save the whole world, lamebrain. Get your own life back on track before you go racing off to rescue some damsel in distress.”
“I didn’t ask for your opinion on my love life,” Connor retorted.
Davy’s lowering eyebrows shot up. “Whoa,” he said. “Back up two steps. Who said anything about your love life?”
Connor cupped the cigarette in his hand and lit it. He took a deep drag and exhaled, to calm himself down before he dared to speak.
“Leave it alone, Davy,” he said.
“Watch it, Con,” Davy said. “You’re treading on shaky ground.”
Sean burst through the screen door and passed Connor a cold beer. “Food’ll be out in a few,” he announced.
“Thanks,” Connor muttered.
Sean looked from one brother to the other. His eyes narrowed. “Did I miss something?”
“No,” Davy and Connor said, in unison.
Sean scowled. “I hate it when you guys do that,” he snapped. He slammed the screen door behind him, hard.
Connor finished his cigarette in grim silence. Davy for once had the good sense to nurse his beer and keep his mouth shut.
Sean kicked open the door a few minutes later and placed a loaded plate in front of Connor. He dug into it without hesitation.
His two brothers silently watched him consume a twelve-ounce steak, two big baked potatoes, a sliced tomato, and three big hunks of hot, toasted French bread slathered with garlic butter.
Connor finally noticed their fixed stares. “Cut it out, you guys,” he protested. “Quit watching me eat, already. You’re inhibiting me.”
Davy crossed his arms over his barrel chest. “Give us a break. We haven’t seen you eat like that for sixteen months.”
“It’s awesome.” Sean’s face was unusually serious. “That’s a week’s worth of calories for you, Con. All in one meal. Check you out.”
Connor mopped up the last of his steak juice with a hunk of bread. He felt a vague stab of guilt. “You guys shouldn’t worry. I’m fine.”
Davy snorted. “We’ll see how fine you feel when you get back from Portland.”
Sean frowned. “What’s this about Portland?”
“He’s going to be Erin’s welcoming committee when she goes to meet the mysterious millionaire who may or may not be Novak,” Davy told him. “He wants to guard her luscious body. Personally.”
“Oh, Christ. You don’t say. Well, finish your dinner, then. You’re going to need your strength. What hardware you taking?” Sean asked.
“Just the SIG. And the Ruger SP-101, for backup.”
“Want some company?” Sean asked.
Connor glanced at him, startled. “I thought you were busy.”
“I’m not too busy to watch my brother’s back,” Sean said.
Connor’s mouth twitched. “Think I need a baby-sitter, huh?”
“Interpret it however the fuck you want.”
Connor finished the final swallow of beer. “I’m OK on my own,” he said. “Thanks. I’ll let you know if I change my mind.”
“You want Erin all to yourself, huh?”
Connor ignored his younger brother’s taunting with the ease of long practice. “Would you guys contact Seth and Raine about Novak?”
“I’m on it,” Sean said promptly.
“I’ll go get to work on this info,” Davy said. “Get some sleep, Connor. You look beat. Crash here, and I’ll give you the rundown over breakfast. The bed’s already made up for you on the side porch.”
“Thanks.” He got to his feet and stared at his brothers, struck by the bizarre urge to say something sentimental to them.
Sean read it in his eyes, took pity on him, and headed him off. “Get a goddamn haircut if you’re looking to get laid, Con.”
Connor winced. “You are such a pig.”
“Sure, but at least I look good,” was Sean’s parting shot.
Connor flopped onto the bed, staring out at the mass of tree branches that swayed outside the glassed-in side porch. The chair next to the bed had a towel, washcloth, and a pair of Davy’s folded sweats lying on it, presumably for him to sleep in. He was exhausted, but his mind was buzzing. He closed his eyes, and his photographic memory promptly served up the image of Erin puttering around in her kitchen, her sweet, curvy body delicious in the faded jeans and T-shirt.
Fresh fodder for his sexual imagination. He’d fantasized about sneaking into her bedroom at Ed and Barbara’s house for years. He’d imagined himself, a big, blundering bull in that feminine world of ruffles and lace, puffy pillows, perfume bottles, lingerie. And Erin, backing up toward her bed, her eyes heavy with excitement as he locked the door.
That fantasy had infinite variations, all of them red hot and X-rated, but tonight the setting changed by itself, unguided by his conscious mind. The ultra-femme bedroom of his fantasies gave way to the crowded studio apartment in the Kinsdale. Painfully neat and organized, the braided rug brightening up the scarred linoleum floor, the crazy quilt covering the narrow cot. Heaps of books piled against the wall. Alphabetized, for God’s sake. How cute. Every detail lit by the patterned glow of the basket lamp and charged with erotic heat.
The Kinsdale room didn’t make him feel clumsy and alien like the fantasy bedroom did, but it was even more alluring, because Erin was all over it. Her practicality and tidiness, her whimsical sense of humor, her refusal to give in to self-pity. Bright colors, indomitable spirit. That room was sexier than any place he could have dreamed up on his own.
He buried his face in the coarse wool army blanket and let the fantasy unfold. He kissed the salty tears off her cheeks, and she opened and clung to him as he devoured her tender mouth. He knelt down and nuzzled the warmth of that velvety strip of skin between the T-shirt and the waistband of her jeans that had so tantalized him tonight. He popped the buttons of the jeans open and tongued her navel as he dragged those jeans and panties down over her curvy hips, her round ass. Slowly, inch by precious inch, reveling in her hot female smell: baby powder and flower petal and ocean salt. He breathed it, in big, greedy gulps. He peeled every scrap of clothing away until she was naked, arms held out to him, her eyes soft with trust.
Yeah. Trust. He shoved away the derisive voices in his head. This was his fantasy, and he’d run it how he damn well pleased.
She trembled as he put his arms around her from behind and explored the exquisite, plump fullness of her breasts. Vivid details were imprinted in his mind as if they were memories, not fantasies. Her nipples puckered against his hand, tender buttons of flesh aching to be tongued and suckled. Her hair clip pulled loose, and her glossy hair tumbled and slid across her shoulders like a swath of dark satin.
