Her jaw dropped. “Excuse me?”

“Honestly, after how Brian’s gone on and on about you over the years, I never figured you for a brother-hopper. I can’t believe you’d do this to him. What was the big plan? Sneak back onto my property and attempt to seduce me in that trampy get-up?”

His eyes dropped mockingly to her drenched chest, which was basically naked under the now transparent fabric plastered to her body like shrink-wrap. “Did you really think that was going to tempt me enough that I’d forget you’re dating my brother?”

He scoffed coldly and drilled her with a glower. “Let’s face it, honey, you’re not exactly the wet t-shirt type.”

Trembling with an equal amount of outrage and hurt, Abby shot him with the most lethal look she could muster before scrambling back to the porch and grabbing her book bag on the fly.

Without another word—though she had a few choice ones in mind—she turned and took off down the driveway.

Away from that colossal asshole.

CHAPTER THREE

AS CONNOR WATCHED ABBY flee his lot, upset and clearly mortified, he wondered why the sight of her tears was having such an effect on him.

It’s not as if she were the first woman he’d shot down for showing up at his house half-dressed and looking for a good time. She was, however, the only one he’d ever had to turn away because of his brother.

Okay, so a part of him felt like a jerk for what he’d said to her. But just picturing how bummed Brian would be about all this was enough to send those guilty feelings packing.

Running off with her tail between her legs was the very least she deserved for screwing with Brian. Connor just hoped his brother wasn’t too serious about her yet. The fact that the two had been best friends for so long surely complicated things.

Regardless, he’d be brutally honest and help Brian nip the doomed relationship in the bud before she broke his heart down the line.

There would be no backseat-brothering on this one.

Standing idly by while Brian had limited his life to just plain existing for the past year had been torture.

But it had been a cakewalk compared to seeing him spend a decade waiting for a horrible illness to slowly kill the love of his life.

Beth had been Brian’s world, his high school sweetheart, the girl he’d come home vowing he was going to spend his life with the day he’d met her.

Receiving the devastating news that Beth’s time with him would be far shorter and infinitely rougher—mere weeks after their unplanned child was born—simply prompted Brian to love and live every day following like it was their last.

And he’d only been nineteen at the time.

Connor wouldn’t wish that on his worst enemy.

Day after day, he’d watched Brian go to that hospital room and whisper reminders to Beth of how much she was loved, long after the dementia from her disease had stolen everything that was sweet and good in her...along with all her memories of her husband and child.

Honestly, Connor wasn’t sure he’d have been able to survive it had the roles been reversed, and God knew the years before the hospitalization had been just as bad, in an entirely different way. He still got chills thinking of the day he’d heard Beth’s slurred voice screaming for Brian to take Skylar and leave, let her kill herself to end it all.

Damn that disease.

“Uncle Connor? What are you doing home?”

Connor almost jumped out of his skin.

Shit, Skylar.

The whole reason he was home this afternoon to begin with.

It was no secret Connor adored his niece Skylar. And with him living so close to the middle school she’d just gotten a boundary exemption to attend, her walking over to his home while he was at work had been his no-brainer solution to Brian’s dilemma over whether to go back to coaching afterschool this year.

Fast forward to today, however, and Connor had found himself envisioning everything from kidnappers to sudden black holes opening up in his quiet street for most of the morning.

It was just a few measly blocks for crying out loud but he couldn’t help it. After the rough hand the universe has dealt the poor girl, they were all a little overprotective of her.

Hell, Brian had moved mountains just to get Skylar into this new school to begin with. The minute he’d found out that Skylar’s best friend would be moving away not long after Beth’s passing, Brian had begun a campaign involving everything short of stalking the educational board to get district approval so the two best-friends-since-daycare could at least be in the same school again this upcoming year.

Thank God it had worked out.

Connor couldn’t imagine what it was like for an eleven-year old to lose her mom the way she did. She’d barely said one word throughout the entire holiday season last winter. Really, the school transfer was the first thing she’d seemed truly happy about all year.

Ditto for her dad.

And now this Abby fiasco to add to everything Brian’s already been through? For Pete’s sake, couldn’t the universe give his little brother a break for a change?

His silent Abby-riled diatribe temporarily forgotten at the sound of Skylar coming up beside him on the walkway, Connor immediately shifted to damage control assessment.

What were the chances that Skylar had caught the full frontal of Abby all slutted-up just now?

With Abby being the closest thing Skylar had for an aunt, how the hell was he supposed to explain this without traumatizing the poor girl?

Damn that woman for putting me in this situation.

“Why hello to you too, princess,” he tossed out casually, turning to greet her with a smile. “I had a few hours free so I thought I’d hang out with you on your first day here.”

“Oh, cool.” She looked around. “Hey, where’d Abby go?”

Fan-frickin-tastic. “So you saw her here, huh? She wasn’t here long…she just stopped by to, uh—”

“She left?” A too-mature frown marred Skylar’s little pixie face. “I told her to wait ‘til I brought back an umbrella for her.” Shaking out a butt-ugly yellow rain slicker, she pouted some more. “And she didn’t even take back her poncho!”

He did a double take. “What do you mean?”

“Abby lent it to me before we ran over here.”

Gulping, Connor felt cold hard shame start to prickle over his skin. “Abby ran all the way here in the rain with you?”

“Yeah, it started coming down right when I left school. She found me under a tree trying to stay dry.”

Skylar surveyed the rapidly worsening weather worriedly. “Dad will totally kill me if she catches a cold this week with all her…wait a sec—” She swung a suspicious look back his way. “Abby never leaves without saying bye. Did you say something to her?”

Smart girl.

Choosing to sidestep her question for the time being, Connor pulled out his smartphone and asked instead, “Do you spell Abby’s last name with two T’s or one at the end?”

“Two.” She raised a brow. “Why? Are you looking her up to apologize for something? If so, I have her cell phone number.”

He sighed. “Unfortunately, I don’t think a simple apology is going to cut it. I think I need to send her a whole bunch of sorry-I-was-such-an-idiot flowers.”

“Holy moly, what did you say to her?”

He again, refrained from answering.

No need to piss his niece off too.

Quickly texting a request for his assistant to order him the most extravagant floral arrangement she could find, he ignored his niece’s interrogation once again. “You wouldn’t happen to know Abby’s address would you?”

“Nope.” A slow, serves-you-right smile hooked her lips. “But dad does.”

Silently, he unleashed a string of expletives and began estimating what the going rate was for bribing a kid nowadays.

It’d be worth it for the stay of execution by Brian’s hand.