Chapter One
Barrett
It's been a long time since I've been back to my hometown for a visit.
Nothing about the bar has changed since college, and when Nick comes around the table with a couple of beers the first sip tastes just like when I was twenty-one. Well, twenty with a fake ID, but this place is way too small for anyone to really care.
“Drink up, bro,” Nick says, placing a pint of beer in front of me. We've been best friends since the second grade, and little has changed between us in all that time. “I'll get us something stronger once we're back at the house.”
My heart almost stops before starting again. “I can't stay with your parents, dude. I'll just find another hotel.” One that isn't experiencing a water main burst.
Nick shakes his head. “I already called my mom. She insisted that you stay, said she'd already changed the sheets in my old room.”
Dammit. The beer I just swallowed sits uneasily in my stomach.
I certainly don't want to impose, and the nearest hotel is thirty miles away. But I can't let Nick know the real reason why I can't crash at his parents’ house for the weekend. I can’t stay there, and I definitely can't tell him why.
“How's work, man?” he asks, reaching for the basket of bar snacks and taking a big handful. “I'm surprised you had the time to make it down here.”
I shrug. “Work is going well enough that they weren't worried about giving me the time off.”
I'd been looking forward to the week back home ever since Nick invited me to his father's retirement party. And since Mr. Saunders was pretty much the only dad I knew growing up, I told him I wouldn't miss it. That and the chance to just relax and get away from the city was a welcome distraction. I haven't taken any time off in the past two years, and I called in a bunch of favors to be here this week, but it’s worth it.
I'd expected to crash at my mom's place, but she waited until I was halfway through the drive here to tell me that the house was already full. I'd gone to the one hotel in town, only to find it closed for repairs brought on by water damage from a pipe bursting last week.
My mother has always done her best, but after she remarried, the kids that came after put me on the sidelines at home. It put a fire under my ass, enough to get an athletic scholarship for college and remold my dreams into going to law school. I passed the bar on my first try and hit the ground running, racking up hours at one of the biggest corporate law firms in Chicago. And now, at thirty, I have a new target—making partner, and eventually getting my name etched on the door.
“Still, I appreciate you coming down. Since my divorce, my parents have been on my back twenty-four seven,” Nick grumbles. The split wasn't pretty. He'd only been married for three months when they filed divorce papers. Which was completely out of character for him. I still didn't have the full story, but something told me we'd get into all that once we were good and plastered this weekend. “Then this whole thing with Dad giving up the factory and...”
“How'd that end up working out?” Hearing Nick's dad had a heart attack was a shock. He wasn't that old, and had seemed in good health. Then he'd been forced into early retirement and the future of his factory hung in the balance.
After gulping down the rest of his beer, he shrugs. “My sister's taking over the place. I have no interest in learning to run some grease pit.”
His sister. Every time Ava comes up, I have to keep a straight face. She's one of the only things about this town I ever missed, but Nick doesn't know. He'd deck me if he ever knew I looked her way, hell, that I even thought about her, and I wouldn't blame him.
Bro code is pretty clear about these things. Those unwritten rules are genetically coded into every male before birth. You don't hit on your best friend's sister. You definitely don't let your mind wander to what she looks like naked, and you sure as fuck don't let your dick go stiff at that thought. I force deep, measured breaths into my lungs.
“Sounds like she'll be busy.” I keep my comment cool, almost off-hand, and wave down the bartender to get us another round. “Damn, it's barely seven and it seems like half the town's here getting hammered.”
“Can't blame them.” Nick casually glances at someone across the bar, and my gaze follows. “Jared Brown's over there with his third wife because it's their anniversary or something. Our old buddy Jacob has four kids now, if you can believe it.”
How sad is your life that you take your wife to a random bar on a weeknight for your anniversary? I’d like to picture myself pulling out all the stops if I was in his position.
Nick continues, his tone turning sour, “The next eighteen years of his life are going to be spent saving up for college funds. I'm lucky I got out before that.”
Honestly, Nick's parents are the only happily married couple I know. Has to be a generational thing because everyone else I run into from high school and college seem to be mired in misery, fighting with exes or trying to scrape the pieces back together before their kids notice. If I've learned anything, it's that settling down is a mistake. It’s almost like no one really wants to commit, and they'll be hellbent on dragging you into a mess because neither side seems capable of being honest about what they actually want.
The single life gives me an advantage at work. Every weekend I watch as the other lawyers at the firm duck out early to try and squeeze in some family time amidst the ninety-hour work weeks. It's not something I have to worry about, and I know if I put my time in, it'll be rewarded. Sure, I spend more time at my desk going over assignments from the partners who are out to drinks with our clients than in my own bed, and my gym membership keeps slipping back further and further on my to-do list, but I'm so damn close to the top. Once I make partner, I've got the foundation for my future set in stone.
But all work and no play definitely makes a dull boy, as they say. Needing an outlet for all those hours spent with my eyes glued to my computer screen drafting contracts, I afford myself an occasional night of fun when I can get it. Admittedly, it's been a while since I did the horizontal mambo. There's just too much work, too many deadlines, and the goals I want to achieve, and I sure as hell won't let anyone take the top spot from me. There will be plenty of time to get laid after my promotion.
“Ah, shit.” Nick's glaring at his phone, squinting at the screen in the bar’s dim lighting. “Ava just got in, so my mom wants us both at the house already.”
“Wait, she's going to be there, too?” The question slips out of my mouth before I think better of it, but Nick just laughs.
“Of course, she is. She just gave up her apartment and moved back in to be closer to the plant.” Nick counts a couple of bills out of his wallet to pay his half of the tab; I drop my platinum card on top of them. “Let's get square and I'll drive us over.”
I think the drinks we had have gone to my head. I'm looking forward to seeing Ava as much as I'm dreading sleeping under the same roof as her.
Fresh snow covers everything as we head out of the bar, little white flakes still falling across the parking lot. It's clean, untouched in a way that never lasts in the city, and for a moment I just stare at the blanket of pristine white that seems to almost shimmer in the moonlight. It's strange how you have to leave a place to find something you appreciate about it.
I chuckle to myself as Nick starts cursing and wiping the buildup off his windshield. He's never really appreciated the weather here.
“Remember when we used to have to shovel all this out of your driveway?” I ask.
“I remember you shoveling it because I told you it'd be great cardio,” Nick jokes, grinning while getting into the driver's seat. “Then Mom came out and yelled at me because you were doing all the work alone.”
“And who got paid double? I did.” Smirking back at him, I ignore the middle finger Nick thrusts my way before he gets us on the road.
Constant traffic and people everywhere are what I’m used to in the city, but out here there's nothing but long roads and trees on either side, broken up by the occasional field or house. And huge expanses of starry sky. Someone with a plow hitched to his truck must have been working late, because the asphalt is scraped clean all the way to Nick's parents’ house.
The place looks cheery with smoke floating from the chimney and lights glowing in the first-floor windows. I recognize his dad's old truck sitting in the driveway. Crazy that he's still driving that thing. A light dusting of snow covers it like it hasn't been moved in a while.
“Home sweet home.” Nick parks behind the truck, then kills the engine so we can get out.
I ring the doorbell while Nick pockets his keys, and a second later the front door swings open. Nick's mom greets me with a smile and the biggest hug I’ve ever gotten from anyone before doing the same to him, and I swear I see tears in her eyes as she claps her hands as she looks at me. The excitement of me staying here has put that joy on her face. I feel a little relieved that I'm not imposing.
“Barrett, I'm so glad you're staying with us.” She glances back over her shoulder. “Ava, come say hi to everyone!”
Ava? Oh, fuck me. I haven’t had enough time to mentally prepare for her being here, to silently chastise my dick to keep it in check, much less having her mom throw her in front of me as soon as I walk in the door. I’d just wanted a few minutes to ready myself for the reality.
Maybe she's changed. Hell, maybe she even went and got married and Nick didn't bother to say anything about it. I'm drumming up every excuse in the world to keep my blood from humming at the thought of Ava, because the last thing I need is my best friend roasting my balls like chestnuts because he realizes I'm into his sister. Really into her.
“Everyone?” Ava's voice carries to the doorway. “Who is every-”
Ava steps into view, and I take her in from head to toe in an instant. She was always a bit of a wallflower growing up, occupied with school instead of catching anyone's attention, but I remember the moment she blossomed.
It was a hot, sunny afternoon out at the lake one summer we came home from college. Ava was in high school then and Nick and I had tagged along with the group of teenagers, watching as they jumped from the rope swing, freefalling into what seemed like a forty-foot drop straight into the cold water below.
I watched Ava grab the rope, and let out a scream in mid-air as she jumped. After that, everything seemed to move in slow motion, because it was then that I noticed her hips, her breasts, and all that milky skin in her tiny two-piece swimsuit that did nothing for my hormones and everything for my fantasies. Bro code or not, I still had eyes, and a hundred adolescent dreams were just overwritten. God, she was beautiful then, but now she's grown into it, that sort of effortless look that...
Damn it. Down, boy.
I know better than this. At least, I'm supposed to. Ava's eyes lock on mine, surprise playing out across every inch of her expression. She must not have expected to see me—at least, not so soon. By reflex, I smile, and even under the dim glow of the lamp in the foyer, I'm pretty sure her cheeks turn pink.
“Hey, Ava. It's great to see you,” I say, sidelining that sudden rush of lust into an attempt at good manners.
If this keeps up, I'm going to have to sleep in the snow to keep the lust filled heat flowing through me to an appropriate level.
“Uh, hello, Barrett.” She takes a step back so Nick and I can come inside, and wipe our boots off on the rug.
“We're making some cookies in the kitchen. I remember your appetites from when you were growing up.” Nick’s mom smiles and then walks toward the kitchen. “Ava, let's go finish the dough.”
“Right. Sure thing.” Her answer is a little distant, her eyes still locked on me. “How's everything with you, Barrett?”
“Great.” I don't want to brag, but it's the truth. “How about you?” It's been years since we really connected and suddenly I want to know everything about her. I want to know what makes a twenty-five-year-old woman give up everything to take over a struggling factory in rural Indiana.
“Well, you know...” She bites her lip, and it distracts me until Nick taps my arm.
“Let's go upstairs, man. Come on,” he says, and I nod, not wanting to give myself away. When I look back toward Ava, though, she's gone.
Shit.
No, that's a good thing. The more space we have between us, the better, and I can keep my focus elsewhere. With a deep breath, I pull my head together, and follow Nick upstairs and into his old room. Everything's neat and cozy, and it's crazy how being here immediately brings me back fifteen years. Everything about this small town feels like a time machine.
“You'll stay in here,” he says, reaching up to tug open the knot of his tie, giving himself a little breathing room. “I'm going to crash down in the den since the flat screen's there. Not to mention a whole lot of booze.”
I think his quickie marriage and even faster divorce fucked with him more than I've realized, but I nod. “I think I'm done drinking for the night.” We'd only had a few beers, but the last thing I wanted to do was throw my self-control out the window when Ava would be sleeping one door over from me. “I might catch some early Zs so I'm not wiped out with everything we have going on tomorrow.”
“You say that like my mom isn't going to be fawning all over you tomorrow, making sure you have everything you need, cooking you your favorite breakfast, hugging you every chance she gets.” Nick grins.
I can't help but return his smile. Sometimes I think his mom likes me more than my own. “Your mom is pretty damn epic, if I do say so myself. But I’m just beat, it’s been a long-time coming for me to just shut my brain down and relax, ya know.”
“Sure thing, man, whatever you want,” he continues. “I'm just glad you're here. Catch you in the morning.”
“Thanks. I want to say hello to your dad, then I'll probably shower and hit the sack.”
The image of Ava tangled in the sheets in the room next to me flickers across my brain again, and I hold back a sigh. Considering my deviant thoughts, it's probably going to be a very cold shower.