She couldn’t help but be amused by his determination. If he would just settle down for a minute Aggie would drop the toy and amble away to find something else to play with instead. If he would settle down—it took sheer exhaustion to get him to do such a thing, though.

Sitting curled on the stones next to the four pups as she gave the parents a break in watching them so they could nap, she tried to make sense of the past ten years. But then, she’d been doing that since she hit Loudoun.

She should have fought Gunny harder. She should have made him tell her what he was learning as he learned it. That was, if she’d known when he was learning something. She normally didn’t find out until he was heading toward the next clue. And all those clues seemed to come with another near escape from Kin sent after her.

“We’re changing that pup’s name, right?” Jazz asked from the sliding glass doors where he propped himself against the frame and watched her.

Her stomach got that jittery feeling again, while her thighs tightened against the moisture that began to gather immediately. Damn him. All she could think about whenever she looked at him was what it had been like as he’d taken her.

“He likes his name.” She shrugged. “It suits him.”

Scratching at his jaw, Jazz frowned at the pup in confusion. “He doesn’t look like a squirrel, Kenni.”

Turning to Jazz, the pup woofed, bounding over to him, only to trip over his own feet before reaching his goal. Sprawled out in front of Jazz, canine bemusement evident on his face, Squirrel struggled back to his feet where he then stared up at Jazz in pride, as though he’d done something completely awesome.

“Why hadn’t you named them yet?” she asked as Jazz straightened from the door frame and moved to sit on the stone bench a few feet from her.

Reaching down to pet Aggie when she moved to him quickly, he grinned at Squirrel’s hurried possession of the furry stuffed toy the female abandoned.

“Maybe I was going to let Jessie name them?” he answered, his gaze locking with hers as the use of the word maybe had her eyes rolling in exasperation.

“Maybe? Really, Jazz?” She was probably one of the few people who knew when that maybe began.

“Maybe.” His lips quirked as she saw the memory in his gaze as well.

Maybe was Jazz’s greatest lie.

Maybe I don’t give a damn … That had been his response to Cord when her brother had informed him that Kenni was far too young for him.

He had given a damn. He wouldn’t have touched her and she had known it. At least not then he wouldn’t have.

“I went to talk to Vinny the day you and your mom left for New York.” His eyes turned somber as they darkened for a moment with whatever emotion he was feeling.

“What about?” What could he have possibly had to discuss with her father?

“You.” His eyes locked with hers then. “I asked for his permission to call on you when you returned home.”

She blinked back at him in surprise. How old-fashioned. She would have never guessed he would do such a thing.

Squirrel moved to her side, butting against her in a bid for attention as she felt her heart beginning to race, her hands to shake.

She hated it when her hands shook. It gave her away every time. It revealed how much something meant to her, how important it was to her.

“You were going to call on me?” she asked carefully.

“I wanted to court you, Kenni,” he told her softly. “Your brothers yelled and cursed and threw their fits and the whole time Vinny just stared back at me.” A low, self-deprecating chuckle left his lips. “When Cord, Deacon, and Sawyer finally shut up, he gave me his permission. I was going to be there when you returned. Maybe take you for a drive.” A frown pulled at his brow as gave his head a little shake. “Then you were gone. Just that fast.”

Turning her head away, Kenni had to fight her tears.

He surprised her. He’d always surprised her, she realized. She never would have imagined Jazz would do something so traditional.

“I had no idea you were even interested.” She’d daydreamed, fantasized, but never thought for a second that any of those fantasies had a chance.

“I had no idea what your father would say,” he returned, his voice soft, his gaze still far too dark. “You were only sixteen. I was twenty-three, but the thought of waiting while some teenage bastard stole your heart seemed a little idiotic to me. But then, I wasn’t aware of how little you trusted me at the time, either. I might have changed my mind if I had known.”

Trust.

“It wasn’t a lack of trust.” Rising to her feet, she brushed the back of her borrowed shorts off before turning and staring out at the pool. “It was the thought of what would happen to you.” Wrapping her arms across her breasts as she fought back the chill invading her, Kenni stared at the water as it trickled along a streambed before falling into the pool. “The first month or so, I didn’t call because I was terrified, and I could tell Gunny simply had no idea why Momma was dead and suddenly I was being hunted. But we knew it was the Kin. You were part of the Kin, and I knew if I called you then you’d call my brothers, my father…” She shivered at the memory of her terror during those days.

“You knew I’d protect you,” he snapped.

Kenni whirled around. “With your life,” she retorted fiercely. “You would have protected me with your life if that was what it took, Jazz. And I couldn’t bear the thought of it.”

“Damned right I would. Then and now!”

“There you go then.” A mocking flip of her hand emphasized her point. “That’s why. And I’ll be damned if I’m going to keep arguing with you about it.”

“No, you’re just going to keep running, aren’t you, Kenni? You’ve run for so long you don’t know anything else,” he accused her, the censure in his voice lashing at her guilt and her temper.

His expression was so arrogant, so knowing, it made her crazy.

“I’ve been in Loudoun for two years, Jazz. How does that constitute running?” The accusation stung, though, whipping at some hidden guilt she couldn’t put her finger on.

A mocking smile twisted his lips. “No, Kenni, Annie Mayes came to Loudoun. Kenni Maddox is still running because she can face dying easier than she can face learning who’s trying to kill her.”

The retort enraged her.

Fingers curling into fists she faced him, knowing it wasn’t true. It couldn’t be true.

“You are wrong.” Shaking, trembling, she stood in front of him, her finger pointing in his face furiously. “I lived…”

“Well by God I didn’t.” Jazz came off the bench so fast she could only blink up at him, surprised, a part of her suddenly wary at the icy fury revealed in his gaze.

“What…?”

“Look at this place,” he demanded as he grabbed her shoulders, quickly turning her to stare out at the valley she’d envisioned as a teenager. “This house, the property. Every fucking detail I could remember. Everything a sixteen-year-old flirt wanted, I built after they told me you were dead. After you began fucking running without a single thought to the people who loved you, Kenni. Who grieved for you.”

She could hear the emotion in his voice, the grief that roughened it, that tore past the control he exerted on every emotion he kept locked inside his soul.

He had grieved for her.

He had loved her.

Every dream she’d ever had was locked in this man, and that, too, had been taken from her.

Agony exploded in her chest. Her heart felt as though it were shattering all over again at the tortured despair in his voice. At the knowledge that he had cared so much, and she hadn’t even known.

“It wasn’t like that, Jazz…” She felt as though she were dying inside. As though her soul were being ripped from her chest all over again.

“Then what was it like?” Voice rising, he pulled her around to face him again, his hold on her shoulders almost desperate as he glared down at her. “Tell me, Kenni. Tell me what it was like.”