Second Chance Summer Read online

  Aidan tugged off his jacket and wrapped her up in it. “Come on, I’ll drive you home.”

  “Is Shelly your ex-girlfriend?” Not the question she’d meant to ask, not even close, but she hugged his jacket close and bit her tongue, not willing to take it back.

  If Aidan was surprised by the question, he didn’t show it. “We saw each other on and off, mostly off, but she was never a girlfriend,” he said.

  “So there’s no … relationship?”

  “I haven’t had time to be in a relationship,” he said. “Now let’s go. I’ll come back to fix your tire and get the car to you.”

  That all sounded good, but there was more sympathy in his gaze than she was comfortable with. “Why?” she asked.

  He looked confused at the question, like it didn’t compute. And for a guy whose job was, literally, to help people, to save them from whatever situation they’d found themselves in, it probably didn’t compute. He was programmed to help people, to save their asses, no matter how pathetic the situation.

  “Why would I help you?” he repeated slowly, obviously still baffled by her. “Because I can. Because I want to.”

  But she didn’t want to need saving. Not by him, not by anyone. She did her own saving, thank you very much. And if she could’ve budged those lug nuts, she’d have changed her own stupid tire. “But I don’t need saving.”

  “I hear you,” he said, calm and quiet, like maybe he was talking her off a ledge, and in some ways she supposed he was. “But it’s raining,” he reminded her. “And you’re wearing a pretty dress, which you’d get dirty changing your own tire.”

  She looked down at herself. She’d almost forgotten she was dressed up. Her knees were a mess. And the dress was clinging to her thighs a little bit. Aidan’s clothes were doing the same now. He looked good wet. Too good.

  “Come on,” he said, grabbing her hand, pulling her across the lot before she could think of stopping him.

  When he pulled open the passenger door of his truck, she met his gaze. “Okay,” she said. “But I want to note that this isn’t a rescue. This is a favor that you’ll let me return.”

  “Sure,” he said. “Just get out of the rain and in the damn truck.”

  “No, I mean it, Aidan. You have to let me pay you back somehow.”

  He dropped his head and muttered something beneath his breath about the entire female race being more stubborn than a pack of Kincaids. “Fine,” he said, meeting her gaze again. “You owe me a favor. Get in.”

  “And you’ll let me repay you.”

  One brow shot up.

  “Say it,” she said. She was probably proving his point about her being stubborn, but she didn’t care. “Say you will, or no go.”

  He gave her a long, hard alpha-man look she imagined usually worked for him, but she held her ground. It was the one thing she knew about him more than anything else—he was strong, inside and out. Strong willed, strong minded, and she needed to be the same to stand up to him.

  Finally he let out a low laugh and shook his head. “You’re something else, you know that?”

  “I do know,” she assured him. “And …?”

  His gaze dropped to her mouth and his voice dropped too. “And I’ll let you repay the damn favor.” Apparently done indulging her, he practically hoisted her into the truck, then leaned in to do her seat belt for her, like that might keep her from running. When she was locked in, he came around to the driver’s seat and slid in behind the wheel. He shook his head and sent a myriad of raindrops flying before turning over the engine and cranking the heater. “You warm enough?” he asked.

  That he cared enough to ask, coupled with his gruff voice, had her getting there. “Yes,” she said. “Thanks to you.”

  “You have enough wood loaded in your place?”

  “I do,” she said. Also thanks to him. “I haven’t used too much, I’ve been at work.”

  “And apparently doing my mom’s hair while you’re at it,” he said, and spared her a glance.

  “She looked pretty tonight, don’t you think?”

  He grimaced. “Yeah.”

  “And happy.” Lily shook her head. “I can’t believe you and Gray tried to sabotage her date.”

  “She’s not ready to go out. She’s …”

  “Feeble?” she asked dryly.

  He sighed.

  Lily found a laugh. “Aidan, she’s fantastic. Really.”

  “She’s not ready for a man in her life.”

  “Why not?” she asked.

  “Why not?”

  “Yeah, why not? She kicked your father to the curb a long time ago.”

  “She’s … frail.”

  “Because of her hip? She says it’s feeling better every day. Besides, that shouldn’t keep her from dating.”

  “She doesn’t pick the right men.”

  She stared at him a moment. “That’s her choice. You realize that, right?” she asked gently. “Doesn’t everyone deserve their own version of a happily-ever-after?”

  “Yes,” he said meaningfully, and slid her a look.

  “Oh, no,” she said. “We’re not talking about me.”

  “We should be.”

  “But we’re not.”

  They drove in silence. Aidan handled his truck like he handled everything in his life—with easy, effortless confidence. It wasn’t fair at all. He pulled into the lot of her building, and Lily hopped out of the truck practically before he’d stopped. When she turned back to close the door he was there already standing before her, big and rock steady.

  “In a hurry?” he asked, brow raised.

  “Yes.” In a hurry to not kiss him again.

  He smiled. He knew, the bastard, as proven by his next words.

  “You don’t trust yourself around me,” he said, sounding way too pleased with himself.

  “I trust myself just fine,” she said. “It’s you I don’t trust.”

  He laughed, looking smug and … damn. Hot. Extremely hot.

  “I’m serious,” she said. “You have this way of mowing over my roadblocks.”

  “Are you referring to the present or the past?”

  “Both.” She pointed at him. “But we’re not talking about it.”

  “Why not?”

  Because my sister was in love with you and I can’t … I can’t go there. “Do you think about her?” she asked before she could access her good sense and keep her mouth shut.

  “Yes,” he said again, not having to ask who. “I think about her every time I have a call up on Dead Man’s Cliff.” He met her gaze. “And you, Lily. To be honest, mostly I think of you.”

  She sucked in a breath at that. She’d thought of him plenty too. But somehow she’d never pictured him thinking of her in return. Shaking her head because it was too much, she took a step back.

  He reached out for her, but she lifted her hands to hold him off and shook her head again. “Don’t,” she whispered. “I … can’t.”

  And then she walked away. Or maybe ran was more like it, taking the stairs blindly. At the top, her fingers shook so badly she dropped her keys twice before Aidan gently nudged her out of the way and opened her door with his keys before bending to scoop hers off the floor.

  “You have keys to my place?” she asked in surprise.

  “I have keys to everything.”

  Except her heart, she told herself. Nope, he was firmly locked right out of that particular organ. And he’d stay out.

  Aidan watched Lily’s heart go to war with her head for a beat before gently nudging her inside.

  She slipped out of his jacket and handed it back to him. “Thanks for that. And the ride. Lock the door on your way out?”

  “I can’t leave you alone. Not on her birthday.”

  “Yes you can. You just walk out the door.”

  He gave her a slow shake of his head.

  “And you call me stubborn,” she muttered beneath her breath, but he was fluent in Annoyed Female Speak, living with Kenna.