A luxury Dell nor Adam had been given. It made her hurt for him, for Adam, too. For the men that they’d become, not that they’d thank her for the sympathy. They were both far too proud for that. But in spite of what had happened to them, they’d become good men. For both of them, trust had to be earned, and Dell certainly didn’t give it away easily. He shielded his emotions behind his intellect and his job, though he completely surrendered himself to every single patient.
“I’d been dumped into yet another foster home and was pissed off at the world,” Dell said casually, letting her know it could no longer hurt him.
But she didn’t believe that. He had Adam and Brady now, and Lilah. And that was about it, other than a bunch of four-legged creatures.
He wasn’t all that much better than she at letting people in. The thought brought the crazy urge to…
Hug him.
The thought was ridiculous and almost made her laugh. Dell was the strongest, most self-reliant person she knew. Comfort wasn’t anywhere on his list of needs. “What happened?”
“My first day at the new school, I picked a fight with the biggest kid there.”
“Dell.
“Hell, I don’t even remember. Because I was stupid.”
“What did he do to you?”
“For starters, he had the entire football team drag me to the park after school for retaliation. They stripped me naked and told me if I begged real nice, they’d let me go. They lied.”
Her heart was in her throat. “Oh, Dell.”
“Yeah, it sucked.”
“Who saved you?”
“Nobody.”
“They just stood there?” she asked, pissed and horrified for him.
“No. They beat the shit out of me, swearing that if I ever told anyone, it’d be worse next time.” He shook his head. “Later, at the hospital, I tried to tell the nurses I’d walked into a door.”
She gasped. “You didn’t tell the truth?”
“I still had to go to that school,” he said. “And I wanted to live.” He rubbed his jaw ruefully, as if soothing an old ache.
“Who was in charge of you?” she asked.
“We went back into the system. Then we were taken in by a guy named Sol Anders.” He said the name with fondness. “It was the last foster home I ever had. He kept us, Adam and me. Brady was already there when we arrived and he quickly became our older brother. After I healed up from the attack, Brady and Sol took turns teaching me self-defense. Luckily that summer I grew six inches, and then another five the year after. And I hit the weights.”
It had done a body good…
“It wasn’t about vanity,” he said, reading her mind with his usual ease. It was about survival. I did what I had to in order to survive, and so have you. But you already know that…”
Reno bumped his big head to Dell’s chest.
Dell made a soft clicking sound with his mouth and the huge horse bumped him again, knocking him back a step, making him laugh softly.
Reno snickered in response, almost as if he was trying to imitate Dell’s laugh.
Dell ruffled the horse’s ears and gave him a smacking kiss right between the eyes, then turned to Jade, eyes serious. “You’re only as strong as your biggest weakness.”
“Is that right? What’s your biggest weakness?”
“Back then, it was trying to be something I wasn’t.”
“And now?” she asked.
His mouth quirked. “Apparently, it’s my fiancee.”
She froze. “So you did hear.”
When he just looked at her, she sucked her lower lip between her teeth. “It was for you, you know. A favor.”
“Yeah? How do you figure?”
“I saved you from having to worry about Leanne. Hell, I saved you from messy emotional problems with
He went brows up. “So I should be thanking you, then.”
“I…” She let out a breath. “Okay, not exactly.”
“You know that news travels fast out here. People’ll have us married with children in no time.”
“Oh God.”
Because she looked much as he imagined he’d looked earlier with Adam, he could laugh. “It wouldn’t be that bad.”
She shrugged but looked unconvinced. And he realized he really had no idea what her hopes and dreams were for herself. None. “You don’t see yourself married? A mom?”
“I try not to look that far ahead.”
“And they call
“What do you want to know?”
“More than you get a hard-on for organizing things.”
“Like?”
“Like… why you come all photo ready to a job you’re obviously overqualified for, wearing designer clothes when you’re going to get dog and kitten hair all over you.”
She shrugged. “I know how to run a washing machine.”
“Okay, so why don’t you date? You’re sexy, smart as hell, and know your way around a good conversation. Yet whenever a guy approaches you, you use cynicism and sarcasm to scare him off.”
“Not my fault if a guy’s scared off by a little attitude.”
She was throwing off some good ’tude right now. “Tell me what scared you so bad you ran from Chicago,” he said. “Don’t you think it’s time?”
She stiffened and turned away. “What it’s time for is to get back to work.”
Eight
The next morning, Jade arrived at Belle Haven before dawn’s first light for their biweekly vaccine clinic. She sat in her car, eyeing the walk to the front door.
Another vet clinic had been hit in Coeur d’Alene the night before, and it was all over the news. Dell had upgraded the security system, adding cameras at the front and back doors and several panic buttons throughout the clinic with a direct line to emergency dispatch.
His cool, calm, almost ruthless efficiency told her that he was very serious about this. And if Dell was serious, it meant he had a good reason. Dell had a lot of really great qualities, but allowing others to see his weaknesses wasn’t one of them. This place, and the people and animals in it, were his. No sharing. The protective, possessive side of his nature should have threatened her peace of mind but at the moment she was glad for it.
Still, she had to make the walk from her car to the door. “Going to need reinforcements for this,” she told Beans and put in her iPod earphones. She hit shuffle and Eminem came on.
Eminem was an ass kicker.
Still, she kept the volume down so she could hear what was going on around her. Normally she liked to get in a half hour before anyone else to set up, but nerves jittered through her stomach as she headed across the lot.
Inside, past the alarm and behind the locked door, she started breathing again. She let Beans loose, uncovered
