“Bring a bag for you guys and stay here for a few days at a time. Don’t make that drive back and forth every day.”
She bites that lower lip, which is plumper than I remember it being before, and shakes her head.
“I’ll be working in the early mornings and evenings after we get home. Unfortunately, I still have deadlines, and Aiden has school. It’ll be fine—I can make that drive with my eyes closed.”
Wills is a voice actor and primarily works on audiobooks and video games.
She’s fucking badass, and I couldn’t be prouder of her.
But I wish I had a studio for her here so she wouldn’t have to drive back and forth to her home in Missoula, which is an hour away. The trip is dangerous, as well as exhausting.
I can tell by the way her jaw tightens that there’s no changing her mind.
Gid and I walk her to her car, and before she can get inside, she turns and hugs us both in turn. My brother whispers something in her ear, but I can’t hear what it is. Willow smiles and nods and offers him a sweet look that almost has me feeling jealous.
I need some fucking sleep.
When she turns to me, she tugs that lip between her teeth, looking uncertain.
“Get over here, Trouble.” I take her hand and tug her against me, wrap my arms around her and hug her close. She smells incredible. Like flowers and laundry soap. After a heartbeat of stiffening in my arms, she melts against me and lets out a long breath.
Maybe it’s the sadness of the day that has her acting different. I hope that’s it.
“I’m glad you’re home,” she murmurs. “Both of you.”
“I knew you missed me.” I kiss her head, and she laughs, which is exactly what I wanted, and then she pulls away, and I miss having her warmth, her softness, close to me.
This is Willow, man.
“I’ll see you tomorrow,” she says, but she looks so damn tired.
“Are you sure you won’t stay?” Gideon asks, obviously reading my mind. “I’m sure Aiden will be fine with his friend tonight. I don’t like you making that drive either.”
“No, I need to get him.” She shakes her head, her mind obviously made up. “I’ll be okay.”
“Let us know when you get home.”
She nods, sinks into the driver’s seat, and waves before heading off down the driveway.
Chapter Three
Willow
“Holy shit, Ry, I was just here two days ago, and this looks like a different house.”
Ryker grins in that cocky way he always does that makes the butterflies attack my stomach lining. Good God, this man’s smile should come with a warning label.
Smile will induce pantie melting from fifty paces.
He slings his arm over my shoulders, the way he always does, and we look around the living room. The old, faded furniture that should have been replaced more than a decade ago is gone. In fact, the room has been completely emptied, and there’s a crew refinishing the original hardwood floors.
“They’re going to paint when the floors are done. They should have done it before, but there was miscommunication,” he says, but all I can think about is his rock-hard side, which I’m pressed up against. “The whole house is getting paint and the floors redone. Come on, you can clean up your room because it’s getting the magic tomorrow, along with the rest of the second floor.”
“My room is clean,” I remind him with a smirk. “I’m not a slob like someone else I know.”
“Hey, I was a teenager. I was supposed to be a slob.”
He smirks and twists his baseball cap so it’s sitting backward, and I’m pretty sure my vagina just did the hula.
