Chapter Three Willow
Chapter Three
Willow
“Holy shit, Ry, I was just here two days ago, and this looks like a different house.”
Ryker grins in that cocky way he always does that makes the butterflies attack my stomach lining. Good God, this man’s smile should come with a warning label.
Smile will induce pantie melting from fifty paces.
He slings his arm over my shoulders, the way he always does, and we look around the living room. The old, faded furniture that should have been replaced more than a decade ago is gone. In fact, the room has been completely emptied, and there’s a crew refinishing the original hardwood floors.
“They’re going to paint when the floors are done.
They should have done it before, but there was miscommunication,” he says, but all I can think about is his rock-hard side, which I’m pressed up against. “The whole house is getting paint and the floors redone. Come on, you can clean up your room because it’s getting the magic tomorrow, along with the rest of the second floor. ”
“My room is clean,” I remind him with a smirk. “I’m not a slob like someone else I know.”
“Hey, I was a teenager. I was supposed to be a slob.”
He smirks and twists his baseball cap so it’s sitting backward, and I’m pretty sure my vagina just did the hula.
He’s your best friend, and that’s it, Willow. Calm the hell down.
“You okay?” he asks, tipping his head to the side.
“Sure.” I’m totally fine. Definitely not reacting to the way that gray T-shirt is molded against his torso and the sleeves hug his biceps. His body is just . . . ridiculous.
“Let me know if you need help,” he says, once he seems satisfied that I’m telling the truth. “I’ll be in the back guest rooms on the second floor. I’m converting the two rooms into one so I can have a gym.”
And now I have visions of this man working out, and I need to get away from him before I do something stupid. Like lick him.
This is why it’s always been better that we didn’t live in the same place, and we just talked via the phone. Because where Ryker James is concerned, my hormones are in overdrive.
“Will do,” I reply, trying to act as nonchalant as possible as I grab some garbage sacks and head upstairs to my room.
It’s so weird to hear the noises of renovations echoing through the gigantic farmhouse. I practically grew up here. My mom was Debbie’s sister. Mom loved to dump me off here so she didn’t have to worry about me, and Aunt Deb and Uncle Ray never turned me away.
They treated me like I was theirs. Like I belonged with them.
Losing them hurt more than anything I’ve ever gone through in my life.
I walk into my room and take a deep breath. The full-size bed still has the same blue hand-sewn quilt draped over it that Deb made for me when I was ten. After college, I didn’t stay out here often, but I was always reminded that I had a place here.
There aren’t any mementos in here. No yearbooks or old clothes of mine.
It looks like any other spare bedroom, but it always belonged to me.
My safest place in this world. I spent countless summer nights sitting by that window, staring out at the mountains and the stars, daydreaming about Ryker.
And I’ve never slept better in my life than I did in that bed.
It won’t take me long to make sure everything is wrapped and covered so the furniture will be safe from the painters.
I’ve just folded up my sheets and blankets and am stuffing them into a giant plastic bag when I feel movement behind me. I’m bent at the waist, wrestling with the edge of this bag. I turn to look behind me and find Ryker’s eyes pinned to my ass.
Embarrassment ignites over my face, and I jerk upright. Jesus, my ass is . . . not tiny. And he was just staring at it.
“Sorry,” I mutter. “What’s up?”
“Huh?” He’s still staring at where my ass was and then seems to shake himself and meet my gaze. He licks his lips. “Oh, lunchtime. Come on down to the kitchen. We’re making sandwiches and stuff.”
“I’m not hungry.”
My stomach decides now is the right time to make me a lying liar and lets out a loud growl, and Ry’s grin slides into view.
“Not hungry, huh?”
“Okay, I’m a little hungry. I just have to finish stuffing this in this bag, and I’ll be down.”
“I’ll help.” He crosses over and picks up the edge of the plastic. “Here, you hold, I’ll stuff.”
With a nod, I join him, and we work together, getting it all secure, and then he tosses it on the stripped bed, and we haul the bed into the middle of the room and spread a tarp over the top.
“Thanks. I’m all done in here.”
“Come on then. Gid always puts too much mustard on the sandwiches. I have to supervise.”
He gestures for me to walk out ahead of him, and I slide past. I’m near the staircase when I glance back and once again find him watching my butt.
My steps falter, and I feel myself pitch forward. Shit, I’m going to fall down the stairs. I flail, but before I can fall, strong arms circle around me, and Ryker tugs my back to his front and plants his lips by my ear.
“Easy, Trouble. No hurting yourself.”
I clear my throat and step out of his embrace. “Thanks. I don’t know why I’m so clumsy today. What kind of sandwiches are we having?”
I’m halfway down the stairs when I glance back because Ryker hasn’t answered me.
He hasn’t moved.
He’s just watching me with the oddest look on his face.
“Ry?”
He blinks. “Yeah?”
“You okay?”
His brows pinch together as he descends the stairs. He pats my back as he walks by and then leads me toward the kitchen. “I’m fine. We have turkey and roast beef. Out of ham.”
Gideon is in the kitchen, already eating his sandwich, and offers me a closed smile when he sees me because his mouth is full.
“Hey, Wills.”
“Hey, handsome.” I kiss his cheek and ruffle his dark hair, the way I always do. Now this I can do. This is easy. “You’re sweaty.”
“I’m working,” he says, his voice as dry as the Sahara. He’s in his typical black tactical pants and T-shirt. I don’t remember the last time I saw this man in jeans. He’s such a military guy.
And honestly, it looks hot on him.
I also don’t remember the last time I was in the same room with the two of them together, before our world fell apart and Ray left us.
Ryker didn’t even make it home for Aunt Debbie’s funeral roughly two years ago, which is something he truly beat himself up over, but he was in the middle of the playoffs, and no one judged him for that.
He ended up winning the Stanley Cup that year, and I think he channeled all his grief onto the ice.
But last week, when Ry confided in us that he’s retiring from hockey and taking over the ranch full-time, I had a moment of panic. Because that means that I’ll see him often. Part of me, the best friend part, is excited at the thought of him being nearby.
The other part?
Well, she’s been in love with this sexy hockey player since the day he climbed out of that car when he was fifteen and stole the breath from her lungs.
He and Gid are both beyond handsome men.
Tall, dark, and stupidly hot. Muscles for days.
Gideon is my intense, gruff, quiet guy. The one who will kick someone’s ass and burn the world to the ground for anyone he loves without blinking an eye, and will do it all while maintaining a straight face and without breaking a sweat.
Ryker is funny. A smidge arrogant, but that comes with being a super-famous, rich professional hockey player.
Over the years, he’s added an entire sleeve of tattoos to his left arm—his muscle definition should be illegal in all fifty states—and his chocolate-brown eyes . . . well, don’t even get me started.
I love these two guys more than just about anyone, except Aiden. They are my family. My heroes. And I think of Gideon as my brother.
Ryker, on the other hand, I don’t feel particularly sisterly toward.
I don’t want to climb Gideon like a tree. The thought makes me slightly nauseated.
But Ryker? I would free solo that man in a heartbeat.
“Why do you have that weird look on your face?” Gideon asks, catching my attention.
“I don’t have a look.”
“You look like you just smelled something like rotting flesh,” he continues.
“I wouldn’t know what rotting flesh smells like, serial killer,” I reply and get to work building my own sandwich. Ry’s standing next to me, making his own as well, and he passes me the mayonnaise. Our fingers brush, and I swallow hard at the zing that shoots up my arm.
Ry pauses, and I feel his gaze on me, but I don’t look up.
I need to have a serious talk with myself later. This is Ryker. My best friend. I need to get over this stupid crush. He admitted himself that he has all kinds of gorgeous women fawning all over him.
I am so not a puck bunny.
“I found this picture,” Gideon says, tossing a photo on the counter. I cut my sandwich in half and set it on a plate before reaching for the picture, and I feel my smile spread all over my face.
“Oh, look at us.”
I can’t help but drag my fingertip over our faces. It’s the three of us, all in swimsuits, with sopping wet hair, grinning at the camera.
“That’s the summer we moved here,” Ry says from beside me as he stares at the photo over my shoulder. I can feel his breath on my neck, and I pray to God no one sees my nipples react. “You were scrawny, Gid.”
“Fuck you.”
I laugh and shake my head as I walk around to sit on the stool next to Gideon and eat my sandwich.
“You two were work,” I say before biting into my lunch. “So grumpy and surly and angry at each other.”
“I think we were just angry at the universe,” Ry replies with a shrug. “It worked out.”
“I’ll have copies made of this,” I volunteer. “So we each have one.”
“I thought the same thing,” Gid says. “I’d like a copy.”
“I’ll make sure we all have one,” I assure him and then bump his shoulder with mine.
“Found this one too,” Gideon says, and then we’re all staring down at a completely different photo, taken one year later. We’re all dressed up, standing in a courthouse.
“Your gotcha day,” I say with a soft smile.