Maverick (The Family Simon 3)

“Kid or brother. Like it makes a difference.”

Maverick sat back and stared at his plate. Permanent. Man. That was one heavy word. Sure he’d been thinking about some kind of future with her and Connor, but permanent? Hell, he’d been thinking along the lines of a long distance relationship. Or something.

“Do you love her?”

Maverick had nothing for that, which was crazy. How many songs had he written about that very thing? But real love? What exactly was it?

Cooper’s eyes narrowed. “Have you ever been in love with a woman? And we’re not counting Donovan here because we all know that was just lust.”

“Getting pretty deep here, Coop.”

His brother grinned. “Someone’s got to make sure you don’t screw things up. Just remember, there’s a big difference between lust and love.”

“What’s the difference?” Maverick didn’t ask the question because he was trying to be an asshole. He asked the question because he was curious to see what kind of sage words an acknowledged womanizer would dish out.

Cooper got up from the bar and grabbed Maverick’s plate. “The difference, brother, is that when you’re in lust with someone you’ll do whatever it takes to get them into bed because all you care about is possessing their body. Having a taste to quench your thirst so you can move on to the next one.”

Cooper took a step back and shoved his hands into the front pockets of his jeans. “But when you’re in love with someone, you’ll still do whatever it takes to get them into bed, but it’s because the next morning you want to wake up with them. You want to listen to her ideas, even the ones that are so fucking crazy you know they’ll never fly. You want to see her smile and hear her laugh. You want to know that you’re the reason for it and you hope that you get to do it day after day after day.”

Cooper swore and glanced away. Maverick felt for him. Everyone saw the playboy. The man who went through women like they were candy. But they didn’t know the real man. They didn’t know the pain that had played such a huge part shaping him into the man he’d become.

“It’s simple really,” Cooper said, looking at Maverick intensely. “When you’re in lust, you taste and then you move on because eventually the lust fades and dies. But when you’re in love, it becomes a living, breathing thing that you want to hold on to. If you’re lucky it stays with you forever. If you’re not it haunts you.”

“Is that something Lee Holloway would say?”

Cooper ignored the dig and Maverick looked away from his brother. He couldn’t handle Coop’s probing eyes. Or maybe he couldn’t handle the fact that Cooper was obviously haunted.

“So do you love her?” Cooper asked quietly.

Maverick stared at his brother, his thoughts swirling like a tornado. His cell buzzed and vibrated—for how long he had no idea—but he came back to reality and fished it out of his pocket.

Jack Simon.

“Hey,” he said, glancing up at his brother, noticing the dark, angry clouds in the window behind him.

“Donovan needs you, Maverick.” Jack sounded like shit and all kinds of alarms bells went off inside Maverick.

Fear hit him square in the gut and he shot to his feet. “What the hell’s going on?”

There was a pause.

“We need you to come home.”

Chapter Twenty-seven

Charlie had just said goodbye to Davis when she heard the bell jingle from the front of her shop. It was nearly six o’clock and she was anxious to get home. She had things to discuss with Maverick. Things to get off her chest.

And dammit, she wanted to see him.

“We’re closed,” she yelled from the garage as she took a look around to make sure things were fine for Davis to open up the next morning.

“I see that.”

Charlie whipped around in surprise, her loose ponytail coming undone in the process. Tugging long tangles of dark red hair from her eyes, she smiled at Cooper Simon.

And then frowned.

“Is that a black eye?”