How did he feel about pizza?

For the most part, Nathan was a diehard fan. His favorite food group even, especially if the pizza was dressed with Andouille sausage, alligator sausage, and about four different types of cheese. (Most people thought it was the dough that made a standout pizza, but Nathan was convinced that cheese made the difference).

Still, he wasn’t quite sure what had brought on the subject change. He closed his eyes. Full disclosure: Nathan wasn’t the “glass half-full” type. Neither was he the half-empty type. End of the day, Nathan didn’t believe in the glass at all. Life could shit on you whether you were the happiest person alive or the most miserable.

Take Shawna Zeker, for instance. She was as good as good came, but that still hadn’t stopped the rage from sweeping over her body when she discovered her husband cheating. Now the husband was dead, she was locked behind bars, awaiting her first trial, and he bet Shawna had never once thought herself capable of murder.

When the glass shattered and the liquid spilled, people reacted on human instinct alone. He’d seen it in the Middle East during his military days, and he’d seen it countless times while on the force here in New Orleans.

But not him—Nathan made sure of it. The laughs, the flirting, the self-deprecating persona . . . His lungs squeezed and his fingers curled into fists at his sides. Yeah. It was a lot easier to pretend that he didn’t have a care in the world than to show that he simply cared too damn much.

He opened his eyes. Heard his raspy voice over the pounding in his ears. “Pizza’s fine. Do you want to get started on the furniture before we eat?”

Her dark eyes flicked over him, roaming his face as though trying to decipher his mood. When she gave a little sigh, Nathan figured she’d given up. And that was good, absolutely. His body might crave hers with an alarming immediacy he’d never experienced before with another woman, but that didn’t mean he needed her prodding into his closet of secrets.

But Jade surprised him.

Her fingers went to his wrist, her touch light and unassuming. “Do you ever get tired of putting up walls?”

Heart pumping erratically, Nathan smoothed his breathing and forced himself to take a step back. Away from her touch, away from what she wasn’t offering him—in other words, her. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Sure you don’t.” Then she grinned, and he got that feeling again like he was standing too close to the sun. Like this woman was eagerly waiting for him to step out of the shadows and into the light.

Nathan stared down at her, the flippant words, for once, jammed in his throat.

Once again, she read his silence to perfection. With a crook of her finger, she said, “All right, follow me. You’re about to be put to work.”

Work he could handle. Random hookups he could handle. The emotional mess she’d unknowingly tangled him in just now? It was out of his realm of experience, and he wasn’t all that sure he liked it.

He followed her down a very short hallway that led to the apartment’s only bedroom that wasn’t much bigger than the kitchen. Until now, Nathan had never experienced symptoms of claustrophobia. Standing in her bedroom, he felt very much like a giant pandering around a delicate toy shop. One foot to the right and he might crush a porcelain doll. A shift to the left and, yep, there went a little girl’s tea set.

He put his hands to his hips and took a look around. “You’ve got a nice stained-glass window in here,” he said with a dip of his chin toward the window in question. It was oval-shaped and maybe twice the size of his hand. Not much natural light, but he guessed that was the purpose of fluorescent bulbs.

Thank you, Thomas Edison.

Jade clambered over a box and brushed her finger against the mosaicked glass. “It’s probably my favorite piece in the house.”

“It’s pretty.” Just like her. Shaking his head from ridiculous thoughts, he found the box holding the bedframe and took out his pocketknife from his shorts. As he sliced the box open, he felt compelled to admit, “It might be the time for me to come clean. I’ve never put a bedframe together. Tables, dressers, I’ve tackled it all. Bedframes not so much.”

Jade’s laughter was bright as she sat next to him on the floor. “That’s great because neither have I.”

Nathan held up the direction sheet between his index and middle fingers. “Do you suggest we follow the rules, then? Or should we get adventurous and figure it out on our own?”

She plucked the paper away from him and flattened it across her lap. “Normally I’d vote for adventure, but sleeping on the floor for another night is not an option. I’ve got a crick in my neck already. Another one and I’ll barely be able to turn my head.”

It was on the tip of his tongue to offer to massage it for her. Except that, no, they weren’t going down that path. Plus, God only knew what Cartwell would do if he found out that his stepson had seduced his best friend’s daughter.

Nathan liked where his head was—attached to his cock and not in fear of castration.

“All right, Miss Let’s-Follow-Directions, lead the way.”

They spent the next hour or so hammering, screwing, and tightening the bedframe into place. Nathan avoided saying anything that sounded remotely sexual—such as inviting her to “hammer his nail” or “screw that one on real tight.”

They did, however, find themselves deep in the trenches discussing their mutual love for the TV show, The First 48.

“Did you see that episode where the victim turned out to be the perpetrator’s brother?” Jade asked as she straddled one of the bed rails, her curly hair spilling over her shoulders. She thwacked the hammer against a wooden slat, nailing it into place like a pro. Damn, but she was sexy as all hell. She continued between thwacks from the hammer, “Usually I can see twists like that coming from a mile away but not that one.”

Seated on the floor with his legs sprawled out before him, Nathan worked on securing the bedposts. At some point, the directions had gone MIA. He shoved his hair back from his face and looked at the woman pounding away at a nail like it was the most fun she’d ever had. “You do realize that describes almost every episode, right?”

“Not true.” Pointing the tool in his direction, it bobbed slightly before she adjusted her grip. “What about the episode where the stepfather pled innocent but turned out to be guilty for murdering his stepson and wife?”

“I’m sorry, just about every other episode, then.”

She laughed. “Do you ever wonder why police departments even let shows like that follow their employees?”

“Free marketing.” Nathan shifted across the floor to the other bedpost. “Think about it. All you have to do is let a camera crew hang around for a bit, and people will see it all on TV. If you’re hoping to increase your recruitment numbers, it’s a great method for showing possible applicants not only the nature of the job but the work environment, too.”

“Is that why you joined the NOPD?” With her head tilted down, she spoke through the dark curtain of her hair. His fingers itched to slip the curly tangles behind her ear. “Or was it because of your stepfather?”

Neither.

He sat up, bending one leg up to rest his wrist across the knee. “I was a marine, originally.”

Her face jerked up. “You were?”

“A sniper.” The rough admission surged from somewhere deep in his chest. He’d been discharged from the military for almost eight years now, and yet he rarely spoke of his time in the USMC. Sometimes he did so with the vets at the V.A., but even then he usually took the passive approach and listened to their stories, their struggles. His words, his wounds, his worries, remained a festering injury he kept locked tight. “Was a spotter at first, but I’m from Louisiana.”

Her brows drew together. “What’s that got to do with anything?”

“I guess it’s got less to do with Louisiana and more to do with the South just in general. It’s sorta just assumed that we’re all good marksmen. Hunters from birth or some shi—thing.”

She smiled at his slip up. “I’m not a delicate flower, Danvers. Feel free to curse in front of me. I won’t shatter.”

“My mom would kill me.”

“And you always do what your mom says?” Whether she’d meant to or not, the question bordered the line of flirtation—and Nathan liked it. He liked it a lot, but the vibe he got from her was friendly while not necessarily being friendly. Or, rather, not the kind of friendly he preferred, since it involved two naked bodies and a flat surface.

He watched silently as she threw one long leg over the bed railing and stood, using the hammer against her knees as leverage. After a quick survey of the newly built bedframe, Jade looked to him, a sheepish expression on her face.

“Okay, confession time,” she said, “I almost always do what my mom says.”

Nathan lifted a brow. “Almost?”

Her sheepish expression morphed into something that looked a lot more like guilt. “Well, I-I don’t know why I’m telling you this, but I’m pretty sure I let my mom down big time by not being anything at all like my sisters.”

He couldn’t imagine Jade disappointing anyone. She was . . . vivacious. Yeah, that was the perfect word for her. Bright and lively and so damn beautiful it almost hurt to look at her. Too vivacious for him; his good humor was nothing more than a front. Didn’t stop him from wanting to tumble her into a bed and steal pockets full of that sunshine for himself, though.

“What are your sisters like?” he asked, digging his socked feet into the rough carpet to keep himself from going to her. “Short?”

Her full, luscious mouth twitched. “We’re all about the same height.”

Nathan pretended to tick off a box from an imaginary checklist. “All right, we’ll scratch that off.” He narrowed his eyes on her playfully. “You got a blonde sister running around?”

This time, a bubble of laughter escaped her. “Rita, the oldest, she’s a bit blonde—but it’s definitely not real, I’ll tell you that.”

With satisfaction humming through his veins, Nathan ticked off another invisible box. “Okay, let’s have it then. You’re you and your sisters are . . . Fill in the blank for me.”

The tip of her nose scrunched, like she was giving the question her all. “My sisters are just like Lizzie.”

Well, he hadn’t expected that one. Scratching at his chin, he tried to cover up his confusion with a one-liner. “So, obnoxious as all hell?”

“I promise not to tell her you said that.”

Waving a dismissive hand through the air, he said, “Nah, go for it. She knows it’s all said with love.” Nathan brought his other leg up and dropped his elbows to his knees. “Wanna expand on that, though?”

The sigh she blew out was so soft he almost missed it. She was nervous, he realized. Still holding the hammer down by her side, Jade swung it back and forth as she stared at the stained-glass window. It was early enough in the afternoon that shards of color weren’t yet painting the room in jeweled tones.

“I guess it’s just . . . Rita is a celebrity hair stylist and Sammie is in her last year of fashion design school.” Jade’s gaze flicked to him. “I thought Lizzie looked familiar when I met her but I didn’t realize why until after.”

Nathan knew where she was going with this and didn’t see the big deal. “Lizzie’s the same girl in person as she is on YouTube, Jade. Don’t be weird about it.”

“Don’t be weird about it?” she demanded incredulously. “Your sister has over two million YouTube subscribers. I knew she looked so put together when I showed up for dinner, but I didn’t get it until Sammie sent me Lizzie’s latest makeup tutorial and she was dressed in the same outfit as the night I came over.”

“Sammie’s a fan, then?” For as much as he ragged on Lizzie, she was still his baby sister and he was incredibly proud of her. “I’ll let Liz know.”

“What? No.” The hammer swung faster and, in a move of self-preservation, Nathan stood up and removed it from her grasp.

Her big, dark eyes shot up to him, questioning, and he murmured, “You swing this any faster and I’m worried you’ll do major damage.”

She blinked, like what he said was physically impossible. “I’ve been around tools all my life. My dad didn’t have a son, just us girls.”

Just like that, Nathan understood the crux of her problem. He placed the hammer on the built-in bookshelf and turned back to the woman who seemed determined to strip him raw.

“Can I ask you a question?”

Her expression turned wary. “Can I ask you one first?”

“We playin’ the point for point game again?” It would be all too easy to fall into the same old rhythm that kept him moving from day to day. But here was a woman who challenged him, whose sharp tongue was tempered by bright smiles, and Nathan . . . He realized he didn’t mind answering her questions so much. Not when there wasn’t any malice in them. She was curious, and if giving honest responses to her questions meant that he could expect the same from her, he wasn’t about to turn down the chance to get to know her a little better.

That’s what friends did, right?

He nearly snorted. Yeah, what he felt for Jade right now was pure masculine interest. The kind of interest a man had for a woman he found attractive.

In a gravelly voice he barely recognized as his own, he murmured, “Ask me your question.”

“Why did you join the NOPD?” In the time that it took for him to draw a breath, she added, “Give me the real answer, Danvers, and you can ask me whatever you want.”

A tempting offer. Brady’s other best friend, Luke, man-whore that he was, would have played this situation to his advantage. Nathan wasn’t anything like Luke. He preferred the shadows to the spotlight, and when it came to women, it was best to shoot straight.

But right now, under her curious stare, he found himself returning to the shadows. He liked her, especially considering that he’d known her for less than a week. But he wasn’t ready to open up fully, friend or not, lover or not.

Scrubbing a palm over his face, Nathan instinctively went for the pack of gum in his back pocket again. Empty. He thought of the older woman smoking on her porch from two days ago—Ms. Bev, she’d later introduced herself as at Headquarters—and how desperately he’d wanted one of her Marlboro Reds.

Pull yourself together.

He put his hands behind him, pinning them to the shelves with his weight, as though that could ease the craving. His mom had forced him to see a shrink when he’d been honorably discharged eight years ago. The old man had given Nathan such a sneering glance during the session that Nathan had been surprised his nuts hadn’t shriveled like ripe grapes and fallen right off the branch.

“Addictions are for the weak,” the curmudgeonly old man had grunted. “Give me that Marlboro packet you keep fiddling with.”

Feeling much like he’d had in elementary school, Nathan had unwillingly handed the Reds over. Then, to his utter disbelief, the therapist had flicked open the cigarette pack, withdrawn the last one, and lit up at his desk.

“Ahhh, it’s been awhile.” A circle of smoke rose in the air as the therapist cranked back his chair and kicked his feet up on the desk. “You can stop looking at me like I’ve killed your puppy, Corporal. You’ve got to learn how to avoid temptation—I’ve removed the first problem.”

“I’ve got another pack in my truck,” Nathan had pointed out because, fuck it, he wasn’t coming back here again. He didn’t know where his mom had found such a quack, but he highly doubted this session was the norm. Instead of one of those classic black lounge chairs, Nathan’s big frame was shoved into a metal folding chair.

The old man had stubbed out the cigarette’s cherry with his fingers like a pro, and turned to Nathan with all the intensity that a seventy-something year old man could with bifocal glasses and a bad case of cataracts.

“There’s that saying that the first step to acceptance is admitting you’ve got a problem, Corporal—you ever hear of it?” A rhetorical question—Nathan wasn’t given the chance to answer. “I say that’s bullshit. Knowing you’ve got a problem helps you none if you aren’t gonna do anything about it. Want to know how you get past an addiction?”

Dryly, Nathan had murmured, “Is this where I’m supposed to participate?”

The old man paid him no mind. “You get past an addiction by replacing it with something new—hopefully with something healthier and less self-abusing than what you had going on before.”

A pack of gum was tossed onto the desk. Brand new, with the plastic wrap still sealed tight. Nathan stared at it, halfway wondering if he’d stepped into the Twilight Zone.

“Go ahead and take the offering and the advice, Corporal. I’ve got a feeling from the look in your eyes that I won’t be seeing you again.”

The old man had been right on both fronts. Nathan had taken the advice, and he hadn’t gone back, preferring instead to figure shit out for himself.

Now, he stared down at Jade’s curious expression. He’d fallen silent, lost in the past, and yet she hadn’t pushed him . . . just waited for him to get back to the present, to tie up the loose memories teasing at his brain.

He released his pinned hands to white-knuckle grip the shelf on either side of his hips. “An honest answer as to why I joined the NOPD . . . I guess you could say that there were two reasons. After getting out of the military, my resume wasn’t exactly glowing with corporate experience. Joining the force seemed like a natural progression after being a marine.”

She took one step in his direction, then halted with her sneakers pressed together. She had such long legs—long enough that he could bend her over the bookshelf and take her from behind without him having to play ballerina. Nathan’s grip on the shelves tightened further.

Jade had no idea how sensual she was, no idea at all.

As if to prove his point, she wet her bottom lip with a swipe of her tongue. “And the second reason?”

“I’m going to count this as two questions,” he told her in a low voice. “You good with that?”

Her long curls shook as she gave a quick nod. “Deal.”

He wanted to ask why she cared in the first place. None of the women he slept with had ever given a damn—although maybe he was partly to blame for that. He’d never given them an opportunity to learn about anything he liked outside of the bedroom. Life was easier that way. But with Jade . . . hell, here he was giving her opportunities left and right.

“The military was an addiction, and I replaced that addiction with the NOPD,” he finally answered.

That wasn’t quite right, not completely. But he’d be damned if he opened up fully—the nightmares that woke him in the dead of night weren’t for her ears. He didn’t want her looking at him like he was nuts. Plus, Nathan did his best to shove those black thoughts into a locked box he never reminisced about.

He fixed his gaze on Jade’s face. “My turn,” he drawled, going for Charming Danvers. In other words, the version of himself that didn’t make people feel uncomfortable. “Why did you almost disappoint your mom by coming to N’Orleans?”

It was her turn to shift uncomfortably. “I’m not”—her hands went up in the air, palms to the ceiling as if to say, what can you do?—“I’m not Rita or Sammie or Lizzie. They help people in their own way, boosting self-confidence and everything, but I want to make a difference, too. It’s just that my way doesn’t necessarily equate with eye shadow and flawless foundation.”

“And this disappoints your mom, how?”

Her hands fell back down to her sides, her chin lifting in a show of defiance. “I don’t have marriages and kids on my radar, for one. For another, my career choice is ‘un-tasteful.’”

He tut-tutted, clicking his tongue against his teeth. “Sinful, Jade. How could you want to help people?”

A small smile lit her face, momentarily chasing away the guilt. “I know, right?”

Pushing away from the bookshelves, he approached her. Two steps, and he was at her side. His close proximity had her tilting her head back so that she could meet his gaze. “My next question,” he murmured softly. His gaze traced the lines of her face, the barely-there freckles dotting her nose and the crests of her cheekbones, as well as the barely-there white scar bisecting the outer edge of her right eyebrow. “If your sisters are like Lizzie, who are you like?”

He should have prepared himself for her answer. He should have—only he didn’t, and her whispered reply was like a sledgehammer to his chest.

“You.”