Harry picked up Alec's beer and brought it to him. "You've done a h.e.l.l of a job taking care of Suz. Seems to me that the beatdown she gave us proves that she learned plenty from you about how to take care of herself."

"She did a great job of nailing us to the wall, didn't she?" Alec grudgingly admitted.

"She sure did," Drake agreed. "I kind of wish I'd seen the first part of the fireworks out here."

"Something tells me you're going to have another chance, because if she and Roman do end up working things out, we're all going to have to figure out a way to deal with the two of them being a couple." Harry nudged Alec. "Especially you."

"Roman said he's going to do whatever it takes to make her forget about him." Alec sounded so hopeful that Drake felt a little sorry for his brother.

"I never thought Roman was a fool," Harry said. "But if he believes that she'll let him walk out of her life, then he's just proved me wrong. And you shouldn't make the mistake of believing that's going to happen, either."

Alec's jaw tightened. "Just the thought of them as a couple makes me want to go ballistic."

"I feel sorry for your future daughters." Only his siblings could have gotten away with talking to Alec like this. No one else in his world would have the guts. "If you're this protective of your sister connecting with someone you like," Drake continued, "you're never going to let your own kid out of her tower on high."

Alec shuddered at the thought. "Yet another good reason never to get married or have kids. I'll leave that to the two of you. And to Suz." He scowled again, obviously thinking of Roman kissing his sister.

Alec talked a big game about staying solo forever, but when it came right down to it, he was utterly committed to family. And one day, Drake had no doubt, a woman would come along who would change Alec's mind about absolutely everything, exactly the way Rosa had come along and changed his.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE.

By the time Roman caught up to Suzanne at the wedding reception, he was clearly dead set on reverting to the no-emotions bodyguard, trying to act as if they'd never kissed. He kept her in sight, but kept his distance at the same time.

She'd always prided herself on being the kind of woman who talked things through with people in a reasonable manner rather than stomping away. But if she went up to Roman now, she was either going to punch him or kiss him. Or both! She wouldn't regret another kiss...but she might regret knocking him to the ground in front of everyone.

A group of her cousins from the West Coast were all chatting by the rose arbor. They were always fun to be with and made her feel loved. Lord knew she needed that even more than usual tonight. She was heading over to them when Buck Elroy intercepted her.

"I've been looking for you. Any chance you'd still like to have that drink?"

She'd forgotten all about him. Hadn't given him one single thought since she and Roman had went off into the woods together.

Feeling awful about the way she'd treated Buck, she said, "I'm glad we've gotten to know each other, and I had a lot of fun dancing with you, but I didn't mean to give you the wrong impression. Not," she added, "that I would a.s.sume you're interested in me in that way."

"I am."

"Oh." That stopped her for long enough to realize that Roman had been right. If she'd been up for a wedding fling, Buck would be more than willing to join her. "Well, the thing is-" She couldn't keep from looking over at Roman, who was standing by the fountain glowering at everyone. Especially Buck. "I'm not actually on the market." Because even though she and Roman were at a heck of a crossroads, she couldn't turn away from her feelings for him.

"I'd like to try to change your mind, Suzanne."

Buck was sweet. She knew how hard Hollywood relationships could be, but one day she hoped he'd find a wonderful woman to be with, the way Smith had with Valentina. "Sorry, Buck."

She didn't get the sense that he let much defeat him, but tonight he simply leaned closer to give her a peck on the cheek. "He's a lucky guy."

Buck had barely walked away when her eagle-eyed female relatives waved her over.

"Spill," her cousin Lori said the second Suzanne sat down. The women had kicked off their heels and were relaxing on outdoor couches with cups of hot tea as the night wound down. Lori's skin glowed from the pregnancy she was wearing as well as she wore absolutely everything.

Lori's twin Sophie nodded. They were both very pretty, but as different as could be. Lori was loud and always moving, whereas Sophie carefully considered every word before it came out of her mouth and was happy to spend hours curled up with a book. Their nicknames-Naughty and Nice-fit them perfectly. Sophie's husband Jake had taken their three-year-old twins to put them to bed a while ago.

"Normally," Sophie said, "you know I'd tell Lori to b.u.t.t out, but I'm dying to know what's going on with you and Buck Elroy and your bodyguard. Even Mom is utterly intrigued by your love triangle-aren't you?"

Mary Sullivan looked a little guilty. "Sorry, honey."

Mia walked up, curiosity gleaming in her eyes. "Are you grilling Suz about all the men who want her?" When Lori nodded, she turned to Suzanne and said, "I haven't missed the good stuff, have I? Tell us everything. Seriously, don't leave anything out."

Suzanne nearly groaned out loud. "First of all, there's absolutely nothing going on with Buck. He's nice, but I'm not interested."

"Of course you're not," Mia said. "I mean, Buck Elroy is a good-looking guy and all, but I swear, I could kill Ford for not letting on that he even knew a bodyguard this exceptionally gorgeous, let alone that Roman was working for you. So...what's going on with the two of you?"

"All I know," Suzanne said, "is that I didn't want him around, but then I kind of did, and then I thought we were getting closer, but he kept pulling back, and then tonight we kissed, and it was the best kiss of my entire life, and-"

"The best kiss of your life?" Lori fanned herself. "I knew it. Look at him." She wasn't the slightest bit subtle as she ogled him. But Suzanne figured married, pregnant women could get away with it. "How could he kiss any other way? Which begs the question, what are you doing here with us right now when you could be doing more super-crazy-hot kissing with your super-crazy-hot bodyguard?"

"Because right after we kissed, he apologized for stepping over a line and tried to resign." Suzanne tried to keep her lips from pulling up into a snarl. "I wouldn't let him. And I wouldn't let my brothers fire him either."

"Brothers." Lori, Sophie, and Mia sighed the word in unison.

"Don't even get me started," Suzanne said, losing the battle to hold back a snarl.

"When you were a little girl," Mary said, "Alec wouldn't let you out of his sight. Not to play with his friends or to let you play with yours. He even insisted on being there to drop you off at school and pick you up every day." She put her hand over Suzanne's, her fingers still elegant and strong though she was in her seventies. "He wants so badly for you to be happy."

"I know he does." Suzanne squeezed her beloved aunt's hand. If only she could have had a mother like Mary. But she couldn't go back and change time. No one could. All she could do was keep moving forward, the best way she knew how. "Alec has been the most terrific brother anyone could have. So have Harry and Drake. But what if Roman makes me happy and they refuse to see it?"

Mary pulled her in close, as if she were one of her own daughters. "As long as I've known you, you've never let anyone stand in your way. Whatever you decide about Roman, I guarantee all of us are going to be behind you one hundred percent. Even your brothers. And if Roman's kisses are as great as you're saying..."

Suzanne lifted her fingers to her mouth, which tingled just from the memory of Roman's kisses. "They are."

"Good," Mary said with a wide grin. "As far as I'm concerned, every woman deserves a man who knows his way around a kiss."

"Amen to that, Aunt Mary," Mia said as she raised her gla.s.s.

And as the other women all joined in the toast, Suzanne gave silent thanks, yet again, that she had the best family in the world.

Suzanne's cousins walked back with her and Roman to her father's house so that she could give Lori a Wild Child rattle toy and Sophie the LEGO Duplo building kits she'd brought for her twins. Lori, predictably, pestered Roman the entire way with invasive questions about his other clients. He was polite, but didn't divulge anything.

By the time her cousins left, Suzanne realized she was absolutely exhausted. Too tired to keep trying to work out exactly what was going on between her and Roman-and what she wanted to do about it. Yes, she wanted him to be her lover. But even if he could forget his rules about client/bodyguard relations long enough to make love to her, would one sinfully hot night with Roman come anywhere close to being enough?

By the time he walked her up to her bedroom, the only thing she knew for sure was that she wanted him to wrap his arms around her and hold her. She'd known how to ask for a kiss, but she didn't know how to ask for that. But when they stopped in front of her door and she turned to look up into his dark, serious eyes, he somehow knew. He'd barely opened his arms for her when she barreled into them.

Being close to him, touching him, was electric as always, but as he stroked her hair, there was comfort there too. So much warmth and relief that she swore she could almost fall asleep standing up, if he kept holding her like this.

"Get some rest, Suzanne." His low voice caressed her the way she wished his hands would. "I'll be right here in the morning."

Despite the way her brothers had always watched over her-or maybe partly because of how they'd hovered so close-she'd spent her entire life proving to everyone that she was tough. Bulletproof. But tonight, it seemed, Roman saw the truth. That she was only human, after all. And sometimes she needed someone else to lean on.

Only the knowledge that he wasn't going to disappear on her in the middle of the night could have made her let him go. Taking one last deep breath of his clean, masculine scent, she forced herself to draw away from his arms. But instead of letting her go completely, he slid his hands up from her waist to cup her face.

"No one has ever stood up for me the way you did tonight. I would never want to come between you and your brothers, but you need to know how much it meant that you'd face them down for me."

G.o.d, she loved it when he touched her like this. When he looked at her like she amazed him. Couldn't he see that he amazed her too?

"They tend to forget how to be rational when they go into overprotective mode." She wanted to say so much more. She wanted to invite him into her bedroom to continue what they'd started in the forest with the kiss of a lifetime. But Roman would never forgive himself for sleeping with her in her father's house, with her brothers down the hall.

Roman was one of the most respectful, honorable people she'd ever met. Regardless of how badly she wanted him-needed him-it wouldn't be fair to ask him to cross any more boundaries tonight. Or to break any more of his rules. Especially when she still hadn't completely figured out her own boundaries, her own rules, where he was concerned.

Her heart had never been at risk like this before. And the truth was that for all she claimed not to be afraid of anything, right now she was downright terrified.

His lips brushed her forehead as he lowered his hands from her face. "Good night, Suzanne."

"Good night, Roman."

When she stepped inside her bedroom and turned on the light, she almost didn't recognize the woman who stared back at her from the mirror over the dresser. Had her eyes ever been that bright? Her skin that flushed? Her expression so full of longing?

Turning away from the mirror, she unzipped her dress and forced herself to hang it up instead of leaving it lying in a heap on the shiny pine floorboards. By the time she'd finished brushing her teeth, her eyes were nearly shut. Wearing only her underwear, she crawled beneath the sheets. But the sleep she so desperately needed wouldn't come.

By three a.m., Suzanne was so tired of tossing and turning that she put on the sweatshirt and sweatpants she kept in her old bedroom's dresser and went downstairs to scrounge up a snack, then settle in with some new code on her laptop in the kitchen. If she couldn't sleep, she might as well work.

After putting together a sandwich on Summer Lake Bakery's delicious bread, she headed for the front porch that looked out over the lake. She was settling down on a double rocker under a blanket when she saw a shadow moving on the sand just beyond the porch.

She froze, her heart pounding like crazy and her breath stilling in her chest. Were her brothers right? Was someone truly after her? Someone who had tracked her down to her cousin's wedding, news of which had finally leaked out to the entire world?

d.a.m.n it, no. She wasn't going to sit here and be a victim. She was going to fight like h.e.l.l.

But before she could scream or spring up out of the rocker to throw any punches, moonlight illuminated her father's face. "Dad, it's you." She sat back hard, her hand over her chest as if that would help slow her heart rate.

"Honey, I didn't mean to scare you." He moved quickly up to the porch and scooted in next to her on the rocker. "I couldn't sleep, so I took a walk along the sh.o.r.e." He looked down at the sandwich she'd yet to take a bite of. "Couldn't sleep either, I take it?"

She shook her head. She gestured to her food. "Want half?"

"Sure." He took it, then said, "Want to talk about what's wrong?"

Normally, she'd say everything was fine, that she was up because of a problem she was having with her code. Anything to make sure that her father never had to worry about her. But she couldn't tonight. Not after that kiss.

And not when she'd longed for a moment like this with her father her entire life.

She put the sandwich on a side table. "I'm confused."

"About Roman?"

It shouldn't surprise her that he'd figured it out so fast when pretty much everyone she'd spoken to tonight had commented on the sparks between them. Even Buck, with whom she'd danced half the night, had immediately accepted that he couldn't compete with her feelings for Roman.

When she nodded, her father put his sandwich on the other side table. "What happened?"

He had never asked her such a direct personal question. She hoped this meant things really were starting to change between them.

"I didn't want Roman around at first, at least, not as my bodyguard. But I've come to really like and respect him. And-" This was kind of weird to talk about with her dad, but she didn't want to hold back now that he finally seemed ready to connect. "Well, there's an attraction between us that just won't quit, even though he's h.e.l.lbent on keeping our client/bodyguard relationship strictly professional. But though he's one of the most honorable men I've ever met, something happened between us tonight."

Her father tensed up beside her as she ventured into TMI territory, but he didn't immediately flip out and start raging the way Alec had. Instead he remained silent, letting her process her thoughts. It reminded her of Harry, who never stomped over the silence the way she and Alec so often did.

"I stopped Roman from resigning after he kissed me. And I stopped the boys from firing him too." Her heart was in her throat as she said, "I can't stand the thought of his leaving. Of never seeing him again." Again her father remained quiet as she tried to make sense of all the thoughts, the feelings spinning around inside. "All my life I've been so rational, especially about the men I date. But with Roman, I've never felt less rational. I almost wonder if the wedding is messing with my mind. Because even though I love these family weddings, every time I go to one, I can't help but wish for someone special for myself. Someone to say all those lovely vows to. Someone who wants to say them to me too." She would have laughed at herself if she could have. "What if that's all this is? Just post-wedding longings?"

As if he understood that she'd gotten everything out, her father finally spoke. "Do you really think that's all this is?"

"I don't know."

"I'm sorry that I wasn't always around when you were a kid-"

"Dad, you don't have to keep apologizing."

"I do. And I will. But right now I'm trying to be the father I should have been a long time ago by reminding you that the words I don't know aren't in your vocabulary. More than any of the other kids-heck, more than anyone else I've ever known-you don't stop until you get exactly what you want."

That gave her pause. "I wish I could be clear-headed and rational about Roman the way I am with everything else."

"Love doesn't work like that, honey."

She turned so quickly to see if he was serious that she nearly gave herself whiplash. "Love." The word croaked out of her throat. "You think I'm in love with Roman?"

"Back when you were in high school, you were the only girl who was more pa.s.sionate about computers than boys. I expected that to change, but it never really did. Not until Roman came into your life. Because I never saw you look like this with any of the guys you've dated. I've never heard you sound like this when you talk about any of them. And I've definitely never seen any of them look at you the way Roman does."

Maybe it would make her father uncomfortable if she asked him this, but she needed to know. "How does he look at me?"

"Like he'd do absolutely anything for you. Like the moon and the sun both revolve around you." Her father's lips curved up at the corners. "Like he loves you too."

Longing and panic battled within Suzanne as her father reached for her hands and gripped them tightly. "I wish things had been different for you and your brothers. I wish your mother and I hadn't made such a mess of things. I wish we'd showed you what healthy, sweet, good love looks like so that you'd recognize it when you found it yourself."

"I see it with my cousins. With Drake and Rosa."

"I'm glad you see that love can work. That you believe it's possible."

"I've always believed love could work. That's why I've been so careful about making sure to take things slow and think things through carefully with everyone I've dated. Because I want to make absolutely sure that nothing goes wrong for me like it did with you and Mom. But with Roman...that's not how it's been. Nothing's been slow. And I can barely think straight when he's around." There was no way to hold back the truth any longer. "I'm scared, Dad. Absolutely freaking terrified about what I'm feeling for him-and how fast it hit me."

Her father squeezed her hands tightly. "I know how scary that can be, but it doesn't mean fast or irrational is bad."

"It was for you and Mom." She felt bleak as she looked into his eyes. "It was horrible."

"It was. But you're not your mother. Yes, you have the same huge heart that she did, but where she was flyaway, you're grounded. Where she was anxious, you're confident. Where she was lost without someone to guide her every step of the way, you're a brilliant explorer, always braving new territory and conquering it." Emotion swamped his face, his voice. "If you love Roman, and he loves you, I sure as h.e.l.l hope you won't let anyone, or anything, stand in the way of being together."

"Don't worry," she said with a slightly soggy laugh, "I won't let Alec run my life."