Duh. From a deep well of testosterone and protective urges that he didn't see any chance of ditching.
Vic shoved aside the stack of restored files and gave Bo his undivided attention. "Another generous offer for my sister."
Seth smirked, jingling change in the bottomless pockets of his cargo shorts. "Purely altruistic, I'm sure."
Bo knew when to keep his trap shut.
Vic blinked slowly. "Thanks, but we have friends we can call."
"I'm sure you do," Bo acknowledged without backing down. A key to savvy aviation involved making fast, smart decisions in a crisis, and not flinching from a set path.
Seth nudged a couple of stacks under his propped foot for higher elevation. "No friends with his military training, though, and I'm not particularly ferocious looking hobbling around."
"Thanks for helping him, Judas." Vic snagged Seth's fishing hat and swatted his shoulder.
"My pleasure." Seth snatched his cap back and folded it into one of his pockets.
A lengthy sigh of defeat ruffled prescription slips in front of the pissed-off vet. "Makes sense for you to sleep here rather than commute all the way out here every day and back at night." He pinned him with a piercing glare. "But you'll be staying in your own damn room."
"Of course."
"Alone." Vic rocked back on two chair legs with a casualness totally negated by the vein throbbing just below the brim of his John Deere cap.
"Dude, I'm here to help your sister, not hurt her. And she is an adult. You'll just have to trust her to know what's good for her."
"Your answer's not reassuring me, Rokowsky." Vic's vein throbbed faster along his temple.
Nothing he could say would reassure any overprotective brother. So he didn't bother spelling out that while he found Paige hot as hell, he intended to keep his hands to himself. He settled on spelling out a piece of the truth. "I'm not here for you. I'm here for her."
"For how long?" Vic shot back with unerring aim at Bo's own doubts.
"Long day." Paige arched the kink out of her back as she strode toward Bo's rental sedan parked under the boughs of the lone sprawling oak. The swelling wind twisted the dangling swing in a lazy figure eight dance.
Security lights blazed to create a halogen halo around the house, clinic and kennels. At least the animals would bark if anyone approached, small reassurance after her home had been violated.
Those lights also showcased well Bo in jeans and his concert T-shirt, leather jacket hooked on his finger over one shoulder. His eyes flickered over her chest, lingered for two hammering heartbeats, then jerked back up to her face.
He shrugged into his flight jacket. "Is Kirstie okay?"
Paige straightened, fast. She would work out the kinks later, maybe in about two weeks when this guy hopped on his plane for a return to South Carolina. She might wish, but she couldn't afford the temptation of more mind-blowing kisses or warm strong hugs from this man who carried so many memories of her past. And her daughter needed stability.
But a selfish part of her insisted she deserved comfort, even the two-week variety, except another part of her balked at that kind of relationship. Maybe she should start dating again. She couldn't imagine spending the rest of her life alone and, oh my God, celibate.
It had been a year since Kurt's arrest, nearly a year since his murder. She was a woman as well as a mother. Somebody like Chuck Anderson would be perfect, uncomplicated and she didn't want him.
She wanted this man. And, sheesh, she sure did have a history of wanting unwisely.
Paige strolled closer, stopping by the lonely tree, a safe two feet away from Bo beside his sedan rental. "She's asleep for now, just scared and trying not to show it. I can relate to that."
Memories of being held by him earlier in the office tormented her with the sweet gift of sharing her burdens. A person could get used to that, a person should have that, but she hadn't just made a simple mistake in judgment in her relationship with Kurt. She'd screwed up in mammoth proportions.>Jamming them into a drawer, she refused to think about the problems Kurt left behind.
She had enough of her own to sort through without more of his grief.
Bo lined up another nail. "Anything missing from the meds?"
The hammer landed home with a smack hard enough to make her wince.
Sheesh, she was strung tight from too much roller coaster in the past few hours.