Everything You Need (5 page)

“I’ll be there in an hour,” Brice said.

She put down the beer at the edge of the porch.
“Okay.”

Confused and uncertain, Hazel turned away. She’d
grown up with the bare minimum of family, a mother and father. Her
parents, only children, had raised an only child. She had always
enjoyed Christmas and Thanksgiving even though there was a huge
hole where something was missing in their celebrations. She
couldn’t wrap her mind around not wanting to see her family.

“Hazel.”

She stopped down the walkway and faced him.

“I’m sorry.”

Unsure what he was apologizing for, she didn’t have
the heart to ask why, not when the heaviness of his emotions filled
the air. “Okay.”

She forced herself to move forward, to not look back
or go to him. What exactly could she, a virtual stranger, give him
what he needed? If she dared listen to her head, she shouldn’t have
wanted to.

*****

Brice parked outside the restaurant and scowled at
it. His bastard of a brother had trapped him.

A woman he had no intention of seeing again was about
to meet his family. Months from now, long after Hazel would have
disappeared from his life, the Creed breed would still ask how she
was doing. They’d shake their heads as if her one-time appearance
proved how incapable he was of taking care of himself and his
professional life.

Where did we go wrong?
rang in his ears as he
cut the engine. His bones seemed to creak when he stepped outside
the car. He was jolted back to life when Hazel laid a hand on his
shoulder.

At his side, she asked, “Are you okay?”

Brice couldn’t be sure—his thoughts had pulled him
undertow—but that had to be the sixth time she’d asked the question
since he’d picked her up.

“Yeah, fine. You? We can always go back to your place
and relax.”

“I am relaxed.” Worry filled her gaze, but she
smiled.

He followed the sway of her hips, but his mind
unfortunately couldn’t appreciate the sight. The first and the last
time he’d introduced his family to someone, he’d still been in high
school. Prom to be exact.

After the pictures were taken at his place, Brice’s
date wore a stunned expression for the rest of the night. Yes, of
course, he had to take her to his house, even though prom night was
traditionally for the female.

He shook his head and brought himself to real time.
His brother sat, alone, at the table. Brice wasn’t a fool. It
wouldn’t be that way for long. When his brother had stepped out of
the shower, hair still wet, Tony’s phone had been glued to his
hand. For all Brice knew, the President of the United States might
show up.

“Oh, don’t you look beautiful,” Tony said and pulled
out a chair for Hazel.

Brice intentionally sat across from her. He wanted to
watch the signs she was ready to leave, so they could make their
escape before her head exploded—or, worse, she ran out of the
restaurant screaming.

“I’ve ordered some popcorn shrimp, if you don’t
mind.”

Hazel laughed in disbelief. “I’m starting to realize
you simply can’t turn it off.”

Brice wanted to laugh too at the observation, but the
tension building in his neck prevented any kind of enjoyment from
Hazel calling out his brother on being full of shit.

In the past twenty-four hours he’d learned the woman
across from him didn’t impress easily. She sure as hell didn’t
mince words. If his head didn’t feel like it would split into a
million pieces, he might have found the room to respect her for
it.

Tony reached over and patted him on the back. “Looks
like you need a drink.” He raised his finger and a waiter appeared
out of nowhere. “I’m paying for lunch. I’m going to consider this a
business engagement.”

Hazel pursed her lips. “Why?”

“Pops won’t question it,” Tony said, but his gaze
went to Brice with full understanding.

She leaned forward, not looking at Tony. The knots in
Brice’s stomach eased for some reason. The coffee-colored gaze had
that effect on him. “Tell me about The Don, Brice.”

Brice found himself smiling back at her. “Pops would
get a kick out of that name.”

Her tongue flitted out of her mouth, wetting the
corner of her lips. His groin tightened at the action. God, even
with the tension building in the base of his head, Brice wanted
her. He wanted to taste her again, this time without vodka clouding
her senses. He wanted to hear her moan again from pleasure. The
room disappeared and only Hazel was in it.

“So, tell me,” she said, eyes lit with humor. “Can
you speak Italian?”

The muscles eased. “If I tell ya, I’d have to kill
ya.”

Her eyes sparkled. “An offer I can’t refuse.”

The fist around his heart loosened. “You tell
me.”

Tony cleared his throat. “Look, it’s Maria. I wonder
how she got here.”

Maria was his oldest sister and only one of out of
the thousands of siblings he had. Brice kept his gaze on Hazel.
Hell, it seemed as if he couldn’t break the contact. “It’ll be good
to see her.”

She mouthed to him,
it’s okay
, and for once in
his life when it came to his family, Brice wanted to believe
it.

Chapter 5

Hazel waved goodbye one last time to the Creed family
brood. Exhaustion weighed her limbs. No wonder Brice tried to avoid
them at all cost. She counted five other siblings besides Tony. She
was sure Brice’s mother counted Tony as five children by himself.
She settled into the car and turned to Brice. Fear no longer etched
lines onto his face, but tension kept his jaw taut.

He spoke, “I’m sorry about that. I didn’t think Tony
would be able to pull this off in such a short amount of time. All
of my family lives on the mainland and only God knows how they got
here in record time.”

“I told you it’s okay. I’m used to schmoozing large
groups of people.”

Brice snorted. “You never had to schmooze my
family.”

“True.” She glanced out the window and they were
almost at her cabin already. She took a deep breath before saying,
“I’m not the big family type. Or at least I’m not from one.”

He chuckled. “You could have fooled me. You didn’t
take offense at the prying questions, and you answered them like a
professional.”

She picked at some invisible lint on her jeans. “I’m
used to it in my professional life.”

He glanced at her but then had his eyes back on the
unpaved road. “It’s more than that.”

She noted he wasn’t white-knuckling the steering
wheel this time around. On the ride to lunch she’d worried he’d pop
a knucklebone from the grip he’d had.

But then, memories crossed her mind of the sedate
family dinners while growing up. Hazel would have given anything
for the loud and boisterous time she experienced. They’d eaten and
then sat for hours afterward. However, no matter how much fun, she
saw how each comment dug a hole in Brice. He was the butt of every
joke.

According to his family he was flighty,
irresponsible, and had an attention span of a gnat. They’d known
him for twenty-eight years, but from what she’d seen of his tool
belt alone she knew he took his work seriously.

On this island, there weren’t many places to buy the
specialty tools he had hanging from his belt and the comfort in
which he wielded the tools meant he invested in his craft, in
himself.

So far from the man they painted. Most of the men she
met in her profession didn’t have either the tools or the mindset
to whip an ailing house into shape by themselves. For one it was
insane, but it took skill and balls to do it anyway.

The tires crunched in the sand outside the cabin. She
opened the car door and made her way to the stoop. She’d gone light
on the alcohol, but seeing him this time of night still created a
heady buzz in her head.

Hazel stuffed her hands in the back pockets of the
jeans, and leaned against the door. He stopped in front of her.

“You can say you had a horrible time and I’d
understand,” Brice said with humor, but Hazel could hear the
vulnerability.

“I had a good time,” she said with sincerity. “Stop
worrying.”

The silence built around them, but he didn’t move
from the spot. The night didn’t feel finished and Hazel knew in her
gut they’d kiss again. This time around she wanted a clear
mind.

“Either way,” he said. “You didn’t run for the
hills.”

She dropped her gaze to the ground and asked the
question nagging at her. “Do they always treat you like that?”

He sighed heavily, but took a step closer to her. “I
made it easy for them to.”

This time she didn’t stop the urge to reach out to
him. His body did more than stop the chill from the breeze coming
off the ocean. Her nipples hardened against the cotton t-shirt and
she pressed against him to ease the ache. He placed his chin atop
her head and they stayed that way for a while.

“Either way,” he said softly. “Thank you.”

The words vibrated through her. She lifted her head,
meeting his gaze. His eyes once again matched the dark night. When
their mouths met it was different. His mouth was tender against
hers, and if they’d been sitting down she’d have crawled into his
lap to pull him closer, to feel the heat of his sex against her
own.

Hazel settled for his body being plastered to hers.
She couldn’t answer for him, but this was treading on new ground
and she liked how dangerous but how safe it felt.

She pressed closer still, needing the taste and feel
of him. She moaned deep and long when his hands caressed the sides
of her breasts. It was cliché to think no man had ever touched her,
kissed her like Brice was doing, but being kissed this way, this
deeply—this passionately felt new.

Her body reacted like it had never done before and
Hazel pressed even closer to him. She didn’t want the space, the
coldness to come over like the first taste of reality. She wanted
this fantasy to go on. His mouth on hers. His tongue flittering
over her lips and back again into her mouth, tasting, teasing the
very essence of her. She sank her teeth into the soft flesh of his
bottom lip and was rewarded with a groan.

“We shouldn’t,” he murmured against her mouth.

“I know,” Hazel murmured back, but let her tongue
rove over his again.

Since high school she hadn’t been this turned on by
mouths meeting in the dark. Kissing Brice somehow felt
forbidden.

God, she loved the way it made her flush with the
thought. Her back melded into the door, and she thought it would
only be fitting if they fell through it onto the floor. She
wouldn’t stop what would happen next, nor could she encourage it.
She didn’t know him. Not the intimate details of what made him who
he was. She would have stepped back if she weren’t already pinned
to the door.

“Brice,” his name was uttered as a moan.

He nipped at the corner of her mouth. “Yes, I
know.”

He took the kiss deeper before stepping back. His
lids were low from arousal. “This feels like high school.”

Hazel chuckled, since that’s what she’d been
thinking. “You walked me home, had heavy petting.” She sighed and
it bordered on another moan. “If I feel the need to decorate I’ll
come by and see you tomorrow?”

The smile started slowly. “Since Tony is like the
clap and I can’t seem to get rid of him, we’ll at least have
supervision.”

“Okay.” She didn’t want to go inside by herself, but
it was for the best. “Night.”

She stumbled through the door and leaned against it.
If he kept making her feel like this, supervision would be
damned.

*****

“You got in late last night.” Tony pried the plank
from the porch with a crowbar.

“I had to take Hazel to the G ward on the mainland
after meeting you guys.”

“She seemed to handle it pretty well.” Tony tossed
the plank onto the growing pile to their left. He bent down to the
next one. Brice laid down the new wood in its place.

“You know Maria is going to talk to Mom about
her.”

The wood beneath was oak, and they didn’t have to
replace the beams because of it. “I’m sure she will.”

Tony tossed the next plank and Brice moved into his
place. “She seems really nice.”

Brice didn’t reply at first, but sealed two new
pieces of wood together. “Yup. She is.”

“So when are you going to tell Hazel you just want
her to design the house?”

This conversation had been boiling since Hazel had
told Tony of her occupation. Brice concentrated on nailing down the
next plank. “It’s complicated,” he finally answered.

“Especially if you plan to fuck her and during the
afterglow ask her to do you a favor.” Tony continued down the
porch, but unleashed anger leaked into his words.

Brice held a nail between his teeth. The words hit
their intended target and he could have been able to break it in
half. “It’s complicated.”

“I think you should tell her now.” Tony threw the
last old plank and reached for a new one to replace it.

“I think you should mind your own business. I sure as
shit didn’t ask you to come out here to help me nor to give me
brotherly advice.”

“Pops asked me to.”

And that really meant Pops told Tony to come help.
The main reason Brice hadn’t gone into the family business—it kept
him out of his parents’ reach. Somehow he’d avoided the iron fist
longer than the rest of his siblings. It probably had everything to
do with being the youngest. By the time he came along, their
parental reserves were tapped. Well, it was a working theory.

Tony turned and started to mix the varnish.
“Brice.”

“Tony, let it drop.”

“I can tell she really likes you. Hell, she didn’t
run by the time Lisa made it to lunch. I haven’t had a date stick
around that long, myself.”

“Let it drop,” Brice said slowly, barely holding on
to his temper.