by Lori Foster
“Jacki,” Cam warned, without interrupting her coffee preparations. “I’ll tell Aunt Lorna. Don’t worry about that now.”
“Sure, but what will you tell her?” Jacki slouched lower in her seat. “She’s going to wonder why the prodigal son has returned.” She turned to look at Cam. “I take it you invited him?”
“Yes.”
“Of course you did.” She turned back to Dean. “And you accepted the invitation, obviously. But why? Did we find out we have money after all and no one told me?”
Cam froze.
Even Eve felt shock at such a blatant dig. Jacki was always outrageous, deliberately so, but that was over-the-top sarcastic, even for her.
Dean didn’t even flinch. “Prodigal? Not quite.”
“Huh.” She raised her eyebrows. “And the money?”
“You wanna compare bank accounts?” He did a quick once-over of the old appliances in the kitchen, the faded wallpaper, and the marred countertops. “I’m pretty sure I’d come out ahead.”
“Really? So I’ve got a well-to-do brother. Better and better. But that doesn’t explain why you’re here. Aunt Lorna always said we’d never see you.”
Something snagged around his heart. “Did she ever tell you why?”
“Yeah.” In a high-pitched, phony voice, Jacki said, “Men are all no-account bastards who only care about themselves.”
“That’s enough, Jacki.” Cam finished the coffee preparations with haste. “Put the claws away right now.”
Jacki grinned. “I sounded just like her, didn’t I?”
Eve started to say yes, but Cam said, “No, you did not. You sound like an ill-behaved child. Now knock it off.”
“Yes, Mama.”
Dean laughed.
It relieved Eve that he hadn’t taken offense, but Jacki appeared more confused than ever at his sign of humor.
“What’s funny?” She propped both elbows on the tabletop. “Or do I even want to know?”
“You’re trying a little too hard, that’s all.”
Eve noticed Dean’s relaxed smile and the gentleness of his eyes. He really was a devastating man in many ways.
“And if you’re not careful,” he unwisely continued, “those skinny shoulders are going to break under the weight of that gigantic chip you’re carrying.”
Uh-oh. Of all the insults Dean could have dished, calling any part of Jacki skinny probably hurt her the most. Eve waited for the fireworks. They weren’t long in coming.
Jacki shoved out of her chair. “Hey, I changed my mind about the coffee.” She saluted Dean, bowed at Cam. “I’m going to go shower and dress.”
Cam took a rigid stance. “I wanted us all to get acquainted.”
“I already have plans with friends.” And with that, Jacki stalked out.
Cam offered a hasty apology. “I’m so sorry, Dean. She’s not at her best in the morning.”
“She’s hungover. That can make anyone grumpy.”
“Jacki doesn’t drink.”
It was beyond obvious that she’d tied one on the night before, but Dean didn’t debate the point with her.
Eve appreciated his restraint.
“If you’ll just excuse me, I’ll…” Cam’s voice trailed off, and she dashed after her sister.
“Way to go,” Eve told him, as she watched Cam’s exit. “You managed to trip right into the thick of things. Real estate, drinking, and female figures—you touched on all the hottest Conor family topics.”
She could almost feel sorry for Dean, being this had to be awkward for him. But as she brought her gaze to his, she didn’t see discomfort at the turn of events.
No, she saw a sudden inferno of heat. And intention. “Uh…”
He pushed out of his chair and stepped around the table toward her.
Eve’s heart shot into her throat. “What are you doing?”
With one hand braced flat on the table and the other on the back of her chair, he closed her in. “I’m going to kiss you.”
The way he said that, with his voice so rich and deep, made her shiver. “Not a good idea.”
He stared at her mouth. “It’s a great idea, and you know it.” As he leaned down more, he murmured, “You said it yourself. Things clicked last night.”
“Last night I didn’t know you were Cam’s—”
His mouth settled over hers, warm and firm, and oh-so-delicious. She sank like a dead weight.
When his tongue licked into her mouth, she welcomed it with her own. A rumbling groan vibrated up from deep inside her, and he moved away a scant inch to look at her with those golden brown eyes.
Oh boy. If only he’d left the reflective sunglasses on, this would be easier. Eve sighed and, sounding breathless, whispered, “Don’t you dare start something you can’t finish.”
Awareness flared in his eyes. “Trust me, honey, I can finish it.”
Lord help her. “Right.” Eve cleared her throat—and held him back when he would have kissed her again. “I’m pretty sure you can. But you see…I have to leave in twenty minutes. I’m meeting a prospective client.”
“Have dinner with me tonight.”
She shook her head. “That’s impossible. You just met your sisters. Surely they want—”
“I want you. The sooner the better.”
He certainly knew how to make a point. “Be fair, Dean. What if Cam is already making plans? I’m her best friend. I can’t infringe on that.”
“I’ll spend the day with her until dinner.”
“She has to work, too.” Seeing that he wasn’t about to give up, and knowing she didn’t even really want him to, Eve thought fast. “I’m having dinner with my folks. But afterward…” Her voiced dropped off as his hand curved around her neck. His fingertips teased along her sensitive nape.
“Give me an address and a time.” His voice went low and gruff and his lips lightly touched hers. “I’ll be there.”
Given how she felt now, all hot and trembling, she’d never survive until then. If she didn’t love her parents so much, she’d cancel on them. “Eight o’clock?”
After one small nod, he took her mouth again, and somehow, in the next few seconds, she ended up standing and pressed against his hard body. One hand still clasped her neck, keeping her in close, and the other coasted down her back to cup around her behind. He stroked, squeezed, then groaned softly.
“God, you have a great ass.”
Using his hold on her there, he snuggled her up close against his lower body. Eve caught her breath. The man was solid muscle, sizzling heat, and restrained power. Pressed against him so tightly, she felt every inch of him, and got a tantalizing glimpse of how it’d be.
She would have groaned, too, but he didn’t give her a chance. Suddenly, through no effort of her own, she was back in her seat, confused and cold, and he was in his, looking bored.
What in the world…
Cam strode back in. She had her mouth open to say something, but she looked at Eve and snapped her teeth together. Drawing to a halt in the middle of the kitchen floor, she looked at them both suspiciously.
Eve knew she should say something, but all she managed was a smile that she knew came off rather guilty and insincere. How had Dean heard Cam’s approach? She’d been only aware of him, of his taste and muscular frame and hot, stirring scent.
“Everything okay?” Cam asked.
Dean answered for her, saving her from trying to find her voice. “I take it Jacki was unaware of the letter you sent me?”
Now Cam flushed. “Yes. I’m sorry. The only one who knew was Eve.”
Grateful for a neutral topic, Eve jumped in. “But I didn’t put it together when you showed up at the bar last night. Cam wrote that letter a while ago.”
“And you didn’t tell Lorna about it?”
Cam shook her head.
“Because she never wanted you to contact me.”
Cam shared a look with Eve. Wishing she could reassure her friend, Eve smiled. “Lorna never talked
about you, Dean. Cam was so young when you left—”
“When I was taken away.”
Cam seemed frozen, unable to respond.
Eve, however, had no such problems. “What do you mean?”
“I didn’t leave on my own. Hell, I was only a kid. I had no choice in the matter. Grover took me because Lorna refused to have all three of us.”
Cam shook her head. “No, that can’t be right.”
“How do you know, if Lorna never spoke of me?”
Blindly Cam groped for a chair. “But…you see, I barely remembered you.”
“You mean you quickly forgot about me.”
Dean said that without any emotion at all, but still Eve winced. What awful misconceptions did he have? Probably none worse than Cam’s.
Shaking her head, Cam reached for his hands and squeezed tight. “I’m sorry, Dean, but I was only two. Still a baby. So much happened, our parents dying, the funeral, friends and neighbors coming and going. Everything was strange and different. You were just…gone, like Mom and Dad, and Lorna made a point of not talking about you.”
Watching Dean, Eve saw the tightening of his jaw and the telling way he eased his hands from Cam’s grip, as if he couldn’t quite bear to be touched while discussing this particular topic.
They were both hurting so much, Eve wished for a way to help them.
Cam drew a calming breath. “When I was sixteen I found some old albums in the attic.” Her smile flickered and was gone. “There were photos of you holding Jacki and me, playing with us, spraying me with a garden hose, and kissing Jacki’s head….”
“We were siblings. Things like that happened.” Dean looked more remote than ever. “What’s your point?”
“I was curious about you, so I asked Lorna. It upset her that I found the album, and I realized then that I never saw photos of us before our parents died. There were pictures taken after that, mostly by friends or neighbors, but there weren’t any of me as a baby and none of Jacki as a newborn. And…none of you at all.”
“I guess when she got rid of me, she got rid of every trace of me, too.” He narrowed his eyes. “What about our parents? Have you seen photos of them?”
Cam shook her head. “Not many. At least, not before I found that album.”
Dean smirked. “If Lorna had known that album existed, she’d have thrown it out, too.”
Cam stared at nothing in particular, lost in her confusion. When she looked at Dean, her need to understand was plain. “You’re saying she never intended for Jacki or me to know about you. We’d have grown up as sisters, unaware that we had a big brother, too.”
“That’s obvious, isn’t it?”
“But…” Cam frowned hard. “I don’t understand why she’d do that.”
“She didn’t want any reminders, I guess.”
And, Eve thought, Cam would have grown up sensing that something was missing from her life, without knowing what. For a certainty, Lorna never would have told her.
Seeing the stark pain on Cam’s face, Eve knew her friend had already realized it, too.
As if trying to soften the blow, Dean told her, “I have pictures if you’re curious about our parents.”
Cam stared at him. “I’m curious about you. I want to understand all this. I want to know you.”
Dean’s jaw tightened. “If you want,” he continued, ignoring Cam’s plea, “I can get them sent here. Or I can make you copies.”
Confusion shone in Cam’s expression. “How is it that you have photos when I don’t have any?”
“When Grover took me, he also took two albums and some of the framed pictures that were sitting around.” Dean tugged at his ear. “He didn’t steal them or anything. Lorna didn’t want them.”
“She told him that?”
He shrugged. “Grover said because it’d be a painful reminder to you and Jacki of what you’d lost.”
With an absent nod, Cam accepted that explanation. “I suppose that could have been her motivation.”
“Maybe.”
Straightening with new resolve, Cam again took his hands. “She didn’t lie to me, Dean. When I asked her about you, she told me you were my brother. But she said you wanted to go with Grover. She said you wanted the adventure….”
“Then she did lie, didn’t she?”
At Dean’s statement, Cam looked so lost, so wounded, that Eve put her arm around her. Dean made note of the gesture and looked away from them both.
“Do you really think,” he said, “that at eight years old, after just losing both my parents, I wanted to leave everything that was familiar to me? My friends, my belongings? You really think I wanted to leave my life?” He turned back to Cam. “Lorna lied to you.”
Dean’s voice never wavered; it didn’t go higher or deeper. He’d carefully, and skillfully, masked his expression—except that Eve read the truth and hurt in his eyes, even if Cam didn’t.
“Why would Lorna do that?” Eve asked. It didn’t make any sense.
“Like I said, I was just a kid.” Dean nodded at Cam. “But Grover talked about you and Jacki all the time, almost as much as he talked about Lorna. So I have my theories.”
Eve decided it was a good time to get on her way. After giving Cam’s shoulders another squeeze, she rose from the table. “You two need to talk, and I need to go home and get ready for a meeting. I’m running late as it is.”
Dean stood when she did. “I’ll walk you out.”
With Cam sitting there looking wounded and unsure of herself and her life? Eve shook her head. “No. That’s okay.”
“I still need your address.”
Well. That certainly distracted Cam. She watched them with keen interest, and Eve almost blushed. “Right.” As familiar in Cam’s home as she was her own, Eve went to a drawer and pulled out a pen and paper to scrawl down her information. “Here you go. I put my cell number down, too, in case you need it.” Maybe to cancel on her, if things smoothed out with his sisters.
Cam looked from one of them to the other. “You two are going out?”
“Yes,” Dean said.
“No,” Eve corrected. She walked over to the door and slipped her feet into a pair of thongs. “I mean, maybe, but not until later and not if it interferes with your plans. I know you and Dean have a lot of catching up to do.” She gave Dean a meaningful look. “I don’t want to get in the way of that.”
Dean stared right back at her. “I’m seeing her tonight. Isn’t that right, Eve?”
“Not,” she said, making her tone firm, “if Cam has other plans.”
“Umm…” Cam bit her lip. “I was hoping you’d have dinner with us, Dean. And Eve, of course you’re invited if you want to—”
Eve shook her head. “I’ve already got dinner plans.”
Finally Dean turned to Cam. “I need to get going, too. There are some things I have to take care of today. But I’d like to see a little more of the town, so why don’t I take you out to dinner tonight? Jacki, too, of course. Can you suggest some place nice?”
Relief loosened Cam’s shoulders. “That’d be great, if you don’t mind eating early. I have to be at work at seven.”
He glanced at his watch. “I could pick you up at four-thirty.”
“Perfect.”
“Will Jacki make it?”
Cam’s eyes narrowed. “She’ll be there.”
“Well.” Eve opened the patio doors. “I guess I’ll be on my way.”
Dean reached for her elbow. Eve noticed that, unlike Roger, his hold wasn’t tight. But somehow she was far more aware of Dean’s touch than she’d ever been of Roger’s.
“I’m walking you out,” he said.
“No.” She nodded toward Cam, hoping he’d get the message. “That’s not necessary.”
“Yeah, it is.”
Eve tugged experimentally, but while Dean’s hold wasn’t abusive, it was unbreakable.
“I was ready to go anyway.” He picked up his sunglasses and nodded at Cam. “Thanks for the d
rink. I’ll see you in a few hours.”
Cam hesitated, uncertain, then she launched herself at Dean. He released Eve while being choked with Cam’s warm affections.
“I’m so glad you’re here,” she told him. “Somehow we’ll work all this out.”
Eve noted Dean’s lack of participation; he didn’t hug Cam back. No, he just suffered the embrace, cold and distant. Not that Cam seemed to notice. She stepped back, smiling, happy, and hopeful. “See you tonight.”
Dean nodded, and as if grateful for a reason to escape, he said, “I don’t want to make Eve late. See you later.”
DEAN got Eve all the way to her car before she began protesting.
Sounding very disgruntled, she said, “I can’t believe you’re just walking out on her like this.”
“Who?”
She pulled up short, rounded on him, and scowled with incredulous disbelief. “Your sister!”
Dean still felt unsettled from Cam’s warm welcome, not to mention her mind-blowing disclosures.
She hadn’t known about him.
Before actually seeing her and talking to her, he’d had some lame plan to rebuff her every gesture, to let her know that he hadn’t needed her then, and he sure as hell didn’t need her now.
But everything was different: the situation, his sisters, and his own feelings toward them both.
“I’m coming back to see her tonight.” And because he wasn’t ready to think about that too much yet, he dismissed Eve’s attempt to chastise him. “Don’t worry about it.”
Eve jerked free of his hold. “Don’t worry? She’s my best friend, as close as a sister. You could tell that she didn’t want you to go. She invited you here for a reason. You two could have talked. You could have explained these theories of yours instead of leaving her to—”
Dean bent and kissed her. Even when bitching at him, Eve had the softest, sexiest mouth he’d ever encountered.
She tilted out of reach, looked at him through heavy eyes, and without much conviction, whispered, “Stop.”
“No.”
She didn’t argue. Instead her eyes sank shut again in blatant invitation, and Dean settled his mouth over hers.
Despite her earlier antagonistic attitude, her lips parted under his. He’d had easy women. He’d had women with ulterior motives. He’d had interested women.