Read Online Hush by Cherry Adair - Free Book Online Page A

knowing who she was as she’d held his hand in that soulless, sterile hospital room. Early-onset Alzheimer’s. Her father hadn’t known who she was for the last six years of his life. She’d always been a daddy’s girl. They’d moved every two years from base to base, like clockwork. She’d lost her mother in her early teens, so it had always been she and her father. She’d adapted to the constant upheaval, and the task of making new friends in new cities. But the slow, terrible way he’d started getting sicker and sicker had hit her hard. They’d stayed in Junction City after his diagnosis. She’d remained at his side, even when it meant forgoing her dreams of a degree in architecture, and Acadia had never regretted putting her life on hold to care for him. She’d treasured every moment. No matter how seeing him like that had torn at her heart.
    Knowing that he didn’t realize who took care of him day in and day out had just about killed her.
    Something must have shown on her face, because Zak moved in closer to drop his voice. “You all right?” His gaze was on her mouth, and he was practically on top of her. His breath moved her hair against her sweaty cheek.
    â€œIf by all right , you mean happy to still be alive, then yes. I’m most excellent.” Her exposed skin itched, from sweat and the bugs that were feasting on her as though she were a long-awaited banquet. She didn’t scratch. There was no point. She did her best to ignore everything. Ignoring the man beside her wasn’t quite as easy.
    â€œIs your name really Acadia? You told me ‘Candy ’ last night.”
    Lovely. He’d done things to her she didn’t even want to think about, and he didn’t even know her name. “Acadia,” she told him stiffly. His brother paced several yards ahead. Zak stuck close beside her. Far too close for comfort, and frankly no easy feat, considering the space restraints on the hacked-out path through the dense foliage.
    He shot her a glance. He had very nice eyes when he wasn’t looking at her as though he wished she’d go somewhere else. A wish they both shared. His eyes were dark-lashed, and a brooding hazel—sometimes green, sometimes a tawny brown that ate the light. And unfriendly.
    Sweat stained the front of his once-crisply-ironed shirt, and he’d rolled the sleeves up over his muscled forearms for relief from the unrelenting humidity.
    Because of the way the sunlight fell through the trees, Acadia noticed a previously unseen hair-thin scar on the corner of his upper lip, and another high on his right cheek. The cut above his right eye was definitely going to give him another scar. If he lived long enough for the wound to heal.
    â€œSo, which is it? Candy or …?”
    â€œYou obviously didn’t hear me.” Some of her friends occasionally called her Cady . But that wasn’t often. She wasn’t a nickname type of person. The pet name had sounded appealing in the bar the night before. He was not, she didn’t need reminding, her friend by any stretch of the imagination.
    â€œLast night you didn’t even know your own name when we were practically having sex all the way up the stairs, down the corridor and—” She sucked in a hot, humid breath. He’d been there. She didn’t need to do a verbal reenactment. Besides, his brother was not even three feet away, listening in. She blushed again despite the heat.
    â€œMy name,” she reminded him, trying for sophisticated nonchalance, “is Acadia Gray.”
    She could smell him even through the lush, wet scent of the jungle. Hot, sweaty male. Not sweaty like the soldiers. His scent was clean and earthy and brought back every vivid memory of every place on his body she’d kissed and tasted the night before … Her heartbeat sped up, and all her girl parts seemed to have antennae tuned in to him.
    She waved her