Page 89 of The Moment He Couldn’t Walk Away

“You’re an asshole,” Lynx muttered.

“Hey, don’t get angry with me because you’re a night owl. Not my fault you rock star prima donnas sleep all day and party into the early hours.”

“Fuck you.”

His brother inhaled his coffee while Finch made toast and scrambled eggs with bacon, which he hoped his parents didn’t smell, as his mother would lecture him about the life that was taken so he could eat.

“So, Nina?”

“She’s in the bathroom.”

“You know what I mean, Finch.”

“All you said was ‘So, Nina?’”

“Are you two going to have a thing?”

He turned down the heat in the pan so the butter didn’t burn and looked at his brother. “If only your adoring fans could see you now.”

“They’d love me if I walked around in a plastic bag—which I wouldn’t because plastic is bad for the environment—but we digress. Are you two going to have a thing?”

“By thing, do you mean relationship?” Finch asked, stalling for time.

“That.” Lynx jabbed a finger at him.

Finch went back to his eggs. “Butter that toast.”

His brother shuffled to the toaster and lowered his mug onto the countertop.

“And I don’t know. Honestly, I’m not really in a good place to think about anything like that, but⁠—”

“You can’t know when love is going to slap you hard in the face,” Lynx added.

“No one said anything about the L-word, bro.”

“Didn’t have to, I have eyes, don’t I? You only ever show this kind of emotion for your family because you love us. Ergo, you love her.”

“Ergo?” His heart rate had just increased at his brother’s words.

“Morning, Lynx.”

The McAllister brothers turned as one and looked at Nina. Her hair was wet, she wore his sister’s clothes and his socks, and right then Finch knew his brother’s words had a ring of truth to them.

What he was feeling was very possibly a lot more than like, and Finch wondered how it had crept up on him so fast.

Chapter 24

She hadn’t cried in the shower or while getting dressed, so that was good because she’d done far too much of that lately. But Nina had stood there with the hot water streaming over her body and thought, What do I do now?

Last night she was sure someone had set fire to something inside her house. But why? Nina had no answer for that, but plenty of questions and ideas that she’d be talking through with Sheriff Dans today.

To ensure her safety, Finch and Lynx took her back to the McAllister cottage. She had put up some resistance when the decision had been made for her—Nina was never good at letting someone else make choices for her—but she’d given in and ended up here.

She’d then spent the night in Finch’s arms and slept better than she had in days. They hadn’t spoken when they’d gotten into bed, but they had this morning.

“Who am I if I’m not a soldier?” His words had been raw and vulnerable, and they surprised Nina because she’d never thought he’d share something like that with her. They’d made her ache to take away his pain, and yet right then, she had little to give other than words because she was raw and vulnerable, too, no matter how much she was fighting it.

Nina knew there was so much more to Finch, but it didn’t matter how she and others saw him; it was about how he saw himself.