She rounded and he stopped, his hands up, as if she’d fired a shot at him.
Maybe she had.
“Tell you what?”
Hello, she wasn’t stupid. She knew York and Coco had a friendship—that was clear when he’d brought her to Coco’s place in Moscow, hoping to enlist Coco’s help to get RJ out of the country. “Oh, please, you know what.”
She’d been so shocked to see her foster sister she’d let Coco’s insistence that there was nothing between them bounce off of her. Believed without a pause they were, indeed, just friends.
Apparently, the kind of friends who had a child between them.
Her heart could break at the fact that poor, unsuspecting Wyatt had gone to Russia to save Coco.
RJ should have probably warned him, but she was so undone by the sight of the little boy, of the way her mother warmed right up to him, challenging him to a thumb war. The kid was cute. And frankly, looked a little like Wyatt, although she could maybe see the resemblance to York too.
“Does Wyatt know?”
York lowered his hands. “Yes, Wyatt knows. I didn’t think I should say anything to you until he knew.”
Right. Because Wyatt’s feelings about being betrayed were bigger than hers?
Okay, maybe.
She winced and turned away from York. “I can’t believe that Coco did this to him.” She wanted to blame York, too, but he wasn’t the one her brother had fallen for, pledged his heart to.
York had simply been guilty of omission. A big, very big, omission. “Why didn’t you say something? Because you had every chance, really. Anytime during the ten days that we were on the run together.”
“Was it ten days? Seemed shorter than that—”
“Yeah, well time flies when you’re trying to escape the FSB. I can see why you glossed over Mikka’s existence.”
“I didn’t—”
“I can’t believe Coco didn’t tell me.”
“Maybe she didn’t say anything because he wasn’t part of the equation at the time.”
“Wasn’t part of the equation?” Maybe he was right. It wasn’t like they were dating. They’d had a sort of romantic-thriller relationship, born out of fear and stress.
What had she been thinking?
York was right. She didn’t know him at all.
“Is that why you pushed me away in Yekaterinburg?”
“What? No, I didn’t—Kat was shot! It was the only way to get you out of the country.” He reached for her.
She jerked away from him. “So what now?” Just calm down.
Because he owed her nothing, really. Had given her no promises.
Still, he looked stricken.
“I…I don’t know. He’s sick, I think. Sarai thinks he might have leukemia—”
Oh. And wow, she got it. What. A. Fool.
He hadn’t come back to America for her, but for his son. For medical treatment. And no, she didn’t blame him for that, not at all.
Her heart went out to the kid. Leukemia. Poor Coco. She’d need RJ’s support. And frankly, so would York.
But not quite yet.
RJ turned and walked away, wrapping her arms around herself, just needing a moment to regroup.
She headed for the playground area. An orange-and-blue path wound around a swing set, a merry-go-round, a slide. A couple giant yellow-and-blue giraffe sculptures peeked between cedar bushes.
“RJ! Please, tell me why you’re so upset.”
“Why I’m upset?” She rounded on him. “I’m sorry, I know I’m being a little selfish right now. But, for Pete’s sake, York. Why didn’t you tell me you had a son?”
He went a shade of white she’d never seen before, as if she’d punched him in the solar plexus, and actually reached out for a hold on the swing set.
It made her stop. Frown.
Really? “York?”
“I…” He swallowed and looked away from her. Blew out a breath. “Yeah, I guess you would have found out. I mean, you are a CIA analyst. I…” He shook his head, swallowed. “It’s not like it’s classified.”
She stared at him and wanted to hit him over the head. “No, it’s not classified,” she said. “It’s pretty obvious.”
“I didn’t think…well, I suppose it’s not like the information isn’t out there. I just thought, well, I don’t know why I’d think it would be sealed. It’s not like they had any reason to protect me.”
What?
He glanced at her. “It happened while I was still a Marine. It was a stupid mistake and I…I’ll never forgive myself.”
“That might be going a little far. I mean, it’s not like, well, things like this do happen.”
“No. Not to me. I thought I was a better man than that.”
Huh. Her too, actually, but she didn’t say that.
“She was pretty and smart and innocent, and the first moment I met her, I…I loved her.”
Yeah well, Coco was all that and more. RJ might be talking to Wyatt for the way York was describing her. RJ’s chest tightened, hating the spurt of jealousy.
What was she doing here, chasing a man who clearly still loved the woman upstairs?
“She was also the daughter of the American Ambassador to Russia, and clearly off limits to a guy like me.”
RJ froze. Wait…
“Her name was Claire, and she was a student at the University of Moscow.”
RJ’s brain simply stopped working.
He walked over to a swing, sat down.
“I was asked once in a while, as part of the personal attachment to the ambassador, to watch over her, and…one night we ended up having dinner. That’s how it started—over Cokes and pizza. I got assigned permanently to her detail, and we fell in love. I’d never felt that way about anyone.”
She lowered herself into a swing next to him.
“I asked her to marry me, and she said yes. It was a really dumb move, but we were young, and she thought if we were already married when her father found out…”
He took a breath, glanced at her, then away again.
“We eloped. Went to Paris, got married, and thought the world was ours.”
He’d been married.
RJ just tried to listen.
“She’d told her father that she was taking a school trip. I was young and a coward. I should have talked to her father, but…well, by the time we got back, she was pregnant, and her father had me fired.”
Coco’s words from weeks past rose like a ghost in the back of her mind. I think he had something terrible happen to him…
Oh no.
“I refused to leave Russia, and I was fluent in Russian, so the CIA approached me, and I agreed to…” His mouth tightened. “I had no choice. I wanted to be with her, and she wanted to stay in Russia, so…”
She swallowed, almost not wanting to hear.
“We had a son. We lived in this little two-room flat on the outskirts of Moscow, and we were happy. I wanted to move back to America, but by then, I was making decent money working for the CIA and I thought…oh, I thought I had life all figured out. I could keep her safe, do my job…no problem.”
He scrubbed a hand across his chin. “I should have made her leave.”
Like he’d made RJ leave? Suddenly his determination to get her out of Russia made sense.
He’d hooked his elbows around the swing chains, his voice, his gaze now far away. “I was asked to follow someone. He was a known smuggler but also a CIA asset working for a local Bratva group, and the CIA wanted eyes on him. Somehow he made me. Must have followed me home. The next day, when I got home…”
A muscled jumped in the side of his jaw. “She’d been taken, beaten, and then hung in some abandoned warehouse. And my son…” He blew out a breath. “He was just under eight months old. I think she was giving him a bath when they broke in.”
She closed her eyes. Oh, York.
He looked down at the dirt, his voice weary. “Her father blamed me. He was right. He left Russia, and…I
stayed.” He looked at his hands. “I…uh…found that asset.”
He said nothing else.
Oh.
“He was important to the CIA and they…well, I’m probably on a disavowed list. I have a feeling that if the CIA knew I was here, I might be in trouble. I’m still useful to them in Russia. Here…I have too many secrets.”
He looked at her. “I thought maybe they would have kept Claire and Lucas out of the official report. Apparently not.”
Aw, shoot. “York, I didn’t know about your son. I thought…” She didn’t want to say it, but… “I thought Mikka was yours.”
He stared at her as she sat there, the swing moving slightly. Nodded. “I guess that makes sense. But, no. Kat and I… No.”
She wanted to rewind time. Go back and be a rational person instead of this drama queen she’d turned into. She’d been watching too much television. “I’m so sorry about your son, York. And your wife.”
He looked away, at the skyline to the west, to the sun falling into the horizon. “It was a long time ago. Nearly a decade now. Grief is funny that way—it’s gone, out to sea, and then suddenly, it just knocks you over. I don’t know why I thought you knew…maybe because I feared you finding out, and…” He blew out a breath. “I told you my life isn’t really conducive to a happy ending. I’m not a…good person.”
“Yeah, that’s why you risked your freedom to bring Coco’s son to America. Because you’re a bad person.”
He glanced at her, then looked away.
“Why didn’t you tell me that Wyatt was Mikka’s dad? I was so angry with you—I thought all this time you’d lied to me.”
“Oh, Syd. I won’t lie to you. Ever. But I accidentally let that out of the bag back in Russia, and it wasn’t my secret to tell.”
“Wow. So, he didn’t know?”
“Not a clue. Really. Not. A. Clue. He’s real bright, that brother of yours.”
“You think?” She looked back at the building. “He had a stellar escape there.” She shook her head. “Why do you think he took off?”
“I don’t know. But he’s also carrying the information we need to clear you, so we need to find him.”
“And Tate. I wonder if he’s in town yet.”
But York had gotten up and now put his hand on her arm. She looked up at him.
“Syd. Claire and Lucas…that was a long time ago. I tried to fill up some of the empty places with Tasha, but…you need to know that you’re not some sort of Band-Aid. I…I don’t know why, but it’s different with you. Very different. I…I always felt like I had to protect Claire, you know? And even Tasha. And yes, maybe you too—” He smiled then. “But you’re the first woman who’s made me feel like…well, I always thought there was nothing left for me but being a soldier, I guess. But you make me wonder—no, hope—that there’s more. And bad person or not…I do want to try for that happy ending with you.”
Oh, York. She couldn’t imagine what it cost him to say that. He swallowed, looked away, as if it had stripped him of something.
Probably his heart.
She pressed her hand against his shirt. “Thank you for letting me into your life. For telling me about your family. For coming back to America for me, and for helping Coco’s little boy. You’re a hero, York. And even if you can’t get clear to see it, I can.”
His blue eyes met hers. “Is your mother nearby?”
She frowned, shook her head.
He smiled. “Good.” Then he wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled her into the shadow next to the slide. “Because this is the hello I wanted to give you.”
Then he backed her up against the slide, braced his hand over her, wrapped his other hand around her neck, and kissed her.
Really kissed her. His mouth drinking her in, his arm falling around her waist to pull her up against him.
If she’d wondered if he’d missed her, she tasted the truth now.
He was adventure and danger, and yet being held so tight against him sent a current of heat through her that felt almost like safety. No, maybe power.
She was Sydney Bristow, secret agent, in the arms of this man, who could both save her and give her his sweet heart. Her Vaughn.
She touched his dark golden beard, running her fingers into it, and sighed, surrendering to him.
He slowed them down and as if savoring, he kissed her upper lip, her lower, then her cheekbone, the well of her eye, down to her neck.
She could combust on the spot.
He finally let her go, breathing a little hard, and met her eyes. “I missed you.”
“I can tell.”
He grinned, and shoot, he was an assassin because he could slay her with his smile. He lowered his mouth to her neck, his whiskers deliciously rough on her skin. “You taste good. And smell good. And feel good in my arms, and we probably need to check on your mother or go find your brother or something, because I could stay here and kiss you on this playground for a very, very long time.”
“And what’s wrong with that?” she said, taking his face in her hands, bringing him back to her lips.
He made a noise deep in his throat and claimed her lips again, something almost rough in his response. It tunneled through her, turned her inside out.
Wow, she loved this man.
The thought took her breath. What—?
But yes. Shoot. She had lost her heart to the spy from Russia.
Right then, her phone buzzed.
He stifled a word as she broke away.
“Tate sent me a text. Says to meet him at the Fairmont Hotel. He’s set up a meeting with Senator Jackson.”
York leaned in, his lips by her ear. “Hotel? Okay.” He dragged his lips along her neck.
“Funny. Say that after you meet my brother Tate.”
His blue eyes held a rare twinkle. “Oh goody. Another Marshall brother.” He caught her hand. “Let’s see. Ford beat me up. Wyatt nearly got me killed. Maybe Tate can get me arrested.”
Wyatt hurt everywhere.
But nowhere more than in his stupid, foolish, cowardly heart.
Wyatt sat in the ice tub, his eyes closed, his head back, fighting the moan.
He’d run. Practically sprinted away from Coco.
From his son.
Yeah, he was really on his way to being Father of the Year.
“Well, I don’t know what you did, but you were in the zone out there.” Jace came into the therapy room and shut the door behind him. Beyond the glass walls, the guys were coming out of the showers, dressing, getting ready to head to the hotel.
Wyatt just wanted to stay. Right. Here.
Hide, actually.
“Reminded me of the early days, when you showed up in the Blue Ox practice arena, asking for a tryout. I remembered you from when we were scouting you, back when you played with the Bobcats, and you were good. Crazy good. But you lacked this edge. And then you stepped into the crease for your tryout, a little desperate after failing in Edmonton, and there was something different about you. You’d grown up, maybe. Definitely a different man than the boy I saw in college. Fierce. Driven.”
Jace leaned against a therapy table and picked up a roll of tape, rolling it between his fingers. “I can’t figure you out, Guns. First we nearly have an international incident, I spend the night in a Russian prison—that was fun—and then I see you jump the train in some Podunk town. I’m trying to figure out how to explain to the press—not to mention our GM—that you went rogue on us, when you show up at the airport with a woman. A friend that you weirdly picked up in Siberia and brought home like a souvenir.”
Wyatt’s lips tightened.
“I admit, I wasn’t sure you’d show up for practice—but then you do and frankly, you play like you have something to prove—”
“Don’t I? You were the one who told me you would start Kalen.”
Jace set down the tape.
Wyatt got out of the tub, grabbed a towel, and wrapped it around his waist. He was shivering as he walked over to
nab a robe from a nearby hook. He couldn’t feel his hips. Frankly, his entire lower body.
“You should get the team doc to check you out.”
“I’m fine.”
“Hardly.”
And then, wouldn’t you know it, to back up Jace’s words, Wyatt turned and his hip flared to life in a bone-deep pain. Gripping the side of the tub, he bit back a groan.
“For cryin’ out loud, sit down, Wy.” Jace vised his arm and practically pulled Wyatt over to the table.
“I’m just stiff.” Wyatt slid onto the table. “Two days on a train, plus a pretty miserable ride over the ocean in the back of a cargo plane.”
Jace gave him a look of horror. “A cargo plane? Why in the world didn’t you just wait for another flight?”
Wyatt lay back. “No flights for a couple days. And Coco had to get here. Her son is in the hospital.”
Jace said nothing.
Wyatt looked at him and he didn’t know why, but, “He’s my son too.”
Jace raised an eyebrow.
“I didn’t know about him.” Wyatt held up a hand. “And before you start thinking it was a one-night stand—”
“I wasn’t—”
“I love her. I have for years. I wanted to marry her.”
“That’s what this trip to Russia was all about? Getting your girl back?”
Sorta. But Wyatt didn’t know how to explain it so he simply nodded.
Jace shook his head. “Well, if there’s one thing about you, Wyatt, you are singularly focused.”
“Thanks?”
“So, why are you here?”
Wyatt frowned.
“Your son is in the hospital. You could have told me that.”
Wyatt’s throat thickened.
“Oh. Wait. This is about Kalen.”
“No, it’s not.”
“It’s about your future with the Blue Ox.”
Wyatt lifted a shoulder. “Not really that either.”
Jace was quiet. Then, “Is this about being a father?”
Wyatt looked away.
“Sirens. I scored a goal, didn’t I?”
His mouth tightened.
“Wyatt—”
“He might have leukemia. Maybe. Oh, please, God, I hope not. He’s so little, and just…this amazingly cute kid and…” He stared at the ceiling. “I…I saw him lying there in that bed and I just freaked out. I left him there. Just…left him, and his mother like…” He thumbed away the grit in his eyes. “I mean, I want to be there for them, but I stood there, and all I could think was, what if I fail? What if this kid dies on me? And worse…what if I do something really stupid and I don’t know, screw up his life? But the worst part is I…I already blew it. Honestly, I never saw myself as a father. I mean, I love Coco, and I guess a family was out there, but it’s always been about hockey, and for a second, I was watching it die. My entire life just…blew up in front of my eyes, and I panicked. Sheesh, I practically broke a land speed record getting out of there.” He pushed himself up, sighing. “I’m such a jerk. Mikka deserves a better dad than me, trust me.”
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