Connor: A Cowboy Stepbrother Romance Novel Read Online Free PDF Page B

again, it wasn't my place to try to bring her down. 
    "Wow..." I said. "I'm just...wow. Sorry, to sound so surprised. I guess you just took me off guard. This is some pretty big news to hear right when you first wake up in the morning." 
    My mom placed her hand on my knee. 
    "I know it's sudden, honey," she said. "But Richard and I talked all night last night after dinner. Everything was perfect and we just click so well. We were getting ready for bed, when he told me that he had something he wanted to show me. We walked a little ways away from the house and looked up at the sky, where we could see every single star. The next thing I knew, he was on his knee and proposing to me. I hadn't cried tears of joy like that ever before. Not even when I first married your dad." 
    When she spoke, I couldn't help but to smile. She really did seem genuinely happy. 
    "Listen, Mom, I really don't want to rain on your parade, but I just want to make sure that you've thought this through..." I said. 
    I told myself that I wouldn't bring her down, but I just wanted to make sure that she understood the magnitude of what she had agreed to with Richard.
    "Honey, I've never been so sure of anything in my life," she said. "You know, sometimes it's as much of a risk not to do something, as it is to do it.”
    Her words somehow resonated with me. I stayed silent as she continued. 
    "It's important that we follow our hearts, Emily," she said. "And my heart led me to Richard. I know that it's the right thing, because my heart knows that it's right. Remember that, honey." 
    Then she slowly stood up from the bed and began walking toward the door. When she got to the entrance, she turned back around to face me. 
    "Breakfast will be ready any minute," she said. "Come join us when you're ready! I hope that you're as excited as I am to spend the morning with our new family!" 
    As soon as she finished speaking, she turned back around and disappeared down the hall. 
    Our new family? I guess I hadn’t thought of it like that...
    It wasn’t that I was against her getting married to Richard. But to suddenly say that Richard and Connor were our family? That felt weird to me. I mean we had just met the two men not more than twenty-four hours prior and now I was supposed to think of Richard as my father and Connor as...my stepbrother?

Chapter 8
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    T he rest of the day went pretty normally. I mean as normal as could be considering my mother had just agreed to marry a man whom she hardly knew.
    But both she and Richard were on cloud nine. They had smiles on their faces and spent most of the morning dancing around the house in a state of glee.
    I hadn’t seen Connor at all that morning and it got to be around noon before I finally just went ahead and asked about him.
    “Hey, Richard, where’s Connor?” I asked. “I haven’t seen him at all today.”
    Richard chuckled as he responded.
    “Oh, well, that’s something you’re going to have to get used to about him,” he explained. “That boy takes his work very seriously. He gets up at four in the morning and starts doing chores around the farm. Then he lifts weights, goes for a run and takes care of the horses. And that’s all before noon.”
    “Wow,” I said. “Seriously?”
    Richard nodded. “Yeah, I guess I taught him a good work ethic. Maybe too good.”
    I smiled and then walked toward the front door of the house.
    “I’m going to go find him and see what he’s up to,” I said, as I pushed open the screen door and stepped out onto the front porch.
    I was excited to get out of the house so that Richard and Mom could have some privacy. I glanced around the farm, looking for Connor as I stepped off of the porch and onto the dirt driveway. Immediately, I heard the sound of metal banging on metal. The noise was coming from the barn.
    “What in the heck is that noise?” I said, out loud.
    I then started walking that direction. The noise got louder and as soon as I