Winning the Right Brother. Abigail Strom

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СКАЧАТЬ about boys he’d worked with in the past, the boys he was working with now. They were all great kids in their own way. He had faith in all of them, even the ones no one else believed in.

      He’d been a kid like that once.

      Alex shook his head sharply. Enough with the trip down memory lane. Tomorrow night was the first game of the season and Will Stanton was his backup quarterback, not to mention next year’s starter if he fulfilled even a fraction of his promise. And Holly Stanton was just another parent.

      He set his jaw, strode up to the door, and rang the bell.

      “Coach is here,” Will said, pushing back his chair.

      All of Holly’s calm evaporated. She had intended to go to the door with Will, where she would greet Alex with polite indifference. Instead she slipped into the dark living room, her heart beating ridiculously fast, so she could see the front hallway without being seen.

      Before she could get a grip on her poise, Will was opening the door, and in the next second Alex McKenna stepped over the threshold.

      Holly’s breath caught in her throat. Just like in the old days, Alex seemed larger than life—and not just because of his size. His presence had always made everything else around him a little dimmer, a little duller, and fifteen years hadn’t changed that.

      On the surface, though, a lot of things had changed.

      His hair was no longer bleached and spiked, for one thing. It was light brown, and cut fairly short. There was no safety pin in his left ear, no metal studs anywhere at all, and no black clothing. He wore a pair of khaki pants and a forest green button-down shirt.

      The haircut and clothes together would normally come attached to a good boy. The kind you could safely bring home to Mother.

      But the harsh planes of his jaw and cheekbones, the piercing blue eyes, the scar slicing through his left eyebrow—all these still screamed bad boy.

      And all the conservative shirts in the world couldn’t conceal those broad, muscular shoulders and rock-hard chest.

      Sex, sin and danger. Yep, Alex McKenna was still open for business.

      Alex grinned at Will and tried not to be too obvious about looking around for his mother.

      The Stanton home, at least what he could see of it, was neat as a pin and furnished with quiet good taste. Big surprise there. Holly had probably been born with the Ralph Lauren logo tattooed across her forehead. The room to the right was dark, but just down the hall he could see the brightly lit kitchen, with lemon-yellow tile countertops and a red geranium on the windowsill. Good smells, like Italian food and freshly baked bread, came wafting toward him, but there was no sign of Holly.

      Alex bit back an irrational feeling of disappointment. “Ready to head out, Will? I’m assuming you cleared it with your mom.”

      “Yep. She’s right—” Will turned his head, but no one was there. “Well, she was right behind me ….”

      And then a small, slender redhead in an elegantly cut brown wool pantsuit came out of the shadows to stand beside her son. She looked up at him for a long minute, her head tilted to one side.

      “Hi, Alex,” she said finally, in the low, husky voice he remembered.

      She was even more gorgeous now than she’d been as a teenager—and as a teenager she’d had every guy who saw her dragging his tongue in the dust.

      Her face was the same—the same smooth, creamy skin, the same delicate features. The expression in her green eyes was different: a little tougher, a little warier.

      Her hair was exactly the same. Coppery red mingled with brown and gold, like fall leaves. She still wore it pulled back, although the style was a little more sophisticated now.

      He could tell her lips were still full and soft, although right now they were pressed together, adding to the sense of caution reflected in her eyes.

      And then there was her body. Hidden, naturally, behind a severely tailored suit that was obviously intended to play down her curves. Begging the question of why in God’s name anyone would want to hide something so delectable ….

      Alex gave a mental shrug. Hell, he knew why she hid. She was still the same, play-it-safe Holly Stanton: afraid to put so much as a perfectly manicured toe on the wild side.

      “Hello, Holly,” he said. “Long time no see.”

      She was looking him up and down now, one eyebrow lifted. “You’ve certainly changed since I saw you last,” she said, her voice amused.

      Just like old times. In less than a minute, she’d managed to piss him off.

      “The Gap just isn’t a look I ever expected to see on you,” she added.

      The kicker was, he’d put on these damn clothes with her in mind. Thinking that maybe she’d see a different side of him. His jaw tightened. So much for a fresh start. Like the seventeen-year-old kid he’d once been, he wanted nothing more than to wipe that superior look off her face.

      He leaned back casually against the door frame, folding his arms across his chest. “Most of us change after high school, Holly. Except you, of course. You haven’t changed a bit. Every hair in place … just like the old days.” He grinned suddenly. “Of course, I did get to see another side of you once. The day I caught you dancing around that empty classroom, singing to Bruce Springsteen at the top of your lungs.”

      That got under her skin a little—he watched the heat come up into her face, the way it had when they were teenagers and he tossed a barb her way. Her eyes narrowed and she opened her mouth to say something, but a glance at Will made her hold it back. Alex wondered what she’d been about to call him.

      “Wow, Mom,” Will said, looking surprised. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you dance.”

      “That’s because I don’t,” she said crisply. She looked from her son to Alex. “Not that this hasn’t been fun, but don’t you boys have plans to talk about that inflated rubber ball you’re so obsessed with? Oh, and the pummeling,” she added, the superior expression back. “Let’s not forget the intellectual stimulation of the pummeling.”

      Will said goodbye to his mom and followed Alex out the door. “She’s not exactly a football fan,” he told his coach.

      “Yeah, I picked up on that,” Alex answered as he led the way to his car.

      They were gone.

      Holly closed her eyes and leaned back against the front door. “That went well,” she said to the empty house.

      Why had she let Alex get to her, as if they were still teenagers? Heck, she was the mother of a teenager, and a successful businesswoman to boot.

      He said she hadn’t changed a bit. She knew what that meant. Boring old Holly was still … boring.

      Holly was suddenly filled with a desire to show Alex McKenna that she wasn’t boring. That she could be sexy and wild and … dangerous.

      She sighed. Who was she kidding? If she’d been uptight as a teenager—with СКАЧАТЬ