Allison Leigh - A Weaver Beginning

“I’ll draw him one.” Stretching, Dillon worked the cookies into the snow above the carrot nose. They were a little uneven but seemed to suit the small-headed, big-bellied guy.

“What about his mouth?” Abby asked.

“He don’t need a mouth.”

“Sure he does,” Sloan argued. “What if a pretty snowgirl came by and wanted to kiss him?” He enjoyed watching the pink color bloom in Abby’s cheeks.

Dillon, however, wrinkled his nose. “Kissing’s gross.”

Sloan hid a smile. “Depends on the snowgirl, kid.”

“Now I see why you’re not still hanging around the office on your day off.”

Sloan looked over his shoulder to see Pam Rasmussen sitting in her SUV, the window rolled down. She was grinning like the cat who’d gotten the cream. “Looks like y’all are having fun.”

He didn’t want to imagine the speculation going on inside the dispatcher’s busy mind as he started to provide the briefest of introductions.

But they turned out to be unnecessary when Abby crossed the lawn and shook Pam’s hand through the opened window. “I think we actually know each other through an old friend of mine from high school,” she told her. “Delia Templeton?”

Pam clapped her hands together. “Of course!” Her gaze went past Abby to Sloan. “Delia’s my cousin,” she told him. “Well, my husband Rob’s cousin, anyway. And now here you are, playing in the snow with one of our very own deputy sheriffs. What a small, small world.”

Sloan could practically see the wheels turning inside Pam’s head. “What’re you doing here, Pam?” She and Rob lived on the other side of town.

“Doing a favor for my mom. She’s been keeping an eye on her uncle’s house while he’s been gone.” She gestured toward the house on the other side of Abby’s where old Gilcrest lived. “He’s coming back tomorrow, and she wanted the heat turned up for him. Told her I’d take care of it when my shift ended. Never expected to find a little romance brewing right next door.” She smiled slyly as her SUV began slowly rolling forward. “Better get that heat going.”

Sloan managed not to groan. “Don’t pay her any attention,” he told Abby as Pam drove a little farther and stopped in front of her uncle’s house. “She’s always like that.”

“I know.” Her head bobbed quickly. “Delia has shared loads of stories about her family. Everyone is into everyone’s business.” She looked over at Dillon, who’d lost interest in what the adults were doing and was sitting on the porch steps holding two chocolate cookies in front of his face as though they were his eyes. She grinned at the sight and looked back at Sloan. “Do you have plans for dinner today? I’m not fixing anything fancy—nothing like a turkey or black-eyed peas, but—”

“I do have plans,” he cut her off abruptly then felt like a heel. He was aware of the way Pam was watching them as she walked up to the old man’s house. “I promised my sister. Family dinner.”

“Abby, I wanna make a badge for the snowman.”

Her gray gaze cut away from his face to look at her brother. “Sure thing, honey.” She glanced at Sloan again as she started toward the house. “Thanks for your help with the snowman. Hope you have a good time with your sister.”

Given a choice, he’d have been happy to stay right where he was, with or without Pam’s unwanted attention. There wasn’t a romance brewing for the simple reason that he didn’t do romance. No point.

But the heat? That was definitely already on.

Chapter Four

“Here.” A longneck bottle appeared over Sloan’s shoulder, and he looked back to see his brother-in-law standing there.

He wanted nothing from Axel, but he could see Tara watching them from across the living room of the Double-C’s main house, where they’d all congregated after the New Year’s Day feast. He accepted the bottle and clinked the bottom of it once against Axel’s and turned his attention back to the football game playing on the wall-mounted television.

His hope that the other man would move along was blown when Axel sat down on the couch, too.

“Tara’s worried you’re going to book when your stint with Max is up.”

He already knew that. But he was damned if he knew what to do about it when he couldn’t even figure out what he wanted to do. He thought a little longingly of Abby’s dinner. He wouldn’t be having this conversation if he’d canceled on his sister and stayed with Abby and Dillon. But if he’d canceled, he’d just have another thing to regret where Tara was concerned. “Whether I stay or not doesn’t have anything to do with Tara.”

Axel grimaced. “Right, ’cause it has to do with me.”

Sloan picked at the bottle label with his thumb. “I don’t want to talk about this.”

“Neither do I. But I love my wife. And she loves you.”

“I’ve told her she needs to stop worrying about me.”

Axel laughed shortly. “Yeah. That’s going to happen. She’s finally got you back. She doesn’t want to lose you again.”

“Whatever I decide, she’s not going to lose me.” He kept his focus on the television, even though the first half of the football game had just ended. “Undercover work for me is in the past.” He hadn’t merely worked undercover. He’d been deep undercover. So deep, and for so long, that the line between reality and fiction had gotten way too blurred.

Some days—most days—it still felt that way.

The record books would show a successful conclusion to the operation. A deadly gang had been dismantled. Murdering thieves had been imprisoned.

But in the end, Sloan’s ATF career had been toast and the woman he’d loved—whom Axel Clay had been brought in to protect—had been dead.

He knew he couldn’t lay the blame for Maria’s death at Axel’s door even if he wanted to. Sloan was the one who’d set that into motion when he’d told her the truth about what he was really doing. He hadn’t wanted to lose her. But he’d lost her anyway when she’d tried going back to her old life once he’d taken his years of evidence to his bosses. If she hadn’t known the truth about Sloan, they’d have left her alone. She wouldn’t have been a possible witness in their eyes; she’d have just been the cocktail waitress they’d never had reason to distrust.

All she’d wanted to do was keep her life intact, but she’d paid a fatal price for it. Then it all seemed to be repeating itself when Sloan’s sister suddenly found herself in the same sort of danger. It was Axel who’d succeeded in keeping Tara safe. Sloan was grateful for that, but he still knew it was his fault that she’d needed protecting in the first place.

He gave his brother-in-law a steady look. “Whether I stay or go doesn’t have anything to do with you, either,” he said evenly. “Or Maria,” he made himself add. For his sister’s sake. “Tara’s good at putting down roots. I’m not.”

“You’re good at it when there’s something that matters enough to you.” Axel’s tone was just as deliberate. “You spent a lot of years riding with Johnny Diablo and the Deuces.” He scooped up his two-year-old son, Aidan, who was chasing full tilt after one of his older cousins. “Seems to me the question is what does matter that much to you?”

Sloan caught his nephew’s wildly swinging foot before it connected with his face and tickled the bottom of it, making Aidan squeal. The little whirlwind managed to climb from his dad’s lap to Sloan’s back, where he clung like a monkey. “Ride! Ride!”

Glad for an excuse, Sloan rose from the couch. “Duty calls.” He turned on his heel to give Axel’s son his requested ride.

They went as far as the basement, which was as crowded as the upstairs living room. The main house was big, but so was the extensive Clay family. They had every age covered from babies to octogenarians.