Page 78 of Second First Kiss

“You just did,” Brynn said from behind, then took the stool next to him. He jumped with a start.

“Jesus. The women in my life are multiplying. Where did you come from? Did someone feed them after midnight?”

“I came from a second date, where we kissed,” Brynn said with a goofy smile.

The two women high-fived and Nolan gagged a little. “Things about my baby sister I don’t need to know. And how did I hurt Kat?”

The women shared a glance as if he were dense, but it was Brynn who spoke. “With that whole ‘I’ve been so wrapped up with other things, I didn’t get on this fast enough’ thing. That was rough. The Nolan I know would never say something so hurtful,” Brynn whispered.

“I’m with the ladies on this one. That was rough,” Jax said. “I have no idea what has happened between you two, but clearly your relationship has changed and calling her a distraction hurt her. I don’t know her very well and I admit I haven’t seen her upset all that often. But she’d been stripped of her ballbuster shield with one sentence.”

“Shit,” Nolan said, hanging his head until his chin touched his chest. “I didn’t mean her. I just meant this investigation, my job, redoing the house, Tommy coming back into my life. There’s a lot going on. But I didn’t mean her.”

“Maybe you should be telling her that and not us,” Brynn said softly.

“I’ll clear things up,” Nolan said. And he would. He would do whatever it took for her to not feel like he was one more guy who found her distracting or not enough. “But just so it’s clear, I will reiterate, we’re just friends.”

Brynn shook her head. “How stupid is that? Walking away from something that could be good because one bad thing happened to you.”

“It wasn’t just bad, Brynn. It shredded me.” Not so much losing Nina, but losing Tommy. He’d really pictured being a dad: big moments, little moments, all the ones in between. Nolan collected people and brought them into his heart since he was young. That’s how Jax and Lucas came to live with them. Tommy had felt like his and now he was gone, and he’d left this gaping hole in his soul that Nolan didn’t know how to fix.

“The odds of that happening again are like three trillion to one,” Brynn said.

“Is that newfangled math?” he asked.

She flipped him off.

“And like I said, she was the one who friend-zoned me. Not the other way around.” His phone rang and he pulled it out of his pocket. He tried to hide his smile, but he couldn’t.

“I don’t need three trillion guesses to know who that is,” Brynn said.

Ignoring the peanut gallery, he answered. “Hey.”

“Nolan?” Kat whispered, and the tone in her voice triggered all his agent instincts.

He was out of his seat and headed toward the office, where he stored his service weapon when off-duty in public. “Are you okay?”

“I think so. Are you in the backyard?” Kat asked.

He was out the door and in his truck in record time. “No. Talk to me.”

“I just heard someone at the back window.”

“Lock the doors and don’t answer for anyone but me.”

20

“Don’t be scared,” she said to Tiny Dancer, who had been snuggled at her feet while they had been sharing a bowl of popcorn and watching reruns of The Blacklist. They were currently in the bathtub with the curtain drawn, sitting on the cold plaster, finishing the popcorn.

If she was going out, she was going out with a bang.

Neigh.

“Shh,” she hissed quietly. “You’ll bring unwanted attention to us and we just have to hold on until the ranger gets here. He’s big and bad-ass and super sexy, but don’t be drawn into his charms. Our life is way too crazy for him. Like he said, like all that came before, were a ‘distraction.’”

For the first time in her life, she was grateful that her sister was out for the night at Gemma’s and not at home. And for the first time in a really long time, she was happy she wasn’t in this alone. But she didn’t like the idea of Nolan putting himself in danger for her.

She looked at her phone. Maybe she should call him back and say it was a mistake and just call the cops instead. Nah, he’d hear about it and come anyway—only with a prepared lecture ready.

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