Hot as Heller (Aster Valley 3)

Solo called over again. “We gotta finish before I’m due for my shift at the diner, remember?”

I gathered my wits about me and finally got my head out of my ass. “Let me make you dinner,” I offered quickly, before he left to finish… whatever it was he was doing with this group of kids. “I’ll text you the address, okay?”

He nodded. “You sure?”

I clenched my jaw for a moment, debating about whether or not to share my thoughts with him. Fuck it. I stepped closer and lowered my voice. “I’m not just interested in the sucking, okay?”

The playful grin melted away as his eyes met mine. He nodded. “Yeah, okay. It’s… yeah. Good. I… same.”

I reached for his hand just long enough to rub my thumb across the back of it. The sounds of snickering from the group of teens met my ears, but I ignored them. “Seven o’clock.”

When I returned to Tessa, she gave me a knowing look. Thankfully, she waited until we were in the car before beginning the third degree.

“You and the Clover kid.”

“His name is Finn,” I said a little too peevishly. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay. I just didn’t realize you were quite so…” She lifted her hands up and wiggled all her fingers in the air. “With the feelings.”

I shrugged. “Not sure there can really be feelings there, but… yeah. I… yeah.”

She made all kinds of squishy sweet noises like she was watching puppy videos. “What do you like most about him?” she asked next.

“He’s feisty but vulnerable. I can tell he’s fighting to figure out who he is underneath all the expectations on him.”

Tessa studied me. “Sounds familiar, huh?”

I glanced at her. “What do you mean?”

“You forget we grew up together. I know your family. I know what it was like for you trying to figure out who Declan was outside of all those highbrow Stone brothers.”

She was right. It hadn’t been easy telling my father, a renowned oncologist at Cedars-Sinai, that I wanted to join the LAPD right out of high school. In fact, he’d been so angry, he’d made me a deal. Get a college degree first, and then if I still wanted to become a cop, he’d support me.

So that’s what I’d done. And it had damned near killed him to watch me put on the uniform and put myself at risk every day. When I’d told my parents I was moving from the LAPD to a small county sheriff’s office in Colorado, they’d celebrated. “The distance is a small price to pay for your life,” my mother had said over and over at the big family dinner she’d thrown. “And if we have to buy a share in a private jet service, then so be it.”

Leave it to my mother, who’d inherited a fortune from her own parents, to mention hiring a private plane as if it was as easy as arranging for an Uber.

My brothers, on the other hand, had been supportive despite the same worries. Two of them had followed my father into medicine, another had gone into investment banking, Patrick had become an attorney, and I’d become a police officer. And I’d never regretted it. Not once. Not even when I had to testify against my fellow officers. Maybe, in fact, especially when I had to testify against my fellow officers.

“Not everyone has such a supportive family,” I said. “I was lucky.”

She made a pensive sound and looked out the window. I remembered too late that hers was one such family. Her parents had insisted on marriage when she’d told them about the pregnancy. “Shit, Tess. I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking.”

She shook her head. “No. It’s fine.”

But it wasn’t, and we both knew it.

It started with a sniffle. Before I knew it, she was crying full-on. I whipped the SUV into my driveway and slammed it into Park. “Christ.”

She waved a hand through the air. “Pregnancy hormones. Ignore.”

“Not possible,” I told her before coming around to her side of the car so I could pull her out and hug her as tightly as I could with a giant beach ball between us. “C’mere. I’m so fucking sorry.”

She cried even harder and clung to me as tightly as she could. “I just wish… I just wish I had someone like Finn.”

It took me a minute to realize she meant she wished she had someone like I had Finn. Not that she wanted a man like Finn. I knew she wanted someone to be there for her, care for her, and love on her the way she deserved. Assure her everything was going to be okay.

I brushed my hand over her hair. “Aw, sweetheart. You will. I know you will.” I didn’t add that I didn’t have Finn. It wasn’t important. She simply didn’t want to go through the scary pregnancy and delivery, not to mention parenthood, alone. And there was only so much I could offer her in the way of support.