Colin’s groggy voice picked up on the fifth ring. “You do realize it’s Sunday, right?”

“Some of us work for a living,” Matt told him. “You said early. And it’s almost eight.”

“It’s seven forty-five.”

“Yeah, early. I want to hit Home Depot before all the weekend warriors get there.”

“Call me back in an hour,” Colin told him. And without another word, his brother hung up.

“Holy shit.” Matt looked at the phone. “You did not just do that,” he said to himself.

He took a few more bites of his breakfast, waited exactly five minutes . . . long enough for Colin to have fallen back to sleep, and dialed him again.

He answered on the second ring. “God, you’re an asshole.”

“I love you, too. Home Depot at eight thirty.”

Colin moaned. “Nine.”

“Fine.”

This time they both hung up.

Matt tapped a finger on his phone, laughing.

Ten minutes past nine and he was pushing the orange cart through the home improvement store while his brother walked beside him holding a Starbucks as if it was a lifeline.

“This place is always a zoo.” Colin shook his head and followed his brother around the store.

“Smells like weekend fun to me.” They stood in front of the home security section, and Matt started tossing supplies he needed into the cart. “Things have changed a bit since I installed my system.”

“I never felt the need to have one before.”

Matt picked up an outdoor wireless camera that needed power but that transmitted the signal wirelessly. “That’s because you don’t work with the public as closely as I do. There’s a lot of crazy in this town.”

“I like my blissful ignorance.” Colin glanced at the box Matt had just put in the cart. “I wonder if this will work all the way to the gate.”

Matt shook his head. “It requires a wireless signal, the gate is what, a thousand feet from the house?”

“Give or take.”

Matt handed him a different box. “You’ll need this one and you’ll have to run a wire all the way up.”

Colin turned it over. “I guess that’s why Parker never bothered.”

“Major pain in the ass, but if I’m not mistaken, her yard is all torn up right now with the new water main.”

Colin nodded, concentrated on the box for a full thirty seconds. “Yeah.” He dropped the box in the cart, looked at the wall of wires. “We’re going to need a lot of wire.”

Matt laughed. “What happened to blissful ignorance?”

“For me.” He reached for the wire. “This is to keep her safe. I can’t be there all the time.”

They filled the cart and kept talking.

“I’m guessing that once you two are married you’ll be moving in with her.”

“That’s where my head is. We haven’t really talked about it in depth. I should probably get a ring on her finger and set a date first.”

“Cabo?” Matt asked.

“Cabo,” Colin said with a nod.

“I’m happy for you. Parker is a great lady.”

“I’m a lucky man.”

Matt wasn’t going to argue with that. Finding a flavor for the week, the month . . . a season was easy. Finding Mrs. Forever . . . not so much.

They pushed through the checkout line, out to the parking lot, and loaded up Colin’s Jeep.

“Did you bring your truck?”

Matt pointed toward his motorcycle.

“Ahh, the real reason you needed to drag my ass out of bed early on a Sunday.”

“My truck is at the dealership on a recall. I won’t get it back until tomorrow.”

Colin climbed behind the wheel. “See you at the house.”

Matt sauntered over to his bike, pulled off the helmet he’d locked to the back, and placed it over his head. It was already hot and he wasn’t going far, so he’d skipped the heavy jacket and took his chances. He swung a leg over the bike and fired it up.

Warm sunshine and wind brushed against him as he made his way onto the main street that cut through town. Damn, it was good to be alive.

Erin heard them arrive before she saw them. She looked out the window and noticed Matt pull up close to her place while Colin drove up the driveway of the main house.

She pushed down the nerves that always surfaced when Matt was around and opened the door to greet him.

“Good morning.”

He took off his helmet and placed it on the seat. “What?” he asked.

“I said good morning.”

His charming smile that made his eyes sparkle in the corners hit her square in the chest. Clean-shaven, perfectly trimmed soft brown hair, and hazel eyes. Kind eyes. The type that didn’t turn dark right before the anger started.

She found her thoughts twisting and took a step back.

“Good morning.”

“Did you guys get everything you needed?”

“I think so.”

He walked toward her and it took everything in her to not retreat. Matt spent time at the gym. At least that was her assumption based on the span of his shoulders and the way his waist tapered to his hips. His arms filled out his short-sleeved T-shirt in ways that made women want to uncover the whole package.

Some women.

Not her.

Or so she kept telling herself. The strength behind all that muscle was intimidating.

He moved closer and she found an excuse to back away. “I made coffee and a coffee cake.”

Matt stopped the second she was on the move.

“Coffee cake?”

“Yeah, sugar, flour, and a drizzle of frosting.” She moved toward her front door.

“You had me at coffee, but I’d love to try your cake.”

The innuendo made her smile along with him.

“I didn’t mean that quite the way it came out.”

Yeah, actually . . . she was pretty sure he had. He’d attempted to flirt with her on a half a dozen occasions over the past six months. Each time she did what she needed to do. She ignored his attention and pretended not to notice. As beautiful a man as Matthew Hudson was, he was a man . . . and she’d sworn off his entire species for life.

“You drink your coffee black, right?”

“You remembered?”

“One of my savant qualities.”

Colin yelled across the lawn. “Hey, help me with this stuff.”

Matt looked at her. “I’m going to . . .” He started walking.

“Go. I’ll get the coffee and cake.”

Inside the small guesthouse she’d occupied for less than a year, she forced her breathing to slow and her heart rate to calm down. Just the distance helped. This place had become her safe zone. A space where nothing bad had happened with no terrifying memories to sweep her back to her past. It was where she was healing. Every day she felt stronger. And with the security system Matt and Colin were going to install, she had another tool in her box of safety. One more weapon against ever falling prey again.

“Knock, knock.”

Erin looked up to see Parker standing at her front door.

“Come in.”

“They’re here,” Parker told her.

“I know. Matt already said hello.”