Page 58 of The Heartbreaker Next Door

Dawson sighed, perhaps sensing my irritation. “Don’t turn this into something it isn’t. I like her.”

“Congratulations,” I deadpanned. “I’ll let her know.”

“This isn’t about her. I’m talking about you.”

“My favorite subject,” I grumbled.

“This is about you deciding everybody else and their problems are your responsibility.”

This conversation was going from bad to worse. I was getting more and more pissed by the second. I was tempted to tell him to fuck off, but Dawson never talked out his ass or butted into anyone’s personal life, so if he had something to say, I wanted to hear it, if only to dispute it. “You mean caring about people?”

“I mean taking care of them,” he clarified.

“Those aren’t mutually exclusive,” I rebutted.

“No. But they’re not the same thing either.”

Weren’t they? I honestly didn’t know.

“She’s been doing this on her own for a long time. Raising her kid. Keeping everything together. She doesn’t need somebody coming in and taking over.”

“You make it sound like staging a hostile takeover.”

“You need to be careful with her,” he came back, not dropping the subject.

My jaw tightened, and I instantly got defensive at his warning, as if he knew what was good for her. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“It means she’s got a kid. A whole life that existed before you walked into it. This isn’t some woman you can charm for a few months and then disappear.”

“Right, because that’s my MO.”

“It is.” Dawson held my stare in challenge. “You’ve been doing this your entire life.”

“Doing what?” I had no clue what the fuck he was talking about. I’d never been in a serious relationship, so my brother, whose opinion I typically valued, was talking out of his ass.

“Saving people.”

A humorless laugh escaped me.

“I’m serious. Mom needs something, you handle it. Dad is absent, you step in. Dylan or Damon get into trouble, you’re the first one through the door. You see somebody drowning, and you don’t even stop to ask if they need help. You just jump in.”

“That’s called giving a shit.”

“No. Sometimes it’s called needing to be needed.”

What the fuck? Is that how my brother saw me? More importantly, was there truth to it?

Dawson held my gaze. “And she’s exactly the kind of woman who’s going to set every one of those instincts off. She’s doing everything on her own. She’s exhausted. She’s got a kid depending on her. There are probably a hundred things in her life you could make easier.”

Exactly. I thought the same thing. So what was the problem?

“So I’m supposed to stay away from her because I can make her life easier?”

“No. You’re supposed to make damn sure that’s not why you want her.”

I started this conversation off denying anything was going on, but Dawson had always been able to cut through my bullshit. I felt like there was no reason to continue my denial.

My brother continued, “Because she and Maverick don’t need some guy sweeping in, playing hero, and deciding six months from now that the cape doesn’t fit anymore. And she sure as hell doesn’t need another man making promises he can’t keep.”