“See?” she called out, following Iris. “I told you I’d bring her back in one piece.”
He glanced up at her, gratitude in his gaze, and something more—the same something more she saw whenever he looked at her—but then his attention shifted totally to Iris.
Helicopter Brother, reporting for duty, she thought to herself.
There was something so endearing about his concern, about this big, strong man who’d taken it upon himself to be both mother and father to his little sister. But if Jack was having problems connecting with Iris, he was taking the worst possible approach.
She didn’t feel she could tell him that, though. Not yet, anyway.
“How was it?” he asked, hovering. “Did any of the dogs jump on you or bite you?”
Iris heaved a sigh and made her way through the door. Jack looked like he wanted to follow at her heels like a herding dog, but he held back and waved Maisie through. When she passed, she felt a whisper of his hand on the small of her back, there and then gone. It sent a pulse of heat through her, but she just stepped aside so he could pass her.
Iris turned to look at him. “I’m going to volunteer at the shelter on Tuesday afternoons too,” she said. A defiant look crossed her face. “Maisie said I could.”
“Sure,” he said with a slightly baffled look. “That’s great. Yeah.”
“I have homework to do.” She pushed past him, leaving him with a slightly lost look.
Adalia emerged at the top of the stairs, looking fresh and pretty in a bright turquoise shirt and a bohemian skirt. Maisie probably should have changed, but it wasn’t like Adalia and Blue weren’t used to her stinking of dog. Besides, she didn’t regret bringing Iris home. She’d learned so much more about her, and about Jack.
Iris edged over to the far end of the stairs, like Adalia might have cooties.
“Do you want to make dinner with me tonight?” Jack asked her. “I thought we could cook together, like we used to.”
“No, thanks,” Iris said, in that careless way teens had about them, like she didn’t know she was being cruel or maybe didn’t care. “There’s some leftover pizza in the fridge, and I’m going to video-chat with Janie.”
“I’m glad you girls are still so close,” Jack said hesitantly, “but aren’t there some friends you’d like to hang out with in Asheville?”
Iris laughed, actually laughed, and then said, “Are you giving me social advice?”
And then she was gone in a thunder of steps.
The look on Jack’s face…
Maisie wanted to say she’d cook dinner with him, gladly, especially if his cooking was anything like his bartending. But she already had plans, and she wasn’t the kind of person who canceled on someone lightly. Besides, she’d promised Finn that she would tell Adalia and Blue about River, and she intended to go through with it. Maybe Adalia could help her figure out how many wedding-related activities a co-best man could feasibly shrug off.
But Adalia reached the bottom of the steps and slung an arm around Jack’s shoulders as Tyrion, appearing from the kitchen, danced around them.
“Cheer up, Jacques,” she said, a nickname she’d appropriated for him after finding out that his grandmother had been a French immigrant. “She’ll come around. In the meantime, why don’t you come out with us?” She glanced at Maisie, who was wrestling with how she felt about this development—on the one hand, she’d wanted to have that heart-to-heart with Adalia and Blue, but on the other…
She wanted to spend time with Jack, to get to know him better. To soak up his presence.
“Blue’s not coming,” Adalia told Maisie. “She texted you too, but I know you. Usually your phone is off at the kennel. It’s something to do with a support group meeting, but she was a bit cagey about giving details. Obviously it’s not AA.”
Obvious, since they always went out for drinks, and Blue seemed to get tipsy off a single drink.
“Huh. We’ll have to interrogate her the next time we see her,” she said.
Jack smiled a little, as if amused, and she suspected it was because he was the type who’d allow someone to sit with their secrets. He would no more press someone for a confidence than he would let Iris go to a twenty-one-and-up concert.
“Well, what do you say, Durand?” she asked, letting her tone get a little playful. “Willing to let someone else make you a drink for a change?”
He glanced upstairs, looking a little twitchy at the thought of leaving Iris, but then something in his posture straightened and his gaze landed on Maisie. His eyes danced over her for a moment, like she was wearing a dress and heels instead of torn-up old jeans and a random shirt, then settled on her face. “Yeah,” he said. “I guess I could be accommodating. Let me run up and tell Iris.”
The second he was up the stairs and out of sight, Adalia turned to Maisie, raising her eyebrows.
“You’re welcome,” she said.
It took Maisie a second to realize what she meant—Adalia must have noticed something between them at Thanksgiving.
“So Blue didn’t have a meeting?” she asked, shaking her head slightly. “That’s some master-level manipulation.”
“Oh, she does,” Adalia said, “but it’s ending early. She offered to meet us later.”
“Adalia, I don’t…” But she didn’t have time to finish whatever it was she’d intended to say—and honestly, she wasn’t sure—because Jack came down the stairs. And every bit of her seemed to lift in anticipation.
Great, Red, the first man you ever loved still has no idea, and now you’re in danger of falling for a man who’s told you it’s a no-go.
But there was a naughty part of her that wondered if everything was a no-go, or just dating. Because they’d been plenty good at the other stuff.
Chapter Twelve
The ride to the restaurant was awkward. Adalia had insisted that Jack sit in the front seat next to Maisie because he had longer legs. Then she’d proceeded to pepper them both with questions, keeping them talking while she listened from the back like their would-be dating therapist. But the awkwardness hadn’t kept him from noticing how close he was to Maisie. She was just inches away, and he clasped his hands in his lap to keep from reaching over and snagging her hand resting on the console. From the few glances she snuck in his direction, the impulse wasn’t one-sided.
Once they got to the restaurant, Adalia immediately claimed the seat across from Maisie at the four-top table, leaving two empty chairs between them.
Jack didn’t protest, although he was beginning to question the wisdom of joining them. Adalia was usually pretty chill, but her machinations were painfully obvious. She’d noticed him talking to Maisie on Thanksgiving. She must have decided to help prod things along. He suspected it had something to do with the fact that she’d started phasing Emma into her Pride and Prejudice watching schedule. Things he only knew about because Iris, who scoffed when Adalia put them on, loved those movies too. The real question was if Maisie was part of the attempted setup, but he quickly dismissed the idea. Maisie would have taken a more direct approach.
They ordered drinks and a couple of appetizers, chatting about Maisie’s shelter and how much Adalia and Finn’s art benefit had helped with funding. The contacts she’d made had apparently been just as useful as her share of the proceeds. However, she was maddeningly silent about Iris’s afternoon, other than to say she’d enjoyed having her there and looked forward to seeing her next Tuesday. The drinks and fried cheese ravioli and spinach-artichoke dip arrived, and Adalia gave them a mischievous look and hopped out of her seat. “I’m going to the restroom.”
“Do you think she’s coming back?” Jack asked in a dry tone, watching her glance back at them.
“Hard to say,” Maisie said, taking a sip of her peach Bellini. “It could go either way.” It delighted him a little, the way a woman as tough and no-nonsense as her savored sweet drinks. They’d joked about putting each other into boxes, but he already knew no one category could contain Maisi
e O’Shea.
Setting her drink down, Maisie shifted to face him. “It’s important you know that I had nothing to do with this. I know it looks a little sketchy since I offered to bring Iris home.”
He shot her a grin. “I know this was all Adalia. Plus, she wasn’t lying about needing a ride. Bessie really is in the shop.”
“I’m glad to hear her orchestrations don’t run so deep,” she said with a smile. “In any case, I truly intended to drop Iris off and pick Addy up. It was supposed to be a simple exchange.”
He laughed. “Is anything ever simple with Addy?”
She laughed too. “You have a point, but her heart was in the right place. She has no way of knowing that we both have good reasons not to get involved right now.”
Both.
What did that mean?
But she took a big sip of her drink, indicating she’d said her piece, and he didn’t feel comfortable pushing. He never had. When he was a little kid, he used to ask his mom all kinds of questions—why it rained and how yogurt was made and where she’d disappeared to for twelve hours without calling. Her answer to that latter question had put an end to his curiosity.
“I needed to get away from you,” she’d said. He’d been six.
“Thanks for suggesting the shelter for Iris,” he said. “She looked happier than I’ve seen her since she moved here.”
“No problem,” she said, then turned serious. “She’s a good kid. She’s lucky to have you for a brother. Addy is too.”
He wasn’t sure what to say to that. He felt like a huge failure in the brother department, and not just with Iris. “I don’t know why she doesn’t trash that hunk of junk she calls a car, and I honestly can’t believe Finn hasn’t gotten her a more decent one. The man obviously has money.”
“You think he hasn’t tried?” Maisie asked with a short laugh. “She refuses, of course. Not that I would expect anything less. Plus, she says her car is perfect for loading up literal junk. She’d be afraid to put her finds in a nicer car.”
“I get that,” he said with a frown, “but she should at least get a new engine. Maybe she’ll have enough money after her art show in February. The current one is unreliable at best, and dangerous at worst.”
“Dangerous?” Maisie said. “How do you figure?”
He frowned. “She works late at night in her studio, and her stupid antiquated cell phone doesn’t hold a charge. She could break down in the middle of the night without a working cell phone to call for help.”
“Because Asheville is so dangerous,” she said with a smirk.
“Bad people are everywhere, Maisie,” he said matter-of-factly. “It only takes one to cause irreparable harm.”
She was silent for a moment. “Has someone close to you been hurt, Jack?”
“What?” he asked in surprise.
“Because you seem to see the boogeyman around every corner.”
He was taken aback by that. “Is it wrong to care about my sisters?”
Regret filled her eyes. “No. Of course not. I was out of line. It’s obvious you care deeply about your sisters’ well-being and take your role in their lives very seriously.”
“Why do I sense a but in there?” he asked with a scowl.
She glanced down at her drink, but then her eyes lifted and he found himself sucked into her deep green gaze despite his slight irritation. “I have two sisters, one older and one younger. Both of them love me, but they usually have very different ideas about what’s best for me. They can’t both be right. Sometimes neither of them is. Just keep that in mind with your own sisters, okay?”
What did she mean by that? His mouth parted to ask, but then she leaned closer and whispered, “I know for a fact that Finn’s getting Addy a new phone for Christmas, so you can take that one off your worry list.” Before he could react, she straightened up in her chair, giving someone a sugary smile over his shoulder. “Everything go okay in the restroom, Addy? You were in there for an awfully long time.”
“They have really awesome soap, so I washed my hands for a full thirty seconds,” she said with a grin as she sat in her chair. “How’d things go out here?”
“Peachy,” Maisie said wryly, picking up her drink.
Jack didn’t respond, his thoughts bouncing back to what Maisie had said. Did she disapprove of the way he was handling Iris? Was it wrong of him to worry about his sister? He’d failed to keep his promise to his grandmother—if he’d protected Iris the way he should have, one of his mother’s many boyfriends wouldn’t have made a pass at her—and that ate at him more than he cared to admit.
Still, he wasn’t upset with Maisie for challenging him. In fact, that was one of the things he appreciated about her. She was up-front about her feelings, and he doubted she’d shy away from standing up for what she believed in. For who she believed in. After spending his entire life playing games with his mother and trying to decipher her every mood, he found Maisie’s forthrightness refreshing. At least he’d always know where he stood with her.
He was withdrawn for the next ten minutes, and Adalia shot him several worried glances. Then Maisie’s phone chimed with a text, and she glanced down at the screen and frowned. “I’ve got to make a call. I’ll be right back.”
“Everything okay?” Jack asked as she got up from the table.
She gave him a surprised glance, still clutching her phone. “Yeah, one of my foster dogs is sick. I just need to check in with the vet.”
“Okay,” he said, disappointment filling him at the realization she might have to leave.
“What happened while I was gone?” Adalia asked in a worried tone as soon as Maisie was out of earshot.
“What?” he asked absently, turning to face her.
“Come on. Before I left, there was so much chemistry between you two I was about to pull out my fire extinguisher, and now it’s like it was doused by a tidal wave.”
“It’s a bit soon to be joking about fire extinguishers, don’t you think?” he asked wryly. “We’ll be lucky if Lurch’s health insurance doesn’t sue our homeowner’s insurance.”
Adalia cringed. “So letting Dottie fry a turkey didn’t work out so well. It’s hard to turn that woman down.” She gave him a pointed look. “But don’t change the subject. It’s obvious there’s something between you two, so why don’t you ask her out?”
“Why are you putting this all on me?” he said, picking up his drink. “Maisie’s a strong, independent woman. She’s perfectly capable of asking me out.”
Except for whatever reason she’d alluded to earlier.
“I know,” she said with a frown, “which makes me think you’ve dissuaded her in some way.”
Jack released a sigh. “Are you asking if I’m attracted to Maisie? How could I not be? She’s an incredibly sexy woman.”
Which made him wonder why she’d never dated River or Finn. The three of them spent a lot of time together, and while he was a firm believer that men and women could be friends, this was Maisie. As far as descriptions went, sexy didn’t cut it. Smart. Funny. Sharp yet sweet, like candy covered in cayenne pepper.
Adalia clasped her hands together and beamed.
“But this isn’t a good time for me to get wrapped up in a relationship, Addy.”
She leaned closer. “Why? Because of Iris?”
“Yes, because of Iris. She already resents me for moving her here. Can you imagine the message I’d be sending if I spent half my time with a girlfriend?”
“That you’re a well-rounded individual?” she asked sarcastically. “Look, no seventeen-year-old girl wants her older brother giving her all his attention.”
He frowned. She probably had a point, but he couldn’t help noticing that Maisie and Adalia were both finding fault with how he was handling his little sister, and it was starting to annoy him. Neither one of them had any idea what it had been like growing up with Genevieve Durand. Sure, he’d told Adalia some things, but she had nothing but a snapshot.
Iris neede
d to know someone put her needs first, and that someone had to be Jack. He’d already shaken the foundation of their relationship by choosing Asheville and the brewery over Chicago, but he saw it as a long-term solution, even if it hurt in the short term. Hopefully, Iris would eventually see it that way too.
“I’m not giving her my full attention,” he said. “She spends a good portion of her time in her room. Without me. But she needs to know I’m there when she does need me. That she’s my priority.” Then, to drive the point home, he added, “If I’d known you after your mother died, I would have been there for you too, Addy. Just like I hope you know I’m there for you now.” She’d told him that Georgie and Lee had gone off to college, leaving her to fend for herself with their father, another narcissistic asshole. If anyone would understand Jack’s motivations, it was Adalia.
Surprise filled her eyes. She started to say something, but Maisie reappeared. “Another emergency resolved with a call. It’s my superpower.” She sat down, her brow furrowing as she glanced from Adalia to Jack. “Is everything okay?”
“Everything is perfect,” Adalia said with tears in her eyes. Then she threw her arms around Jack’s neck in an awkward hug. “Thank you,” she said in a muffled whisper.
He hugged her back, saying nothing. Words were cheap. It was a man’s actions that proved his merit. He only hoped he could prove himself to all his sisters. Only further proof that he shouldn’t start anything with Maisie right now, but it would be a whole lot easier if she would stop looking at him like that…
Chapter Thirteen
Maisie had come back to find the mood between Adalia and Jack so serious they could have been at a wake. She preferred Irish wakes, full of dancing and drinking. Full of life. So she ordered another round for everyone.
Several sips in, they seemed to relax a little, and Jack started telling them about his bartending days. The stories were light and funny, but she found herself thinking about what his life had been like beyond the bar. He wouldn’t have been able to see Iris as much as he did now. Was he trying to make up for that? Or had something happened to make him more protective?
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