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Jen lets out a little sigh and shakes her head. “Does she need somewhere to crash? Use my place. No one is there. She can water my plants. It would be doing me a favor.” She pauses, then frowns. “Actually, don’t have her water my plants. They’re on a strict watering schedule and Candice is taking care of it. I wrote out the instructions for each plant and she promised she’d follow it to the letter. I’m not sure I trust someone else to do it.”
Despite myself, my lips curl into a smile. Of course she has a strict watering schedule for her jungle. Her hand is soft and warm when I reach over and squeeze it.
“Is she in trouble?” Jen asks, those intelligent eyes searching mine.
I give her a sharp nod.
“An ex?”
I shake my head. How do I explain this?
“It doesn’t matter. You said she’s not safe? So put her up in my place.” She thrusts the keys toward me, the look on her face telling me she knows her logic will win.
Shoulders dropping, I give in. “Thank you. It’s only temporary.” I put the phone back to my ear. “Nora?”
“Yeah?” Her voice is so fucking small and it makes me want to kill Slim for doing that to my baby sister. How dare he find out where she lives.
“I’m sending you some money. Can you make it to Heart’s Cove?”
“Yeah. I’ve got a car. If I leave tonight I can be there by tomorrow. I’ve got enough money, Fallon, I just didn’t know what to do. I feel like I’m being watched.”
“Okay. Pack everything essential. Assume you’re not going back. I’ll meet you in town and you can crash at my…” What is Jen to me? Co-worker isn’t accurate anymore. Friend seems wrong. “At Jen’s place.”
After solidifying our plans, my sister and I hang up, and I let out a long sigh, rubbing my thumb and forefinger over my forehead.
Look, I know this sounds so selfish, but it seems like any time I try to do something for myself, some emergency happens and I need to divert all my time and energy away. I was hoping to have one month—just one, single month—to spend time with Jen. But I’ll be paying for my teenage mistakes until I’m old and gray.
Well, older and grayer.
With a sigh, I resign myself to this. I love my sister, and it’s my fault she’s having to leave her own house. Wrapping my arms around Jen, I inhale the scent of her fruity shampoo and let my nerves settle ever so slightly. I’m not sure if I’m thanking her or if I just need the comfort of her in my arms. “That was really generous of you, Jen. I’ll find somewhere else for my sister to stay once I know what’s going on.”
“It’s fine,” she says, her voice muffled against my chest. She pulls away and looks up at me, the air between us shifting slightly. The panic from my sister’s call ebbs, and my heartbeat takes on a different timbre. I tighten my hold on Jen’s body, loving the way she fits against me. Loving the way her hands slide up my chest.
I could kiss this woman every day of my life and never get sick of it.
Jen’s fingers drift over my beard, tickling the skin where I’ve shaped it along my cheeks. “I think it says a lot that your sister knew she could call you in a crisis, and you’d sort it out without question.”
My gaze slides to the side as my throat grows thick. “I’m her big brother.”
“My big brother hasn’t spoken to me in three years apart from my birthday and Christmas.”
Your big brother probably didn’t bring a man like Slim Miller into your life.
I stare into her eyes, wishing I were someone else. Someone worthy of her. “And yet you have enough heart to give up your house to a stranger.”
She cracks a smile, and my hold on her tightens. “Your sister is hardly a stranger,” she says softly. Her eyes drop to my lips, and all my blood rushes south.
But before I can dip my lips to kiss her again, to relieve that ache in my chest that hasn’t gone away since the day my parents got in that accident, Jen pulls away. And I let her.
Because, really, she deserves more than what I can offer.
CHAPTER 8
Jen
Fallon and I do the whole I’ll-sleep-in-the-cot-no-you’ll-sleep-in-the-bed thing, until he ends up on the floor and I invite him into the bed in the middle of the night. I wake up to a blanket of Fallon once again. This time, he blinks his eyes open when I move, and I feel something, um…stiff…between us. Fallon shifts his hips away from me and rolls off me with a sleepy groan.
And I’m…disappointed?
