Chapter 9
9
She hesitated to invite him in. Aubrey knew he was well aware of it. But, she had never had a man in her home before. Not once. She had only ever had Genny and Gia and Greer in her house when Ayla hadn’t been there. The mayor’s wife had stopped by once, dropping off Ayla’s bag when she’d left it at Genny’s mother’s house one day, too. Ronnie Hiller had stayed for coffee for a few minutes.
The mayor was Genny’s older brother George. George looked a lot like the Hiller brother staring at her right now. So…at least she was keeping it all in the family. “Thank you for the ride.”
“Anytime. I’m going to walk you inside. Make sure you’re okay. Wheedle my way into staying, that kind of thing. Where are our wicked baby sisters at tonight?”
“They are spending the night with Hala. It’s her first night in her new apartment. I think a bottle of wine and a lot of chocolate and some Hunter Louis Clark and Slater Davis movies were on the agenda. Ayla has an incredibly ridiculous crush on Royal Davis, and I suspect he’ll be in those movies, too.” And her sister had been beyond excited. Sometimes, Ayla was both an ancient soul…and…an excited kid.
She was uniquely Ayla, without a filter or pretense at all. Aubrey hoped her sister always kept that joy in life. Her sister, more than most, had reasons to do the exact opposite.
“Why don’t you pack a bag, and come home with me? Not to my apartment, you wicked perv. But…to Genesis at the ranch. She’s supposed to be home after her shift…She should just be getting there, actually.”
Aubrey bit her bottom lip, hoping he wouldn’t see through her expression.
“What?”
No such luck, apparently.
Aubrey couldn’t lie—and this wasn’t something he wouldn’t hear the next day. Gossip was already going around at the hospital. “She was the nurse who was kicked tonight in the ED. Chad took her home with him. Supposedly to take care of her. But I don’t think he was taking her home. At least, not to her home.”
She had the feeling the last thing Chad was going to do was let Genny go home anytime soon. Not with the way he had been looking at her.
“Was she hurt?”
There was that overprotective big brother thing he had going on. It was probably one of his most redeeming qualities. This man loved his family—and fussed over them when he could.
“I think it scared her more than anything. And it cracked her ribs. He was a pretty big guy. But Chad was there to stop anything from escalating. We both went down hard.” And she would have the bruises in the morning to prove it.
“Sometimes I worry about her working the ED.”
“She’s good at what she does.” And though Genny complained about her overprotective pediatrician brother knowing everything she did at the hospital, Aubrey envied her that. To have that kind of family, those kinds of connections, the pure knowledge that her brothers would be there if Genny ever needed them—yes, envy was one way to describe it.
“I know. But she’s my little sister…And I know the kind of things that come in through an ED. Even as small as ours.”
“I completely understand. To be honest, I wouldn’t want Ayla working the ED on second shift, either.”
“You raised Ayla, didn’t you?”
“In a way. Not really legally, until she was sixteen and I was twenty-two though.” And it had taken some doing to keep a part of Ayla’s life when her little sister had been at the whim of social services. “We muddled through.”
“I think you did more than that. You’ve triumphed. And your sister is pretty awesome. And incredibly sweet.”
“She is. She always has been.” Aubrey pulled in a breath, then pushed open her front door. And made her decision. “Please, come in. I can make coffee. To say…thank you…for being there tonight.”
And…she wasn’t quite ready to be alone.