That simply wasn’t the Bradford way.
No matter how many times he’d explained how a traditional Bradford wedding happened, Jodi’s father, a really stubborn son of a bitch who’d promised to kick his ass one second for knocking his daughter up and the next threatened to get a shotgun and blow his balls off if he didn’t do right by Jodi, refused to listen to reason. He wanted his daughter to have a proper wedding and was willing to do whatever it took to make that happen no matter what Danny or any of his relatives told him.
Bradford weddings were tricky, which basically meant that if the marriage didn’t occur through a desperate act such as your basic Bradford kidnapping, then the marriage didn’t have a chance in hell of making it past a year. Over the past two hundred years any Bradford that had made the mistake of proposing and actually going through with a church wedding where everything was planned, invitations were sent out and a small fortune had been spent had regretted it.
The marriage either didn’t happen, because the bride was caught fucking someone before the reception, the groom was too drunk to go through with it, or the rest of the Bradfords decided to knock some sense into the dumb bastard and stop him from making a huge mistake. The few marriages that occurred through a traditional wedding hadn’t lasted even a year, most ending before the first month was over.
Since Danny fully planned on keeping Jodi, he’d refused to allow his father-in-law to fuck this up for him. There was a tradition to uphold and he’d made damn sure that he’d done everything by the book to make damn sure that this marriage wasn’t going to end in divorce, or worse, in the ICU. Bradfords might only be capable of marrying when they were out of their fucking minds, desperate to make whatever woman was foolish enough to fall in love with them their wives, but they didn’t take any risks and taking a honeymoon before the year mark was definitely a fucking risk.
It was a risk that he hadn’t been willing to take.
So, when he’d schemed and planned this elopement, he’d made damn sure that there was absolutely no way in hell that this trip could be mistaken for a honeymoon. Not only had he brought his father and cousins to ensure that they were never alone, but he’d also managed to keep his hands to himself.
For the most part, but since he’d stopped himself before he’d seriously considered consummating their marriage, they should be safe, he reasoned as he pulled his wheelchair up to the large table where his wife and cousins sat, focusing completely on their plates and ignoring each other, which definitely worked for him since it gave him a little more time to figure out how to explain why they were here to-
“So,” Jodi said, pausing to take a sip of chocolate milk before she placed her glass on the table and locked her eyes on him, “are you ready to tell me exactly why we’re here and why we’re suddenly sporting matching wedding bands?”
And just like that, he knew that his carefully orchestrated plans had just gone to hell and they’d be fucking lucky if they didn’t follow.
Chapter 6
Sighing, because she really wasn’t sure what else there was to do, Jodi carefully pushed her chair back and decided to get another plate of food while Danny and the rest of the Bradford men sat there, trying to avoid making eye contact with her and looking absolutely terrified.
Not that she could blame them since she did have a tendency to cry over the littlest things these days. Not that she was proud of this or anything, but it was kind of interesting to see a bunch of Bradfords fall all over themselves to get her to stop crying, or when that didn’t work, watching them beat the shit out of each other as they tried to get away, more than willing to screw each other over in an attempt to get away from her before she turned her sad eyes filled with tears on them.
Since they clearly expected whatever they were keeping from her to make her cry, she decided that it would probably be a good idea to prepare herself for the worst with the help of the dessert tables. They’d obviously taken advantage of her drug intolerance, brought her to Vegas, helped Danny marry her and for whatever reason they were now doing everything they could to avoid talking about it.
She considered sitting there, quietly crying with a sniffle here and there to screw with their heads until they finally caved and told her what was going on, but she decided that whatever they were hiding from her could wait. Besides, she’d been craving a slice of that triple chocolate mouse cake since the moment she’d spotted it when she’d walked inside the large restaurant.
Since she was starving, a bit cranky and admittedly amused by the way that all the men were walking on eggshells around her, she decided not to push the subject any further and just sit back, eat a slice of cake or two and simply enjoy the show. She’d eventually find out what was going on, but until then…until then…
She swallowed hard as the rich scent of warm chocolate teased her senses. She shifted her attention to the new table being rolled out and nearly whimpered with pleasure as her babies shifted approvingly in anticipation as her eyes locked on the large fondue surrounded by every tasty morsel known to man. Shifting nervously, she glanced back at the large chocolate mouse cake that was waiting for her and found herself take a step towards the large decadent treat that she’d been craving for the past hour only to stop and glance at the chocolate fondue table with a sigh.
Heaven help her, but she couldn’t make up her mind.
Oh, she would have both, there was no doubt about that, but she wasn’t sure which one she should start with. It was then that she realized that she didn’t have to choose, not while she was carrying Bradfords.
*-*-*-*
“He can’t tell her,” Jason argued as he shove his plate of food aside and joined the conversation.
“He has to,” Trevor bit out, reaching out and grabbed Jason’s neglected plate and immediately begin to dig in, his glare locked on Jason who was against keeping their mouths shut.
“I’m not going to lie to her,” Danny said, shoving a spoonful of mashed potatoes in his mouth, wishing that he could actually allow himself to enjoy the bounty that surrounded them, but he had much bigger problems to deal with.
“We need to leave,” his father repeated absently as he sat down with two large plates of food overflowing with food.
“Yes, we do,” he said with a pointed look for each them, glaring at them until they got the message, but since two of them were still focusing on their food out of fear of what his hormonal pregnant wife would do to whoever was foolish enough to make eye contact first.
Giving up on the cowards hiding behind their food, he shifted his gaze to his father to find him calmly eating his dinner, lookin
g almost peaceful when they should all be panicking out of their fucking minds. They’d been here too long and even with the three of them tagging along, there was still a very good chance that the curse would take notice and decide that this was a real honeymoon. They needed to grab Jodi, get in a cab and get their asses to the airport, praying that the damn plane didn’t get struck with the curse and make this a truly fucked up trip.
When his glare went unnoticed, he decided to shift his attention to his wife and see what she was…oh…fuck…no.
“Get up,” he said hoarsely, unable to take his eyes off the scene in front of him, terrified that if he looked away even for a second that it would get worse.
A whole hell of a lot worse.
“What?” his father asked, reaching for the salt.
“Get up,” he said, unable to take his eyes off the scene unfolding in front of him, telling him everything that he needed to know.
The curse had started.
*-*-*-*
“What the hell are you talking about?” she snapped, stepping out of reach when the officer went to grab her again.
“You violated the ban,” the officer said firmly, gesturing for her to turn around with a pair of handcuffs.
“What ban?” she demanded, crossing her arms over her chest as she glared at the officer.
“The one you violated when you entered Las Vegas,” the officer said, sounding annoyed while she stood there trying to figure out how one second she was filling her plate with every chocolate treat known to man and the next she was surrounded by police while Danny, his father and cousins were shoved down to the ground and handcuffed. The odd part was that none of them had looked particularly surprised to find themselves on their knees with their hands handcuffed behind their backs.