I CAME HERE. I came to you.
The words hit Oakes like a punch. Like the answer to a prayer, one he’d never been brave enough to say, let alone think about.
He was in serious trouble here. Because he was taking what she’d surely meant to be innocent words as some sort of overture. He was a man well used to women coming on to him. His looks helped, but he knew part of his appeal was his last name—at least before those women got a chance to know him. He also knew when a woman was tossing the ball in his court, giving him an opening, a chance to make a move.
And he wanted, badly, to do just that. To make a move on Daphne, to see how those curves felt pressed against him, how that mouth would taste.
He was wrong. He had to be. There’s no way she was coming on to him. Daphne was his friend. Sort of. But more than that, more important than that, she was Zach’s sister.
He gave her an awkward, brotherly pat on her shoulder. “I’m glad I could help. And that you had the good sense not to go home with some stranger.”
Was it his imagination or did she look disappointed by his response? He couldn’t analyze it, was afraid if he did, he’d come to a conclusion he didn’t like. One that was purely a figment of his imagination.
“Ready to eat?” he asked, desperate to get back on solid ground with her.
As if the moment had never happened, she smiled. “Yes, please. I am starving.”
He pulled the boxes out of the bag while she refreshed their coffee. He tried not to take in how good she looked in his kitchen, that red dress like a beacon calling his attention again and again. How comfortable she was here, barefoot in his house, all bright and cheerful as she chatted about some dessert she’d had last night.
He let her talk wash over him as he folded the bag and set it with the recycling. He had to get a grip. Yes, he found Daphne attractive. He was a man, wasn’t he? And she was, well...she was Daphne. All curves and subtle sensuality. She was also smart and funny and full of energy. Last night when she’d been asleep on his couch was the first time he could remember seeing her so still. She always seemed amped up, lit up from some internal light, an inner spark.
But she was Zach’s sister. Zach Castro, the only one of Oakes’s brothers who kept him at arm’s length. The man who was recovering from injuries sustained while serving with the marines in Iraq.
The only Bartasavich son not to take their father’s name, who’d been raised as much as possible away from his older brothers. Zach had spent his entire life making his resentment toward his father and the rest of his family perfectly clear.
Not that Oakes could blame him. None of them could say they were close to their father. Clinton Bartasavich, Sr. wasn’t an easy man to get to know or to love. In his younger years he’d been all about power and increasing his wealth. As the company that had been in his family for generations had grown, so had Senior’s ego and his unhappiness with his personal life. Always searching for the next best thing, he cheated on his first wife—C.J. and Kane’s mother—with Oakes’s mother, taking advantage of her young age and adoration of him. That marriage, too, eventually failed after Senior’s numerous affairs.
“I owe you for this,” Daphne said, setting his coffee cup in front of him. “How about I take you to dinner next weekend?”
Have dinner with her, just the two of them? Yes, they ate out together, but usually coffee or lunch. Quick, casual meals that had a set time limit, and were held in open, bright and airy places surrounded by noise and people. But dinner was different. It was too dangerous. Too close to a date.
He tried to avoid this exact scenario with her as much as possible—had done so for the last few years, ever since he’d noticed she wasn’t a little girl anymore. “There’s no need. I’m happy to help. We’re family, after all.”
“You keep saying that,” she said, opening the takeout box he’d given her, “but we’re not.”
“I feel like we are,” he insisted, needing her to understand where he stood. She’d had a crush on him as a teenager, around the time he’d finished law school, and he didn’t want a repeat of the awkward, uncomfortable experience they’d shared back then.
Zach had asked Oakes to look in on her and their mother while he was serving overseas and, as it was the first and only time Zach had ever asked him for anything, Oakes had been more than happy to do his younger brother a favor. And things had been fine until Daphne graduated from high school. But after that she took every opportunity to flirt with him—touching his arm or leg, flipping her hair and batting her eyes.
He’d been horrified. She was a child and he an adult. Thank God she’d gotten over it when she started college, but for a few months, it’d been torture.
Mainly because, as much as he hated to admit it, he’d found her attractive, too.
It had killed him that he’d allowed his baser instincts to get the better of him. That he’d been just like his father. He hadn’t acted on his feelings, of course, but that hadn’t made him feel any better. So he’d avoided her as much as possible and by the time they’d met up for coffee over Thanksgiving break during her freshman year at Rice, things between them were normal again.
They’d become friends and he didn’t want to lose that friendship just because he was having some inappropriate, yet purely physical and normal, feelings toward her. It was simple science, really. She was a smart, beautiful, sexy woman.
And he was just a man.
She opened her breakfast and frowned down at the dry toast and scrambled eggs. “What’s this?”
“I thought you might want something bland. To settle your stomach.”
She eyed his omelet, loaded with cheese, peppers and sausage. “Why would I want something bland?”
“For your hangover. And you should drink more,” he said, nodding toward the bottle of water he’d set by her elbow. “It’ll help with the headache.”
She laughed, the sound light and sunny. “Please. I’m Irish-Mexican. You insult my ancestors by such slander. I’m not hungover. I can handle my alcohol. I just...shouldn’t have handled quite so much of it last night.” She shoved her food aside and pulled his plate closer to her. Dug into his omelet. “Mmm...good, but needs hot sauce.”
And she hopped down. He couldn’t help but notice her dress riding up a bit so he turned his attention to his breakfast. Sighed, then switched it with hers.
Although he did scoop some of the hash browns onto his plate.
She came back, added enough hot sauce to her food to get his eyes watering—and he wasn’t even eating it—then tucked in to her meal as if she feared it’d disappear if she didn’t shovel it into her mouth as quickly as possible.
“That last shot of tequila hadn’t been such a good idea,” she said around a mouthful. She wrinkled her nose. “Well, the last two shots, really. Hindsight and all that, you know? Just once, I’d like to have a bit of foresight. An inner sense of worry or a niggling of doubt that warned me the wonderful, brilliant plan that popped into my head was really only misery in the making. Some sort of sixth sense to stop me from following said course. One to give me a moment’s pause, time to sort through all my options and work out what I should do next. That would be wonderful and, I imagine, come in quite handy.”
“You wouldn’t listen to it,” he said.
“What do you mean?”
“You don’t like being told what to do. By anyone. Not even yourself. It’s