“I’m sorry,” Ava said, stealing a moment to lean against John. It was almost time to leave for the night. She still couldn’t get over the fact he didn’t mind spending half the day there every day. “You’re probably bored stiff.”

John’s arms came around her, and he lowered his head to her ear, his mouth brushing her skin. “Not one bit. I like watching you work.”

Ava shook her head at him. “On a computer monitor, from twenty feet away? That’s a load of crap.” He’d spent the day at Janna’s workbench, watching the front of the shop on monitors. There was no way he could see a damned thing.

He grinned and slid a large hand down her backside to her ass. “I saw enough.”

She laughed and shoved at his chest, not managing to push him a bit, but liking the way his chest felt under her hand. “You’re bad.”

“I plan to be very, very bad when I get you home.”

Ava planned to take him up on that.

“Janna, wait,” John said, stepping back from Ava so suddenly she almost fell. “I’ll go with you,” John was saying.

Ava turned to see Janna in the doorway, her face crumpling at John’s words. She carried a bag of trash and Ava knew instantly what had happened. Janna was having trouble remembering that the back door needed to be locked. An outsider would think with Janna’s increased anxiety over the robberies, it would be easy for her to remember not to go out into the back alley by herself, but routines were crucial for Janna. She thrived on them, so the pattern of collecting the trash and taking it out each night was an almost automatic response for her.

“I didn’t mean to.” Janna ducked her head, looking at the floor, and Ava could hear the self-hatred spewing under her breath. “Stupid, stupid, stupid. I messed it up.”

John took the trash bag from Janna. “Why don’t we just put this by the door, and we’ll put it out on our way out? We forgot to show Ava my masterpiece.”

“Masterpiece? What does that mean?” Ava looked from one to the other, hoping his distraction would work. Janna had been so stressed all day before John arrived. Ava was still pretty floored at her sister’s reaction to him. Janna responded to him in ways she never did with other people.

Janna didn’t make eye contact with him any more than she did with other people, but she did interact with him a whole hell of a lot more than most. Right now, her sister was all smiles as John took the bag of garbage from her and set it by the door.

Janna took Ava’s hand and led her to the workbench on the other side of the room.

“John is making a bracelet.”

“Really?” Ava shot a look of surprise over her shoulder at John, who was laughing.

“It’s not very good.” John warned.

Janna proudly showed off her protégé’s work, which turned out to be a lump of copper with glass gems in the center. Ava laughed as she recognized the materials Janna had learned on when she was young. Copper was cheaper than silver but could be melted down and molded in a similar way. The glass gems were self-explanatory.

Ava was actually impressed. For a first go at jewelry making, it wasn’t horrible. “I was so bad at this when I was little,” she said. “I think I made two or three pieces and gave up. Janna had an eye for it right away and was willing to sit and practice for hours on end without stopping to eat. In fact,” she put her arm around her sister, “we still have to force her to stop some days, and she’ll almost never choose to stop to eat on her own.”

Janna frowned. “I like making jewelry.”

Ava gave her a squeeze. “Yes, but eating is important, too.”

Janna only shrugged at that.

An hour later, she and John were snuggled on the couch with a bottle of wine. She had taken off her blazer and kicked off her heels, leaving her in the pants and camisole she wore that day. Eventually, she’d go get into something more comfortable, but she hadn’t had the energy yet. It had taken them a little while to get Janna settled in with their dad up at the main house, and Ava was finished.

He sat with one leg stretched along the couch and one leg on the floor, cradling her back to his front.

She sipped the Merlot in her glass and tilted her neck to the side, making room for the one-handed massage John was giving her shoulder.

When she moaned, he leaned in and gave a warning growl. “Careful. Keep that up and I’ll toss the wine and the massage and skip to the naked part.”

Ava leaned to the side and looked up at him. “Promises, promises.”

His laugh was deep and ran over her body like a caress as he leaned in to kiss her. It was a slow, unhurried kiss, and she was glad he wasn’t in a rush to get them to the naked part. She liked this. Liked feeling the connection of being with him after a long day, instead of feeling like they just had to strip and get straight to the sex.

John broke apart from her and set his own glass on the coffee table. “Let’s get you to relax,” he said, putting his good hand to work on her shoulders to rub the knots out of them.

“I think the stress of these robberies is getting to me. Half the time, I think I should close the store so none of our employees are in danger and the other time, I think that’s just ridiculous. They’d lose their livelihoods if I did that. But there’s not a minute in that shop now that I don’t feel on edge.”

“I’m sorry,” John said, and she heard the weight of his statement. He wasn’t just saying he was sorry she had to feel that. He was saying he was sorry for not solving the case yet, as if the way she was feeling was entirely on his shoulders.

She shifted to the side again, turning to look at him. “You get that this isn’t on you, right? I mean, the fact that you haven’t solved this case yet, that’s not completely on your shoulders and yours alone? Please tell me you understand that.”

He didn’t answer.

“John, I know you like to take responsibility for everything and everyone, but there are a whole unit of you guys over there working on this case, right?”

He nodded. “Right.”

She raised a brow. “I can hear a silent ‘but’ at the end of that admission. There isn’t any ‘but’ about this. You aren’t responsible for the actions of these men any more than any of your partners at the precinct.”

“I only have one partner,” he said, and she knew what he was doing. It was an attempt to get her off her soap box with humor.

She wasn’t buying it. “And that partner of yours, do you blame him for not getting these guys off the street yet?”

“No, but he blames himself. We all do. It’s in our natures.”

“Yeah, well, it sucks.” She turned back around and snuggled into his embrace. “You can’t hold yourself to that level anymore John. You might like to think of yourself as some mythical magical super hero, heaven knows, you seem like that some days. Heck, Janna is convinced you’re Thor come to life, but you’re just a man, John. A very good one, but you have to stop blaming yourself for everything bad that happens.”

John wrapped his arms around her and laid his head on her shoulder. “Ava, do you remember when you said you wanted this to be just sex between us?”

Ava stiffened. She’d crossed and line, and he was telling her that. Damn it. She should have known she couldn’t handle this. She’d told herself she could keep this about sex and nothing else, but she’d just played her cards and he was about to call her on it.

She opened her mouth to respond, although she didn’t have a clue what to say. Heat flooded her cheeks. Before she could speak, John spoke again, this time with his mouth against her shoulder, the heat of his breath tickling the bare skin beneath the strap of her camisole.

“What if I don’t want to accept that anymore? What if I want this to be more?”

The flood of emotions hitting Ava was complex and confusing. She felt hope and happiness on a level she hadn’t in a long time. But there was also the fear of knowing he might not realize what he was getting into. She blew out a deep breath and braced herself.

“John,” she started, but her voice was shaky. “I want that. I really do, but you haven’t seen the half of what taking care of my dad and Janna is like. Things with them have been really good lately, but that can change on a dime. And when it gets bad, it gets really bad. I can get called away at all hours to help one of them, and—”

He didn’t let her finish. He sat up, turning her so she faced him. “Listen to me, Ava. There are going to be plenty of times when I’m the one to get called away. Whether it’s for my job or for my dad. He’s getting older. He’ll need me sometimes, the same way your dad and sister need you. You think I won’t understand when you need to put other responsibilities first? That’s just crazy talk right there.”

He seemed to be winding up for a good rant, so she let him talk, all the while feeling that hope and the excitement of something more happening between them grow stronger.

“And I like Janna, a lot. I don’t know her well, but you seem to think it was some burden for me to hang out with her today. It wasn’t. She and I had fun. I don’t know that she got much work done since she spent half the day trying to teach me to melt and bend metal into something that looked like little more than what a cat puked up, but we had a good time doing it. If she needs you, I’ll be there backing you up. The same goes for your dad. I want to have your back, Ava. I don’t want you to feel like you have to do everything yourself and apologize to me while you’re doing it.”

She put a hand to his chest. “Will you do the same? Will you let me back you up when you’re feeling frustrated or upset about your job or a case? Will you share that with me?”

Now he scowled. “Ava,” he said, and there was a heavy weight in his voice, “I see things at work, things I would never want to put into your head. I can’t share that with you. I can’t make you bear what I bear.”

“Then don’t.” She ran a hand over his jaw. “Don’t tell me the details. But talk to me. Tell me how it made you feel. Come home and put your head in my lap and let me hold you and make it better. Or tell me if you need space to deal with it, and come to me when you’re ready to have someone hold you. But don’t shut me out over it, okay? I can see you trying to hold the world on your shoulders, trying to take it all on yourself, and you can’t do that and stay sane. I want you to let me help you hold it all up.”

He nodded, then let a slow smile spread across his face as he ran a hand up her arm. “So, we’re doing this? We’re going to make this real between us? Because I gotta say, I love the sex, but I love this, too.” He gestured around. “Coming home with you. Just being with you and here for you.”

Ava felt her heart squeeze. She hadn’t wanted to tell him that she wasn’t doing a good job keeping her feelings for him from growing. Knowing she didn’t have to made her feel like anything was possible. She believed him when he said they could manage the crazy circumstances of her life and his. She believed in them.

“I was an idiot to let you go when we were in college,” she whispered, leaning into him, running a hand over the muscles in his shoulder.

“Yes, you were.”

He said this so solemnly it made her laugh, but then he was kissing her, and the laughter was captured by his kiss. He turned her humor to passion in a heartbeat as his hands and mouth played over her.

She moaned, wiggling to try to get closer to him. It wasn’t working.

John stood, pulling her up with him and leading her to the bedroom.

She had a feeling he was about to show her just how stupid and idiotic she’d been back then. And she was going to enjoy every minute of that lesson.