by Elise Faber
I chuckled, nudged her with my shoulder. She’d always been a melodramatic little thing, and I loved her for it. “Hey, little sis,” I said, forcing my gaze from the prickly little thing in front of me to the little thing I was related to.
And, yes, I knew full well that both women would like to be referred to as little things about as much as they would appreciate their favorite reality show being canceled.
Two days home and I’d already been introduced to TLC and all the “gloriousness” (Brookie’s words, not mine ) of their reality TV lineup.
“Hey, big bro,” she said. “Or should I say, older by ten minutes, bro.”
“Watch it.” I nudged her again, this time with my elbow, but I couldn’t hold back my smile. “Missed you, kid.”
Those emerald eyes shone. “No emotions,” she ordered. “I just wrote a very sad scene, and I’m on edge.”
Iris gasped as she slid onto the stool on the other side of me. I’d met Brent’s fiancé officially earlier that evening and though my best friend was still keeping his distance—in fact, he’d barely said five more words to me—his woman hadn’t done the same.
She’d marched right up to me, grasped both my arms, and said, “You made a mistake, but you’re here. You’re family.” A squeeze before she let go and stepped back, voice dropping. “He’ll forgive you. Just be patient.”
In the present, however, Iris didn’t appear the least bit patient. Her gaze was greedy, her tone demanding. “Tell me you did not kill off Chase.”
Brooke’s smile went decidedly evil.
There was no other way to describe it.
Her words matched. “You know an author never tells.”
Iris moaned, pressed her hands to her cheeks. “Oh, no. Please, no. He’s mine.” Accusing eyes directed at Brooke. “You promised.”
“I thought I was yours.” Soft words, male words. A tenderness in my best friend’s—or the man who had been my best friend before I’d ruined our relationship—voice I’d never thought I would hear.
Tough had melted, transformed into devotion, to love, to—
Fuck.
I shouldn’t have spent the last few months reading my sister’s books. I’d wanted to catch up on her life, make sure I hadn’t missed anything important that might not have been highlighted in the surveillance. Also—and I was fully aware this made me sound like a complete asshole—but I’d never bothered to read them before, thinking they were boring and sappy and . . . not good.
See?
Asshole.
But I’d read the first one and been hooked.
She wrote about vulnerable heroes and heroines and did it in a way that was realistic and heartfelt.
And I was so damned proud of her.
My sister was talented.
However, now as acute longing coursed through me, I realized that bingeing all of her books over a few short months had flipped some sort of switch in me. I was turning into an utter romantic, one whose throat got a little tight when I heard my friend talking to his woman in that gentle tone.
He loved her, plain as day.
And I was happy for him.
But . . . it was also a reminder of everything I had left behind. Everything I’d missed out on finding.
So . . . fuck.
I shifted, my eyes meeting Brent’s as he wrapped his arm around Iris’s shoulders, tugged her into his side. But our gazes only locked for a moment because she was already turning into him, wrapping her arms around his waist and hugging him tight.
“Ready to go, baby?” she asked, the question punctuated by a yawn.
“All set.”
Blue-green eyes narrowed in my sister’s direction. “If you killed off Chase, he’d better have a resurrection.”
Brooke finger-waved.
Iris made a face.
Then Brent kissed her temple, whispered something in her ear that had red streaking across her cheekbones, and they high-tailed it out of the bar.
My sister sighed. “That’s romance. Off the pages. Tangible and real-life.” She smiled. “I’m so glad he found her.”
“Me, too,” I agreed.
And though it was true, I had to work really fucking hard to keep any trace of jealously out of my voice. I wanted that—someone to know every part of me, the flaws, the good things, the really fucking bad, and to still love me at the end of it.
Of course, Brent didn’t have bad parts.
I’d known him long enough to recognize that. He was a good guy with a big heart, who’d put his life on the line for this country. Brent was a hero. Full stop.
I was . . .
Complicated.
I’d served. I’d sacrificed. I’d put my life on the line.
But I wouldn’t call myself good. Not with the deceit, not when I’d left my friends on to fight alone on a dusty battlefield. Not—
“Get out of here.”
Anabelle’s voice drew me out of the memories, and I looked up to see that Kace had come up to stand next to her, towel thrown over one shoulder.
“I’ll lock up,” she said. “Brooke looks ready to fall asleep on her feet. The three of you should get home.”
My eyes flicked to the left, and I made the instant judgment that Brooke didn’t look tired in the least. My eyes flicked back to the front in time to see Kace scowl. “I’m not leaving you here by yourself.”
“I’ll be fine.” A beat. “Plus, I have tomorrow night off. I’ll make sure everything is good to go and then head back to my place to crash.”
“Anabelle—”
“I have my car. I’m not a child.”
Kace opened his mouth.
I took advantage of what was most certainly going to be a stalemate for my own benefit. “I’ll stay with her,” I interjected.
Three gazes shot toward me.
I shrugged. “I’m still off on my sleep schedule.” My eyes moved to Kace’s, held. “I’ll hang out, make sure she gets to her car, and then take the long way and walk back to you guys’ place.”
Brooke cocked her head to the side, brows drawn together.
But Kace merely smiled. He knew what I meant, and I was ruthlessly using the knowledge that I’d invaded their lives with little notice while also determinedly ignoring that I was all but giving this man permission to sleep with my sister.
See?
Not good.
Especially since I had an ulterior motive . . . and she was standing directly across the bar from me.
“Why would you take the long way round?” Brooke asked, way too innocently.
I smothered a grin. “I need the exercise.”
“I—” Her mouth opened and closed. “At this time of night? That’s dangerous and—”
“He’s giving you two love birds time to bone,” Anabelle interjected dryly.
Brooke gasped, but she couldn’t really work up any amount of outrage, not when Kace had gathered her things, rounded the bar, and was herding her off the stool and out of the building in all of a minute.
Then it was just me . . . and Anabelle.
“Okay,” she said, tossing down the towel she’d been drying a glass with. “Now it’s time for you to go.”
I frowned.
She waved her hand in the direction of my face. “Put the scowl away. I didn’t make a fuss because I don’t need Kace here to close down,” she said. “But I also definitely don’t need you here.”
Always a fight. Always so tough.
I knew I wouldn’t win an argument with her, so I just shrugged and said, “I know.”
One eyebrow arched up. “You know?” she asked, and it was a dangerous question.
“Yup.” I leaned one elbow on the bar, smiled at her.
“And what?” she asked, plunking her hands on her hips. “You’re just going to stay right there?”
“Yup,” I said again.
She sighed, closed her eyes for a long moment then opened them, fixing me in place. “There’s no point in arguing, is there?”
A beat before she hit me with a curveball I knew was designed to make me run. But I’d spent years in terrifying situations, years putting my life on the line. I wasn’t that weak.
Even though the question was a fucking doozy.
“You really don’t care that your sister is having sex?”
I stifled a shudder . . . along with the urge to go hunt down Kace, no matter that I’d just given him carte blanche. The truth was that I hated it, so fucking much, and knew I’d never think anyone was good enough for her. But—
“She’s a grown woman,” I said, telling the truth, as much as it pained me. “She’s allowed to make her own decisions, allowed to be the one to figure out who she’s letting into her life, her body.” I shrugged, feeling far less casual than my words dictated. Because even though it went against every protective bone in my body, Brooke didn’t answer to anyone but herself. “She deserves to find her happy ending,” I told Anabelle. “And frankly, after everything she went through, she deserves to have a man who looks at her like Kace does.”
Silence.
Then, “He does look at her right.” She nodded, tossed her towel down, then slipped out from behind the bar. “So, the long way round?” Her lips twitched.
This time I did shudder. But, pushing the thoughts of Kace and my sister doing whatever they were going to do for the long way round, I got up from the stool and moved toward Anabelle.
She grinned, led the way into the hallway. “Men. Always feeling the need to be so protective.”
“Look who’s talking,” I teased. “You’ve got protective down pat.”
A roll of deep brown eyes. “I look out for the people who belong to me.”
“Belong to you?”
“Yup.” A shrug as she put in a code above the doorknob then pushed open the wooden panel. A different door than the other night, this one had a label in the center of it that read “Office.” She stepped in and reappeared a second later, a plain black backpack in her hand. “They pulled me into their little circle of happy,” she said, shrugging into it and closing the door behind her, “so now they have to put up with my snarky, ill-tempered ass.”
“I happen to think that snarky and ill-tempered is sexy.”
She huffed out a breath. “You’re just pent up.” She strode out into the front room of Bobby’s. A large open area with another bar, this one tended to cater to a younger, more college-aged crowd. The back room, where I’d spent my time, where Kace, Anabelle, and Brent worked, was quieter, filled with fewer frat boys and more young professionals.
Different vibe.
Chiller vibe.
Obviously, I preferred the back room. Absence of twenty-somethings aside, it was where the cool kids hung out.
Anabelle crossed the space, checked that the front door was locked, then hit some buttons on a keypad behind the bar. I trailed her back out as I heard the security system begin the countdown to arm itself.
Breasts bouncing, ass swaying. God, I could watch her stride around purposefully for days.
“Come on,” she snapped, not stopping as she glared at me over her shoulder.
Or not.
I got my ass into gear, followed her out of the front room, down the hall, and out the back door.
She pushed out, not holding it for me, but I didn’t mind.
I’d seen her play nice that evening with almost every customer, aside from one who’d been a total jerk to his girlfriend. He’d gotten the icy glare, his drink deliberately forgotten for long minutes.
Part of me knew that she wasn’t playing nice with me, not like she had the majority of the customers. Another part knew she wasn’t just ignoring me like the other peons who’d failed to gain more than a passing awareness from her that evening—passing because she’d served them, failure because she’d paid no notice to them otherwise. So, she wasn’t ignoring me, and she definitely wasn’t playing nice. Therefore, I was hedging my bets in the belief that she must be feeling this strange draw just the same as me.
Either that, or she just doesn’t like your dumb ass, and is putting up with you for Brooke’s sake, my mind chimed in helpfully.
There was that.
She was attached to my sister, to Brooke and Kace and Iris.
She’d called them family.
I didn’t move as she leaned in to check the door had latched, and consequently, didn’t miss her breath catch when she got close enough to scent.
My inhaling that spicy floral scent had her freezing, had her head turning, eyes locking with mine. “Did you seriously just smell me?” she asked, completely aghast. The deep brown of her irises was almost black in the dim light.
I shrugged. “You smell good.”
“I—” A shake of her head. “Smell—” Another. “You’ve lost it, you know that, right?”
“Will you think I’ve lost it if I tell you you’re the first woman I’ve wanted in years?”
She snorted, started walking toward a silver sedan. “Um, yes.”
“Why?”
A dark glare over her shoulder. “Um . . . because you’re you and I’m me.”
I frowned. I’d already told her she was the sexiest woman I’d ever laid eyes on. I hadn’t been lying. “What does that mean?”
“Come on,” she said with a gloomy laugh. “You had to have seen the girls looking at you tonight. You could have had any one of them in bed in an instant, no sweet-talking needed.”
I hadn’t been paying attention to other girls. I’d been salivating over her. “Would you come to my bed if I sweet-talked you?”
She pulled out her keys, bleeped the locks. “No.”
“No?”
“Nope.”
She yanked open the door, stopped when I asked, “Why not? Am I not pretty enough for you?”
Anabelle snorted. “You’re joking, right? You’re pretty much the most attractive man that I’ve ever seen.”
There were parts of that I liked—the most attractive man I’ve ever seen.
And there were parts I despised—pretty much.
“What?” I asked. “You like the guys who were desperate to get your attention all night better? The ones who were all but begging you for their chance to sweet-talk you into their bed?”
Her fingers clenched on the frame of the door. “You’re insane. No one even gave me a second look.” She started to get in the car.
Delusional. As in, this woman was completely delusional. But the other guys didn’t matter, didn’t play into this. Because, “I did.”
She stopped, glanced up at me. “What?”
“I gave you a second look and a third and a—”
A roll of her eyes. “Sure, you did.”
“Why don’t you believe me?” I asked, stepping closer. “And don’t give me any bullshit about you saying that you’re not attractive. You’re a strong, modern woman, and you know that shines through.”
Except . . . was that a slice of vulnerability in her eyes?
It was hard to tell, the glow from the moon was diffused through several layers of clouds and the interior light in her car not doing much to illuminate her face.
“Yup,” she said after a moment. “That’s me. I’m confident and strong and that adds to my mantle as the sexiest woman you’ve ever seen. I’m more gorgeous than a supermodel. I’m hotter than a Playboy spread. I—”
I ran the back of my knuckles over her cheek.
The sarcasm was strong with this one.
“I know you’re not fishing for compliments,” I said. “But I’m going to give them to you anyway.” I brushed my thumb along her bottom lip. “This mouth had me waking up hard as a rock this morning, imaging what it might taste like.” I stroked my finger across one collarbone then the other. “These I want to trace my tongue across, dip lower”—I slid that finger just beneath the collar of the pale pink sweater she was wearing—“and this”—I skated my hand down her side, played my fingers mere millimeters from her luscious ass—“I
want to take a bite out of.”
Her breath shuddered out, her head shook in disagreement. “We won’t have any chemistry. I know it.”
More lies. But rather than calling her on the fact that I could almost scent her desire, could see that her nipples had hardened against the fabric of her bra, all but begging to be stroked, I asked, “How do you know it?”
“Because—”
I placed a finger over her lips. “Don’t say because I’m me and you’re you.”
She narrowed her eyes, shoved the finger away. “I can say whatever the fuck I want to say. I don’t have to prove anything to you and—”
“That’s why you’re the sexiest woman I’ve ever seen.”
“You’re impossible.” She sighed.
“Maybe,” I said and cupped her cheek, allowed myself the barest touch of her lips. So soft under my thumb, so warm and tempting. “But I’m not lying. You’re—”
A disgusted noise. “Maybe this will dissuade you,” she muttered. “Maybe this will make you see reason.”
I was frowning, trying to understand what would make me see reason and didn’t process her raising onto her tiptoes, didn’t fully register her slipping out from behind the car door. Not until her body brushed mine, not until flames erupted below the surface of my skin at the simple contact.
Then her mouth pressed to mine.
And the world exploded.
Or maybe that was just my brain, because the light touch of her lips against mine, her smell drifting over me, the silky softness of her skin under my palm . . . they were nirvana and pain. So fucking good, but also filling me with so much longing that I could barely control the urge to yank her against me and devour her.
But she was giving me light and sweet, and that tempered the raging need that swept over me.
Then her tongue traced the seam of my lips.
I opened and my hand clenched on her waist, drew her close, fingers slipping beneath the sweater to find skin.
More silk. More heat. More . . . need.
Forget the hauling her near and devouring her mouth. I wanted her naked and pinned against the car as I thrust home. Or naked and in the back seat. Or naked and on the hood—
I was sensing a theme.
But I wasn’t processing much else.
Not when Anabelle’s lips were on mine. Not when she tasted like ambrosia and sin and temptation. Not when the moment her mouth met mine, the moment her tongue slid into my mouth, the moment her breasts brushed my chest, every other kiss and touch and female disappeared from memory.