LITMIR.BIZ

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got a whiff of the brunette and the puke. “Idiot,” she muttered to the girl. She caught hold of her, pulling her to her feet before she looked at Lawson. “Are you a cop?”

      He frowned because he was reasonably sure he looked nothing like a cop. Hell, he still had some cow dung on his boots from the stockyard he’d visited earlier, and he was wearing one of his prize rodeo buckles.

      “You know this girl?” he asked. Yeah, it was a cop maneuver, answering a question with a question, but he wanted to know what was going on.

      The newcomer nodded. “She’s a sorority sister.” She rattled off some Greek letters. “And she’s my roommate.”

      “Sorority?” His frown deepened. “As in college?”

      She was no longer giving him an are you a cop? look. She was staring at him now as if he was an idiot. “Uh, yes. We’re staying here temporarily until our sorority house is ready.”

      All right. So, maybe the brunette wasn’t underage after all if she was in college. But that immediately led Lawson to something that didn’t fit.

      What was Tessie doing here if this was for college students?

      Maybe there was still a boarding school along with the sorority sisters? Or it could be that Tessie was indeed college age. Since he’d never seen a picture of her, it was possible that Eve had adopted her when she was four or five instead of an infant.

      “I’ll take her back to the room, and I’ll call the janitor about the throw-up,” the young woman said. “I’ll make sure she’s okay. Just please don’t arrest her. Wellsmore College has a no-drinking policy, and she could get in big trouble.”

      Lawson wasn’t letting her off the hook just yet. “There were two other people with her, and they were also drunk. A guy and a girl, both blond.”

      “Idiots,” she repeated. “I know them, too. They’re the ones who threw up?”

      He nodded. “Someone will need to check on them.”

      “I’ll make some calls,” she jumped to answer. “Just please—no arrests. If my mom hears about stuff like this going on, she’ll make me move back home.”

      Lawson really didn’t want to let this slide, but the young woman did seem to be on top of this, and that “idiot” label hopefully meant she was going to give all three of them some grief over this screwup.

      He finally put his hands on his hips. “When she sobers up, tell her I’ll be keeping an eye on her, and I will put her butt in jail if she does this again.”

      She gave a shaky nod, and even the brunette attempted some kind of an agreement to that. It came out as a groan-belch-nod, but Lawson thought he’d gotten his point across. That’s why he didn’t stop the other woman from taking the brunette up the stairs.

      However, it was only after he’d allowed them to leave that he remembered he hadn’t accomplished what he’d come here to do.

      Find Tessie. Attempt a rift-mending. Go home.

      He was about to call out to the sober girl to ask her if she knew Tessie, but the front door inched open. The pukers hadn’t returned though. This was a redhead in her thirties. She was wearing yoga pants and was carrying a baby in her arms. She was in midsmile—aimed at the baby, whose cheek she was touching—but she “ewww’ed” when she noticed the puke. She sidestepped it on her tiptoes and froze when her attention landed on him.

      “Holy shit,” she spit out. Then her mouth twisted up. “Sorry,” she added to the baby. “Holy crackers.”

      Despite the toned-down version of the profanity, her expression was pretty much still in the “holy shit” mode. Her gaze slashed around. At every corner of the foyer. Then at the stairs. The sorority sisters were already around the bend of the stairs and out of sight, but the redhead kept looking as if she expected someone to materialize out of the putrid air.

      “It wasn’t me who got sick,” Lawson said when she glanced at the puke again. Then the door. But at the same moment he spoke, she said, “What are you doing here?”

      He didn’t think that was a general kind of question. As in what was a grown man doing in an apartment building for a sorority? She seemed to want some specific information. “Do I know you?”

      “Oh.” Her forehead bunched up. “Oh. No. We’ve never met, but I’m Cassidy Vale. What are you doing here?” she repeated.

      It took Lawson a moment to realize that this was the actress who used to be on Demon High. Maybe Eve and she were still friends, and Eve had sent her to check on Tessie.

      He tipped his cowboy hat and was about to introduce himself, but she spoke before he could. “I know who you are. You’re Hot Cowboy.” She frowned as if sorry she’d admitted that. “That’s what Eve used to call you. She kept your picture in her purse when she first moved to LA.” Another frown. “Now, why are you here?” She made one more of those nervous looks up the staircase.

      Hot Cowboy? Well, it was better than cop. Actually, a lot better. But why had Eve talked about him like that? And carried his picture? She’d been finished with him when she left Wrangler’s Creek.

      Or so he’d thought.

      At the exact second he was thinking that, the baby made a fussing sound and squirmed, drawing Lawson’s attention to it. Or rather to him. It was a baby boy wearing denim shorts and a shirt that said Number One Son. The kid smiled at him. And Lawson instantly knew who he was.

      “Eve’s baby,” he muttered.

      “Yes. Aiden,” Cassidy confirmed.

      Well, the kid had changed a lot in the six weeks since Lawson had delivered him. For one thing, he was bigger, and his eyes were open. He didn’t look pissed off and ready to kick the world in the balls. Nope. He looked, well, like a cute kid. One who was smiling at him, and Lawson found himself smiling right back.

      “Eve’s parking the car,” Cassidy went on. “Now, why exactly are you here?”

      Lawson heard the repeated question, but his brain latched on to the first part of what Cassidy had said. Eve was parking the car, which meant she’d soon be there. He didn’t especially want to avoid her.

      Okay, he did.

      But the important thing was there was no reason for him to be there if Eve had personally come to check on Tessie. It was best for him to leave. Immediately.

      This time he tipped his hat in farewell and had even managed a couple of steps when the door opened and Eve came in. Like Cassidy, she made an ewww sound when she spotted the vomit. Lawson wasn’t ewwwing though. He was cursing. Because, hell, there it was again.

      Lust.

      Apparently, old lust was just as potent as the fresh stuff because one look at her, and it heated up every inch of him. Which only caused him to mentally curse himself even more. Thankfully, he didn’t have to deal with the lust for very long because the inevitable second reaction came.

      Grief.

      Yeah, this was the Brett-effect again because all of that came back, too. Since he’d just had to fight off the flashbacks minutes earlier after seeing the drunk teenager, he didn’t have them tamped down enough. They came much too fast to the surface. At least it was a cure for the lust, but Lawson knew it was a temporary one.

      Eve shifted her attention from the floor. To Cassidy. And then she spotted him.

      “Shit,” Eve snapped. “I mean, shoot. What are you doing here?”

      Lawson had heard that question more today than he had in years. “I was on my way back from a buying trip, and Belle asked me to come by and check on Tessie.”

      Judging from the way the color vanished from Eve’s face, that wasn’t an answer she’d expected. Or one that she wanted to hear.

      “Belle?”

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