Page 35 of Jay Bird

He had known Willow for two days. Two fucking days and somehow he had gone from catching her when she collapsed to buying a car seat, stocking his refrigerator with toddler food, and handing her the security code to his house.

That wasn’t normal behavior for him, but then again, nothing about Willow or Lily seemed to bring out anything even close to normal in him anyway.

Derek had also told him that he planned to stop by tomorrow with Tink.

Tink had served with Derek years ago before leaving the teams and starting his own security company, although calling what the man did “security” didn’t quite cover it. Tink had contacts everywhere and a disturbing ability to find information others couldn’t. Not to mention he has classified contracts with the government.

Give the guy a name and a few details, and somehow he would come back with tax records from nineteen ninety-five, your fourth-grade teacher’s maiden name, and probably what you had ordered for lunch last Tuesday.

According to Derek, Tink had already uncovered information that might help Willow start reclaiming her identity and figuring out what had happened to her life during the three years she had been missing. That alone was worth bringing him over.

Jay Bird would talk to Willow in the morning before they arrived. After everything she had been through, the last thing he wanted was two men she didn’t know showing up at the house without warning.

The fact that he was already thinking that way, planning around what might make her comfortable, should probably have bothered him, but it didn’t.

Jay Bird rubbed a hand over his jaw. What the hell was it about those two?

He understood Lily a little better. The kid had latched onto him immediately, and apparently he was enough of a sucker that one pair of big brown eyes and a stuffed elephant had turned him into a willing participant in Peppa Pig marathons.

Willow was harder to explain. She was beautiful. He wasn’t blind to that. Even exhausted and bruised, there had been something about her the moment he first saw her outside the gym that made him look twice. Now that she had showered, rested, and finally gotten some food into her, that quiet, striking quality about her was only becoming more obvious.

But attraction alone didn’t explain the pull. Jay Bird had been attracted to women before, but none that ever felt like this. This was different in a way he couldn’t explain.

Maybe it was what she had survived. Maybe it was knowing she had been trapped with Chen and still risked herself to help Riley escape. Maybe it was the way she automatically put Lily first in every situation, even when she looked like she could barely remain standing herself. Or maybe it was the fact that after everything she had endured, she could still look at his barren front yard and tell him, with a completely straight face, that it appeared he had threatened the landscaping.

That one made him smile. She hadn’t been wrong. His house really had no personality, and he knew it. He just hadn’t cared enough to do anything about it.

Furniture served a purpose. Landscaping required maintenance. Pictures collected dust. Decorative pillows were completely fucking useless.

Willow had walked through his front door for the first time and immediately looked around as though the place was personally offending her sense of decency, and he found that ridiculously entertaining.

A faint sound from the hallway pulled his attention away from the television, and a moment later Willow stepped into the living room. For a moment, she didn’t notice him.

Her long hair was pulled into a high ponytail, although several shorter pieces had escaped and framed her face. She had changed into a pair of loose pajama bottoms and a matching royal-blue tank top that made Jay Bird abruptly forget what documentary he had supposedly been watching.

Jesus. There wasn’t anything provocative about the outfit, and that was exactly what made his reaction so irritating. She just looked comfortable, and at ease in a way he hadn’t really seen from her since she’d shown up outside the gym.

As soon as she spotted him, she stopped in her tracks.

“Sorry,” she said quickly. “I didn’t know you were still out here. I didn’t mean to disturb you.”

Jay Bird frowned. “Bother me?”

She gestured vaguely toward the television. “You were watching something.”

He glanced at the screen. “I couldn’t tell you what.”

The corner of her mouth lifted slightly. “Still.”

“Willow, you walking through the living room isn’t an interruption.” He motioned around them. “Remember the whole make yourself at home speech?”

“I remember.”

“Good. Because I don’t want to repeat it.”

She laughed softly.

There it was again, that sound doing something strange to his chest, and Jay Bird tried to ignore it.