Page 64 of To Hold and Protect

Tristan tapped his fingers on the table. “Do you think you could draw her from Willow’s description?”

“Good question.” Parker had never done anything like that before, but why not? “It’s definitely worth a try.” He touched Willow’s arm. “Let’s go to my studio and do that now.”

“Okay.”

Harper came back into the room. “She’s asleep. What did I miss?”

Parker stood. “They can catch you up. Willow and I are going to go play police artist.”

She blinked at him. “Is that some kind of kinky new game?”

Kade laughed. “Yeah, and we’ll play it later tonight. Come here, sugar honey lips.” He patted his lap.

“You should run for the hills from that one,” he told Harper.

“It’s an option,” she said, then got a goofy smile on her face as she headed for Kade.

Parker took Willow’s hand and pulled her up. “Let’s go do our thing, Miss Willow.”

Thirty minutes later, he handed her his sketchbook. “This her?” They were sitting side by side on the daybed, and instead of quizzing her on the woman’s features for the past half hour, he would have rather spent that time making love to her. He didn’t want to stop spending time with her, but someone had burned up her car because of him. Although they weren’t entirely sure about that as the reason, it had to be. Why else target her?

“I think so.” She handed him back the sketch pad. “I wish I’d paid more attention.”

“You didn’t know you needed to.” He hadn’t taken in the entirety of the sketch while he’d been drawing as she gave him the details of what she remembered of the woman, but as he studied it now, he frowned. The face was familiar. Skylar had asked if the black hair might have been a wig, and he visualized that face with blond hair. “Eff me.” It was her.

“What?”

He’d give anything if he didn’t have to tell Willow he knew the woman and how. Her name wasn’t Cassandra. “Hang on a sec.” He called Tristan. “Leave the dogs in Ev’s room to keep an eye on her, and bring everyone to the studio.” Without waiting for a reply, he disconnected, then got up and turned on the baby monitor. He was only going to tell this story once, and even that was going to be embarrassing.

While they waited for the others, he took Willow’s hand and brought it to his lips. After placing a kiss on her palm, he said, “Please don’t judge me.”

“You know her?”

“Unfortunately, yes. Just remember that I met her before I knew there was a you.”

“I’d never judge you, Parker. I had a life before you, too.”

Which he refused to think about. Willow with another man was a visualization he didn’t want to see. What did that mean? Was he doing it again, falling in love? And was he maybe okay with that? Willow loved Everly, and Everly loved Willow. That wasn’t something he had to worry about, except his daughter was going to be hurt when Willow moved away. Would Willow give up her dream to live on the beach for him and Everly? He supposed the bigger question was if Willow could fall in love with him? If not, she’d have no reason to stay.

His family arrived, and he waited for them to settle. Skylar and Harper joined Willow on the daybed, Kade sat on the floor at Harper’s feet, and Tristan leaned against the wall. No one said anything as they waited for him to speak, and he’d rather be anywhere but here, even cleaning the toilets at the station.

Everyone still had on the clothes they’d worn to the birthday party, and he wished he’d changed into jeans or his sweats. He stuffed his hands into his pockets. There was no easy way to say it, so he blurted it all out. “Her name’s Crystal. At least, that’s the name she used when I met her. I never asked her last name.” He glanced at his brothers. “I met her four months ago at that fire science workshop in Atlanta that three other fire chiefs and I organized. I went down to the bar for a beer and something to eat the night I checked into the hotel. She was already there and was by herself. We talked, I bought her a drink, and...” His gaze fell on Willow. If only he could ask her to leave for this part.

She smiled. “It’s okay, Parker. Like you said, that was before you knew there was a me.”

“Yeah, but I wish now I had known there was going to be a you.” He huffed a breath. “Anyway, things progressed as you’d expect. The next morning I hinted that I had to go to work, and it was time for her to leave. She refused to take the hint. Said she’d just hang out in the room while I was gone. She wanted to know what time my workshop was over, and what we were going to do that night. I told her I didn’t date, and that she couldn’t stay in my room. She wanted my phone so she could put her number in, and when I refused to hand it over, she wrote hers on a piece of paper. Told me to call her as soon as I was free. I thought, yeah, whatever, just go. As soon as she left, I dropped her number in the trash.” He glanced at Willow again. “By then, I was regretting leaving that bar with her.”

“Was that the last time you saw her?” Tristan asked.

“I wish. You know what they say about hindsight, but I should have been more forceful in telling her we wouldn’t have a repeat. I went to my workshop, and when we broke for lunch, the other fire chiefs and I planned to meet in the hotel’s restaurant. Of the other three, one was a woman, Maribel Jennings, who is happily married and has two kids. Mari and I arrived first and were seated. While we were waiting for the other two, Crystal walked up to the table, picked up my glass of water, and dumped it over my head.”

“Holy moly!” Harper exclaimed.

“Tell me about it. Crystal accused me of cheating on her with Mari, and to make things worse, the other two chiefs had walked up behind her and saw the whole thing.”

“My God,” Willow said. “I would have died of embarrassment.”

“I wanted the floor to open up and swallow me. Unfortunately, it didn’t. I escorted Crystal out of the hotel, told her I never wanted to see her again, and went back inside. Since my shirt was wet, I went to my room to change, then had a power bar and a cup of coffee for lunch before returning for the afternoon session.”

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