Double Tap (2 page)

He looked up at me over the carton and winked, drinking deeply before he put the cap back on and shoved the carton back in the fridge door.

“I was thirsty and there were no cups,” he explained lamely.

I glared at him. “I’m sure there’re some in the dishwasher, if you’d cared to look.”

He wrinkled his nose and crossed his arms over his muscular chest.

My mouth went dry as it only served to bring my attention from his face, where I’d been doing a damn good job at ignoring his near nakedness, to the bulging muscles of his arms.

He looked drool worthy.

Nicolas, Nico for short, was twenty three to my eighteen.

He was Nikki’s big brother and so far out of my league that I couldn’t help being slightly depressed about it.

I’d been in love with Nicolas Giuliani Pena for five years, and was just as much in love with him now as I was when I first saw him.

He had no clue, of course, because I was incredibly good at hiding my emotions.

I had to be with my father. Otherwise I’d be dead meat.

Well, pulverized meat was more truthful.

My dad liked to hit me. He liked to hit my mom, too.

But that was neither here nor there.

What
was
here, was Nicolas and his sexy as sin body.

“Yeah, but I can’t see in the dark and I left the light off so I didn’t wake you up,” he countered.

“Oh, Diablo, you’re so thoughtful sometimes,” I teased as I started filling up a glass of water. “I brought my blow up mattress, though, so I wasn’t out on the couch today.”

There were times that I didn’t necessarily ‘plan’ on staying over, and those were the days I stayed on the couch.
It was nice that he didn’t want to wake me up. The man was considerate, I’d give that to him.

“Why do you call me Diablo?” He asked inquisitively, leaning his lean hips back against the counter.

The motion really accentuated his abdominal muscles.

And try as I might, my eyes slipped down.

The light from the fridge gave off a soft glow that seemed to make Nico’s golden brown skin glow. It made the deep ridges of his abs seemed more pronounced. Or, at least,
that was what I was contributing it to. There was really no way that a man, one who’d been beyond ripped before he entered the Navy, could come back looking that much better.

“When you’re playing soccer, it’s like the devil’s on your heels. You leave everyone behind like you’re running for your life,” I answered him honestly.

Did I mention that Nico was a soccer star, too?

He could’ve gone pro, but he’d decided to go Navy instead, much to his mother’s disapproval.

Rosa Pena was a hell of a woman, but just like any Latino mother, she loved her children with a fierce protectiveness that bordered on going overboard.
She wanted what she wanted for her kids, and that wasn’t joining the
Navy
.

I walked up to the kitchen counter and grabbed a glass from the cabinet.
The kind that Nico hated because they were too small. ‘
A waste of my time
,’ he liked to say.

It happened to be the one directly in front of where Nicolas was standing, so my body grazed his as I leaned up and over him.

He didn’t move, and I didn’t ask him to as our bodies grazed.

Goosebumps started to chase down my spine as I felt his overheated skin against mine.

I held back a shiver as I stepped away from him and started filling up the glass.

Once filled, I closed the fridge door, plunging the room into darkness. Then I leaned back against the counter next to him, shoulder to shoulder.

“How do you like the Navy?” I asked into the dark.

I felt him take a deep breath next to me.

“It’s okay, I guess. I don’t really know what I expected…not what I’m doing,
that’s for sure. I’ve met some really good friends
,
though. One of them actually lives fairly close to me. The others live in Las Vegas. Two brothers, if you can believe it
,” he murmured.

He didn’t see how the sound of his voice sent goosebumps dimpling all over my skin.

My elbow hit the digital camera I’d left on the counter earlier and I grinned.

I’d been wanting a new picture of him for a while, but he never let me take one, something about national security and all that B.S.

My camera was my pride and joy.

I’d saved up for nearly two years to buy this bad boy and I’d just gotten it last week.

I couldn’t think of a better subject.

I turned the camera switch to the ‘on’ position and backed away from the counter.

Aiming it at where I thought his face would be, I depressed the button and a bright flash lit up the kitchen.

I smiled when I saw the picture.

It was a good one of him, most definitely with it being dark.

“You know,” Nico sighed. “You can’t post that picture anywhere. You can have it, just don’t put it on any social media. Or anything.
Ever
. Okay?”

Curiosity got the best of me, and I couldn’t help what I asked next. “You’re not like a hit man or anything, are you?”

He chuckled. “No. I’m not a hit man. I’m a SEAL. And we can’t just have our pictures floating all over the internet. Our lives could depend on it.”

A SEAL?

That was new to me.

“When did that happen?” I asked.

Setting the camera down on the counter, I leaned up against the counter again. This time we touched from shoulder to thigh.

“A year or so ago,” he said.

I could practically feel him roll his eyes.

“So,
when do you have to go back? You practically wasted your first two days on the couch
,” I teased.

He sighed. “I have…had a week. I go back on Friday.”

I turned to look at him. “You’re going to make our graduation?”

He looped an arm around my shoulders. “Yep.”

I shivered at the touch. A touch that I’d wanted for so long.

Although not quite the touch I yearned for, it would do.

I leaned my head onto his shoulder, staying like that for a few long moments before he pulled away.

Except it wasn’t to let go of me, but to turn so his body was in front of mine, leaning into me, pushing my hips into the counter.

“You’re legal now,” he whispered.

I felt his breath on my lips.

If I leaned closer…I’d be able to touch my lips with his.

I leaned.

Our mouths touched briefly, but just as quickly, he was gone.

And Nikki was in the kitchen, the lights flaring bright.

“Water, woman! How hard is it to grab some water? Oh,” Nikki exclaimed. “Nico, you’re finally awake!”

We both blinked at Nikki’s impeccable timing of turning on the lights.

Then we both got our first good looks at each other.

I was in my usual of a long t-shirt of my brother’s that reached my knees and some really short shorts
. Ones
that could pass for panties, if I was being truthful.

He was in a pair of boxer briefs. The type that left very little to the imagination.

His hair was shorter than I was used to, buzzed closely to his head.

He had on a pair of dog tags that hung between two defined pectoral muscles, and his smooth toffee colored skin looked gorgeous. Although, he did have a new scar that ran the length of his arm.

“Well, my clock’s a little backwards from what I’m used to. I was up all night last night, but I didn’t have the energy to wake up with y’all this morning,” he said, explaining away his tiredness.

Nikki walked into his arms
and hugged him fiercely. “If you can manage it, mama’s making chorizo and eggs in the morning. The kids miss you.”

The ‘kids’ were Nikki’s and Nico’s sisters. There were six of them in total, including Nikki and Nico, ranging in age from nine to eighteen.

Nikki was the second oldest, and one of five girls, similar to what I was with my own family of all brothers.

That’s why we’d gotten along so well, because we both had overprotective brothers that didn’t like that their baby sister was old enough to date.

“I’ll try, sis. I really will,” he promised.

I was looking down at my hands, trying to will them not to shake from the moment we’d almost shared.

“If Georgia tries a piece of the chorizo, I’ll promise to stay up,” he declared.

I made a gaggy sound. I hated chorizo. A Spanish form of sausage, it made me want to
barf every time I smelled it.

Nico, however, loved it. He loved it so much that he wanted me to love it, too. Except it smelled like ass and I didn’t want anything to do with it.

Nikki laughed as she grabbed her cup of water and left the room, leaving the two of us staring at each other.

I’d planned on leaving before breakfast.

I had to go help my brothers with the farm work, because they couldn’t get it all done by themselves.

“I can’t stay. I have to be out of here by five. We’re moving the cattle to a different
pasture in the morning,” I explained.

I was already tired.

It’d be a long day tomorrow, but I’d get through it. I only had four more days, then I was away to college.

I could do four more days.

Nico smiled at me, a warm me to my bones and more, kind of smile. “Maybe a graduation dinner before I leave on Saturday. To celebrate.”

“Friday afternoon is the only day I can do,
” I said.
“The other three days I’ll be branding cows,” I explained.

He nodded. “Friday.”

Except, the next morning, something happened that would change the course of my life. Taking away everything that I thought
my life might be, even my dreams.

Nico being one of them.

I never made dinner.

Jingle Bells, Twilight smells, Edward ran away.
Jacob cries, Bella dies, Harry Potter all the way. Hey!

-T-shirt

Nico

Eight years later

“Nikki, I can’t talk right now. I’m swamped,” I said as I continued filling out my paperwork.

“She’s back!” My sister crowed loudly into the phone.

“Who’s back?” I asked distractedly.

“Georgia Brianne!” My sister yelled.

That was enough to make everything freeze, even my blood.

“What?” I asked for clarification.

“You heard me,
big brother. She’s here. I saw the farm’s gates unlocked when I walked past it this morning on my morning walk. You know how curious I get, so I had to walk up there and see
,” Nikki explained.

My keys were in my hand and I was walking out of the bull pen moments later without actively thinking about it.

On the drive to her house, I thought about that night. The night I’d gone to her house to find it burned to the ground.

The two youngest of Georgia’s siblings, as well as both of her parents, perished in the fire.

It’d been a murder suicide.

Her father had tied each child up, as well as his wife
. Colt, Remy, Jasper, Hansen, and Georgia had all been shot
by their father, but lived.

Rain and Dell, the babies of the group, hadn’t lived from their gunshot wounds, dying within minutes of being shot.

Georgia’s mother was burned alive, their father having doused her in gasoline and set her on fire to initially start the blaze.

It’d been while their father had set the fire that Georgia was able to get free, and their father had shot himself while Georgia untied her siblings.

The five remaining Valentine children had disappeared the next morning, and it wasn’t until a year later that I was able to find Georgia again.

They’d moved to Houston.

All but Georgia had been taken into state custody. Georgia had followed her brothers, taking any job she could get to help support herself.

The family that’d taken in the brothers was a good one. A rarity.

They’d taken in Georgia, too. Or would’ve if she’d have let them.

I pulled up to the gate that led up to the Valentine farm, stopping at the bottom to walk up the long driveway.

She’d get spooked if she saw the KPD squad car and I didn’t want to freak her out.

The farm looked much the same as it used to. The last couple of years it’d
spent abandoned; yet, now, the pastures were mowed, and there were a couple cows mulling about on either side of the drive.

Almost like the last eight years had never happened.

The large, charred farm house was gone, though.

I’d
seen to that.

There was nothing left but the bare bones. I’d gotten a pleading letter from Georgia around a year after the incident, asking me to ‘take care of the house’ and then a letter from an attorney giving me the right to do so under the law.

Since that time, I kept the property directly around the homestead free of weeds and overgrowth, keeping it ready…just in case.

Although there was only a barn left, there was a huge loft that they used to rent out in the summer to an extra ranch hand. That was probably where she was staying.

I spotted her the moment I topped the hill.

She was wearing jeans. Skin tight jeans that made my heart skip a beat.

She looked exactly like I remembered her.

Long legs that went on forever, small dainty hands. She was around five eight, and had a killer ass. Her hair was the only thing different.

It used to be long and brown, down to her waist.

It was the same beautiful brown color on top, yet now there was a barrage of colors added to the layer underneath the top brown layer.
It was shorter, as well. Short. As in to her shoulders, short.

In fact, it really did it for me.

I made sure to scruff my boots on the gravel to let her know I was behind her, and she froze, turning slowly.

Her face was exactly like I remembered it.

A smattering of freckles still covered her nose and cheeks, and her beautiful lips were still round and full.

And God, her eyes were to die for.

Crystal fucking blue.