Nobody But You (12 page)

“What did you get?” Kenna asked.

“I'm in charge of the fifty preschoolers coming to learn about living green on the mountain,” Aidan said with a frown. “
Fifty?
Who in their right mind would want to handle fifty preschoolers?”

“You,” Gray said, clapping him on the shoulder. “Oh, and I wouldn't feed them too much. At that age they still need help with the paperwork in the bathroom, if you know what I mean.”

Aidan stood and pushed Gray into the chair. With huge enthusiasm, he whipped Gray around three times and then slapped a dart into his hand.

Gray threw and got
Shit Even Yo Mama Don't Wanna Do
.

Aidan gleefully handed him a piece of paper, which Gray read out loud. “Make a sweep of the employee locker room—
Shit
,” he muttered.

“Sorry,” Aidan said, clearly not looking sorry in the slightest. “But we've been told that the room smells like skunk, so someone's broken the no-drugs rule. The stash has to go, and if we let Hud do it, he'll have to arrest the idiot.”

Gray sighed again, then pointed at Jacob.

Jacob craned his neck and looked behind him.

“Nice try,” Gray said. “But you're a part of this family, like it or not, so move your ass.”

Jacob sat in the chair, and Gray spun him while the words sank into his head.

Like it or not…

Fact was, he did like it.

When Gray finally stopped his chair, Jacob narrowed his eyes on the board, but aiming the dart Gray had given him wouldn't help. First, he was dizzy as shit. And second, he didn't know which of the jobs were the shittiest. And the truth was, he was actually enjoying being included.

When his dart landed on
Craptastic
, Aidan grinned. “Nice,” he said, and slapped a piece of paper to Jacob's chest. Jacob pulled it away and read, “Bring in a new load of firewood for the weekend bonfires.”

Aidan whistled. “Tough break,” he said, not sounding sympathetic in the least.

“This doesn't look so hard,” Jacob said.

Aidan snorted. “We'll talk when you're done.”

He looked at Kenna, who explained, “We can't get anyone to deliver firewood because it can't be driven in past the parking lot. It has to be carried in from there to the fire pit by wheelbarrow, which as you know, is a good hundred yards.”

Jacob pocketed the paper, and when the meeting was over, he started thinking maybe this whole family gig was like getting back on a bike. Not easy, not always a good fit, but worth the trouble. “I can do more than load wood.”

Kenna immediately claimed him. “Me! Me! I need his help. I'm in over my head and losing my mind.”

“Spoiler alert,” Aidan said. “You lost your mind a long time ago.”

This caused a momentary rubber band fight. When they each had at least one welt, they got back to it.

“No, but seriously,” Kenna said. “It's summer season, so you guys all have it easy right now. I'm the only one doing the work of five people—so I claim Jacob.”

“Works for me,” Gray said.

Kenna pumped a victorious fist. “Events coordination is too big for just one person,” she told Jacob. “But now there's two of us.”

“But we've got something going on every weekend,” Hud said, coming back into the room, pocketing his phone. “Our next big event is Wounded Warriors, and that's only two weeks out.”

“So?” Gray asked.

“So how do we know he'll even be here?” he asked without even looking at Jacob.

“I'll be here,” Jacob said. “I told you, I'm on leave. I go back shortly after the event.”

Hud didn't acknowledge this or take his gaze off Gray.

Gray held out his opened hand, indicating that Jacob had just answered the question.

Hud left the room again.

Okay, then. Yep, things were going just great.

Several days later, Jacob was heading to his cabin, tired but feeling good about the past three days of working as one of the Kincaids, feeling for the first time like he'd actually been of some use.

And if it was Gray and Aidan—the brothers he'd never felt like he'd fit in with all those years ago—who'd made him feel the most welcome, he told himself he could wait for the rest.

For Hud.

He eyed his refrigerator. Empty.

The same way his dock had been for three nights…

With a shake of his head, he headed out to the store. He stood in the frozen-foods aisle, trying to figure out what he could toss into the microwave that might pass for dinner when he felt compelled to look behind him. Yep, there Sophie stood in front of the ice cream section, and suddenly he was ravenous.

But not for food.

Seeing her had relief filling him. He'd been missing her, foreign as that felt to him. Missing her and worried about where she'd been staying at night, hoping she was safe, wishing she trusted him enough to stay at his dock.

She hadn't seen him yet. Her back was to him and she was on the phone, so he didn't approach her. But he wanted to.

Stand down, soldier
, he told himself.
You already know she's not for you. Or more accurately, you're not for her
.

S
ophie stood in the frozen-foods aisle at the grocery store, staring at a two-gallon tub of ice cream. She was doing her damnedest to stay upbeat, but between her and the very tiny bathroom mirror on
The Little Lucas
, she was having a hard time.

She was on the phone with her parents, and her dad didn't sound happy. But then again, he never did. She wished she could find the magic button to cheer him up, wished—

“How's the hotel chain management job going?” he said.

Her stomach sank. “I was fired from that one.” She paused. “A month ago.”

The deafening silence made her wince. Being fired was the ultimate failure in her dad's eyes. After all, it was after he'd been let go from the job at NASA that he'd hit rock bottom.

“You've got to work harder at things,” he said. “Like being married. Like your job. Look at Brooklyn. She has it all: a husband, kids, a good job with benefits.”

“You didn't finish college because it wasn't for you,” her mom said. “You left your great almost-a-paralegal job? Sophie…”

She closed her eyes at that and
thunk
ed her forehead right there on the glass door in the frozen-foods aisle.

“You've got to hold yourself to a higher standard,” her dad said quietly.

“It's not what you think,” she said, not quietly. That had always been part of the problem. Her parents were calm, internal people.

She didn't have a calm bone in her damn body and she'd never been able to keep much inside. “And I do hold myself to a high standard. I'm working hard, on everything.”
I want to make you proud…
But she didn't say that. Instead, she said what she always said. “You'll see.”

“You're like a loose tumbleweed, twisting in the wind,” her mom said. “Find what you love and the money will follow.”

Right. But what if she didn't know what she loved?

Or if she even
could
love?

They said their good-byes, and Sophie loaded a gallon of chocolate fudge ice cream and then on second thought made it two. Then she called her sister.

“Hey, what's up?” Brooklyn answered, sounding irritated. “And what I really mean is ‘Hey, unless you have a time machine to whisk me away from the insanity of my life, I can't talk right now.'”

Sophie could hear the sounds of kids laughing and playing in the background and also what was probably the clicking of her sister's fingers over a keyboard. “You busy?”

“I can't even. What's up?”

“Just talked to Dad.”

Brooklyn sighed. “And how did that go?”

“The good news is that in the best-daughter competition, you're still winning. The bad news is that he's still upset about the divorce.”

“You've done some good things too,” Brooklyn said. “Marrying a dickbag wasn't one of them. Don't feel bad about leaving him. In fact, leaving him should be added to the list of good things you've done, stat. Hang on—Kyle,” she yelled, “if you shove that crayon tip up your nose, so help me, I'll—
shit
. Soph, I gotta go.”

Sophie slipped her phone back into her pocket and felt a tingle of awareness along the nape of her neck that had her lifting her head.

Her gaze collided with Jacob's.

He stood at the end of the aisle in front of the frozen pizzas, wearing sexy jeans and an army-green T-shirt that fit like it'd been made for him.

Bad for you
, she reminded herself. All you've done is daydream about the things he did to you in his great big bed with his great big—

“Hey,” he said.

“Hey.”

He smiled like maybe he knew what she was thinking about. And his smile made her remember all the things she'd been coaxed into doing the last time he'd flashed it at her.

Just keep your cool. And your clothes on
. She eyeballed his section of the freezer. “Dinner?”

“Yeah. The question is three meat and five cheese or fully loaded.”

“In other words, a heart attack waiting to happen?”

He slid a laughing gaze her way. “Says the woman who ate a heart attack for breakfast the other day.”

She'd had something else for breakfast that day too.
Him
. Her body involuntarily softened at the memory. Dammit. “That was a hangover cure,” she said. “Entirely different.”

His grin made the woman behind Sophie drop her frozen chicken Alfredo casserole.

“There's healthier stuff in the fresh aisle,” she said.

He gave her cart—and the ice cream in it—a long look.

“Do as I say, not as I do,” she muttered.

He laughed, but grabbed a loaded pizza. “I don't really have all that long of a life expectancy,” he said. “So I'm not too worried about a heart attack.”

That sobered her up pretty quick. And right then and there she made yet another choice.
No regrets
. “Put the pizza back,” she said. “I'm grilling spice-rubbed beef tenderloin with chimichurri for a client. I'll have extra.”

“You had me at beef tenderloin,” he said, making her thighs quiver. “Although I've got no idea what the hell chimichurri is.”

“It's a tangy, zesty condiment that's like a cross between vinaigrette and pesto,” she told him. “I'll have plenty.”

“How do you know how hungry I am?”

The words—not to mention his voice—gave her a shiver in the very best kind of way. “How hungry are you?” she heard herself whisper.

He let five solid beats go by, during which time he just looked at her. “Frighteningly hungry,” he finally said.

Another woman promptly ran her cart into Sophie's. “Oh, sorry!” the woman gasped, face red as she hurried off.

“You're making quite an impression,” Sophie managed dryly.

He shook his head like he disagreed and stepped closer to her, right inside her own personal little space bubble. Now she was in his orbit and in danger of being sucked in and going up in flames.

But she didn't make a move to a safer zone. In fact, all she could think of was how he'd felt moving over her,
in
her, his voice a low, sexy murmur in her ear. She knew the texture of his skin, the dips and valleys of his beautiful body, the sounds he made when he came…

Something flashed in his eyes. Heat for sure. And maybe humor. “I like what you're thinking about,” he said.

“You have no idea what I'm thinking about.”

“Wanna bet?” he asked, running one hand up her back until the pads of his fingers slid beneath her hair and brushed the sensitive skin at the nape of her neck.

Her very long few days vanished in the flame of hunger flickering to life at his touch. She'd thought she could stay away, ignore him. Ignore this. She'd been delusional.

Jacob lowered his head so that his mouth was a fraction of an inch from hers and they were sharing air. He wasn't touching her anywhere but with those rough fingertips, and yet she could
feel
him, big, warm, strong. So strong.

Yearning washed over her in waves, and she was the one to make the move, fisting her hands into his shirt and yanking him in. She who kissed him. She who planted her mouth on his and, at the taste of him, moaned.

The last time they'd kissed, he'd made her feel wanted, made her feel sexy, vibrant.
Alive
.

She wanted that feeling again, that sensation of flying without a net, knowing that he'd catch her…

Kissing him gave her all that, and when he slid his hands into her hair and cradled her head, it also gave her more.

She heard something crash and tried to pull free. Jacob, not so easily startled, was much slower to lift his head, keeping his hands on her when he turned his head to look.

Another woman had come down the aisle and had run her cart into the display of pie crusts. She wasn't alone. She had a much older woman at her side, holding on to the cart like it was a walker.

“Wow,” the older woman said. “Haven't seen a kiss like that in a long time.”

“Mother,” the younger woman hissed.
“Shh!”

“Just calling it like it is,” the older woman said, not
shh
ing. “And look, it gave her a healthy glow. Wouldn't mind a glow like that,” she said wistfully.

While the woman rushed her mother out of the aisle, Sophie drew a shaky breath and ordered herself to get a grip. “So,” she said, trying to remember what they'd been talking about.

“So,” he said. “You done working for the day?”

“No. I'm temping for a property management company, opening up one of the vacation homes for some English duke and duchess on a secret American getaway. I have to unload all their supplies and check that everything got cleaned and set up.” Her lips were tingling.

They wanted another kiss.

She gestured to the huge cart in front of her, filled with high-end wines, fancy cheeses and crackers, and other things like caviar and stuff that cost more than she'd spend for herself in a month. “I'm filling their fridge from their list of requests,” she said. “But I'm having trouble finding”—she consulted her phone again for the list—“goat-cheese ice cream.”

He winced. “Who eats goat-cheese ice cream?”

Still eyeballing her list, she shrugged. “Apparently the duchess. Also, it needs to be whiskey and pecan flavored.” She tried not to gag at the thought.

“What else do you need to find?”

Detecting a note of humor in his voice, she lifted her head. “Are you laughing at me?”

“I wouldn't dream of it.”

She narrowed her eyes. “Uh-huh…” She eyed the list again. “The duke wants condoms. Ribbed for her pleasure.” She managed to control her grimace on that one. The duke was eighty-five if he was a day, and although he was tall and…duke-like, gravity hadn't been kind. He'd been a rugby player in his day and all that muscle had atrophied, so he now resembled something like a plucked rooster. “He also wants massage oil, but it has to be organic. And…” She paused, unable to say the next item with a straight face.

“What?”

She shook her head. Nope. Couldn't do it.

Jacob came up behind her to peer over her shoulder at the list. He left no space between them, his arms brushing each of her sides as he rested his hands on the cart handle in front of her.

She pretended to study the list. But the truth was, she'd forgotten how to read. She'd forgotten how to breathe.

“‘A battery-operated massage gizmo,'” he read for her, and nuzzled her ear. “I've got a gizmo. No batteries required.”

She closed her eyes. “This isn't my list.”

He laughed softly, and since he remained in place at her back, she felt the laugh reverberate through his chest to hers. “Interesting job. I think we should take this discussion to the lake.”

She opened her mouth to say absolutely not, but her body went to war with her brain and all that came out was a sigh.

Someone came around the corner and down the aisle.

“Kenna,” Jacob said, not sounding thrilled.

“I saw your truck and
knew
I'd find you in the freezer aisle.” Kenna eyeballed them both with great interest. “So you two are a
thing
.”

“No,” Sophie said.

“None of your business,” Jacob said at the same time.

They looked at each other.

Kenna laughed. “Never mind. I've got my answer.” She turned to Sophie. “You've temped at the resort a couple of times, right?”

“Yes. I've worked a couple of your events when you've been short-staffed.”

“You helped us manage the mountain biking event we did a couple of weeks ago,” Kenna said. “And did a hell of a job too. She saved the day,” she told Jacob. “The promo was all screwed up, and she managed the social media and crazy phones, doing the work of, like, ten people. It was awesome.” She smiled at Sophie. “Hope you'll join us for some of our upcoming events, specifically the Wounded Warriors. We need all hands on deck.” She hugged her brother and then looked in his cart. “Seriously? What are you, twelve?”

“Hey, I've missed having some things from home,” he said.

“Like what, clogged arteries?” She pointed at Sophie. “Talk some sense into him.”

Sophie was fascinated by the relationship between brother and sister. Obviously, there was love and affection. And irritation. It was…normal, so much so that it made Jacob seem all the more human to her. “Have you ever had any luck telling him what to do?” Sophie asked Kenna.

His sister laughed. “Good point.”

Jacob watched as Sophie moved on, heading down the aisle a bit, referencing her list, her mouth moving as she read it to herself. There were shadows beneath her eyes. She was tired and probably working too hard.

Just watching the way all those sweet, warm curves moved, the way her hair seemed to shift in counterpart—she was absolutely unaware of her beauty—made him want to haul her in close until she let out one of those sexy, helpless little murmurs and pressed herself up against him.

“I've never seen you look at anyone like that before,” Kenna said. “You look at her like she's…”

He slid her a look. “What?”

“Like she's a double-fudge brownie, warm from the oven.”

“You're wrong.” He wasn't looking at her like she was a double-fudge brownie. She was more important than dessert. She was a main course, the base of the food chain.

And hell.

He hadn't seen her coming.

Kenna set a hand on his arm, bringing his gaze back to her. Her expression was much more serious now, her voice quiet. “You going to fall for her, Jacob?”

“Do I look insane?”

“Yes,” she said immediately. “Sometimes.”

He gave her hair a soft tug.

She let him lighten the mood, doing her part by sending him into the freezer doors with a well-placed shove. Apparently they'd made up and were back to normal.