The Sweetest Taboo (A Modern Vintage Romance)

Chapter 1

”Ace, you don”t bring the trash you fuck home,” I admonished my brother.

The woman Ace had introduced as his girlfriend, after knowing her for eight weeks in London, had a British accent, was stunningly beautiful, was suave and sophisticated, and a bona fide gold digger.

Women saw the Ledger last name and saw dollar signs. She wasn”t the first; she probably wouldn”t be the last.

What shocked me was that Ace had had the nerve to bring her to the Ledger Ranch, where he knew neither his mother nor I would accept her.

Before he left for London for a course in economics at the London School of Business, he”d ended a five-year relationship with his high school sweetheart, Caitlyn Mason, who my stepmother wholeheartedly approved of, but I thought Caitlyn was vapid and spoilt. Her father owned a nearby ranch that wasn”t as big or profitable as ours, but they were certainly well off.

The Masons had been as excited as my stepmother about Ace and Caitlyn being a couple. I was glad that Ace wanted to marry Caitlyn, so there would be an heir to the Ledger legacy. Eight years older than Ace”s twenty-one, I wasn”t interested in marriage. I”d seen what it did to people. My father and his second wife, Ace”s mother, had had a dismal marriage that made neither of them happy. He remained sour about that until he died, and Deb continued to be bitter to this day.

The problem had been incompatibility, as my father was a third-generation rancher and his new wife a fifth-generation New York socialite, whose family had fallen on hard times. He fell in lust, she fell in love with a pot of money, and after a whirlwind romance, they married. Within six months, she was pregnant. A year later, she hated Montana, the ranch, and my father, and not in that order.

I disliked my stepmother, but I”d been devoted to Ace since he”d come into the world. He was the apple of his mother”s eye. He was also a lot like her. He liked the big city flash and had decided that he”d be involved in the business end of ranching, and leave the actual ranching to me. The truth was, Ace was lazy and didn”t work very hard at anything. I didn”t mind. As he grew older, I was certain he”d make something out of his life.

I”d been happy to see him apply himself when he went to London. But then he came back with a fucking starry-eyed girl, pissing us all off.

Isha George was twenty-one and breathtakingly beautiful. I had no doubt she traded on that. She had little money, which was easy to see in the clothes she wore. Ace had mentioned she had no family and had grown up in an orphanage.

”She”s na?ve about a lot of things,” Ace told me enigmatically.

Yeah, sure!She had somehow managed to be in Montana eight weeks after meeting my brother—that required some skill. She probably gave good head, considering those plump lips of hers.

”You”re out of your mind. Is her pussy that amazing that you brought her home?”

”Rowan, don”t talk like that, bro.”

”She”s hot, and I”m sure a good lay, but—”

”Cut it out,” he groaned. ”She”s a nice girl. Okay? She”s had a hard life.”

”And does she want you to make her life easy for her?” I taunted.

”So, what if she does?”

”Christ, Ace, tell me you”re not that stupid? And please tell me you”re wrapping it up when you fuck her. She gets pregnant, honest to God, it”s goin” to be a clusterfuck.”

”Mind your own business, Ro.” Ace slammed the door leading out to the wraparound porch on his way out.

We”d been in the living room as I tried to talk to him to assess the damage he”d already done. Was the bitch already pregnant?

Ace”s mother came into the living room, a sneer on her face. ”Did you talk to him?”

“Yeah.”

”What did he say?”

”He asked me to mind my own business.”

”How could he do this to Caitlyn?” Deb muttered. ”I”m very disappointed, Rowan.”

”Then talk to him, not me. I”m not the one who dragged some two-bit slut with a British accent home to meet the family.”

”She”s so stiff and cold. How does he find her interesting after Caitlyn?”

”I think he”s probably more interested in what she has between her legs rather than between her ears,” I suggested dryly.

”Don”t be crass.”

I walked up to the window in the living room and watched my brother with his new girlfriend.

Isha was the antithesis of Caitlyn.

Where Caitlyn was pale and blonde, Isha was brown and brunette, with big eyes and a wide mouth. Caitlyn was petite and sexy, while Isha was tall and graceful. When Caitlyn wore shorts and a T-shirt, she oozed sex appeal. Isha was in shorts and a t-shirt, and looked like she was posing for Vogue”s outdoor edition.

Then there was how she spoke. Deb had said that she sounded blue collar. To me, she sounded sophisticated and untouchable, while Caitlyn was flighty, flirty, and boring as fuck.

Isha”s laughter sparked a light in her eyes, revealing how good she was at wearing masks. Her demeanor cleverly concealed her true intention: to trap a wealthy man. Surprisingly, Ace seemed oblivious to this, treating her with unwavering gentleness—holding her hand and wrapping an arm around her. There was no overt physical intimacy between them in public, hell, I hadn”t even seen them kiss. And then there was the fact that they didn”t share a bedroom, which I found peculiar. But I”d seen Ace leaving her room the previous night, which had filled me with anger.

I was a grown man. I knew what I was feeling.

I wanted Isha!

I was lusting after a girl eight years younger than me, who was sleeping with my brother, and who was, for all practical purposes, a whore. No matter how attracted I was to a woman, no way was I going to dip my dick into my brother”s sloppy seconds.

”You know we have to fix this,” Deb insisted.

I knew. I was working on a land deal with the Masons, and even though Ace and Caitlyn had broken up, we were all certain they”d get back together. But now Ace was prancing around with this foreigner, which was going to piss off Jack Mason, and there was a good chance, if his daughter insisted, he”d ask me to go fuck myself on the deal.

”I know, Deb.”

Ace”s mother was not my biological mother. Mine had died when I was a year and a half old. I didn”t remember her. My father married Deb when I was four, but she never became Mama, always Deb. She”d complained about it for years, especially when I did it in public, but I”d told her to can that shit. She wasn”t my mother and hadn”t, to my father”s chagrin, been motherly to me. I would not dignify her with that title. She”d have to be happy with Ace as the loving son and me as the meal ticket.

My father had left everything to me when he died five years ago.

Ace would only inherit if something happened to me. He had an allowance that would be more than enough for most, but not the way Ace liked to live. Chartered planes, Michelin-star restaurants, expensive wines, hotel suites….

I made sure he was taken care of. Money wasn’t an issue. We had plenty.

Deb would inherit no Ledger asset but was entitled to an income, which did not support her lifestyle and, just like I did with her son, I took care of her. She spent her time in Montana at the ranch and in New York in an apartment I owned in Manhattan. She came to Montana during the summer and fall, when there was more social activity, and during the holidays. Couldn”t let anyone think the Ledgers weren”t one big, fucking happy family.

Life was working out like gangbusters for Deborah Ledger.

”Well, what are you going to do?” she demanded.

”I”m going to convince her she”s been tryin” to trap the wrong brother,” I said, making that decision as I watched Isha, feeling a surge of excitement at that thought.

Her honey-brown skin was dewy, and unlike the women around here who needed to get a tan, she came by it honestly with her unknown heritage. Her eyes were steel gray, giving her an ethereal look. And then there was the body. I liked my women well-rounded. I was a tits-and-ass man. But Isha had something that most women didn”t. She was regal. It wasn”t just the British accent, it was her posture, how she stood with a straight back, how she moved with elegance. She had this touch-me-not air about her, making me want to do exactly that.

”Be careful, Rowan.”

I turned away from Isha and looked at my stepmother. ”Why?”

”Maybe she”ll ensnare you,” Deb suggested smugly.

I smirked. ”Won”t happen. Don’t you know how hard it is to catch a wild mustang?”