by Jami Alden
But thanks to some very talented surgeons and his dogged determination to continue to serve with army's most elite covert operation team, he was nearly there. In a few weeks, he'd have his final medical evaluation and be cleared for duty. Until then, he continued to train, build up his strength, prepare himself as much as he could to be sent back into the fire.
He only had to tolerate a few more weeks, spinning his wheels instead of fighting terrorists and rescuing hostages as part of a spec ops group so secret the government didn't officially cop to its existence.
He resented every moment of this idleness, hated the fact that while he was kicking around Big Timber, shacking up with his brother Damon and his fiancée, Ellie Tanner, his teammates were in the thick of it.
Ever since he'd returned from first deployment to Iraq as a ranger, he'd had trouble settling into life back home. He had no idea how his brothers had managed to adjust to civilian life.
For his part, he couldn't imagine doing it and keeping his sanity in tact. The slower pace made him edgy, restless. And now, after all his years in the forces, he found that too much down time made it too easy for all the darkness that went along with his job to come creeping into his consciousness.
He shook his head. He'd be back in soon enough, too busy to contemplate all the things he'd seen, done, in some of the darkest corners of the world.
He shoved away the pity party as he unlocked the door and glanced at his watch. Only five-thirty. He'd have a couple of hours at least before Damon, Ellie, and Ellie's son Anthony got home to relax, decompress, maybe even spend some time in front of his computer pouring out some of the turmoil swirling inside him.
He swung open the door, stepped through the entryway, and headed for the kitchen and the ice cold microbrew waiting in the refrigerator.
Intent on his mission, he didn't register the low grunting noises until it was too late.
"Jesus Christ!" He covered his eyes and recoiled as the sight of his brother's white ass confronted him head on as Damon hunched over the kitchen table between a pair of thighs Dylan fervently hoped were Ellie's.
Damon's curse, echoed by Ellie's, followed Dylan as he staggered back to the entryway. Damon skidded into the entryway just as Dylan was grabbing his keys and wallet from the table where he'd tossed them.
"I thought you said you'd be home around six," Damon said accusingly. He'd thankfully pulled on his boxers, but Dylan didn't think there was enough bleach in the world to get the image of his brother's ass humping and pumping out of his brain.
"And you and Ellie don't usually get home until after seven on Wednesdays," Dylan retorted.
"It was slow at the restaurant so we thought sneak in a little alone time while Anthony's still with the sitter." This from Ellie, cheeks flaming and now modestly covered by Damon's t-shirt which hung almost to her knees.
Dylan felt his own cheeks heat with embarrassment. While Ellie was a beautiful woman, and he'd be a liar if he said he hadn't had impure thoughts about her when he'd been a horny teenager and she'd been dating Damon back in high school, now she was Damon's fiancée. Practically his sister.
Whose ass had been on the exact spot where Dylan had eaten his scrambled eggs that morning before leaving for the shop.
"Your bed broken or something?"
Damon shrugged. "We hadn't christened the kitchen yet."
Dylan shook his head. "I'll leave you to it. Next time leave a sock on the doorknob or something."
"You don't have to leave," Ellie protested as he started down the walk.
"Call before you come home," Damon countered, and slammed the door.
I really need to find another place to stay, Dylan thought as he climbed back into his truck. When he'd come back to town, staying with Damon had seemed the easiest option—and a damn sight better than moving in with his folks.
Not that he didn't love his parents, or even enjoy a little spoiling courtesy of his mom every now and then. But their house was tiny, and the last thing he needed was his mom in his business all the time, wondering why he wasn't sleeping, asking him what he was doing tapping away at his computer all hours of the night.
Not to mention, the prospect of moving back into the room he shared with his brothers—with its bookshelves still adorned with their high school trophies and freaking NFL sheets on the bunk beds—even temporarily would drive him even crazier than he already was.
"We've got plenty of room, even with Ellie and Anthony there," Damon had offered before Dylan even had a chance to ask. Not only was Damon's house almost twice the square footage as his parents', it had a bedroom on the lower level away from the others so Dylan—and Damon and Ellie—could presumably have their privacy.
Not quite private enough, he thought, cringing as his mind flashed back to the scene on the table.
As he headed back toward Big Timber's main drag, he was forced to admit that even if the house were three times bigger, it wouldn't have been big enough to accommodate the mushy ooey gooey I love you vibe that permeated the house whenever Damon and Ellie were together.
Not that he begrudged his brother a second of happiness. Despite their bad break up and years apart, it was clear as day that Ellie made Damon happier than anyone could have ever thought possible. And he and Anthony, Ellie's five-year-old son from her first marriage, had bonded so strongly, if he didn't know different even Dylan would have believed he was Damon's biological child.
But it was hard not to feel like an outsider amidst all that new found familial happiness.
Driving on auto pilot, he headed for town and pulled up in front of Adele's Cafe, the restaurant started by Ellie's grandmother decades ago and taken over by Ellie's mother a little over twenty years ago.
Ellie's mom, Adele, and Dylan’s mom, Vivian, had been best friends growing up and had picked up their relationship right where it left off when Adele had moved back to Big Timber with her daughters, Ellie and her younger sister, Molly, who was in the same grade as Dylan.
As such, he'd spent a lot of time at Adele's growing up, especially after Damon and Ellie had become attached at the hip. Then, as now, Dylan had played the unwilling third wheel until he'd turned sixteen, fixed up an old Ford to drive and was no longer at Damon's mercy for transportation.
Still, Dylan had spent his share of evenings after practice shoveling down the food at Adele's, because everyone knew she made the biggest, best cheese burgers and chili fries in all of Sweetgrass County.
Every time he came back home on leave, he'd made a point to visit Adele's and eat enough chili fries to make him feel like his gut was going to bust, knowing he'd be spending several months after surviving on army food and MREs.
Now as he climbed out of the truck and started across the parking lot, he took in all of the changes Adele's had gone through recently, most of it thanks to his brother Damon, who had entered into a partnership with Adele and invested his own money to fix up the place.
And fix it up he had, starting with the outside. Instead of asphalt of the parking lot flowing to a simple concrete walkway leading into the restaurant, there was a patio made out of flagstone that offered outdoor seating when the weather allowed. A new outdoor bar lined the side wall of the restaurant, and at the other end Damon had installed a brick pizza oven close to the back entrance to the kitchen.
Inside the changes were even more startling. Gone were the worn linoleum floor, formica tables and naugahyde-covered booths. It had all been replaced with gleaming hardwood floors and wooden tables and chairs that could have come from any big city restaurant.
Then there was the bar. While Adele's had always served beer on tap—two kinds, Coors and Coors light—as well as wine—also to kinds, red and white—now premium liquors lined the shelves behind the gleaming mahogany bar. A half dozen beer taps were mounted to the bar itself. In addition to the Coors, there were selections from microbrews from all over Montana.
While he appreciated the new look, he still felt a pang every time he walked in. Like a pie
ce of his past had disappeared.
"We needed to up our game if we were going to stay in business," Damon had said when Dylan had revealed his nostalgia for the old place. "The tourists coming through here, even the locals—everyone has more sophisticated tastes now. If we want to attract business, we need to offer more than burgers, fries, and a cold one."
Dylan had silently wondered what was wrong with that, but hadn't argued. Especially when it was clear the changes Adele had made at Damon's urging had been so successful. From what Molly, Ellie's sister, had told him, business had been booming even before movie star Jane Bowden had hosted a birthday party at Adele’s for her husband, Dylan and Damon’s older brother Deck. Once the party was written up in all of the tabloids, it seemed like every tourist taking a summer road trip out to Yellowstone wanted to stop in and see where Jane Bowden threw her parties.
Still, when Dylan pushed open the door he saw that as Ellie had said, business was slow for the moment. At five-thirty, before the dinner rush, there were only a few tables occupied.
Several people mingled at the bar enjoying happy hour specials. Over several heads he could see Molly, who bartended and waited tables along with keeping the books for the restaurant and Damon's other businesses, smiling and making small talk as she placed two cocktails in front of a couple before she moved down to the other end of the bar to talk to another customer.
Dylan tracked her, every nerve ending going on alert when he realized who that customer was. Sadie.
Like he was caught in a tractor beam, he walked over the bar and sat down on the empty stool next to her before he thought better of it.
"Dylan!" Molly said and leaned over the bar to hug him. Dylan squeezed her back, grinning. "Ooh, someone's been working out," Molly said, giving his bicep an affectionate squeeze.
"You know me, always pumping something," he shot back.
Molly chuckled. "Did you need to talk to Damon? Because he's—"
Dylan held up his hands, "I know exactly where he is, and what' he's doing," he said with a grimace.
Molly rolled her eyes. "He and Ellie?"
"On the kitchen table."
"Oh jeez." She and Sadie giggled in unison. "Just last week I caught them in the bathroom here! You'd think they never had sex before."
"All I know is, I need to find a new living situation or my psyche is going to be permanently scarred."
Molly gave his hand a sympathetic squeeze and went to get him a drink, not bothering to ask because it was always the same thing. Within seconds a frosty mug of a locally brewed lager appeared in front of him. "Maybe this will help you forget." She excused herself to take an order from one of the waitresses working the floor.
He watched her walk away, wondering why, as beautiful as Molly was in her own right, she'd never been one to make his blood run hot or make him shift in his seat so no one would see the tentpole popping the front of his gym shorts.
Not like the woman next to him, damnit. "So other than catching Damon and Ellie in a compromising position how's it going?" Even the sound of Sadie's voice was enough to make his temperature slide up a half dozen degrees as he imagined getting her into a compromising position of their own.
"Well, I got your tractor up and running, and Andy out to the fields," he said and took a sip of his beer.
"Hallelujah for that," Sadie said, and clinked her glass of water with his beer.
"Can I get you a drink?"
"I wish." She shook her head. "I just came in to get a bite to eat, and then I have to get back to work on a project for a client. She wants a prototype by Friday."
"Oh yeah, what kind of project?"
She went on to explain that she was building an app for a mobile device that would help the boutique owner connect with customers. Apparently a large data management system was involved, along with front end interface that would offer an improved virtual shopping experience.
"I'm boring you aren't I?" She stopped with a sigh.
"Not at all," he replied honestly. While he didn't understand half the terms she was throwing around, he liked the way her eyes lit up when she talked about her work, the obvious passion she had for the project.
She shook her head. "Saying out loud all the crap I have to get done is giving me an ulcer. With everything else going on, I can't believe I agreed to such a crazy deadline."
It was then that he noticed the lines of strain around her mouth and eyes, the faint circles under her eyes. He fought the urge to reach out and smooth them with his fingers.
"Do I have something on my face?" she said her brow knitting as she brought her hand to her cheek.
"No, not at all," Dylan said, feeling his cheeks burn as he was caught staring. "I—"
Fortunately her phone rang before he was forced to come up with something glib, since the only thing coming to mind was along the lines of "you're so beautiful I have a hard time not looking at you."
She looked at the screen and wrinkled her nose adorably. "It's June. I better take it."
He turned back to his beer as Sadie retreated to a quiet corner of the restaurant. Molly wandered back over to refill his beer and told him about a couple of places she knew that were available to rent short term.
Dylan listened politely, knowing all the while they were more than he was willing to spend.
"What's up?" Molly said as Sadie slid back into her stool with a sigh.
While before she looked tired, now she was pale on top of it. With nearly all the color drained from her peaches and cream complexion, the smattering of freckles on her nose and cheeks stood out in stark contrast. "That was June," she said with a bright, pasted on smile. "Apparently Andy decided to quit!"
"The guy with the brown teeth who kept spitting tobacco at you?" Molly cocked her head. "I'd think you'd be glad to get rid of him."
"We would be, if he weren't the last hand standing as it were," Sadie said. "And with Dad still out of commission, it's up to me and Pete to take care of the horses. And, oh yeah, get the hay cut, baled, and stacked in time to get it shipped out and keep up on all the maintenance."
"Can't you hire more people?" Molly protested. "There's always hands looking for work."
"Fewer and fewer, what with the platinum and palladium miners offering double what we can pay for unskilled labor," Sadie said and rubbed at her temples. She looked at her watch and grimaced. "I need to get back. Pete needs me to feed the mares in the south pasture."
"I'll tell Brady to make your order to go," Molly said and headed for the kitchen.
"That sucks," Dylan said lamely.
"It's just for the summer," Sadie said with a heavy sigh, as much as herself as to him. She stared glumly at the bar for several seconds. She gave a humorless laugh. "Well, if you're seriously looking for a place to stay, you could always move out to the ranch with us."
###
Molly's stomach rumbled as she walked into the kitchen, where the smells Brady McManus's cooking were much more intense. Aromatic onions, grilled meats, simmering sauces made her mouth water like Pavlov's dog, especially since she was currently existing on a diet of salad and plain chicken since she was still ten pounds too heavy to pull off the wedding dress she'd fallen in love with.
Her gaze wandered over to the man responsible for all of the deliciousness that came out of Adele's kitchen. Talk about mouthwatering.
Molly tried to smack the thought out of her head, but engaged though she might be, she didn't think there was a straight woman in the world who could look at Brady and not feel her insides go a little melty.
With his back turned as he worked at the massive, eight burner stove, Molly was offered an unobstructed view of broad shoulders straining the soft cotton of his black t-shirt. Underneath the fabric she could see the shifting and bunching of his back muscles in time with the motion of his arm as he stirred something in a large sauce pan.
The arm in question was ropy with muscle and covered with tattoos, one of many things that made him decidedly not her type.
But hell, you couldn't blame a girl for looking.
Especially, she thought as her eyes drifted to where his back tapered into narrow hips and lower, when there was so much to look at.
"What do you need?"
Her eyes jerked up at the gruff voice, meeting the full force of his silvery gray gaze. With his dark, shaggy hair, striking eyes, and rough-hewn features, Brady's face was the perfect match to his body. Hard, chiseled, seemingly designed specifically to make women go weak in the knees.
Most women, she corrected herself. Unlike most of the women who felt the impact of Brady's impenetrable stare, Molly did not feel the urge to drop her panties and invite him to join her on the nearest flat surface.
She appreciated him from a purely aesthetic standpoint, she told herself as she straightened her shoulders and lifted her chin. Because from what she'd seen in the eight months they'd been working together, that was about all there was to appreciate.
"I just wanted to let you know Sadie needs that order to go."
He grunted and turned back to the stove.
Her shoulder muscles bunched in irritation and she took a few steps closer. "Am I supposed to take that as a yes?"
He mumbled something and turned suddenly, brandishing a spoon in her face. "Taste this."
The spoon slid into her mouth before she could react, and any protest she might have offered died the second the concoction hit her tongue.
Savory, sweet, creamy, warm.... Bliss. Okay, in addition to being hotter than a four alarm fire, Brady McManus could cook his too fine ass off. Ever since he'd taken over as head chef and designed a menu focusing on the freshest, most local ingredients he could find, Adele's had gone from serving good solid stick to your ribs fare to offering food that could be served in a four star, New York restaurant.
She closed her eyes and swallowed. "Oh, my God, what is that?" she said with an ecstatic sigh.
"Corn chowder, made from the corn I got from Askey's farm. Does it need anything?"
He grabbed a clean spoon and dished another bite into Molly's eagerly parted lips.
