If You Were Mine (The Sullivans #5)(24)

She immediately hopped up and sped over to him.

“That one doesn’t count,” Heather told him.

He shot her a look that said he already knew that. He paused, sent up a silent prayer, then said, “Cuddles, sit!”

The puppy blinked up at him for several seconds and he thought it was all over...until her little ears went back and she plopped her rear down on the grass as if she’d been waiting her whole short life for him to tell her to sit.

He reached into the treat bag on Heather’s belt—taking any excuse to touch her—and handed one to the puppy while telling her what a good girl she was.

“How was that?” he asked Heather.

She shot him a suspicious glance. “You played me.” She looked at Cuddles’s innocent face and then his less innocent one. “You were practicing before tonight, weren’t you?”

“We wanted to impress you.” Which was true. “Still, you’ve got to admit it was pretty close there for a while.”

She sighed and said, “I know a great Indian place with a patio that allows dogs.”

Chapter Ten

They settled into their seats with the dogs contentedly chewing on the plastic bones she’d brought for them. Heather took a sip of her cold beer and couldn’t repress a sigh of pleasure. She and Zach hadn’t talked much as they’d walked the three blocks from her business to the restaurant, apart from her trying to convince him that Cuddles could manage the trip on her little paws, while he made one excuse after another for why he “needed” to carry her.

She’d never seen anyone get attached to a dog so fast, and frankly, she was worried about how he was going to deal with giving the puppy back to his brother. She’d actually taken a few minutes that afternoon to scan her list of Yorkie breeders to see if any of them had a new litter coming soon, but she was very much afraid Cuddles was irreplaceable.

The mischievous but loving puppy fit perfectly with the mischievous but loving man who was holding her in his arms.

Loving?

Ugh. She took another gulp from her glass, while sternly reminding herself that even though this was practically a script of her vision of a perfect night out, it wasn’t a date. And she had no business thinking of Zach as loving...not even if he was currently looking at her with more affection than desire.

His eyes darkened as she stared into them and she amended that thought to slightly more.

Just as the waiter came to their table, Zach’s phone went off. “Sorry, it’s my brother.” He gestured to the menu. “Go nuts with the meal. I trust you.” He stood up to take the call away from the other diners.

Even after she’d ordered, the buzz was still going through her from his last casually tossed-off words. I trust you.

What would it be like to be able to say that to someone without pause, to give her trust to someone she’d met less than a week ago?

She tried not to stare at Zach where he was standing on the sidewalk talking with his brother, but when he laughed and his gorgeous face lit up, she realized she wasn’t the only one who couldn’t take her eyes off him. Every other woman on the patio was staring, too.

Amazingly, he didn’t seem to notice or care that he was the center of attention. Instead of soaking up the public’s adoration like the vain man she’d once thought he was, he was utterly focused on what his brother was saying.

“Is everything okay?” she asked when he’d sat back down.

“Chase’s wife, Chloe, is a couple of days past her due date. I left him a message earlier to make sure everything was okay. She’s fine, but antsy.”

Yet again she was amazed by how close he was to his family, especially given his outwardly footloose-and-fancy-free personality. Amazingly, the fact that he clearly wasn’t looking for a wife of his own didn’t stop him from appreciating—and worrying about—his siblings’ wives.

She couldn’t put the puzzle of Zach Sullivan together...and it only added to her worries where he was concerned. If only he were black and white, then she would know exactly where to shelve him in her head, rather than having the very real concern that he was creeping into her heart by bits and pieces every time they were together.

“How many nephews and nieces do you have?”

His excited smile made her go warm all over. “This will be the first.”

A man who loved puppies and babies was hard to resist. Almost impossible, actually.

But she needed to keep doing just that, darn it....

“Do they know if they’re having a boy or a girl?”

“If they do, they haven’t told any of us.” He grinned at her. “We’ve actually got a betting pool going.”

“Your family is betting over the sex of your brother’s child?”

He refilled her glass as he said, “It was my mother’s idea.”

She laughed out loud at that, the feel of that spontaneous joy bubbling up from her chest surprising her the same way it always did when she was with Zach.

“She really does sound like a remarkable woman. Stunning, raised eight kids, and now has her first grandchild on the way.” She shook her head. “A gambler, too, from the sounds of it.” She thought about the gorgeous man in the black and white photo who looked so much like Zach. “I’m assuming your father encourages all the Sullivan family madness?”