Summer with the Soldier

by Amy Lamont

  “It’s okay.” I rubbed my hand up and down his arm, mimicking the movements Deidre had made moments ago.

  He dropped his arms and moved one to my shoulders, pulling me in close. He rubbed a hand up and down my arm in what I’m sure he intended as a soothing gesture. The frissons of awareness popping up everywhere he touched did nothing to soothe me.

  I turned to Deidre. I took a deep breath and discovered it was a lot easier to be kind toward the other woman when I was standing in the circle of Logan’s protective arms. “It’s nice to meet you, Deidre.” I waved a hand dismissively. “And don’t worry about not knowing me. It happens every year. My friends know they’re welcome to bring friends with them. Who did you come with?”

  “Oh, um, a couple of friends from my office, but I think they might have, um, took off last night.”

  I shrugged. “No worries. Grab some food. I’m sure once everyone has a little coffee and breakfast in them, things will start breaking up here. Someone can give you ride back to the city.”

  “Thanks,” she said softly, her eyes still wide. I could even be magnanimous when they lingered on Logan a little longer than I’d like before she wandered into the kitchen to find food. And hopefully a ride that would get her the heck out of here and away from my man.

  My man. What on God’s green earth was wrong with me?

  I turned toward Logan and his arm dropped. Before I could mourn the loss of his heat, he faced me fully and looped both arms around my waist.

  I was a mass of conflicting emotions as I stared at the black T-shirt stretching across his chest. Should I stay in his arms and risk getting caught or step out and risk offending Logan?

  He shook me gently in his hold. I moved my gaze to his and the look in his eyes nearly brought me to my knees. Gone was the implacable soldier. In his place, I had my old Logan, ready with a laugh and affection. And now there was something else. Something more. Something that stole my breath. All I could do was lose myself in his gaze.

  He smiled down at me and leaned in close. “So I didn’t dream last night, right?”

  I shook my head silently.

  “When I woke up alone, I was afraid I’d been hallucinating. But then I figured even if it was, it was worth it. It even left the scent of you on my sheets.” He leaned in closer and ran his nose along my cheek, nuzzling me. “Made me wish you were still with me. Preferably naked.”

  “Logan!” I smacked him in the chest, but all I got was an unrepentant grin in return. “Last night was....” I searched for the right words.

  “Hot?” He pressed a quick kiss to my lips. “Amazing? Unforgettable?”

  I glanced around quickly, relieved when I was met with a few curious looks but none of them belonging to my closest friends or their guys.

  “Logan! We have to...” What? What did we have to do? “I don’t know what happened last night, but...”

  He stiffened. “You don’t remember what happened last night?” His voice was lethal.

  What? Oh.

  “No, no, no.” I rushed to assure him. “I remember,” my voice lowered, getting husky as the details of last night rushed through me, “everything. I just meant I’m not quite sure how we ended up there. I mean, you’re Logan. Katelyn’s brother. I never planned...I didn’t expect to ever...”

  He chuckled and pulled me closer. I shot him a sour look. “So glad you find my rambling amusing.”

  “Jade, I’m not going to lie. I’ve thought you were hot since you were about sixteen, and I got my first good look at you in a bikini. Last night was like many a wet dream come true.”

  “That’s gross, Logan.” I gasped and than whacked his chest again before resting my hands there. But I had to admit that I liked the idea that he’d thought of me as more than Katelyn’s friend for longer than a day.

  He leaned in, bending his knees a little so we were eye-to-eye. “And then as I got older, more experienced, I started to appreciate how amazing you are. For more reasons than your ability to fill out a bathing suit.”

  I softened against him.

  “Of course, the fact I got to peel you out of yours last night is a memory I’m going to carry with me for the rest of my natural life.”

  My breath came out on a huff before I gave into the giggles that bubbled up inside me.

  “You’re impossible.”

  He grinned and my stomach flipped. There he was. My Logan.

  “Hey, what are you guys up to?” Paige’s voice came from the doorway to the family room and I froze.

  I was so not ready to face my friends.

  Chapter 8

  “Talk later?” I whispered the question as I slipped from Logan’s arms, giving his forearm a squeeze as I stepped away from him.

  The smile fell from his face and the mask took its place. Huh. Amazing how easily he slid in out and out of soldier mode. I couldn’t help but wonder why he felt the need for it at all when he was here among friends.

  “We’re definitely talking more later.” He gave me a hard look to make his point before putting his hand to the small of my back and guiding me toward Paige.

  Turned out it wasn’t just Paige who finally made it to the kitchen. Now Emma and Nate, Katelyn and Hunter, and Jared had joined us, too.

  I searched the faces of the other people still hanging out. Lots of familiar ones, and I stopped to chat with a few here and there, but no sign of Will or the other guys from Sliding Violet.

  I refilled my coffee cup and finally felt ready to fill my belly with all my favorite hangover foods—bacon, cheesy scrambled eggs, buttery white toast and greasy home fries full of onions. Don’t ask me why this combination of grease, salt, and fat did the trick for me, but it seemed to work every time.

  I plunked myself into a chair around the big mahogany table, joining the rest of my closest friends and their boyfriends and Logan. It seemed significant that the kitchen table was just large enough to accommodate us.

  I slid my eyes to Paige and Jared who had their chairs pushed close together, whispering to each other in between bites of breakfast.

  “Wow, Jared, Paige must really like you if she’s willing to let you get that close to her plate while she’s eating,” I teased. Paige's appetite was a long running joke.

  Jared held up his hands, back side out and one finger bent to make it look like it was missing. “I’ve learned my lesson.”

  We all laughed together. Paige nudged him with her elbow, not missing a beat in shoveling eggs into her mouth.

  “What happened to your friends? I ran into Will this morning, but I don’t see him here. Did they clear out already?”

  Paige slid sly eyes my way. “Oh, you ran into Will did you? Where was that? Next to you in bed?”

  My eyes bugged out, and I couldn't help but glance at Logan. His jaw was hard as a rock and he sat ramrod straight in his chair. I looked back to Paige. “No! Why would you say that?”

  There. That sounded fairly calm.

  “I saw you flirting with him last night. Don’t play Miss Innocent with me.” Paige took a bite of bacon, chewing and swallowing before pointing what remained of the piece at me. “I knocked on the door to your room earlier and it was empty. I figured you’d hooked up. You know, trying to keep up with me by catching a rock star of your very own.”

  I shook my head, rolling my eyes. “Nope. No rock stars for me.”

  I looked up at Logan sitting across from me and found his eyes boring into me. I tried to smile at him, to reassure him. He gave nothing away, not even a flicker of emotion crossed his face.

  I don’t know if he meant what he said before about thinking about me as more than his little sister’s best friend years ago. I don’t know if he thought what happened last night was more than a one-night stand. But no matter what, in that moment, it was hugely important to me that he knew I hadn't settled for him when the rock star got away.

  I wasn’t about to announce what happened between us to the room at large. It could cause real tension between me and
one of my best friends. But for some reason it was vital that I reassure Logan in some way.

  I downed my steaming coffee in a few sips, my burning mouth be damned. I stood and grabbed my coffee cup and walked the long way around the table on the pretext of a refill. Along the way I dropped a hand on Logan’s shoulder and let it slide along his back as I passed him.

  I could feel his eyes on me as I walked away from him, and did my best to act naturally as I chatted to a few friends occupying stools around the counter and refilled my cup from the urn.

  When I turned to head back to the table I noticed two things. One was that Logan’s tension seemed to have eased a little. He still wasn’t his casual, laid back self, but his jaw and shoulders had lost that rigid posture.

  As he looked at me, his eyes softened, and I couldn’t help but smile at him.

  I noticed the second thing as my gaze moved to the other occupants of the table. Everyone seemed busy eating and chatting. Everyone but Emma. Emma had shrewd eyes fixed on Logan. I walked to my seat and her eyes shifted to me, speculation clear in her gaze.

  Oh crap, I think the jig was up.

  We spent the rest of the morning lounging around the kitchen and family room. The sliding glass doors were opened to let in the breeze coming in off the ocean, bringing with it the brisk, salty scent of summer.

  One by one my guests left. I hugged coworkers and college buddies and people I hadn’t seen since high school good-bye. Most of them told me they couldn’t wait for next year.

  I hoped that was true. I loved being surrounded by so many friends. And the older we got and the more responsibility we had, the more I wanted to be able to give them this little window of fun to remind them what they were working so hard for.

  By early afternoon, the only people remaining were Logan, my very best friends and their boyfriends. Could I call them boyfriends? Nate, with his elegant good looks and the air that made him seem not quite approachable, certainly didn’t qualify as a boy.

  Jared might be the most easy-going of the bunch, but with his sharp cheekbones, soulful eyes, and knowing how hard he worked at his music, it would be hard to classify him that way.

  The same went for Hunter with his dark and dangerous good looks. I watched him sitting on the couch talking to Logan and my heart squeezed in a good way. It seemed so right to see them like that. Logan and Hunter had been best friends when we were growing up. Hunter and his family lived next door to Katelyn and Logan.

  But even when he was with Hunter, I couldn’t help but notice something was not quite right with Logan. I stood apart from everyone for a few minutes just to watch, and Logan never really joined the conversation. Even when someone asked him a question directly, he chose the fewest words possible to respond.

  Maybe he was just tired. He’d been on a plane for God knows how long and I knew very well that his sleep last night had been interrupted.

  But my gut told me it was more than that. He purposely held himself apart from everyone, so different from the Logan I knew. And the same feeling told me that he was acting that way because he was hurting. Something inside him was broken.

  I didn’t care in that moment if everyone guessed what happened between us last night. Even Katelyn. If we upset her or she jumped to conclusions, she’d have to get over it. Everything in me called me to try to fix things for Logan.

  I walked over and plunked down on the couch next to him. I curled into the corner and draped my bare legs across his, not totally out of character for me, but it still felt intimate after the night we spent together.

  I nudged him with my elbow. “How are you still awake? All I did was throw a party and I’m exhausted. You must be ready to conk out.”

  Watching his face was like watching the clouds disperse after a storm. Everything about him eased and he dropped his hands on my legs.

  I bit my lip and let my head fall back on the couch, hoping everyone would just assume I was tired rather than the truth. The truth being that just the feeling of Logan’s hands on my legs was enough to set me off. Enough to get every synapse firing under my skin.

  I wiggled more deeply into the cushions. I needed to be near Logan more than I needed my next breath. For whatever reason, he remembered who he was when I was near. And I wasn’t going to examine too closely why it thrilled me beyond reason that I was the one who gave him that.

  Not even his sister or Hunter seemed to be able to ease him the way I could.

  But if I could give him that without spilling the beans about the night we’d spent together to all our friends, I wouldn’t hate it.

  “What did you want to do while you’re home, Logan?” Katelyn asked.

  I peered at him without raising my head from the cushions, probably even more interested in the answer than Katelyn. No matter how many times I told myself I had no right to be interested.

  He shrugged. “I hadn’t really thought much beyond getting home. Probably go see mom and dad.”

  He shrugged again, the gesture tugging at my heart as it left him looking slightly lost.

  “Oh, you should come home with us for a few days,” Katelyn said, referring to the apartment we all shared in the city. “We could see a show and get dinner.”

  I scooted lower in the seat, wiggling to get comfortable. The movement drew Logan’s attention.

  When he turned his eyes on me, my stomach clenched. His eyes looked completely blank. Something was definitely wrong.

  Katelyn didn’t pick up on the vibes he threw off. She just kept ticking off ideas to fill Logan’s visit home.

  “We should all go stay with Mom and Dad a few days. There’s that big fair in the park next weekend. You know that one with the balloon rides.” Katelyn’s voice got more excited as she continued on. “And we could go down to the park and see if we can get a baseball game going. That was always your favorite.”

  I wrinkled my nose at Katelyn. I knew she meant well, but holy Moses! She made it sound like he’d been dead two years.

  I could feel Logan’s hands tightening on my legs. As much as I loved his touch, the tensing was not communicating good things.

  A glance at Hunter’s face told me I wasn’t the only one concerned. He sat on the couch with an arm thrown over Katelyn’s shoulders. He cuddled her closer, and I couldn’t help but smile at his show of affection. Even when we were kids together, Hunter had been pretty stoic. Not one for big emotional scenes. He hadn’t changed much over the years, except when it came to Katelyn. The way he felt about her was so obvious. I’d be lying if I didn’t get a few pangs of jealousy seeing the two together.

  The way he held her close now, though, told me he might be about to say something to clue Katelyn in to the fact that all was not hunky and dory with Logan. Hunter of all people would know what Logan was going through. He’d been the first to join the Army, Logan following him in a year later. He’d stayed in through two deployments, so he had to know that Logan was having some trouble adjusting to being home.

  Hunter glanced at Logan, his lips tightening. His eyes moved back to Kate, softening the moment they hit her.

  I was always in awe of the way he looked at her, the way he changed when his gaze landed on her. But today I had no time to embrace the warm squishy feelings. Whatever he was going to do to head off Katelyn’s overenthusiastic plans was going to distress Kate and put Logan’s emotional state out there for everyone to see. Neither of those things were acceptable, no matter how good his intentions.

  Hunter opened his mouth to say something, but I jumped in first.

  “Logan, why don’t you stay here with me for a few days?”

  Oh, holy hell. Did I just ask Logan to stay here alone with me?

  Chapter 9

  Three hours later I was still shaking my head over my blurted invitation as I said good-bye to everyone. Everyone but Logan.

  I can’t say he’d jumped at my offer—and I’d be lying if I didn’t admit that stung just a little. He’d turned his head toward me and studied me, scrutin
izing every inch of my face with his laser-sharp eyes.

  I’d managed to hold his gaze the entire time. Despite any reservations I might have about us staying here alone together or the weird physical attraction that now mingled with my affection for him, this was Logan. And if he needed a few days to decompress before facing the rest of the world and I had the ability to give it to him, he had to know there was no question about me being happy to give it.

  After a long moment where I fought not to squirm under his intense scrutiny, he nodded. One sharp dip of his chin set my heart to leaping and my stomach to turning cartwheels and a thousand other little physical reactions that you think are utter bullshit when other people talk about them, right up until the second you experience them yourself.

  He’d quietly thanked me before turning back to his sister to let her know he wanted to stay here a few days.

  I could tell Katelyn wanted to protest. But Hunter said her name in his quiet, sexy, dark and dangerous voice. They’d shared a moment of silent communication, that it must be said, once again elicited that small pang of jealousy, before she accepted Logan’s decision.

  In that instant, I fell a little in love with Hunter myself. He’d seen the need of his best friend and the need of the woman he loved and he did what was best for both of them without upsetting Kate or sharing too much about what Logan was going through.

  That’s why, when it was his turn for a hug as we all stood in the entryway, I squeezed him a bit tighter and whispered a thank you in his ear. He hugged me right back, not saying a word. When he pulled away I got the same sharp chin tip I’d gotten from Logan earlier. I rolled my eyes and he grinned before he herded Katelyn out the door to join Paige and Jared who’d already said their good-byes.

  Nate gave me a quick hug before stepping aside so Emma could squeeze her way in. “I’m glad you won’t be here all by yourself.”