Page 33 of Homecoming Heartbreaker

Mack recalled the occasional comment Jameson had made about Molly over the years; how he worried about her, that she pushed herself too hard, that she thought she owed him the world. She was overqualified and could be climbing the corporate ladder at another company. Jameson was convinced the resort was too laid-back for her.

Jameson, he suddenly realized, had been worried about Molly for a long, long time.

Seeing the stubborn look on Molly’s face, he knew that he was venturing down a closed-off path. Hoping to catch her off guard, Mack changed tack.

“Why the hell are you still giving your brothers money, Mol?”

Molly’s head snapped up, her delicious curls bouncing with the sharp movement. Molly sent him a cold look. “Mind your own business, Holloway.”

Not a chance. Because her business was starting to become his. Whatever made Molly sad, mad or crazy was his problem to solve. Not because she couldn’t—Molly was one of the most capable, independent people he knew—but because he cared for her. She’d been a part of his childhood, had been and was still, his best friend, the person who knew him best. He was also her lover and was, and always would be, protective of her.

Nobody messed with Molly.

“They are adults, Mol, and shouldn’t be asking their baby sister to bail them out.”

Mack, watching her body language, saw the tension seep back into her body. It was in the way her hands tightened, in her suddenly clenched toes, the way her back hunched over.

Oh, yeah, her family was a major cause of stress. They always had been but this was harder and deeper than before.

“God, Molly, talk to me. You know you can!”

“I don’t know that, Mack!” Molly responded, her tone sharp. “How can I trust anything you say? You said you’d love me forever but you left me, without a word. Without a goodbye or an explanation.You. Left. Me.”

Mack sighed. He’d been thinking about this lately; being back in Asheville had forced him to dig a little deeper into the past and his actions. He was big on control; there was no getting around that, but his need to protect was almost as strong.

And Molly had always been under his protection.

Mack leaned forward, captured her chin in his hand and gently pulled her on it, forcing her to meet his eyes. “I left you without a word because I knew that if you asked me to stay, if you asked if you could come with me, I would’ve said yes, either way. And neither of those options was best for you, Molly. You needed to stay. You needed to be in school. You needed to dance, if you’d left with me you would’ve given up all of that!”

“I—”

“I couldn’t stay. I was, in a clumsy, crazy way, trying to protect you because I could never say no to you, Mol.”

And he probably still couldn’t. Mack knew that no matter what Molly asked him now, there was a good chance he’d move heaven and earth to give it to her.

She was that important to him.

Mack allowed his thumb the pleasure of drifting over her full bottom lip. “I would’ve given you anything you wanted, Mol. But right now I want something from you.”

Molly’s green eyes turned wary. “What?”

Mack kept his fingers on her face so that she kept looking at him. “I want you to trust me, Molly. I want to know what’s driving you, what’s hurting you, what’s making you crazy. And, God, if you tell menothing, I swear I’ll boot you off this deck.”

It was an idle threat but Molly seemed to take it seriously, possibly because he’d tossed her into this pond a hundred times when they were kids. Molly brushed an irritating curl out of her eyes before scowling at him. “You play dirty, Holloway.”

Ah, but he wasn’t playing at all. Not this time.

Could she trust him? Could she share her deepest secret with him? She was so damn tired, a battery whose energy was slowly being drained, with no hope of been recharged. She felt lonely and sad, and hostile, angry and guilty.

Yet, a part of her,mostof her, would prefer to live like that to avoid seeing the same expression she remembered seeing on Jameson’s face when she was six and dealing with her dad’s betrayal: confusion, pain, disappointment and anguish jumping in and out of his eyes.

She’d been so young yet she understood, at a fundamental level, that her father’s actions had eviscerated Jameson.

And when he’d hear about her theft, she’d be reopening, deepening and expanding that wound.

If she didn’t tell him, she’d slowly fade away. If she did, she’d lose everything she loved. It was a hell of a choice...

Molly tipped her head to the side, considering the idea of telling Mack, thinking he could be her trial run for telling Jameson. Mack would be horrified and wouldn’t want anything to do with her; he’d immediately hit the brakes on their relationship—if that was what it was—and start backing away. And yeah, that would suit her because a) she didn’t have the strength to walk away from Mack on her own and b) at least she’d see this split coming and could be, somewhat, prepared for it.

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