“You’re giving me mixed signals, Lilah.”
She dropped her forehead to his door with an audible thunk. “I know! I’m sorry.”
“When you settle on a decision, you’ll let me know.”
“My decision’s made. It’s courage I’m waiting on.”
He didn’t like the way that sat in his gut. “I scare you?”
Forehead still to the door, she let out a short laugh. “No. I scare me. And I should be scaring the hell out of you.” She turned to him. “I’ll tell Adam that you’re coming-” She broke off and grimaced. “I mean that you’re getting up-” She closed her eyes, her cheeks going pink.
Grinning, he set the sleeping dog next to him. When he made to toss back the covers to get out of bed, she squeaked and left, slamming his door.
He laughed-until he realized she hadn’t taken the damn dog. By the time he got downstairs she was gone, and stayed gone. Which, he told himself several times throughout the following hours, was probably a good thing. A month was plenty of time for him, but he thought he knew her now, or at least he was starting to know her. And she gathered people in and kept them, not walking away after four weeks. Ever.
Yeah, she was the exact opposite from him in that respect, but he was drawn to her all the same, just as he was drawn to this small town. A novelty. A diversion. It would wear off, all of it.
Any minute now.
That night Brady stood in front of his bed staring down at the dog.
In return, the dog looked at the ceiling. At the floor. Anywhere but at Brady.
Finally Brady picked him up and dangled him nose to nose. “Here we are again. Bedtime.”
The dog tried to lick him, but he wasn’t holding it close enough. “And don’t start with the eyes. We’re going to sleep. Do you really need to”- Jesus -“cuddle?”
“Arf.”
With a long-suffering sigh, Brady held him close and let himself be licked half to death. “There,” he said, and carefully set the dog down on the blanket between the fireplace and the bed. “Stay. Sleep.” Brady paused to inhale the delicious silence before getting into bed with a heartfelt groan. He was exhausted.
Three minutes later the whining started. “Christ on a stick!” He sat up, shoved his fingers through his hair and dropped his head to his knees. “I’m begging you. Shut up.”
That didn’t work either.
Throwing back the sheet, Brady dropped to the floor and the very nice pad of blankets he’d carefully folded, littered with stolen treasures. A shoe, a watch, a shirt-all Brady’s.
The dog was a thief.
“We cuddled already. Don’t tell me you need more. Come on, man, where’s your self-respect?”
“Arf.”
Shit. Brady crouched low and pulled the dog into his chest. The bundle wriggled with pleasure. Brady sighed, and beyond exhausted now, slowly lowered himself to the blankets.
Not bad.
“Arf!”
In the darkness, on the floor, Brady squeezed his eyes shut and tried to pretend he was back in Afghanistan, in the middle of a war zone, which was starting to seem like it might be easier.
“Arf!”
“I’ve been to places that look at you as a free meal,” he warned softly in the dark. “Not my thing personally, but I’m willing to make an exception.”
There wasn’t another sound.
With a blissful, exhausted sigh, Brady began to drift off.
Only to come awake some time later. He lay there utterly still in the dark night, aware of the fact that something had woken him but not sure what. He was still on the floor, but there was no warm lump on his chest. Sitting up without a sound, he found the dog-in the middle of the fucking bed. How he’d gotten up there was a mystery, possibly by using the chest at the foot of the bed as a stepping stool.
But that’s not what had woken him. Pulling on his jeans, Brady grabbed the gun he’d stowed in the nightstand, moving soundlessly through the loft.
Then he heard it again, a crash from downstairs in the center that was completely closed up for the night. Thinking of the drugs that were kept there, he headed grimly toward the door, intending to protect what was Dell and Adam’s with whatever force was necessary. He turned to tell the dog to stay, but he hadn’t so much as taken a break in his snoring. Shaking his head, Brady moved out.
Downstairs, the open reception area was dark and empty, but the first examination room was lit, and sounds of a struggle were coming from within. Moving quietly along the shadows of the wall, Brady stepped into the open doorway, gun drawn.
“Don’t move,” he said.
But he was the one to go still.
In the room, arms full with an injured dog on the examination table, was Lilah.
The dog was snarling and trying to bite her, and as she wrestled with him, she spared Brady a quick glance.
“How’s this for too safe?” she asked.
Eight
L ilah took in the sight of Brady, gun in his right hand, the safety flipped off, and his hands braced in a shooter’s stance and thought, Holy shit. That was her sole thought. Holy shit. She might have even murmured it in shock, in sheer appreciation for the magnificent male form standing there so utterly completely, fantastically… dangerous. She couldn’t help it. In the overhead light, his nearly naked body gleamed muscular, lethal, and entirely too sexy. “You going to shoot me or help me?” she asked, as if her heart wasn’t lodged in her throat, thundering so fast there were no pauses in between the beats.
“Fuck,” he whispered under his breath and lowered the gun, thumbing the safety back on. The sound of it clicked loudly in the very still, very tense air as he tucked the gun into the back of his jeans before stepping close to lend her a hand.
Lilah let out a breath and shook it off. He seemed impossibly large and unyielding as he reached up and adjusted the overhead light so she could better see what she was doing, which she appreciated. “Thanks.”
He nodded, looking a little worn, a little weary, and a whole lot rough around the edges.
When he was tired, as he clearly was now, his features were wary, as if he knew he was on autopilot and simply trusting his instincts. It did something to her, looking at him like this, almost… no. Vulnerable was not the right word.
Accessible.
“I’m sorry,” she said quietly. “I should have let you know I was here.”
He said nothing. Probably still working through his adrenaline rush.
She sure as hell was. And it was to her shame that she hadn’t thought of this. Of him. She should have thought about the fact that he’d be upstairs sleeping, but the truth was that she broke in all the time with Dell’s and Adam’s blessing, and it hadn’t occurred to her to wonder what his mental condition might be at being stirred in the middle of the night. He was ex-military but clearly not so ex. He certainly hadn’t lost any of his skills.
Startling him had been bad.
He recovered far faster than she, but then again, she had her hands full. And still, all she could think was that she surely looked like crap in her baggy sweats, and he looked…
Hot.
God, so very very hot.
Tearing her gaze off him, she put her mind to the task at hand. She had Lucky’s head tucked beneath her arm and was struggling with holding the rest of the seventy-pound animal still. She hadn’t wanted to muzzle her and didn’t, but now, it seemed, that might have been a mistake.
Lucky was in Lilah’s care for two days while her owner was on a business trip. As had happened twice before, a porcupine had broken into the kennels through the cellar, come up the stairs to the main level, and ended up in the room where Lucky had been crated for the night. Lucky had played Houdini and gotten out, and dog and porcupine had done the tango.
Now Lucky was sporting ten quills, Lilah was up in the middle of the night playing doctor, and she’d nearly gotten shot by the sexiest, most gorgeous night prowler she’d ever seen.