More Than Rum (The Maple Leaf Series Book 3) (3 page)

As he changed into sweatpants
and a plain gray T-shirt, he heard Wendie open his refrigerator.

“Adam!”

Shit. Busted.

She appeared in the hallway as
he stepped out of his bedroom, her hands on her hips in that Bossy Big Sister
way she’d spent years perfecting. “There is no food in your refrigerator.”

“Your point?” He leaned against
the wall and folded his arms across his chest.

“My point is you’re going to
starve.” She poked a finger into his stomach.

“No, I won’t. You won’t let
me.” He offered her something that may have been a smile, but he couldn’t be
sure.

Wendie gathered her unruly
brown hair into a messy bun and mumbled something he couldn’t understand. She
did that a lot around him. “Come over when you’re done pumping up or whatever
it is you do with all those weights and what not. I’ll have something healthy
for you.”

“No celery.” He hated those
stringy fibers that refused to break when he bit into celery. Just thinking of
them now had him involuntarily shuddering.

“I’m going to make you a celery
sandwich with a side of celery and you’ll eat every bite.” She gave him a wave
and headed out the door. Her cabin was only a short walk across the property
the two of them shared. A gift from their parents when they high-tailed it down
to Florida and warmer temperatures, the land was mostly wooded except for the
six-acre cleared spot that had his barn on one end and Wendie’s cabin on the
other.

They’d had this set up for
about eight years, but Adam’s barn had been vacant on and off during his
military assignments. Wendie had kept it clean and maintained, and truthfully,
he couldn’t imagine living anywhere else. He’d visited his parents a few times
and couldn’t for the life of him see the appeal of living in Florida. He was
doubly surprised that his father liked it. Normally the guy couldn’t sit still
for more than a few minutes without twitching, but something about palm trees
and beachfront property had mellowed his father, which was good. A career
firefighter, his father deserved some quiet years whacking golf balls around
courses full of endless green, and his mother spent most of her retirement
helping at a big cat sanctuary.

His parents were happy.

Good for them.

Happiness wasn’t for everyone.
Not everybody got that blessing. Some people had to do shit they never planned
on doing to preserve that happiness for others. He’d signed up to do that and
had done it.

And now he couldn’t sleep at
night. Hence his interview at Black Wolf Tavern for the bartending job. If he
couldn’t sleep, he could at least make extra money serving drinks to people who
could go home to their beds and conk out completely.

Bastards.

Adam entered his gym and peeked
out the window to see Wendie climbing the steps of her front porch. God, he
hoped she didn’t make him something with celery. With the exception of getting
that bartending job, this day had sucked. If it ended with celery he might go
bat-shit crazy.

Glancing around the room, he
decided to spend some solid time lifting. Part of the PTSD treatment had been
about taking time to relax as a way of allowing his mind to process what he’d
done and seen in Afghanistan. Unfortunately,
relaxing
was not in Adam’s
vocabulary. Sitting around thinking about his thoughts was useless. He needed
to be
doing
something. Anything. Still, he’d tried relaxing during the
treatment. To his knowledge, all it had accomplished was making his biceps
soft. Soft biceps were no good for manhandling chainsaws and lumber.

After about an hour of lifting
until his arms burned, Adam hit the shower and threw on a pair of jeans and a
black thermal shirt. He inspected his lip, which didn’t look or feel too bad,
and shrugged into a green fleece sweatshirt. He stepped into his work boots and
jogged toward Wendie’s. He skidded to a halt when he saw Orion’s truck in her
driveway. Though Orion was his best buddy, he wasn’t in the mood for being
social.

Adam was about to turn around
and head back to his place for a dinner of cold cereal when Wendie’s front door
opened.

“Get your ass back here,” his
sister yelled. “I promise there’s no celery.”

“But there’s people.” Was he
whining now? What the hell?

“People you like, last I
checked, moron. C’mon.” Wendie stepped aside and waved him in.

His stomach let out a loud roar
and he cursed the traitor as he climbed the porch steps. When he entered
Wendie’s living room, he expected Orion and Sage. He got more.

“Hey,” Hope said from her
position on the couch.

She knew coming to Wendie’s was
a bad idea, but did anyone listen to her?

Of course not.

Hope had fully intended to stay
home, but when she’d gotten there, a note was stuck to the refrigerator with a
“Don’t Forget Your Diet!” magnet. Her mother’s curly handwriting danced across
the small square of paper.

Went to Sage’s. Having a
Twilight Zone marathon. Come over. Love, Mom.

She took one look down the dark
hallway of her mother’s house where she still lived, and something inside her
said, “Nope. Not going down there alone.”

Yeah, she’d told Diana and Kevin
she was fine, but being in the brightly lit police station with armed officers
milling about had made her brave. The quiet blackness at home, however, was
another situation entirely.

With slow, backward steps, Hope
had crept to her Jeep, her gaze darting to every quivering shadow on the
snow-covered driveway. A clump of snow had slid off the roof of the garage, and
she’d let out a yelp. Calling herself every pathetic word that popped into her
head, she’d rushed over to Sage’s house.

Naturally, her sister knew
something wasn’t right the moment she’d laid eyes on Hope.

No secrets in this family.

Within five minutes, Hope had
unloaded the whole story, accepted hugs from Sage, Orion, Orion’s father and
daughter, and finally her own mother who hung on for some extra loving moments.
That had been nice, but when Adam’s sister had called and invited Sage and
Orion over, things had gotten out of her hands pretty damn fast. She wasn’t
even sure how she ended up at Wendie’s. Something about Sage saying, “We’re not
leaving her alone,” and her mother saying, “You guys will take her mind off
what happened.”

Still a lot spooked, Hope had
agreed to going with Sage and Orion while her mother babysat Orion’s daughter,
Myah, and his father, Ian, whose memory problems needed a little supervision.

Looking at Adam’s reaction to
finding her at his sister’s house now, Hope was sure she’d made the wrong
decision.

Wendie pushed him into the
living room. “Sit. I’ll get you some food.” She disappeared into the kitchen,
but Adam remained in the threshold to the living room. He reached his hand up
as if to adjust the bill of his baseball cap only to realize he hadn’t worn the
cap. His fingers scratched along the side of his shaved head instead, then his
hand clamped onto the back of his neck for a moment before sliding down to rest
at his side.

His legs looked extra long in
the faded blue jeans he wore. The green sweatshirt made his hazel eyes more cat-like.
They searched the room. For an exit most likely. Not finding one, he strode
into the living room and sat in a cushiony chair—the piece of furniture
farthest from where Hope sat.

Sage immediately got up and
crossed the room to Adam. “Stand up.”

“Why?” Adam looked at her
suspiciously, which he was probably right to do.

What is she up to now?

“Because I told you to,” Sage
said, waving him up with her hands.

Adam looked around Sage to
Orion. “Don’t you have her under control yet?”

“Nope,” Orion said, settling
deeper into his seat on the couch. “Don’t plan to get her under control either.
I love her just the way she is.”

“Oh, brother,” Adam and Hope
said at the same time.

Hope’s eyes connected with
Adam’s for the briefest of moments, but then he looked away. Slowly, he stood
in front of Sage, his tongue darting out over the split in his lip—a split he’d
gotten swooping into Hope’s rescue. She hated that he’d gotten hurt helping
her.

“Thank you,” Sage said,
wrapping her arms around Adam in a hug. “You saved my Hope. If something
happened to her, I’d… I’d…” She released him and glanced back to Hope, whose
eyes were filling with tears. “Well, I don’t know what I’d do, but thanks to
you, I don’t have to know.” She squeezed his hand and sat back next to Orion on
the couch. Her arm snaked over to Hope, and she gave her a pat on the thigh.     

Adam cleared his throat as he
sat again, and Hope desperately wanted to know what was going through that
handsome head of his. When she’d first met him, he appeared to be in favor of
starting a relationship. Sage had told her he’d asked about her, wanted to meet
her and everything. They’d had a few dates, but then he’d done a one-eighty on
her. He’d even gone so far as to completely drop off the planet for a few
months.

She ought to move on to someone
else, but she couldn’t. Even now, looking at him all the way across the room
there was… something about him. Something she couldn’t shake. Something she
wanted to know more about.

“Did you get the job?” Orion
asked.

Job?

Adam nodded.

“So Black Wolf Tavern has a new
bartender?” Sage asked.

“A few nights a week, yes.”
Adam shifted in his seat, clearly not wanting to discuss the matter.

“We’ll have to come in for a
drink.” Sage looked at Hope with raised eyebrows, and bless her for trying, but
was drinking going to get Hope any closer to unraveling the mystery that was
Adam Rouse?

Wendie came in with a plate of
spaghetti for her brother. She handed it to him and set a bottle of beer on the
coffee table in front of him.

“See? No celery.”

Adam took the fork and poked at
the mound of spaghetti topped with sauce and a meatball. “There better not be.”

“You don’t like celery?” Sage
asked. “Hope hates celery.”

At this, Adam actually looked
at Hope and a quick, sudden sweat broke out all over her body.

Jeez. Get it together. He
just looked at you, idiot.

“Do you hate it or truly
loathe
it?” Wendie asked. “Because Adam doesn’t even want to be in the same room with
it.”

Sage laughed. “Hope once
stormed out of Rick’s store when a customer brought a veggie platter in for a
book group she was having. She took one look at the celery slathered in cream
cheese and said she didn’t get paid enough to watch cream cheese be abused in
that fashion.” She turned to Hope. “Do you remember that?”

Hope hadn’t been able to tear
her gaze off Adam as he stared back at her, but she said, “Yeah, I remember.
Nobody ever considers the cream cheese’s feelings.”

A slow smile turned up the left
side of Adam’s mouth, and everything in Hope’s body skipped—her heart, her
breath, that magical place low in her belly that hadn’t skipped in a
loooong
time. Good God, he was like a zap of lightning to her senses. She broke out in
yet another fresh sweat and had to reach for her glass of wine to keep from
combusting on Wendie’s couch.

A cat hopped up on the armrest
beside Hope and she jumped. When the thing scrabbled across her lap, then Sage’s
and Orion’s, only to dive off the other armrest and run up the stairs in a
multicolored blur, Adam shook his head, the spell now broken.

Pointing his fork at the
stairs, he said, “Told you Frisco was psycho.”

“He’s not psycho,” Wendie said.
“He’s… energetic.”

“My father’s still slightly
afraid of him,” Orion said. “Frisco will forever be known as Devil Cat.”

“But your father can make
friends with Rick’s coyote,” Sage said. “Go figure.”

“I think I need a pet,” Hope
said, completely unaware she was going to share that information aloud. Hell,
it was news to her. She loved Poe, Rick’s coyote, and Ranger, Orion’s Greater
Swiss Mountain dog, but she’d never considered owning a pet herself. A canine
companion of her own might be just what she needed, though a Marine companion
sounded way better. Unfortunately, those were much tougher to adopt.

“One of my nurse friends has a
Dalmatian that had puppies,” Wendie said. “She’s ready to get them into homes.
I went over there once already, and they are crazy cute. You want to take a
look?” She sat in the chair opposite the couch and next to Adam.

“Okay,” Hope and Sage said
together.

“Umm, we have a dog, dear,”
Orion said to Sage.

“I know, but I still want to
take a look with Hope. They’re
puppies
, Orion. Who doesn’t want to look
at puppies? I’m taking Myah too.” Sage sipped her wine then said, “And yes, we
can look without taking anything home.”

“If you say so.” Orion shook
his head.

“I do.” Sage held up her hand
to him. “And see this lovely ring right here? It means you have to listen to
what I say until death do us part.”

“I haven’t said, ‘I do’ yet,
lady.” He pushed her hand away, but his blue eyes were full of humor… and love.

Hope hated being jealous of her
sister, but it was hard not to be when everyone was paired off so neatly, and
she was adrift in a leaky rowboat by herself. She looked at Wendie sitting across
from her. Though older than Hope, she was actually in the same category—the
Alone category. Maybe they could move in together and be a modern day Laverne
and Shirley.

Sigh.

“Okay, how about tomorrow?”
Wendie asked. “I know my friend is eager to clear the house of puppies, and if
we get there first, you’ll be able to play with them all and select the best
one for you.”

“Sounds good,” Hope said. At
least now she had something besides building websites on her agenda for
tomorrow.

But there was a whole night to
get through first before tomorrow and puppies came. A long, dark, cold night
where she was sure sleep would not be a visitor. She wasn’t afraid now,
surrounded by her family and friends and… Adam, but as soon as she went home
and got into her own bed in her own room with her mother all the way
downstairs, it was going to be a different story.

“Could I get more wine?” Hope
asked, because that was the only plan she had.

“Sure.” Wendie started to get
up, but Hope signaled for her to stay seated.

“I can get it.”

“There are several bottles in
the rack on the counter. Take your pick and bring the bottle back.” Wendie shook
her own almost empty wineglass.

Hope saluted her and wandered
into the kitchen. She walked to the sink, set her glass down, and gripped both
her hands on the rim of the sink. Taking a few deep breaths, she stared out the
window into the darkness until she got freaked.

I am safe. I am safe.

She rolled her shoulders then
went to the wine rack and slid out a few bottles until she found a cabernet
that looked appealing. She nearly dropped the bottle when a hand settled on her
shoulder. Fortunately, another hand—a big, rough man hand—closed around the
bottle and set it on the counter before anything went crashing to the floor.

“I didn’t mean to scare you,”
Adam said.

“It appears to be easier to do
this evening.” Hope stayed facing the window, not sure if she could turn around
and
not
lean into Adam’s muscular, protective body. “You move like a
ninja. I didn’t even hear you.”

“That’s because of the noise up
here.” He moved his hand to tap a finger to her temple. That one touch of his
fingertip to her skin set off dynamite in the rest of her body.  

“You don’t know what’s going on
up there.” Her voice wasn’t above a whisper.

Adam let out a puff of
breath—one that moved her hair and sent a warm wave down her neck. “Trust me. I
know.” Gently, he tugged on her shoulder until she had to turn around.

She expected him to step back
when he realized how close they were standing, but he didn’t. Instead he put a
hand to either side of her, gripping the sink as she had earlier and corralling
her between his arms.

“You’re telling yourself that you’re
perfectly safe, but you feel completely unsafe. That darkness out there,” he
gestured over her shoulder with his chin, “is almost paralyzing right now, and
every time you blink you see something you don’t want to see.” He angled his
head at her. “How’d I do?”

“Spot on.” She stared at his
chest, afraid to make eye contact and want more from him. “Will it go away?”

“God, I hope so. At least for
you. For me…” He let his voice trail off and took that step back now. His arms
dropped to his sides, and he stood still for a moment. His broad shoulders
moved up and down with each breath he took. The fleece sweatshirt he wore
looked so soft, exactly what her cheek would love to snuggle against. In
contrast, his arms looked hard, strong enough to protect her from anything real
or imagined. Her gaze traveled lower, stopping to survey the way his faded
jeans molded to his thighs and finally ended at the brown work boots covering
his feet. She wanted nothing more than to sit him down somewhere, crawl into
his lap, and not move for a long, long time.

Finally, he reached next to her
and grabbed the bottle of wine. “Don’t let your head win, Hope.”

She looked him in the eye then
and immediately wanted to gather him close. Behind that gorgeous green-gold
gaze, she saw incredible pain. And regret. She wanted to erase all that for
him.

Could she?

                                                                          ****

Bits of dirt and gravel rained
down on him like earthen rain while the taste of blood filled his mouth. His
left ear hurt like a motherfucker, and the ringing inside his skull was driving
him mad. He tried to take in a breath, but something pierced his lung when he
did so. Running a hand over his ribs, he found the source of the ache and
pressed tentatively on the spot.

Cracked ribs, for sure.

Add it to the list of injuries
he was amassing during this raid. Where the fuck was everyone else? He’d come
into this area with a whole team, and now it was just him wandering around,
smoke filling his eyes. What he could see looked exactly like an area he’d passed
at least ten minutes ago. He was moving, wasn’t he?

He slammed the heel of his hand
against his head, hoping to put an end to the ringing, hoping to be able to
concentrate.