Worth the Wait (McKinney_Walker #1)(67)

“As long as you know if you hurt her, I’ll kill you.”

“As long as you know you’d have to kill me to get me to let her go.”

“Mmm.” While he did have a growing respect for the man, Nick wasn’t going to go out of his way to let him know that. Better to keep him on his toes. “We’re going out for a drink later.”

“Who’s ‘we’?”

“Me, Luke, Zach, if he can make it. And you.”

“That doesn’t sound like an invitation,” Stephen said, spearing him with a look.

“You’re about to marry my sister,” Nick said, looking right back. “It’s not.”

“I guess I could do that. Hannah’s doing a girl thing. Some special after-hours-champagne-dress-try-on party.”

“A shopping party when you already know what you’re buying?”

Stephen shrugged in shared male bafflement.

“Aww. Look at you two talking,” Hannah said, coming back with a small gray horse. “Makes my heart swell.”

Nick would have sworn McKinney took a deep inhale of breath, like just seeing his fiancée filled him with the air he needed. He could tolerate the man for that alone. That’s how it was with Mia. At the thought of her, he breathed through the tightness in his chest.

“I have to go.” Stephen kissed his sister deeply right in front of him.

If he was trying to get under his skin, it worked.

“I put your drink in the fridge. The food’s on your desk.”

Hannah tipped her face up to him for another kiss. “You’re too good to me.”

“Never.”

On that, at least, they agreed, Nick thought.

“Miko’s at seven,” Nick said.

Stephen nodded then, with a smirk, passed him on his way out. “Later, detective.”

Hannah watched Stephen go then turned and narrowed her eyes. “Do you have to do that?”

“Do what?”

“Puff yourself up every time you see him?”

“I don’t puff up.”

“If you stuck your chest out any farther, you’d grow antlers and start bumping like moose.”

“You’re my baby sister. What do you expect me to do? And why am I getting in trouble? He just kissed you right in front of me.”

“I know. He did. We do other stuff, too,” she whispered.

He pressed his fingers to his eyes to block out any images. “Don’t.”

“Don’t be mean to him,” she shot back then lifted a finger before he could speak. “Miko’s?”

He grinned. “Just being friendly. McKinney can take care of himself. It’s my job to let him know I’m watching.”

She rolled her eyes, went into the tack room, and came back with a bucket of tools. Brush, hoof pick, other stuff he had no idea about. She went to work with the brush first. “Mia was out earlier.”

“Really? I was planning on going by before I went back to Maryland.” Planning to and fighting the knot in his gut, because if he was honest with himself, and really, he might as well be, he was terrified.

There was so much between them, both trying to figure out all the twists and turns. Too much between them to jump halfway. She was right to go slow. What they’d had, what they were trying to get back, was no small thing. You didn’t date or dance around it, not when you’d had what they’d once had. A once-in-a-lifetime love, if there was such a thing. For him there was.

He loved her, every cell of his body belonged to her, and the thought of her saying she didn’t love him, didn’t want him…It was almost more than he could take. Another reason he was giving her time and space. Because he was afraid.

“She brought me some old pictures she thought I might want,” Hannah said, lifting the horse’s back hoof. “She said the two of you had talked.”

He rubbed Hazel between the ears, and she lowered her head in ecstasy. “Yeah. We have.”

“Mmm hmm.”

“What does that mean?”

“Nothing.”

He let her get away with the ‘nothing,’ lost in his own thoughts for a moment, looking at Hannah here in her element. He’d had plenty of time to think over the past months. “You know, Mia wanted to send you to a place like this. She thought you’d be better off. A recovery place, outdoors, with horses and…” He laughed, not feeling at all funny. “That’s exactly what ended up helping.”

“Yes.”

“So she was right,” he said, fighting more guilt. “You could have gone sooner, could have healed sooner, but I couldn’t let you go.”

Hannah set Hazel’s hoof down gently and looked at him. “Do you really think there was one right answer? One right moment to do the right thing? You never gave up on me. You were always there.” She came around to stand in front of him, wrapped her arms around his waist, and looked up, smiling. “You brought me back, Nick. And now look where I am.”