His to Keep (Carmel Springs Book 4)

Chapter 1

Jax~

I wasn't sure how long I had to be on the police force for it not to be 'news' anymore, but I was pretty sure that the re-opening of the bakery should've probably replaced the headline of me and Lou Kertzer joining the Carmel Springs PD already. Plus, it wasn't like the whole world hadn't already known that I'd always planned on joining the CSPD.

Raised by a retired Marine and CSPD police officer, it hadn't been a surprise to anyone when my brothers and I had decided to join the Marines, then carve out careers in policing and security. Now, while we could have started our careers anywhere, we hadn't. All six of us had come back home to Carmel Springs to live out the rest of our lives, and none of us were sorry that we'd had.

My parents, Stanley and Nadine Colter, had raised us to be close as a family, and even with all the military tours, we had always remained close. Now, while Dad had been in the Marines, he had still managed to knock Mom up five times, leaving the grand total of kids at six because they'd also manage to produce a set of twins. It'd been a lot, but Mom had still managed to run the local rec center and keep us all out of jail. Of course, even though Dad had been deployed a lot, his heavy hand of authority had still been felt at home, and no one had wanted the man making an impromptu visit back home just to kick our asses because we'd been giving Mom a hard time.

There was also the fact that my eldest brother, Clayton, was a mean bastard, and he'd had no problem stepping in when Dad hadn't been able to. Being stairsteps, we were all two years apart, and God bless Mom for succeeding where many would have put us up for adoption a long time ago. Six growing boys was enough to test anyone's patience, and we had tested Mom's a lot.

So, now we were making up for it by trying to be upstanding, productive, decent citizens of Carmel Springs. Clayton was the oldest at thirty-two, and he was a Carmel Springs police officer. Trayce and Keats were thirty, and they owned their own security company that Dad worked at part-time. Brett was twenty-eight, and he was also a Carmel Springs police office. I was next in line at twenty-six, and I'd just started my career with the CSPD about two months ago. Lastly, we had Maxwell at twenty-four, and he worked as Keats and Trayce's IT expert, which worked out wonderfully since the kid was a goddamn genius. His mind was like a computer, and my brothers were lucky that Max had chosen to work for them.

Like Dad, we had also all joined the Marines, each of us serving two tours with the exception of Max. A few years ago, Mom had been diagnosed with COPD, and when she'd contracted a respiratory infection, Max had immediately come home, forgetting all about his expected second tour in the military. In retrospect, it'd been the right thing to do since we'd ended up losing Mom shortly thereafter.

Now, while we all had taken after my father with our dark brown hair and hazel eyes, Maxwell had gotten Mom's aqua-colored orbs, and it was hard not to think of her when looking at him. We had also all topped out at six-foot-two or three, me hitting six-foot-two. As for the rest of us, having been in the military and working in security, we all knew our way inside a gym. Ironically, Clayton was the most fit out of us all, even though he was the oldest and had a weakness for Rolos and RC Cola.

Personality wise, Clayton was mean, Keats was amiable, Brett was nice, Trayce was funny, Max was serious, and I enjoyed a good time. I especially enjoyed a good time if it involved the opposite sex. While I wouldn't say that I was easy with my affections, I wasn't stingy with them, either. Unlike the rest of my brothers, I enjoyed the headache of dealing with a female. If she didn't cause you stress, then she wasn't the one, was my motto.

Granted, nowadays, Trayce, Keats, and Brett were all loved up with my future sisters-in-law, but before getting blindsided by love, all my brothers had treaded carefully where the opposite sex had been concerned. With Carmel Springs being such a tight-knit town, there'd been no fucking around with the local women unless you'd been looking to get married. Trayce had jumped on the new vet in town, and Keats had snatched up the new bakery owner, so only Brett had fallen for a local. Of course, he'd been in love with Addie since they'd been in high school, so that was different. We were also in the middle of planning their wedding, and the only reason that Trayce and Keats hadn't married Arden and Poppy yet was because Addie deserved to get married first. Now, if she'd just say yes to Brett's proposal, then all would be well.