Roughing It With Ryan

much I lug around every day, I should be thin. I deserve to be thin.”

“Nah.” Taylor jerked her head toward Nicole. “If you were thin like Nicole, for example, you wouldn’t have boobs.”

With a frown, Nicole looked down at her small breasts.

Suzanne laughed. “I’d give up the extra ten pounds each in a heartbeat.”

“Really? Wonder if Ryan would say the same…”

Taylor then ducked past Nicole to avoid Suzanne’s extended foot. “By the way, I hope he’s there tonight, you look great.”

Suzanne did not feel great, she felt…harried. She was wearing her usual uniform of a white shirt-with the small chocolate stain-and black skirt, which, upon reflection, actually was kind enough to hide her biggest flaw-her hips. “It doesn’t matter to me one way or the other if he’s there.”

Taylor snorted. “Right.”

“Singlehood,” Suzanne said. “Remember?”

“Hey, I’m keeping the vow,” Taylor said. “Don’t you worry about me.”

“Or me,” Nicole muttered, sliding the last tray in the back of Suzanne’s car and swiping her palms on her thighs.

“You’re too cute and young for such a vow,” Suzanne said.

Nicole lifted a brow. “I’m twenty-seven. Same as you I’d guess. And besides, a woman can never be too young to decide no man is a good man.”

Only a few weeks ago, Suzanne would have said amen to that. But the image of Ryan came to her-tall, dark and…well, hers.

Damn him. “I’ve got to go.”

“Give Ryan a kiss for me.”

“Shut up.”

Taylor smiled knowingly at Nicole. “She’s going to give him a kiss for me.”

Suzanne sighed. “There are containers in my fridge. Help yourselves to dinner.”

Taylor and Nicole high-fived each other and vanished up the stairs.

Suzanne got into her car, and all the way to the job lectured herself on the reasons why singlehood was a good idea. Why she’d made the vow in the first place.

And all the way there, the reasons didn’t make much sense.

An hour later the party was in full swing. She was in the kitchen, racing around, humming to herself, when she turned toward the door and froze. Ryan stood in the doorway looking at her with an expression that completely stole her breath.

And suddenly, she couldn’t remember a single one of those reasons she’d recited to herself on the way over here. She couldn’t remember anything but how he made her feel.

He wasn’t wearing his usual jeans and work shirt, but instead a pair of khakis and a collarless thin sweater that clung to his broad shoulders and chest in a way that made thinking all but impossible.

Before she could recover, his long, long legs swallowed the distance between them. “Hey,” he said softly.

How was it possible to be so off balance just by looking at him? He hadn’t even touched her, couldn’t touch her when he had his hands in his pockets as he did, and yet her heart had already taken off.

He slipped his hands out of his pockets to tuck a wayward strand of her cursed hair behind her ear. Just a gentle touch, an easy touch, one he drew out by not retracting his hand right away, instead letting his finger trail down her cheek.

“I have work to do,” she managed.

“Okay.” He ran his finger over the pin on her blouse, just above her breast. Her nipples would have hardened, but they’d already done that at the first sight of him.

She lifted a tray but he took it out of her hands.

“Ryan-”

“Let me help.”

Before she could say that wasn’t a good idea-if she let him help, she would feel obligated to him, and if she felt obligated to him, she might do something stupid at the end of the night like beg him to make love to her-he simply leaned close and kissed her cheek. Just her cheek, just a quick connection, and yet her entire body reacted. Wanted more. No other man had ever had that kind of power over her.

And, she realized, no man ever would. Her legs wobbled at this realization.

Ryan walked out the double swinging doors of the kitchen with the tray, leaving her standing there…stunned. Aching.

“Fine, then. Take the tray.” Muttering beneath her breath about beautiful, bossy men who had to have their own way, she whirled back to the counter and began to fuss over another tray that had gotten a little sideways on the drive.

“Why is it that every cook I know mutters to themselves?” asked a female voice.

Angel. Suzanne didn’t turn around immediately, as she wasn’t ready to face yet another Alondo. “How many cooks do you know?” she asked lightly.

“Well, there’s you. And my brother. Even though we tease him, Ryan is pretty handy in the kitchen, did you know that?”

No. No, she didn’t. She didn’t know a lot about him, and despite the pull low in her belly at the thought of him, say standing barefoot in his kitchen whipping them up a midnight snack, she decided that was a good thing.

“He cooked dinner for us every night after our parents died.” Angel looked over the dessert tray carefully as she spoke. “Through homework. Through basketball games. Through me being a stupid, vain and mean teenage girl. Through Rafe and Russ not wanting to sit down for family dinners without Mom and Dad. Through thick and thin, Ryan was there, making us dinner.” Angel plucked up a brownie. Popped it into her mouth. Chewed, then closed her eyes and moaned with pleasure. “Oh my God, this is sinful.” Her eyes opened again. “He always made a veggie.” She shuddered. “Usually a green one. He made us eat it. I used to hate him for that.”

Suzanne pictured the three of them, Russ, Rafe and Angel, young and scared and hurting, being gathered together for dinner by Ryan. Ryan, who just wanted to keep his family together and safe. Ryan, who’d do anything, including giving up college, simply to make that happen.

A man like that was different from any man she’d ever known. A man like that wouldn’t just walk away when the going got tough. A man like that would say only what he meant, and would never, ever, hurt her on purpose.

She couldn’t ruin a man like that…right? So what was she afraid of? What was she really afraid of here?

Maybe, she thought with a hitch in her breath, nothing. Absolutely nothing.

Worse, maybe the truth was she’d hidden behind her fear of nothing.

And that made her a coward. “And now?” Suzanne asked quietly. “How do you feel about him now, knowing all he sacrificed to keep you guys together?”

“I love him more than anything or anyone,” Angel said simply. She popped another brownie. “Mmm.” She licked her lips. “And I’d seriously hurt anyone who hurt him.”

Suzanne leaned back against the counter and considered the younger woman. “Is that some kind of a warning?”

Angel looked at her. “Do you plan on hurting him?”

“Don’t be silly,” Suzanne said with a little laugh that didn’t hold any real humor. “I don’t have the power to hurt him.”

“Is that what you really believe?” Clearly disappointed with Suzanne’s response, Angel put her third brownie back. “Really?”

Suzanne pictured how Ryan had looked a moment ago, eyes hot and aching.

For her.

In their wildest dreams, neither of them had ever intended for this…this thing to go as far as it had. She knew that, just as she knew what they’d wanted had little to do with it. Their hearts had taken over.

Oh, Ryan. What a pair we are.

As if he could hear her thoughts, he came back into the kitchen, looking bigger than life. Dividing an even