by Jill Shalvis
“Only every single second of every single day.”
She smiled sadly at him, and he nodded before pulling on gloves and then getting out the supplies he needed to do her blood draw. He eyed both of her arms, clearly looking for the best vein. As he wrapped a rubber tourniquet around her biceps, she inhaled a deep breath, and his gaze went to her face. “You have a needle phobia too?”
“No, it’s just not my favorite thing to do,” she admitted, and then sucked in a breath. “Wait—Kinsey has a needle phobia?”
He swiped the spot he’d chosen on her arm with an alcohol pad. “Along with a phobia of men’s toes, people throwing up, and getting dirty, yes. Worst one is the needle phobia, though. It’s bad.”
She gaped at him. “But she gets stuck every week.”
“Three times a week, two pokes each time. Make a fist, darlin’. Little pinch, that’s all.”
She made a fist, so distracted by the thought of Kinsey suffering through a genuine phobia of needles and how awful it must be for her that she barely felt the needle go in. “She never complains.”
Deck’s gaze lifted briefly to Brynn’s. “She does this thing where she protects everyone she cares about from worrying about her. Something you two seem to have in common. That’s it, all done.” He pressed a cotton ball to where the needle had gone in. “Hold on to that for me.”
“That was fast.”
“I’m good.”
“I barely felt it.”
“Not my first time.”
She smiled at him.
He smiled back, but it wasn’t full wattage.
“You haven’t been around,” she said.
“She kicked me to the curb.”
“I was hoping that was more like a temporary thing.”
“Nope.” He turned his back to her and began writing on labels to attach to the vials of her blood.
His broad-as-a-mountain shoulders seemed relaxed and his tone had been mild, but she wasn’t buying it. She’d seen the way he looked at Kinsey. She’d felt how much he loved her. “Are you okay?” she asked.
He pulled off his gloves, tossed them into the bin, and turned to her. “You should get the results within a week.”
Code for no, he wasn’t okay. “I’m sorry,” she said softly. “I don’t know what happened. She’s very clearly head over heels for you.”
His smile was small and dry. “She’s the bravest woman I know, but she’s also a huge chicken when it comes to certain things.”
“Things like telling someone they’re related to her?” she asked wryly. “Things like letting someone into her heart? Like facing any emotion other than amusement or bad temper?”
He touched his finger to his nose.
She sighed. “If it helps, I’m pretty sure she has no idea what she’s doing.”
“Makes two of us.”
She turned to go, but stopped. “Do you think you could rush the blood work?”
“I’ll put in for a rush, but don’t hold your breath. The fastest I’ve ever seen this test come back was three days.”
She drew a deep breath. “I’m putting out feelers, looking for our dad.”
Deck went still. “She know that?”
“There’re so many definitions of ‘know’ . . .”
“Shit,” Deck said.
“I told her the morning after I found out we were sisters, but she didn’t like it. I don’t care. I happen to think sisters should be open and honest with each other, but still be their own person.”
“I agree,” Deck said. “And while Kinsey’s honest about who she is and makes no apologies for it, she’s not exactly an open book.”
Brynn sighed. “Yeah. But, hey, maybe there’s a silver lining. Maybe I’ll find our dad and he’ll be a match and a great guy who wants to save his daughter’s life. And maybe I’ll also be a match. Maybe she’ll have choices.”
“That’s a whole lotta maybes,” he said.
Yeah. It was. “Well, while I’m wishing on stars, maybe Kinsey will be grateful that I’m doing these things.”
His mouth twitched. “Wouldn’t bet my life on that, cute stuff.”
She blew out a rough breath. “Yeah, so ‘grateful’ is a little much, I agree. I’ll settle for her not killing me.”
“It’s been good knowing you.”
She laughed. “Okay, you’re doubtful, and I get it. But I think she’s . . . changing. Slowly.”
He didn’t say anything to this, which probably meant he thought she was foolish.
“Look,” he finally said. “I’m going to give you some advice you didn’t ask for. You should talk to her about this stuff. Before you find your dad, because it might be there’s a good reason for her to feel the way she does.”
Wait. Did he know something she didn’t? His voice had been his usual calm, not giving anything away, but she searched his face. “Is there something you want to tell me?”
He didn’t say anything to this, just busied himself gathering the vials, setting them in a holder.
“Deck.”
He pulled her out of her chair. “This is between you and her. She’s made it clear where I fit into her life, which right now is nowhere. Sorry, but you’re on your own with this one.”
She shook her head. “I don’t believe that. You care about her too much. You love her.”
“I do,” he said, and that this big, huge guy who looked so tough could so easily admit his feelings made her throat tight.
He tilted his head back to look at the ceiling, and then met her gaze. “I also got tested. I’m not a match,” he said.
And he clearly wanted to be a match, badly.
“But it wouldn’t have mattered if I was,” he said. “She wouldn’t take a kidney from me. And not from you either.”
She took his hand. “I’m sorry. But if I’m a match, she’s damn well going to take it if I have to shove it down her throat myself.”
He looked at her and then gave a small smile. “I like you. You’re going to give her a good run for her money. She needs that. Don’t let her push you away too.”
“I won’t.”
“And watch your six. If she figures out what you’re up to, it won’t be pretty. She seems like a curmudgeonly grump, but it’s coming from a place of wanting to protect those she loves.”
Brynn’s phone buzzed with an incoming call from Raina.
“Take it,” Deck said. “I’ve got to get to my next patient.”
Brynn hugged him hard. “My sister would be an idiot to let you go. She’s not an idiot.” She kissed him on the scruffy jaw. “She’ll come to her senses.”
He nodded, but she could tell he didn’t believe it. Hurting for him, for Kinsey, she walked out and answered her phone.
“Guess what?” Raina asked.
With Raina, it could be anything. “I don’t know, Mom. I need a hint.”
“Oh, for God’s sake,” she heard Olive say. “Give me that phone.” There was a tussle and then Olive said two words into the phone. “Found him.”
“What?”
“We found your dad.”
Brynn’s heart flung itself against her rib cage. “Tell me everything.”
AT SUNSET, KINSEY was standing alone on the beach, feeling sorry for herself because she wasn’t out on the water with Deck. Or out to dinner with Deck. Or in his big, amazing bed with Deck doing big, amazing things to her body, the same body that only felt alive when he was working his magic.
And whose fault was that . . . ? a little voice asked.
God, she was such an idiot. She hadn’t gone to the bar the other night. Max had stopped her, and that was for the best. After all, she’d been the one stupid enough to let Deck go.
When her phone rang with an incoming call, she almost didn’t answer it. But she didn’t have that luxury. It could be her doctor, or the hospital telling her there was a donor. It could be about Deck; maybe his motorcycle had finally done what she sometimes had nightmares about and he’d been in an accident
.
She was a glass-half-empty type of girl.
But it wasn’t her doctor, the hospital, or Deck, who’d probably removed her as his emergency contact since she was such a bitch.
Best Sister on the Planet was calling.
She stared at the phone for another full ring, not sure she was up for this. Because her sister was definitely a glass-half-full kind of girl. She swiped to answer, but before she could say anything, Brynn beat her to it.
“I found him,” she said, voice shaking with excitement.
“Who?” Kinsey asked.
“Dad.”
She froze.
“Kinsey?”
“I must be hearing things,” she said in the voice she used to warn people she was considering committing murder, the same voice that said she already knew where she was going to hide the body. “Because I distinctly remember telling you we weren’t going to look for him.”
“Yes,” Brynn said, using the same voice right back at her. “But since you’re not the boss of me, I figured it was better to ask for forgiveness instead of permission.” She laughed. Laughed. “Come on, Kins, this is great news. Admit it.”
She would do no such thing. “I have to go.”
“Okay, but don’t you want to know where I found him? Bakersfield! Can you believe it? This whole time he’s only been a few hours away.”
Not only could Kinsey believe it, she’d been to his place in Bakersfield. And she didn’t want Brynn there. She didn’t want Brynn anywhere near him.
“It’s Thursday,” Brynn said. “You know what that means, right?”
“That tomorrow is Friday?”
“Yes, smart-ass. We’ll leave right after work. We’ll drive out there, and if he’s not home, we can get a hotel and make a night of it, then try again on Saturday morning. We have the whole weekend to catch him. Road trip!”
Kinsey stopped breathing. “No. Brynn—”
“I wish I had called one of those reality shows that track people looking for their birth families. We’d make such a good episode, don’t you think? We’re going to get our happy ending, Kins! Anyway, I’m hanging up now, before you can tell me all the reasons why this is a bad idea.” And then she did just that and disconnected.
Kinsey carefully sat on the sand, pulled her knees to her chest, dropped her forehead to her knees, and . . . missed Deck. Missed his comforting presence, his calm, his adventurous spirit, but most of all she missed how he made her feel safe. She needed him right now. He would know what to do.
She also loved him, almost beyond bearing. And that was her own burden to bear.
Chapter 23
For the first time in Kinsey’s life, she woke up the next morning wanting to feel sick so that she could postpone the stupid road trip.
So of course she felt great.
Karma was such a bitch.
The problem was that she knew that with or without her Brynn was going.
And Kinsey couldn’t let her do it alone.
She had a text from Brynn saying: Pack before work, we leave right after!
Whatever. She purposefully didn’t pack a bag until she got home from work. Opening an overnight duffel, she started with pj’s. She’d been sleeping in a shirt she’d pilfered from Deck, one she hadn’t washed because she was pathetic and wanted to have his scent on her. Carefully folding the T-shirt, she tucked it into the bag like it was her finest possession. Which it was.
With a big exhale of grief, she did as she’d done a hundred thousand times since she walked away from him. She picked up her phone and brought up his contact info, her thumb hovering over his number.
She wanted to hear his voice more than she wanted her next breath.
Then she thought about why she’d let him go. Because as much as she loved him, as much as she ached to be with him, she knew he felt the same about her. So in the only way she knew how, she was protecting him, she reminded herself. Only one of them needed to feel this heartbreak.
Slinging her bag over her shoulder, she headed down the stairs. Through the living room window she could see Eli and Brynn by her car. They stood close, barely any space between them, but Eli pulled her closer still. They kissed, his hands slowly sliding up her slim thighs, vanishing beneath the hem of her sundress. With Eli’s mirrored shades and Brynn’s brightly colored clothing, they could have been on the cover of any summer magazine in the land and sold a gazillion copies.
Kinsey wanted to be totally and completely annoyed by the PDA, but even from here she could see how much Eli adored her sister. With a sigh, she strode out the front door.
They were still kissing, and now Brynn had wrapped her arms around Eli’s neck and appeared to be trying to climb him like a tree. “Thought we were on a schedule,” Kinsey called out, waving her phone. “Ticktock.”
Brynn broke free with a grin, so blissful it almost hurt to look at her.
Eli was much slower to pull back, gazing down at Brynn like maybe she was the most important thing on the planet to him.
“We’ll need to stop for snacks.” Brynn smiled up into Eli’s face. “Lots of snacks.”
“I thought I was your snack,” he said.
Kinsey rolled her eyes, but Brynn laughed, a low, husky sound that spoke of sexy memories and an easy, natural connection.
Eli laughed too, in a way that Kinsey hadn’t seen him do in a while. He was . . . happy, she realized. Her sister and her best friend were clearly in love, and something deep, deep, deep inside, so far in there that Kinsey hadn’t even known that corner existed, both warmed and got worried at the same time. Why were they doing this? Didn’t they know the danger? And how was it possible to be genuinely happy for two of the best people on the planet, but also at the same time to be just a little jealous? But then her heart squeezed. Because it wasn’t jealousy. She loved Eli, but she wasn’t in love with him. She wanted him to be happy. He deserved it. He deserved this.
A part of her recognized that she’d pushed away the same thing for herself, on purpose, and that she wasn’t going to get another chance. Hardening her heart, she moved to the car. “Let’s go, dammit.”
Brynn started to get behind the wheel, but Kinsey gave her hip a bump. “I’m driving,” she said. “It’ll be dark before we get there and you can’t drive at night.”
“Neither can you,” Eli pointed out.
Brynn’s mouth fell open as she stared at Kinsey. “How did I forget that? You’re as blind as I am at night.”
Kinsey shrugged. “Makes sense we’d have at least one thing in common.”
“Oh, we’ve got more than that in common,” Brynn said.
“No we don’t.”
Brynn ticked the points off on her fingers. “We both work with kids, love our unit, have the same hair—”
“Hey.” Kinsey touched her hair. “Mine’s not frizzy like yours.”
“Because you buy ridiculously expensive product for it that I can’t afford.” She grinned and hugged Kinsey tight. “Shotgun!” she yelled and dove into the passenger seat.
Eli flashed Kinsey a grin and slid in behind the wheel.
Kinsey climbed into the back, grumbling, “You’re both children.”
“Sticks and stone,” Eli said mildly. “Destination?”
Kinsey gaped at him. “You don’t know?”
“I didn’t tell him the amazing secret yet,” Brynn said. “I wanted it to be a surprise.” She turned to face Eli. “I found our dad. He’s in Bakersfield.”
Eli flicked a glance Kinsey’s way, his brows up.
“Exciting, right?” Brynn was practically bouncing in her seat. “Let’s get going. I’ll get the GPS programmed.”
With Brynn’s attention turned to the navigation system, Eli craned his neck to look right at Kinsey, a look that said: We need to talk.
No shit. “The weather app says it’s going to be a hundred and five in Bakersfield. I vote we wait for it to cool off.”
Brynn stared at her like she was a nut. “It won’t cool
off until October.”
Exactly . . .
“I’m not waiting that long,” Brynn said.
Again Eli flicked a glance at Kinsey in the mirror. What else do you got? his eyes asked.
“I’m pretty hungry,” Kinsey said. “Let’s stop at a restaurant.”
“I’m too excited to eat first.”
By now they were leaving the lush, green coast and heading into the high desert landscape of the middle of the state, and Kinsey was still doing her best to ignore what was happening, which was that she and her life were both circling the drain because she had no idea how to make this little impromptu reunion not happen. “The car’s making a funny noise,” she said. “We need to try again another time.”
“I’ll buy us bus tickets if I have to,” Brynn said.
Okay, who was this ballsy, brave chick and what had she done with her sister the mouse? Fuck it. Just fuck it. “So . . . there’s some stuff I should tell you.”
“Hell no.”
“Excuse me?” Kinsey asked.
“You think I don’t know how much you don’t want to be on this trip? You’re trying to make it not happen, but it’s happening, Kinsey. Deal with it.” As she’d been speaking, Brynn had been searching for a radio station, finally settling on country music, which always made Kinsey’s teeth grind. “No one listens to the radio anymore,” she said. “If you turn it off, I’ll bring up my Spotify—”
“Road trips require the radio,” Brynn said. “It’s part of the adventure, not knowing which song is going to come on.”
“You’ve got an odd sense of adventure,” Kinsey said, having to automatically disagree with everything. It was how she was wired. Especially when secretly, deep down, she envied Brynn’s sense of ease in winging things like road trips and . . . life.
The song was some guy wailing about his tractor, his dog, and the woman who’d left him. “My ears are bleeding.”
Eli caught her gaze in the rearview mirror. “Doesn’t Deck love country music?”
“Yeah, that’s why I dumped him.”
Brynn turned to face her. “He seems really sad about the break up.”
Kinsey blinked. “When did you see him?”
“I ran into him at the clinic the other day while I was getting tested.” Brynn paused. Grimaced. “Um, so that was supposed to be a surprise.”
