Then

I am not waiting up for Nash Hawthorne. The fact that he is out doing who knows what and the fact that I am up examining the age-old question of How much chocolate is too much chocolate in one cupcake? are completely unrelated.

I’m not worried. Nash Hawthorne is not the type of person you worry about.

He’s the type who comes home bleeding at two in the morning with a puppy in his shirt.

His lower lip is busted right down the center. There’s a cut on his jaw, a split in the skin directly over his left cheekbone. And as much as I want to be mad at him for fighting, I can’t be.

It is literally impossible to be mad at a man who is wearing a sleeping puppy like it’s a baby, snuggled up against his bare chest.

“You’re bleeding,” I say. His lips are swollen, smeared with blood—and that’s not even touching the jaw or his cheek.

Nash does a good impression of someone who doesn’t feel a thing. His bleeding lips have the audacity to curve. “She’s worth it.”

She. He’s talking about the puppy. Coming closer, I resist the urge to reach out and touch her velvety soft ears.

“You were looking for a fight.” That’s why I’m up, why the well-stocked Hawthorne House chef’s kitchen is now out of every ingredient that in any way involves chocolate. Nash and his brothers are hurting—the boys because they just found out their grandfather wasn’t who they thought he was, and Nash because he knew the whole damn time.

“I’m never lookin’ for a fight, Lib.” He lifts a hand to caress the pup’s tiny head. Gentle doesn’t even begin to describe Nash Hawthorne. “I found her in an alley behind a college bar. Bunch of drunk frat boys had a stick.”

Nash is not one to overshare, but I can imagine what happened the second he heard so much as a single puppy whimper.

“Now would be a good time to tell me that you did not do a murder. Or five.” I study his swollen lips, his jaw, the cut on his cheekbone.

Nash shrugs. “They saw the error of their ways pretty quick.”

The puppy makes a little whuffing sound in her sleep, and all my best-laid plans are rendered obsolete. Nash Hawthorne. Bare chest. Puppy. This is the very definition of a red alert.

I come to stand close enough to touch him—and her. “Is she okay?” I ask softly.

“She’s warm.” Even when he’s tender, Nash is matter-of-fact. “She’s safe.” He lifts his gaze from the puppy to me. “She’s ours.”

“Ours,” I repeat, “as in yours and your brothers’.” I am fighting a losing battle, but at least I’m an optimist. “This is a Hawthorne dog.” I lift my hand to her head, stroking her baby-soft fur.

“Got any thoughts on a name?” Nash asks me. The pup stirs in her sleep, nuzzling me right back.

I cannot name this puppy. Just like I can’t move my hand from her head to his warm chest. From his chest to his bleeding lips.

For the first time pretty much ever, it occurs to me that Nash Hawthorne might actually need someone to take care of him.

“I am not naming this dog,” I tell him. “But if I did, I’d call her Trouble.”