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BANG. BANG. BANG. BANG. BANG.
Fuck, that knock sounded familiar, and wholly out of place.
Through the late morning light spilling in through the windows, Oliver looked down at the woman stirring in his arms. “You hear that too, right?”
Addison blinked like a sleepy owl. “Yeah. Do you think it’s Sylvia again?”
“Nope.” Climbing off the bed, he pulled on a pair of sweatpants while Addison struggled into one of his tees from the dresser drawer. The fabric fell mid-thigh on her. “Stay here.”
Rolling her eyes at his directive, she followed him down the stairs.
“I’d recognize that knock anywhere,” grumbled Oliver, crossing to the incessant sound. “It’s my brother.”
If Addison followed any closer, she’d trample him. “Here? In Ireland? Which one?”
Oliver glanced down at her. “Hayes.”
As he threw open the door, the brother in question glared. “What the fuck, Oliver? You stop answering texts, and I have to track you down halfway across the world? Joy’s due in less than a month. You think I want to be away from my pregnant wife?” Marching inside, he dropped his leather duffel bag with a loud thump to the foyer floor. “I drew the short straw to come find your ass. Nate’s in the middle of trial and can’t leave, and Evie’s about to have the twins—no way is Jackson leaving her. And I didn’t want to leave my wife, but here we are.”
“I told you I was fine.”
“And then stopped responding? Mom and Dad were up our asses. You’re the baby—they’re going nuts. You haven’t exactly been in the right headspace the last couple years. What did you think we’d do when you disappeared like that?” Hayes cut his glare to Addison. “And you. You couldn’t answer a damn text either?”
Three years ago, Kyle’s car had blindsided him—he’d been jogging one moment, airborne the next. Hayes’s question to Addison hit him with the same gut-punch of incredulity.
Addison’s panicked gaze slid to Oliver. Even the split second was enough to see the guilt etched there. “Um… I didn’t have my phone on me.”
Oliver’s head spun. He felt as though he’d been catapulted into the air all over again.
Addison.
Hayes.
They knew each other.
They fucking knew each other.
His older brother scowled at them both. “Get your things, Oliver. There’s a flight back to San Diego later today. You can stay with Joy and me, or drive back to LA. Your choice. But whatever the hell you two are doing ends now.”
Addison appeared to have developed a fascination with her bare toes. He’d never seen her look so timid.
He moved his attention from the crown of her head to Hayes. “What the fuck is this? How do you two know each other?”
The stranger in his home lifted her head long enough to exchange a look with Hayes, and Oliver knew. He knew. That was how she’d learned his address and came out here to Bumfuck Nowhere. His family sent her, like he was a kid who needed a caregiver. “My siblings sent you here.”
How stupid of him to not realize. How else would she have gotten his address? Why else would she have felt comfortable locking herself inside a home with a virtual stranger?
Addison’s duplicitous eyes looked huge in her too-pale face. “They didn’t send me. I went to them. I needed to get your address and—”
“They gave it to you.”
As though he was afraid Oliver would hurt her, Hayes stepped closer to Addison.
Where the fuck does he get the right? Addison wasn’t Hayes’s to protect. She was his.
Hayes put up a hand, and it took all of Oliver’s self-control to not smack it away. “You haven’t been yourself lately.”
“No shit.”
