"This is for love, Izzy. Love! Would you buy a guy on the clearance rack? No, you would not."
"Um, I wouldn"t buy a guy at all."
"It"s a metaphor! You want him new and shiny and expensive."
Izzy went back into her purse. "A buck fifty in change," she muttered. "That"s all I"ve got. It"s going to have to be enough." She closed her eyes, her brow furrowed in concentration, then she opened her eyes and tossed in the money.
Both women held still a beat.
"Nothing," Izzy said in disappointment. "Told you." She turned away from her friend to stalk off and ran smack into Sean, who"d come out of the pub.
His hands went to her arms to catch from falling to her a.s.s. He looked down into her face with concern. "You all right, darlin"?"
Izzy blinked up at him looking dazed. "Um . . ."
Her friend stuck her head in between them. "Yes," she told Sean. "She"s okay. She just can"t talk in the presence of a hot guy. Especially one she wished for."
He smiled, though it was muted. "You work at the flower shop, right?" he asked Izzy.
She nodded emphatically.
"Well come into the pub and have a drink any time," he said.
Izzy gave another emphatic nod.
"That means yes. And thank you," her friend translated and dragged Izzy away. "Oh-em-gee, the fountain totally works!"
Pru watched them go and had to laugh. Luck was where you made it for yourself and she knew that. She"d wished for love for Finn, and she still wanted that for him but she was realizing that would mean letting him go.
She had to let him go.
Sean looked at Finn. "Need to talk to you," he said.
Finn, face blank, nodded.
"I"ll meet you inside," Sean said.
Finn nodded again.
When Sean walked way, Finn turned to Pru.
"Work calls," she said with a small smile.
"Story of my life," he said. "About last night."
Her heart skipped a beat.
"We were onto something."
Her nipples went hard. "Were we?"
"Yeah. And you liked it too."
She felt herself blush a little. "Maybe a little."
"Just a little, huh? Because I still have your fingernail imprints in my scalp." He was out-and-out smiling now, a naughty sort of smile that made her thighs quiver. "I wasn"t finished with you, Pru," he said softly. "I had plans."
Oh boy. "Maybe I had plans, too."
"Yeah?" Closing the gap between them, one of his hands went to her hip, the other slid up her back to anchor her to him. "Tell me. Tell me slowly and in great detail."
She laughed and fisted her hands in his shirt, but just before her lips touched his, someone cleared their throat behind them.
"Dammit," she whispered, her lips ghosting against Finn"s. "Why do we keep getting interrupted?"
"That is the question," he murmured.
With a sigh she pulled free and turned. "Jake," she said in surprise. "What are you doing here?"
In Jake"s lap was a box and on top of that box sat Thor, one ear up, one ear down, his scruffy hair looking even more thin and scruffy than usual, sticking up in tufts on his head.
"Brought you the last box," Jake said. "Never seen anyone stretch a move out so long."
"Yes, well, hiring movers was cut from the budget." Pru scooped up her Thor, kissing him right on the snout. He panted happily, wriggling to get closer, bicycling his front paws in the air, making her laugh and hug him.
"I"m taking him for a grooming at South Bark," Jake said. "He"s past due."
"Also cut from the budget," Pru said. But she traded Thor for the box. "Thanks."
"I"ll bring him to work when he"s finished," Jake said.
And then he didn"t roll away.
Pru gave him a long look, but Jake"s picture was in the dictionary under pig-headed so he didn"t budge. "You"re going to be late," he told Pru in his boss voice.
With a sigh, she turned to Finn. "I picked up an extra Sunday shift today. I"ve got to go. Hope you have a good day."
"In case it"s our last you mean?"
"You don"t think Sean will get the license paid tomorrow?" she asked.
"If he wants to live, he will." But Finn"s attention was on Jake.
Pru forced a smile. "Okay, so we"re all going off to our own corners now, yes?"
"Go to work, Pru," Jake said.
"Um-"
"It"s okay." Finn gave her hand a squeeze. "Knock "em dead today," he said.
Right. Dammit. With nothing else she could do, she lifted the box of her stuff and walked away from the only two men to have ever earned a spot in her heart. She just hoped they didn"t kill one another.
Chapter 18.
#BeamMeUpScotty Finn watched Pru make her way toward the elevator with her box before he turned back to Jake.
Both he and Thor were watching him watch Pru.
Jake was brows up, the picture of nonchalance. "What"s going on?"
"Nothing much," Finn said.
Jake took that in and nodded. "You"ve got an arm on you. The other night at the game you nearly saved our a.s.ses-not that anyone could"ve actually saved our a.s.ses."
Finn shrugged. "I played some in college."
"You going to keep playing for us?"
"Depends."
"On what?" Jake asked.
"On if this sudden interest in my ball-playing abilities is in any way related to the woman we both just watched walk away," he said.
"About ninety-nine percent of it, yeah," Jake said.
Okay, so the guy got brownie points for honesty. "Why don"t you tell me what you really want to know," Finn suggested.
"I don"t want to know anything," Jake said. "I want you to know that if you make her so much as shed a single tear, I"ll break every bone in your body and then feed your organs to the pigeons. I mean, sure, I"d have to hire it out to do it, but I"m connected so don"t think I won"t."
Finn stared at him. "You forget your meds or something?"
"Nope."
"Okay, then, thanks for letting me know," he said and turned to go.
Jake rolled into his path. "I"m not s.h.i.ttin" you."
"Also good to know." Finn c.o.c.ked his head. "I"m going to go out on a limb here and guess that you already had a shot at her and you blew it."
"Why would you think that?"
"Because you just threatened me with death and dismemberment. Only one reason to do that-you f.u.c.ked up somehow."
Jake stared him down for a minute. He might be in a chair but Finn got the sense he could more than handle himself.
"That might be partially true," the guy finally said.
Finn wrestled with his conscience a moment. "I"d say something helpful here, like it"s never too late" or you can fix any mistake," because truthfully, I like you. But-"
"-But you like her too," Jake said.
"But I like her too," Finn agreed firmly, not willing to back down, feeling a little bit like Thor did about his prized dog cookies. "Much more than I like you."
"It"s a bad idea," Jake said. "You and her."
"That"s for me and Pru to decide."
Thor jumped down from Jake"s lap, walked over to Finn and put his paws on his shins to be picked up-which Finn did.
Then it was apparently Jake"s turn to wrestle with his conscience. "What the h.e.l.l. The d.a.m.n dog likes you?"
Finn shrugged and gave Thor a quick cuddle before setting him back down on Jake"s lap.
Jake muttered something to himself that sounded like "she bit off more than she can chew this time" and turned his chair to roll off.
"Yeah," Finn said to his back.
"Yeah what?"
"Yeah I"m going to keep playing on your team. But I want to buy new jerseys."
Jake rolled back around to face him. "Why?"
Because it would make Pru happy. "You got a problem with SF Tours splashed across everyone"s backs in bold letters?"
"Not in the least." Jake paused. "I suppose you also want O"Riley"s on there somewhere."
"It"d be nice."
Jake stared at Finn for a beat before nodding. "Our next game"s tomorrow night," he said and again he made to leave but didn"t. "About Pru and me. We didn"t work out for one simple reason."
"What"s that?"
Jake looked behind him to make sure Pru wasn"t standing there, which normally would"ve made Finn smile but he wanted to know the answer to this question shockingly bad.
"I made a mistake with her," Jake said, and then grimaced. "Okay, more than one, but the only one you need to know is that she"s strong and resilient and smart, so much so that I believed she didn"t need anyone, and certainly not me. It must have showed since she called me out on it. She said we couldn"t be intimate anymore because I wasn"t in love with her and she didn"t love me either, at least not in that way. To my shame, I didn"t realize that I hurt her by so readily agreeing, by not giving much thought to how she felt about splitting." He paused. "Pru doesn"t do casual. She can"t. Her heart"s too d.a.m.n big."
"Are you trying to scare me off?"