Page 6 of Bad Girls Don't Marry Marines (Rock Canyon, Idaho 3)

“Rule number one: pick up after yourself. I am not a maid.”

“Fine. Sure. Hurry up,” Ellie pleaded, hopping from one UGG-booted foot to the other.

“Number two: your little friends are not allowed in the house when I’m not here.”

“God, you really need to get laid,” Ellie said, but when Val started to shut the door, she yelled, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry! Yes! No friends over when you aren’t home.”

Val stepped back and Ellie started dragging her bags in, kissing Val’s cheek on her way. As she started down the hallway, Val remembered one last thing. “And no men in this house. This is a man-free zone.”

Her sister muttered something Val couldn’t hear, but she let it go. Her sister could think she was being an uptight prude all she wanted, but Val believed her attitude was more about self-preservation.

Looking down into Gus’s smushed face, she frowned. “Did I make the right choice?”

Gus growled, and Val had to agree with him.

Chapter Two

* * *

“THIS IS HAROLD the Great and you are listening to Kat Country. That was Florida-Georgia Line and their song, ‘Stay.’ Now I know some of you are waiting for your chance to win Brad Paisley tickets and I promise we’re gonna do this in the next hour, so stick around.”

Justin sighed as he pulled his truck out of the driveway. He’d been listening all day for those tickets and he had a feeling he was going to miss the song.

He was on his way to Buck’s Shot Bar to meet up with his best friend, Jared, and his wife, Stephanie. Usually he didn’t mind being a third wheel; it had been that way since Jared had first seen Steph freshman year and had fallen head over heart for the green-eyed spitfire. Most people said in this day and age high school sweethearts couldn’t make it together, but Jared and Steph were the exception.

Lately, though, he’d been envious of their relationship, wanting someone of his own who knew his habits, could finish his sentences. It sounded cheesy as hell, but it was the kind of thing his mother had talked about when she was alive.

His parents had been happy and in love for most of his childhood, up until he was twelve. His dad had made a bad investment and had had to risk everything to save the farm. His mother had wanted to sell it, take the money, and live modestly, but his father was firm; the farm had been in his family for generations and he wasn’t going to sell. Ever.

The night of their last big fight, his mother had gone to stay at a hotel. The roads had been slick, and the police figured she’d hit a patch of black ice. It was hours before another driver saw her car overturned, and by the time any rescue attempts were made, she was already gone. The doctors said she’d died on imp

act, but Justin had always thought they were just trying to make her husband and sons feel better.

A few months after her death, Edward Willis had started visiting their ranch often, and for a while, his dad had been in good spirits. Then one night, he and Everett had heard them screaming at each other. Justin had overheard most of it. Edward had called Fred a “stupid, drunk lowlife who’d ruined everything.” Fred had screamed that Edward was an “uppity prick with a stick up his ass.” It wasn’t until they’d started throwing punches that Everett had stepped between them, breaking up the fight, despite Fred’s orders for his son to mind his own business. It had taken more than a tap on the chin to get their dad to stop struggling. After Edward had peeled out of their gravel driveway, Fred had continued to rage, and it had taken both of them to get their dad upstairs and calm him down.

Though Justin had missed his mom, his dad had taken her death the hardest. Justin had tagged along with Everett for the next two years, picking his dad up from whatever bar he’d managed to close down.

When Everett had announced he was joining the Marines after high school graduation, his dad had been accepting and proud. Justin had figured it was because the two had butted heads at every turn, but he’d known Fred had still worried.

So, at barely fourteen, Justin had followed in his older brother’s footsteps, riding his bike into town and driving his dad home when he was too bombed to function. He’d never gotten caught for driving without a license, but hell, he’d been driving their old truck on the farm since he was twelve. Still, as soon as he turned fifteen, he was at the DMV, taking his test. For the next three years, he’d skipped out on dates, hanging with his friends, and even prom to pick up his dad.

But when Justin had announced his own intentions to enlist, his dad had exploded about being abandoned and had even tried to bargain with him.

“If you want to go to college, I could probably swing it. You could take some Ag and business courses here and—”

“When are you going to realize, I don’t want this life?” For the first time in his seventeen years, Justin had stood up and gotten mad, clenching his fists as he yelled, “I don’t want to work this run-down piece of dirt until I lose everything and end up a bitter old drunk like—”

His dad had taken a swing at him, but because he was already halfway through a bottle, he’d been unbalanced. Though shocked, Justin had avoided the right hook and could only watch as his dad fell over the coffee table and hit the floor. After a moment’s hesitation, Justin had picked him up and helped him to his room to sleep it off. He hadn’t mentioned leaving again until the week he was scheduled to report to recruit training.

“What am I gonna do without you, boy?” his dad had whispered. Stone cold sober, instead of being angry, his father had seemed disappointed and sad, but Justin was resolute. He wanted to be anything but a farmer, and if a college education and a trade could do that for him, it was worth it.

After Justin had left, Jared started working for Fred, helping Silverton Farms become a profitable business again. But once Jared got his teaching license and left, the business manager he’d hired to help out had rubbed Fred wrong.

Justin had been in the Marines eight years, finishing up his third tour when he’d gotten a letter from his dad begging him to come home and help out. After what had happened to his brother, he had been planning to get out anyway, but when the letter came, he knew it was the right thing to do.

Thinking it was just going to be a few months, he’d agreed. But four years later, he now had a mechanics license to work on tractors, a bachelor’s degree in business, and a small two-bedroom on the east side of the property. It hadn’t taken him long to get wrapped up in the farm’s success. Even when Everett had brought up finding a new business manager, giving him the opportunity to escape the chains of the farm, he hadn’t taken his chance. After all the work he’d put in, turning the farm over to a stranger had just seemed wrong.

Funny how the old saying “All roads lead home” was especially true in his case.

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