But the beautiful girl, er, woman standing before him wasn't just any woman. She was his best friend's little sister. Strictly off-limits. That was guy code 101.

And even if she weren't, it wouldn't be fair of him to expect anyone to shoulder the big pile of screwed-up he'd become, especially someone just starting out in the world like Alyssa.

"So," she said, turning away from him again, "would you like me to finish the employee manual or..."

"Yeah," Pete said. "Go ahead and do that and let me know when you're done. I'll answer any questions you have, then give you the ten-cent tour. Oh, and I need to make a copy of your driver's license for proof of age."

"Sure." She bent and retrieved her purse from the floor.

Marco barely restrained a groan. Those jeans were going to be the death of him. "I, uh..." He scrubbed a hand over his face. "I'm gonna get back to inventorying." He crossed the room, seeing the box that had brought him in here looking for Pete in the first place. "Oh, and this case wasn't on the list."

"Just leave it there," his manager called. "I'll look at it after I'm done here." Pete accepted the license from Alyssa and she returned to the seat where Marco had first seen her.

Marco retreated to the barroom, stepped around the boxes he had scattered on the floor behind the long bar, and retrieved his clipboard. On a sigh, he dropped it with a clatter to the lacquered surface and braced his hands against the edge.

When he'd first walked into the dining room, he'd been so surprised to find someone sitting there, he hadn't realized who it was. And then she'd looked so much older than the last time he'd seen her two Christmases ago that it took his brain a moment to connect the dots.

Older, but still too innocent, especially for this place.

He stifled a groan and threw himself back into counting and stocking bottles of wine, beer, and liquor. But his mind kept returning to the too-cute-for-her-own-good brunette sitting just around the corner.

Why had she come back to Frederick? It wasn't like she had family here. Brady was still in the Special Forces, deployed God knew where, and Marco had only run into Joseph Scott once since he'd returned to town. Their father hadn't changed one iota as far as he could see. He might've felt sorry for the guy if he hadn't seen firsthand how Joe's heartbreak over his wife's death had hurt his kids, literally. Brady and Alyssa had shown up at his house with more than one bruise or cut over the years. He sincerely hoped she wasn't planning to visit the old man.

Marco crouched down and sliced the blade of the utility knife along the seam of the next box.

The Scotts' experience, wanting to stand up for other people who couldn't stand up for themselves-that's what made him want to join the military. Now who did he stand up for?

"Aw, hell." A headache flared up under his left ear. He sank to his knees and closed his eyes, concentrating on the breathing exercises he'd been taught. In for two. Out for two. Over and over until his head stopped swimming. Opening his eyes, he found himself kneading at his left arm, the one that had been torn apart from bicep to wrist by a booby-trapped explosive he barely remembered. Surgeons had rebuilt his arm as good as could be expected, especially since the nerve damage was so extensive they'd initially doubted he'd have coordinated use of his hand, but the tendon transplant never healed right. His fingers remained weak, and his elbow was stiff as hell.

But the shit with his brain was worse. It blanked out a big spot in his memory and tormented him with haunting nightmares and frustrating apraxia, the occasional inability to say a word and communicate his thoughts. And surgeons didn't have a fix for those.

All of which gave him a one-way ticket to separation and retirement.

Do not pass go.

Do not collect two hundred dollars.

Marco ripped the box open and removed the bottles, lining them up next to him. Seeing Alyssa again made him feel trapped between two worlds but not fully a part of either. In those few short moments they'd spoken, her very presence had pulled him back in time to when he knew who he was and what he wanted. When he believed he could do or be anything.

And then she'd said how glad she was that he was home, and it was like a sucker punch to the gut-because all he'd wanted for ten long months was to be back out there, doing what he'd trained to do. Which was never going to happen.

Letting go of that man and those dreams... He'd never find his way to being okay with that.

On a curse, Marco tossed the empty box behind him.

This right here was the problem. Twenty minutes of Alyssa's presence had him all up in his head, thinking about things he really didn't want to be thinking about. Stack. Count. Beer. Wine. On tap. By the bottle. Red. White. These were the thoughts he could handle. These were the thoughts he wanted to handle.

Not how he could barely stand the sight of his own reflection.

Not how he'd succumbed to the pain and weakness.

Not how every fucking thing had changed.

And sure as hell not how three deaths lay at his feet.

Hands pounded a rhythm on the bar top. "Hey, lunch break?"

Marco spun on his heel and darted up, braced for battle. His knee smacked into the neck of a bottle sticking out of the recycle bin on the floor beside him. Like an avalanche, the bottle and two others careened over the edge. He flinched at the crash and spray of glass. "Shit. Sorry," he said, looking sideways at Pete on the far side of the bar.

"No worries, kid. I'll grab the broom."

Marco started collecting the big pieces, heart racing ridiculously in his chest, and tossed them one by one into the bin. If this was what her presence was going to do to him, he'd rather she-

"Here, I'll help." Alyssa crouched in front of him, reaching around a box to retrieve a shard.

"Don't," he snapped.

She jerked back.

Marco clenched his fists, hating his jumpiness, his short-fused temper, his loss of control. "Why are you here?"

Alyssa brushed her hands on her thighs as she stood, then retreated from behind the bar.

He rose and faced her. She eyed him like he was an unpredictable animal. Good. "I just meant, what are you doing now? Why are you still in the bar?" He pressed his fingers into his temple. "I know Pete has you doing..." The word paperwork sat clear as day in his speech center but couldn't find its way to his lips. He swallowed a lump in his throat. "So I didn't think..." Damn, he couldn't even manage to talk to her, could he? He raked a hand through his hair and sighed.

Alyssa wrapped her arms around herself. "Pete invited me to have lunch with some of the other employees so I'd be able to recommend things on the menu. Since I'm here and all."

Pete stepped back into the bar area, a cell phone pressed to his ear and a broom in his free hand. "Why don't you show Alyssa to the break room?" he whispered to Marco. "I'll get this."

Wiping his hands on a bar rag, Marco nodded. "This way." An awkward silence weighed heavily on him as he led them through a series of halls to the break room located near the kitchen. Guilt and a ten-months-old sense of failure made his gut clench. He could at least try to make small talk, couldn't he? "Heard from Brady?"

Alyssa looked at him, her brown eyes wide and uncertain. "He called the day I graduated. From somewhere. He sounded okay."

What Marco wouldn't give to be out there with him. But that life was done and over, and he had no one to blame but himself. "Good."

"Yeah."