A Home for her Hawk

  A Home for her Hawk

  By Summer Donnelly

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Epilogue

  Other books by Summer Donnelly

  Pursue your dreams. Make it happen. ~ SD, North Carolina

  © Summer Donnelly, 2018

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Any trademarks, service marks, product names or named features are assumed to be the property of their respective owners and are used only for reference. There is no implied endorsement.

  Prologue

  Maxwell Mountains, North Carolina

  Dan

  Thirty-year-old Daniel Donofrio didn’t want Kimber to know he’d waited up for her. She was twenty-one years old. He didn’t need to wait up for her. But under the guise of babysitting for one-month-old Anthony, he felt responsible.

  Sure, that was it, he thought. Dan didn’t have to acknowledge the heat and electricity that arced between them. Didn’t have to admit he might be worried about the single mom. Didn’t have to confess that after thirty years of loneliness, Kimberly Bromstad was everything he wanted, needed, and could never have.

  Like Cinderella, Kimber came home at the stroke of midnight. She slipped her shoes off in the dim light from the kitchen and approached the recliner. She smiled when she saw Anthony cuddled onto his chest.

  “Daniel?” Her caress was gossamer soft. An animal as wild as he was shouldn’t have wanted to sink into her touch and beg to be petted. So, he forced himself to be still.

  Dan opened his eye. Now more than ever, he detested the injury that cost him his right eye. He wanted to absorb the nuances of color on her cheeks. Each silken strand of her chestnut colored hair. The plays of blues that made her eyes appear violet.

  “I need the baby,” Kimber whispered. She pressed one hand against her top and blushed. “Please.”

  Without a word, he handed the sleeping baby to his mother. Dan saw the indecision in her eyes. He reached for her, urging her to sit on his lap. “Let me hold you.”

  Kimber pulled back for just a moment before giving into the irresistible pull they created.

  “My breasts are aching.” Kimber settled onto his lap and pulled up her shirt. “Please tell me he’s hungry.”

  “I fed him at nine.” Dan held Kimber and watched while she tickled the baby’s feet.

  “Be a good baby,” Kimber crooned to her son. “Help your mamma out, okay?”

  Anthony stirred, yawned, and immediately began fussing. He snorted a little as he rooted and Kimber giggled at his enthusiasm. The room filled with a hushed silence broken only by the sound of Anthony latching onto his mother’s breast.

  Kimber hissed. “Oh, that hurts so good.” She leaned down and cuddled into Dan’s chest. “We aren’t too heavy?”

  “You’re perfect.”

  If hell existed, Dan had his bags packed for the journey. He couldn’t be a part of this tiny but perfect family. Pretending, even in the magic hour of midnight, was only going to lead to pain.

  After about ten minutes, Kimber switched sides. “Normally, I’d give him at least half hour on each side,” she whispered, cheeks stained pink at the intimacy of information she shared. “I’m worried he’ll fall asleep and leave me lopsided and aching.”

  But like the good boy he was, Anthony rooted and found her other nipple.

  “What’s it feel like?” Dan asked, unable to remove his gaze from the Madonna-like vision of mother nursing child.

  Kimber yawned. “It’s the most amazing sensation. Like when you hit the last wall at the gym. Every muscle aching. You’re pushing, pushing, pushing. And then, suddenly, relief.”

  Dan tightened his grip on Kimber’s hips and watched her. Physically ached from denying his fantasy of claiming this beautiful, curvy woman and her child.

  Finally, after what felt like seconds, but was probably only thirty minutes, Anthony fell asleep. One cherry-red nipple popped out of his mouth. Kimber lowered her top and lifted Anthony to her shoulder.

  At that moment in time, Dan felt complete. He was just a man, holding his woman, while she burped their baby.

  When Kimber stood to put Anthony in his crib, reality washed over Dan with the force of an ice-cold power wash. Kimber was not his woman. Anthony was not his son. And the magic created in a cabin in the woods was not his to claim.

  Like a coward, he slunk out the door.

  Chapter One

  Kimber

  Kimberly Bromstad’s life was saved by a bear shifter and ruined by a hawk shifter. Not just any shifters of course. One was her probably hot (not that she’d ever admit that in a million years!) bear shifter brother. Her ruination was at the hands of a grumpy, reclusive, irritatingly distant hawk shifter

  Former intelligence officer Daniel Donofrio with his one amber eye who watched her like. Well. Like a hawk.

  Her brother had sacrificed himself and volunteered to go under the surgeon’s laser scalpel to become a bear shifter in the Shifter Special Forces. He transferred his healthy sign-up bonus to his sister, ensuring Kimber had the money she needed for college.

  Unfortunately (or fortunately as the case may be because she loved her son) Kimber found herself pregnant and alone in the middle of her junior year of college. Which is how she found herself in western North Carolina living in a cabin in the woods.

  Waves of uncertainty washed over her, and she held her abdomen. She’d been so sure her mother and grandmother’s cycle of poverty would end with her. Kimber was going to go to college. Get a good paying job. And not have to live paycheck to five days before paycheck.

  Kimber knew she needed to figure out how to graduate college. Get back to the life she’d left in Raleigh. But she didn’t want to give up Maxwell Mountains. For the last five months, she’d felt loved for the first time in her life. After arriving broke, scared, and pregnant, she’d been enveloped by the gentle love only family could provide.

  Her only brother lived here with his mate. They had loyal friends who had helped her through the scariest time of her life.

  And Daniel.

  But Kimber didn’t want to think about him. The heated, sensual night he had held her while she fed Anthony. The way his hands said mine but his body left her alone.

  Kimber shook her head and moved on from that line of thought. It was a badger hole with no end in sight.

  So, while her brother Hunter had tried to save her from the generational poverty they’d been born into, Daniel was determined to steal her peace of mind and create havoc in her life.

  She heard the truck long before it appeared in the parking lot of the three cabins that comprised Maxwell Mountain Resorts. Kimber walked to the window so she could watch as Daniel’s truck pulled into the parking lot.

  Kimber didn’t know why she could pick out the specific pattern of Daniel’s engine. Unlike her brother or even Daniel, she wasn’t a shifter. Didn’t have acute hearing or special spidey senses. Just a goofy, romantic woman who had somehow fixated on a one-eyed hawk shifter who watched her like prey but flew away when she got close.

  Once more, she thought about the night she’d come home from a girls’ night out, breasts aching for Anthony to nurse. And Daniel had been there, one amber eye gleaming in the diml
y lit living room.

  The night mystery and desire wound their way around her while she nursed her baby. Strong, masculine hands held her. Cradled her and allowed her to feel safe and loved for an hour. Kimber closed her eyes and for just a moment pretended they were a family.

  But when she came back into the living room after putting Anthony in his crib, Daniel was gone. Shattering the illusion of unity.

  Daniel got out of the truck. His long legs ate up the distance between his vehicle and Kimber’s cabin. Light glinted off his sandy hair making it look almost blonde. Kimber’s eyes ate up the vision of his lithe stride and the supple sway of his shoulders as he walked.

  Power and awareness surrounded her as arousal stirred within her. The little yellow cabin in the woods suddenly lost its façade of cozy safety.

  She pushed back on the siren call of forbidden lust. Daniel didn’t deserve her desire after the way he’d taken off without a word. Hurt and anger bubbled up within her. How dare he show his face at her home again? For as temporary as it was, Little Yellow was still her home.

  After checking the baby monitor to make sure Anthony was still asleep, Kimber squared her shoulders and went to confront the walking contradiction.

  “What are you doing here?” Kimber demanded, leaving the cabin and heading him off before he could knock on her door. Maybe she wasn’t a big tough shifter like the man standing before her, but she could be a mama bear with the best of them.

  Daniel stopped short. His golden blond hair picked up red highlights in the sun. His single piercing amber eye watched her. Not for the first time, Kimber wondered what he had looked like with both eyes fully functional.

  Too handsome for his own good, was her resounding reply. Or her good.

  Internally, she sighed. Unless she found an old picture, she would never know. The injury that took Daniel out of the Shifter Special Forces hid behind a rather dashing eye patch.

  “I heard Anthony was hurt. Is he okay?”

  “How did you hear about that?” Kimber couldn’t help challenging him at every turn. That night he held her while she nursed still haunted her. The spell was woven and then destroyed in one fell swoop.

  Daniel flushed. “Hadley told me there was a spill.” He walked, trying to get around her and into the house, but Kimber blocked him.

  “He’s fine.” Kimber felt her cheeks get warm. “If you must know finding time to shower with a baby isn’t easy. I got him one of those rocking baby seats so he can be in the bathroom with me. But he was bouncing so much he wound up tipping it over. There was no damage, but I asked Hadley to check him out for me. Just in case.”

  “You could have asked me to watch him.”

  Kimber’s eyes widened at the suggestion. Ask him? Oh sure, like she’d be able to strip down and shower without being completely aware and incredibly aroused by her next-door neighbor, stud-muffin wanna be, hawk shifter babysitter.

  She stifled a grin at the string of adjectives. Now was not the time to give in. She was in mama bear mode. “I don’t need your help.”

  One eyebrow raised and again, Kimber wondered what the effect he’d have with two fully functional eyes. “It seems to me, you do.”

  Daniel feinted right, and when Kimber blocked him, he darted left. “Is he in his crib?”

  “Why do you even care, Daniel? What’s it to you?”

  Daniel paused as if he were going to say something but then pushed on. Anthony was in the spare room, blinking himself away from his nap. One fist shook while he sucked on his left foot.

  “He’s so little,” Dan said, kneeling beside the crib and gazing in. “You okay big guy?” he crooned.

  Kimber felt her heart expand several sizes as she watched this big, strong man take a knee before her son. What was it about seeing him with Anthony that made her lady parts pulse with need?

  “Stop it,” she scolded herself. Throbbing lady parts were part of what got her into this problem. They certainly weren’t going to get her out of them.

  After whispering sweet nothings to the baby, Daniel reached into the crib and touched one tiny fist. Anthony gurgled and was more than happy to replace his toes with Dan’s finger. “Is he cutting teeth?”

  “No, thank goodness. He’s still too young for that. But I’m blessed that I have a Nurse Practitioner in the family like Hadley.” Kimber’s small shoulders lifted and fell in a long sigh. She still had her arms crossed in front of her like a shield, but she felt her heart softening.

  Kimber walked over to the crib and smiled down at her son. “Isn’t that right, sweetie pie? Auntie Hadley helps us out a lot, doesn’t she?”

  Daniel put his hand on her shoulder and pulled her into a hug. “It can’t be easy being a single mom,” he murmured.

  Kimber let herself be weak. Just for a moment. Damn, damn, damn he felt good. Was it wrong to want someone to hold her, tell her she was doing a great job, and you know, maybe give her a chocolate bar or something?

  And somehow, Daniel, who had no dog in this race, was giving her the exact encouragement she needed. Only, without the chocolate.

  Kimber relaxed against Daniel, hugging him back and allowed a single tear to slip from her eye. Just one because if she allowed herself to break down, she wasn’t sure what would be waiting for her on the other side of the rollercoaster.

  She was the one who wound up pregnant and deserted. Homeless, afraid, with a partial education, and no job.

  Daniel’s smile faded to a frown as he looked around the room. “What’s with the suitcases? Are you’re leaving?”

  “No. Yes. I don’t know.” Anger stirred within Kimber again. She was up against pride, dwindling finances, and family obligations. “It’s complicated.”

  Daniel

  “Tell me.” He spoke soothingly. The thought of her leaving churned in his belly. He connected with Kimber and Anthony. Losing them for whatever reason was unacceptable.

  Daniel had been alone almost all of his thirty years. Given up for adoption when he was a toddler, there was always something off about him. Something different. Nothing anyone could ever identify. Just enough so he was never adopted. Never fostered long term.

  Group homes weren’t bad, but Dan found they gave him no way to relate to other people. No path to follow that would lead him to connect to another human being.

  Sometimes he felt more like a wild animal than a man. The irony wasn’t lost on him. Joining the Shifter Special Forces was the only decent decision he’d made.

  But, since losing his right eye and by default his ability to soar, Dan didn’t feel much like a hawk, either.

  But when he looked into Kimber’s violet-blue eyes, Dan wanted things he couldn’t have. Had never had. Emotions pummeled him. Scratching and tempting him with all he wanted to succumb to.

  “I can’t stay. I’m nothing but a burden. Maybe if I head to a major city, I can find a better paying job.” She glanced at Anthony. “Get back to school. Make something of myself.”

  Dan’s senses sharpened. “You’re a mom. What else could possibly compete with that?”

  Kimber’s gaze darted away from him. “How about a job that pays more than a waitress at the Lunchbucket?”

  “Hunter doesn’t seem the kind of guy who would turn his back on his only sister. But I assume you know him better than I do.” Daniel couldn’t keep the surprise out of his voice. “Loyalty is usually bred into the Special Forces.”

  Kimber’s eyes lit with anger as she turned to face him. “Don’t you dare insult my brother! You have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  Dan folded his arms across his chest and stared at her. Waiting. Silence was a tool he’d used a lot in his intelligence work. It unnerved even the strongest men. Of course, he knew Hunter was loyal to his sister. What he wanted to know was why Kimber was turning her back on it.

  “Hunter has done a lot for me. For us.” Kimber’s gaze went back to her son. She picked him up and held his tiny body close to hers as though she feared losing him.r />
  The temptation was too much. Dan reached for her and embraced them both. “Then why do you want to leave?”

  Kimber brushed her lips against the baby’s downy soft hair but didn’t resist his hug. “You can’t keep doing this to me, Daniel. Touching me. Making me feel too much and then backing off and leaving.”

  Dan rested his cheek on her head, mimicking her gesture to the baby. He wasn’t good at words. Wasn’t good at any human interaction, really. But she looked so forlorn, he couldn’t resist.

  Kimber trembled in his arms. Her mouth opened and closed before she finally took a deep, shuddering breath. “There was no way I was going to afford college. Hunter and I were raised dirt poor.”

  Dan’s arms tightened around her. He understood all about being poor. “But you’re already halfway finished, right?”

  “And then Wayne happened.”

  Dan felt a lurching in his belly. He didn’t want to hear this part. But, since he asked about it, he embraced the suck and let her talk.

  “We met when I was eighteen. My freshman year of college. Wayne was a teacher’s assistant. His family had a lot of money, and it seduced me. Here I was this poor girl from nowhere special. I felt guilty because Hunter signed up for the Shifter Special Forces so he could send me to college.”

  She turned to look up at him, and he was again stunned by her violet eyes. “I didn’t want my brother to leave. Why did he abandon us?”

  Dan tilted his head, confused. Even he knew the answer to that question. “He didn’t abandon you, Kimber. He loved you enough to sacrifice a part of himself so you could live a better life.”

  “And I failed him.” Kimber closed her eyes and tightened her grip on Anthony. “I got pregnant by a rich asshole who was engaged to someone else. Who handed me a handful of hundred-dollar bills and ordered me to have an abortion.”

  Dan stilled all movement. Swallowed. How anyone could reject their own son killed him. “What did you do?” The words were flat. Unaccented. Was it wrong to hope her heart was free to love again?

  “I refused. Wayne had his lawyer draw up some fancy papers saying he wouldn’t pay child support, was giving up his parental rights.”