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Hannah saw the other woman’s fingers clench. Angry, icy gray eyes and thinned lips emphasized her displeasure as Jackie looked Hannah up and down.
“Who is this?” Jackie asked Brody as if not hearing the dismissal.
“This is the reason you need to go,” Brody said simply, delivering a kiss to the top of Hannah’s head.
Hannah tried to step away—clearly she had walked into the middle of something awkward—but Brody’s muscular arm held her fast against him.
The tension thickened as Brody and the blonde stared each other down for a few seconds.
Brody won.
The woman grabbed her bag from the table and came to the door, standing only inches from Hannah.
“Jerk,” she spat back at Brody before she stalked out, marching to a white Mercedes that Hannah had parked beside.
The door closed, and Brody let out a breath.
“Good timing, sweetheart. Maybe that will finally get her off my back for good,” Brody said, dropping his arm from her shoulders and retreating through the foyer.
Hannah was immobile, still warm from his kiss as she watched through the window as the blonde kicked up a cloud of dust on the road that led away from the ranch.
“Wait. What the...?” Hannah sputtered.
She was pretty sure that the heat rebuilding in her system wasn’t from the kiss, but from anger.
“Did you just use me to get rid of a woman who’d spent the night?”
He looked at her from across the hall, leaning laconically on the door frame.
“She didn’t spend the night—not last night anyway. Come on in and have a muffin. There’s coffee.”
He headed into the recesses of the house. Hannah followed him. She was starving after her overnight drive, and lured by the aroma of coffee. She stopped in the kitchen and watched him pour two cups.
She also noted the half-empty beer bottle on the counter near the sink. Several empties, in fact. While the outside of the farmhouse was pristine, the inside was a wreck, as if no one had cleaned in several weeks. There was also some funky odor coming from the trash basket near where she was standing, so she moved. It was like the house of an eternal frat party. Brody was far from a neat freak, she knew, but he wasn’t a total slob, either.
He grabbed several muffins and took the food and his coffee into the adjoining dining room. Hannah’s stomach growled. She needed to eat something more substantial than muffins, but a fistful of carbs would tide her over. She grabbed the other mug and a blueberry muffin with coffee-cake crumbles on top.
In the dining room, she took a seat across from Brody at the long harvest table. She had to clear a spot to do so, moving old newspapers and takeout boxes that were stacked everywhere. When she was done eating, she seriously contemplated getting another muffin, but sipped her coffee instead.
“Are you even going to ask why I’m here?”
He looked at her over the top of his coffee cup. “I know why you’re here. You obviously needed some more top o’ the line Brody lovin’, right?”
Hannah coughed, her coffee going down the wrong way. When she caught her breath and started to protest, Brody chuckled.
“Calm down, Hannah. I’m teasing. So, why are you here?” he asked dutifully.
Hannah shifted in her chair, frowning. In spite of the kiss at the door—which had obviously just been for effect—he seemed distant. The connection she’d always had with him wasn’t there.
Something was off, and suddenly she didn’t feel comfortable asking him for his help. Not until she knew what was going on.
“I was in Atlanta, and I thought I’d come down and see how you were doing. Just a lark,” she said. It was mostly true. “How’s retirement?”
“You had business in Atlanta?” he asked, ignoring her question.
“Sort of,” she hedged.
“’Fess up, Hannah.” He sounded irritated. “Did Reece send you here to check on me?”
She sat back. “No, why would he?”
“He seems to think I’m not dealing with my retirement or my accident well.”
Another surprise. “What accident?”
He cursed as he leaned forward and shook his head. The gesture made him look even more tired.
“I forgot how to handle a horse. Got thrown, hurt my shoulder and lower back. It’s not the end of the world. I’ll be fine. Really. I’m just sore and stiff, but mostly better now.”
“Oh, I didn’t know.”
“You expect me to believe that?” he said, pinning her with a look. She could see faint circles around his eyes, a tightness around his lips.
“Are you saying I’m lying?” she challenged him, but now she was worried. She’d never seen Brody like this, and maybe Reece had been concerned for a reason.
He looked away. And then he began to tap his fingertips on the table as if he was holding something back.
“I never knew you had horses,” she said, changing the subject.
“There’s a lot you never knew about me, sugar,” he drawled as he roughly pushed his chair back and returned to the kitchen, apparently done with the conversation.
This wasn’t the Brody she’d known. Not by a long shot. Brody had always been a wild man, a partier and to a certain degree, a player—which was how she’d met him in the first place. But he wasn’t ever a jerk about it.
His eyes were bleary, and she noticed now that his gait was off, his walk more hesitant than usual. He held himself stiffly, his legs moving only with concentrated effort, as if each step was painful.
She followed him.
“If you’re fine, why is this place such a mess? Are you too hurt to pick up things? Maybe you need a cleaning service to give you a hand?”
He turned on her, eyes narrow, as if his patience was worn out.
“Listen, I don’t need help. Just because you and I had some fun together doesn’t mean I’m going to spill my guts to you or anyone else. So if that was the plan, forget it.”
Hannah took a steadying breath. “Something is wrong. Tell me.”
“You don’t know me as well as you think you do.”
Ouch. Hannah straightened, held her chin high.
“Maybe not. But I’m telling the truth, Brody. No one sent me. But since I’m here, I’m not going away until you tell me what’s going on.”
Her blog problems fell by the wayside. Hannah knew firsthand that people didn’t care as much about their health or their surroundings, or even people they loved when they were depressed. Brody was no dummy; he had to know that she could see this.
Her mother had reacted similarly after Hannah’s dad had died, until her mom had gotten some help. Hannah, though only ten, had been the one to take care of the house, the food and her mom in the meanwhile. Brody didn’t have anyone, from what she could tell.
She stepped forward, putting a hand on his arm. He flinched, and she pulled back.
“Oh, I’m so sorry, Brody, I didn’t mean to—”
His eyes were fierce as they looked down into hers. They were so close, the heat of him burned right through her. She stared at his mouth, her mind drifting back to the kiss at the front door. Hannah had always loved his mouth. She’d enjoyed his smile, his kisses, and many other wonderful things he did with those lips.
“You think you know me, Hannah? You want to help?”
She was unsure, not knowing what to do with Brody in this mood.
His gaze was intoxicating, his body hard and solid. Brody could always turn her inside out with merely a look. Even now, even when he was acting so strangely, that still held true.
“Then help,” he said, intention clear in his eyes.
She started to speak, but he stopped her with another kiss. All Hannah could do was hold on.
* * *
BRODY’S BODY WAS going to suffer for this later, but he didn’t care. Hannah was here.
She was possibly the last person he’d expected to see at the door. When he looked into her sweet face and had her back in his arms, at least one thing about the world seemed right.
He hadn’t meant to kiss her again. He was going to send her on her way, but now here they were, and she was making those soft sounds she tended to make when she was turned on.
Even as he deepened the kiss, he tried to tell himself to back off. Hannah didn’t deserve this. She didn’t deserve his lies or to be the answer for his frustration and restlessness. She didn’t need to be part of this sham he was involved in.
Any minute now, he would cut her loose and show her the door.
Or to his bed.
There’d never been anyone like Hannah, and all he wanted was to have her again. To lose himself in her body and forget about everything for a while. Being with her was the last time he could remember anything really good, and he wanted that back more than he could say.
He bunched his fingers in her thick, dark hair—shorter now, and curlier. Angling her mouth so he could go deeper, he walked her back toward the wood island that dominated the center of the kitchen. It was lower than the counters and would work for what he had in mind.
He kept kissing her—Hannah loved lots of kissing—as he covered one full breast with his palm, feeling the nipple bud against his palm.
“Damn, I missed this,” he muttered against her lips, tweaking the hard bud between his fingers and catching her gasp with another deep kiss.
She was wearing jeans, and he slid his hand down, working the snap with one hand. Slipping his hand inside, his fingertips brushed her soft curls. He laid his palm flat against her lower belly.
She murmured something against his mouth, but he continued the kiss, tasting more. He was hard, getting harder. He hadn’t felt this alive in some time.
This was what it had been like between them since the first time they’d met: spontaneous combustion.
He slipped his hand between her legs and swallowed her responding sigh. She tried to move against his hand.
“Not yet,” he whispered against her ear.
He used his other hand to push her shirt up, moving the lace of her bra out of the way at the same time.
Hannah had the prettiest breasts he’d ever seen. Full and perfectly shaped, the pert, peachy nipples were like dessert to him, and he savored each one in turn.
She cried out, and he saw her grip the edge of the island tight. His back was starting to ache, so he removed his hand and got onto his knees, working her jeans down her legs as he went.
Then he spotted it—the small racing flag tattoo that he’d talked her into, right beneath her belly button. He leaned in, kissed it and looked up to find her watching him.
“You kept it.”
“Of course I kept it.”
He smiled, remembering the day when she’d gotten the tat, and how they’d celebrated after, made him even hotter.
He nearly lost control then, as he kept looking into her eyes. Hannah, who was so cool, collected and composed most of the time. His responsible, serious Hannah, who wore boring suits and talked about accounting, now looked back at him with wild hair, flushed cheeks and eyes glittering with desire.
But there was more than desire there. There was warmth, need and...affection? Expectation? Concern?
He’d seen that soft look before, and wondered if they had more between them. That was a problem—then and now—because they couldn’t have more than sex. Sex was all he wanted. All he needed.
That was an even better reason for her to go.
He couldn’t do this, use her to entertain himself, to take his mind off his life for a little while. Brody backed off, his breathing heavy, shaking his head.
“I’m sorry, Hannah. This shouldn’t have happened,” he said stiffly, closing his jeans as he walked to the sink, washed his hands, his face. Washed the past few minutes away.
“Brody?”
“Just leave, Hannah. Please.”
Hannah fixed her clothes, straightened her hair. She still looked amazing and turned on. Brody peered out the window, fighting for control.
“I’m not going anywhere until you tell me what’s happening.”
“There’s nothing to talk about, can’t you get that? I’m fine. I don’t need you here. Despite what you might think, you mean nothing to me.”
He heard her sharp intake of breath. It was low for him to speak to her like that, but he needed her to go. If he had to insult her to get her to do it, fine. It was better than insulting her even more by letting her stay under false pretenses. By taking her here in his kitchen, with no plans for anything more than that.
He didn’t warrant her concern, and he certainly didn’t want her pity.
“Listen, whether you like it or not, I’m your friend. I want to help, whatever the problem is.”
He watched incredulously as she stormed over to the small dinette, sat down and looked at him. He’d never seen such a stubborn, determined woman.
There was only one thing to do.
