Chapter 1

“Amy O’Neal,” she said with a smile as she held her hand out for the man to shake.  He was cute.  There was no doubting that fact.  His blonde hair curled on top of his head, barely brushing his ears.  Brown eyes stared at her with a bit of heat in their depths.  She could tell that this guy was no slouch.  It may have been the way that his grip stayed steady in hers or maybe the fact that he looked like he hit the gym at least three times a week.  To put it simply, he was more than cute; he was hot.

A slow smile curled the corner of his lips, making him look more like a predator by the minute.  “Jimmy Fader,” he replied while dropping her hand and slipping into the seat across from her.

The place he had picked for their blind date was a nice one.  She knew from experience that in order to sit where she was on a Friday night someone had to have connections.  Which meant the man sitting across from her either knew the right people or was wealthy. “It’s nice to finally meet you.”

He leaned forward, tucking a piece of her auburn hair behind her ears.  “The pleasure is all mine,” he whispered in a husky tone.

If she were any other woman, she may have melted on the floor.  As it was, she let a small smile fall onto her face as she leaned away from his touch.  She had enough experience with men to know what their normal moves were, but it didn’t keep her from feeling a slight flutter as his skin brushed hers.  “So,” she started awkwardly, pulling at the hem of her little black dress.

“So,” he echoed with a chuckle as he leaned back in his chair.  “What’s your favorite movie?”

“Hmm, that’s a hard one. I have to be honest with you.  I’m the person in school who wrote ‘everything’ on all the surveys that asked about your favorite things. I just can never really choose, you know?”

His grin widened.  “You like everything then?”

“What she likes,” a voice growled behind her, “is watching me kick your ass.”

She groaned, plopping her face into her hands.   She should have known from the start that this date was too good to be true.  Her brothers would always interrupt any date she would attempt to have.  She knew they were afraid she was too naïve to date, too naïve to see the bad in a person.  She knew all those things, but as the chair beside her scraped against the tile floor, rational thought flew from her mind.  She was pissed. Just once, she wanted some alone time, time to make her own mistakes.  Snapping her head up, she opened her mouth to yell at her brother, Logan, but as soon as she saw the deadly expression on his face, her mouth snapped shut.  This was going to be a disaster.

“I’d like you to know that I’m with the FBI. You make one wrong move, and I’ll kill you.”

“He’s not with the FBI,” Amy said, narrowing her eyes at the lie.

“But I am,” another voice said.  Glancing up, she let out a louder groan as Carson flashed his badge before staring down at Jimmy with an evil smile.

She looked at the two men, one to her left and one to her right.  “Two brothers down; two to go,” she mumbled under her breath just as a hand clamped down on her shoulder.

“What Logan didn’t tell you is that he was a Navy Seal until he was discharged for an unauthorized killing.”

“Three down,” she groaned, covering her face with equal amount of mortification and anger.  Still, she could not help herself from peeking through her fingers, from wanting to see Jimmy’s reaction to the mess surrounding her.

Jimmy glanced over at the man sitting down at the table with them.  “You’re Logan?”

Logan let a small smile form on his face, making Jimmy audibly swallow.  “Affirmative.”

She jerked her shoulders away before glaring over her shoulder at the newest arrival.  “Spencer, where is he?”

Spencer just smiled with a shrug.  “I don’t know what you’re talking about, sweetie.”

She jumped to her feet, ready to yell at him, but her mouth snapped closed when she saw the subject of her anger.  Stomping to the booth three tables down, she snatched the newspaper down, revealing bright green eyes that matched her own.  “Dammit, Asher,” she hissed.  “How did you find out?”

The feeling of a barricade behind her clued her into the fact that the other three were now standing guard.  Asher just smiled, not even rising from his seat. “You can’t hide anything from me.”

“I’m telling mom.”

The sentence made all four men freeze.  She already knew that Jimmy was running for the hills, and she couldn’t blame the man.  If she were him, she would have ran too.  Having four, very powerful looking men glaring at you was a little bit uncomfortable, to say the least.

“Don’t,” Asher said, with a bit of panic.  “Don’t do it.”

Leaning down, she poked his chest in anger.  “I’m twenty-five, Asher. I’m old enough to date.”

An arm wrapped around her shoulder and pulled her away from her oldest brother.  “You’re our baby sister,” Spence whispered in a cajoling tone.  As his grip tightened on her, she reminded herself not to make a scene in public.  Her mother’s words ran through her mind.  In public, an O’Neal behaves; at home, they could have as many screaming matches as they wanted.  Therefore, with Spence holding her away from Asher, she took a deep breath and let his soothing voice relax her.

“I know, but I want a life, Spence. I’m tired of y’all always ruining my dates.”

“I did a background check,” Carson defended.  “The man was dirty.”

“I cannot believe you actually ran a background check on a man I just met,” she groaned under her breath with a small smile on her face.  She should be mad at him for always checking up on the people who tried getting close to her.  She should be furious that they butted in her personal life, but to be honest, after twenty-five years of dealing with her four older brothers, she was used to it.  

After a couple minutes of silence, she realized that they were still waiting on her to berate them for invading her privacy, but if she were being honest, she would admit that she was curious.  She wanted to know exactly what Jimmy was capable of.  She could always ask how they knew Jimmy’s name before she did, but that wouldn’t be as fun as learning exactly what the man had done.  Taking a deep breath, she did the one thing that always got her brothers off the hook; she let her curiosity take over.  “How dirty?” she asked.

“He’s had three wives in the past two years.  Each of them had money, Amy.  He’s a gold-digger.”

She let the news settle in, not surprised that yet another man would be after her for nothing but the O’Neal family’s money.  Turning her back on Asher, the oldest of the lot at thirty-seven, she faced her other three brothers.  With a stern expression on her face, one that she had learned from their mother, she settled her hands on her hips. “Carson, did you really have to make up that story about Logan?”

Logan shrugged, showing that it didn’t bother him, while Carson answered.  “It seemed like the best approach at the time.”

“He was a Navy Seal,” Spencer piped up, making Amy roll her eyes.  As if she didn’t know every single detail of each of their lives.  Sometimes, she rather wished they wouldn’t tell her everything.  Like the time Carson was eighteen and caught with his pants down while an angry father threatened his life.  Honestly, she loved her brothers to death, but sometimes, like now, they were just too much.

Logan locked eyes with her, and she knew that she had no chance.  He didn’t talk much, had been that way since he came back years ago, but one look from him was enough.  In that look, he let her know that he wouldn’t have changed the situation.  The man would have done the exact same thing over again. Even with the determination in his eyes, she could see that he wanted forgiveness. Letting out a sigh, she smiled at him.

“It’s fine,” she mumbled under her breath.  “He wasn’t my type anyway.”

“Liar,” Spencer said.  “Don’t think we didn’t see your predator smile.”

The rest of her brothers scowled, making her flush red.  While Spencer didn’t mind joking about her dating, the others never thought anyone was good enough for her.  It may have had to do with the fact that she was the youngest, the baby in the family.  She knew that wasn’t the real reason though.  Plenty of times, her mother had told Amy the story of when her older brothers were little.  When her mother had gotten pregnant again, they all wanted it to be a girl. When Amy had arrived, they all spoiled her to no end.  The only problem was that they were overprotective, even overbearing at times.

Carson grunted, bringing her back to the conversation at hand.  “She doesn’t have a predatory smile.”  He frowned at her before bending down and yanking on her dress.  “What did you do, shop in the children’s section?”

She glared at him, while yanking the top of her dress up further.  “It’s either they see my legs or my breasts, you choose.”

All four of her brothers snapped their hands around their ears, making Amy laugh.  It was a long-standing joke in their family.  Any time she or her mother would say anything remotely feminine about their bodies, the four of them would snap their hands around their ears as if the words were loud music that was not meant to be heard.  She shook her head at their foolishness and cursed them for not letting her be mad at them longer.

“Are you done?” Asher asked, pulling his hand away cautiously.

“You’re all dorks,” she mumbled, while shooing Asher over.  “Scoot. While we’re here, we might as well eat.”  A smile formed on her lips.  “Plus, Rebecca is working tonight.”

Logan winced, making them all laugh.  For some reason, a certain waitress named Rebecca thought that Logan was the strong, silent type that wished to be pushed out of his comfort zone.  Little did the woman know that Logan liked the way his life was.  He wasn’t completely silent. He just kept his mouth shut unless he thought there was something needing to be said.  It was how he had always been especially since returning home, but his silence was mistaken for shyness more often than not.  For people who knew him, Logan was the one to watch.  When the man wanted something, or thought that one of his family members needed something, he would go after it unmercifully until he finally had his hands on it. 

“Speak of the devil,” Carson mumbled as they all sat in the overcrowded booth.

“Hi!” the waitress said in a chirpy voice, making Amy jump.  Even though she had known the woman was coming, the magnitude of Rebecca’s voice was a surprise. She sat five drinks down, already knowing what they wanted.  It wasn’t a surprise to Amy that Rebecca remembered what each of them drank.  The O’Neal family had been frequenting this particular restaurant for years.  “What can I get you?”

Amy looked over at the woman and rolled her eyes.  Rebecca’s eyes were directly on Logan, not moving an inch away from him. Her brother shifted uncomfortably under the waitress’s gaze until Amy finally started feeling bad for him.  “I’ll have a steak, medium rare. On the side, I would like mashed potatoes with gravy.”  She tapped her bottom lip in thought. “Let’s see, something healthy…”

“Green beans?” Rebecca added, sounding excited that she could help.

Amy smiled at the woman.  Even if the waitress was a little forward, Amy liked her.  “Green beans it is. By the way, can you tell Berry to make them like I like them?”

“Sure,” she said with a nod before taking the other’s orders.  She lingered on Logan as if waiting for him to say more.  When all he did was bark out his order, her face dropped in defeat.  Rebecca walked away, no longer having the little pep in her step as she did earlier.  All at once, they turned to Logan and glared.

“What?” he grumbled.

“You should really give her a break,” Asher said with a shake of his head.  “The woman has been pining after you for years now. What would it hurt to take her out on a date, just to see how it goes? If you don’t like her, then at least you tried.”

“I’ll think about it.”

The table quieted after Logan’s abrupt answer.  Biting her lip in thought, Amy glanced at each of her brothers. Should she spring her news on them now, or wait until after they ate?  If she said something now, all through dinner they would bombard her with questions she didn’t want to answer.  Although, they would do that even if she asked them after dinner.  At least if she said it now, she would have a steak to stuff her mouth with when they asked too much.

“I’m going on vacation,” she blurted.

Four pairs of eyes snapped towards her and narrowed.  “Where?” Carson asked, bringing out his phone.

“You are not putting a security team on me, and I mean it,” she snapped.  “Look, I’m just going to the beach house for a week,” she lied.  “It’s summer, guys, and I only have a couple of months before school starts back up.”

“But you love teaching,” Spencer said as Carson typed a message into his phone.

Reaching out, she snatched the phone from him before dropping it into his drink.  His eyes widened as he dug into the sugary concoction.  “Dammit, Amy,” he growled under his breath.  “That was important.”

“I do love teaching,” she replied, ignoring Carson’s grumblings, “but I need a break every once in a while.”  With a shrug, she sent them a small smile.  “Sometimes I just need some quiet time to myself.”

Something flickered in Spencer’s eyes, something that looked a lot like panic.  “Look, Amy, if we're getting to be too much, if we’re too overbearing, just tell us.  Please don’t run off.”

Laughing, she shook her head at him.  “Y’all are annoying at times; I’ll admit to that, but I know you just do it out of love.  To be honest, I would feel weird if you did back off.  I’d feel as if something was wrong.”  Her laughter ceased as she let out a sigh.  “It’s just been a rough year, you know? I need a little bit of silence and what better than the beach house in the middle of nowhere?”

“Take a guard with you,” Logan said, “just one.”

She opened her mouth to reject the idea, but to her surprise, Asher beat her to the punch.  “No,” he said in a hard voice.  “She needs this. For once, we’re letting her go alone.”  His eyes narrowed on Carson’s phone.  “That means no calling in agents to babysit her, do you understand?”

The other three grumbled under their breaths, but agreed.  Smiling, she wrapped her arms around her oldest brother. “You won’t regret this.”

He hugged her back with a sigh.  “I hope not,” he mumbled. “I really hope not.”

“Me too,” she whispered, hoping that her small lie didn’t come back to haunt her.