by Addison Fox
But why was she here?
He’d admit to the spark of attraction—and how odd that it was the biggest spark he’d felt in a long time—but he’d never been a big believer in coincidence.
So why was it they met that morning over a break-in, and now, ten hours later, she sat inside his brother’s bar? Was she keeping an eye on him?
Was it because of his reactions earlier? Or the way he got upset when she intimated his biological mother might be involved?
Landon turned back to the bar, glad for a few moments of quiet as his brother worked the opposite end. Nick and Fender typically avoided prying, but Landon was well aware he had few poker skills when it came to Amber McGee.
Since he spent as little time as possible thinking about her, that failing usually worked in his favor.
But damn, why was this surfacing now?
He was quite sure his mother’s poor choices had nothing to do with what was going on with his business. Hell, assuming she’d even survived to middle age. Sixteen when she’d had him, she’d be hitting fifty now. That was ancient for an addict and all-around party girl.
Even as he thought it, another weight added to the one that already rested on his stomach. He’d comforted himself with the thought that she’d vanished a long time ago, leaving him to something better. Something honest and true and valuable—a new life with a new mother and ready-made family of brothers.
But dead?
That one sat harder than he wanted to admit.
“Landon.” A light tap to his shoulder came just after his name, and he swung around, looking straight into warm, smoky eyes that stayed level on his. “Mind if I sit down?”
“Back for more, Detective Rossi?” The words slipped out—hardly the warm welcome he felt toward her—as he gestured with his free hand.
“More what?”
What he’d intended as a taunt fell flat, her knowing smile still tilting the edges of her lips. “More questions without answers.”
Undeterred, she reached for a handful of the bar snacks from one of the small silver dishes Nick kept perpetually full. “No more questions. Instead I thought I’d say hello. Possibly even save you from the marauding career women who’ve been eyeing you like payday.”
Since she’d basically reinforced all the reasons he was still sitting, bellied up at the bar, he couldn’t quite hold back the smile. “Coming to my rescue? That makes twice today.”
“Oh, I don’t know. I suspect you hold your own quite well. But I couldn’t sit back and not attempt to offer my help.”
“Help?”
“Oh yes. We gals in blue take our work very seriously.”
“So it seems.”
Nick appeared, seemingly out of nowhere, a margarita in hand. “Pulled this off the service bar. I think it’s yours, Detective Rossi?”
“Thanks.”
Nick moved on as quickly as he arrived, but Landon didn’t miss the spring in his step or the quick wink he’d shot Daphne as he handed over the foamy drink. Bastard had already stripped out of his suit jacket and rolled up his sleeves as he kept things moving in the bar, which meant he’d decided to stick around.
Which only added to Landon’s personal lucky streak. The only thing that might make the family audience more awkward was if his mother and Mrs. Weston decided to show up.
Ignoring the tug of frustration, Landon tapped the base of her margarita glass. “Drinking on a Wednesday?”
“Not usually. But it was a busy day and Jasmine and I decided on an impromptu happy hour.” To punctuate her point, she waved at her friend, who lifted her own matched margarita in return. “The End Zone’s a personal favorite.”
Landon didn’t miss the challenge shining from her eyes, daring him to suggest she was here for any other reason. Since he’d been about to do just that, he parried instead. “Miss Shane’s been busy lately. Word around town is she hit a big one with her prosecution of that mob cell operating down on the waterfront.”
Daphne smiled, warmth suffusing her features with a bright light. She was obviously happy for her friend, but the pride shone even more brightly. “She kicked ass on that one.”
“Heard your brother played a role in bringing down the leads involved as well.”
The smile dimmed, even if the pride was still evident in her voice. “Antonio nearly didn’t come home from that one. The mob boss nearly took him down before his team hit the warehouse. We’re all glad it’s over.”
Landon took a sip of his beer, the reality of what she lived with day in and day out settling over him. His day had been shot to shit, but no one was hurt and everything taken could be replaced. How much harder was it to walk into situations where the exact opposite was true?
Where your own life was on the line, along with the lives of whomever it was you were attempting to protect?
“Your family takes on a lot. You, Cade, your older brother? Is everyone in law enforcement?”
“Older brothers. Plural.” She added. “Much to my mother’s wildly mixed pride and sorrow, yes. All five of her children are cops. Antonio, Giovanni, Rory, Cade, and me.”
Since he’d fielded three calls from his mother over an office break-in he wasn’t even present for, Landon imagined the pressure placed on Daphne and her siblings was considerable.
That must go double as the only daughter.
The stoic cop from earlier that day, full of gleaming pride, suddenly added up in a way he hadn’t been able to place during their conversation in his office. Daphne Rossi likely spent her days proving herself not only to her coworkers, but also to her family.
The layer of frustration he’d carried into the bar faded several notches in the face of such attractive company. While he was curious to ask a few more questions on the cop front, it hardly seemed fair to ask such serious questions on her off-duty hours.
“You know, your mother’s meatballs are legendary here in our small corner of the neighborhood. I’ve only been fortunate enough to have them once, when your brother dropped a container off to my mother’s boarder, Mrs. Weston, after she had hip surgery. I could swear I was sitting in Italy as I wolfed down three.”
“I’ll pass on the compliment.”
“I should add I got smacked for going after a fourth.”
“That’s the highest compliment. My mother loves it when anyone suffers for her food.”
He took a sip of his beer, the inane conversation as enjoyable as those meatballs had been. “For those few blissful moments, I was convinced I’d teleported. So tell me something. Antonio and Giovanni I get.”
“Right.”
“Where did names like Rory, Cade, and Daphne come from?”
“Hollywood, of course. Westerns specifically.” Daphne reached for another handful of pub mix. “My mother met her family responsibilities first—Antonio and Giovanni are named after my two grandfathers. Rory is named after the actor Rory Calhoun. Cade was some name she heard in a western. And Daphne, she said, felt like a name she’d find in a field of flowers.”
“A blend of Old World and New?”
“Perhaps.” Daphne took a sip of her margarita, her eyes closing briefly before tipping her head toward the glass. “Now this is a blend I can get behind.”
Blends.
Of families. Of cultures. He’d been a recipient of the same, only rather than crossing an ocean to a new life, he’d crossed the neighborhood. And discovered that the two ends of Park Heights were separated by far more than custom and culture.
The day Louisa Mills came into his life, he’d crossed the chasm between fear and pain into life and opportunity.
And until today, he’d never looked back.
Jasmine smiled into her margarita, pleased Daphne had taken her advice. She hadn’t seen Daphne so mixed up in a long while, and her friend deserved something new to spark her interest. Fucking Mike, as Jasmine had come to think of him, hadn’t deserved Daphne’s time, and that went double when he jumped ship.
Landon McGee, on the othe
r hand . . . Well. He might be just what Dr. Shane ordered. A little summertime fling to chase away the lingering blues.
She’d been after Daphne for months to open her eyes and start looking around. The fact that her friend had peeked into Landon’s background—and come up with an unnecessary rationale for why she’d done the looking—had raised Jasmine’s antennae. But it was the lame work excuse that clinched it.
While she was sorry Landon McGee had experienced a break-in, they were sadly run-of-the-mill. She saw the files and knew the caseload on the police department. Add on that the old loft space McGee occupied, vulnerable no matter how updated the interior, and you had the makings for the occasional problem.
The bigger problem was how many of these pointless cases her friend seemed to get tagged with. Daphne was good and she was determined, but the PD bureaucracy kept putting her on cases not that much more inspiring than traffic duty. Bureaucracy, Jasmine amended to herself, and the reality of four seasoned older brothers in the same department.
Most people argued over the ravages of nepotism. Daph struggled daily with the opposite. It was about damn time she got something fun out of all the hard work. And flirting with Landon McGee was hardly going to blind Daphne to her ability to process the case. That office break-in would likely go down as a lone file somewhere, with paperwork backing him up for an insurance claim.
Certainly not a reason to avoid having an adult conversation with the man.
“Drinking alone?”
She glanced up into the same eyes as Daphne’s, even as these sat in a harder, more angled face. The long, aquiline nose would have been harsh if it weren’t set off by dark eyes fringed with the most outrageously long, spiky lashes. The voice, however, was the clincher. Deep and rich, it made her think of warm caramel drizzled over whipped cream.
And summer flings that turned serious by the time fall arrived.
It was also the voice that had taunted her and twisted her heart since the second grade.
She swallowed around the sudden dryness of her throat and tossed back the fastest insult she could think of. “Original much?”
“Just wondering why you’re sitting here all alone.”
“As long as I have cheese fries and a margarita I’m never alone.” As if to prove her point Jasmine reached for a few of the gooey fries, satisfied when she managed to snag a trio smothered in cheese and bacon. “And Daph just went over to say hello to someone.”
Cade’s gaze followed the direction of her head nod, his mouth tightening when he saw Daphne. “She’s talking to McGee?”
“Yeah.”
“Why’s she doing that?”
“I suppose it’s because she has something to say.” Jasmine avoided mentioning the furtive—and longing—glances, or weak arguments Daphne had attempted only moments before. She reached for another fry.
“He’s on her caseload.”
She shrugged. “The guy had a break-in.”
“That my sister is handling.”
With the second Rossi of the evening attempting to walk a moral high ground that simply didn’t exist, Jasmine pointed toward Daphne’s chair. “Sit down and eat something. Maybe food will keep you from being a total ass.”
“I’m not a—”
“Sit.” Once he did as she asked, Jasmine gestured toward Patty and hollered out Cade’s favorite beer. The nodding head of bouncy curls indicated the order was on its way. Satisfied she’d begun the process of diverting Cade’s attention off his sister, Jasmine turned back toward the infuriating male who drove her nuts. Keeping her voice casual, she reached for another fry. “I’m surprised to see you out tonight. I thought Wednesdays were for the gym or dates.”
“And here I thought Wednesdays were for writing legal briefs or babysitting other people’s kids.”
Her work teaching ballet to underprivileged kids was one of the high points of her life. His dismissal of that choice snuck beneath her ribs with a swift slice. “Classes are on the weekends during the summer.”
“Even better. You can give up what little free time you have.”
The words rose up fast on her tongue, but she held them back, firmly clamping her lips. He’d given her a hard time since the incident last year, and no amount of explaining was going to change his mind. She was sick of trying.
As if he sensed he’d overstepped, he picked up the beer one of the bar runners set down before him. “My date stood me up and I left my gym bag at home.”
“Stood up?” She had no right to ask, and certainly no right to rib him, but Cade Rossi—the god of Park Heights—wasn’t exactly hard up.
“Don’t sound so gleeful.”
“Consider that my surprised voice.”
He shrugged and reached for a few fries. “Summer craziness is in high gear, and I’ve been busy with my caseload. I had to cancel on her twice before for reasons out of my control. Clearly she got smart and figured I was a bad bet.”
“All work and no play.”
He grinned at that. “I haven’t quite hit my Shining moment, but if one of these situations doesn’t crack open soon, I may go looking for my ax.”
“It’s way too hot for a Shining moment.”
Cade snatched a few more fries. “I guess that’s lucky for me then.”
The quiet moment and sweet grin tugged long and low in her belly. Oh, how she wanted this man. Had always wanted this man. But he saw her firmly in the friend zone. Or worse than the friend zone, actually.
He saw her as another little sister.
And she’d spent her entire life watching how the Rossi boys treated their little sister. Deep respect coupled with an overwhelming need to smother.
A small line dented the space between his eyebrows. “Daph’s still over there talking to McGee.”
“Why do you care?”
“He’s on her ca—”
“Yes, I know. He’s on her caseload. Why don’t you tell me why you’re really bothered by this?”
Cade reached for his beer and took another sip, his gaze reflective as he considered his beer. “She had that look. Earlier.”
“What look?”
“The ‘I will defend kicked puppies’ look. When she ran his background.”
Jasmine had a faint idea of what he meant, but figured she’d sit back and let him explain it to her. “Doesn’t everyone defend kicked puppies? Except for the asshole kickers of puppies.”
“You know what I mean. She had it over Mike. That subtle determination that won’t back down.”
“I’ve yet to ever see your sister back down from anything.”
“That’s my point.”
“It’s awfully unfair to paint anyone with the Asshole Mike brush.”
“Maybe.”
She and Daphne both took their oaths of service seriously. She’d never go hunting through someone’s background just for fun or to be nosy. It was a trait the Rossi boys carried as well. “You know something?” she asked.
“No. I mean, I just know McGee’s background. That’s a hard thing to get over. I don’t know if anyone gets over that.”
“She’s talking to the man, Cade. Not marrying him.”
“Yeah.”
Even though she knew she’d pay for it later, torturing herself over the strength of his palm and the warmth of his skin, Jasmine reached out and covered Cade’s hand. “She’s tougher than you give her credit for.”
When Cade only nodded, Jasmine squeezed once and then let go of his hand. And wondered, not for the first time, why her heart was unable to see reason and turn away.
If the eyes were the window to the soul, Daphne figured Landon McGee had learned a long time ago how to pull the shades. She saw depth there—and humor, honor, and compassion—but could read little else. It was unnerving, even as she couldn’t deny her interest in rising to the challenge.
She would pass on the meatball compliment to her mother, and she had no doubt a delivery would find its way to his DUMBO office in a matter of days.
&n
bsp; But what about the rest?
The look into his background had been routine. What she’d found once she went hunting had been anything but. And while she itched to ask a few more questions, she knew this wasn’t the time or the place.
“Your brother has quite the business here.”
“He’s a part of the neighborhood. It’s been fun to watch it grow and to see him succeed in something not related to sports.”
“This place is called the End Zone.” She couldn’t resist pointing out.
“The only point in common.”
As if he sensed the direction of their conversation, Nick dropped off a second beer for Landon and pointed toward her margarita. “Can I get you anything else right now?”
“I’m good. These are great but their strength is matched only by how delicious they are.”
“The house special.”
“Oh?” Daphne couldn’t resist a quick nod toward recent events. “I’d have thought the house special was now Unity beer.”
Nick grinned at that, happiness and pride puffing out his chest. “I’ll get right on that.” He moved on down the bar, leaving her and Landon to their conversation.
“He’s good at that.”
“At what?” Landon took a sip of his fresh drink.
“Intruding and then walking away. Far better than my brother.”
“You’ve got more than one. Can you be more specific?”
“At the moment I mean Cade. But they’re all piss-poor at it.” She tilted her head in the direction of her table. “Cade’s been sitting over there, spying on us.”
“I thought he was sitting with a beautiful woman, enjoying his evening.”
“He’s too dumb to recognize just how beautiful and perfect she is. But that’s a conversation for another day.” Daphne took a few more sips of her margarita before she recognized the last was actually a gulp. “And he’s here spying on—”
She broke off as laser points of pain centered inside her forehead. The delicious margarita had turned on her in one swift gulp, and she wanted to bend over as the pain lit her up from the inside.
“What’s wrong?”