Page 21 of My Secret to Protect

‘Pregnancy is turning you into a horndog.’

She cackles. ‘I know, Nick is exhausted but happy.’ I shake my head. I love this woman, but I can’t quite process what just happened enough to laugh or say anything at all. Arlo is here, in Forest Falls, right next door.MyArlo… except he’s not mine, not anymore, not for a long time. ‘Okay,’ she squeezes my hands, ‘so, I need information, and I need it now.’ Dropping my head, I step up onto the porch, then feel her arms around me as she senses the turbulence in me. ‘Let me call the girls.’

Fuck My Fuckin’ Life

Arlo

Goodgod,thiswomanis going to be the end of me. I glance across to Bree’s house once more. It’s been an hour since I laid eyes on her for the first time in years, and I was not prepared. It’s been eating at me ever since I watched her ass as she headed inside that she’s right there in touching distance, looking the way that she did, as fucking gorgeous as ever.

I was so goddam nervous. I’m thirty-nine, a grown-ass man, and I was nervous to see the woman who betrayed me and broke my heart when she was barely out of high school, and then the second I laid eyes on her, all I wanted to do was piss her off. I’m supposed to be here to help her, but that old resentment reared up at the sight of her.

Fuck my fuckin’ life.

How did I find myself messed up in this shit? I spent eight years of my life behind bars because of that woman, and the second I look at her, my dick’s trying to get hard like she’s not the reason he only had my hand for company for basically all of my twenties.

The last time I looked at Bree, I saw in her expression just how badly she had betrayed me, and any feelings I had for her went up in flames that burned hot for longer than I care to admit. I don’t have feelings for her now, but nostalgia has me looking at the woman I saw today as though she’s the girl I watched crying on the street all those years ago from the back of a police cruiser.

She’s not that girl, though.Thatgirl, though she was tough as nails, she was naïve and hopelessly optimistic. The woman I saw today was all grown up and hardened to the world—the candle of hope she always had behind her eyes was out. All I saw was exhaustion and desperation.

She’s as beautiful as she always was. Those caramel eyes, though they sparkled less today, still grabbed me by the balls, so much so that I avoided her gaze as much as possible. She was wearing a tank top and jean shorts, there was a lot of tanned skin and freckles on display, and it was fucking distracting. She looked like that seventeen-year-old girl who climbed out of her car and sassed me all those years ago, but she looked strong, defined, and I can see she clearly works out.

And her hair, pulled into two braids today, is still long and brown, and it made me want to smile. I like that she didn’t change that. I always loved her hair.Fuck, Arlo, quit it. It doesn’t matter to me what she does or doesn’t do with her fucking hair. She’s not mine. She made sure of that.

‘You want to get out of here, bud?’ I ask Beans, needing to get some breathing space, and he stands, his tongue falling out of his mouth as his tail wags, and I can’t help but smile. ‘Okay, come on.’

‘Beans,thisway,’Icall out, and he runs ahead of me. I can’t pretend I don’t love having the lake and the forests surrounding my new hometown close by for walks. It sure beats taking Beans to the dog park in the city, and he is loving it.

I needed to catch my breath. I’m going to have to dive headfirst into this plan to draw out this son of a bitch cop, and that means that even if she doesn’t know it yet, Bree and I will be getting up close and personal, fast. I need to protect myself because she affects me now the way she always did, and I can’t let myself fall for her again. I need my head on straight.

Since I left the club, my hands have been clean, and now, for the woman who put me behind bars, they’re going to get dirty again. There’s only one way this can end. The cops aren’t protecting her. They’re not going to make sure he stays away.Ineed to make sure of that, which means being a person I never wanted to be again, and it isn’t sitting right. Everything I did, the choices I made, was to give myself a shot at a different life, but it’s all circled back to this, and all of it had Breanne Campbell in the center.

Nineteen Years Ago

‘Whatdoyoudreamabout?’ Bree asked lazily as her head rested against my chest. We were laid out on a blanket on the ground, gazing up at the clearest night sky, inky black dotted with stars, the full moon big and bright.

‘You, mostly,’ I grumbled, honestly. She had been consuming my thoughts, waking and asleep since the first day I laid eyes on her.

‘Stop it.’ She tapped my chest and turned her face to press a light kiss to the same spot. ‘For your life, what do you dream for your life, Arlo?’

‘Same answer, short stuff.’ She sat up to gaze down at me, and I pushed up to sit, raising my hand to push the silky strands of her chestnut hair behind her ear. ‘You, Bree. You’re what I dream for my life. You’re all I want.’

My answer was the truest thing I’d ever known. Bree Campbell was the brightest star in my sky. She was the sun, the moon, the fucking oxygen that I needed to survive.

‘Arlo,’ my name came on a sharp exhale as she lunged forward, toppling us back to the ground with a groan followed by giggles until I rolled us, settling above her and claiming her mouth with my own. She was it. She was everything, and I would do whatever it took to keep her.

God Damn, He Looks Good

Bree

‘Itishot,’Zoesays, fanning herself on my front porch.

The babies are asleep inside, where it’s cool. Missy insisted on us sitting on the front porch in the hopes of introducing the girls to Arlo, and I feel like I might throw up at the prospect. I saw him leave with his dog just before Cara and Zoe arrived, so I am just hopeful he’s out for the rest of the day.

‘You think you’re hot now? Wait until you see Bree’s newneighbor,’ Missy says, and I roll my eyes.

‘Really?’ Cara grins and Missy nods.

‘Oh my god, yes, he is a smoke show, and Miss Breanne clearly has some undisclosed history with him.’

---