He’s dark and sexy. She’s sweetness and light.

Nightclub owner Jason Dare knows all too well about loss and hardship. Family lies and personal pain define his past and the man he has become. The lesson he learned? Keep his circle small and the people he loves close, and do his damndest to keep tragedy from hurting him again. When he meets Faith Lancaster, he’s immediately smitten. Faith and her Sweet Treats business tempt him to open himself up to all this free spirt has to offer. But from the moment they meet, Jason realizes that Faith comes with danger which threatens the tightly woven family he’s created for himself.

Faith is determined to build a life for herself in New York City, where she can easily get lost in the crowd. Although she puts her candy shop, Sweet Treats, together with love, sugar and a shoe-string budget, she plans to succeed. When it becomes obvious her brother, who is after what little inheritance she possesses, has found her, she panics but she refuses to run away again. It’s time to make a stand.

Jason has spent his life focusing on growing his business and the men he calls his brothers, never letting anyone in. Suddenly there’s someone else he wants to protect and keep safe, forcing him to make a choice; retreat into the safe cocoon of his comfort zone or open his mind and his heart to the woman who’s meant to be his.

Jason had settled into a chair in the center of the shop, surveying the work going on around him. He’d already left once, returning with sandwiches and sodas for everyone. As the hours passed and he vacillated between returning messages on his phone and talking to the workmen he obviously knew, she grew more confused.

“Don’t you have somewhere else to be?” she asked him.

He raised an eyebrow as if to say, Really? “Nowhere more important. I want to make sure the work here is done correctly and this place looks exactly the way you want it.”

She appreciated his thoughtfulness, but he had to have better things to do than worry about her. “Okay, but I can handle that. I don’t want to take up more of your day than I already have. I can stick around until the guys are finished, lock up, and head home.”

He folded his strong arms over his chest, his olive-green Henley pulling tight over his muscles. “And do you think I’m going to leave you here alone after what you told me about your brother?”

She’d been pushing thoughts of Colton aside all day. “I have pepper spray on my keychain.” The words sounded ridiculous, even to her.

She was no match for her brother, and if he was strung out? He’d have a wiry strength she couldn’t handle. She knew that firsthand, memories of her hands trying to pull his wrists off her neck very clear in her mind.

“Okay, fine. I appreciate you making sure I get home safely.” She’d be a fool to fight Jason’s protective nature.

“You still don’t get it. But you will.” He shook his head, amusement warring with a more serious expression. “You’re coming home with me, sweetness. I’m not leaving you here or in that shitty walk-up with a crappy lock your brother could break with one good kick.”

“Hey! That’s my apartment you’re insulting!” And all she could afford.

“It’s only an insult if I’m wrong.” He studied her, as if daring her to argue.

“I can’t just move in with you!”

He sighed. “Fine. You need someone to vouch for me? We can call my partners. Or my sister. Or… Hey, Sam! Am I trustworthy?” Jason yelled out to the man who was just climbing down a ladder, her clean window staring back at her.

Sam strode up to them and looked from Jason to Faith and back again. “Best man I know. Take a look at this.” Reaching into his pocket, Sam pulled out his phone, then began scrolling through his pictures.

“This is my girl.” He turned the phone so Faith could see a picture of a grinning little pixie with a bright smile and a pom-pom hat on her bald head, no hair hanging down beneath the folded brim.

“She’s beautiful,” Faith said, sliding her finger over her face.

“And if it wasn’t for this guy introducing us to his sister, I don’t think my wife and I would have made it through the roughest parts of her illness.” He shoved his phone back into his pocket.

Looking up at Jason from beneath her lashes, she caught a flush on his cheeks.

“It just so happens I could help you, man. But I’m glad Sienna could do her part. She loves fundraising and doing anything she can for kids who’ve been through what she has.”

Faith would like to help her one day, when there was no danger following her around, she thought sadly. For now, though, she had to fight through her own problems and not bring them into other people’s lives.

“Thanks, Sam.” Jason all but dismissed his friend, who waved and walked back to the other guy helping him.

“So? Still think I’m a serial killer?” Jason asked her. view abbreviated excerpt only...

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