I SAW CASS the moment I walked in. My eyes went to her like a fucking magnet.

I didn’t need any magnets in my life. I’d been drawn to enough shitty stuff over the years, all of it dangerous. I was done with being drawn. Done with connections and caring.

In fact, I was about to move on in every way—apartment, career, associations—but seeing Cassidy James, who used to be about four feet tall and wear her long hair in a high ponytail, smiling and laughing, always earnest and goodhearted, tugged a smile to my mouth.

She still had her hair in a ponytail, high up, which used to be cute but was now sexy as hell, because she’d grown up in a whole lot of other ways too.

Long neck, curves up high and a tight ass down low, and damn…long legs. But still with that smile that curved her cheekbones and put a flush on her pale face.

Yeah, she looked good.

She flew at me and I dropped my bag a second before her body hit me. Her arms went around my shoulders and she hugged me like I hadn’t been hugged in a long time. No complications, no dying wishes, just a big, happy smile, the faint scent of some fruity shampoo or something, and pure happiness.

Also, breasts. Yeah, they were here too, pushing against my chest.

“Trey, you came,” she whispered against my ear. “I can’t believe you came. I didn’t know you were coming.”

I’m not proud of it, but I got hard. Probably because she kept saying all the forms of ‘come,’ and with her breasts and her tight ass that I could see in the wall-long mirror behind her, it was an involuntary reaction.

“Little Cass,” I said, putting my hands on her arms and setting her back a few inches.

She beamed at me. “Ben didn’t tell me you were coming.”

Doubt he had any desire to draw us closer together. Probably because he’d once warned me to stay a thousand miles away from Cassidy.

That had been the Night of Cassidy’s Tattoo. I thought of it in capital letters, because it was a shitty night for her, a reckless night, and while I hadn’t done anything you couldn’t post on social media, I’d sure wanted to, watching Cass all sweet and drunk, wanting to get a picture of her ex tatted on her shoulder with a dagger through his eye.

I’d talked her into the Celtic design.

It looked good.

But I didn’t need Ben’s warnings, not even back then. I knew very well to stay away from someone as sweet and good as Cassidy. She was sunshine and I was a storm cloud, and I was smart enough to keep my weather system of trouble away from her.

But yeah…she looked fucking good.

She tipped her face up, still beaming at me. “Does Ben know you’re here?”

I shook my head and gestured to the duffle bag. “Just got in.”

“So I’m the first to see you?” she said happily, like I was a present.

“You’re the first, baby.”

The flush on her cheeks got a little deeper and for half a second, her teeth closed around the plumpness of her lower lip.

More looking good.

I swung my gaze away from her goodness and scanned the swanky hotel. “Ben’s really moved up in the world, huh?”

“Oh, yeah.” She blew out a breath and her lower lip popped out from between her teeth. “That was always his goal.”

“Always was.”

“What about you? Where have you been? What have you been doing? I haven’t seen you for, what? How long has it been?”

“Too long.”

“Yeah. Too long.” Her eyes never left mine. “Ben’s going to be so happy to see you.”

“I wasn’t sure I would be able to make it.”

“Been busy?”

“As a bee.”

She smiled. I liked what it did to her cheeks. “Buzz buzz.”

I smiled back. “You?”

“Oh, jeez.” The animated look on her face dampened and she waved her hand vaguely. “Since high school? It feels like a thousand years ago.”

Understatement of the century.

“I haven’t been doing anything worth talking about. But you…seriously, Trey, where have you been?”

“Nowhere good.”

She smiled. “That was always your way. Dragging Ben into your trouble.”

I shrugged. “He was a man who knew what he wanted.”

She folded her arms under her breasts. I forcibly kept my eyes up. “And you were there to provide it.”

“I live to serve.”

She grinned. “So, where’s nowhere good?”

I really didn’t want to talk about my nowhere good places. There were a lot of them. I paused, thought about lying, then said simply, “Afghanistan. And other places.”

The brightness in her eyes dimmed a little. “Oh.”

“Yeah.”

“This whole time?”

“Twelve tours.”

“Twelve,” she echoed, an exhale of understanding, or as close as someone who hadn’t been there could get. “That sounds like a lot of tours.”

“Not as many as some.”

“And you just got back?”

Just got back. Just got out. Thirteen years in, a lot of time downrange, lots of fucked up shit under the bridge, and now, I’d left it all behind and dropped myself into this strange, fucking normal American life full time, and I had no idea what I was going to do next. Didn’t much care either. Not yet. Maybe not ever. I was just…done. A towel wrung out, dry and desiccated and pissed off.

“Just,” I agreed.

She didn’t say anything for a second, then out of the blue, she reached for me again and hugged me, fast and hard—breasts, ass, legs—but before I could hug her back in confusion, she stepped away and thrust out a hand.

“Hi, I’m Cassidy James.”

I laughed, still confused, and reached for her hand. “I’m Trey Dante. Pleased to meet you.”

My hand, hardened by years of holding a weapon and the civilized world at bay, closed around her slim, cool one, and a jolt of something went through me that had nothing to do with ass or tits or long, shapely legs that ended in red-painted toenails peeking out from high heels.

“Come here often?” I said, keeping things light.

Her cheeks were pink as she laughed, happy again, our hands still holding. “Never been.”

“Me either.”

“Well, we have to stop meeting like this.”

“Oh, I don’t know, I could meet you a time or two again,” I said lazily.

Still holding.

“Did you call us here for a reason?” I asked.

Soft laughter met this. “I figure war changes a man, and you’re probably not the guy I knew thirteen years ago, but I’ll bet a lot of people will expect you to be. So I thought we should, you know, get reacquainted.”

Well…damn. She looked sweet and innocent and hot as fuck, but that was a sword-thrust of an insight, and I looked straight at her and said something I probably shouldn’t have.

“I’d get reacquainted with you, Cassidy.”

Her eyes never left mine. They were searching, and I wasn’t in the mood to be searched, so I looked at her toenails again, then slid my gaze up her body under the guise of admiring her dress. “Nice dress.”

“Oh, this.” She glanced over her shoulder at the woman she’d been talking to when I came in, and lowered her voice. “That’s Ben’s fiancé. Amber.”

I lowered my voice too. “Are we scared of her?”

“We are very scared. She invited peacocks to the wedding—”

“Peacocks?”

“—and she wanted us all to look like…”

I angled an eyebrow up.

Cass tipped forward and if I looked down, I could stare into the valley between her breasts. I didn’t. I sincerely, adamantly, did not look. But I sincerely, adamantly wanted to.

“Christmas Barbies,” Cassidy whispered.

Another smile pulled at my mouth. Five minutes with her and I was smiling more than I had in a month.

“You’re joking.”

She shook her head. The high ponytail bobbed a little, swaying the long dark strands across her back. Perfect length to grip in a fist and tug her head back while you were taking her from behind.

Fuck. Stop it. Little sister of a friend. Not a fuckable woman.

She stared into the middle distance and put a bright, blank smile on her face, like you did when someone said they wanted to tell you about a dream they’d had.

“So, do I look like a Barbie?” she asked playfully, her eyes shifting to mine while she held the stance.

“You look good,” I said, slowly and honestly.

Our eyes held.

“Cassidy, who is this?” said a voice. It broke our gaze and we turned to the woman, fiancé of my long-ago best friend. Blonde and tall, she was wearing tights and covered overtop by a very expensive-looking silk robe. She looked like a high priestess.

“Amber, Trey Dante, Ben’s oldest and bestest friend,” Cass said, introducing us. “Trey, this is Ben’s fiancé, Amber Rothsman.”

“Ohh,” Amber exclaimed as I took her hand to shake it. “So you’re Trey Dante. I’m so glad you came.”

“Thanks for having me,” I said politely. She was still holding my hand.

“‘Having you?’ Ben talked about sending troops to abduct you.” She looked me over. “You look different from the high school pictures he showed me.”

I shrugged. “It happens. Older. Wiser. More mature.” I thought about Cass’s ass and hoped I was more mature.

“But not too mature?” Amber replied in a flirty voice. “Ben still eats lollipops and Pez.” I laughed. “He’s spent hours talking to me about you.”

“Oh, I’m pretty sure that was just an excuse to spend hours talking to you,” I replied gallantly.

Her eyes widened then she giggled.

I glanced over her shoulder to Cass, who was standing in the background. Cass rolled her eyes and I grinned, then she reached out and extracted me from Amber’s grip.

“I need to take him to Ben,” she announced. “I’ll be right back.”

She turned and whisked me to the elevator to see the guy I hadn’t seen in years, who’d once been as close to a brother as you could get. Then Ben went to college and I went to war, and now…I didn’t know what we could get back. But he’d asked me to come, so I went.

We didn’t say anything as we rode up the elevator and walked down the long corridor. But Cass didn’t let go of my hand and I didn’t pull it back.

I figured I’d been touching parts of her body for three-quarters of our time together. Maybe five minutes.

Five minutes longer than I’d wanted to touch part of anyone in a long, long time.

She and I drew up outside a door and Cass rapped on it.

“Ben’s going to be really touched you came all the way from Afghanistan to see him,” she whispered.

“Maybe I came to see you.”

Why the fuck had I said that? It wasn’t even true.

The door handle rattled and she gave me a little push forward while she took a step back—always what Cass was doing, stepping into the background—then the door swung wide and Ben stood there.

Blue-eyed, bow-tie swinging loose, shirt half buttoned, cuffs unlinked, my once brother in all but blood stood staring at me. Behind were the voices of other guys.

“Jesus…Christ,” he breathed, then stepped forward and hugged me, drew me back into his world, and hugged me harder than I’d been hugged since…since Cassidy did it downstairs.

And fuck that shit, my eyes filled with tears.

My Ranger buddies were closer than bone, bound by the blood we’d been soaked in, but this…this was home. And I’d sworn I couldn’t go back.

Ben held for a long time, and I let him, because I couldn’t speak without my voice cracking, then I said, “Dude, it’s not like we won the pennant or something.”

With a burst of laughter he released me. His eyes were a little red, and he was laughing and holding the door wide, stepping back and telling me to come inside.

I went in, then turned to look at Cassidy, standing in the hallway. Her eyes were way redder than Ben’s.

“You made me cry, you bastard,” she said softly.

“I’ll make it up to you,” I promised. I thought about ways to make it up to her. Make her smile. Maybe make her do some other things.

“Deal.” She backed up a step. “See you downstairs?”

“Downstairs.”