Chapter 3
AIDEN
As I approach the Reilly property, the lick of flames can be seen above the tall grass. I put my foot on the pedal, hoping the entire place isn’t going up. But when I pull into the courtyard, I find the fire contained to a fire pit, and the surrounding grass trimmed back to stubble.
A woman stands in front of the fire with her back to me, her curves silhouetted by the flames.
My gaze travels up her body from her white urban sneakers to her snug-fitting jeans that cling to her wide hips.
She wears a coat that’s too light for the chilly spring nights, and she wraps her arms around herself to ward off the cold.
She doesn’t hear my car pull up over the fire, but she hears the car door slam as I get out.
Spinning around, startled, she looks at me, and, fuck me, it’s as if a spark from the fire lands in my chest.
This woman is gorgeous.
She’s got the biggest brown eyes I’ve ever seen, and they’re wide with surprise.
Her hair is a deep brown and tied in a topknot, but some strands have gotten loose to dance around her neck. One loose strand is caught on her lower lip. Her plump lips look perfect for kissing, and doing other things with, too.
Which is an inappropriate thought to be having and not one I usually have about a woman I’ve just met. But I can’t stop staring, and my heart is thumping a new rhythm that tells me this woman, whoever she is, is mine.
She’s staring at me with a mixture of curiosity and wariness, and I must be staring right back like a speechless creep because, without taking her eyes off me, she bends down and picks up a long, thin piece of wood. It looks like it’s a table leg.
I’m scaring her, which is not my intention, but I can see how a big guy turning up out of nowhere and staring at her would do that.
I want to tell her she has nothing to fear.
That all I want to do is take her home, find her some clothing more appropriate to living in the mountains, and protect her from whatever demons she’s trying to ward off with this fire.
She clasps the table leg with both hands, and her body goes rigid and ready for fight or flight.
I hold my hands up to show her I mean no harm, even as I’m imagining what her lips feel like and thinking of all the things I want to do with that plump mouth, with kissing being the first.
But I’m not an asshole, and I don’t want to scare her away or get hit by a table leg, because she looks like she’s not afraid to use it.
“I’m Aiden Whitley. I do security at Jake’s Retreat.” I indicate the glow of our own bonfire across the field. “I saw the fire and came to check if everything is okay.”
When I take a step toward her, she rises onto the balls of her feet with the table leg in her hands. My gaze flickers to the pile of wood by the bonfire. It’s pieces of furniture cut up as if she’s been at it with an axe, which seems like something a desperate person might do.
“Are you okay?”
Finally, something gets through to the woman that I’m not going to hurt her, because she lowers the table leg.
“I’m fine. Just burning old furniture.”
“I can see that.”
I have a hundred questions. Who is she? Where did she come from? And what the hell is she doing on the Reilly property? But she seems skittish, and I need to go slow.
“What’s your name, firefly?”
She tilts her head, and her gaze sweeps over me. I like the way she looks at me, assessing me, and the half-smile and wide eyes tell me she likes what she sees.
“Lexi.”
“Lexi.” I try it out on my tongue. “What you doing here, Lexi? This place is abandoned, but I don’t know who owns it now.”
My gaze sweeps over the pile of broken furniture and the charred pieces already in the bonfire. The door to the house is gaping open, so she got these from inside.
If she’s homeless, I want to know why. There are better places she can spend a night than out here, in my bed being one of them. Where I can keep her safe and get to know her.
“I own it.”
That’s not what I expected her to say. From what Joel’s told me, the place has been abandoned since Vaughan Reilly passed away over a year ago. No one’s claimed it since.
“My father left it to me,” she added.
She hurls the table leg into the fire, and it goes up with a crackle. The flames leap around it, making her face glow orange.
“I didn’t know Vaughan had a daughter.”
Joel told me about his old neighbor, a veteran who kept to himself. He never mentioned any family. The town expected the property to go to the state, and Joel was thinking of buying it to expand the retreat.
“Only by name. I never met him.”
She says it casually as she slings another piece of wood into the fire.
I know what it’s like to grow up with no father. The military became my family and provided the brothers I never had, and there were enough mentors to be father figures to me. I’ve long gotten over my fatherless childhood, but I wonder if Lexi has.
“That’s too bad. I’m sorry.”
She shrugs her pretty shoulders. “Don’t be. You can’t grieve someone you never met.”
Crouching by the fire, she puts her hands up to toast her fingers. Seeing her relax further in my company, I move around to the pile of broken furniture to check it out, and her wary gaze follows me.
Up close, the small holes that indicate termites are obvious. No wonder she’s using these for firewood. If she’s planning to move in here, then there’s a hell of a lot of work to be done.
“You having a clear out before you move in?”
She shakes her head, making her hair bounce, and I wonder what it would feel like to run my fingers through it.
“I’m clearing a space to camp out.”
“What, inside?”
I glance at the house, silent and dark. I expect the electricity is still disconnected, and if it’s been sitting empty for over a year, I can only imagine what vermin has moved in. Termites are the least of her concerns.
“You can’t stay here. It’s not livable,” I tell her, worry threading through my voice.
She shrugs, nonchalant, though I see the tenseness in her posture. “It’s only for three nights. Then I’m heading back to Jersey.”
Whoa, did she say three nights? That stops me in my tracks, and my heart takes a nosedive. I’ve just met the woman who makes my heart beat faster, and she’s only in town for three nights?
That means I’ve only got three nights to win Lexi over.