Sydney, he reminded himself. Ticking clock.
So, he wrapped the towel around his hips—a Janie-sized towel, barely enough to cover his rear end—and went unto the breach.
At the sound of the door opening, both women looked up.
Janie, eyes the size of saucers, said, “Rafe. Wow. Um...you knew Sable was here, right?”
“I did. Thanks,” he said, saying a hell of a lot more with his eyes. “Though she assured me she would stay outside.”
“But it’s freezing out there! Much more comfortable in here.”
“Nice to know you’re so concerned about everyone’s comfort,” said Rafe, lifting an eyebrow. Skin damp, hair dripping, he could feel his nipples puckering. The hairs on his legs standing on end.
Janie bit back a grin.
While Sable blinked at him. Once. Twice. And he felt the connection he’d been trying to pretend did not still exist twang, as if they were tied together with some invisible lasso that had just tightened around them.
“Janie,” Rafe growled when the knot of the towel began to slip.
“Right.” Janie moved to block Sable’s view, to usher her back towards the door. “Come to think of it, that coat does look very warm. What’s it made of? Crow?”
“Ah, nothing real,” Sable stammered. “It’s fake. Fluff. Stuff. But yep, definitely doing its job. Feeling pretty warm right now. And happy to wait outside.”
Janie opened the door, and said, nice and loud, “Sorry about that. He’s not usually such an exhibitionist.”
Sable’s fading voice wafted to him as the door slowly swung closed. “Could have fooled me.”
Sable didn’t want to blink in case it rid her of the vision currently burned into the backs of her retinas. Acres of hard male chest. Naked. Rippling. That magical vee of muscle she’d only ever seen in underwear ads. And a happy trail leading beneath the edge of the minuscule towel held precariously at lean hips.
“Earth to Sable.”
“Hmm?”
Janie watched her, head cocked to one side. “I was saying... Have you decided how long you’re staying?”
“Staying?”
She wasn’t staying. She was on a mission. For Rafe.
Not all the bits she’d just seen. Ogled more like. Other bits. A single healthy, hearty sperm would do her just fine. He’d never had any plans for them so he’d never miss it. Not that she’d put it quite that way.
“Sable?”
“Right. Staying. How long? Depends.”
“On? Mercury’s alignment with Mars?”
“Sure. Let’s go with that.”
Sable stamped her feet, the dew having seeped through the bottoms of boots that had not been made for the great outdoors. “What’s he doing in there, do you think? Curling his hair? Sewing his clothes?”
Janie laughed. Then, in the same tone one might use to ask where they might go for breakfast, she said, “Just don’t hurt him, okay?”
“I’m sorry?” said Sable, though she’d heard just fine.
“My big brother might never say so out loud, but he’s really made something of himself since you left. He’s respected. Settled. And a raging success. I’m sure you can imagine the amount of work he had to put in for all of that to come to pass.”
Sable blinked. “I’m really glad to hear that.”
“Mmm. The thing is, as a kind of cosmic payment for all the good that has come to pass, he has this thing about responsibility. About not turning his back on anyone. His staff, the townspeople, me. He takes that obligation very seriously. To a fault. Our very own St Jude, Patron Saint of—”
“Lost Causes,” Sable finished.
Janie clicked her tongue and pointed at Sable. “That’s the one.”
Sable tried hard not to swallow. Not to let Janie know that every word felt like a barb, snagging on her vulnerable underbelly.
For a few months back she had felt like a lost cause. Humiliated, broken-hearted, and appalled at how she’d let herself become a passenger in her own life, she’d felt about as strong as a single strand of dandelion fluff.
But while she might look a little thrown together, and was deliberately vague in voicing her intentions, Sable was not lost. She was exactly where she was sure she was meant to be.
“Janie,” she said, “I can assure you, the last thing I want to do is hurt anyone.”
Janie cooed, “Gosh, look at those doe eyes of yours. So beseeching. So earnest. Just make sure you don’t do it anyway.” With that Janie jogged up the stairs and pulled the door open. “Come on, pretty boy! Your date is waiting!”
Rafe growled something from inside the van that sounded like Not a date. Then appeared in the doorway in dark jeans, slick dark boots, dark Henley, dark hair curling damply around his ears. Just big, and dark and so beautiful it hurt to look at him.
Sable might actually have sighed. Out loud.
“Yeah,” Janie muttered. “This isn’t going to end badly at all.”
Rafe picked his sister up by the upper arms and deposited her inside the caravan. “Be good,” he growled. Then he gave her a kiss on the cheek and closed the door in her face.
Janie’s words skittering about inside her head, her feet cold and wet, her belly empty, Sable found herself caught in Rafe’s tractor-beam gaze as he ambled down the steps.
“Hungry?” he asked, hands rubbing together.
“Mmm-hmm,” she managed.
“As I remember it, you’re buying. So, lead the way.”
CHAPTER FOUR
BOTH BRANDISHING FRESH COFFEE—Sable’s hot and dark, Rafe’s cool and bitter—made by an exceedingly curious Bear, they found themselves strolling into Radiance Reserve, a series of parks bordered by dense forest at the far end of town.
Rafe took the outside of the path, his strides shortened so she could keep up, and Janie’s “he has a thing about responsibility” speech niggled at the edge of Sable’s brain.
She only hoped this expanded sense of responsibility of his didn’t get in the way of her very good plan.
“So, this town, huh,” she said. “A few interesting new faces about.”
Rafe spared her a glance over the top
