Always You (Adair Family 3)

Because I knew at that moment that I loved her back, but I was just another man in her life who would never say the words. At least her father had said them before he left her. I wouldn’t even be able to give her that.

I could give her something, though.

My friendship and my protection.

Standing, I followed Arro from a distance, making sure she returned safely to her car in the beach car park. Knowing that’s how it would always be between us.

Me, loving her, from a distance.

10

Arro

Constant rain for two days had transformed the site into a mud-ravaged mess. The downpour finally stopped, and after assessing the situation this morning, Marcello had gone ahead with sending the machinery in to finish the job since we were so close to being done.

Now our damn timber harvester was stuck, and we’d spent most of our last hours in the workday trying to get it out.

The truck on the flat revved its engine one more time and drove forward against the mud. With great relief, the harvester pulled free.

A cheer went up around the crew, and I smirked unhappily. We were definitely off schedule now, something I’d usually be able to handle with little stress, but now it seemed like a massive deal on top of everything else on my mind. For example, my brother had only just let me return to my own house; the mysterious note sender hadn’t made another move, and thus the police couldn’t do a thing about it; oh, and Mac—the cause of this constant, piercing ache in my chest—kept calling and leaving messages every bloody day.

“Isn’t it your job to make sure something like this doesn’t happen?”

I looked at the asker of the snide question.

Duncan.

Of course.

It was more than sexism here. The little prick did not like me.

And today I was not in the mood to deal with his shit. Everyone knew Marcello had made the decision to go ahead, even though I’d been apprehensive about it. But we’d worked in muddier conditions, so I could see why he thought we might get away with it, and we were behind because of the weather. So I backed him. And I wouldn’t shift the blame to him because we were a team, and I wouldn’t undermine him.

“Excuse me?” I narrowed my eyes in warning at the assistant.

He shrugged, watching as the others parked the timber harvester, securing it for overnight. “Any moron could see this was going to happen.”

“Oh. Do you have a crystal ball?”

Duncan sneered. “No, just brains in my head.”

And just like that, I snapped. “Speak to me like that again, and you’ll find yourself back in the unemployment line.”

His eyes flashed in surprise. “You can’t fire me.”

“Oh, I can and I will.”

“Just because you’re some daughter of an aristocrat and a movie star’s sister doesn’t mean you can do anything you like.”

I felt true rage in that moment.

This little fucker had looked into me.

“First, my family aren’t aristocracy, but you’d know that if you’d dug a little deeper when you were obviously investigating me.” Our ancestors had been landed gentry. No titles or ranks like the aristocracy. “And second, what you just said is so far out of line, it is a firing offense. I’m noting this interaction, Duncan, and putting a complaint into Marcello about you. But make no mistake, if this happens again, I won’t need Marcello’s go-ahead to fire you. You think I haven’t dealt with misogynists like you before? You’re wrong. And guess what? I’m still here, despite their efforts to get rid of me. So this is your last warning. Give me attitude, make my working environment unpleasant”—I leaned in, despite the stark fury in his expression—“I will not only fire you, I’ll make sure you never work in this industry again.”

To my shock, he made a move toward me, teeth gritted, and was only stopped by Marcello’s voice. “Problemo here?”

“No.” Duncan stepped back.