“She is.”
“The puppy’s for her? You’re bringing your mother a puppy to make up with her?”
Because that thought clearly had her going all soft in the eyes, he shook his head. “The puppy’s from Dell, not me.” He took the puppy from her hands, wrapped her inside his jacket, and opened the door. “Stay here.”
“But—”
“Holly.” Christ, this was hard enough. He couldn’t do this with her here. “Please.”
She stared at him for a long beat, and then nodded. “I’ll stay,” she said quietly, and reached out and squeezed his arm. Soothing him. “I promise.”
Nodding, he shut the truck door and walked to the back and grabbed his toolbox before heading toward the trailer.
Nila watched his approach with dark eyes that gave nothing away. Like mother, like son.
“Adam,” she said.
“Dell said you need some stuff fixed.” He showed her the toolbox.
She nodded but continued to block him. Great. He met her gaze. “You still mad at me?”
“You going to try to give me money again?” she asked.
“Not today.”
A very small smile curved her mouth, and she moved aside for him but then stopped him with a hand on his arm, gesturing to the wriggling mass beneath his jacket.
Adam pulled out the puppy and handed it to her.
The breath left her lungs in a soft “awww,” and her gaze flew to his face. “Homeless?”
Adam lied without compulsion. “Yes. She needs a good home.”
Nila hugged the thing in close, and Adam knew the puppy would be completely accepted.
In a way he never had been.
Shaking that off, he fixed her lock and sink in five minutes flat and then headed to the door. The puppy supplies had been moved from the back of his truck to the top step.
Holly, of course.
“Here’s everything you’ll need,” he said to Nila. “She’ll have to get her shots in a few weeks. Dell will take care of that. If there are any problems, call one of us. When she’s a little older, I’ll train her for you.”
Nila gestured to the truck. “Who’s that?”
Adam looked through the windshield at Holly, who smiled. His chest had been tight for the past two hours, too fucking tight, but her smile eased it somehow. “A client’s daughter.”
Nila looked at Holly for another moment and then at Adam. “She’s more.”
Adam didn’t bother to ask how she knew. “You have enough supplies for several weeks. I’ll send Dell with more.”
“I’d like you to bring them to me.”
Adam looked at her, seeing a warmth in her eyes that hadn’t been there before. “Okay.”
Nila nodded and turned to go inside. “Bring the woman with you. She makes you smile. You have a good one.”
And then she shut the door.
Adam was still shaking his head when he slid into the truck.
“What?” Holly asked.
“She likes you.”
“How about her son?”
“He likes you, too.”
She smiled and then let him drive back in peace. When they got back to her Jeep, the tire was repaired. Holly leaned in and gave Adam a kiss. “Thanks,” she said.
“For?”
“For letting me in. Did it hurt?”
He stared into her smiling eyes. “Only a little.”
She laughed. “I’m growing on you.”
“You’re absolutely not.”
“I so am.” And then she was gone.
He watched her drive off into the sunset and had to shake his head. Because she was right. She was growing on him.
Big-time.
That night Holly sank into a hot bath. With a sigh, she set her head back and relaxed. She was supposed to be reading next month’s book club book. Lilah had picked it, and she’d chosen a romance. Damn newlyweds. Lilah had told them all that she expected a full book report on the characterization of the hero, but she’d been looking at Holly when she’d said it.
Holly knew that Lilah was wondering, hoping, that she wasn’t going to hurt Adam.
She wasn’t.
She planned on being the best thing that had ever happened to him.
And he her…
God, she could still, if she closed her eyes, feel his hands on her body. Just the memory of the way he’d touched her was enough to arouse. She could still hear his low erotic whisper in her ear, feel the delicious roughness of his day-old beard when he’d scraped it over her inner thigh, see the look of pleasure on his face as he’d taken control and moved over her.
She wanted him again.
Still…
She drifted on that thought for a while, until from the tub’s edge, her phone buzzed an incoming text from Derek.
I’m appealing the divorce. Need to see you.
Holly nearly dropped the phone into the tub. He was appealing the divorce? Since when? And what the hell was he talking about? He’d had his chance already, back when she’d filed and he’d ignored it. She’d had to petition the court for an uncontested divorce, and again he’d ignored it. Holly had met with the judge, who’d finally granted the divorce. So what was to appeal now? Grinding her teeth, she pounded out Derek’s number.
He answered with, “Hey, wife.”
“No,” she said. “No, no, no, no. Not your wife.”
“Technicality.”
“We’re divorced,” she said. “You didn’t show up for the hearing, but I did. I heard the judge decree it done. There’s nothing to appeal. We’re free of each other. You promised.”
“Ah, but I never promised any such thing.”
This was true. He hadn’t. He hadn’t said a damn word in all this time, just radio silence.
“I’m thinking we rushed this thing through,” Derek said.
Holly was holding the phone so tight she was surprised it didn’t shatter. “How is years of separation being hasty?”
“I don’t know, Holly. It just is.”
“I was gone for weeks before you even noticed.”
“I’m noticing now. I miss you.”
Bullshit, he missed her. “Call one of your students,” she said.
“Yeah, that’s just the thing,” he said. “Single professors don’t really have any business calling their students.”
She almost drowned herself by accident trying to stand up in the slippery tub because she liked to stand up when she was yelling at someone. “Are you kidding me? That’s why you’re going to appeal? Because being married gave you an edge with the silly, floozy college coeds?” She stepped out of the tub and stood naked, trembling in fury as she dripped water all over her bathroom. “You are slime, Derek. Scum. The scourge of the earth—”
“Listen, sorry to interrupt this fascinating tirade on my character, but you do remember that you were once one of those silly, floozy coeds, right?”
She disconnected. And then, because she was out of control, she tossed her phone to the counter, where it slid across the granite and hit the tile floor. Think, she told herself. An appeal isn’t the end of the world. No judge would grant him an appeal.
Probably.
Steaming, she yanked a towel off the rack and dried herself. She stormed into her closet and stared at the slim pickings. She needed to do laundry. Dammit. She grabbed the first thing she came to, a little black cocktail dress. Whatever. She shimmied into it and grabbed her keys. Maybe she’d once, very briefly, been a silly coed, back when she’d been desperate to belong, desperate to be loved, but no longer. She was a woman who’d gotten herself a life, one she actually liked.
She started out the door and then realized she was barefoot, so she shoved her feet into the mud boots by the door. Then she stalked to her Jeep and headed down the road, reminding herself that she was no longer desperate to belong or desperate to be loved. She’d grown up. It wasn’t a mindless connection that she sought now. Nope, this time she knew exactly what she wanted.
br /> And she was strong enough to go after it, too, settling for no less than absolutely everything.
Except…was that really true? Was she really getting everything she needed from Adam? Was she going to be able to accept what he could give her?
Yes, she told herself, ignoring the little clutch in her gut. At least for now. She was going to choose to be happy, and to that end, she pulled into the drugstore parking lot, belatedly realizing that she was wearing a cocktail dress, and…oh God.
Big, old, clumsy mud boots.
Too late now, she told herself. If she went back home, she’d never find the courage to come back out. So she wore her outfit with pride, right into the drugstore.
And then the liquor store.
Her third and last stop was Belle Haven. She parked and drew a deep breath. Then she got out of the Jeep and clomped in the boots toward the stairs.
A shadow stepped out from a side door. Tall, dark, built. He had Adam’s dark eyes and mocha latte skin, the same tall, rough-and-tumble exterior that said he was up for anything, complete with the devastating Connelly smile.
Dell.
“Hey,” he said. He stepped under the porch light and his smile faded. “You okay?”
She ran a hand over her hair, realizing she’d literally run out of the house. No makeup. Hair still up from her bath, damp tendrils hanging in her face. Fancy LBD.
And then there were the mud boots…
Dell ducked down a little, looking into her eyes. “Holly?”
“I’m fine. I’m just here to…” Jump your brother’s bones.
He waited patiently, looking more fascinated with each passing second.
Holly closed her mouth.
Dell laughed softly and nodded toward the brown bag she was holding. “Whatcha got?”
She hugged the bag to herself. Oh, hell no! No way could he see what she had in the bag.
“Okay,” Dell said easily, still amused. “So you don’t want to talk. You’ll be quite the pair. He’s upstairs. Oh, and Holly?”
“Yeah?”
“Be gentle.”
She felt the blush heat her face. “Excuse me?”
“You’re going to light into him for something, right?”
“No, I—” She nibbled on her lower lip. Okay, that was probably less embarrassing than the truth. “Maybe.”
Dell’s smile softened as he looked at her for a long beat. “You know, you might be just what the doctor ordered tonight.”
“Why, is something wrong?”
Dell hesitated, which was unlike him. Neither of the Connelly brothers were ones to mince words or hold back. “What’s wrong?” she asked.
“There was a search and rescue tonight that turned into a search and recovery before an S&R team could be mobilized.”
She knew what a recovery meant. They’d gone to get a body.
“They used Milo,” Dell said. “He’s young, but he’s an excellent cadaver dog.” He met her gaze. “It’s tough on Adam still. Finding bodies. Sometimes the old demons get him.”
Holly’s heart clenched hard, and she nodded. She’d never been to war. She’d never rescued anyone. She’d never failed to rescue anyone. Hell, she’d never had to see a dead body and probably never would. Adam had done all of that and probably more than she could even imagine. He’d put his entire adult life on the line for others, and never once had she thought of what the consequences might be. “Is there anything I can do?”
Dell looked at her, appraisingly. “You care about him.”
A question, not a statement.
“Always have,” she said.
Dell cocked his head. “Always?”
That secret was so old she’d nearly forgotten it was a secret. She thought about denying it, but what was the point now? And besides, Dell was far too sharp and astute to believe her, anyway. “Always.”
There was a beat of silence as he processed this, then he let out a long breath. “Guess I should have seen that one from a mile away. There always was something between you two.”
A truer statement had never been uttered. “So what do I do?” she asked. “He’s not exactly good at accepting help.”
Dell tipped his head back and looked up at the silent loft. Then he met her gaze. “You know what I think? I think you’re good at winging it. Just don’t let him chase you away with that bad ’tude of his. It’s all a front. Beneath, he’s a pussycat.”
“Do you really believe that?”
He laughed. “Undomesticated wildcat, maybe.”
She sighed and walked up the stairs, heart pounding so loudly she didn’t think it was even necessary to knock. Surely he could hear her coming.
But she did knock.
And he answered, wearing low-slung jeans and nothing else. He took one long, slow look at her, hands up high, braced on the doorjamb. Silent. Whatever he thought about her appearance, he was keeping it to himself. Fair enough. She’d certainly kept far too much to herself. Talk, she reminded herself. You’re here to talk.
But her mind didn’t get the message, couldn’t get past the gotta-have-him signals her body was putting out. Crowding him, she plastered her body to his, talking the very last thing on her mind.
Twenty
Adam stared into Holly’s gaze and felt something shift in his center of gravity. It was a good thing he was holding on to the doorjamb above his head because, good Christ, she leveled him flat.
“Yesterday, at class, you said you weren’t up for food,” she said. “That food wasn’t what you wanted.”
His mouth went dry. He wasn’t up for this, for battling wits or whatever she thought she was doing. What he was up for was a night alone. Being in such close contact with her on the mountain, and then again at the class, had stirred up emotions he didn’t want stirred up.
Brady had accused him of feeling sorry for himself.
Adam didn’t want that to be true, because that meant he was a fucking pussy, but he was starting to fear that it was true. Grif had made a career out of the military. Adam had always thought that he would, too. But he was still broken, as it turned out.
And that pissed him off.
He wanted to be alone to lick his wounds in private, but hell if he could get any alone time. Between Brady and Dell, and now Holly, it was like living at Grand Central Station. “I’m not up for games, Holly.”
“I know. But as was previously established, neither of us plays games.” Her gaze ran over his body. She nibbled on her lower lip as she looked at him.
She was thinking of sex. And of course he was always thinking about sex, so they were perfectly in sync. He loved her body, loved