After snapping at every paralegal and associate who’d dragged themselves into the office on a Saturday, he knew he’d be no good to anyone and took off to visit his friends in his old hometown. Ty and Lacey had returned for the weekend to visit Ty’s mother and their timing couldn’t be better.

A quick phone call and they agreed to meet at their old hangout, Night Owl’s. He paused at the bar, ordered a beer and carried it over to the table where his friends sat eating dinner. He’d already filled Ty in on Molly’s sudden resurrection in his life. Hunter was certain Lacey knew by default, so there was no need for explanation as he pulled up a chair and joined them.

Ty eyed the bottle in Hunter’s hand and frowned. “Beer not vodka.”

“Your point?” Hunter asked.

Ty shrugged. “You already know.”

Hunter answered by taking a swig from the bottle.

Hunter had refined his tastes soon after putting himself through college then law school, straightening out his life. He’d taken to dressing more like an attorney and drinking name-brand vodka instead of cheap brew. But that was back when Hunter cared what people thought. Before he’d learned appearances meant little and he’d always be the same kid who’d gone through a revolving door of foster homes on the wrong side of the tracks. The guy nobody thought would amount to a damn thing. Since his breakup with Molly, if he could call it that, he’d reverted to his old ways.

“Hard living and harder drinking,” Lacey said, shaking her head, her disappointment and concern clear. “I thought you’d get this need to self-destruct out of your system by now. Do you know how worried we’ve been about you?” Lacey reached across the table and placed her hand over his. “Ty, tell him.”

The other man merely shrugged. “I’m not worried. I just think you’re an ass and you need to get your life in order. No woman’s worth-ouch!” he muttered as his wife elbowed him in the ribs.

“You know what I mean,” Ty said, placing an arm around Lacey’s shoulders and kissing her on the cheek before turning back to Hunter. “You’ve been burying yourself in work and women to forget Molly and it hasn’t helped. Now she’s back and she needs your expertise. That’s two things you can’t resist, so-”

“She dumped me and disappeared for almost a year. Not one word-”

“I’ve heard from her,” Lacey reminded him.

He cleared his throat. “Like I said, I haven’t heard from her until now when she needs my help, pro bono I might add, and she calls on me. Hunter, the sucker. Hunter, the one who can’t resist her. Uh-uh. No way, no how. I am not helping her.” He slammed the empty bottle onto the table for emphasis.

“Pro bono is what you do,” Lacey said in her sweetest, most cajoling voice.

Best friend or not, he was going to strangle her, Hunter thought.

“Besides, you owe Molly,” Lacey said.

“I what? ” Hunter hit the side of his head with his palm to clear his hearing.

“You owe her. Last year when everything went down, I thought Uncle Marc was the one who wanted me dead so he could claim my trust fund. And instead of taking Molly’s side, you backed me up. So you owe her, Hunter, you really do.”

Ty leaned closer to Hunter. “It’s a female thing,” he explained. “Just look at her and smile like you agree. Trust me, it’s easier than arguing.”

Hunter opened his mouth, then shut it again. But in the end, he couldn’t resist. “I apologized to Molly,” he reminded his best female friend. “And I proposed to her. Not just marriage, but I said I’d pick up my life and move wherever she wanted so we could have a chance at a real future together. I hardly think I owe her,” he said through clenched teeth.

Just the memory of that time had the power to send him reeling all over again. He’d thought Molly understood and accepted him, past and all, but he’d been wrong. He’d learned then that all the refinement in the world wouldn’t change his destiny. When Molly rejected him, she’d proved that hard work hadn’t altered the fact that he was what his father had claimed, someone who’d never amount to anything. Someone not worth staying around for.

Everyone left Hunter eventually. Molly’s betrayal had just hurt the most because he’d taken a risk and opened his heart.

Never again.

“You’ll help her,” Ty said right before he bit into his burger. “It’s what you do.”

Lacey nodded. “It’s who you are.”

Hunter slid the bottle across the table, his annoyance and frustration growing. “Neither of you listened to a word I said.”

Lacey took a sip of her soda from a straw, and met his gaze. “As long as you don’t listen, that’s all that matters, because Molly needs you.”

Hunter swore and glanced toward the ceiling. “What about what I want and what I need?” he asked.

Ty slapped a brotherly hand on his shoulder. “When it comes to women, it doesn’t matter what we want. It’s all about what they want.”

Lacey grinned. “He learns fast.”

“Married men have no choice,” Ty said.

“But marriage does have its perks, doesn’t it?” she asked, playfully sifting her hand through the back of Ty’s hair.

“As thrilled as I am that the two of you are disgustingly happy, I have to get back to work.” In truth he was thrilled that his best friends had found the happiness they deserved, but he couldn’t stand to be around their marital bliss.

He pushed his chair back and rose. “I’m out of here.”

Lacey frowned. “Don’t go running away just because we’re hitting a nerve. Stay for dessert.”

He shook his head. “Can’t.”

“Won’t,” Ty countered. “PDA isn’t his thing. He’d rather bring home women who don’t mean anything to him and make sure they leave before the sun rises.”

Lacey winced. “Do you have to be so blunt?”

“Did I mention last night’s didn’t leave before Molly showed up?” Ty asked.

Lacey’s eyes opened wide. “Tell me he’s joking,” she said as she met Hunter’s gaze.

He shook his head. He could still vividly recall how the color drained from Molly’s face when she’d realized he wasn’t alone, and he let out a slow groan. “I wish he was kidding, but it’s the truth.”

In the condemning silence that followed, Hunter wished he’d left when he’d had the chance. “It’s not like I knew she was coming,” he muttered, wondering why he’d become the guilty party.

“He’s got a point,” Lacey said.

“It’s time to give you a kick in the ass. Get your life together,” Ty said to Hunter. He then turned to his wife. “And do you always have to take his side even when he’s wrong?” he asked, disgusted.

Lacey merely laughed and hugged him until he relented, wrapping an arm around her shoulders.

Hunter, Ty and Lacey had played out similar scenes before. The three friends went back a long way. Ty’s mother was Hunter’s last and best foster parent, taking in Hunter and Lacey both. From the beginning, Lacey had sensed Hunter needed a friend and heaven forbid Ty ganged up on Hunter, Lacey jumped in as his defender. She’d always been someone who believed in him when no one else would. Just as Ty always ended up doing the same.

Lacey had a big heart, which had been the reason Hunter had fallen in love with her when they were kids. Through the years, he’d realized those feelings had morphed into brotherly affection. A good thing since Lacey had always been head over heels for Ty, the dark-haired rebel, as she used to describe him to Hunter.

And Hunter had known the difference between caring and love the day he’d met boldly dressed, outspoken Molly Gifford. Hunter and Molly’s chemistry was undeniable, but from the beginning there’d been so much more between them. In Molly, he’d found his intellectual equal. Hell, she’d beat him out for valedictorian of their law-school graduating class and he’d admired her for it. He’d also sensed an emptiness inside her that he understood because he felt the same way. He believed they’d fill those needs for each other.

He’d been wrong. Thinking like a character from Jerry Maguire had cost Hunter emotionally.

He was still suffering the aftershocks, but he couldn’t say that Lacey and Ty were incorrect. They’d made some valid points, damn them, and their words crowded his brain, outweighing his selfish emotions.

“I really need to get out of here,” Hunter said and turned to leave.

“Take this before you go,” Ty said.

Hunter swerved back and grabbed the paper his friend held out to him. “What is it?”

“The address of one General Frank Addams. He lives in Dentonville, Connecticut. I just figured I’d save you the cell minutes. You know damn well you’d have called me to find the man eventually,” Ty said helpfully.

His knowing grin really pissed Hunter off, mostly because he was right. At some point during this aggravating meeting, he’d decided to book the next flight from Albany to Connecticut and find out what was really going on in Molly’s life that had caused her to turn to him for help.

Lacey was right about something else, too. Not that he’d give her the satisfaction of admitting it. He had put Lacey and their shared past before his trust in Molly. Ty and Lacey were the only family he had, the only ones who cared enough to stand by him. He hadn’t been willing to risk that, even for Molly.

So, yeah, he owed her. But obligation wasn’t the only reason he’d go. Tonight Lacey and Ty had looked at him with the same disgusted expression he viewed in the mirror each morning. He was tired of it.

Hunter was finished sleeping with women he didn’t give a shit about, and he was done drinking himself into a stupor only to wake up with the mother of all hangovers. He’d worked too hard to achieve success only to throw it all away now.

To prove it, he’d help Molly without getting sucked in again. He’d show himself he was over her once and for all by winning her father’s case, and then moving on without looking back.

CHAPTER THREE

FIRST THING MONDAY morning, Molly visited her father. She sat across a metal table from him, and looked him over, searching for changes though she knew there’d be none. A few nights in jail wouldn’t affect her strong, controlled parent and she admired his strength. His salt-and-pepper hair, cropped army-regulation short out of habit, looked too right with his orange jumpsuit. But he didn’t belong here and she would prove it.

“How are you?” Having been warned there must be no contact, she kept her hands folded on the tabletop.

“I’m fine. I promise. How are you?”

“Fine.” She squeezed her hands tighter.

“The rest of the family? How are they all holding up?”

Molly smiled. “It took a lot of convincing, but Robin went back to school for the week and the commander’s telling anyone within earshot you’re being railroaded.”

He burst out laughing. “And Jessie?”

“I think this is hardest on her.” Molly sighed, her heart breaking for the teenager despite their rocky relationship. “She’d normally turn to Seth,” she said of Jessie’s best friend and their next-door neighbor.

Seth’s father was Paul Markham, the man the general had been accused of murdering. Frank and Paul had been army buddies. They’d been honorably discharged and eventually they’d become partners in a real-estate-development business. The families had been close; Seth, his father and his mother, Sonya, living next door.

“But Seth is dealing with his father’s death and I know Jessie feels alone, not that she’d admit it. Or come to me for anything,” Molly said.

“This shouldn’t be happening to any of us.” Her father maintained his ever-present control, but his body tensed in frustration.

Molly instinctively reached a hand to his and the guard behind them, who she’d been trying to ignore, cleared his throat as a reminder. She shot her father a regret-filled glance and snatched her hand back.

“We’ll figure this out,” she promised. She just didn’t know how. She wasn’t about to mention Hunter to him and get his hopes up when the likelihood of the lawyer helping them were less than slim. “Are you sleeping?” she asked instead, leaning closer to study his bloodshot eyes and the tension lines in his forehead.

He nodded. “I’m trained to sleep anywhere. I’m fine, ” he said again.

She believed him and yet she didn’t. He had to be worried sick about his fate.

“I just miss you all. Even the damn mouthy bird. I don’t want you making yourself crazy trying to fix this, or Robin losing focus at school. As for Jessie…” His voice trailed off. Nothing more needed to be said.

Molly swallowed hard. “I just wish I’d specialized in criminal law so I could do more.” She hated feeling useless, and her stomach had been in permanent knots since his arrest.

“You know, when you first showed up here, I couldn’t have been more shocked if I’d given birth myself and then forgotten all about it. When your mother got pregnant, I was a kid with a plan, making the army my career like my father had. She said she wanted to give the baby up for adoption. I thought it was for the best and signed the papers. I believed she’d do what she said and you’d have a happy life.” He frowned as he always did when her mother’s lies came up between them.