BUILT
Jay Crownover

Copyright

Published by HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd

The News Building

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published in Great Britain by Harper 2016

Copyright © Jennifer M Voorhees 2016

Cover layout design © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2016

Cover photographs © Kevin Irby

Jennifer M Voorhees asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Source ISBN: 9780008116231

Ebook Edition © January 2016 ISBN: 9780008116248

Version: 2015-12-10

Dedication

Dedicated to the best dad any gal could ask for. My dad has always had a way about him … a rock-solid reliability that has made him forever my hero and number one badass. Because life is never easy we haven’t always seen eye to eye, but at the end of the day I have always known whatever needs to be done, my dad will be there to take care of it. He’s the real deal and few people I have encountered have managed to live up to his legend.

This one is for you, DadVo.

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Introduction

Epigraph

Prologue

Chapter 1: Sayer

Chapter 2: Zeb

Chapter 3: Sayer

Chapter 4: Zeb

Chapter 5: Sayer

Chapter 6: Zeb

Chapter 7: Sayer

Chapter 8: Zeb

Chapter 9: Sayer

Chapter 10: Zeb

Chapter 11: Sayer

Chapter 12: Zeb

Chapter 13: Sayer

Chapter 14: Zeb

Chapter 15: Sayer

Chapter 16: Zeb

Chapter 17: Sayer

Chapter 18: Zeb

Epilogue: Eight Months Later

Author’s Note

Sayer and Zeb’s Playlist

Acknowledgments

Keep Reading – Leveled

Keep Reading – Charged

Keep Reading – Rule

About the Author

Also by Jay Crownover

About the Publisher

INTRODUCTION

Are you guys ready for this? I am so ready!

A new adventure. A new cast of characters. Something so different yet still familiar and comfy like a favorite pair of well-worn jeans.

I have to tell you that it only took one second, a single moment when these two met, for me to know they had to have a story and that it had to be epic. It had to be special, and larger than life, because frankly Zeb Fuller is both of those things. I needed to do my bearded wonder justice. Without Sayer and Zeb and their undeniable spark there would be no Saints of Denver. (I actually posted about the fact that they needed a book the second they met on Facebook when I was in the middle of writing Rowdy.) Their chemistry in that tiny little moment was so bright, so electric, so addicting, that it exploded in my head and I just knew they would be a perfect mess and that trying to get these two together was going to be a challenge I couldn’t resist.

I adored writing this book. I loved getting to go back to places that feel like home, but seeing them and describing them in a whole new way. I know it will make my readers happy to see some familiar faces (it’s always nice to check up on old friends here and there) but I sure hope the new ones steal your heart along the way. I’m pretty sure they will.

If you are a new reader just being introduced to all my crazy, welcome, I’m so glad you are here with me. Strap in for a sweet, sexy, often unpredictable ride.

If you are a longtime reader who is familiar with the series that started this whole journey, I’m sure you’re curious how the time line in the new series relates to the Marked Men series. While it might not be an exact match, in my head the start of the series takes place in the six months between the end of Asa and the epilogue in the final book. So that fall/winter before Rome and Cora’s wedding is when all the madness and sexiness begins.

As always, thank you, kickass readers, so much for being here. Thank you forever for letting me be here. There will never be a better place to be.

The fact that I get to keep doing this, that this is my actual, real-life job, never ceases to amaze and humble me. You’ve let me tell so many stories, let me bring so many interesting, valuable, important people to life with my words … it’s a dream come true and I couldn’t do it or have any of these opportunities and escapades without you.

You are EVERYTHING!!!

Epigraph

I have not failed. I’ve just found ten thousand ways that won’t work.

—Thomas A. Edison

PROLOGUE

I met her at a bar.

She had a beer bottle in her hand even though she looked like she should be sipping champagne out of an expensive flute, and that inexplicably turned me on. She was pretty and looked completely out of place in the no-name bar sitting across from one of my oldest friends who also happened to be her long-lost brother. He was the reason she was here. In that split second that I laid my eyes on her I wanted to be the reason she stayed.

I knew it was rude and that the two of them needed some time together, some time to figure out what they were to each other now that she had blasted into his life unannounced. If I was a better friend I would have left them alone. As it was, I made my way over to the tiny table and sat down. I was covered in sawdust and had drywall mud caked in the hair on my head and on my face, but she didn’t flinch or bat an eyelash when I purposely broke up their party of two and placed myself as close to her as I could without actually touching her.

My buddy Rowdy St. James lifted his eyebrows at me as I stared at her while he introduced us. Sayer Cole. Even her name was elegant and sophisticated sounding. She was an enigma, this lovely woman who seemed like she should be in any place but this bar with the two of us. She’d showed up out of the blue a couple of months ago claiming to be Rowdy’s half sister, claiming that they shared a father, claiming that all she wanted was to be in his life and have some kind of family of her own. She looked too delicate to be that brave. Came across as way too proper to have said “fuck it all” and picked up her life to move it someplace unknown without being sure of her welcome. She looked like silk, but if my guess was right about her, it was silk wrapped around steel.

Luckily Rowdy was a good guy. After the shock of discovering he wasn’t alone in the world, and once he realized he had someone tied to him by blood forever and ever, he had warmed up to the idea of having a sister and appreciated that the sister was Sayer.

I liked Rowdy a lot. He was a stand-up guy and a good friend, but I had a feeling I was going to like his newly found big sister even more. In my usual tactless way I asked him without looking directly at the knockout blonde, “So you have a sister? A hot, classy sister?” A sister that was also a lawyer, so beautiful and smart.

I expected a giggle from her or an eye roll at the outlandish compliment, but what I got was a wide-eyed stare of disbelief as eyes bluer than anything I had ever seen on earth danced between me and her brother like she wasn’t sure what to do with herself or with my overt interest in her.

I thought that I had gone too far, pushed the beautiful stranger too far out of her comfort zone. I was a big guy and knew I looked far wilder and rougher than I actually was. I figured it might be too much for a woman already obviously out of her element and depth to take.

Instead, Sayer surprised me and I could see by the way he stiffened that she surprised Rowdy, too. While she wasn’t exactly overflowing with welcome and warmth, she did ask me about the current project I was working on after Rowdy explained I was a general contractor and had rebuilt the new tattoo shop he worked in. She seemed genuinely interested, and when I told her that my specialty was rehabbing old houses and giving them new life, her eyes practically glowed at me. I wanted to feel her to see if she felt as smooth and polished as she looked. I wanted to leave streaks of dirt on her perfect face to mark the fact that I had touched her, that she had let me touch her. It was a primal and visceral reaction that I couldn’t explain and I liked the way it felt. Liked the weight and heft of it in my blood even if I knew the feeling wasn’t likely to be returned.

She told me all about a fantastic but crumbling Victorian she had purchased that was falling down around her. She asked me for a business card and I saw Rowdy stiffen across the table. I sighed and rubbed a hand over my already messy hair. I watched her eyes follow the light cloud of dust that escaped the strands. I was great at my job, loved what I did, but I couldn’t do anything with her or for her without laying everything on the line. Especially not with Rowdy giving me the death glare from just a few feet away.

I dug the card out of my wallet, and when I handed it over our fingers touched. I saw her eyes widen and her lips part, just barely. She looked a little dazed when I grinned at her.

“You take that card, but understand that the man giving it to you has a past.”

She blinked at me and cleared her throat. “What kind of past?”

It wasn’t something I liked to tell a beautiful woman when I first met her. It was something I liked to work up to, liked to prove was behind me, but with this one it seemed like I wouldn’t get that chance.

“I tell everyone that I do any kind of work for or that considers hiring me on for a project that I have a criminal history. I spent time locked up for a few years, and while I’m not proud of it I can’t deny it happened. I was a hotheaded kid and it got me in trouble, but I’m the best at what I do, so I hope that doesn’t discourage you from giving me a call.” Hopefully for more than some construction.

Usually I got a concerned frown followed by a hundred questions about what had led me to serving time. I got none of that from the stunning blonde. She tilted her head to the side and considered me silently for a long moment before reaching down and slipping my card in her purse. If anything, I could have sworn she was wearing a look of sympathy when she told me softly, “I see it every day from the inside. Sometimes the system simply gets it wrong.” A slight grin turned her mouth up at the corners, and I wanted to lean over and kiss it. “People make mistakes. Hopefully they learn from them.”

I don’t know that “wrong” was accurate in my case so much as misguided, but the complete lack of judgment or censure coming from her made me want to pull her into my arms and hold on to her even more. I had made a mistake, a huge one, one that I was forever going to have to carry around with me, but I had learned from it, was still learning from it. That kind of understanding from a total stranger was so rare, especially coming from someone in the legal field. I wasn’t accustomed to someone looking at me and seeing me, just me, not an ex-con loser after I explained where I had been. It was wildly refreshing and attractive. I couldn’t quite get a handle on what made the woman tick, but I would welcome any opportunity she gave me to figure it out. I found her outwardly flawless and pristine demeanor tempting to taint with my dirty hands and ways, and there was something about the way she watched me, the way she turned toward me like she was drawn to me, that made me think maybe I wasn’t alone in the inexplicable pull department.

Rowdy left and she stayed.

We had a couple more beers and talked some more about her house and what she wanted done with it. She already hired one contractor but felt like the guy was ripping her off. It happened a lot in the industry, so I wouldn’t be surprised if the guy was taking her for a ride. Spending time with her was easy. She was fun to talk to and really fun to look at. I really wanted to get my hands on her house and of course on her, and I felt like she was maybe, kind of, slightly leaning in the same direction when I made the mistake of asking her about her past.

I asked about where she had been before she found out about Rowdy and decided to move to Denver so that she could get to know him. I was curious what kind of life she had where she could leave everything behind and not be missed. Really I wanted to know if she had a boyfriend or husband stashed somewhere, but the simple inquiry must have touched a nerve. The next thing I knew she had paid out the tab for both of us and disappeared into the night. She went from glowing and bright to frigid and untouchable in the span of a heartbeat.

I figured I blew my shot by being too blunt, as always. I assumed she probably did have someone else in the picture and had been friendly and polite only because I was good friends with her brother. I thought I would never hear from her again and was baffled why the thought of that made my chest ache and my heart feel like it weighed two tons.

Imagine my surprise when she called me and hired me to renovate her house a week later without a bid, without a contract, without even knowing if I was half as good as I claimed to be.

Of course I accepted, but I knew once I was inside I would need to knock down and rearrange more than just the walls of the house, in order to get at something beautiful and lasting.

Love is friendship that has caught fire. It is quiet understanding, mutual confidence, sharing and forgiving. It is loyalty through good and bad times. It settles for less than perfection and makes allowances for human weaknesses.

—Ann Landers

CHAPTER 1
Sayer
Six months later

Can’t sleep?”

The soft question sent the glass of white wine I’d been chugging like it was cheap beer falling from my fingers and clattering noisily to the beautifully refinished hardwood floors under my bare feet.

The glass shattered and wine splashed everywhere as I put a hand to my chest and looked over my shoulder at the pale ghost of the young woman I was currently sharing my newly renovated living space with. Her light brown eyes were huge in her face, and, like always, she looked like a delicate fawn ready to bolt at any noise or quick movement I might make.

I took a deep breath to calm myself down and gingerly picked myself out of the broken glass minefield so I could get a towel and the broom to clean up the mess. “Why aren’t you asleep, Poppy?”

I knew the answer. The old Victorian I bought just a few weeks after relocating to Denver was huge, had three separate levels, was made of sturdy wood, and had heavy, solid doors on each room. None of that was enough to keep the sounds of this young woman’s screams of terror as she had nightmare after nightmare from reaching me. They weren’t as frequent as when she’d first moved into my home. In fact they hardly ever pulled me from my own troubled dreams anymore, but every now and then I would hear her voice through the walls, hear heartbreaking sobs echoing across the rafters, and my brittle heart wanted to snap in two for her.

She pushed some of her long, caramel-colored hair behind her ears and lifted an eyebrow at me. “Bad dream. How about you, Sayer? Why are you still up?”

I cleared my throat as I bent down to sweep up the glass.

It was late.

I was really tired.

I had a full day at work tomorrow and I needed to be up early enough so I could swing by the gym before I went into my office.

I had also agreed to have drinks with a fellow attorney after my final court appearance of the day. It was a semidate I had already rescheduled twice, so I couldn’t reasonably back out again without looking like a complete jerk. Doing any of that on a few hours of sleep was less than ideal, but I was getting used to running on fumes lately. I, too, was having dreams that woke me up in the middle of the night, that left me shaken, heated, and too wound up to stay in bed.

Only my dreams weren’t terror inducing—they were good. Oh, so fucking good. They were better than good. They were the best dreams I had ever had. Hell, the dreams were better than any kind of actual sexual experience I had ever had while wide-awake. They were the kind of dreams that had me jerking up from a dead sleep while I panted and sweated. I woke up twisting in my sheets and touching myself because the man that starred in each and every single one of them was nowhere around.

Control was everything to me, and Zeb Fuller made me want to lose it even when he was sound asleep in his own bed all the way across Denver.

I’d paid him a fortune to turn this broken-down, sagging, sorry excuse for a house into a stately, soaring, and magnificent home, and so Zeb had his hands all over my real-life dreams, not just my naughty midnight ones. He had finished the last of the remodel a couple of weeks ago, and ever since I found myself missing the sounds of hammering, drilling, and the rumble of his deep voice. All the dirty, sexy things I secretly wanted him to do to me were chasing me into dreamland, making for rough mornings and some serious dark circles under my eyes. I was pale anyway, so there was no hiding the evidence of Zebulon Fuller’s effect on me.

It was stupidly simple. I had a crush that I couldn’t shake, and it terrified me.

It made me feel off balance, unsure, and so damn sexually frustrated I wanted to pull out all of my long, blond hair by the roots just for a distraction.

I swore softly as a piece of glass slid across my fingertip when I bent down to usher the mess into the dustpan. I stuck the bleeding digit into my mouth and grunted in annoyance at myself. I had learned before I could walk that showing any kind of emotion was a weakness, a fatal flaw that would end with you in tears as the victor stood over your broken, weeping form with a look of pity and disgust on his face. I shouldn’t have jumped when Poppy startled me. I was supposed to be made of more glacial stuff than that. I didn’t react to anything—ever. Poppy was still staring at me with wide-eyed curiosity, so I pulled my finger out of my mouth and wiped it on the yoga pants I had worn to bed.

“I was having weird dreams, too. I thought a glass of wine would help put me back to sleep.” My tone was frostier than I meant it to be, but old habits were hard to break. My coolness was habit and it was armor.

She shifted her weight a little and again I was reminded of a timid woodland creature always ready to flee from danger. She was so pretty, so delicate, and no one should have had to endure the things this young woman had been through in her short lifetime. Poppy Cruz was only a few years younger than my own twenty-eight, but when her amber eyes assessed me with a knowing that felt ancient, it seemed like she was aeons ahead of me in both life and experience. Even though I had been raised by a father who was a tyrant, and had had to put my mother, who loved him and tried to please him right up until her last breath, in the ground before I was old enough to drive. My formative years had been spent trying to live up to standards I could never reach and mourning the loss of a woman I loved and loathed equally.

“You’ve had a lot of sleepless nights since Zeb finished all the work on the house. You seem … unsettled.”

I wanted to roll my eyes in exasperation with myself but held it back. I shouldn’t seem any way to anyone. My cracks were starting to show and that unnerved me to no end.

Was “unsettled” another word for horny enough to climb the walls? Because if so, then yes, I was most definitely unsettled. And I felt ridiculous for it. I’d never had the mere thought of a man distract me or cost me much-needed shut-eye before. I was supposed to have more restraint than that.

I dumped the broken glass into a plastic shopping bag and tossed it all into the trash. It took a few more minutes to wipe up the wine that was on the floor and that had splattered on the cabinets and bottom of the fridge.

“I guess I got used to living in the chaos of construction. Everything seems so neat and tidy now. So new. I’m sure I’ll get used to it. This is my dream home, what I always wanted. I think maybe the fact that I finally have it is still settling in. That’s all.” I had grown up in a home where what I wanted or needed wasn’t permitted, so the fact that I had something that was mine, that was tangible, solid, and real, something that was untouched from the taint of the past, still took my breath away when I thought about it.

I made sure everything was back to being spotless and snatched a bottle of water out of the fridge before turning back to Poppy when she quietly said:

“I thought maybe you were missing having Zeb around. He’s kind of hard to ignore.”

He most assuredly was hard to ignore.

Tall, tattooed, and built like a guy who hauled heavy stuff around and swung a hammer like Thor should be, Zeb was impressive, to say the least. But it went beyond the work-hardened muscles, low-slung tool belt, and the flirty charm he liked to throw around so effortlessly. There was something rock steady and so certain that shined out of his dark green eyes when he looked at the world around him and the people in it. There was an inherent confidence and assuredness that poured off of him when he looked at a person, like he knew without a doubt whatever he was bringing to the table was a thousand times better than what anyone else in the room had to offer. God, I could hardly handle how hot it was when he smiled and rubbed his hand over his neatly trimmed beard. Especially when that smile and knowing smirk was directed right at me.

I had never been into beards, and I always thought I preferred a well-groomed, well-dressed man. A man who looked great in a suit and tie and knew all about expensive cologne and hair product in the proper amounts.

As it turned out, what really flipped the switch on my usually inactive libido was a guy who looked like he could cut down a tree with one swipe and had unruly dark brown hair that looked like it rarely saw a comb or brush, let alone any type of product. It was a guy who made a sweaty T-shirt and torn jeans look like high fashion who kept me awake all night long while I fantasized what those work-toughened hands would feel like sliding across my naked skin.

I didn’t know what Zeb Fuller had done to me or to my common sense. All I knew was that he was keeping me up at night and making me resent every single time I turned icy and cold when he flirted with me. I hated that I couldn’t act normal around him because all I wanted to do was rip his clothes off and climb all over him. I wasn’t familiar with any of those emotions, so as a defense I locked them all down.

My awkwardness and ineptitude in the face of Zeb’s overt masculinity meant that I could never find any words beyond polite pleasantries, clichés, and platitudes, which I had no doubt gave him the impression that I was nothing more than a stuck-up bitch. I never intended to treat him like the hired help, but somehow that’s exactly what I had done, and now the job was finished, Zeb was long gone, and I was having phantom orgasms simply thinking about having his hands and mouth on me while I tossed and turned in my very empty and very lonely bed.

So yeah, I missed having him around. I missed watching him, hearing him, and even smelling that unique scent that all men who worked hard for their money seemed to have. Sweat and accomplishment mixed in with something that just screamed hard work and sex appeal.

I pushed my long hair back over my shoulder and raised my eyebrows at Poppy in a questioning expression similar to her own.

“You didn’t seem to mind him roaming around the house while he was here,” I said casually.

Poppy had had a horrible experience with her abusive ex-husband, and in the aftermath the beautiful young woman had shied away from all physical contact with the opposite sex, including my brother, with whom she had grown up. It was crippling, and when I started work on the house I worried how Poppy was going to handle having so many strange men in and out of the place that had been her sanctuary since she started to recover from her abduction.

Initially she handled Zeb and his crew banging around the Victorian by never leaving her room. She spent all day locked in there with a dresser in front of the door until one night when I was supposed to get home early to look at paint samples with Zeb but was running late. When I finally got there, I was stunned to find the bearded giant and the fragile flower with their heads bent together while they looked at paint samples in my torn-apart kitchen. I was so stunned that when Zeb mentioned that Poppy really liked an unusual shade of reddish orange for the walls, I blindly agreed to the choice, even though neutral and serene was much more my personal style.

After the shocking splash of color made it onto the walls I was surprised at how much I loved it. It took me a few days beyond that to realize it was the same shade as a field of poppies, and then I loved it even more. When Zeb left, I tenderly prodded Poppy about how the big man had coaxed her out of her fortress.

It was simple really. He told her he needed a woman’s opinion. He wanted to make sure he was in the right wheelhouse and gave her the choice and the control. If I hadn’t already wanted to kiss him, his simple understanding of how Poppy needed to take back the reins of her life would have made me want to jump him on the spot.

Zeb Fuller was a nice guy. Ugh … a nice guy I couldn’t stop thinking about or picturing very naked. He had tattoos on either side of his neck and ones that peeked out of the collar of his shirt. He had ink that decorated the back of each hand and wild swirls and designs that covered every inch of both of his arms. I wanted to see what else marked his skin and then I wanted to drag my tongue across every single inch of it.

Poppy cleared her throat and walked over to get her own bottle of water out of the fridge. She leaned next to me on the island with its fancy marble top and sighed softly. Even the noises she made sounded like a fragile flower fighting to stay upright in the wind.

“I like Zeb. I was surprised that I did, but I really do. He reminds me of Rowdy and he didn’t look at me like I was broken. Not once. Eventually I’m going to have to leave this house, go back to work, and I know that means I have to stop thinking every man out there is going to hurt me. Zeb is huge; I mean, he’s just so BIG, but nothing about him is threatening or scary once you get to know him. I think he was good practice for me, and I love how the kitchen turned out. I would’ve died if it ended up looking terrible considering it was the first decision I’ve made on my own in a really long time.”

Rowdy was my younger brother, who I didn’t know existed until a year ago when my father died leaving his secrets printed in black and white in his will. Rowdy had grown up in entirely different circumstances than my own, with Poppy and her older sister, Salem. After some time and some tragedy, Rowdy and Salem had figured out they were always meant to be together, which meant he cared even more for Poppy and her current state of mind than he normally would. She was family and now that I’d found Rowdy, had dropped every part of my old life, and moved halfway across the country to get to know him, so was I. My father’s final stab in the back, his last cruel act of manipulation, had actually been the best and only gift he had ever given me.

I reached out an arm and wrapped it around her thin shoulders so I could give her a squeeze. Unlike her older sister, Poppy was missing any kind of curve or thickness on her frame. She was a waif and sometimes I thought she was going to disappear right before my eyes. I also wasn’t terribly surprised when she wiggled out of my grip. She wasn’t the biggest fan of touching even if it came from a safe place.

“I can call him back to … I don’t know, I’ll ask him to build a deck or a fence or something, if you want more practice.” I was only half kidding. I would love an excuse to have him back within ogling distance.

Poppy laughed and it was such a rare and precious sound it made my heart squeeze tight. I’d never had a roommate before, never shared my space with anyone so closely, or had anyone else to give my time to aside from my clients. I cherished the time I had with this young woman so much that I often wondered if Poppy was healing more than just herself on her journey to take her life back. I refused to acknowledge the scars and wounds etched deep in my psyche and that festered all over my soul from growing up in the care of my father. But occasionally Poppy would say something, or reach out and touch me, or my little brother would call just to check up on me, and old injuries I purposely ignored would tingle as they fought to knit themselves together despite my persistent denial that they existed.

“No, but thank you for the offer. Rowdy calls me every Thursday night when Salem goes out with her girlfriends and asks me to have dinner with him. I always say no because I panic at the thought of being alone with him and going out in public around all those other people, but I think next time he asks I know can say yes. I can do this.”

I nodded and tried not to seem overly excited. I didn’t want to pressure her in any way. “That will make him very happy and I think it’ll be good for both of you.” I nudged her with my elbow. “And if you need me to get off work early or want me to come because it’s overwhelming you, just say the word and I’ll make it happen.” Rowdy would understand if she needed me as a buffer. He always understood.

She gave me a tiny grin that looked like a baby bird trying to figure out how to fly for the first time in its hesitancy.

“Thank you. That means a lot.” She walked around the giant island and headed toward the room that was hers at the very back of the house and as far away from my master suite in the converted attic as it could get. She knew her screams of terror carried and had made it clear she wanted to be as unobtrusive as possible while she recuperated in my home. “Good night, Sayer. Sweet dreams.”

There was a note of humor in her voice that made me think that maybe I hadn’t been as coy about what—or rather who—was keeping me up at night as I thought. I sighed and made my way up to my own room.

Zeb had transformed the abandoned and decrepit attic space in the house into a retreat that anyone would love. It was modern but still had the vintage charm that came with an old house. The colors were all pale grays and soft blues. It was a place where I could shut out the rest of the world after a rough day in court or when I had a client and a case I couldn’t let go of. He made me a paradise in my own home, and the only thing that would be even better was if he would strip and climb into the massive, four-poster, king-size bed with me.

I called myself every kind of fool I could think of as I took in the tangled sheets and the pillows tossed in every direction. My imaginary Zeb got more of a reaction out of me and out of my body than my very real ex-fiancé ever had. I had been involved with Nathan for years and not once had he made my entire body quake, bow up, or tremble from head to toe on the verge of an explosion that had every kind of sweet heat imaginable in it. That was why I had stayed in the relationship for as long as I did. There was no passion, no overwhelming rush of lust and desire that I wasn’t equipped to deal with. Nathan was safe, easy, and I didn’t have to pretend not to feel anything because I legitimately didn’t feel anything other than the bland security that being with him offered.

There was nothing wrong with Nathan. He was kind. He had a good job. He looked good in a suit and liked all the same things I did … well, all the things I had been convincing myself I liked up until my father died and my life turned upside down. And I truly believed that Nathan loved me even though I wasn’t very emotionally responsive and worked way too much. He cared about me a lot even though we both knew I was never going to rock his world in the bedroom and that he was never going to be my top priority. It had taken the passing of my father and the discovery of my brother for me to realize that no matter how much effort Nathan put in and how accepting of my frosty personality he claimed to be, ours was ultimately a relationship I didn’t choose for myself. It was a relationship I chose in order to make my father happy and to keep him off of my back. I picked Nathan because it was what was expected of me.

I knew Nathan deserved better than someone who was only putting forth the bare minimum in order to keep the relationship alive, so despite his protests and his assurances that I was all he wanted, no matter what that looked like, I ended the engagement and packed up and moved to Colorado in search of a new life and a new family. I got both in spades and also a startling wake-up call when a filthy, unapologetic, and ruggedly handsome Zeb Fuller had sat down across from me at a tiny bar table while I was talking to Rowdy.

The way Zeb affected me was one of the main reasons I wasn’t going to back out of the semidate I had arranged with Quaid Jackson tomorrow. Quaid was the kind of guy who seemed to like reserved blondes who were more comfortable in front of a judge than they were between the sheets, and it didn’t hurt a thing that he was also disgustingly handsome and over-the-top suave. The term “lady-killer” had been invented for guys like Quaid, and the way I felt around him, pleasant, warm, but generally unaffected was a reaction I was familiar with. Quaid didn’t make me panic or want to strip naked and throw myself at him. Quaid was safe.

He was a criminal defense attorney who had a legendary reputation in Denver. We had gotten to know each other when my firm handled his very messy and very public divorce not too long ago, so I was really hoping all he had in mind was a friendly get-together because there was no way the man could be ready to jump into anything serious after the kind of train wreck he’d just endured. I was hoping time and attention with the handsome blond attorney would force my hormones to get their shit together and stop screaming Zeb’s name. After tonight, I wasn’t so sure it would work, but for the love of God, I needed to get some sleep and I was desperate.

I straightened out the bed, put the pillows back where they belonged, and hit the lights. I stared up at the ceiling and prayed that the rest of the night would be Zeb free. Of course, as soon as my eyelids got heavy and sleep began to beckon, I began to wonder what it was like to kiss a mouth that was hidden in a beard, and this, of course, led to thoughts about what that facial hair would feel like as it rubbed against other parts of my body. My eyes popped open wide, so I groaned and gave up. It was either a cold shower or battery-operated-boyfriend time. Neither sounded as pleasurable as the thoughts that were keeping me up in the first place, but a girl had to do what she had to do, and sadly I had been taking care of my own needs far too much lately.

Stupid, illogical crush. This was torture and the only solace I had was that in the past, I had always been too cold, too distant from my emotions to ever feel anything like this. It was my first crush in my entire life and it felt like it might kill me.

CHAPTER 2
Zeb

I turned my head when one of the guys from my crew called my name, and immediately regretted the lapse in concentration. Behind the filtered mask I had on to protect my lungs from all the deadly things that came out of the walls in these old houses, I dropped a litany of filthy words as the hammer I was in the middle of swinging came down and smashed mercilessly onto my thumb. It happened in my line of work, but lately stupid, preventable accidents were becoming more and more frequent because my head was up my ass and rooted firmly on my last job—or rather the stunning blonde that had hired me to do it.

One of my younger crew guys, Julio, gulped when he noticed the murderous look on my face and the way I was shaking out my hand. He held up his own hands in a gesture of surrender before I even said a word. My temper had been on a shorter fuse than usual lately and the guys that made up my crew had obviously taken notice. It made me feel like a dick, but there was nothing I could do about it. My head was all wrapped up in Sayer Cole and her endless legs and chilly demeanor, and nothing I seemed to do could pull it away from her.

“What?” I pulled the safety mask off my face and forced myself to ask the question in a level tone instead of barking it out like I wanted to. I flicked my throbbing digit with my index finger and swore as it burned like it was on fire. I nailed the sucker good. It was going to be a lovely shade of black and blue when I took my work gloves off and I would be lucky if the fingernail didn’t fall off.

“There’s a lady out front looking for you.” Julio’s heavily accented words took me a second to process. I lifted my eyebrow and put my hammer in the slot that was made for it on the leather tool belt that hung low on my waist.

“Looking for me for what? Is she with the city? Or one of the neighbors?”

Permit people were always dropping by to make sure everything was in order when I started tearing apart historic homes in order to return them to their original glory. I was also pretty good at turning them into something completely new and fantastic, but I still had to have the right licenses and permits in place in order to do so.

Julio scratched the back of his neck and flushed a little. “I didn’t ask. She’s real cute, though.” The kid was young, not even out of his teens yet, but he was a hell of a hard worker and really good with his hands, so even if he wasn’t always the brightest member of the team, I knew he had plenty of time to learn and grow. He just needed a shot and someone not to give up on him.

I shoved my hands through my hair and snorted when a cloud of centuries-old plaster dust floated up from the motion. I was covered in all kinds of construction debris … I always was.

“Inspectors can be both female and attractive, Julio.”

The kid shuffled his feet and looked down at the bare flooring we had spent all day yesterday putting into the vernacular 1870s cottage-style home that was my latest renovation project.

“I know. She just asked if Zebulon Fuller was on-site and I told her you were. She started for the front door without a hard hat or a mask or anything, so I told her the house wasn’t safe. I don’t think she’s a pro or anything. She seems a little …” He twirled his finger next to his temple indicating he thought the woman might be a little bit off.

I sighed. If she wasn’t a pro she was probably an angry neighbor wanting to complain about the construction noise or the mess. It happened all the time, but over the years I had gotten pretty good at keeping the peace as my business grew and expanded, taking my reputation and name along with it.

“All right, I’ll handle it. Can you finish stripping the wall and pulling the plaster off so we can get drywall up tomorrow? Wear a mask. That old paint is no good and dangerous.”

I dealt with lead paint removal so much in these old homes that I’d had to get certified in order to be a lead-removal-certified contractor. What I did was never easy and there were always lots of hoops to jump through, but I lived for the sense of accomplishment I got by saving rotten and falling-apart buildings from ending up condemned or bulldozed. I loved to give something no one else wanted or believed in a second chance.

I shook the rest of the dust out of my hair and ran my hands over my beard to shake whatever was stuck there loose, too. I’m sure I looked like I had been rolling around in baby powder but there wasn’t much that could be done about it. I was in the middle of a workday, and didn’t have time for uninvited guests—in person or the one that wouldn’t leave my mind. I already had enough of a distraction hounding me in the form of a lovely lady lawyer. My still-aching thumb was proof of that.

I stepped out of the hole in the front of the house where the original door had long since been kicked in and rendered useless by squatters or trespassers, and immediately caught sight of a young brunette woman who was indeed very easy on the eyes and who was pacing back and forth on the dead lawn. Her arms were crossed over her chest and she was moving in such an obviously agitated way that I knew whatever she was here to talk to me about wasn’t going to be any fun. I cast a baleful look at the sign that was in the yard that had FULLER CONSTRUCTION on it along with my name and number. It wouldn’t have been too hard for her to figure out who was in charge of the project. I told myself that I needed to rein in my sour mood and forced what I hoped passed for a pleasant and professional smile on my face as I approached the woman.

“I heard you might be looking for me. I’m Zeb Fuller, how can I help you today?”

The woman paused in her tense pacing and I watched her eyes go wide when they landed on me. I got that reaction a lot from both men and woman, so it didn’t surprise me. I was a big dude—really big—and the fact I had ink scrolling up both sides of my neck and across the backs of both of my hands often gave people the impression that I was a much bigger and much badder threat than I really was. The beard and the fact that I looked like I could level the house behind me with my bare hands obviously unnerved her.

She uncrossed her arms and lifted a shaky hand to her mouth. It was my eyes’ turn to widen as the woman suddenly started to cry. Not silent trickling tears either, but big, full-bodied sobs that shook her tiny frame from head to toe. I took an instinctive step forward, which caused her to immediately take a step back. I held my hands up in front of me to show I meant her no harm and also took a step back, giving her some space.

“Hey, you were looking for me. You’re on my jobsite. I just came to see what I could do for you.” I hated to see a woman cry. It killed me. Growing up, it had been me and my older sister and my mom. My dad took off when I was too young to remember what he looked like, so that meant I was always the man of the house. I didn’t let anyone make the woman I loved cry, so when this one went all weepy on me it immediately sent me into protector mode. “I’m really sorry if I scared you.”

She bent over and put her hands on her knees while sucking in audible breaths. Her curly hair fell forward to cover her face, and I could see her shoulders were still shaking. I was getting really concerned when she held up a hand and choked out:

“Just give me a minute. You look just like him and it threw me for a second.” She was still breathing heavily and making no sense. It was my turn to cross my arms over my chest as I watched her physically pull herself together. It took a long time.

“I’m not following. I look just like who?”

She pulled herself back upright and shoved her hands through her wildly curly hair. Her gaze raked over me from the top of my head to the tips of my worn work boots, and when she was done she was shaking her head. Not typically the reaction I got when a woman checked me out but I would take it if it meant the tears stopped.

“I know I’m coming across like a lunatic, but I swear I’m not. It took me a couple of days to track you down since I didn’t have a name or anything to go off of. You took me by surprise. I’m sorry for losing it on you like that. It wasn’t the first impression I was hoping to make.”

I was already grouchy and impatient. I didn’t have the time or the patience to deal with the maze of words this woman was winding around me.

“Lady, I don’t know what you’re talking about and I have to get back to work sometime in the near future. This house isn’t going to renovate itself. I need you to tell me what I can help you with or I’m walking away.”

She cleared her throat and took a step closer to me. I could see her choosing the words she wanted to use very carefully as she told me, “My name is Echo Hemsley. My best friend in the entire world was a woman named Halloran Bishop.” She paused like either of those names or the women attached to them should mean anything to me. When I didn’t reply she kept going and I could see her lip quiver and her hands shake as she did so.

“Halloran had a rough life. She made a lot of bad choices, had terrible taste in men, and used a lot of really awful things to help her deal with her issues.” The woman took a deep breath and I could see the tears well up. “She was also the kindest, gentlest person I had ever met and I never gave up hope that one day she would be able to get control of her life.”

I frowned. “Okay, but I still don’t know why any of that has you on my jobsite. I don’t know you or your friend.”

I mean I knew a lot of woman … A LOT … but all of them I could remember and I never went to bed with anyone without knowing their first name. I enjoyed being single and the freedom to play around, but I wasn’t a douche bag about it. In all honesty, my bed had been very empty and my nights very uneventful ever since a certain leggy lawyer had become the center of every fantasy and daydream I had. I wanted her. Only her, and no one else would do. It sucked because so far no matter how much I showed my interest, she wasn’t having it. She seemed absolutely oblivious to all of it.

Either that or she was keeping our relationship professional and casual because she knew that she was so far out of my league. My business was doing great considering how new it was and I made good money, but even with all I had accomplished in such a short amount of time, the fact was that I was always going to be an ex-con and blue collar instead of blue blood.

I was admittedly impressed and slightly captivated that my past never once seemed to be an issue—at least I didn’t think it was an issue until I started trying to express my interest in her. I was irrationally disappointed when she froze me out after how calmly she seemed to accept my revelation when I first told her about my past. I thought she was different, understanding, nonjudgmental, but when it came down to it, Sayer was just like everyone else that couldn’t see past the bars once they knew they were there. She pretended like she didn’t notice the way I watched her every move, and that she didn’t feel the way the air got thick and heavy between us whenever we were together. She brushed off every compliment I tossed her way and ignored every sexual innuendo that I threw at her. Eventually I got the hint that she was okay with me working for her but dating her and getting her into bed was never going to happen. She wasn’t into me the way I was into her, and no matter how much game I leveled at her she wasn’t budging. Hence the crappy mood I was perpetually living in these last few weeks.

“You’re right. You don’t know me, and it’s very possible you don’t remember Halloran because you only spent one night with her. Do you remember a bar called Jack and Jill’s?” When I just stared at the woman blankly she pulled on her lower lip and puckered her eyebrows in a little frown. “Maybe if you think about the day you got out of prison, that will help jog your memory.”

I jerked my head back at those words and narrowed my eyes. Five years ago I had been released from prison after serving two and a half years on an aggravated-assault charge. I refused to let my mom or my sister, Beryl, meet me on the day I got out; in fact I hadn’t even told my family what my release day was.

At the time I was angry, bitter, and had so much resentment and hostility still pent up over the reasons behind my arrest and the subsequent changes in my life, that I knew I needed to blow off some steam and get my head on straight before I saw anyone that loved me. I needed a few days to get back to the man they knew and not the one prison and life on the inside had turned me into.

I might not remember the name of the bar, but I did recall that I had walked aimlessly for a few blocks once the bus dropped me off at the first stop in Denver. The state prison was miles and miles away in Canon City and I swore to this day that the bus ride back home took days instead of a few hours.

“I might recall finding a bar that day but still don’t know anyone named Halloran.”

I had a bad feeling about where this conversation was headed. I didn’t hide my past but it wasn’t exactly my favorite topic of conversation either. It was unnerving that this stranger seemed to know so much about me.

That day was far from one of my finest.

Sure, I was free and it felt good to be out, but the girl I was in love with when I got locked up had moved on, left me not even six months after I went away. Meanwhile the bastard that I had nearly killed with my bare hands was still free and unchecked, allowed to do whatever he pleased even if that included using his fists on unsuspecting women. The injustice of it all festered inside me, making me a ticking time bomb ready to go off again. My fuse was always primed and just looking for an igniter. To tame the explosive fury that was still churning inside of me and to kill the craving that two years of no booze and no women had left burning in my guts, I figured the best place to scrounge up both would be the first seedy bar I could stumble into. I would get my fix of whiskey and a willing woman and then face both Beryl and my mom feeling somewhat like my old self.

“She was about this tall.” The woman held her hand up a few inches over her own head. “She was blond, blue-eyed, really pretty, and, like I said, supersweet.”

I didn’t miss her past-tense use of the word “was.” It was the second time she had referred to her friend that way. “Was?”

The tears started up again and the woman wrapped her arms around herself like she was giving herself a hug.

“Like I said, Halloran had terrible habits and terrible taste in men. Both of those things caught up with her last weekend. She was shot and killed over a drug deal gone wrong on East Colfax. Her new boyfriend was a drug dealer and thought it was perfectly safe to take her along on a pickup. Halloran should’ve known better, but she never thought things like that through. They were attacked by a rival dealer and his crew. Halloran was shot eleven times, the boyfriend was hit more than twenty.”

The woman could barely get the words out, and I couldn’t stand idly by any longer while she sobbed all over my jobsite. I walked over to her and pulled her into a tight hug even though she was a stranger and not making any sense. She needed someone to comfort her and I was the only one around to do it.

“I’m sorry about your friend.”

She didn’t hug me back, but she did nod her head where it was pressed against my chest. She took another steadying breath and moved away from me while wiping her cheeks off with the back of her hand.

“You might not remember her, she did tell me the night she met you that you were very drunk, very angry, and also kind of sad. She was in the bar because her boyfriend at the time had just kicked her out after knocking her around and she didn’t have anywhere else to go. She said the two of you started trading horror stories; you told her all about the guy that hit your sister and how you went to jail because you stopped him. She was smitten. You were brave, stood up for someone that couldn’t stand up for themselves, and well … look at you.” She waved a hand in my general direction as bits and pieces of that day started to pepper my brain with memories.

I’d always had a thing for blondes. Add some tragedy and whiskey to the mix and there was a very good chance I had gone all in on the booze and sex and just couldn’t remember any of it. I vaguely recalled sitting at the bar while someone that smelled sweet and gazed up at me with sad blue eyes took up the stool next to mine. I remembered heavy words and solemn kisses. I remembered gentle touches and liquor-fueled decisions. I even remembered the itchy comforter from the no-tell motel that I had woken up in, facedown and hungover like a motherfucker. I couldn’t remember the girl, her name, what she looked like, but I remembered that she made me feel better for just a moment and that I wanted to hurt the person who had made her so sad.

“Are you trying to tell me I hooked up with your friend?” I wouldn’t deny that it was a strong possibility and any reason this woman had for tracking me down now after all this time was making me break out in a cold sweat. I could clearly follow the trail she was leading me down without bread crumbs. The destination simply didn’t seem possible.

“Yeah. You guys hooked up, but like always, Halloran made the wrong choice and went back to the guy that was beating on her. She told me she skipped out on you the next morning without even giving you her name.” The woman who said I should call her Echo tucked some of her curly hair behind her ears and looked at me with tired hazel eyes. “She saw you on the news when they did that story about the tattoo shop you were renovating in LoDo. I don’t think she meant to tell me but it slipped out … she saw you on the TV and said, ‘That’s Hyde’s daddy.’”

I knew it was coming, had felt it as soon as she told me I had hooked up with her friend. Fury, whiskey, and a pretty, sad girl led to really bad decisions on my part. I had been having sex since I was fifteen, and I could count the number of times I had done it without protection on one hand with most of my fingers left over. Unfortunately one of those times was the night I got out of jail.

“You’re telling me I fathered a child with your dead friend?” It sounded harsh but my head was reeling and I was suddenly having a hard time breathing. The ground under my boots felt less solid than it had a minute ago and everything inside of me wanted to call her a liar and throw her off of my site.

She nodded. “Yeah. I mean, at the time I didn’t really think anything of it. Halloran has had a lot of boyfriends and Hyde has had a lot of ‘special’ uncles throughout the years. I wouldn’t bother you, would never have tried to find you if it wasn’t an emergency. Because of how she died and her history of drug use, the state took Hyde. He’s with Social Services now on his way to a foster home. If you don’t do something they’re going to put him in foster care and then try and adopt him out. He’s going to get lost in the system.”

I balked and fell back a step. “If I don’t do something? Seriously, lady, I don’t even know if what you’re telling me is true.”

She nodded and dug around in her back pocket until she pulled out a cell phone. “I know it’s sudden, and I know it’s crazy. But Halloran didn’t have much family and the ones that are left don’t have anything to do with her or Hyde, so there are no relatives that can or are interested in taking him. I offered, but I’m gone so much for work and my track record isn’t exactly spotless, so they turned me down as fast as they could. I also had some bad habits and liked the wrong kind of men when I was younger. Luckily I got myself straight before it was too late.” She gulped. “I very easily could’ve ended up like my friend.”

She blinked at me then turned her attention back to her phone. “It may be crazy and hard for you to believe, but you have a son, and if you don’t do something soon he’s going to end up nothing more than a case number in some social worker’s file.”

It was my turn to shake my head. I wanted to tell her to leave. I wanted to tell her she was crazy and talking nonsense, but I had never been the type of man to run away from the messes I created or my responsibilities. So when she thrust her smartphone at me I took it from her like it was going to bite me.

I held the little device in my hand and stared numbly at the picture of a very pretty blond woman with her arms wrapped around a little boy in torn jeans and a Transformers T-shirt. He had wavy dark brown hair, big eyes that were a clear, calm dark green, and a smile missing a few of his teeth. He also had a very familiar dimple indenting his chubby cheek. He was tall for a little kid, and as I gazed at the image before me I couldn’t help but feel like I was looking at a photo from my own childhood. My hand went numb and the phone tumbled to the ground.

Echo didn’t say anything. She just bent down to pick up the device and held it out in front of me. “There are hundreds more if you want to see. The resemblance is startling, isn’t it? That’s why I freaked out when you first came out of the house. It’s like looking at Hyde in the future when he’s all grown up. He looks just like you. He just turned five, so you can do the math if the picture isn’t enough to convince you that he’s yours.”

He did look just like me. He really fucking did.

I ran a hand over my beard and considered her thoughtfully. “Why didn’t your friend ever find me? Why didn’t she ask for help?” The idea that a part of me, a tiny human that I had helped make, had been out there in the world all these years without me knowing had some of that old rage and resentment I struggled to keep a lid on churning deep in my guts.

“I told you, she went back to the guy she had been with. I don’t think she really knew who Hyde’s dad was until he was born. It was pretty obvious when she had him, though, that it wasn’t her boyfriend since he was Mexican and Hyde obviously isn’t.” The girl flinched and shoved her phone back in her pocket. “The boyfriend beat her so bad when she got out of the hospital she almost died then. That forced her to clean up her act for a while because she didn’t want her newborn to be without a mother, but the older Hyde got the more Halloran started to slip back into her old ways. She probably could’ve tracked you down, introduced you to your son, but she was more concerned with chasing the next high and keeping her newest man to be bothered doing something that might benefit her kid. Like I said, Halloran was sweet and kind, but she wasn’t a very good mother. I mean, I think she tried to be, she just didn’t know how. Hyde has had a pretty shitty time of things in his few short years. You could make such a huge difference in this boy’s life, Mr. Fuller. He’s a great kid, outgoing and funny. You would never know what he’s been through. He deserves a real home. He deserves a parent that will love him and take care of him.”

I braced a hand on the top of my hammer and blew out a heavy breath. I felt like the entire world had shifted around me and had started spinning in the other direction.

“I have a kid?” I wasn’t sure the words came out or if I just thought them, but they felt so bizarre and foreign on my tongue.

She nodded again and this time her expression was full of sympathy and knowing.

“Look, I know this is a shock. I know you might go back in that house and do nothing because you think I’m a liar or a crazy person, but it was a chance I had to take because the last person that should be forced to suffer for his mother’s poor choices time and time again is that little boy. He makes me wish I had lived a better life, had been a better person from the start just so I could help him out.”

“My history isn’t exactly one that’s going to win me any awards or make anyone think I’m prime father material.” I was all too familiar with the sins from the past having a lasting effect on the here and now.

“Maybe. But don’t you think you should at least try? Are you going to be able to live with yourself if there is even a slim possibility that Hyde is yours and strangers are given responsibility for his care? I’ve been in the system. It isn’t pretty and most of the kids that come out of it end up in jail or way more messed up than when they went in. If you can stop that, why wouldn’t you?”

I knew she was right because Rowdy had spent his youth orphaned and then his teenage years in foster care. He wasn’t messed up per se, and had never been in jail, but whenever he mentioned his past it wasn’t full of happy memories and sunshine and rainbows.

I sighed again and lifted my hand to rub it across the back of my neck. “Okay, lady … I mean Echo, I won’t make any promises, but I do have a client slash acquaintance that practices family law, so I will reach out to her and see what she thinks I need to do. I imagine the first step would be proving the boy is mine legally. I don’t suppose your friend put me on the birth certificate?”

The brunette tugged on her lip again and shook her head in the negative. “It’s blank. I pulled it right after the funeral when the state came and took Hyde. I was hoping to find a name, but like I said I don’t think she really knew who the father was and she was so scared of her man at the time there was no way she was going to put another man’s name down. All I had was her mentioning you when she saw you on TV. I actually went to the tattoo shop and asked them for the name of the person that had done the renovations. The tiny blonde with all the tattoos at the front desk didn’t want to hand it over without a reason why. I told her I was looking to hire someone to renovate my condo. I don’t think she believed me. Luckily one of the guys that works there had your card and handed it over.”

I knew exactly the kind of attitude that tattooed and tiny blonde could throw, so I was grateful that one of my boys had stepped in. Even if this lady wasn’t on the up-and-up, I owed it to myself, to the kid, and, sadly, to the girl that had helped me drown my sorrows in booze and sex when I was feeling so lost and alone to find out if the little boy really was mine.

“Like I said, no promises, but I will talk to the attorney and see what she thinks needs to happen. Okay?”

The woman nodded and I could see the relief flash across her face. “I guess that’s more than I had hoped for when I initially decided to search you out. You honestly could’ve just thrown me off the property without hearing one word I had to say, so I’m considering the fact that you listened a win regardless of what happens next.” She gave me a wobbly smile. “Thank you.”

She turned and started to walk away back toward a little hybrid car that I just noticed was parked behind my truck in the driveway. I called out to her before she was halfway across the yard.

“Echo.” She stopped and turned to look at me over her shoulder with raised eyebrows. “If I give you my cell number, can you text me a picture of the kid?” I shrugged. “It might help me explain the situation to the lawyer a little better since I’m not always so great with words.”

She tilted her head to the side a little and narrowed her eyes at me. “I will on one condition.”

“What’s that?”

“Call him Hyde, Mr. Fuller. He has a name.”

I swore softly under my breath. I purposely hadn’t been using the kid’s name. It made it all too real. Made him all too real.

“Can you please text me a picture of Hyde, then?”

“I’d be happy to.”

I rattled off my number and she pulled her phone out to pop it in. She said nothing else as she made her way to her car and climbed in and left. I was just walking back into the house, my mind racing a million miles an hour, when my phone dinged with several messages.

I told myself to just wait and look at them after work, that it could wait, but I found myself sitting on the dilapidated steps of the cottage and scrolling through the photos.

They were all of a little boy laughing and playing. In every image he was smiling and happy. He appeared to be carefree and light of heart, which was amazing considering the things that Echo had mentioned he had been through. He was too young and innocent to have to navigate not only the sudden death of his mother but the shock of being put into the care of strangers as well. I didn’t know for sure that he was mine even if the resemblance was uncanny, but I was about to really ruin any shot I had with Sayer Cole by asking her to help me find out.

If she thought I was an undatable ex-con before this, she was really going to steer clear of me when she found out there was a strong possibility that I had fathered a child during a forgotten night of drunken sex with a woman I couldn’t even remember.

It didn’t matter if she wasn’t ever going to be interested in me the way I was interested in her as long as she helped me help the kid.

Right now Hyde, and whatever I could do to help him out, was my top priority, not convincing the lovely lawyer to go to bed with me … even though I wasn’t one hundred percent ready to take that dream off my agenda just yet.

CHAPTER 3
Sayer

Rough day?”

I was sipping on a lemon-drop martini and trying to rub my temples where a dull throb has been pounding since lunch. I blushed when Quaid commented on the gesture and wondered how bad my lack of sleep really had me looking. I was typically put together in a way that could almost come across as harshly professional. I didn’t mess around when it came to my job and being a pretty woman in the legal world was always a disadvantage when it came to being taken seriously, so I made sure to have on a practiced and poised demeanor at all times.

“Rough few weeks. I haven’t been sleeping well and I’m in the middle of not one but two custody cases that are unbelievably time-consuming. One day I’ll have a client who really has the best interest of their kid at heart.”

I forced a lopsided grin and watched as Quaid pulled the knot of his tie that rested loose at the base of his throat. He really was outrageously good-looking. Several women at the bar kept glancing over their shoulders in our direction, and the waitress had almost dropped his Scotch on the rocks on his lap when she delivered it because he smiled at her. His hair was cut trendy and sharp, shorter on the sides and longer on top and styled like he was going to be in a magazine shoot for something expensive. Quaid was name brand all the way and not ashamed to show it off. His eyes were an unusual shade of blue that shifted between faded denim and gray. His gaze was calculating and focused. Nothing about him was relaxed or at ease, and while he dominated his space and oozed self-assurance, it was in a much more in-your-face kind of way than Zeb did.

I wanted to kick myself.

I was hanging out with Quaid specifically to keep my mind off Zeb, and yet I was having a hard time focusing on what was a lot of hotness encased in a very expensive suit across from me.

He lifted a golden eyebrow at me and picked up his drink. He grinned at me before putting the glass up to his lips and I wanted to have a serious talk with my vagina for not even kind of taking notice or perking up.

“I could never do family law. The kids are too hard, the emotion tied up in those cases seems exhausting. I deal with adults trying to manipulate the system and the law every day. Watching them do that to their own kids, using them as pawns …” He shook his head and I think I heard one of the women at the bar sigh dreamily all the way from across the room. “It’s too much bullshit.”

“Well, I couldn’t deal with people who are guilty getting away with things they shouldn’t be getting away with. I don’t have enough faith in a random selection of jurors to make the right decisions when it comes to law. People are too easily swayed by charm and pretty words.”

He lifted his other eyebrow to join the first. “You don’t trust the system?”

It wasn’t a popular opinion among my peers, but I had seen too much, had lived too long with what happened when the system failed, to put all my faith in a flawed construct. I finished my drink and shrugged. “I trust the system to fail, which is why I do what I do. Some of these kids have to have someone who will fight for them no matter what. The system can fail, but I won’t.”

Quaid’s mouth pulled tight and he leaned back in his chair as he considered me thoughtfully. It was a good look. Piercing, intent, probing, I bet it worked really well when he used it to pick apart a witness on the stand, but I knew all the lawyerly tricks he had in his bag because I used them, too. I grinned back at him and waved the waitress over to order another drink.

“So what about someone who is just unhappy and out for blood? What about someone who just wants to make another person suffer? How are you helping in that situation? Are you fighting for the right and the just then?”

I was smart enough to know he was talking about his ex-wife. It was no secret in the legal community of Denver that she had taken him for a ride and that he had been lucky to escape with anything left to his name. They had been high school sweethearts, and when things went south they really went south. There were rumors of infidelity on both sides, but nothing had ever been brought to light, and because my firm was the best at what we did, Quaid escaped with both his reputation and fortune intact. He still had to pay through the nose monthly for maintenance, but overall we considered the settlement a win on our end. Apparently he didn’t share those thoughts.

“Everyone deserves representation. Isn’t that what the illustrious system is built on? I don’t handle a lot of divorce cases myself for that very reason, but I do know how ugly they can get. Happy people don’t split up, so by the time the marriage has dissolved I think everyone involved is already looking for somewhere to place the blame and looking for an outlet for all that hurt.”

He chuckled, but there was no humor in it. “Been married before?”

I shook my head. “No. Engaged, and it ended amicably, but I see it every day in my office. Something that is supposed to bring couples closer, make them happy, ultimately makes them the most miserable they have ever been.”

“Tell me about it.” The bitterness in his voice was impossible to miss.

He muttered something else I didn’t hear and put his panty-dropping grin back on just in time for the waitress to slosh half my drink on the table as she put it down.

I rolled my eyes at him. “Really?”

He chuckled. “Women like me.”

“I bet they do.” Why wouldn’t they? He was gorgeous, smart as hell, well-spoken, charming, exuded wealth and confidence, and that smile was lethal. I was a fucking idiot for not responding to any of it. I would punch myself in the face if I could. Why couldn’t I get my act together?

“Not you, though. I mean you obviously like me well enough, but you don’t like me. Can’t say I’ve ever had a woman cancel on me more than once.”

My hair was braided and pinned up in a coil at the back of my head, but if it had been down I would be twirling it nervously around a finger. A bad habit my father had hated. I had spent my entire youth doing anything to avoid his disapproving looks and cutting words, but some of my less attractive habits he had been unable to scorn out of me.

“I’ve been busy. My caseload is full, I was in the middle of a renovation on my house, and I’ve been trying to spend as much time with my brother as I can.” It was complicated to explain to people why I was obsessed with being around Rowdy and being a part of his life, so I went with the half-truth that I told anyone who asked me about it. “We didn’t get to spend much time together growing up and I feel like I’m making up for lost time now that my father is gone.”

The promise of having someone, anyone, who I was tied to, who I could call family and rely on, the thought of not having to be just me, myself, and I anymore, made me determined to find a place for myself not only in Denver but in Rowdy’s life. Luckily for me my little brother was a kind and caring man, and after a rough start he had welcomed me into his fold with open arms. My long-lost sibling was the greatest thing that had ever happened to me.

“Well, thanks for making the time for me tonight even though I think we had different ideas about what this date was about.”

I cringed a little and awkwardly picked up my martini as he went on.

“You’re really a lovely woman, Sayer. You’re driven, intelligent, and dedicated to your job. We have a lot in common, I think, and I was hoping there was more of a connection between us. I think there could be, but you don’t seem interested in letting it take root.”

I chugged back the rest of the drink so hard that it made me cough and had my eyes watering. I was mortified at the spectacle I was making of myself, but Quaid didn’t so much as flinch and his gaze never wavered.

I put a hand to my chest and wheezed out that I would love a glass of water when the waitress stopped by to gape at me and ask if I was okay.

“Quaid.” I started coughing again and wanted to crawl under the table and die. It took a full glass of water and five minutes in order for me to reply to him. “Your divorce was only finalized a few months ago. You can’t possibly be ready to get into a new relationship.”

A smirk played across his mouth and his eyebrows dipped down over his eyes in an undeniably sexy way. “Who said anything about a relationship? You’re attractive, busy, and independent. You don’t need me for anything other than sex. We’re both single and we get along. I thought it would be a great arrangement until the first time you bailed on me. I get the feeling that even though you are very discreet, there is someone else in your life. And no, I am not talking about your brother.”

Good Lord, could this get any more embarrassing? Yeah, there was someone else in my life, only he had no idea I was infatuated with him or that I was wearing out my vibrator because of my idiotic crush on him. Not that Quaid needed to know any of that.

Instead I told him, “There isn’t anyone else, but that isn’t an arrangement I would ever be comfortable with, regardless.” I fiddled with the collar on my shirt and heard my father reprimanding me in the back of my head. “I’m kind of old-fashioned and boring when it comes to relationships, Quaid. Friends with benefits isn’t something I have the ability to navigate.” And if he took me to bed and was bored out of his ever-loving mind, I didn’t want there to be a chance in hell of that kind of gossip making the rounds in the courthouse. It would kill me.

“Fair enough. I kind of got the hint when you canceled on me for the second time.”

I smiled at him. “But I do like you in the normal way and I really do enjoy spending time with you. It’s nice to have someone who I can talk the law with.”

It was his turn to roll his eyes. “Of course you normal like me, not naked like me. Like I said, all women like me one way or another.”

We shared a stilted laugh. I was terrible when it came to men. That was one thing that was all on me and I couldn’t blame on dear old Dad. I could never figure out how to be invested in them and still keep myself separated and safe. No one wanted to date or make love to an ice sculpture and pretty much that was all you got with me. It was the only way I survived growing up under my father’s critical eye. When you’re made to feel like the worst sort of idiot, the biggest kind of failure, for showing any type of emotion—even tears at your mother’s funeral—you learn pretty quickly that if you don’t have feelings then they can’t be destroyed. Quiet disapproval and endless disdain could land just as heavily as a balled-up fist when it was all that was given to a child.

And now Zeb Fuller was not only threatening to melt the icy shroud that made me feel safe, he was also making it impossible not to feel things. So many hot, bright, and addicting things. It was no wonder I was equally terrified of and obsessed with the man.

The rest of the evening passed with easy camaraderie and friendly banter about the legal system. I wasn’t lying. I really did like Quaid and I appreciated his quick wit and effortless flirting even though I didn’t return the interest, but it was when my phone buzzed with an incoming text message as I was walking in the front door that all the attraction and lure I wanted to feel for Quaid flared to life because Zeb’s name flashed on my phone.

He sent a message asking if I would be home on Saturday. I was so frazzled for a second I almost typed back YES in big, bold, shouty caps. When I calmed down I sent him back a reply that I had some work to do but he could swing by around lunch.

I didn’t even think to ask why he needed to see me and he didn’t elaborate, responding back with a brisk See you then.

At two in the morning the night before he was supposed to swing by, I gave up trying to sleep and went into my office to see if I could at least use my restlessness to get some work done, which really meant I sat at my desk and watched hours of Buffy the Vampire Slayer on Netflix without accomplishing much of anything besides wondering what Zeb could possibly want with me. It only took a few episodes before I decided that I was absolutely team Spike. I mean, hot, British bad boy, how could I not pull for him and Buffy to get over their obvious differences and find everlasting love?

I didn’t have high hopes for getting any kind of sleep, but when I finally dragged myself to bed around five, after some stern nudges from Poppy, as soon as my head hit the pillow my body gave out and my mind finally shut down on me. There were no visions of a handsome bearded man and no endless fantasies of all the things I wanted that man to do to me … or fantasies of all the things I really, really wanted to do to him. There was just darkness and finally blissful, dense, consuming sleep. I had hit the wall and there was nothing left for my psyche or body to give.

When a soft hand landed on my shoulder sometime later I could have sworn that my eyes had just fallen shut. I jerked up in the bed and blinked at Poppy while I tried to figure out what was going on. I was confused for a second because the entire room was flooded with sunshine and she was dressed for the day. I was also surprised she was in my room and that she had voluntarily touched me.

“What time is it?” I pushed a messy handful of hair out of my face and stretched my arms up over my head. I groaned as every bone in my neck popped at the motion.

Poppy nervously fiddled with the end of her long braid and told me, “It’s twelve-oh-five. Zeb’s been downstairs for the last ten minutes waiting for you. I told him you haven’t been sleeping very well and he offered to leave and come back another day, but I didn’t think you’d want that, so I decided to come wake you up.”

At first I just stared at her like she was speaking Spanish, then I swore and threw the covers off of me.

“You’ve got to be kidding me? I finally fall asleep after months of sleepless hell and I almost miss the visit of the person keeping me up in the first place? Un-freaking-believable.” I never normally would have admitted that Zeb was the reason for my insomnia. That’s how unsettled I was. There went those pesky emotions again.

I scrambled out of bed and paused when I caught sight of myself in the full-length mirror that was mounted on the closet door. My hair was a wild mess around my head. It looked like an entire family of squirrels had moved into the mess overnight. My face was scary pale and my eyes were way too big in my face, making me look startled and almost frightened. I had on the stretchy tank top and comfy yoga pants that I always wore to bed, but it was the last outfit I wanted Zeb to see me in. I didn’t want to keep him waiting any longer than I already had, so I decided the sleepwear was going to have to do even though the idea of appearing as anything other than perfectly groomed and put together in front of him made me want to vomit. It felt like I was going into battle without armor.

Frantically throwing on a loose T-shirt to cover up the points on my chest that were also apparently excited to see him, I dashed around until I found a brush in the bathroom and ripped it through my hair until the tangled heap was smooth enough to put up in a ponytail. I wrapped a bandanna around my head and hurriedly slapped on some blush so I didn’t look so much like an extra from The Walking Dead.

Poppy watched the frantic spectacle with a smile on her face while she shook her head at my antics. “Sorry. I would’ve woke you up sooner, but I was talking to my sister on the phone and lost track of the time. I didn’t realize how late it was until the doorbell rang. I panicked for a second thinking it was a stranger that I was going to have to open the door for and try and talk to until I remembered you said Zeb was coming over. If it helps calm your nerves, he looks as uptight and stressed out as you’re acting right now.”

That gave me a moment’s pause as I was headed out the bedroom door. I looked at Poppy in question where she was perched on the edge of the bed. “He does? Did he say why he’s here?”

She shook her head. “Nope. He just came in and said it was nice to see me and that I looked pretty as a picture, but he did it without smiling at me. When I told him it would just take me a minute to go and get you, he muttered that he would just wait in your office.”

That was odd. Zeb was always charming and laid-back. He was quick with a grin and one of his booming laughs. He typically went out of his way to put Poppy at ease and never seemed ruffled or keyed up about anything. If he was being abrupt and distant with her, then something was definitely off and this wasn’t a friendly visit at all.

I took a deep breath and ran my sweaty hands over the thin material of my pants. “Okay. Well, I guess I’ll go find out what’s up with him, then. Thank you for waking me up.”

“No problem. You look better. You obviously needed the rest.”

No, I was pretty sure what I needed was to let the man waiting for me downstairs to fuck my brains out so I could stop dreaming about it, but I would rather have my tongue cut out with a dull knife than admit that.

I took the stairs two at a time and practically jogged across my living room into the room at the front of the house that Zeb had converted into an office for me. The door was propped open slightly, so when I hit it going full speed it flew open and crashed into the wall behind it with a loud bang.

The sound made Zeb whirl around from where he was looking out one of the big windows behind my desk. I flinched when I saw his reaction and told myself to calm the hell down. I plastered what I hoped was a friendly smile on my face and made my way much more slowly across the room. I shivered when his dark green eyes settled on me and felt secret places in my body get tight and start to tingle.

“Hey, Zeb. How are you?” It sounded forced and strained to my own ears and I could tell he heard the tension in my tone as well when his dark eyebrows dipped over his leafy-colored gaze.

“I’ve actually been better.” He sighed and I saw his gaze slip from the top of my head to the tips of my bare toes. I wiggled them involuntarily when his gaze seemed to stay stuck on the brightly colored appendages. Since everything I wore was typically black, taupe, or gray with an occasional neutral color snuck in, I liked to have my pedicure be as loud and as outrageous as possible. My toes were hard to miss, but when they made the corner of Zeb’s mouth twitch inside of the facial hair that surrounded his mouth, it made my heart rate kick up. Even his smile was rugged and tough looking.

“Poppy mentioned that you seemed a little tense when you came in, so I figured this isn’t a social call. What can I do for you?” I kept my tone level and as professional as it could be considering I wanted to purr and rub up against him. Professional I could handle. Heated and aroused just by being around him I had no clue what to do with.

He heaved a sigh and walked around to the front of my desk. He propped his backside on the edge and crossed his arms over his broad chest, pulling the thin material of his T-shirt tight and making his biceps bulge. It was an eye-candy feast that I would have appreciated much more fully if I hadn’t noticed the muscle ticking in his cheek under the facial hair that covered it and the emotion in his eyes that darkened them from a deep green shade to one that was almost black. Sensing things were going to get serious really fast, I walked over to shut the door I had just thrown open and then took a seat in one of the cream-colored chairs I had bought to match the rest of the sedate decor in the office. I had to look way up at him when I sat down and I could see his struggle with whatever it was that had brought him to my door stamped clearly across his strong features as we watched each other silently.

“I didn’t mean to rattle Poppy. I know she’s sensitive and has every right to be. I thought I was holding it together better than I am, but something about actually admitting out loud what I’m about to tell you really has me on edge.” He blew out a long breath and looked me straight in the eyes. “I fucked up, Sayer. I mean, I really and truly fucked up and I think you are the only person that can help me fix this mess that I made.”

Startled by both his harsh words and the rawness with which he poured them out, I leaned back in the chair and curled my hands around the arms. “Are you talking about my professional help?”

I was asked for legal advice all the time, so I would gladly hand over any knowledge that I had that might benefit him in any way. In fact, it made me want to breathe a sigh of relief. Business, the law, cold hard facts, I could handle with ease. It was anything that required dealing with someone on an emotional and personal level where I tended to fall apart and drop the ball. When you shut your emotions off to survive, it is nearly impossible to turn them back on, even for someone you care about.

Zeb chuckled, but there was absolutely no humor in it. “Yeah, I need your professional help and maybe your personal help, too, considering you know what it’s like to find out you have a long-lost family member that no one bothered to tell you about. You know what it’s like to have your world turn upside down in the space of a few seconds.”

I reared back a little and took a minute to get my thoughts in order before asking, “You have a sibling your family never disclosed to you, too?” It seemed highly unlikely, but I was missing a piece of the puzzle here and he didn’t seem to be in any hurry to hand it over. I couldn’t believe he’d found himself in a similar situation to the one I was in when my father died and his will revealed that I had a brother. The bastard couldn’t even be bothered to tell me himself. Ever the consummate Svengali, toying with the people he was supposed to love like we existed for nothing more than his amusement. His games and ploys had been exhausting, but his last one had failed. Thank God. I was so lonely growing up, so sad and isolated, that when I found out about Rowdy, I dropped everything in my old life in Seattle and hightailed it for Colorado as quickly as I could. It was the one time in my life when I acted without thinking. It was the one time I had let myself feel … until that fateful day I met Zeb.

I made it no secret that I considered Rowdy to be the greatest thing that had ever happened to me, so if that was what Zeb was talking about I could walk him through the ups and downs of it all.

He pushed off the desk and started to pace back and forth in front of me. I was trying to figure out what exactly was going on as he brooded before me, but I couldn’t stop my eyes from tracking the way the muscles in his shoulders and back bunched and flexed under his T-shirt each time he reached the end of the rug and turned around to walk back the other way. The man was hot even when he was troubled and it made me feel a little bit like a pervert for not being able to control my fascination with him.

“Not a sibling … a son.” He stopped in front of me as the words dropped like a bag of bricks between us. “There is a possibility I fathered a child as soon as I got out of prison. I might have a five-year-old son out there.”

I felt my jaw drop a little and I was glad I had taken a moment to add some artificial color to my face because whatever heat had worked into my cheeks by being around him had surely leached out with his revelation.

“A possibility, but you don’t know for sure?” It was what I would ask any client in the same situation. “Is someone coming after you for child support?”

He shook his head and picked the pacing back up. “No. It was a one-night deal and the mother didn’t even know who the father was until the baby was born. She passed away recently and the little boy is currently with Child Protective Services. The woman’s friend tracked me down claiming I’m the boy’s dad and begging me to keep him out of foster care. I don’t really remember the girl or the sex, but I do recall the day since it was the day of my release and the timing fits. The little boy just turned five according to the friend that found me.”

I frowned and fought the urge to get up and grab his arms to get him to stop moving so that I could talk to him without having to crane my neck.

“So a stranger dropped all of this on you with the mother out of the picture and you just bought the story at face value?” He had to be smarter than that.

My skepticism finally brought him to a halt as he stopped in front of me and looked down at me. I sucked in a surprised breath that whistled through my teeth when he bent down slightly and held his phone under my nose for inspection.

“No. I thought she was nuts and threatened to throw her off my jobsite until she showed me a picture of the boy.” I stared in shock at the image on the phone of the mini Zeb. “That kind of proof made me listen to what she had to say.”

Without thinking, I snatched the phone out of his callused hand and touched a finger to the adorable little face looking back at me on the screen. “He looks just like you.”

Zeb snorted. “I noticed. Which is why I’m here.”

I couldn’t stop looking at the little boy, so without looking up, I asked him, “There are no other relatives? No grandparents or aunts and uncles who could take him in while we figure out paternity?” I winced when I realized I said “we” like this was a problem we were going to find a solution for together. For all I knew, Zeb just wanted some advice or the name of another good attorney. The thought of anyone else helping him navigate the tricky family court system made the hair on the back of my neck rise up.

“According to the friend that brought the information to me, the mom was living a pretty dangerous lifestyle. She hadn’t been in contact with her family for years. The little guy has no one, and if he is mine then I need to do the right thing by him and I need to do it as quickly as possible.”

I gulped and handed the phone back when he stuck his hand out for it. I put my own hand to my chest because my heart was beating so fast I thought maybe he could see it through my skin and layers of clothing.

“That’s very admirable, Zeb.”

“No, it’s not. If he’s mine I should’ve been taking care of him all along. He shouldn’t be in this situation because I was too drunk and disgustingly miserable to use a condom one time. It’s not his fault that his mom was an addict and made terrible decisions. No kid should have to suffer because of the shitty choices the adults in their lives might’ve made. He deserves better than this.”

I agreed with him, but I also thought he was being kind of hard on himself. I knew far too many men who, were they in the same situation, would have ignored the revelation of a child they fathered and pretended like nothing had happened.

Since the conversation had turned serious so fast I no longer felt comfortable sitting down while Zeb loomed over me. I got to my feet and took up his original pose leaning against the glass-topped desk. I set my hands down next to me so I could rap my fingernails against the surface. It was another unconscious habit I had that my father had abhorred. He hated it so much that I had a burning memory from when I was fourteen of him scolding me, chastising me, and sending me to sit in my room during the middle of a fancy dinner party he had held at our house when his firm won a major case. It was mortifying to do a walk of shame in front of his colleagues and their families over something so small, something so seemingly insignificant. My father had ignored me, glowered at me for days on end. He told me I wasn’t fit for company, and that I had no manners and that he had raised me better than that. His disapproval crawled all over me like angry bugs whenever I did something he didn’t like. I learned to behave like nothing he said or did bothered me. I shivered a little as the image of his sneer and scowl whispered across my memory. I immediately stopped tapping my fingernails.

“So what do you want to do here, Zeb? Do you want to find out for sure if the child is yours, and if he is do you want to try to appeal to the state for full custodial rights? What’s your plan?”

He moved so that he was facing me and we stared at each other for a long, silent moment. He took a step forward until the tips of his worn Red Wings were almost touching my brightly colored toes. He dipped his chin down so we were eye to eye, and I stopped breathing as he reached out and put his hands on top of mine. He towered over me, but my breasts still hit the center of his chest and he was bent just enough that all the parts of him that I dreamed about in the dark were pressed tightly against me. I could see a thick vein on the side of his neck throbbing. This was the closest I had ever been to him and I could tell the proximity was going to do nothing for my sleeplessness. He was everywhere and yet not close enough.

“My plan is you, Sayer.”

I opened my mouth and then closed it again. I felt my eyebrows shoot up and a flush start to work its way up my throat. His eyes were so dark now it was almost impossible to see the pupils and every breath he exhaled I took in. I could taste his tension and my own across my tongue. The flavor of each was very different and had its own tang.

“What does that mean exactly?” My voice was thin and shaky and there was no real hiding the way my body reacted to his nearness. I longed for the layers of my professional garb, but instead the thin material of my bedtime outfit put the way my entire being flushed and the way my nipples tightened into noticeable peaks on full display.

He noticed.

Zeb took a step closer and ran his rough hands up my arms until they curled around my shoulders.

“I want you to help me, Sayer. I need you to get me through this. I need you to help me help this little boy even if it turns out he isn’t mine.”

His eyes drilled into me and I felt like I was being welded to the spot. I nodded slightly. “Of course I’ll help you, Zeb. I’ll get started on the paperwork we need to file to figure out paternity on Monday. You’re going to need to get a DNA test and we’ll have to petition the state to get one done on the little boy.” I did a lot of pro bono work for families in the community and this was a case I would be happy to handle free of charge even though I knew Zeb made enough to afford my regular rates.

He sighed and I was stunned when he dropped his forehead so that it rested against my own. I could feel the brush of his beard against my face and I wanted to whimper at the surprising softness of it. I also wanted to rub my face against it like a cat.

“No, I don’t think you get what I’m asking you. I want you to help me because it’s me, Sayer. Not because it’s your job and what you do.”

His deep voice rasped across my skin and I felt like I had been thrown into an alternate universe all of a sudden, a universe where all I could do was feel things. I tentatively put a hand in the middle of his wide chest and was surprised to realize that his heart was racing and pounding just as erratically as my own.

“Obviously the fact that it’s you and we know each other makes things more complicated on a personal level. Why would you think otherwise?” I was having a hell of a time concentrating because he took another step closer so that we were pressed even more tightly together and moved his hands up so that he was grasping either side of my face. His palms were rough and I wanted to lean into them.

“How about the fact that you spent three months dodging every move I tried to lay on you, or maybe it’s the way you laugh off or ignore any kind of compliment I toss at you. You went out of your way to keep things between us strictly professional the entire time I was working on this house, but you can’t deny that there is something there between us when we get close to one another that is completely unprofessional. I want your help, Sayer, but I want you, too.”

I frowned at his words and lifted my hands to wrap around his wrists. I wasn’t at all surprised when my fingers barely touched. Everything about him was so big and hard. He really was the epitome of what a man should be, and I had no clue what to do with any of it or the fact that he had just come out and told me I wasn’t the only one suffering from what felt like a fatal case of lust.

“I thought you were just being friendly. You flirt with everyone. I thought it was habit, and I didn’t want to make things awkward since you had so much work to do on the house.” Not to mention I didn’t want to try to explain to him my baggage and my chronic case of overthinking every move I made. Zeb was a nice guy. He wouldn’t fuck me without getting to know me, and it made my stomach turn to think of him knowing any part of the real me, the me that walked on eggshells every day, the me that was constantly waiting for the other shoe to drop, the me that spent her entire life praying she had finally reached the level of expectation set out by the very man she hated most. He wouldn’t like her very much. No one did.

He pulled his head back and his eyebrows snapped down low over his eyes in a fierce scowl. His mouth pursed into a tight line and I could see his jaw twitching under his beard.

“You thought I was trying to get you into bed out of habit? That I have no control around a pretty girl and just want to nail whoever happens to be in the vicinity? Jesus, Sayer, what kind of asshole player do you think I am?”

I dug my fingers into his wrists and scowled right back at him as his pulse kicked into my touch. “I don’t think you’re an asshole or a player at all, Zeb, but I also have no experience with men like you.”

“Men like me? What does that mean? What kind of man am I?” He was getting angry and frustrated and I couldn’t blame him. It was hard for me to explain why he was everything I wanted but everything I could never have. We were on two different levels when it came to our personalities and I knew there was no way someone as passionate and expressive as he was would ever be interested in someone as reserved and closed off as I was. Where I was the frozen tundra when it came to emotional availability, he was the blazing heat of the desert. I could see the fire of his annoyance in his gaze as he waited for my shaky explanation.

“You’re a man who is sure of himself and confident. You’re a man who is used to having women fall at his feet. You’re a man who is exciting and interesting.” I lifted an eyebrow at him. “You’re a man who is tattooed and drives a cool vintage truck around, you’re a man who doesn’t mind getting dirty and can create things for a living. All of that is the total opposite of everything I’ve ever known, Zeb.”

His eyebrows went from the deep frown over his nose to shooting up on his forehead and disappeared under the dark fall of hair that rested there. A grin that could only be described as wicked slashed through his beard and his hands tightened where they were still holding on to my face.

“I thought you were going to say a man with a past. A man that has been to jail. I thought you were going to say a man with my history is the kind of man you have no experience with. You surprised me.”

If I was a different type of woman, I might have smacked him for that kind of ignorance. “Where you have been doesn’t define who you are, Zeb. I told you when we first met that I understand that people make mistakes.”

He grunted and moved his face closer to mine. “And here I am on your doorstep with another one. You want me to teach you about a man like me, Sayer? I’m pretty simple to figure out.”

I didn’t believe that for a single second, so I opened my mouth to tell him. There was never anything simple about passion. I didn’t get a chance to utter a sound because before I got a word out I suddenly knew exactly what it felt like to be kissed by a guy with a beard because he dipped his head and devoured my mouth with his.

It felt phenomenal.

His lips were soft and warm when they landed on mine and the brush of his facial hair had just enough of a rasp against my skin to make me shiver all over. He was still holding on to my face, so he tipped my head back. While I was still trying to get my head around the fact that this was actually happening, his tongue invaded my mouth, and I thought I was going to pass out from the devastating pleasure of it all.

I had been kissed before. In fact, I liked kissing. I liked the press of mouths together and the way you could tell what kind of man you had on your hands by how skilled or terrible he was at such a simple act. I liked that kissing was intimate and involved without having to have all your cards on the table. But more than any of that, I liked that kissing spoke to exactly how into you the guy laying it on you was. If it was a peck on the cheek or a brush of lips, it meant there was no spark. If there was a closed lip press and no tease of the tongue, it meant he found you attractive and kissable but probably wasn’t going to put forth the effort to be worthy of you. If there was a little nibble of teeth and the swirl of a tongue, there was promise and potential.

Then there was whatever it was Zeb was doing to me. It felt like a conquering. A victory. A battle fought and won. It felt like he was trying to make it so that I would never be able to kiss anyone else in my life without having to compare it to this moment, to the feel of his hard mouth contrasting with the soft scrape of his beard against my skin. It was more than a kiss, it was a sensation overload, and it was making all the crystalline barriers I had in place crack.

His lips were firm and unyielding as they pressed into my own. His tongue danced across mine as his teeth scraped delicately across my lower lip. I felt it everywhere and all I could do was hold on and let him devour me while I whimpered and shook against him. I think I kissed him back. I really wanted to be kissing him back, but I was so lost in the sensation, so caught up in the fantasy becoming reality and it all being so much better than I was prepared for, I might just have stood there like an unresponsive dope.

When he finally pulled back after tasting what felt like every hidden spot I had in my mouth and across my tongue, he was breathing hard and his dark green eyes were glassy with desire and something deeper.

“Men like me are about action, Sayer. We’re much better at doing than saying.” He let go of my face and took a step back from me. There was no missing that the front of his faded jeans had gotten much tighter. God, I wanted to rub my hands over that impressive bulge. “I’ve wanted you since the first day I saw you at the Bar sitting with Rowdy.”

I cleared my throat before trying to speak. My head was still spinning from his assault on my senses and my libido was trying to take over my common sense.

“Zeb …” The word squeaked out even though I tried for collected and cool. “I like you and I think you’re incredibly attractive, but you don’t know me and I don’t really think you would be interested in me if you did. Obviously there is an attraction here, but I can’t act on chemistry alone. I’m not built that way.” Even though I wished sometimes that I was. “I can still help you out with your situation with the child. We’ll figure everything out together, so don’t worry about things being weird. We can forget about this kiss and focus on what’s important.”

I would never forget that kiss … not ever.

He growled at me like an animal. He put his hands on his lean hips and narrowed his eyes, which had lightened back up to their normal mossy color.

“Sayer, do you want to go on a date with me?” I opened my mouth to tell him of course I did but that it wasn’t a good idea with all the other things he suddenly had going on in his life. I also didn’t want to bore him to death and risk having him find out just how unappealing I really was. Before I could speak he held up a hand and pointed his finger at me. “Don’t give me a bullshit lawyer answer or tell me what you think you should say. Just tell me yes or no if you want to go out with me?”

Put that way, real and on the spot, there was only one thing to say to him without lying through my teeth. “Yes, I want to go out with you, Zeb.” Even though I knew it would almost certainly end up a disaster.

He grinned at me and I felt my knees get weak.

“Okay, then I’ll make it happen. We’ll go on a date and you’ll see you can totally handle a guy like me … I think I’ll enjoy that part of it.” He took a step toward me and I was startled when he pulled me into a one-armed hug. I instinctively wrapped my arms around him and squeezed back as he told me, “Thank you. I knew you were the person that was going to save me.”

That was a lot of pressure and I had a moment of panic wondering what would happen if I let him down in court or on a date.

“We’ll figure it out. I’m really good at my job and the reason I got into family law in the first place was to help kids.” Because no one had been there to help me. “By the way, what’s his name?”

“Hyde. His name is Hyde.”

Of course it was. A mini Zeb wouldn’t have anything but a cool and unusual name.

“I’ll take care of you, both of you.” My voice was muffled by the fabric of his shirt, but I was sure he heard it because his arm tightened around my shoulders.

I was already getting too close, melting a little bit into him. I was making promises I couldn’t keep. That was what happened when emotion started to bleed through the cracks.

CHAPTER 4
Zeb

I was out of my damn mind.

I was supposed to be begging her for help. I was supposed to be trying to do the right thing. I was supposed to be full of dread and embarrassment at the consequences of my past actions. I wasn’t supposed to feel the burn and sharp twist of desire that blazed through me every time I got near Sayer. That hadn’t been part of my agenda when I went to her for help. There simply wasn’t any stopping it.

Maybe it was the fact that it was the first time I had ever seen Sayer outside of her typical, severe-looking work wear. If there was such a thing as being tragically flawless and ferociously immaculate, then those were conditions that she definitely suffered from. She was always so tailored and put together. Sometimes she didn’t seem real, more like a life-size doll without a hair out of place and a face full of perfectly subdued makeup still intact after a full day’s worth of work. She was intimidating not only in her carefully crafted beauty but also in her consummate perfection.

Seeing her standing there with messy hair and dressed in rumpled clothes that she obviously slept in had pulled my head from all the cloudy thoughts about the possibility of impending fatherhood and immediately launched it into all kinds of filthy and sexy thoughts that involved putting her in even more disarray with my mouth and hands. God, I wanted to touch her, to taste her. I wanted to know if she felt as cool as she looked and just what it would take to get her to melt, to thaw her out and turn her into nothing more than liquid and want in my hands.

The kiss had been a solid start.

Hell, the way she kissed me back, arched into me and got all soft and pliable at just the touch of lips to lips, let me know she would have zero trouble rolling with anything I wanted to lay on her. Even if it was clear she had her doubts about that. As perfect as Sayer appeared to be on the outside, it was becoming obvious that all of that perfection cracked and splintered a little bit below the surface. She had a shell around her, but it was much thinner and more brittle than I think she was aware of.

Now that I had admitted the truth to Sayer, which felt like jumping off a cliff without knowing what was waiting below me, I had a few more people to tell about my current, questionable situation. I knew my sister and my mother would support me no matter what the outcome of the paternity test was, but I dreaded seeing the look of disappointment in their eyes when I came clean. They would be frustrated and exasperated that I had once again made a rushed, drastic decision that led to an outcome that could stick with me for the rest of my life.

I watched my mom’s heart break in half when the judge laid down the sentence after I pled no contest to the aggravated assault and additional charge of child endangerment. She cried harder than I had ever seen her cry and that included the night my dad walked out on us for good when I was just a kid. I never wanted to put her through that again, and depending on the outcome of the looming test, my guts twisted into knots at the idea that I could cause her that kind of pain and disappointment more than once in a lifetime. All I wanted to do since getting out of prison was make my mother proud. That was why I worked six days a week and made sure to keep my nose clean and my easily ignited temper in check.

My sister, Beryl, was a little different. When I went to jail she had wanted to fight harder to keep me out than I had. She was in court with a broken nose, black eyes, and her arm in a sling, and was recovering from a head injury that had put her in the hospital for a week. She was ready to tell anyone that would listen that the only reason I was in trouble in the first place was because her boyfriend at the time, my niece’s deadbeat father, had nearly beaten her to death. There was no way she could stop me once I learned how badly she was hurt, and I hadn’t stopped to think for a second about what it would mean for me that I had attacked her abuser in plain sight of not only her but of my then three-year-old niece. Beryl couldn’t believe I was the one facing a prison sentence while that asshole she used to be involved with got to walk free. She also couldn’t believe that because her daughter, Joss, had witnessed the beatdown I had delivered, I was the one looking at a child-abuse charge. Beryl felt that it was all unjust and disgustingly unfair, but there was nothing she could do to help me when I decided that instead of dragging everything through court and subjecting her and Joss to a trial, I would just take my punishment and serve the time. I was going away regardless of any argument put forth, so I wanted to do it as quickly and painlessly for those that I loved as possible. Maybe it was guilt and remorse for losing it so drastically in front of Joss, or the fury that I hadn’t known what was happening to my sister, but I just wanted it all to go away. It was the hardest decision I had ever had to make until Echo showed up on my jobsite claiming I fathered a child.

Beryl had hidden the violence and abuse she suffered at her ex’s hands for years, but like all abusers a time had come when he had gone too far. With the evidence so brutal and blinding right in my face, I had lost my shit and taught the guy a lesson he would never forget about using his hands on the fairer sex, especially someone I happened to love beyond measure. He had beaten and hurt my sister, so in return I had nearly killed him with nothing more than fists and the rage behind them. I was out of control, and honestly once the haze of fury had dulled, I understood I had crossed a line and did deserve to be punished for my lack of control. My temper was always something I struggled to keep in check, it still made my heart hurt that sometimes I could still see threads of fear in my sister’s eyes when she looked at me and saw the dangerous man I could be if pushed too far. For the last seven years I worked hard to be respectable and repentant because I never wanted to be that guy again. I didn’t want my family or anyone I cared about to look at me like I was a bomb about to go off.

When I told Beryl about Hyde I knew her reaction would be to wrap me up in a hug, hold me tight, and tell me that everything was going to be okay. She would prop me up and help me fight to make things right if Hyde was indeed my kid, but behind her support and encouraging words there would be that sisterly knowing that scolded me for not thinking things through. While she appreciated me riding to her rescue and always told me how guilty she felt for not leaving the dickhead sooner so that years of my life weren’t given up for her, she still never let me forget that there was a better way for all of us to have handled the situation with her ex. My actions had cost us all a heavy price in the end.

Sighing and shoving my shaggy hair off my forehead, I wheeled my fully restored, 1950 International farm truck into my mom’s driveway and parked it next to my sister’s little hybrid that was already taking up half the space. I had grown up in a suburb of Denver called Lakewood, and my mom still lived in the one-story brick rancher that she raised me and Beryl in. It was a quiet, family-friendly neighborhood that Mom had relocated to not long after Dad left. Even after all the time and circumstances that had passed, pulling into the cracked cement driveway that led to the garage still felt like coming home. I had offered to move my mom into one of my properties, to upgrade her home for her, but she wasn’t having any of it. Beryl even bought a town house a few miles away, which made life easy for her since Mom picked my niece up and watched her after school until Beryl got off of work from her job as a bank teller. Mom insisted she wasn’t going anywhere, and that her house was just fine the way it was. I honestly couldn’t complain. It was nice to have a solid base, a place that never shifted or moved and that always felt welcoming and warm. My mom had always made sure we knew where home was and that had been one of the key factors in driving me to create that kind of place for others.

I loved working with my hands and getting to be my own boss. But handing over the keys, walking away from a family knowing that I had given them a place that could be their home base, their security, fulfilled me in a way that was hard to put words to. I always felt like what I did was so much more important than driving nails into wood or slapping some paint onto walls, and that was why my crew was all made up of guys that needed a second chance and a way to give back.

Every single guy that worked for me was either an ex-con or an otherwise at-risk individual. I was the captain of the second-chance crew and I couldn’t be happier about it. I wanted all the guys I took under my wing to know that there was life after a major mistake, that making the most of a second chance was the only way to get ahead, and I wanted them all to see how important something like home really could be. I also wanted to give guys the opportunity that they might not get anywhere else to learn a tangible skill they could take with them wherever they ended up in life. There had been a failure or two along the way since I started recruiting the unrecruitable, but for the most part the guys were overly grateful for having honest work in an environment that wasn’t about judging the sins of the past.

I didn’t bother knocking on the metal storm door since the front door was open and I could hear the infectious sound of childish laughter floating from somewhere inside the house. It was the weekend, which meant plenty of family time. We usually all got together on Sundays for either brunch or dinner depending on my work schedule, but Beryl always swung by on the weekends and spent a couple hours catching up with Mom and letting Joss play with the neighborhood kids that made up her circle of friends.

I prowled through the empty house and followed the sounds of laughing and screeching to the backyard. I could see my mom’s dark head bent toward my sister’s as they talked quietly about something while a group of kids including my adorable niece played tag. A grin tugged at my mouth as I tiptoed my way through the kitchen and dining room until I reached the sliding glass door that led to the concrete patio they were sitting on.

Joss caught sight of me and I saw her lift her arm up to wave at me, but I shook my head and put a finger to my lips, indicating she should keep quiet while I crept up on her mom and grandmother. My boots squeaked on the laminate floor that Mom refused to let me rip up and replace, but the noise wasn’t loud enough to draw attention. Joss giggled as she watched my approach, and when I got to the glass of the doors I gripped the metal handle and yanked it open while shouting “BOO!”

I chuckled uncontrollably as the glass in Beryl’s hand went flying and as my mom leaped out of her chair like it was on fire. She spun on me and smacked me playfully in the center of my chest. I rubbed the spot playfully as she scowled up at me.

“Zebulon Fuller! Are you trying to give an old woman a heart attack?”

My mom was far from old. In fact she looked good and young enough that if it wasn’t for the few wrinkles around her eyes she could easily pass for my older sister instead of my parent, so I didn’t bother replying to that nonsense. Instead, I grunted and bent down to scoop Joss up as she ran at me. I wrapped an arm around her as she grabbed on to the end of my beard and pulled. It was something she did every time she saw me and it always made me smile. I gave her a smacking kiss on the cheek and made sure to rub my whiskers on her face as she giggled.

“Uncle Zeb, stop!” She wiggled until I put her down and dashed back to play with her friends.

I sighed dramatically and walked over to take one of the remaining seats at the patio set across from my sister. “How quickly I’m forgotten.”

Beryl was still frowning at me and wiping her damp fingers off on her jeans. “She’s almost eleven. Just wait until she’s a teenager and the boys she’s running to hug are the ones she wants to date.”

I let out a low growl at that and jerked when something freezing and slippery suddenly slipped down the back of my T-shirt. I leaned forward in the chair and practically pulled my shirt off over my head in order to fish out the ice cube Beryl had just dropped down the collar.

“You suck.”

“You’re the one that made me spill my drink. Jerk.”

We glared at each other for a second until my mom snorted and had us both turning to look at her.

“I kept waiting for the day when you two won’t argue like you did when you were little, but at this point I don’t think I’ll live long enough to see it. Zeb, it’s Saturday, why aren’t you working?”

I contemplated tossing the dripping piece of ice back at Beryl but instead dropped it back on the ground. I stroked a hand down my beard and looked at both of them solemnly.

“I’m in the middle of a situation and I needed to ask a friend for some help with it, so I took the day off. I also need to tell you guys what’s going on. It’s a conversation we need to have in person.”

My mom put a hand to her mouth and I saw it shake a little. Beryl’s eyes sharpened and she reached out a hand to put on my tense shoulder.

“Are you okay? Are you in some kind of trouble?”

I cringed involuntarily and shifted my gaze to the kids playing in the yard. “Some kind of trouble, I just don’t know what kind yet.”

“What happened?” Beryl kept her voice low and I could see worry filling my mom’s eyes. They were the exact same color as my own so I knew by the way they darkened that she was already expecting the worst and that made my heart squeeze and my breath lock up in my lungs. That was exactly the reaction I was dreading. I was back to having her look past me and seeing only the things I was capable of. I was used to being judged, but it hurt a little more when it came from someone you loved unquestioningly.

“A girl showed up at my jobsite this week and gave me some news that flipped my world upside down.”

Beryl’s fingers curled into my shoulder. “What happened to the lawyer you were all hung up on? The one you worked yourself to death trying to impress by building her your dream home?”

I shook my head slowly and bent to put my elbows on my knees so I could hold my head in my hands. She knew me too well. Sure the house was Sayer’s vision and her ultimate dream, but the work I put into her Victorian, the way I agonized and labored over every part of the remodel, meant I left a part of myself in the structure. Sayer’s home was my dream home and she didn’t even know it.

“This isn’t about some girl, Beryl … well, it is but not like that. Sayer is actually the friend I went to see to ask for help. She’s a family attorney … which I may need because there is a good chance I might have a family.”

“What?!” The whispered exclamation came from my mother followed by a whole slew of surprised curse words from my sister.

I pressed my fingers into my temples and sighed again. “Like I said, this girl showed up on my jobsite and dropped a bomb. She was pretty shaken but managed to tell me that her friend that had recently passed away identified me as the father of her child. A child that is currently on his way into foster care.”

“Oh, Zeb.” My mom’s voice was soft and I couldn’t bring myself to look her in the eyes.

“You can’t just believe some stranger, Zeb. Where’s the proof? This is ridiculous.” I knew Beryl would immediately go into defensive mode, and while I appreciated it, the proof was pretty clear when the child in question had my face.

I pulled out my phone and pulled up the image. Without a word, I put the phone down in the center of the table and waited for my family to take it all in. Tears immediately shined over my mother’s eyes, and for once Beryl seemed to have nothing to say.

“The proof is in the picture. I didn’t just believe her, and there are things about her story that add up and make me believe the boy could be mine. When I got out of prison I wasn’t in a good place. It was almost as hard to come home as it was to go in. Before I saw you guys after more than two years of being away, I needed a minute to get my shit together. That minute was full of some reckless choices on my part. Choices that very well could mean the boy is mine.”

My mom picked up the phone and I saw her hands shake. “This looks exactly like your picture from the first day of kindergarten, except you had on a Star Wars T-shirt.”

“I know, Mom.”

I finally looked up at my sister, who was staring at me with a mixture of compassion, aggravation, and that soul-deep understanding that we were ultimately in this together.

“What did the lawyer say?”

I couldn’t stop the little snicker that slipped out as I sat back up in the seat and laced my fingers behind my head. “Before or after I kissed her?”

“Zeb!” My mom gave me a hard look and my sister just shook her head.

“Really? You thought ‘hey I may have a child floating out there in the world somewhere’ was a good pickup line? I hope she kicked you in the balls.”

“She told me that she would work on getting the state to put a paternity test in place first thing tomorrow, though I think we all know what the outcome is going to be. There is no doubt in my mind that the boy is mine.” I wiggled my eyebrows. “And then she kissed me back.”

“Okay, and once the paperwork proves paternity, what happens next? Have you thought any of this through, Zeb? Are you really ready to be a dad full-time? What about your company? You work all the time.” They were the same questions that had been chasing themselves around in circles in my mind ever since Echo had ambushed me, and my answer always ended up being the same.

“Of course I’m not ready. I have no clue how to be a parent or how to take care of a child, but this isn’t about me. That kid needs me. There is no reason for him to be caught up in the system when I’m here and can take care of him. He’s my responsibility.” And these were the last two people in the world that would ever question how seriously I took my responsibilities in life.

“Okay, then. You just let me know what you need me to do. You know I’ll support you any way I can, Zeb.” Beryl reached out and ruffled the hair on the top of my head just like she used to do when we were little kids. “And for what it’s worth, I think you’ll make a wonderful father no matter how it happened to come about. No one loves as fiercely as you do, little brother.”

My mom reluctantly put the phone back on the table so I could reach out and slide it back toward me.

Beryl and I both watched her as she remained silent and on the verge of tears for long-drawn-out minutes. I kept waiting for her to say something, anything, and just when I was going to break the silence with an apology of rushed words, she got up and walked around the table and stopped right in front of me. I had to swallow hard to keep back the emotion that welled up in me. There was no disappointment or censure in her dark green gaze, none of the judgment that I feared with every breath I took. There was only open and endless love.

She bent down and wrapped her arms around me in a hug that felt like everything I wasn’t aware I needed since hearing the news a few days ago.

She kissed me on the top of the head and whispered, “What’s his name, Zeb? What’s my grandson’s name?”

It took me a minute to find my voice and to get my arms to move so I could hug her back. I had to clear my throat around all the feelings that seemed to be clogged there before I could answer her.

“His name is Hyde.” I really needed to start with that instead of just calling him the kid or the boy. He needed to be real and solid. He needed to be more than just a fuzzy and cloudy idea of a thing that would forever change my life. He was a tiny, little person. He was my tiny, little person and I needed to get not only my head wrapped around that but my heart as well.

“Hey, what’s going on? Why is Grandma crying and hugging Uncle Zeb?” Joss’s tiny voice was concerned, so my mom pulled back and gave me a teary smile.

“Your uncle just told me a secret that made me happy, is all. They’re happy tears.”

Joss’s delicate features curled up and her eyes narrowed at all the adults gathered around the table. “Secrets aren’t nice.”

Beryl reached out and tugged on the end of her daughter’s ponytail. “Some are. Some are just a surprise that you have to wait for the right time to share.”

Joss’s mouth puckered and she crossed her arms over her thin chest. She had her mother’s fight and stubbornness in her without a doubt.

“Is it a secret about my birthday? Am I getting the puppy I want?” Her petulant tone made me laugh and had Beryl sighing.

“Not everything is about your birthday, Joss. It’s still three months away and I told you that I think we’re gone from home too much to take care of a puppy right now.”

Miniature dark eyebrows that matched Beryl’s perfectly shot up, and I saw the spark of mischief light up my niece’s blue eyes right before she threw her mom under the bus.

“Well, if the secret isn’t about my birthday, is it about that guy, Wes, who’s been coming over for dinner all the time? Did you tell Uncle Zeb and he told Grandma? I bet that would make her cry happy tears. She’s always saying you need a man friend.”

My sister screeched her daughter’s name over my laughter. I stuck my hand out and Joss gave me a miniature fist bump right before running off as my mother called Beryl’s name in much the same tone as the one my sister was using to holler at my niece.

“You have a boyfriend?” My mom sounded incredulous and delighted at the same time. Beryl was pretty and smart, but her experience with men had left her standoffish and overly protective of both herself and her daughter. There had been a short-term guy here and there over the years but no one that seemed special enough to keep around. Whoever this Wes was, he was already miles ahead of any other guy that had been on the track if Beryl had let him not only into her home but around Joss.

My sister flushed a hot red and fiddled anxiously with the ends of her long hair. “I have a friend who may be more than that, yes.”

“Why didn’t you say anything? Why haven’t we met him?” My mom was going into full-on mother mode and all I could do was sit back and watch. Beryl glared at me as I grinned at her, grateful some of the focus was now off of me.

“Yeah, why haven’t we met him?” I couldn’t keep the teasing humor out of my voice.

“Ugh. Because I’m not sure what I’m doing with him. I met him at work. He’s a customer at the bank. He asked me out for coffee and I turned him down. The next time he came in he asked again, and again, until I said yes. He’s persistent and funny. He’s really nice and has a good job. He’s a natural with Joss, and really I think he’s too good to be true, so I’m just waiting for the prince to turn back into a frog or for him to show his true colors. If I introduced him to you guys, that would be admitting that I want him to stick around. I’m trying really hard not to get attached.”

It was my turn to reach out and put a hand on her shoulder for a comforting squeeze. “Nothing wrong with hitching your wagon to a proven winner, sis.”

She leaned forward and buried her face in her hands. “Ugh … don’t say that. It’ll just make it harder when it all falls apart.”

Neither one of us had ever been very lucky in love. The first man my sister gave her heart to hurt her physically and the first girl that I thought I was going to spend forever with hadn’t been able to handle the dire consequences I faced after I exacted justice from my sister’s abuser. But despite all of that I felt like I needed to remind her that “Some things are built to last and won’t fall apart no matter how much force or stress is put on them. Look at those old beauties I work with every day. They’ve been around for over a century, and while they might be weathered and worn they’re still standing.”

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