Page 10 of Beehives and Broken Heroes

“You’ve had a long day.” Brandon stood and reached for her hand.

She shouldn’t take it, but she didn’t want to be rude after he’d just sat out here listening to her whine. She placed her hand in his; it was callused from hard work and so large it nearly swallowed hers. He pulled her to her feet with a quick tug that brought her right into his personal space, his light brown gaze warming her. She released his hand immediately and stepped back into the porch swing, nearly losing her balance and toppling back down. He grinned and grabbed her arm to steady her.

Oh, right. She was soooo funny. Hilarious.

He opened the back door and let her go in first. “What are you smiling at?”

“I’m not smiling!” She forced a frown.

Clara looked up from the couch. “Why are you limping, Brandon? Did you hurt yourself?”

He glanced down. “It’s nothing. Just a little sore.”

Allie frowned. He’d been limping? Great, now she felt like a jerk. She hadn’t even noticed. And she’d stolen his warm leather coat, which smelled like Christmas and manliness.

Aunt Sophie eyed her in the coat, looking none too happy. Allie slipped it off and handed it back to Brandon. She wasn’t competition with her cousins. She wasn’t playing to win. She wasn’t playing at all.

He bumped her shoulder lightly with his as they came into the living room. Cash, Andy, and Uncle Mark came through the front door, carrying plates of food.

“Dinner’s ready!” Cash called.

“Finally!” Maggie May, her 21-year-old cousin with a perfect heart-shaped face, scrambled over the back of the plastic-wrapped couch, making it crinkle under her movements. “I’m starved.” Maggie May was by no means the silliest of the Winslow sisters—that title fell on Cecilia—but she was pretty ridiculous. Maggie May and Cecilia fed off one another’s bursts of ridiculousness and had little sense between them. Maggie May was nowhere near as flirty as Cecilia, but in her attempts to try to be more like her younger sister, she wore short cutoff shorts and had tied her shirt in a knot at the back even though it was freezing outside. Cecilia at least had the good sense to wear pants when it dropped below forty.

Cecilia and Diana followed Maggie May into the dining room, but they went around the couch instead of over it. Soon there was a mad scramble for the table, as people rushed for their seats laughing. In the hubbub, Allie got shoved to one side of the table, and Brandon’s arm was seized by Aunt Sophie leading him to the other side, where she practically shoved him into a chair between Jessie and Caroline. Again.

“You sit here, dear,” Aunt Sophie said, patting his shoulder.

Caroline glanced up at her mom, her alabaster skin flushing at the apples of her high cheeks with embarrassment. “Mother, please.” Caroline was so polite, so accommodating, and so … well, frankly, drop-dead gorgeous, that Allie couldn’t understand why one of Caroline’s ex-boyfriends hadn’t married her.

Allie sat across from Brandon and next to Jo. Jo giggled as Aunt Sophie scrambled to grab Andy’s arm and shove him down in a chair between Jessie and Cecilia. Allie couldn’t fathom why she’d want Andy sitting next to Cecilia; he was probably twenty years older than her, and she was a ginormous flirt!

Brandon gave Aunt Sophie a startled look, then angled an amused stare at Allie.

She grinned as he raised his brows.No, Brandon, there’s no escaping. Resistance is futile.

“Sorry, Andy . . . Brandon,” Jessie said. Then she raised her voice as Aunt Sophie took her seat next to Uncle Mark at the head of the table. “My mother has a one-track mind.”

Aunt Sophie sat tall in her seat and smiled. “I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Jessie rolled her eyes.

Brandon patted Jessie’s hand, and Allie’s gaze zoomed in on where he was touching her cousin. Her stomach tied in knots.

“It’s fine, Jessie.” He pulled his hand back. “Andy hasn’t seen so many pretty women in ages. Getting to sit between you and Cecilia, and at a table with this many stunning women, has got to be a highlight of his existence.”

“He’s not wrong. I usually have Sunday dinners with my brothers, and they’re ogres,” Andy said.

Everyone burst into laughter.

“But it’s not a highlight for you?” Cecilia asked Brandon, swiveling her shoulders a little as she spoke.

Brandon locked gazes with Allie for a brief moment before he glanced away and blushed. The man actually blushed. The rough-and-tumble, ex-military man blushed. “It definitely is.”

“Good.” Maggie May giggled and clasped her hands in front of her. “That’s what we like to hear.”

Mom took the seat at the head of the table across from Uncle Mark and next to Cash. “Shall we say Grace?”

Uncle Mark said the prayer, and in the middle of it, Allie felt a nudge under the table. Unable to help it, she opened her eyes. Brandon’s eyes were closed, his hands folded in his lap, but from how he was sitting, she could tell he’d stretched his legs out. She glanced under the table, and sure enough, his long, long legs spread across the space until his heel rested against the toe of her high-heeled boot. She lifted her foot, just a little, and put it on top of his, to see what he would do, then glanced up once more, finding Brandon’s dark gaze on her.

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