Private Player by Louise Bay

Author:Louise Bay
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781910747728

Eighteen

Nathan

It was one of those perfect summer evenings that only happened a couple of times a year. Madison had a blanket over her legs and had been sitting talking to whoever was next to her—first Dax, then Jacob. Barring the last few days, we’d spent so much time together over the last weeks that it was strange having to share her with people. But that was the nature of the Cove household. There wasn’t much chance of time to ourselves, but I kinda missed her.

I took a sip of my wine as I watched Jacob and Madison talk and laugh like they were old friends swapping bad jokes. They were quiet enough for me to catch only the odd word, the crackle of the fire interrupting my eavesdropping. One by one family members had peeled off and gone to bed, leaving just four of us around the fire pit. Madison and Jacob on one side and me and Zach on the other. Madison had slotted right in to our family dynamic. No one had stood on ceremony and everyone had treated her like she was one of the family. And I hadn’t seen any evidence that she’d been in work mode, pestering people with questions about me. It was as if I’d brought a friend home for the weekend. A friend who seemed to fit in with my family as if she’d known them for years. A friend who seemed completely unselfconscious and at ease with the people most important to me. A friend who just happened to be gorgeous—even more so now, with her face lit up in the warm glow of the firelight.

I was in trouble.

I’d never brought a woman home before. Being with my family was where I was most at ease, most myself, and it was a place I fiercely protected. Jacob had brought girlfriends home from time to time but none of them seemed to last. And Zach brought someone over a few months ago, although no one had heard of her since. We were a tight circle of history that was hard to penetrate. But Madison seemed to have floated right in.

“Getting jealous?” Zach asked, lifting his chin toward Madison and Jacob on the other side of the fire pit.

I chuckled. “Of Jacob? Never.” I wouldn’t admit it, but I wondered if the tight swirl of heat in my belly was jealousy or desire. Either way, it didn’t bode well for the deal Madison and I had made to keep things entirely professional between us.

“He’s got her eating out of the palm of his hand. He’s a handsome, eligible doctor. If you don’t want him swooping in and taking what’s yours, you better step in there.”

Jacob was definitely handsome, even if I’d never tell him so. And of course he was a doctor: he was a Cove. But Jacob wouldn’t make a move on Madison, would he? They were just talking. “You think he fancies her?”

Zach knocked back a mouthful of his beer. “She’s completely gorgeous.

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