It wasn’t until the garage door was shut and locked—take that, spider!—that he was allowed to put the woman down. At least Sloane didn’t argue the move. Instead she was staring at the garage door. She noticeably shivered.

“That thing was huge,” she said, shaking her head. “I mean, I’ve seen spiders before, and, yeah, they’re not my favorite, but holy crapsticks, that thing was so big it needs to pay Callum rent!”

She started to fan herself and bounce up and down, as if trying to make the memory go away.

It was oddly adorable.

And extremely distracting.

Sloane was still shirtless, and her pale pink, lacey bra? Well, it wasn’t leaving much to the imagination. Hell, it was barely offering an already generous chest any support. Each bounce was a wave of motion that tugged his gaze down and made the almost-nonexistent space between them seem even smaller.

When she finally met his eye, Brady had already gone from being amused to trying really hard not to do anything stupid.

Like admit he wanted to kiss her.

Or actually kiss her.

But a quip? Well, he was never smart enough to pass up one of those.

He shot a look down to her exposed chest and then back up. “Well, you did say being frugal was sexy.”

It was like putting a drop of red food dye into a glass of water. Sloane’s face turned red at an almost alarming speed. She threw her arms over her chest, finally realizing that taking off her shirt meant that her shirt was off, and then the mortification set in.

Then the desire Brady had been feeling was replaced by a feeling that he hadn’t had in a long, long time.

Protectiveness.

Not of the spider, but of Sloane—from Sloane.

Brady placed his hands on her bare upper arms and angled his head down to focus her attention on what he was saying.

“Hey, when I first moved to Arbor Bay, I had no idea what a cicada was. You know? Those big-ass bugs that are loud as hell and leave those empty husks lying around everywhere? No idea they were a thing…until Dixon thought it would be funny to catch one and put it under my covers while I was sleeping.” He shook his head at the memory, not bothering to hide how it still gave him the heebie-jeebies. “I woke up once it got to my neck, and, to this day, I still will fight tooth and nail to get as far away from those little demons as I can. Even the husks freak me the hell out. Found one in my truck last month and jumped out like it was on fire. And, between you and me, there was definitely some squalling on my part.”

He smiled.