Lori Foster - Buckhorn Beginnings - Sawyer

“Ex-fiancé,” Sawyer clarified, then suffered through the resultant snorts and snickers from his demented brothers.

“I thought so at first. He…well, he wasn’t happy that I broke things off. He was actually pretty nasty about it, if you want the truth.”

“Truth would be nice.”

She glared at Sawyer so ferociously, he almost smiled. But not quite.

“I think it wounded his pride or something,” she explained. “But regardless of how he carried on, my father is certain it couldn’t be him.”

“Why?”

“If you’d ever met Alden, you’d know he doesn’t have a physically aggressive bone in his body. He’d hardly indulge in a dangerous chase. He’s ambitious, intelligent, one of my father’s top men. And my father pointed out how concerned Alden is with appearances and that he’d hardly be the type to cause a scene or run the risk of making the news.” She shrugged. “That’s what my father likes most about him.”

Sawyer curled his lip, more angered at her father’s lack of support than anything else. “Alden? He sounds like a preppy.”

“He is a preppy. Very into the corporate image and climbing the higher social ladder, though I didn’t always know that. My father scoffed at the idea that Alden would chase me because regardless of his temper, I wouldn’t be that important to him in his grand scheme of things.”

He watched her face and knew she was holding something back, but what? Sawyer pushed her, hoping to find answers. “Even though you walked out on him?”

“I left, I didn’t walk out.”

“What the hell’s the difference?”

She sighed wearily. “You make it sound like I staged a dramatic exit. It wasn’t like that at all. I found out he didn’t care about me, I packed up my stuff, wrote him a polite note and left.”

Her body was tense, her expression carefully neutral. Sawyer narrowed his gaze. “Why did he ask you to marry him in the first place if he didn’t care about you?”

She closed up on him, her face going blank, and Sawyer knew she still didn’t trust him, didn’t trust any of them. It made him so angry his hands curled into fists. He wasn’t the violent type, but right now, he would relish one of Morgan’s barroom brawls.

Sawyer surged to his feet to pace. He wanted to shake her; he wanted to pull her up against his body, feel her softness and kiss her silly again until she stopped resisting him, until she stopped fighting. He tightened his thighs, trying for an ounce of logic. “How in hell are we supposed to figure this out if you won’t even answer a few simple questions?”

Morgan leaned back and stacked his hands behind his head. Jordan propped his chin on a fist. Gabe lifted one brow.

“You’re not supposed to figure anything out.” Honey drew a deep breath, watching him steadily. “You’re just supposed to let me go.”

CHAPTER SIX

SAWYER’S DARK EYES glittered with menace, and his powerful body tensed.

Watching him with an arrested expression, Morgan murmured, “Fascinating.”

Jordan, also watching, said, “Shh.”

Honey turned to Gabe, ignoring the other brothers, and especially Sawyer’s astounding reaction to her refusal of help. She couldn’t look at him without hurting, without wishing things could be different. She’d known him almost no time at all, yet she felt as if she’d known him forever. He’d managed, without much effort, to forge a permanent place in her memory. After she was gone, she’d miss him horribly.

Gabe grinned at her. It seemed they all loved to be provoking, but she wasn’t up to another round. All the questions on Alden had shaken her. She’d tried to answer without telling too much, juggling her replies so that Sawyer might be appeased but at the same time wouldn’t learn too much. Alden had been so vicious about her refusal to come back to him, to continue on with the marriage, she didn’t dare involve anyone else in her troubles, especially not Sawyer, until she better understood the full risk, and why it existed in the first place.

She’d been looking blankly at Gabe for some time now, and she cleared her throat. “Does your handyman expertise extend to cars?”

“Sure.”

Jordan kicked him under the table. Honey knew it, but in light of everything else they’d done, it didn’t seem that strange or important.

While Gabe rubbed his shin and glared daggers at Jordan, Sawyer stalked over to her side of the table. With every pump of her heart, she was aware of him standing so close. She could feel his heat, breathe his scent, unique above and beyond the other brothers, who each pulsed with raw vitality. But her awareness, her female sensitivity, was attuned to Sawyer alone. Her skin flushed as if he’d stroked those large, rough hands down her body, when in fact he’d done no more than stand there, gazing down at her.

When she refused to meet his gaze, he propped both hands on his hips and loomed over her. “Gabe can fix your car, but you’re not going anywhere until I’m satisfied that it’s safe, which means you’re going to have to quit stalling and explain some things.”

Honey sighed again and tilted her head back to see him. Sawyer was so tall, even when standing she was barely even with his collarbone. Since she was sitting, he seemed as tall as a mountain. She really was tired of getting the third degree by overpowering men. “Sawyer, how can I explain what I don’t understand myself?”

“Maybe if you’d just tell us what you do understand, we could come up with something that makes sense.”

Leave it to a man to think he could understand what a woman couldn’t. Her father had always been the same, so condescending, ready to discount her input on everything. And Alden. She shuddered at her own stupidity in ever agreeing to marry the pompous ass. Now that she’d met Sawyer and seen how caring a man could be…

With a groan she leaned forward, elbows on the table, and covered her face with her hands.

She was getting in too deep, making comparisons she shouldn’t make. Morgan was right, he could start tracking her down. And since she didn’t know what the threat was, only that it was serious, it was entirely possible he’d accidentally lead the threat to her—and to this family. She couldn’t have that.

Car keys hung accessible on the wall by the back door. Sawyer wouldn’t be sleeping in the same room with her tonight; there was no need. She’d have to take advantage of the opportunity. She’d borrow one of their vehicles, go into town and then get a bus ticket. She could leave a note telling Sawyer where to find his car.

Just the thought of leaving distressed her on so many levels, she knew she had to go as soon as possible, whether she felt up to it physically or not.

Sawyer evidently wanted her for a fling; he’d made his interest very obvious with that last kiss. He’d also indicated he found her to be a royal pain in the backside, and no wonder, considering she’d wrecked his fence and left a rusted car in his lake, along with taking his bed and keeping him up at night. When he wasn’t watching her with sexual heat in his dark eyes, he was frowning at her with unadulterated frustration.

She felt the same incredible chemistry between them, but she also felt so much more. He had the family life she’d always wondered about, the closeness and camaraderie, the sharing and support that she’d always believed to be a mere fairy tale. So often she’d longed for the lifestyle he possessed. And he was that special kind of man who not only accepted that lifestyle, but also contributed to it, a driving force in making it work for everyone.

She found Sawyer very sexually appealing, but he also felt safe and comforting. Security was a natural part of him, something built into his genetic makeup. And after the way her engagement had ended, she would never settle for half measures again, not when there was so much more out there.