DEFENDING TIERNY (Gray Wolf Security, Texas Book 1) Read online

“Is that what you think? That I wasn’t interested?”

  “You rarely came around, and when you did, you were rushed and uninterested. You made me feel like this burden you were trying to unload.”

  “That’s not what my intentions were. I didn’t know how to handle you, Tierney. My life was not exactly conducive to becoming a father again when you were born.”

  “Maybe you shouldn’t have had an extramarital affair.”

  “If I hadn’t, you would exist.”

  “One of those Catch Twenty-twos, huh?”

  He studied my face for a second. “There are many things I regret in my life, Tierney, but you are not one of them. I love you. I just never know how to show it.”

  I blushed. He’d never said that to me.

  “Listen,” he said, touching my arm lightly, “maybe we could start over. Would you have dinner with me tomorrow night?”

  “Can I bring my boyfriend?”

  “Yes.”

  I looked at him, really contemplating the idea. Then I nodded. “Okay.”

  Maybe a fresh start wasn’t such a bad thing. Maybe I could finally put a few of my own ghosts away.

  Chapter 20

  Alexander

  I walked up to the front door, hesitating under the first camera. I was about to announce my arrival when the door suddenly burst open.

  “Hi!”

  Vanessa was standing there, looking beautiful in a soft pink summer dress.

  “Hey,” I said, a little hesitantly. I couldn’t remember a time when she had opened the front door, let alone stood there in the sunlight without a look of utter horror on her face.

  “I made lunch. Come inside.”

  I followed her inside, surprised to see some clutter in the living room. Her laptop was open and sitting on the couch, a couple of magazines on the coffee table. She was hardly ever messy, let alone in the living room. Most of her clutter, when there was any, was in the master bedroom.

  The kitchen was a disaster. There were pots and pans everywhere, waiting to be washed. And the trash was nearly overflowing rather than being carefully tied up and set out in the garage for disposal.

  “What’s going on?”

  Vanessa shook her head. “Not much. Dr. Arden came by yesterday and we went out in the backyard. She says I’m making amazing progress.”

  “You went outside?”

  She smiled, clearly pleased with herself. “I don’t know. Ever since you told me that Justin had been arrested in Nepal…it’s like a burden’s been lifted from my shoulders. I was always so convinced that he would come back and finish what he started because I got the police involved and everything. But now that he’s not an issue anymore…it’s just so much easier to breathe.”

  There was a light in her eyes that I hadn’t seen in a very long time. It gave me hope.

  “I love you, Vanessa.”

  She suddenly came to me and wrapped her arms around me. It was the first touch she’d offered me since that night that wasn’t wrapped in panic and fear. I held her close, breathed in the scent of her hair, and smiled.

  I had my sister back.

  Baby steps…awesome.

  Chapter 21

  At the Compound

  I stood on the front porch and watched the car pull up to the front of the house. Ash climbed out, his familiar mug more of a pleasure to see than I’d expected. And out of the passenger side stepped a tall, dark man who had the regal stance of a lifetime military man, but the stoop of someone who’d been living under a terrible burden far too long.

  Ash finally told me what Kipling McKay’s story was.

  His family was murdered while he was in Afghanistan. Someone broke into his house and brutally murdered them for reasons that even the police hadn’t quite figured out. It seemed they initially thought it might have had some connection to Kipling’s work overseas with the military, but they were never able to prove that. But there didn’t seem to be any other motive, either.

  They caught the guy who did it. He was convicted and sentenced to life without the possibility of parole. But Ash thought that Kipling wasn’t quite satisfied with that. He hinted that Kipling would have preferred to take the guy out himself.

  It was a military thing, I think.

  They came up to the house and Ash pulled me into one of those awkward bro hugs that always seemed to go wrong for us. I knew Ash loved me. I knew family was important, especially now that we were the only two left from our biological family. But there was still that undercurrent of sibling rivalry that would always exist between us.

  “David, this is Kipling McKay.”

  We shook hands. Kipling didn’t have much to say, but I was used to that after our many telephone conversations. Ash had finally talked him into consulting with GWS 2. As I watched the two of them walk into the house, I found myself wondering if I was getting in deeper than I’d wanted to.

  There was no going back now.

  ~~~