleep a night, jumped to her
feet, dropped the basket of burnt biscuits to the floor, shoved her
messy hair back and in the process ended up spreading ash over her
beautiful tangled hair as she raced to the table, grabbed a large
dirty mixing bowl and with a panicked expression on her face, began
making more dough right around the time that the Robert spotted her
and the smile slowly slipped away from his face.

She opened her mouth to make another
excuse for Elizabeth, to distract him away from the fact that his
wife was beyond exhausted, covered in soot and ash, trembling and
quietly sobbing, because there wasn’t enough lard to make another
batch of biscuits, when she saw all the good humor evaporate from
Robert’s face only to be replaced seconds later by a look that she
prayed that she never saw again, because it was in that instant
that she realized just how dangerous Robert Bradford
was.

*-*-*-*

“It’s okay, Robert. Just let
me-”

“Watch the boys,” Robert said firmly,
shutting the bedroom door behind him and cutting of Mrs. Brown
before she could give him another bullshit excuse.

“I thought we agreed that there would
be no more secrets,” he murmured softly, kissing Elizabeth’s
forehead as he carefully carried his trembling wife across the
room, berating himself for letting this go on for so
long.

He’d known that she was overdoing it.
Hell, it was the one thing that they were always arguing about.
He’d tell her that she was overdoing it and she’d tell him the same
thing. He’d threaten to spank her bottom raw if she didn’t slow
down and she’d threaten his balls.

No matter what he said or did, she
wouldn’t listen to him. If he was going to work himself into
exhaustion to take care of their family, then so was she. She
didn’t understand that he was doing this for them, that he had
absolutely no fucking choice but to take every single job that came
his way no matter how exhausted he was or how much he’d rather be
able to sleep in with his wife in the morning, spend the day
playing with his sons and making them smile, but he
couldn’t.

When he’d sold his investments, he’d
expected to have to support a wife, maybe a servant or two, but
twins? Christ, he’d never expected to have boys that could eat more
than most grown men. Right now they were fine, he could afford to
keep a roof over their heads, clothes on their backs and their
bellies comfortably full, but he knew that could all change at any
time. If he got hurt or sick, then he wouldn’t be able to provide
for his family and that absolutely terrified him.

So, he took as many jobs as he could,
pretended that he wasn’t exhausted and saved every penny that he to
make sure that his family would be well taken care of if anything
ever happened to him. It was his job to provide for his family and
to keep them safe, not Elizabeth’s. He wasn’t working day and night
so that she could do that same. He wanted her well taken care of,
happy and able to enjoy herself.

One of them should be able to, he
thought with a resigned sigh as he gently placed her on the edge of
the bed. Ignoring her muttered protests that everything was fine,
he set about wiping her tears away, pressing a kiss to her
trembling chin as he carefully undressed her. He knew that she was
exhausted when she couldn’t even come up with the energy to argue
with him as he finally slipped her chemise off and gently pulled on
one of his old cotton shirt over her head, her favorite shirt to
sleep in. She did however release an adorable little sniffle that
had him biting back a smile as he pulled the covers back and helped
her crawl between the covers. Before her head hit the pillow, her
eyes were closed and she was softly snoring.

“Ah, minx,” he said with a small smile
and a sigh as he leaned over and pressed a kiss to the tip of her
nose. “What the hell would I do without you?” he asked no one in
particular, not really expecting an answer because he already knew
it.

He wouldn’t survive without
her.

She meant everything to him, absolutely
everything. She was his heart, his soul, the reason why he pushed
himself so hard to make a better life for their family. He loved
and adored his boys, but Elizabeth…

She was his everything.

And so far, he’d failed her. He’d taken
her from everything she knew, gave her absolutely no choice but to
start a new life whether she wanted to or not and now she was
exhausting herself trying to prove that she could handle this new
life. Tomorrow, things were going to change, but for right now, he
was going to make sure that his wife got the rest that she
desperately needed.

He pulled off his boots, shoved his
pants down, and pulled off his shirt, tossing it on the chair in
the corner and crawled in bed behind her, determined to make sure
that she was well rested for their trip.

“You really are going to be the death
of me, minx,” he whispered, half joking as he pulled her in his
arms, kissed her neck and gave in to the exhaustion that had been
plaguing him for months. He was just starting to fall asleep when
the light scratching at the door caught his attention.

“Sorry, Mr. Bradford, sir, but Mrs.
Kinnley just sent a messenger. It seems that there was a fire in
her kitchen this morning and she has no way to heat the house or
cook for the children until it’s fixed,” one of timid girls that
Mrs. Brown had hired from town hesitantly announced from the safety
of the other side of the door, making him realize that he was going
to have to put off catching up on his sleep for a little while
longer.

Chapter 4

The Next Day…

“No!” Noah said firmly with a glare as
he folded his little arms over his chest and glared up at Robert,
matching his brother Shaun’s glare exactly as Robert stood there,
wondering why he’d even bothered to try and reason with his
sons.

“She stays,” Shaun bit out
before his eyes narrowed dangerously on Robert,
“
you
can
go.”

Biting back a few words that would have
his wife going for his balls, Robert pinched the bridge of his
nose, trying to ignore the headache that exhaustion and the
leftover fumes from the Kinnley house had bombarded him with, and
focused on the two little boys standing in front of him, making the
warning very clear.

If he tried to leave with their mother,
they would kill him.

Or at the very least, do their best to
beat the shit out of him and make him rethink ever coming between
them and their mother again. Robert took a slow, deep steadying
breath, praying for patience this morning, but by the time that he
caught his boys sharing one of their secret, and admittedly
terrifying looks, it was too late.

“She stays,” Noah said with an evil
little smile just as his brother’s lower chin began to tremble and
his big green eyes filled with unshed tears.

Sniffle, “She loves us more,” Noah
mumbled, getting into character as he reached up with his little
tan hand and wiped away a single tear that rolled down his cheek
while Robert stood there, glaring down at his sons and silently
daring them to push him too far today.

“You don’t want to play this game with
me today, boys,” he warned them quietly, but since they were his
sons, they ignored the warning and focused all of their attention
on the beautiful woman walking into the nursery.

The pleased smile that Elizabeth wore
each morning when she greeted their sons instantly changed to panic
as she caught sight of the twins, standing there in their
nightshirts, suddenly looking lost and a little terrified as both
the boys released matching sniffles and sobs that would have even
the most heartless of bastards feeling bad for them. It just made
him want to put them over his knee and spank the hell out of them
for trying to pull this shit on him.

He’d been the one who’d taught them
that trick to manipulate Elizabeth into making them extra apple
tarts and they were trying to use it on him? Oh, they had so much
to learn…

“Good morning, minx,” he said, smiling
and letting her know just how happy he was to see her as he
smoothly stepped in front of their sons and pulled her into his
arms.

She looked better than she had last
night, but he could still see exhaustion marring her beautiful
expression. She needed this week away now more than ever and he
wasn’t going to let anything, especially the boys that he’d trained
a little too well, ruin this for her. So, pretending that he
couldn’t hear his sons sobbing quietly in a ploy to gain their
mother’s sympathy, he gave her a proper good morning
kiss.

One of the boys, most likely Shaun,
sobbed a little louder, trying to gain his mother’s attention, but
it was pointless and they both knew it. As long as he had Elizabeth
in his arms, nothing else mattered. Besides, she trusted him and
knew that he would never ignore the children if they were really
hurt. So, when she wrapped her arms around his shoulders and pulled
him down and returned his kiss with a sweet little sigh that nearly
had him sweeping her off her feet and bringing her back to their
room, but just before he let his cock lead him around, he
remembered that they had a purpose.

“Are you ready?” he asked as he pulled
back, pausing only long enough to tease her lips with
his.

When he caught her worrying her bottom
lip between her teeth and shooting the manipulative boys standing
on either side of him now a look, he knew that she was having
second thoughts. It was something that he simply couldn’t allow.
So, keeping his smile easy, he reached down, grabbed both boys by
the back of their shirts and picked them.

“Kiss your mother goodbye,” he said
firmly, ignoring the murderous glares that they were sending him as
they crossed their arms stubbornly over their chests.