Gabe found he was having a hard time not staring at Nic during dinner. He wasn’t sure why. Maybe it was because when she showed up at the beginning, she’d taken her hair down and now looked less like someone who’d spent the day dusting furniture and compiling the week’s grocery shopping list.

Maybe it was because she was holding a wine glass and smiling at Lucian and Julia in a way she hadn’t smiled at him in a long time.

Or maybe it was because when her cheeks got flushed and those big brown eyes started to dance, she was fucking beautiful.

It didn’t matter.

Sitting back with his cheek resting on his palm, he knew he needed to stop staring at her, because he wasn’t exactly being inconspicuous about it.

He didn’t stop.

Gabe couldn’t even blame it on liquor. All he’d been drinking tonight was water and sweetened tea.

“So what made you decide to go into social work?” Julia asked, picking up her glass of red wine. “That has to be a hard job.”

“Can’t be any harder than nursing,” Nic said as she reached for a piece of garlic bread. She hadn’t been watching him. Hell, it was like she barely knew he was there, which he found fucking irritating, because they were friends now.

Gabe noted she hadn’t answered Julia’s question so he opened his big mouth. “Nic has always been a helper.”

Her gaze shot to his from across the round table. Finally.

“A helper?” Lucian slid a long look in his direction.

Gabe ignored it. “Yeah, she’s always wanted to help people.”

Nic blinked slowly and then focused on Julia. “My friend Rosie says I have a savior complex. I don’t think it’s that extreme, but I do want to help people. I know that sounds cheesy—”

“It doesn’t,” Gabe interjected. “The world needs more people like you and Julia and fewer people like us.”

“Agreed,” snickered Lucian around the rim of his wine glass.

Julia put her glass down. “You guys donate a lot of money to charities.”

“Giving money is easy,” Gabe replied. “Giving time isn’t.”

Nic bit down on her lower lip as her lashes swept down.

“So are you done with school or not?” Julia asked.

“I have my bachelor’s and I’m currently deciding if I want to get a master’s or PhD. Kind of going back and forth on it,” Nic answered, breaking a part the piece of garlic bread into little sections, getting crumbs all over her plate. “I could get started and take evening classes.”

“That would be really hard.”

“It would be,” Nic agreed, popping a piece of the buttery bread into her mouth. “But getting out there and doing the job sounds more enticing than grad school.”

“No doubt.” Lucian rocked back on his chair as he toyed with a strand of Julia’s hair. “Did you know that Gabe isn’t the only one good with his hands when it comes to woodwork?”

Julia looked over at Nic. “You?”

“Um.” She took a rather long sip of her wine. “I used to be able to create like these stupid little charm bracelets and figurines—”

“They weren’t stupid.” Gabe straightened in his chair, frowning. “Nic has a talent.”

“I wouldn’t call it a talent,” Nic began.

“I’m not going to sit here while you’re being all modest and shit. The little pieces of jewelry she used to make were amazing.” Gabe was speaking the truth. “So were the figurines. You’re still doing that, right?”

She avoided his gaze. “With school and everything, I didn’t have a lot of time to mess around with that stuff.” She lifted a shoulder. “It’s not something I really do anymore.”

“Really?” Surprise flickered through him. “I thought you wanted to open up a little shop and sell your work. It was all you talked about—”

“People change. I’m just not into the same things I was when I was a kid.”

A kid? She’d been into it right up until that night, and she sure as fuck hadn’t been a kid that night.

Nic turned to Julia. “How did you and Lucian meet? You’re from Pennsylvania, right?”

His eyes narrowed as Nic changed the subject. She obviously didn’t like the focus being on her, which was new. The younger Nic loved to be the center of attention—the center of his attention.

Julia glanced at Lucian. “Well, I was . . .”

“She was hired to care for Madeline,” Lucian finished for her since it was obvious Julia didn’t know how much she could share. “Did you know she returned?”

Since she was chewing on a piece of bread, Nic only nodded at first. “I was told that she had returned, but nothing beyond that. How . . . is she doing?”

Gabe raised a brow, letting Lucian take the lead on this since anything he had to say about Madeline would most likely upset his younger brother. Lucian now knew just how messed up Madeline had been, but she was still his twin. That biological connection was hard to get over.

“Not well,” Lucian said after a moment. “She’s dead.”

“What?” Nic gasped, and he’d swear a tiny piece of garlic bread fell out her mouth. Her wide gaze swung to his before darting back to Lucian. “Oh my God, I’m sorry.”

“Thank you, but don’t feel sorry. Not for Maddie.” Lucian sat back with a sigh. “How much do you know about what’s been happening here?”

Nic had lost the pretty flush in her cheeks. “I knew that Madeline had come back and something happened with Daniel? He threatened you and Julia?”

“That’s the watered-down version, but Madeline did show up. Found her one night floating in the pool outside,” Lucian explained. “She was virtually comatose and we had to hire someone.”

“Which was me.” Julia’s arm moved under the table, and Gabe knew she was comforting Lucian. Most likely placing a hand on the tapping leg of his. “We believed she was in some sort of locked-in state of consciousness, but that wasn’t the case.”

“Remember the night our mother died?” Lucian asked.

Nic nodded. “How could I forget? I was young, but that kind of stuff sticks with you.”

Gabe remembered Nic crying when she heard the news, not because she really knew their mother, but because she was so upset for them—the brothers.

“Turned out Mom didn’t kill herself. She and Maddie had been up on the rooftop arguing.” His brother’s voice sounded detached, but Gabe knew better. That whole mess still cut him deep. “Fighting over our cousin Daniel. Maddie had been with him, and yeah, as in having relations with him.”

“Oh my,” whispered Nic.

“The argument escalated and—” Lucian drew in a deep breath—“Maddie pushed her off the roof.”

Nic jolted. “Oh my God.”

“It gets worse.” Gabe reached for the water, wishing it was liquor. “She’d spent the last ten years hiding out with Daniel. They ran out of money, concocted some wild-ass plan for getting ahold of the de Vincent fortune.”

“Almost worked,” Lucian said quietly. “She had me fooled, right up until the night Daniel threatened Julia.”

Surprised that Lucian was opening up, he sat back and said nothing, glad that his brother was talking about it.

“I . . . I don’t know what to say.” Nic reached for her wine again, then stopped herself. “How did she even think that she could get the money?”

Julia sipped her wine while Lucian seemed to choose his words wisely. “Her plan was ridiculous, but well, you know it’s never been a secret that Maddie and I weren’t the offspring of dear old dad.”

If Nic hadn’t heard that rumor, she didn’t show it.

“Come to find out, Maddie knew the truth about who father’s true heirs were.” Lucian smiled but there was no humor to it. “Maddie and I were Lawrence’s children. Dev and Gabe were not.”

Nic’s lips parted as her gaze darted to Gabe. Her face had paled considerably, so much so that he was a bit concerned. “I . . . I really have no idea what to say.”

“It is what it is.” Lucian picked up his fork, lazily dragging it through what was left of his spaghetti. “Not much has changed. Dev is still the heir. Gabe is still the spare.”

Gabe raised his hand.

“And I’m still Lucian and I don’t have to worry about business meetings or deal with Senator Dickhead. And honest? Maddie was a true sociopath, but in a way, I’m thankful.” Lucian looked at Julia. “If she hadn’t come back, I would’ve never met Julia.”

“That’s . . . sweet,” Nic murmured, blinking rapidly.

Gabe grinned as her gaze connected with his. “It’s a lot to process. Besides your parents and our doctor, no one outside of the family knew that Madeline was back.”

“It has to stay that way.” Nic picked up her wine glass and finished it off. “I understand.”

“Well, that was a bit of a conversation killer, wasn’t it?” Julia laughed nervously. “I think we need to stop telling the truth.”

“We did meet at a bar first.” Lucian grinned at her. “We should just go with that version.”

“Yeah, I think you should most definitely go with that version,” Nic said, eyes widening. “It’s a lot less intense.”

Julia kissed Lucian’s cheek and then turned to Gabe. “Are you heading up to Baton Rouge this week?”

He shook his head. “No.”

“What do you have going on in Baton Rouge?” Nic asked.

The question was innocent enough. Gabe knew damn well neither Livie nor Richard would’ve said a single thing about his now-frequent trips.

“A few personal things,” he said.

“Oh.” Disappointment flashed across her face, and he felt like an ass. He could’ve come up with a better answer, but that was just something he wasn’t ready to talk to her about.

Or talk to her at all about it.

Lucian came to the rescue. Sort of. “So, are you seeing anyone, Nikki?”

Gabe’s hand stilled along the arm of the chair. This was an interesting question.

Nic’s brows flew up. “Um, no. No. Single.” Her nose scrunched. “Well, I was seeing this guy in college.”

“And that didn’t last?” Gabe asked before he could stop himself.

Her gaze darted to him. “We broke up a bit ago.”

“Interesting,” he murmured.

She started to frown.

Lucian stared at him.

And then he realized that his response was a bit odd. “It’s interesting because . . . most college relationships don’t work out.”

Okay.

That sounded stupid.

But then something flickered over Nic’s face before she quickly looked away, but he knew what she was thinking about. Hell, he knew what he was thinking about now.

Or whom, to be more exact.

Emma.

Dinner had been . . . enlightening.

That was all Nikki could think as she grabbed her purse from the staff office. She couldn’t even process what Lucian had told her about their sister and father. The de Vincents had some crazy drama in their background, but that was beyond anything she could’ve imagined.

And she had no idea how Gabe was dealing with it. She’d always had the impression that Lucian had never been close to Lawrence, but Gabe and Dev had been. Well, they had been as close to him as anyone could be to that man.

To learn that the man you thought was always your father wasn’t? And who was their dad? God.

Digging her keys out of her purse, she started to head out the back door but stopped.

Nikki remembered how bad it had been after their mother had died. They’d grown up thinking she’d killed herself, and this whole time, she’d been taken away from them by their sister.

How did one even begin to get over that?

As she stood in the small ten-by-ten room, she suddenly thought about the de Vincent curse.

What was it? Women never lasted long here. Yeah, that was it. They either lost their minds . . . or died.

Nikki never really believed in the curse and the brothers had always been so blasé about it, but now she was beginning to think it was onto something and that the brothers weren’t so dismissive of it, because sweet Jesus. Wow.

She looked over her shoulder, toward the back hallway. How would she feel if she found her dad wasn’t her father? It would kill her in a way. He’d always be her father, because he was who raised her and that was all that mattered, but still. And then to find out their own sister killed their mother because their sister was screwing her cousin and their mother objected?

Sorrow wrapped its way around her heart, and she was moving without telling her legs where to go.

In the back of her mind she could hear Rosie saying, Don’t listen to your bleeding heart. . . .

Unfortunately, she was listening, and it wasn’t that big of a deal. Not like she was in search of Gabe to throw herself at him. She just wanted—God help her—to make sure he was okay, really okay.

Because that’s what friends did.

She cut down the back hallway, making her way to the rec room. Some kind of bizarre sixth sense guided her down the long hallway and to the door that was cracked open. Placing her fingers on the engraved wood panel—the panel that Gabe himself had carved the vines into—she pushed.

He was alone.

Gabe was behind one of the pool tables, lining up a shot. The cue stick jutted out, smacking into the ball. It shot across the table, knocking into a red solid, sending it to spin into a corner pocket.

Her gaze dropped.

Gabe was barefoot.

Straightening, he looked up. “Nic?”

“Hey.” She stepped into the room, wondering what the hell she was doing. It was already dark outside, and Lord knows she didn’t have a track record of being smart once the night fell here, so she should be well on her way out of here, but here she was. “You’re playing pool by yourself?”

“Lucian wanted some alone time with Julia.” He placed the stick against the pool table. “So here I am, playing pool by myself.”

“That’s kind of . . . sad.”

One side of his lips kicked up. “Is it?”

“Yeah.” Dropping her keys back into her purse, she draped the strap over her shoulder. “I mean, pool is a game for more than one person.”

“Some consider it a sport,” he corrected, leaning a hip against the table.

She rolled her eyes. “I truly feel like for something to be considered a sport, you have to break a sweat.”

“You aren’t playing pool right if you’re not breaking a sweat.”

A smile pulled at her lips. “I’ll have to take your word on that.”

Gabe cocked his head, and a strand of hair fell forward, brushing his cheek. “I thought you had left.”

“I was going, but . . .”

Everything about Gabe appeared to go on alert. “But?”

What was she doing? She wasn’t so sure. Okay, she wasn’t being honest with herself. She was now wasting time and being stupid. “I wanted to check on your car.”

“Check on my car?”

“Yeah. The window?”

“It’s been fixed. My car is whole and happy.”

“That’s . . . good,” she said lamely.

A knowing look settled on his features. “That’s not why you’re still here.”

Hating that he could read her so well, Nikki took a deep breath. “I just wanted to say that I’m sorry about everything that happened with your sister, your mom . . . and your dad.”

He stared at her for a moment and then looked away. “It’s no big deal.”

“No big deal?” she repeated, stunned. “Dude, that’s a huge deal. All of it. Every last piece of it.”

He let out a soft laugh. “And you only know half of it.”

“Half of what?”

A muscle flexed in his jaw as he turned back to her and a long moment passed. Long enough that Nikki began to really worry. “Thank you, though. For saying that.”

She didn’t miss that he hadn’t answered her question.

“But you don’t have to apologize.”

“I know.” She inched closer. “But I can’t imagine what you guys must’ve gone through—are going through.”

Lifting a hand, he brushed the hair out of his face. “What can we do, though? We can’t change what our sister did or the stuff with our mother and father. No point in dwelling on any of it.”

Fidgeting with the strap on her purse, she inched a little closer. “Do you and Devlin have any idea of who your father could be?”

He shook his head, but Nikki didn’t miss the way his jaw tightened. He may be standing there acting like everything was a nothing burger, but Nikki knew better. Maybe someone like Devlin would be wholly unaffected by the events but not the Gabe she knew.

Before she gave herself time to think about what she was doing, she sprang forward and all but tackle-hugged Gabe. Wrapping her arms around his waist, she squeezed him and said, “I really am sorry for everything that has happened.”

Gabe was utterly frozen. His entire body was so stiff she wasn’t even sure if he breathed or not, and for a really tense moment, she feared that she’d let her heart guide her into making another bad decision.

But then she felt Gabe’s chest rise under her cheek and his arms swept around her, folding across her back. He held her, and she couldn’t even remember the last time they’d hugged or been this close.

Actually, she did.

That night she’d gone to him they’d hugged and obviously that hug had turned into a hell of a lot more. Four years was a long time between hugs, and being this close to him again did crazy strange things to her senses. The entire front of her body tingled sharply and when she inhaled, she was surrounded by the crisp scent of his cologne.

It was just a hug.

That’s what she kept telling herself even as she knew she needed to pull away. It was just a hug—one that probably had little to no impact on Gabe while it was absolutely destroying her best of intentions.

Gabe’s arms tightened around her and she bit down on her lip when she felt his chin brush the top of her head. One of his hands moved, dragging down the line of her spine. His palm flatted at the small of her back.

Just a hug. Just a hug.

Her body wasn’t on the same wavelength as her brain. Heat flashed through her, intense and wanting. The feel of his chest against her and—

Oh my God.

Nikki’s eyes flew open. She felt him, hard and thick, pressing against her stomach.

Gabe suddenly let go and stepped back, putting distance between them as her wide-eyed gaze swung to his. “You should leave.” His voice was rough, deep. Abrasive. Nikki shivered. “Now.”

Resisting the idiotic voice that always got her into a world of trouble and wanted her to ignore what he was saying, she turned and got the hell out of there.