Need You for Always (Heroes of St. Helena)

by Adair, Marina

  He held up a silencing finger. Beep.

  Emerson had a finger of her own to hold up, but since she was working, she refrained.

  “Hey, Emi,” he said into the phone, charm and swagger dialed to full. “Wanted to let you know that I had an amazing time the other night—”

  “Five months and nine days ago.”

  He flashed her a do you mind, I’m busy here look. “I’m in town for a bit and I’d love to see you. Say grab a drink, maybe after you get off work? I know the perfect place, coconut shells welcomed.”

  Then he ended the call, slid the phone into his back pocket, and smiled. “You were saying?”

  “You’re infuriating.”

  He shrugged as though he’d been called worse, then slipped a twenty into the cash box and took a lei, a pink one, and held it out for her. She rolled her eyes.

  “Now slip this flower necklace around my neck so I can go get us a drink.”

  “There is no us.”

  “If you say so.”

  “I say so.” But she didn’t sound all that convinced. Maybe it was because as she said it she swayed closer. “And I’m not going on a date with you.”

  Dax held out the lei and wiggled it at Emerson. When she crossed her arms and shook her head, he slid the lei over his head and winked. “Who said anything about a date?”

  Normally, Dax wasn’t all that big on actively engaging the unexpected. They were called unidentified threats for a reason in his line of work—former line of work, he had to keep reminding himself, now that his career as an army Ranger was unexpectedly over. But after a month of bed rest and three weeks of dragging his sorry ass out of bed, working out until he passed out, working out some more, then crashing only to start all over again the next day, the unexpected was looking pretty tempting.

  Especially since Emerson’s coconut shells and wisps of dyed straw did little to camouflage the lethal bod beneath. And that mouth. Man, that mouth was sharp and smart and, if memory served correctly, so talented it should be registered as the eighth wonder of the world.

  And his memory about her mouth and that night was photographic. Sparring with Emerson was like walking into hostile territory. It put him on edge, pumped him full of adrenaline, and had him jonesing to gear up for some hand-to-hand combat.

  Full-body combat with Emerson, yeah, he remembered that too. Every second. The way her skin tasted, how she gave that breathy little sigh when he got it right, which made him want to get it right over and over. And over again. He especially remembered how, for such a small thing, she liked to talk a big game during sex—often and dirty. His personal favorite was when she ordered him around.

  Fifteen years in the army had taught Dax how to take an order and, in more recent years as squad leader of a highly trained and elite team of soldiers, how to issue them. But never in his life had he been turned on by a direct command.

  Move those hands any slower, Ranger, and I’ll make you drop to your knees and give me twenty. And I’m not talking about pushups.

  Dax found his gaze dropping to Emerson’s hands and felt his lips curl up again into what he was pretty sure was a smile. It felt odd because he hadn’t used those muscles much since being back stateside—awkward and a little rusty, but damn good.

  “Oh no,” she said, pointing to his mouth, her voice taking on that feisty edge he loved. He hadn’t known her all that well growing up—she was a few years behind him in school—but he’d heard enough to know she had bite. “Aim that somewhere else. As I said, there will be no date, no repeat of that night, and absolutely no talking about it.”

  “But I love it when you talk.”

  She opened her mouth to argue, and when he gave those feisty lips all of his undivided attention, she closed it. Then pulled out her cell, her fingers swiping furiously across the screen. With a satisfied huff she stuck it back between her coconuts, and a second later his phone buzzed.

  Not Interested in what you’re selling.

  He did a little swiping of his own. Hit Send, making her dig between those pretty shells.

  Your coconuts say differently.

  She looked down at her shells, perfectly in place, and scowled. He slid her another wink designed to rile her, and mission accomplished. Her eyes narrowed, her nostrils flared a little, and she got an intense expression that looked really similar to the expression she wore just before she exploded.

  She leaned in, providing him an inspiring view of her coconuts, and with a quiet steel to her voice, said, “You, me, Johnnie, and Jack in San Francisco. It was a fun escape.” He’d call it a hell of a lot more than fun but decided now was not the time to argue. “You and me here in St. Helena? Surrounded by the gossip mill, our crazy families, and, well, life? That sounds . . .” She shivered—and not in a good way. “Suffocating.”

  “More complicated maybe, but I wouldn’t say suffocating.” Although thinking about sex with Emerson had his chest acting strangely.

  “Complicated defeats the purpose,” she said. “So let’s agree that it was epic—”

  “Epic, huh?”

  “—and go back to being two people who happened to grow up in the same town.”

  “Two people who grew up in the same town.” He tried that out, then looked at her mouth and shook his head. “Won’t work. I’ve seen that cute tattoo on your a—”

  She pressed her hand to his mouth and looked around. “Well, make it work, because no one in town knows what my tattoo looks like, and I like it that way. So as long as you are here, and gossip is still the town’s leading commodity, this”—she dropped her hand to flap it between them—“is never going to happen.”

  When put that way, Dax saw her point. No strings only worked when there was nothing tying them to more than a casual, fun, and fuck-yeah kind of party—a hard thing to accomplish when surrounded by a shared past.

  And Dax treated ties the same way he treated unidentified threats: avoid if at all possible, but if forced to engage, proceed with caution, use the appropriate level of force, get crafty when things get sketchy, and if all else fails, pop smoke.

  Hands down, this was a pop-smoke kind of situation. But he’d always had a hard time walking away from a challenge—especially one with a smart mouth. So he closed the rest of the distance, pressed his lips to her ear, and whispered, “Never is a long time, Emi.”

  Satisfied when he heard her breath catch, he gave her a parting wink and headed toward the bar on the other side of the room, a thousand and one WTF questions going through his head. He’d only agreed to recuperate at home because, one, St. Helena Hospital had one of the top orthopedic specialists in the state, and, two, if he hadn’t come home, his family would have come to him. Sharing the occasional meal on his terms seemed a hell of a lot easier than sharing bunk space with his two brothers.

  He’d also agreed because he had a plan. A good one. Get in, get better, and get out—avoiding as many firefights as possible. The plan was working. His blown-out knee was still tender but healing, and he had a potential job lined up that would take him far enough away so that he could process the last few years without one of his eight hundred relatives asking what was wrong. Or one more little old lady dropping off another casserole. He wouldn’t be working special ops in the military anymore, but he’d be engaging bad guys nonetheless. As long as his doctor signed off, which he’d make sure would happen, he was pretty sure the position was his. So a distraction right then probably wasn’t smart, seeing as last time he’d been stupid enough to get distracted he’d ended up with a hunk of shrapnel in his leg.

  Sure, the shattered kneecap still hurt like a bitch and the images were tattooed on the insides of his eyelids, but at least he’d come home. Others weren’t as lucky. So in honor of buddies who’d never get that chance, guys who deserved it more than he did, he’d set up post in St. Helena. Not forever. Jesus, he couldn’t take forever in a town that spewed sunshine and rainbows, but long enough to get back on his feet, so to speak, stuck for the next month in a
house he’d sublet—spitting distance from one brother and hollering distance from the other. Not to mention the myriad of other relatives who also called St. Helena home.

  Dax spotted his brother Adam over by the bar. Being an elite smoke jumper for the Napa County Fire Department, Adam was a hero in his own right, but not a soldier—past or present. Didn’t stop him from holding up the bar like he owned the place, though.

  “I didn’t know you were coming,” Dax said.

  “Wasn’t. Then I heard you were coming.” Adam was usually the most laid-back of the brothers, but tonight he looked like a force of nature in his SHFD T-shirt and his ball cap pulled low. “On your bike.”

  On an expired license went unsaid, because they both knew Dax hadn’t been stateside long enough to renew it. “It was just a few blocks.”

  “Explain that to Jonah. Because last he knew I was your ride today, then he gets a call that you were spotted driving your motorcycle with a jacked-up knee down Main Street.”

  Two minutes and he already had a headache. “How did he know?”

  “Nora Kincaid posted it on the town’s Facebook page. It’s under her Damn Fine Vintage album if you want to check it out.”

  Dax blew out a breath. He shouldn’t have asked. Nosy Nora had been perched outside his stoop since he got home, trying to catch a picture of the missing Baudouin brother. Keeping a secret from leaking in St. Helena was like trying to stop Niagara Falls with a tampon.

  “Is he pissed?” Dax asked.

  Jonah was the biggest tight-ass of the group. Loved every letter of the law. All that black-and-white text really revved his engine. Not a surprise since he was also the oldest and acted like he carried the entire universe on his shoulders. Yup, the local sheriff was big, badass, and when packing that brother-knows-best attitude, could be intimidating. And irritating as hell.

  He was also one of the best men Dax knew. Honest, tough, loyal, and a man who got things done. Jonah could find gold in a shitstorm, herd feral cats, and swim through land. He was that good.

  “Called me nine times. When I didn’t answer he came over waving his phone, acting like I’m your keeper. Interrupted the best nap I’ve had in weeks.” The way his brother’s hair was tucked messily under his cap and the relaxed, just-been-laid stance he had going on told Dax that his nap was done in tandem. “Said he’d arrest you next time.”

  “What did he expect me to do? Take the senior shuttle?”

  “Be smart enough to know that nothing good will come of you driving that bike with your knee. Or, I don’t know, you could always call someone who owns a car and ask for a ride,” Adam suggested.

  “Jonah’s on duty, it’s your day off, and based on your T-shirt being inside out, you were otherwise occupied.” Dax shouldered his way past Adam to order a beer. He might be the baby of the brothers, but he had three inches and thirty pounds on the both of them.

  “And yet I’m still here,” Adam said, giving the bartender a nod. “Next time call Shay. She’s all smiles when she gets to help someone in need.”

  “Yeah,” Dax said, running a hand down his neck. How did one go about explaining that his brother’s wife was kind of crazy? Pretty as hell, sweet, funny, perfect for Jonah, but crazy as hell when it came to her animals. “Did that. I ended up going to PT with a Shetland pony on my lap. On the return I got stuck with a flock of geese who were left behind in the migration. I got suckered into goose-sitting for two days. Two days of honking and feathers, bro.”

  Now it was Adam’s turn to run a hand down his face, only he was hiding a stupid grin. “It’s called a gaggle, and I heard the mama has a thing for pecking at the boys.”

  She also had a thing for sneaking up on him when he was in the shower—and his boys weren’t covered. “Which is why I came alone. Mr. Fallon is in town, he wanted to meet me in person, but I didn’t want to show up covered in feathers or holding a bag of frozen peas.”

  Mickey Fallon was the former chief of the San Francisco Police Department and an old army buddy of Dax’s commanding officer, who was also at the party. Three years ago, Fallon had been asked to head up a security company in Silicon Valley that provided elite detail teams for private sector businesses, so when he’d e-mailed Dax and asked if he wanted to meet up for a beer, Dax had jumped at the chance. He was more than qualified for the position, but he was the only outsider in the running, and if he wanted his transition into civilian life to go as smoothly as possible, then having Fallon’s blessing would go a long way toward securing this job.

  “Well, you can meet him holding this,” Adam said, trading the bartender a bill for a drink. It was tall, fruity looking, prissy as hell, and had one of those umbrellas sticking out of the top. And it was pink—the umbrella and the drink.

  “What the hell is this?”

  “You in a glass.” Adam took the cold draft off the tray, clinked rims, then took a long swallow. “Now, if you want one of these,” he said, holding up the beer, “you need to man up.” When Dax didn’t make a move for the glass, Adam went serious. “You applied for a job with Jonah’s former boss. And you didn’t say a word. To me or Jonah. We want to hear these things from you, not the grapevine. It sucks having to pretend we know what the hell’s going on in our own family.”

  This was not the conversation Dax wanted to have tonight. “Because I’m still in the application process.” And because he didn’t want to spend the next five weeks defending his decision to live a good two hours from home and his family.

  “We knew that convincing you to stay for the long term was a pipe dream, but to apply with Jonah’s friend for a job that would take you to San Jose and not say a word?” Adam shook his head, which made Dax feel like he was ten all over again.

  “This isn’t a for-sure thing,” Dax explained. “And I knew if I told you guys I was applying, Jonah would want to hook me up. Help out. And I didn’t want his name to sway the decision.”

  Jonah hadn’t always been a small-town sheriff. Prior to working in the sheriff’s department, Dax’s older brother had been one of the top detectives at SFPD. He was respected, admired by everyone he talked to, and a real honest-to-God hero. If Dax wanted those kinds of expectations hanging over his head, he would have stayed here in St. Helena. “I wanted to get it on my own merit.”

  So that there wouldn’t be any misconceptions about exactly who they were hiring. Dax was good at his job—better than good. He had been one of the best snipers in the army and had no doubt he could out-shoot, out-train, and out-strategize any of the competition. It was when he wasn’t combat ready that he fell short.

  Both of his brothers had a charisma about them. Baudouin charm, as his stepmom called it. A way of making people feel safe, involved. Making people want to be better, do more just from being in their presence, which made them powerful leaders. Dax didn’t have that.

  Didn’t want it.

  By nature, snipers clung to the shadows, a position that fit Dax’s personality well and had earned him the name Wolf. He liked being a part of a team, liked the rush of a mission, but didn’t want the responsibility again that came with being a squad leader or looking through the scope of the gun and being the one to decide if he pulled the trigger. Nope, this time around, he wanted to do his job, do it well, then be able to clock out and go home without fear of closing his eyes.

  Simple, straightforward, clean-cut.

  “Too bad for you, Fallon had dinner with Jonah,” Adam said, and Dax’s stomach knotted. “And it looks like they’re headed this way.”

  Dax turned to look at the entrance, disappointed he couldn’t catch a glimpse of Emerson through the door. Just his luck, he could see his big brother leading the former chief right toward him. Chest puffed out, superhero complex in full effect, Jonah walked right over and gave Dax a hug. It was a handshake/bro-hug combo that was a little heavy on the back smack part.

  “You made it,” Jonah said as though this were his meeting. “Dax, this is Mickey Fallon. Mickey, this is my brother Dax.
And like I was saying, you couldn’t ask for a better addition to your team.”

  Fallon reached out a hand. “After spending the day with Jonah here, I’m starting to realize that a Baudouin is just what our team needs.”

  Emerson wasn’t much for sweating the little things. She’d long ago learned that stressing over variables she couldn’t change was a big energy suck. It also clashed with her tough-girl persona. But with fifty pounds of shaved lamb shank and an entire day’s profit hinging on a faulty heating system, she felt the first bead of perspiration slide between her breasts.

  Today she’d set up her cart in front of town hall to attract the tourists who were in town for Crush, wine country’s harvest season. The big clock above the pillars of town hall told her she had fifteen minutes until Twofer Tuesday began, and with her own twist on her mom’s famous lamb gyros, she wasn’t surprised by the line of hungry customers roughing the harsh wind, waiting for her to open.

  With one last attempt at relighting the pilot light, which failed the second the wind passed through the duct, Emerson slammed the access panel. Telling herself it would take more than a temperamental starter to take her down, she raced down Main Street toward Cork’d N Dipped.

  “Sterno,” Emerson announced as she pushed through the wooden door. “Where did you store the big ones I ordered last month?”

  “Used them to keep the hot buttered wine steaming last weekend,” Ida Beamon said from beneath a display of chocolate plantains. “But I think I have some of the fondue size left.”

  Ida had frosted hair, violet bifocals, and was wearing enough pink feathers on her shirt to be confused for a flock of flamingoes. She was also the owner of St. Helena’s only wine and chocolate bar—and most likely the artist behind the dipped plantains.

  “Those will do.” They’d have to. She was desperate, not a new feeling for her, and with the clock ticking, it was time to get creative.