He took a good look at what she was wearing and felt his body tightened in immediate response. Jillian favored cut-off jean shorts that barely covered the most perfect ass he had ever seen. And the frayed edges of denim just served to draw the man's eyes to the long legs.
He understood that it was because of the heat. Even the top she wore was a thin wisp of nothing, in a soft yellow that reminded him of the sun. The straps that covered her shoulders were thin, and barely covered those of her bra beneath.
Jillian was wearing a blue bra beneath that yellow cotton. Rafe balled his hands up, before he did something stupid with that yellow cotton.
"Don't be a butthead. I can admire without liking you, can't I?"
There was slight red on her cheeks; because of what she had said to him? Or because of what he had said to her? Rafe released her hand. And stepped back. He had to get some space between them before he did something that he would greatly regret. He slipped into his shirt quickly, then returned to his surprise guest. “So why did you come over here again?"
"We are having a family barbecue. Your brothers and your niece and nephew will be there. You have been invited. Consider this your invitation." She crossed her arms over her chest and eyed him warily. “Chance tricked me into coming over here. He used the baby, which was completely unfair, and scrambled my brains for a moment.”
"But… You don't want me there, do you?"
"I have resigned myself to the fact that you're probably going to be around more than I would like. Especially because of Travis. And because Marcus is in and out of Chance's house all the time now. Even Isaac and Katie are calling my father Uncle Kevin. You’re kind of like that annoyingly annoying relative who shows up every holiday and messes everything up. But I can tolerate you now. I'm working on my tolerance levels. New Year’s resolution, after all. It's a slow battle, but it's happening.” She turned serious, and those golden brown eyes finally met his. “It's not that I don't want you there, but it's that I feel I should warn you. Simon's parents are coming to get him. Paige and her husband Mick. Luc and his wife are also flying down with them. They're coming to pick up Simon. And visit. They're bringing my sister’s family with them. I didn't want you to get over there, and be blindsided. That wouldn’t be fair or right. You should make the choice to be with them, not just have it tossed at you in order to see Travis and Marcus and the kids."
Rafe understood what she was saying. "I see. How much do they know about me, Jillian?"
"To be honest, I'm not sure. I know after Mel's initial letter and your response they decided that was your decision. You have to understand something. These people don't want anything from you."
"Then why did they look me up in the first place? That's something I don't understand." He led her into his kitchen, feeling like an idiot for keeping her standing in the entryway for so long. She slipped onto the barstool as he grabbed two sodas from the fridge. He handed her one. Rafe could have told her yes or no, he wasn't going to attend the barbecue. But to be honest, he wanted Jillian exactly where she was. Rafe had spent most of the morning thinking about her, after all. Thinking of the night before, and how vulnerable she had felt pressed up against him. How she had depended on him in that moment to keep her safe. How for a long, long minute or two he’d honestly thought he could do just that. That it was his right. “Tell me about them."
"I know Paige best."
"How?"
"Through my sister, Carrie. Carrie was a runaway, Rafe, from the time she was fifteen until she was eighteen. The first week she was on the streets she met Paige.”
"Paige was on the streets? How did that happen?" He wondered about this Paige, what she looked like. How old she was. Wondered more than he wanted to.
"Paige grew up in foster care until she was about eleven or so. She ran away from a particularly vile foster home and she lived on the streets until she enrolled in college. When she was fifteen, she met Carrie; the two of them stuck together. Once they were through with college they joined the FBI. They are as close to being sisters as they can be without biology tying them together. Which means Paige is a part of my family, too. My eldest sister is autistic like Brynna. If it hadn't been for Paige, I don't know if Carrie would've survived. We’ll always be in her debt for that."
"You had a sister in foster care?" He hadn’t known that. And it surprised him. The Becks protected their own, in everything. That one hadn’t been shocked him.
"Carrie is my half-sister. She was born before my father and mother married. My father didn’t know about her until the night her mother was murdered. By Justin Albright's father. He told Houghton's father to kill her. But Handley Barratt didn't; instead he took her to Oklahoma where she went in the foster system. My father spent seventeen years looking for her. I didn't know about her until one night at dinner not quite three years ago. When they were eighteen Luc found them, but kept it secret that he was Paige’s brother. Carrie had designed some software that he bought for LT. The money he gave them allowed them to have a future.” Rafe liked having her right there, talking to him without them arguing. He liked listening to her talk. “Less than a year after we met Carrie, someone was threatening Luc and learned about Paige. They were going to harm Paige and Payton. Payton is one of Paige’s close friends and Luc had a real thing for her. They’re married now and expecting their first child. They are happy, kind, wonderful people. Paige and Carrie have both married. They're happy. But…"
"Go on. How did Paige get the boy?" Rafe didn’t want to be curious about these people, but he found he couldn’t help it. She cared about the people she was talking about. It was obvious. And hell, he just wanted her to be there for a while longer. The house didn’t seem quite as big and empty with Jillian there. Nor as monochromatic—Jillian Beck brought color, that was for certain.
"Ari was abducted by the man working for the one responsible for paralyzing my sister Mel. The man who took Ari kept her for three days, Rafe. He didn't hurt her; he was protecting her, thank goodness. But he kept her locked up and alone for three days. The man who planned it all became angry because he couldn't find Ari so he went after Simon. He was planning to kill them all. To get to Simon, he killed your biological mother. After that, Simon went to live in St. Louis with Paige. She and her husband finalized the adoption a few months ago.”
Rafe sat the soda down on the counter and stared at her as what she said sank in. He appreciated her matter-of-fact tone. He hadn't known the details of what happened to his biological mother; he hadn't wanted to. The woman had sold him—and apparently a few other kids, besides. But what he had heard sickened him. Simon didn’t deserve that kind of horror in his life. “Did he hurt Simon?"
Serious light brown eyes met his. There was a pain there he understood. Nightmares. "Yes. Simon got away, while his mother was dying. But that didn't stop it. Simon was with a federal agent in St. Louis when they were run off the road. The agent was stabbed repeatedly and barely survived. Simon was taken. Paige and her husband rescued him. He's healing. Receiving the best counseling available. Paige's mother-in-law was one of the top child psychiatrists in the world. She’s retired. Simon is her grandson now; he's going to be okay. He’s happy, now, too. Paige and Mick, and Luc and Payton, are making sure of it."
"And Ari?" It was her he cared about, that little sister he didn’t want who had a way of reaching into a guy’s heart and twisting it.
He’d watched her some over the last month. She was just as sweet as everyone said. The idea of some nameless, faceless bastard locking her away for three days infuriated him.
Jillian suddenly smiled. Rafe was getting used to the power of her smile, at least. It still made him want to make her smile again and again. Which was ridiculous. When a man started thinking of a woman that way, he could lose sight of what he truly wanted.
"The man didn't hurt her, Rafe. He was older and he had daughters her age. He genuinely took her to protect her. He worked with Paige and knew Paige could take care of herself. He just w
anted to protect Ari. And he did. But the experience changed her. Shook her perception of the world. She’d been sheltered quite a bit. Ari had a great future as a concert violinist until it happened. Once it did, she wanted to help others. She transferred to Finley Creek's main campus. Once we realized that we already knew each other—we’d met in St. Louis, shortly after Mel was shot and Ari met Paige—we became good friends. At the time, Mel was staying in St. Louis at Luc's, recuperating from what had happened to her. She lived with him and Payton for almost five months. I won’t ever forget that they were there for her when she needed them. Or back at Thanksgiving—we went to them to stay safe. And Luc protected all of us. Lacy, too. We’re connected, my family and yours. They're good people. Some of the best I've ever known. If you give them a chance, I don't think you'll regret it. I certainly don't regret having Carrie in my life now. Once you lose part of your family, there's a wound there. A wound that won’t heal. It's easy to close yourself off, if you let yourself."
Rafe just stared at her.
His home was open concept, the primary colors were white and gray with black accents. It was modern and minimalistic just like he liked it.
Jillian was red and yellow and blue and pink and perfect in the center of his home.
She had a way of drawing the eye. And in that moment, if she'd asked him to dance naked on the marble countertop he might have seriously considered it. "I'll go. I'm not making any promises. I don't want any more family than what I've got. Travis and Marcus. That's all I have room for."
"Chance told me about your adoptive parents. I'm sorry they treated you that way. They shouldn't have."
"I've long since stopped being bothered by them. They are my parents for appearance’s sake, legal sake, and we leave it at that. My father has been gone for several years. But my mother is still living. I haven't seen her in two years. She lives near Barrattville in the home we grew up in." His adoptive mother had sent him messages through Marcus since his return to Finley Creek, but Rafe hadn’t bothered returning them. He’d spent years without contact with her. He didn’t need it—nor did he want it.
They heard honking from the road in front of their houses. She turned toward the windows of the living room. They were large, floor-to-ceiling, and tinted, allowing light to pass through but not much more than shadows to be seen from the streets. The built-in window blinds were up. Rafe liked the sun. Especially in the morning light. Jillian stepped closer to the glass as the light almost haloed around her.
Little she-devil drew the light, didn’t she? Everywhere she was, she drew the light.
That was one of the things that drew him.
She looked over her shoulder at him. "They're here. Luc always arrives in style. He likes to try to show up Houghton whenever he can. They've known each other for years; been rivals and friends for just as long. The two of them can be total idiots sometimes though."
She was right. There were connections to her. Her family seemed to be weaving itself around his, both adoptive and biological, tighter than anything he ever would have expected. Or wanted.
It was up to him where his place in it would be. Rafe wasn't certain he knew; he'd been searching for years to find that out for himself, with just Marcus and Travis and their mother. Now he had a second family to worry about? Rafe didn’t know if he could do it, let alone if he wanted to. "So why were they looking for Denise Daviess’ children?"
"Ari and Simon. Ari never met her birth mother, Rafe. She was raised by her biological father and her stepmother. They are good people. And they love her very, very much. Simon… Simon is extremely bright, and he managed to hack some databases that he shouldn't have a couple of years ago. He found birth records. He was looking for someone he was related to other than his mother because she was abusive and he needed some way to escape. He asked Ari if he could live with her and she was trying to make it happen. She was willing to change her whole life for that kid. Before all that other stuff happened. He found a dozen birth certificates of children that were his half-siblings. She trafficked them, Rafe. She sold Luc over and over again to monsters to feed her drug habit. When she sold him and Paige to perverts when Paige was only three, Luc went to social services himself. Got himself and Paige out. There were three or four possibly more children born in between him and Paige. You were one of them."
“A quarter of a million for a healthy baby boy. That's how much Marcus’ mother paid for me when I was four days old; you're not telling me anything new here. Just the sheer number." He’d been bought for his mother, and no one in his family had been allowed to forget it. Like an annoying pet they’d regretted.
"Well, there are more of you out there. And there are at least one or two that are still minors. Simon was the youngest. But there was one a year or two older and then another year or two older than that one. Luc and Paige are looking for those children, to make sure they are happy and safe and protected. And not going through the hells that they went through. And it's for Simon that they are making the connections. He needs to see that just because his mother was not a good person, that doesn't mean that he is cursed to be just like her. He needs to see those of you who have succeeded in life. Like you, for instance. It's for him, and Paige's son Mikey, that they are looking so hard. But it's up to you how much of a connection you want to have. Even Ari worries that she is like her mother. Even though she is the kindest, gentlest, sweetest soul I have ever met. So, it's for her, too.” Her voice had turned so sad as she’d spoken of the pains these people she cared about had gone through. She hurt for them. Because she loved them, this family that he didn’t really want. “She had a stepmother when she was younger who liked to point out that she looked just like her birth mother, so she must be just like her. Ari’s father divorced that woman when Ari was eight or so, but she left an impression on Ari. Hurt her."
Rafe stepped up behind her and put his hands on her shoulders as they stared out the window. Those yellow and blue straps tickled his palms. And he wanted to hold tight.
Instead he just looked over her head out the glass at the large group of people pouring out of the stretch limousine that barely fit on their block. He saw a redhead, and he saw a lot of others that he knew were more closely related to him than the two brothers he had loved his entire life. Sudden nerves hit him straight in the gut, and his hands tightened on the woman in front of him reflexively.
59
Hell, Jillian thought, as she felt his warmth pressed up against her back. She understood why he wouldn't necessarily want to make a connection with the birth family crowding on her front porch right now.
What she had told him was a lot for anyone to take in. The things his birth family had gone through just in recent years was more than any family should have to go through ever.
Take in the fact that his adoptive parents hadn't made him feel loved, the knowledge that his biological mother had sold him, why should he want to get involved with strangers that he didn't know? She wouldn't.
No reasonable person would.
She was starting to feel compassion towards Rafael Holden-Deane. Talk about a complete one-eighty. "I'll go with you, you know. And if they try to bite, well, I'll protect you." She looked up and behind to where he stood. Close. He was right there behind her, tall and strong. Damn it. When he wasn’t growling at her, she almost forgot she didn’t like him.
He was a good foot and two inches taller than she was. She had never been more aware of that than she was in the moment. She could smell him around her, could feel him around her, and the swirl of emotions went straight through her.
Emotions where he was concerned.
He laughed and spread his fingers over her shoulders. Jillian’s skin tightened as a thrill of heat went straight through her.
"I'm going to hold you to that. You may be small, but you are certainly fierce." His fingers tightened.
"I'm not that small, you know. I'm a little shorter than average, but I think it's just because everyone around me is at least thre
e or four inches taller. Except for Lacy; she's only an inch or two taller, you know. I've always been the smallest Beck. Even my cousins are taller. It’s...irritating."
"Temperament aside, you have to know that you're a very beautiful woman. Even if you are smaller. And mean. It doesn’t hide the fact that people look at you. Half the men at the hospital have looked and liked. I look at you. Even when I don’t want to."
"Yeah, I'm small and mean. You’re large and cranky. Not much room for you to talk.” She stepped to the side slightly, fighting the stupid urge to move the other way. To move closer. “I need to get back over there. I'm in charge of feeding this crowd. I have a lot to do today. We’re eating at one, if you'd like to get dressed, and join us. There's plenty of room for you there. And I mean that. You and I might not always get along, I think we can both agree to that. But… I'm not going to slam the door in your face again. However, next time you act like an ass to Ari, I am going to throw you in the pool again. Just be forewarned."
She liked the sound of his laughter behind her as she slipped out the front door. Jillian was smiling when she joined her family and his in her own front yard.
Yes, a truce had been drawn between her and her arch nemesis. Now it was up to her to just make it last.
60
Ari was rocking her nephew Mikey when Jillian appeared, Dr. Holden-Deane a few moments behind her. Ari studied her friend's face quickly. Jillian didn't look upset. She was almost smiling. Which was good. That meant Jillian and Ari's brother had not been arguing again.
The two of them would probably never get along.
He terrified Ari. Not just because of his size, but the way he glared at her all the time.
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