Damaged and the Knight (Damaged #2)

“We were raised like shit. Coop says I’ll be good at it, but I’m scared. Seeing Maddy take to everything so easy makes me think I won’t.”


Cupping her face, I smiled. “You took care of me. You take care of Coop and his family. You have a good heart and you’ll be a great mom. You’ll just need to practice at it like you do everything. Maddy is good with kids because she’s had practice. She’ll help you learn. I’ll help you by looking worse at things than you do and that’ll feed your ego.”

Laughing again, Farah hugged me. “This Christmas is so beautiful, but I just keep waiting for something to ruin it.”

“Those men are dead,” I whispered in her ear. “Mom is gone. Dad wouldn’t come here because he doesn’t know you have money. If he does show up wanting to hassle you, Cooper will take care of it. Nothing can ruin Christmas or our lives here. We’ve started over and the world will just have to get used to that fact.”

Farah gave me a weird look. “Grandma is coming to the wedding.”

“Good. She’ll see you’re successful and tell all of our loser family about it. They’ll hate us, but she’ll also tell them how you have a scary rich husband. They might want to sponge off our good fortunes, but they’ll know not to. Having Grandma come is a great thing.”

“She can also see how good you’re doing,” Farah said, grinning.

“Yeah, she might even remember my name and everything.”

“Oh, Tanya, don’t be like that.” Giggling, we realized our men were waiting for attention. “They get so needy.”

“Wait until Coop sees the Christmas gift I bought you,” I said, giving her a wink. “He’ll be needy all night long.”

Bursting into laughter, Farah looked ready to shove everyone out of the house and open her gift. Instead, Cooper appeared with my gift.

“Open it,” he said, crossing his arms and trying to intimidate me.

“No.”

“There’s a speech that goes with the gift and I can’t do it on the phone. Open it, employee.”

Rolling my eyes, I unwrapped the gift, careful to avoid tearing the beautiful snowman themed paper. I stared at the laptop then at Cooper.

“Thank you, but what do I need a laptop for?”

“You’ll use it to finish high school. This is the beginning of my speech, by the way.”

Frowning, I turned to Farah for support, but she only smiled. “It’s okay, Tawny. You can finish high school online, so there’ll be no classes to go to. No pressure either. You can take your time and do one subject at a time. We’ll even hire you a tutor, if you want.”

“Why?”

Cooper looked ready to wrap an arm around my shoulders for his big brother speech, but Judd sent out a male signal indicating how violence would result from any touching. Rolling his eyes, Cooper sighed.

“To be part of my organization, you need to be fearless. I saw how badass you can be when you dealt with the mole. You also put up with this asshole, so I know you’re a brave little bitch,” Cooper said, grinning at Judd. “High school beat you though. You need to defeat that fear you have of school. Get your diploma and know you can do whatever you want, even if you fucking hate it. If I can do law school, you can finish high school. Besides, if you don’t promise to work for your diploma, you’re not working for me. I can’t have you afraid of anything.”

On the spot, I glanced at Judd who shrugged. “Say yes and weasel out of it later.”

Cooper snorted. “You’re not helping.”

“Wasn’t trying to, man.”

Farah stepped closer. “You can take your time, so it doesn’t have to be stressful. I know you hated school, but this isn’t school. This is just courses on a computer. You are plenty smart enough to handle that, Tawny.”

Sighing, I nodded. “Thanks for the laptop. I can use it for other stuff too, right?”

Cooper rolled his eyes. “I’m not monitoring your computer use. Do what you want with it. Just promise you’ll give school a chance. That way, you can look at your kids one day and seem fearless to them. Trust me that having fearless parents is fucking awesome.”

Breathing easier now, I hugged Cooper. Once I did, I felt Judd tense. As Cooper hugged me back, I had no doubt he was glaring at Judd. Finally, Farah cleared her throat and pulled me into a hug with her.

“Men are stupid sometimes.”

“That’s why God made these two so hot,” I said, grinning over her shoulder at Judd. “He knew their good looks would offset the dumb.”

Cooper waved off my words and returned to Aaron who entertained Sawyer. I knew Farah wanted to hang out more, but she had to play hostess. While I cuddled with Judd, Bailey helped Farah in the kitchen until everyone was ready to head home to wait for Santa. Well, Sawyer waited for Santa. Judd and Cooper just wanted to enjoy those sexy Christmas gifts.

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