Megan Wright retrieved her nine-month-old son Kyle from his crib and checked her watch. She was due at the hotel for the morning housekeeping shift in fifteen minutes. After a diaper change, she handed Kyle his bottle, grateful he could now hold it himself.
He let out a squeal of delight that drew a smile from Megan.
"You like that, huh, buddy?"
His pudgy legs bounced about on either side of her hips, and she tightened her hold on him while attempting to tame his soft brown hair. She grabbed the diaper bag, the tote she took to work, retrieved her lunch from the refrigerator and headed out the door. Across the yard, she entered her sister's house through the screen door on the back deck.
"Morning," she called out.
"In here," Paige said from the living room, where she sat amid three babies and a variety of toys. One of the babies was her daughter, Saraya, born just a month before Kyle. The other two Paige cared for as part of her in-home daycare business.
Megan kissed Kyle, whispered that she loved him and plopped him down on the mat with the others. "I'm running late as usual."
"Go ahead. We're fine."
"I'll be back by three."
"See you then."
Paige watched Kyle for free during the day in exchange for Megan taking over the daycare from three to six, while Paige taught dance classes in her studio under the apartment Megan rented from Paige and her husband Kevin. The delicate balancing act left Megan worn out at the end of every long day.
She jumped on her bulky old bike and set off for Ambrose's Gansett Inn on the other side of the island. Checking her watch one more time, she groaned when she saw how close she was cutting int.
From his vantage point in the ferry's wheelhouse, Dean Ambrose watched the bluffs on the island's north coast come into view and felt the vise around his chest tighten. Just the sight of the island where he grew up made Dean feel confined.
"Never gets old, does it?" Dean's childhood best friend, Captain Seth Rollins, owned and operated Gansett's thriving ferry business.
"What's that?" Dean asked.
"The first view of the island. Always gives me a thrill to see it appear out of the fog."
"Even after all the times you've seen it?"
"I still love it."
Dean studied his old friend. Time had worn some lines into the corners of Seth's hazel eyes, and his dark black hair was now shot through with small streaks of gray that hadn't been there on Dean's last trip home.
"You ever wish you'd done something else?" Dean asked. "Gone out in the world a bit?"
Seth took a long drag off his trademark clove cigarette and clicked the ashes out the open doorway. "Go where? Do what?"
"Those things are gonna kill you," Dean said, nodding to the cigarette.
"No faster than working three hundred plus days a year is gonna kill you."
"Touché," Dean said with a chuckle.
"Are you planning to tell mama bear about your night in the hospital?"
"Hell no! She'd freak out all over me. That's the last thing I need."
Seth laughed. "What's it worth to ya?"
Dean shot him what he hoped was a menacing scowl.
"You wouldn't dare."
"So what happened?"
"The doctors said it was an anxiety attack—too little sleep, too much work, too much stress. They ordered me to take at least a month off to recover."
"How'd the big boss man take that news?"
"Not so well since I'm at the height of a major title push right now. We've busier that hell leading up to WrestleMania, but they'll handle it until I get back." Dean was a wrestler for the WWE and he traveled all around the country going from state to state and city to city. He had just won the Royal Rumble and was set for a title match at WrestleMania.
"And your girlfriend? Renee, right?"
"My ex-girlfriend. We decided to cool it for a while. And then I got the email from my mother about my dad selling Ambrose's…I told my mom I'd help him fix the place up a bit."
"I still can't believe that."
Dean shrugged. "He can't work forever, and none of us want to deal with it."
"How's your sister doing? I haven't seen her in a while."
Despite the nonchalant question, Dean knew there was nothing nonchalant about his friend's feeling for Nikki. "Still carrying that torch?"
Seth shrugged. "I've yet to meet anyone I like better."
"She and John are engaged, man. Might be time to move on."
"Maybe." He flashed the grin that had made him popular with the girls in high school—not that he'd noticed after he gave his young heart to Nikki Bella. "She's not married yet."
"Seth—"
"I'm not going to show up at the wedding in a gorilla suit and cart her off or anything."
Dean studied the expression on his friend's face: staged indifference mixed with wistfulness. "That sounds a little too well planned."
"No worries, I don't own a gorilla suit. I am thinking about getting a dog, though."
Dean laughed at that because Nikki worked for the island's veterinarian.
Seth steered the 110-foot ferry past the breakwater to the island's South Harbor port.
Dean watched the town of Gansett come into view—the bustling port, the white landmark Beachcomber Hotel with its clocked tower and turrets, the Victorian Portside Inn, the strip of boutiques and t-shirt shops, the South Harbor Diner, Mario's Pizzeria and Ice Cream Parlor where Dean stole his first kiss from Liv Morgan in eighth grade.
His overriding memory of growing up there was plotting his escape. Once he finally managed to leave, he'd never looked back except for occasional visits to his parents. Every time he came home, he counted the minutes until he could leave again. This would be his longest stay since he turned eighteen and left for wrestling school. Dean wondered how long it would take before he was chomping to leave again.
Salt air, diesel fuel and rotting seaweed—the aromas of home—filled Dean's senses and turned his stomach. He hated the smell of rotting seaweed.
"Come on back with me," Seth said.
At the ferry's stern, Dean watched as Seth used a combination of engine power and bow thrusters to efficiently turn the ferry in the tightest imaginable space and back it into its berth. "You make that look so damned easy."
"It is easy—especially when you've done it a thousand or two times."
Once the ferry was docked, they stood at the rail and watched the throngs of trucks, cars and tourists disembark from the day's first boat to Gansett.
"I still spend Friday and Saturday nights on the island during the summer," Seth said as Dean gathered up his stuff. "Come on by the Beachcomber if you feel like grabbing a brew or two."
"I'll do that." Dean shook Seth's hand. "It's good to see you, man."
"Been too long."
"Yeah." But as Dean took a long look at the bustling town of Gansett, he decided it hadn't been nearly long enough.
Carrying his oversize backpack, Dean navigated the crowds on his way to Main Street. He stopped to let a family on bikes pass and continued up the hill, mesmerized by the frantic activity.
To his left, in neat, orderly rows, cars, vans and passenger trucks waited to back onto the nine a.m. ferry for the fifty minutes return trip to the mainland Rhode Island. Seth's employees moved like a well-oiled NASCAR pit crew, offloading cargo from the arriving Gerry and reloading the next boat. The island relied on the ferries to deliver everything from food to mail to fuel to milk. During the summer, when the island's thirty restaurants and bars operated at full tilt, each ferry brought new shipments of beer, wine, liquor, fresh seafood, potatoes, vegetables and linens.
A forklift carrying a pallet of soda came within inches of running into Dean.
"Sorry, man," the operator called out with a smile.
Dean waved to the driver. He cleared the cargo area and fixed his gaze on the Beachcomber, the iconic building that anchored the town. The quaking horn of a Range Rover painted yellow and tricked out like a duck—complete with a bill affixed to the hood—caught Dean's eye. Laughing at the JSTDKY license plate, he stepped off the curb onto Main Street.
A searing pain stabbed through his left leg, sending him sprawling into the street.
Dean lay there for a second, trying to catch his breath and gather his wits. A young woman was lying next to him, her bike about to be run over by a pickup truck that would hit her next. Dean ignored the burning pain in his calf and leaped up to stop the truck inches from her. He wasn't fast enough to keep the truck from mangling her bike, though.
Dean squatted down to help the woman. Her top had ridden up in the fall, so he noticed her extravagant curves and had to remind himself that she was hurt. She was struggling to breathe and must've had the wind knocked out of her by the fall. He quickly adjusted her shirt to cover her full breasts.
"Take it easy," he said. "Don't struggle. That'll only make it worse."
Frantic chocolate brown-colored eyes stared up at him.
The impact of their eyes meeting hit him like a locomotive to the chest. What the heck was that? Long hair the same color as her eyes fanned out under her head, and blood poured from huge cuts on her knee, elbow and hand. Dean winced, wishing he'd been more careful.
Tears spilled from her eyes.
Dean reached out to brush them away, his fingers tingling as they skimmed over her soft skin.
Her eyes widened, and she seemed to stop breathing altogether.
"Breathe," he said.
Anxious to get her away from the prying eyes of the crowd that he formed around them, Dean slid his arms under her and lifter her from the pavement.
She let out a startled gasp and then a moan as her injured leg bend around his arm. "W-what're you doing?"
"My friend Nattie runs the Beachcomber. She's a volunteer paramedic on the Gansett Fire Department. Let's go get you cleaned up. Did you hit your head?"
"No, just my arm and leg." She turned her palm up. "And my hand."
Deans' stomach roiled at the sight of her pulpy hand.
"God, I'm so sorry." Still carrying her, he crossed the street to the hotel. "I wasn't looking where I was going."
She struggled against his firm hold. "I need to get to work, so if you could just put me down. Please…"
"You can't go to work in this condition. You're bleeding."
"I have to go or I'll get fired."
Her twisting and squirming caused her round rear end to press against his belly, which sent a lurid message straight down to where he lived.
He groaned. "Do you mind holding still?"
"No one asked you to carry me," she retorted, apparently misinterpreting his groan.
"Look, I can't just put you down and send you on your way when you're bleeding all over the place. Let's get you patched up, and we'll see what's what."
"I'll get fired," she whispered, her eyes flooding with new tears.
"Where do you work? I'll call them and let them know you had an accident."
"They won't believe you. They're bastards."
"I can be very convincing." He took the steps leading to the Beachcomber two at a time, ignoring the shooting pain from his own injured leg. The porch was full of people having breakfast, and his passenger turned her face into his chest. At the maître d' stand; he asked for Nattie and was shown to her office off the lobby.
"Dean!" Smiling, Nattie jumped up from her desk chair. "I didn't know you were coming home!" She glanced at the woman in his arms, whose shaft of long hair hid her face. "And bringing a friend. Don't tell me you ran away and got married."
"Not exactly. We had a little accident on the street."
Nattie glanced at the woman's leg, saw blood and went into paramedic mode. "Bring her in here." She gestured to a sofa in her office.
"I don't want to get blood all over your sofa," the injured woman said.
Nattie grabbed some towels and spread them out.
As Dean put down his passenger, her breast bounced against his arm, sending another burst of lust coursing through him. Her hourglass figure reminded him of the old pinup girl posters his father had in the garage when Dean was a kid. Betty Boop had nothing on this woman.
With her uninjured hand, she brushed the hair back off her pretty face.
"Megan!" Nattie cried. "What happened?"
Megan gestured at Dean. "Someone wasn't watching where he was going and knocked me off my bike, which is now totaled."
Nattie tied back her shoulder –length blonde hair and broke out an elaborate first-aid kit from under her desk.
Dean hovered in the doorway to the small office. "Do you want me to call your work and let them know you'll be out today?"
"Just tell them I'll be late. I can't afford to miss a whole shift."
No way could she work today, but Dean wasn't going to argue with her—yet. "Where am I calling?"
"Ambrose's Gansett Inn, housekeeping department."
Smiling to himself, he reached for his cell phone and dialed the number from memory. Megan watched him, a startled expression on her face.
Keeping his eyes fixed on her, he asked for the housekeeping department. "Lana? Hey, it's Dean Ambrose."
Megan gasped from the double shock of hearing his name and having antiseptic applied to her gruesome cuts.
He whispered to Megan, "What's your last name?"
"Wright," she said through gritted teeth.
"Little Dean Ambrose, you devil," Lana said. "How in the hell are you?"
"I'm great. How are you?
"Can't complain too much."
"I wasn't on the island five minutes when I knocked one of your housekeepers off her bike."
"Still causing trouble, I see," Lana said with her trademark guffaw. "Which one?"
"Megan Wright. She's with me at the Beachcomber, and she's hurt pretty bad. Nattie is patching her up, but I don't think she can make it in today."
Megan scowled at him.
Lana released a deep sigh. "All right, if you say she can't work, I'll cover her shift."
"Thanks Lana. I'll be over to say hello, but don't tell my mom I'm here. She doesn't know I'm coming."
"She'll be over the moon, honey. Good to have you home."
"Thanks."
"That's not what I told you to say," Megan snapped the second he ended the call.
"You really think you can clean today with your hand ripped to shreds? Not to mention your arm and leg?"
"He's right, Megan," Nattie said as she covered the ugly wound on Megan's leg with a large gauze pad. "It'll hurt like hell in an hour."
"Already does," Megan said with a wince.
Her face had lost all color, her mouth was twisted with pain and Dean hated that he had caused her suffering. Despite her killer figure, an aura of fragility surrounded her, with the notable exception of her hands, which were rough and obviously used to hard work.
"You'll need to be real careful with that hand for a week or two," Nattie continued. "It won't take much to cause a bad infection if you get something in those open cuts."
Megan closed her eyes and tipped her head back against the sofa. "Oh my God," she whispered. "What am I going to do?"
Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God. The refrain played over and over as Megan pondered the deep load of shit she was in—or, rather, the deep load of shit Dean Ambrose had pushed her into. From the second she'd looked up to see him leaning over her in the street, he'd seemed familiar to her. But with her injuries demanding her full attention, she'd been unable to put a name to the distinctive face. The nearly twenty years since he'd led the Gansett High School to the state wrestling championship had transformed him from a handsome boy into a stunning man.
Sandy-brown hair that curled over his collar, bright blue eyes, broad shoulders, defined pecs…After the way she'd ogled him in school, she couldn't believe she hadn't recognized him instantly. No, she'd had just enough time to call his parents bastards before she put two and two together to get Dean Ambrose.
Except for the dark circles under his eyes and the grayish tone to his complexion, the man was utter perfection. She knew from Mrs. Ambrose, who bragged about her five darlings incessantly, that Dean lived in Las Vegas, but travelled quite extensively. You'd never know it to look at him.
Back when he'd been five years ahead of her in school, he'd never even known she was alive. And now, the first time he saw her, really saw her, he got a full view of the ban of her existence—her overly large breasts. She wanted to die just thinking about it. Megan wished she could either disappear or find a way to make Dean Ambrose and his big, bulking presence go away.
She opened her eyes. Still there. Still hovering. Still gorgeous. "You don't have to hang out," she said. "I can take it from here."
"I'll see you home."
"That's not necessary."
"It's my fault this happened—"
"I was the one that hit you."
"Because I stepped in front of you."
"You got hit by the bike, Dean?" Nattie asked, turning to him. "Let me see."
Dean turned his leg to show a huge bruise forming on his calf.
Both women gasped.
"It's nothing," Dean stood and put on his backpack. "If you're ready," he said to Megan, "I'll take you home."
"And how do you plan to do that?"
"I'll carry you."
"What if I live on the other side of the island?"
"I'll get a cab."
"I don't need you to take custody of me! I'll figure something out the same way I always do."
Dean leaned in so his face was inches from hers. "You're injured because of me, and I'm going to help you. Now, we can do this the hard way or the easy way. What's it going to be?"
The air crackled between them as they stared each other down.
"You've got a lot of your mother in you, huh?"
He glowered at her. "Now you're just being mean."
"I've, ah, got to get back to work," Nattie said. "Come in for lunch while you're home, Dean."
"I will. Thanks for your help, Nat," Dean said without looking away from Megan.
When they were alone, Megan said, "You think just because you're a mighty Ambrose everyone has to do what you say, don't you?"
"I don't know what my family has done to piss you off, but since I haven't' lived here in almost twenty years, I'm pretty sure it has nothing to do with me."
She attempted to cross her arms in impatience and grimaced at the pain that radiated from her elbow. For a brief, sickening second, she wondered if she had broken it. Then it finally gave way and bent the way it was supposed to. All she could think about was how much money this lost day of work was going to cost her, if it didn't cost her the job itself.
"What's it going to be? I can stay right here all day." He leaned against the edge of Nattie's desk. "I'm on vacation."
Oh! He's so sanctimonious and infuriating! "Fine! If you have some sort of macho need to see this through to the gruesome finish, you can take me home, but for the love of God, take me out the back door so I'm not any more of a public spectacle."
"Fine."
"Fine."
Dean scooped her up and gave her a moment to get her injured arm and leg settled. "Okay?"
"Yeah," she said, releasing a long, deep breath.
While she once again hid her face against his faded yellow t-shirt, he carried her through the lobby and out the back door. He smelled of sporty deodorant and laundry detergent, and his steady heartbeat echoed in her ear. Too bad he was an Ambrose. Otherwise, she might be tempted to forget about her no-men-ever-again policy.
Megan directed him through a series of pathways behind the buildings that made up downtown Gansett.
"I used to play cops and robbers with my brothers back here."
"I used to drag trash bags heavier than I was to the dumpsters when my mother worked at these places." She let her gaze travel up over the strong column of his neck to focus on his jaw, which seemed tense. Megan wondered what it would be like to trail her lips along his whisker-sprinkled jaw…
He glanced down to catch her studying him. "What?"
Her cheeks heated with embarrassment. "Nothing."
After a long pause, she said, "Your leg has to be hurting. Why don't you put me down? I can walk." He surprised her when he did as she asked. The sudden weight on her injured knee sent pain shooting through her, and she cried out from the shock of it.
"Have we proven that you could use a lift?"
A surge of nausea took her breath away. "Yes," she whispered. "Please."
He tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, surprising her again with the tender gesture. "I'm really sorry this happened."
Megan ventured a glance up at him and swallowed hard, taken aback by his intense gaze. "I know you are."
"I'll make it up to you."
"You don't have to. It was an accident."
"An accident that was my fault." He lifted her carefully and once again gave her a minute to settle her injured limbs before continuing on.
Megan directed him to her apartment over Paige's studio.
"Isn't this the Skaff place?" Dean asked.
She nodded. "My sister Paige is married to Kevin Skaff." As they reached the foot of the stairs, Megan realized her purse was still attached to the wrecked bike. "My bag! I never got it off the bike. My wallet, keys—"
"Take it easy." He carried her up the stairs to her door. "I'll track it down for you."
Megan tried to remember how much cash she'd had in her wallet. Twenty, maybe thirty dollars, but she needed every one of them. "The door isn't locked," she told him.
Somehow, he managed to carry her, open he door and get her inside without causing her any additional pain. She watched him take a quick survey of the small space and felt her defenses rise. No doubt he was used to much better, but she refused to be ashamed of the home she'd put together for herself and her son.
His eyes landed and settled on the baby toys stacked in the corner. "You're a mom?"
"My son Kyle is nine months old."
He lowered her to the tattered sofa she'd bought at a yard sale. "Where is he?"
"My sister watches him during the day. Oh God. The kids."
"Excuse me?"
"I take over for my sister at the daycare at three so she can teach her dance classes. She watches Kyle for me, and that's how I pay her back."
"I'll do it."
"What?"
"I'll watch the kids for you. How hard can it be?"
"Have you even changed a diaper?"
"I'm sure I have. Some time."
"Right. Look, I know you're probably some sort of Boy Scout—"
"Actually, I'm an Eagle Scout," he said with a proud smile.
"Of course you are, but you've really got to go now. Your family is expecting you—"
"They didn't know I was coming today."
Megan wanted to shriek in frustration. Why can't he get the message and leave me alone? And then it hit her in a wave of sickening despair. "It's not going to happen," she spat at him.
"What are you talking about now?"
"Get out of my cabinets! What're you doing?"
"Looking for some painkillers and a glass." He produced a bottle of Advil and a glass of water and brought both to her.
"Thank you," she muttered after she swallowed the pills. "Now, please, just go, will you?"
But of course he sat on the coffee table, and Megan prayed the flimsy table would hold his two-hundred-pounds-of-pure-muscle frame. "So, what's not going to happen?"
"I know what you're after." She wanted to smack the amused expression off his face.
"And what is that?"
"You think if you're nice to me that you'll get something in return."
Amusement faded to bafflement. "Like what?"
"Don't be obtuse. I know you got a damn good look out there on the street, so you're hanging around hoping to get your hands—among other things—on Megan Wright's famous breasts."
He stared at her for a long, breathless moment. "That is so not true."
"And how are you different from every other man alive?"
"When I look at you, the first thing I see are gorgeous eyes that remind me of the way melted chocolate looks over vanilla ice cream. They're a rather interesting combination of brown and gold. Your mouth, when it's not twisted with cynicism and bitterness, is so lush and pretty that my personal fantasies—if I had them about you, that is—would definitely be focused there, not on what's under your t-shirt. As spectacular as they may be, I'm more of an ass-and-leg man myself."
Megan had never been more shocked in her life—or more aroused by words alone.
"Now that we've got that subject covered, let's talk money."
That brought her right back to reality. "What about it?"
"I want to pay for your lost wages."
"Absolutely not." She might be short on cash, but she still had her pride, and no one—especially someone named Ambrose—was going to take that from her.
"You have to let me help you, Megan. I know you can't afford to miss work."
"That's the least of it! If I miss more than one shift, they'll replace me. They need the job done. They don't care who does it."
"I believe we've established that I have some sway with the owners of the hotel and can prevent that from happening."
"Good for you. That still doesn't get my job done, and it won't help me when they decide who they're keeping for the winter and who gets laid off."
"Then I'll do the job for you until you're back on your feet."
Megan cracked up. "Sure you will."
"You don't think I can do it?"
She realized he was serious. "You have no idea what it even entails. How can you be so sure you can do it?"
"I'm capable of wrestling five days a week, and keeping a balanced diet and workout routine while on the road three hundred plus days a year. I think I can handle cleaning a few hotel rooms."
Megan studied his supremely handsome face. "All right." What else could she do? She couldn't afford to lose her job, so she had no choice but to let him help her. "Since you seem determined to make it up to me, I accept."
He flashed a victorious smile. "Excellent. Now what about the kids? Could I be your arms and legs there, too?"
"Have you ever changed a diaper? Seriously?"
"No," he confessed, quickly adding, "but I'm a fast learner. If you tell me what to do, I'll do it."
He'd be saving her life if he stepped in for her, but wait until he saw what the summer people were capable of doing to a hotel room. Just the idea of a mighty Ambrose stooping to the level of manual laborer at the hotel his family owned brought a smile to her face. She offered her uninjured hand. "Deal."
He shocked her again when he took her hand and brushed a soft kiss over the back of it. "Excellent. Now, let me go find your purse and see about getting you some lunch."