A Family Affair (Book 1 of the Smalltown Superstars Series)

4

“Looks like we got other fishers today.” Steve said nodding toward the people approaching them.

Liam looked over his shoulder and saw a cute little blonde woman sashaying their way in a pair of white shorts and a black tank top. She had a tackle box in one hand and a rod in the other. At first, he didn’t mind the sight of her until he looked past her and saw her companion. Dark chocolate hair in two childish braids, bright blue eyes and an incredible little body in short cut off jean shorts and a white bikini top. The very sight of her stirred something inside Liam he had tried hard to deny.

Somehow Miss. Micelles had hunted him down at the river, no doubt to further harass him to attend her wedding. He had to admit the girl was relentless. When she set her mind to something she seemed to follow through on it. Unfortunate for him, it would seem he was not quite done dealing with his brother’s bothersome fiancée. “She is persistent is not she?” Liam chuckled.

“I will give her that.” Steve agreed. “And this time she brought reinforcements.” He teased. “Two nagging women for the price of one.”

Liam reeled his line in as the women reached them and he walked out of the water to greet them with a smile. “Good morning ladies.” He said watching them place their tackle box and gear down beside his. “Lovely day for fishing isn’t it?”

“It is a lovely day to be doing anything outside.” The blonde said with a flirtatious smile. She held out her hand and he shook it. “I’m Maggie.”

“Liam.” He introduced himself. “That is my buddy Steve, the scrawny fellow there is Clark, and the guy waist deep in minnows and river rocks is Harry.” He said introducing everyone. He looked back at the boys. “Guys this is Maggie and this is Raven.” He said introducing the ladies to the boys. Now that everyone was aquatinted he could get to the point. He offered Raven a charming restrained smiled. “So, what brings you here this morning?” As if he did not know.

She offered him a playful smile and crouched down to open her tackle box. “I heard it was a good place to fish.” She said playing it cool, as she selected a hook for her rod and then looked at the line for a moment as if she were not entirely sure how to connect the two.

“Is that a fact?” He asked not buying her act for a moment. Liam suspected Raven had never fished a day in her life. “So, what are you fishing for?” He asked watching her closely as she tried to figure out how to tie the hook to the line.

“Whatever is biting I suppose.” Raven shrugged. “We are not picky.”

Liam grinned trying to hide his amusement. She had no idea at all what sort of fish swam in this river or what sort of lure she should be using to catch it. “What are you using as bait?” He asked looking into her box.

“Bait?” She said and looked through the box.

He tried hard not to laugh. “Yeah, you did bring bait, right?”

“Well yeah, of course we did.” She said moving stuff around in the box. “We are using… um…” She moved some more stuff around and Liam pointed at the container of yellow synthetic salmon eggs. Raven snatched them up quickly and read the label. “Salmon eggs?” She read with more question in her tone than she had meant to. “Yep love these things.” She said.

Liam grinned looking at the lure she had chosen. If she used that thing she would snag on the river rocks in a second and break her rod right away. “Do you do a lot of river fishing?” He asked.

“Sure.” She lied.

“And you catch lots with that lure?” He asked nodding at her selection.

She looked at it and then looked at the one that was attached to his rod. “No, are you kidding? I was just moving it out of my way.” She scoffed placing it on the rocks and reaching back inside moving things around until she found the one that looked like this. She held it up and looked at it as if she did not know how to attach it. Pickerel rig was a little more complicated. It was much longer with weights on the end of the line that sat on the bottom of the river bed among the rocks. While inches up the line was one hook and then farther up was another floating in the middle of the water where the fish were. That way the hooks did not snag on the rocks braking the line or god forbid the rod. It was the best way to river fish in Liam’s opinion.

Liam placed his rod down. It was clear she had no clue what to do. He took her rod from her hands and the lure. He smiled at her knowingly and securely attached the lure to the end of her line. “There you go, but I’m sure you knew that.” Maggie did not seem to need any assistance. She actually seemed to know what she was doing. Liam opened the blue bait box on top of his tackle box and took out a huge fat dew worm. “The walleye in this river prefer live bait that is if you are interested in trying something new.” He suggested knowing she had no idea as to what to use.

Raven looked at the synthetic fish eggs and tossed it back into the box. “Well if you insist.” She said making a gross face and reaching for the worm. She stopped and reached for it again, but stopped once more. She clearly did not want to touch it. Liam laughed, he took her lure and baited her hooks for her. She smiled. “Thanks.”

“You are welcome.” He said baiting his own line. Liam started walking right out into the water. It was warm, it was one of the things he loved about this river. He could stand all day in the water fishing in the sun. The ladies soon joined them. Steve wasted no time chatting Maggie up. Raven looked as if she was having some trouble navigating the rocks of the riverbed as she walked out into the water. She stumbled and almost fell but she caught herself and stopped where she was a few feet away from Liam, no doubt so she would be close enough to nag while they fished.

She tried to cast but the line wouldn’t release. She fiddled with the rod for a minute and tried again flinging it around precariously without successfully casting. The hook almost hit Liam and he ducked to avoid taking the lure to the face. She was going to kill someone. “Just release it.” He instructed ducking again.

“I am.” She argued jerking the rod around with no luck as she struggled with the open reel.

“No,” he snipped ducking again, “you are going to take someone’s eye out like that.” He walked back to the shore and put down his rod then walked up behind Raven closing his hand around her wrist to stop her from flailing the rod around. “Just stop, I will show you how to do it right.” He said moving in behind her, his body in line with hers.

Her tiny frame tucked in snugly against his. Liam wrapped his arms around Raven, his hands moved over hers shadowing her own. He moved her hands in to proper position and placed her fingers where they should be. Liam lowered his head over her shoulder to instruct her as he pulled the rod back to prepare for casting. “You are making it harder than it has to be.” He said softly, his body stirring from her closeness. She was so warm, and she smelled so good, like lavender. “You pull it back and then snap it forward and…” He showed her how to release the reel and they watched the lure flew and sunk into the water. It was a perfect cast. “See not so hard.” He said.

She squealed excitedly as if she had just accomplished some sort of great feat. It was sort of endearing he thought, staring down at her over her shoulder, his hands still on hers. His body still wrapped around her. Something about her felt so right. “That was great.” She said looking up at him. Their eyes met and her smile fade as she realized how inappropriately close they were. Their lips only inches away. The look in her eyes changed, became heated.

Suddenly the rod jerked braking the spell they were both under and drawing their attention. “You got a bite.” He said.

“What do I do?” She asked in a panic.

“Reel it in.” He said moving her hand to the reel.

Raven struggled with the fish, pulling on the reel and the rod jerked and bent as the fish fought to get away. It took a few minutes of everyone cheering her on but finally she pulled in her catch. It was a good one too, a good seven pounds easy. Liam grabbed the line and pulled the fish from the water. “That is a keeper.” He said holding it up. “You want to do the honours?” He asked.

“Of doing what?” Raven asked.

“Well you got to kill it. You can’t just put it on land it would suffer. You got to kill it out of mercy.” He explained. “So, you can eat it later.”

She scrunched up her nose in disgust and shook her head. “No! I can’t kill it.”

“Well how do you suppose to eat it?” He laughed raising a quizzical brow.

“You do it.” She begged.

“Sissy.” He teased taking her rod and the fish to shore. Using his pliers from the tackle box he took the hook from the fish’s mouth. Then he took up a big rock and looked back at the women. “I would suggest you don’t watch if you are squeamish.”

“Why?” Maggie asked.

“Because he is going to bash its head in with a rock.” Steve informed her.

“Oh no!” Raven gasped. “Is not there a less painful way to do this?”

“Sure,” Liam teased. “Let me just run back to the truck and get that shot of Morphine I keep in the glove box.”

Raven planted her hands on her hips and glared at him. “You don’t need to be a smart ass.”

“You know every second we debate this it is suffocating and in agony. When I could just hit it and end it all in a second. Sure, it hurts but only for a second. Then it will not care anymore, it will be dead.” He said. “So, turn around or watch I don’t care.” He said lifting the rock once more. Both women turned away unable to watch. Silly women, they had no problem eating the meat but never wanted to have to think about killing it. Liam killed the fish and tossed it into a bucket. “All done.” He teased picking up his rod and heading back out into the water.

Now that Raven knew how to cast properly he could fish without the risk of being hooked himself. They spent the rest of the morning fishing in the river. Raven still would not touch the worms to bait her hook so Liam happily did it for her. Steve and Maggie hit it off really well. They spent most of their time flirting. Liam caught three fish that morning even though he had to toss two back for being under the legal weight limit. Harry caught two that were keepers and Clark had no luck at all. Raven managed to catch another one but she threw it back and even Steve stopped fraternizing long enough to reel in two fish that morning. Between them they brought in six fair sized walleyes and had themselves the makings of a nice meal.

It turned out to be a wonderful morning. They fished and enjoyed the sun, the warm water and talked about the past few days at the rodeo. Liam was surprised that Raven had not so much as once mentioned Dawson or the wedding. Everything thus far had been perfect. It was well past noon though and everyone was hungry. Steve invited the girls to come back to their site and join them for lunch and some drinks. An idea that didn’t sound so bad to Liam.

They packed up their gear and headed back up the path through the bushes to the camp site. Raven went ahead of Liam and as she was climbing up the dirt path the mud slid out from under her wet sandals and she slipped falling back against him. Liam caught her dropping his tackle box and rod, letting them fall down the path back to the rocks below. He held Raven in his arms and she looked up at him blushing at her clumsiness. “I’m sorry.” She whispered staring into his eyes.

“Not a problem.” He smiled down at her. “It always gets a bit slippery after we get out of the water.” He said watching her lips, wondering if they tasted as sweet as she smelled.

“You can set me right. I think I can stand now.” She whispered reminding him he was still holding her.

Feeling foolish Liam immediately set Raven back on her feet and gave her a boost up the path. He went back down and picked up his rod and box before heading back up the path after the others. What was wrong with him? Why did he keep getting caught up in this woman? Sure, she was stunning, and any man would be mad not to be attracted, but she belonged to another man and he knew this. Not just any other man, but to Dawson.

Liam reached the top and emerged from the bushes and walked along with Steve, the girls ahead of them. “They are hot little numbers are not they?” Steve whispered. “Talk about luck. If we play our cards right we could get a little action tonight.”

Liam rolled his eyes. “Perhaps you can.”

“Are you kidding? I have seen the way you have been looking at that girl all morning.” Steve teased. “Don’t even try to pretend like you are not in to that.”

He couldn’t deny it, there was no sense in lying to Steve, Liam never could pass one over on him, no point in even trying. “She is another man’s wife.”

“Not yet.” Steve pointed out.

“Engaged is close enough. Might as well be the same thing.” Liam argued. “She belongs to Dawson.” He sighed.

Steve scoffed at the mention of Dawson’s name. “If you ask me that shouldn’t stop you, after all, turn around is fair play.” He said running up ahead to catch up to Maggie.

Liam fixed Raven in his sites. Could he really be so callous as to seduce his brother’s fiancée? Dawson had seduced his wife. Revenge would be sweet. To have Raven, to enjoy her, and to take from Dawson what he had taken from him. Tit for tat. Liam smiled as he thought about Dawson finding out about him and Raven. Perhaps coming home from a business trip to find them in bed together. To see the pain in his brother’s face. To see his heart breaking in his eyes. Liam smiled, oh how satisfying that would be.

Steve was right, Liam though watching Raven as she joined the others in their camp site. He was going to have her. If he played his cards right he could do more than get lucky, he could put an end to Dawson’s upcoming marriage. There would be no wedding bells in the near future if he had anything to say about it.