Stirring Up Trouble (18 page)

Chapter Eighteen

Gavin took the porch steps two at a time, juggling a couple brimming bags’ worth of groceries on one hip while unlocking the front door.

“What are you doing here?” Sloane poked her head out from the entryway to the kitchen, decked out in that ridiculously endearing sun hat and a look of pure surprise.

“Great to see you, too,” he teased, moving past her to offload the bags to the counter. Damn, she made even a simple hoodie and jeans look hotter than naughty lingerie.

Although knowing her, he wouldn’t be entirely shocked to discover she was wearing some racy scraps of lace beneath all that cotton and denim. She was a walking contradiction, a complete puzzle.

And he wanted to undo her one piece at a time.

“You know what I mean.” A flush crept up her cheeks, topping off the hot-look thing with subtle perfection. “It’s only three-thirty. You’re not off work for another eight hours.”

Gavin unpacked a bag of flour with a grin. “We have a lull between lunch and dinner shifts, and I promised Bree we could make breakfast together tomorrow. I just ran to the grocery store to grab a few things.”

“I bet she’ll be excited to see this stuff when she gets back.” Sloane eyed the box of powdered sugar in his hand, but he stopped short of the pantry where it belonged.

“Bree’s not here?”

She shook her head, starting to unpack the second bag. “Nope. Still at the movies with Caitlin and Sadie. Jeannie’s bringing her home any minute now. Actually, I thought you were her when I heard the key in the lock.”

“Oh, right.” When Bree had texted him to make sure the trip out was okay, it had been such a no-brainer that he’d forgotten all about it. “So we’re alone?”

“For the next five minutes, anyway. Where do you want—”

Gavin’s hands were on her in an instant, stilling both her words and her swift movements. “The groceries can wait five minutes.” He snaked an arm around her from behind, uncaring that the move was bolder than their usual repertoire. Her breath coasted into a sigh, and he dropped his mouth to taste the skin on the back of her neck to see if it would make her cross the threshold into a moan.

Bingo.

Sloane gripped the counter in front of her with both hands. “Five minutes, huh? I bet that’s just a blip in your slow and steady world.”

He wanted to spend an hour just testing the nuances of the fold between her neck and her shoulder, to run his tongue over the sharp angles and soft curves until she screamed.

He slanted his mouth just above the rim of her ear. “Barely milliseconds. Which is a damned shame.”

She turned the tables on him before he could even breathe back in.

“Sure you don’t want to come on over to where it’s fast and furious?” Sloane tipped her head to give him better access to her neck, surrounding him full force with the spicy cinnamon scent of her skin. “We could make those five minutes really count.”

Jesus. He’d give his left arm for the ability to stop time right now. Gavin’s usually stalwart resolve wavered like tissue paper in a stiff breeze. “We could?”

She nodded, canting her hips back into his and turning him rock hard in an instant. “Mmm hmm. From where I sit, five minutes is an eternity.”

Five minutes sounded like paradise coming from those heart-shaped lips, and the promise of it dared him right over the line. “Turn around and prove it.”

Her throaty response vibrated against his mouth as he trailed kisses from her neck to the velvety landscape of her shoulder, and she arced back into his arousal in another wanton slide. “How about I stay right here and prove it backward?”

Fuck it. Slow was overrated, anyway.

“Sloane,” he said, the word going to gravel in his throat. “If you don’t—”

The front door banged open, and they catapulted apart like dry leaves in a wind storm.

“Hey, I’m back!” Bree’s voice floated in from the foyer, and Gavin cursed the hardwiring that had let a part of his anatomy other than his brain temporarily make his decisions. Although he doubted either one of them would’ve ended up really giving in under the circumstances, he still should’ve kept a more level head. Getting that lost in the moment when he knew full well that Bree was on her way home was just a bad idea, no matter how enticing the flirtation leading up to it.

And god
damn,
had it been enticing.

“Hey! How was the movie?” Sloane’s voice was just a shade too bright, but Bree didn’t seem to notice as she cruised into the kitchen and headed toward the fridge. Gavin busied himself with sorting the rest of the groceries, hoping that the task—along with the sudden presence of his sister—would be enough to loosen the image of what he’d been doing a few minutes ago from the impulsive clutches of his brain.

“It was good.” Her eyes glimmered with surprise as she caught sight of him at the counter, and she stopped short on the floorboards. “Hey, what are you doing here?”

Sloane did a poor job of stifling a laugh, lifting her hands palm-up as if to say,
See?

“Last I checked, I live here,” Gavin said, rebounding with a chuckle. “How come everybody keeps asking me that?”

“Um, because it’s a good question?” Bree crinkled her nose in true smart-ass fashion, and he snapped a dish towel at her, prompting a dodge-and-giggle maneuver that made his heart consider exploding.

“Told you.” Sloane winked at Bree in like-minded approval, scooping up the twin containers of vegetable oil and heading for the pantry.

“Since you so eloquently asked, I made that run to Joe’s Grocery to grab the ingredients for breakfast tomorrow. All I have to do now is dig up the fryer and mix the dough in the morning, and we’ll be all set.” The idea of spending time with Bree, doing something he’d once taken for granted but now missed like crazy, sparked something pure and good in his chest.

It flickered hard as soon as he caught her expression.

“Oh, doughnuts.” Bree shifted her weight from one boot to the other, and Gavin paused.

“You still want to make breakfast, right?” Disappointment knocked his gut down a peg, but he refused to let it show. Considering how touchy Bree had been about cooking with him in the first place, he’d tried to prepare himself for the possibility that she might recant. He was learning the hard way that thirteen-year-old logic could change with the wind.

Bree dropped her eyes, but nodded. “I do, but, um . . .”

“Maybe you’d feel more comfortable if we invited Sloane.”

Okay, so he’d blurted the suggestion without consulting the reasonable part of his brain, but he only wanted to make things easier for Bree. Maybe all she needed to feel untroubled about letting him back in was a buffer.

Asking Sloane just made sense. It felt . . . right.

“I don’t want to intrude on a family thing,” Sloane started, her blue eyes as wide as the ocean, but Bree shook her head, emphatic.

“No, you wouldn’t. I mean, it’s not that.” She wrapped her arms around herself and scuffed a boot against the floorboards. “It’s just that Caitlin and Sadie invited me to go skiing with them tomorrow, and I kind of wanted to, you know. Go.”

Gavin frowned. “But you don’t ski.”

“I know, but they do, and they’re both really good. And they promised to lend me their extra gear and help me on the easy trails until I get the hang of it. There’s even a beginner’s class for people who have never skied, so I won’t look totally stupid.” Her words rushed out, but as hard as he tried, Gavin couldn’t quite latch on to any of them with a whole lot of clarity.

“Okay, but the resort is a big place, Bree. There are twenty-three trails. You can’t just expect me to drop you off at the gate with your friends and say, ‘See you later.’” The more the idea made it past his what-the-hell filter, the less he liked the thought of it. No less than a billion things could happen to her out on those trails, way more of them bad than not.

Bree flattened her mouth into a thin line, but her voice stayed calm. “I knew you’d say that, so Mrs. Carter promised she’d stay at the resort. And that we’d have to check in with her during the day. In person, not by cell phone.”

Score one for Jeannie. He’d have insisted on the same thing. Still, something about the plan didn’t quite add up. “How long are we talking about this trip lasting, exactly?”

She mumbled something, and Gavin’s jaw popped.

“Sorry, did you say overnight?” The whole notion of what-the-hell went into overtime.

“It’s just easier if I sleep over there. Then we can get up and head out early tomorrow morning before the crowd gets too bad. They’re even making fresh snow tonight.”

“Sounds like you have it all figured out.” The words came out less noncommittal than they’d sounded in his mind, but come on. She’d practically blindsided him, for Chrissake! What was he supposed to do?

Bree let out an exasperated breath. “Only because I knew you’d want all the details. You would’ve said no right away if it wasn’t planned out!”

“I might say no anyway, Bree. To be honest, I’m not really crazy about the way you’re springing this on me, and I have to be back at work in less than an hour. I don’t have time to talk to Mrs. Carter about this, or take you over there, or anything.”

“Sloane could take me, and find out everything you want to know.” Bree turned toward the pantry, and damned if Gavin hadn’t forgotten Sloane had even been standing there. “Couldn’t you? Please?”

Time hiccupped for the briefest second, but before he could get the protest brewing in his brain all the way out of his mouth, Sloane shocked the hell out of him by going totally Switzerland. She said, “That’s not really my call to make.”

Bree swung back to Gavin, exasperation hardening her girlish features. “But it’s totally unfair. They didn’t invite me until today, otherwise I would have asked before now! You’re going to say no without even talking to Mrs. Carter, and all my friends are going to know it’s because you think I’m a total baby.” She stomped a booted foot on the floorboards, throwing her hands into the air. “Just because I got all excited and forgot about the doughnuts!”

Gavin’s head snapped up. “It doesn’t have anything to do with that.” His composure simmered, threatening to boil over from the heat of aggravation flowing freely through his veins. The last thing he wanted was to have yet another argument with her, especially in front of Sloane. He had to tie this up, pronto, so he made his voice as calm as possible. “Look, I’m not going to apologize for wanting to make sure nothing bad happens to you. It’s the same thing Mom would do.”

Bree’s eyes flashed for just an instant, brimming with unshed tears, before she struck, angry and swift.

“You’re nothing like Mom! At least with her, I got a say in things. But with you, it doesn’t matter whether I’m good or bad. You never
hear
me. I don’t even know why you bothered to take me if I don’t make a difference to you!”

Thick silence soaked through the air while Gavin tried desperately to rebound from the serrated slice of her words, but all he could do was grasp for steady breath. Tears tracked down Bree’s cheeks, and any peace of mind he’d had about finally getting it right disappeared like a cheap parlor trick.

He didn’t know shit about taking care of her.

“Bree.” The voice that cut across the kitchen was soft, but meant business.

And it wasn’t his.

“Bree, look at me.” Sloane moved soundlessly, but stationed herself so close that Bree had no choice but to do what she’d said. “Do you trust me to tell you the truth?”

The question made Gavin’s thoughts feel like molasses stuck in the back of the cupboard for too long. Turning them into words was going to take nothing short of a miracle, and he had no choice but to listen by shocked default.

Bree’s eyes went wide, her lashes stuck together. “Yes.”

Sloane’s hesitation was barely perceptible, as if she hadn’t quite been expecting that answer, but she didn’t falter. “Good. Then let me tell you this. Your brother loves you.”

“But—”

“No.” Sloane put a hand on Bree’s arm, barely making contact. “No buts. He does. You can be mad all you want, but you can’t doubt that.”

Gavin watched, completely poleaxed, as Bree’s lips softened from a scowl to a tremble. “I don’t. It’s just . . .”

She hesitated, and in that moment, Sloane slid back out of the way so Bree could look at him, unimpeded. Fresh tears coursed down her face, and even through all the emotion running rampant in his head, he had the urge to cut the conversation off in order to protect her.

But instead, he listened.

“It makes me mad. I keep telling you I’m not a baby anymore, but you treat me like one anyway.” Her breath sobbed out of her, but she continued in a torrent as if she’d been suddenly uncorked and spilled hard. “I hate being the new kid, the different kid. The kid . . . with no mom. I just want to be normal, like everybody else. But I can’t. I can’t change any of that stuff, and I don’t . . . I don’t . . .”

She choked out another sob, and Gavin’s feet moved before his brain commanded them to. He covered the steps between them without breathing, only exhaling after Bree let him pull her close.

“I don’t know how to be normal anymore,” she cried into his shirt. “Everything’s so backward and weird, and nothing feels right without Mom. All this stuff keeps happening without her, like you making omelets and me getting my stupid period, but it’s all so different without her here. I hate it. I
hate
it. I don’t want to change! I want her back.” She shook in the cradle of his arms, and as much as her weeping ripped at him, he refused to let go.

At the very least, he could protect her in this.

“Okay.” Gavin repeated the word until he lost count of how many times he’d spoken it, his earlier anger completely obliterated by the need to erase the hurt sawing out from Bree’s lungs in cries so deep, they belied her size. God, how had he missed the level of her grief? How could he have not seen all this hurt that was so clearly in front of his face?