Trust in Me (2 page)

He stands from the table and I hold out my hand to him. He removed his hat before he takes my hand to shake it. His sandy blonde hair is shaggy and he’s got a major case of hat-hair, but without the hat I can see that he’s younger than Ryan.

“Brandon Newell,” he says as he takes my hand and shakes it gently.

He puts his hat back on and waits for me to take a seat before he follows suit.

“You knew Ryan?” I ask as I try not to stare at the burn scars on his right hand.

“Sorry. I know I probably look a little out of place here.”

“Don’t be silly. We built this place for you, and others like you.”

He stares at the surface of the table as if he’s unsure how to respond. “Yeah. I’m pretty sure Ryan would have felt out of place here, too.”

“Excuse me?”

“Oh, no offense. He just always was talking about how he didn’t feel like he belonged in Afghanistan, but he didn’t belong here either.”

I grit my teeth to fight back the tears. “Did you want to talk to someone? We’re opening up the center in a few hours and we’ll have counselors available. In fact, they should be arriving within the hour if you want to just wait in the lobby.”

I’m not the person he needs to talk to. Talking about Ryan has never been easy for me. Luke has always been patient with me on this subject, but this guy probably doesn’t even know that I was there with my brother when he took his last breath.

“I actually came to talk to you, but I understand if you’re not up to it. I just wanted to talk to someone who knew him. I looked up to him a lot and it really fucked me up when I found out what happened.”

His dark eyes scrunch at the corners and I get the feeling he’s holding something back. His skin is stretched taut over his cheekbones and I can only imagine how familiar he’s become with the gnawing hunger I hear gurgling in his belly.

I heave a deep sigh. “Listen, Brandon, I have a million things to do today, but I’d love it if you could join my family and me for dinner tonight. I’d love to talk some more.”

He smiles and I force myself to smile back as I imagine what kind of grief I’m going to get from Luke tonight.

CHAPTER TWO

Luke

Even though I left the office two hours early, the drive home is a fucking traffic nightmare. By the time I pull into the driveway of our new lake house I’m surprised, and excited, to see Brina’s black Volvo parked in the driveway. I didn’t really expect her to come home from the banquet early. The foundation is so important to her; she seems to have found her calling. I’m already anticipating all the ways I’m going to thank her for putting me first today—until I walk through the front door and see her leading a man into the kitchen.

Brina would never cheat on me. Besides, this guy looks too shabby to be her type. But this doesn’t stop me from following quietly behind them.

I pass the wall clock that Brina had made a few months ago by a local craftsman. The clock had a different shell—picked by Lucas, Jr.—where each of the numbers should be. She had her doubts when she was pregnant with Lucas, but I always knew Brina would make an excellent mother.

When I enter the great room the guy is taking a seat behind the breakfast bar at the kitchen island. He looks thin and a bit disheveled, possibly homeless, but he’s young. He spots me in the doorway and his eyes widen with fright. What the fuck is she doing inviting strange men into our house? Where are the kids?

He doesn’t say anything and I keep my eyes locked on his as I speak. “Brina?” I try to dial down the anger building inside me, but something tells me I’m not going to like what’s going on here.

She turns around from where she’s standing in front of the open refrigerator. The expression on her face is both shocked and apologetic. I look to the guy sitting in my barstool in my house and he has his head down, the bill of his baseball cap hiding his face.

“Luke, honey, this is Brandon Newell,” Brina says as she closes the refrigerator door and starts toward me. “He served with Ryan. I invited him over for dinner. Is that okay?”

My nostrils are flaring as I try to keep myself calm. I nod toward the hallway and she follows me out of the great room. When I turn around her face is inches away, her eyebrows scrunched together over her beautiful brown eyes, and I shake my head at how easy it is for her to get her way with me.

“On my fucking birthday?”

“He’s homeless and obviously starving. He wanted to talk. I offered to get him an appointment with a counselor at the center, but he said he’d feel more comfortable talking to me because he really looked up to Ryan.”

“That’s bullshit.”

“Luke, please. I really think he just wants to talk about my brother. Can we please just give him the benefit of the doubt? It’s one meal.”

She slides her hands over my chest and I grit my teeth as the blood rushes to my crotch. I’ve been thinking about getting Brina into bed all fucking day and now I have to put it off to have dinner and a heart-to-heart with a stranger.

I kiss her forehead and her smile eases the tension building inside me. “All right. But I’m calling him a cab right after dinner and you are going to pay for this tonight.”

She bites the corner of her lip and it takes everything in me not to kick the guy out right then. “Oh, no. Sounds serious.”

“It’s very fucking serious, so don’t drag this out.”

She turns around and laughs as I grab her ass, that luscious ass that only got sexier with each pregnancy. When we enter the kitchen, the guy is resting his head on top of his arms on the breakfast bar. Something about this guy both infuriates me and makes me pity him at the same time. I don’t know what he’s been through, and I feel for the guy, but I don’t know him and my job is to protect my family.

Brina looks over her shoulder at me and shrugs. “Should I wake him up?” she whispers.

I shake my head and nod toward the hallway. “Where are the kids?” I ask as she follows me up the stairs to the bedroom.

“Myrna said she put them down for a nap about an hour ago.”

“What’s that guy’s name?” I ask as I slip my phone out of my pocket and prepare to fire off a quick text message to Perry—Brina’s former full-time bodyguard who only works on-call since Brina started spending most of her time working for the foundation.

“Brandon Newell.”

I ask Perry to do a background check on Brandon Newell and get over here as soon as he can. “How long before the kids wake up?”

“Rhianne will probably be asleep for at least another hour. Lucas will probably wake up soon.”

We enter the bedroom and I close the door behind her. “Then I guess it’s a good thing you’re wearing a dress.”

I grab her waist and pin her against the door as I crush my lips against hers. She tastes like champagne. They must have been drinking at the banquet. I yank up the skirt of her dress and grind into her as her fingers clutch my hair.

“Take your panties off,” I whisper into her ear before I taste her neck.

She shakes her head and pushes my chest back. “No, it’s
your
birthday.”

She bites her lip as she looks up at me with that mischievous look that never fails to get her whatever she wants. She grabs the front of my shirt and pushes me backward toward the chaise next to the window overlooking the lake. I lie back and let her take charge as she unbuckles my belt and unfastens my pants. She smiles when my erection pops out and I hold my breath as I wait for it.

She lays a soft kiss on the tip and I clench my jaw. She loves me to tease me this way because she knows it drives me crazy. She takes me into her mouth and I suck in a sharp breath through my teeth. Her lips and her tongue are warm as she draws me in until I hit the back of her throat. I grab a handful of her hair and gently guide myself in and out of her, watching in awe as she swallows me.

The knock at the door startles us both and she lets out a strangled choking sound before I pull her head back.

“Fuck!” I shout as I struggle to zip up my pants over my hard-on. “Who is it?!”

Brina swipes her thumb across her lips as she springs to her feet and I reach for her dress to smooth down the back.

“Mr. Maxwell!” Myrna sounds panicked. “There’s a man in the kitchen!”

I scuttle around Brina to get to the door and yank it open. Myrna’s round face is pale and her black eyes are wide with fright as she hands Rhianne to me. Rhianne’s blue eyes are also wide as she picks up on Myrna’s terror. I brush her wispy, brown curls out of her face and kiss her forehead.

“Calm down, Myrna, it’s just a friend of Brina’s,” I say as I make my way down the stairs.

Rhianne grabs a handful of my hair and yanks it with her sticky little fingers. Like mother like daughter. I pull her hand away and give her fingers a playful bite that makes her giggle.

“Where’s Lucas?” I ask Myrna as I make it to the bottom of the curved staircase.

“Still sleeping. He was very tired from throwing a tantrum.”

I thought I’d have more trouble with a daughter, but last year Lucas gave new meaning to the terrible twos. This year, he created a new category of terror I like to refer to as the Tyrannical Threes. Brina spoils him too much and we all pay the price because she refuses to believe that giggling is an inappropriate reaction to a child’s tantrums. Rhianne, on the other hand, is my angel.

When we enter the kitchen, Brandon is sitting up straight in the barstool with his hands in his lap and a guilty look on his face. In other words, he looks like Lucas every time we enter the room.

I hand Rhianne to Myrna. “Can you please change her diaper and wake up Lucas before you get dinner started?”

She nods as she takes Rhianne then marches off toward the stairs.

I glare at Brandon for a second because he needs to know I don’t appreciate the havoc he’s brought to my house in the span of fifteen minutes. He scared the shit out of my kids’ nanny and interrupted my blowjob. I’m getting more pissed at him by the second.

Brina comes up behind me and threads her fingers through the hair on the back of my head. I know she’s doing it so I’ll relax, but it only pisses me off more because my dick is still hard.

I twist my head to get away from her hand and I hear her tsk. “How long have you been on the streets?” I ask the guy.

I’m not going to beat around the bush with him; he’s in my home on account of my wife’s hospitality, not mine.

His eyes harden as he looks me in the eye. “Three weeks. I was at Compass Center while the VA processed my disability claim, but they denied it a few weeks ago so I left.”

Brina gasps at this news. “Why would you leave Compass Center? That is such a great place. I’ll call Tracy in the morning and ask her to take you back.”

“No, you don’t have to do that.”

“It’s no problem, really. Tracy and I talk almost every day. She has been such a huge help to me with setting up the counseling program.”

“No, you don’t understand. I can’t go back. They kicked me out.”

Brina and her big heart. It’s this quality that attracted me to her and the same quality that nearly broke us up exactly four years ago. You’d think we’d both have learned something by now.

I nod toward the hallway as I grab Brina’s arm and she follows me. “I know you want to help this guy, but I don’t think we want him here. I can see the wheels turning in your head and I am not going to allow this guy to stay here. Understood?”

She frowns and for a moment she looks the way Lucas looks when he’s being chastised.

“Brina? Tell me you understand and you’re not going to offer this guy anything more than a meal?”

She stares at my chest for a moment before she speaks. “Fine, but he’s somebody’s son. Would you do that if it were Ryan? Ryan could have ended up like that. They cleared him for another tour even though he had PTSD. Guys like them just keep slipping through the cracks. You can pretend like you don’t care, but I know you do. That’s why you pulled me aside to tell me this instead of telling him outright.”

I look her in the eye and she doesn’t flinch. She’s right, as usual. “Fine. He can spend the night, but you’re taking him with you to the center tomorrow and you’re letting them find him a place to go. One night. Got it?”

She smiles and I can feel my resolve melting. This is not going to end well.

CHAPTER THREE

Brina

After the kids eat their dinner, I decide to give the kids a bath while Myrna makes her special pad Thai. I bathe Rhianne first because she’s a breeze. By the time I pull Lucas out of the tub, the skin on my hands is covered in tiny, red bite marks and I have a splitting headache from the screaming. He finally calms down once I have him dressed in his pajamas.

As always, I lie with him in “Mommy and Daddy’s bed” for a while to calm him even further. “What’s this?” I ask, pointing at the dinosaur on the front of his shirt.

“Dinosaur!” he shouts proudly.

“Very good, but what kind of dinosaur is it?” He shrugs and smiles because he knows. “Come on, honey, you can say it? What kind of dinosaur is this?”

He shakes his head and I pull him into a hug. He climbs on top of me and wraps his arms around my neck as he lays his head on my chest. I breathe in the scent of his hair and squeeze him tightly. I never thought I could love anyone more than I love Luke until this little monster came along.

Luke walks into the bedroom carrying Rhianne. Her chubby cheek is resting on his shoulder and her curls are still a bit damp at the ends, but she’s dead asleep. He nods toward the hallway and I sit up with Lucas so he’s sitting in my lap facing me.

“It’s time to go to bed. Can you make me a promise?”

“I don’t want to go to sleep.”

We made the mistake of allowing Lucas to sleep in our bed until he was ten months old. When we came back from our honeymoon, we broke him of this habit, but he still climbs out of his bed and sneaks into our bedroom to join us once or twice a week. Tonight is not a good night for that.