“You and Dean are pretty close, huh?” he asked, picking back up on the conversation and ruthlessly ignoring the idea that maybe she was too good for him.
“Very. We’ve always known what the other was thinking.”
Deanna dropped her hands from his head and snuggled up against him, as if content to let him stroke her. “Did you ever have one of those moments when one of you knew something was wrong before anyone else?”
She nodded. “We were in the seventh grade. He was staying at a friend’s house overnight when he broke his arm falling off a bike. A few minutes before the boy’s mother called, I knew the phone would ring. I knew something was wrong with Dean. I could just feel it.”
“Damn, I bet that freaked out your mom.”
“Mom doesn’t get worked up easily. She’s always been able to take things in stride.”
Jonas could see that about Deanna’s mom. He’d never heard the woman so much as raise her voice, and yet she always seemed to get her way with her three kids. “So, has Dean always coddled you?”
“Yes. Well, that’s not entirely true. Dean could be somewhat tough on me, especially if he thought it was for my own good. Back in high school, he’d challenge me to arm-wrestling matches and he never let me win.”
Jonas tensed at the visual that brought to mind. “Arm wrestling? That’s not even close to a fair fight, Deanna. Your brother is a big man. I have to assume he was big in high school.”
“He’s always been muscular. But Dean taught me self-defense. He’s shown me all sorts of little tricks to use against a guy.”
“Have you ever had to use them?”
She snorted. “I should’ve used them on Gary, but my heart was involved then. Not so easy to hurt someone you think you love.”
He kissed the top of her head. “No, it’s not,” he murmured. “So, what’d Dean say about you taking this trip with me? He couldn’t have been happy.”
“Uh, I didn’t exactly tell him.”
“He doesn’t know?”
“By now he does. Mom or Wade would’ve told him.”
Jonas cupped her chin in his palm and urged her to look at him. “Are you ashamed to be here with me, Deanna?”
Deanna rolled her eyes. “Don’t be ridiculous. Of course I’m not ashamed. It’s just that Dean is more protective of me than Wade. It’s like he can’t bring himself to believe I’m all grown up and allowed to have sex. I think if I’d become a nun, he would’ve been thrilled.”
Enticed by the temptation of Deanna’s taste, Jonas brushed his lips back and forth over hers. “I wouldn’t have been happy if you’d become a nun,” he confided in a hushed tone.
Deanna laughed. “I’ll just bet.”
Jonas started to ask if she was going to talk to Dean when they returned to Ohio, but his cell phone rang, shattering the moment. He picked it up from the table and looked at the time on the clock on the wall. “It’s midnight. What the hell?”
It rang again. “Answer it,” she urged him. “Maybe it’s an emergency.”
Jonas flipped it open, not bothering to check the caller ID. “Hello?”
“What the hell do you think you’re doing taking my sister to that beach house, you motherfucker?”
Jonas’s gaze shot to Deanna. “Dean,” he said, and watched as Deanna’s eyes grew round with shock. “What a pleasant surprise.”
“If you hurt her, Phoenix, I’ll bury you.”
Jonas sighed. “I didn’t kidnap her, Harrison. She wanted to come. She’s a big girl.”
“Put her on the phone.”
“Nice talking to you, too, buddy.” Jonas handed the phone to Deanna.
Deanna snatched it out of his hand. “Before you open your big, stupid mouth, you better remember that I don’t answer to you. Nor do I answer to Wade. I came on this trip because I wanted to spend time with Jonas, so back off!”