Blonde Bomb Tech

  “Sabrina!” he said in a loud voice as he traversed the final few steps to her. Jake stepped around in front of her at the last minute as Murphy came right up to them.

  “Get out of my way!” Murphy said to Jake.

  “Okay, she’s all yours.” Jake laughed as he shifted to the side and pulled her from behind him. He then pushed Sabrina towards her partner. Murphy quickly engulfed her in a hug that made all the air rush out of her lungs. “Ooftah.”

  “Don’t you ever scare me like that again,” he said loudly for the appreciation of those listening in.

  “Yeah, right,” Sabrina said, and then led Murphy away a few paces from Jake for some privacy.

  “Did you tell him yet?” Murphy asked her.

  “No, I just got out of federal custody.”

  “Jeez, get your ass over there and tell the man. Do I have to go get a shotgun?”

  “Shut up, Murphy. I want to wait until we’re alone.”

  “Don’t wait. Tell him now,” Murphy said with a sage meaningful look. “Give him time to digest it, before you go off alone for more unsafe sex.”

  “Okay. Thanks, Murphy. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  “Hennessey said you get tomorrow off, which is totally unfair in my opinion.”

  Sabrina sent Murphy off and stepped back up to Jake. He was huddled up with several firefighters.

  “Jake, I need to tell you something,” she said exasperatedly.

  “Okay. Tell me.”

  “In private.”

  Several oohs, ahs, and wolf whistles erupted from the group he was in. Jake smiled like a proud wolf-like Lothario and led her to the front of the fire truck and the open bay door to the night air outside.

  “I haven’t been feeling well, Jake. So Suzanne made me take a test the other night,” Sabrina started out quickly. She needed to tell him. She couldn’t wait to see his face.

  Jake’s brows furrowed, but he remained silent like he wasn’t quite sure what to expect from her.

  “Guess what? It was positive. I didn’t believe it so we went out and bought four more tests. And guess what? They were all positive too. I still didn’t believe it so yesterday I went to a doctor and guess what?”

  “What?” he finally said, his eyes widening, understanding dawning on his face.

  “Turns out your brothers were right. You can’t believe a girl when she says not to worry about using a condom, after all.”

  “What are you telling me, Sabrina?” His voice was a little harsher than she’d been expecting. His eyes had narrowed as she finally spoke the two words she thought she’d never say in her life.

  “I’m pregnant.”

  Jake just stared at her, disbelief written all over his face.

  “So will you marry me, Jake?” Sabrina asked with a timid smile.

  Jake closed his eyes, took a deep breath, but didn’t say a word. His eyes popped open and he gave her a furious look. His mouth opened and closed again apparently unable to speak. He turned and walked away from her, anger rolling off of him in waves.

  Chapter Nineteen

  The next day the paper had a full-page exposé on John Everett Hollingsworth the Third and his over two decades long reign of terror. Councilman Peters was also featured prominently in the papers. He’d had a sudden change of heart regarding his defense of his long time friend. Charges would probably be brought against him as well for aiding and abetting a now disgraced Hollingsworth.

  Sabrina stared at the article without reading. Tears of anger welled in her eyes as she sat at her new kitchen table in her sterile little house. She reviewed her previous evening with Jake directly after her confession.

  “Jake?” Sabrina had called out in alarm to him when he’d gotten five feet away.

  “What?” He’d turned around, hands on hips in a defiant stance and she’d seen the utter fury in his eyes. She’d taken a step back from his look of utter and complete wrath. Which, make no mistake, was directed right at her. Was he angry that she’d gotten pregnant? Did he think she’d lied about her infertility or something?

  “What are you so angry about?” she said in a low tone so everyone around wouldn’t know they were fighting.

  “Sabrina. Meet me at the apartment. I don’t want to say anything I’ll regret right now,” he said in a measured and controlled tone. He was pissed. At her. Why?

  “Regret? What are you talking about?” Sabrina was truly baffled. He shook his head and turned away again.

  “I’m not meeting you at your apartment tonight until you tell me why you’re angry,” Sabrina said with her own surly tone and she didn’t care who heard her anymore.

  “Damn it. Do you really want to do this now?” Jake stepped back up to her, but not close enough to be touching. She could feel the heat radiating off of his body though they didn’t touch.

  “I guess I do. Why are you so mad at me?”

  “You knew you were pregnant when you went in to defuse the bomb today. Have I got that part right?” he accused.

  “Well yeah, but…”

  “What the hell were you thinking?”

  “I imagine I was thinking I had a job to do. I thought you of all people would understand that.”

  “No, I don’t understand. There are other people who could have done your job. You aren’t the only one, Sabrina. I don’t know if I can forgive you for risking the life of my child.”

  “Your child? Well, Jake, the baby is mine too and wherever I go the baby goes along. I needed to defuse that bomb because…”

  He held up his hand to stop her and shook his head as if in disbelief as he started to walk away again. Now he refused to listen to her? Now she was furious.

  “I never realized what a bad temper you have, and I certainly never figured you for such a macho male chauvinist pig, either,” she spat out.

  “I do not have a temper and I am not a male chauvinist pig…macho or otherwise. Call me crazy, I just won’t allow you to risk my child’s life.”

  “Won’t allow? Please tell me you are just trying to rile me because you think it’s sexy,” she ground out.

  “No. Why don’t you understand how precious you are to me? And the child even you thought you’d never have, how can you be so cavalier about that miracle?” Jake stepped back up to her and spoke in a low dangerous tone.

  “I’m not cavalier,” she sobbed, not realizing the girly emotional side of her had emerged without warning. “What did you expect me to do, just ignore my responsibilities? Did you want me to say, ‘no, sorry can’t save you today. You get to die.’ Is that what you expected me to do?”

  “Yes, for the sake of our baby. As a matter of fact, I want you to promise me right now, you will give up your job. Give it up for the baby…and for me. Right now.”

  “Who the hell are you? Are you going to give up your high-risk job for your child?”

  “What? No! We aren’t talking about me.” Jake looked incredulous.

  “No? Well, we should be, and just so you know, I would never ask you to give up your job.”

  “Well, I’m asking you to give up yours.”

  “No. You’re telling me. I will not be ordered, and I’m not quitting my job either. So get used to it,” Sabrina spat out.

  “You are not being rational,” he countered.

  “Well, neither are you.” She stalked away from him. It was all so unfair. He was not being fair.

  Men never had to compromise their dreams or their jobs for the sake of the children. Every working woman had to justify why she spent time away from her children for a job. How many Fortune 500 men executives were ever asked how time spent at their job affected their home life with their children? Sabrina guessed big fat zero times.

  Sabrina had gone directly back to her quiet, nearly empty house after leaving the fire station and a still angry Jake. She had been expecting him to show up on her doorstep, but he didn’t. He called her around one in the morning and had left a brief message of, “Call me.” But she could still hear the
accusation in his voice so she had ignored the message.

  Sabrina looked around her house by the subdued light of the morning streaming in through the blinds. She had replaced the curtains so she at least had privacy. The doorbell had begun to ring early this morning as the media found out she was alive and had been thought dead for a few hours. Great front-page news to add to the rest of the frenzy over the capture of the Mad Bomber.

  She spotted reporters through the peephole in her front door and had declined to answer. Instead, she planted herself on the only other piece of furniture she had in the house besides the kitchen table.

  Sabrina had gotten a good deal on a pull out sofa at a scratch and dent sale. Good thing too, because she hadn’t yet replaced her mattresses. She had kept the wood head board even thought there were ugly slash marks gouged in it.

  The headboard represented much like what her heart felt like as she thought about the angry words between she and Jake last night. Sabrina had slept fitfully, dreaming of Jake and his angry face and his even angrier words.

  Her cell phone had begun to ring. Jake? She looked. Nope, Suzanne.

  “Hi, Suzanne,” she answered, barely keeping the tears out of her voice.

  “Hi, sis. How are you?” She sounded fresh and happy.

  Unable to control them any longer the tears began to flow and she couldn’t answer.

  “Stay there. I’ll be right over. Wait, tell me how to get there.”

  Sabrina sobbed through the directions to her house and then curled up on the sofa until her sister could come and comfort her, because Jake didn’t want the job anymore. That realization made her cry even harder. Suzanne arrived and Sabrina spilled all to her about the previous evening. From the declaration to the angry words they’d spat at each other. It felt so good to get it all out and have a confidant.

  “You have to compromise,” Suzanne told her an hour later, as she sat next to Sabrina with her arm around her, handing her torn pieces of toilet paper. Sabrina hadn’t gotten around to replacing the tissues yet.

  “Whose side are you on?” Sabrina asked as she blew her red, irritated nose into a length of paper.

  “I’m not taking sides,” she said quietly, and squeezed Sabrina once around the shoulders in a comforting gesture.

  “I shouldn’t have to give up my job,” Sabrina said again, forcefully. Although she was starting to soften. Staying angry wasn’t going to help put things back together with Jake.

  “Maybe not, but that isn’t how the world works, is it?”

  “It isn’t fair,” Sabrina responded petulantly, her head resting on the back of her sofa.

  “Whoever told you life would be fair?” Suzanne asked, laughing lightly.

  “No one,” Sabrina answered morosely.

  “Exactly. Besides, you don’t have to give up your job completely,” she continued. “From now on, just try and leave the more dangerous aspects of it to others until you have the baby. Then you can go back to risking your life everyday.”

  “Quit making fun of me,” Sabrina said drawing away. “I risk my life everyday to save people. I saved you yesterday.”

  “I know that, and I’m grateful. I’m not making fun of you, Sabrina, but you have to see things from Jake’s side, too. That is the way marriage works…relationships, too. Lots and lots of compromise.”

  “Do you have to give up your job because you’re pregnant?” Sabrina asked her suddenly.

  “Ray wanted me to quit my job too when he found out I was pregnant.”

  “Why? What’s so dangerous about five-year olds?” Sabrina was surprised. She’d been feeling all alone in the I-have-to-give-up-my-career-to-keep-my-man scenario.

  “Beyond their rapid and constantly moving arms and legs, not too much, but Ray didn’t want me to work. Period. He wanted me to be a stay-at-home mom.”

  “But you are working.”

  “Because we compromised. I told him that it was important to me to work. I told him I would take off some time after the baby is born. Even though I really wanted to come back as soon as possible.”

  “How do I compromise my job? I’m the lead bomb tech. How do I tell someone else to go in and risk their life when I’m not willing to?”

  “I don’t know. That’s something you have to figure out. Go talk to him, Sabrina. You need converse with him and to learn how to make it work. Actually, I’m surprised you don’t want to protect your child. I would think you might want to think about giving up your dangerous job in favor of motherhood.”

  “I don’t think I believe it yet,” Sabrina said in a quiet voice. “I’m not willing to give up the life and career goals I’ve chosen, when I don’t really believe I’m pregnant. I’m afraid to hope it’s true because then it changes everything I planned on.”

  “Of course it does. You’re pregnant, Sabrina. Five tests and a doctor have told you so. Talk to Jake. Go tell him how you feel and what you’re worried about. Compromise.” Suzanne said, and then left abruptly so that Sabrina could her to ponder the unexpected changes to her life…all alone.

  * * * *

  “I see you have your stubborn face on,” Sabrina said as she approached Jake in the parking lot at his apartment building. He was hunched over his car, poking around in the engine of his safe dependable Volvo.

  “Sounds like you do, too,” he responded calmly without looking up. She couldn’t read his mood yet. At least he didn’t sound like he was furious with her.

  Jake was shirtless, though. A fine sheen of sweat coated his chest and shoulders. Low-slung jeans hugged his lean hips as she tried not to stare below his belt. God, he looked good. Make-up sex came boldly unbidden into her mind when she looked at him. Stop it. Compromise is the reason you are here, not make-up sex.

  Why not a two-for-one special ? asked an unrecognized voice in her subconscious.

  Sabrina moved her eyes upward over Jake’s muscular torso and noted a smudge of grease near his collarbone. She wanted more than anything to wipe it away and then tuck herself into his arms and let him have his way. He could have what ever he wanted if he would only stop being mad and love her, but she wouldn’t give up everything that was important.

  Sabrina didn’t want to give up her job. She was good at it. She took pride in her abilities, and yet she also wanted this baby more than anything else in the world. Compromise. What was she willing to compromise to have Jake, too? Everything. Nothing. She didn’t know what defined middle ground.

  If Jake was surprised to see her, it didn’t register on his face. He’d looked up when she spoke and didn’t frown or growl. He looked thoughtful.

  Jake extracted himself from underneath the hood of his car and shut it with a slam.

  “Why don’t we go upstairs and talk?” he asked quietly, looking into her eyes. She nodded and followed him. He grabbed his t-shirt from the roof as he passed by. He shrugged it back on and walked slowly up the stairs to his apartment, ending her lust-filled reverie about his sweaty, grease-smudged chest.

  Jake opened the door and held it for her, but didn’t try to touch her as she entered or after he followed her in. He sauntered to the kitchen and snagged a bottle of water from the refrigerator silently, offering her one. She nodded and he handed her one without touching her. She sighed. Not a good sign. He leaned back against a kitchen counter and sucked the entire bottle down in one pull.

  Sabrina sipped her bottle, completely mesmerized, watching his throat muscles work to swallow. He leveled a gaze at her when he finished. His look seemed receptive instead of angry, as if the water had cooled any lingering temper along with his thirst.

  “I’m sorry,” they both said at the exact same time, bringing smiles for the first time at one another.

  “Me first,” Jake said. “I have a lot to say, so let me get it all out.”

  When she nodded at him, he led her into the living room and together they sat on the sofa. He pulled her back up to his chest, wrapped his big strong arms around her and began speaking slowly in that hone
y-smooth voice that never failed to stir her.

  “I had too many emotions hit me at once. You are an absolute roller coaster ride, babe. Here I was tooling along through life in my safe dependable car, thinking I had everything figured out.

  “I was approaching thirty and had almost decided I’d never find the right woman. I was unconsciously preparing to become the bachelor uncle, when one day I read an article about the famous Blonde Bomber and saw your picture. I was intrigued. A couple of months later I met you three seconds before a bomb exploded when you tackled me to the ground. Right then, I knew my life would never be the same. You came along and started me on a wild ride. I vowed to grab you and hold on tight until you saw things my way.

  “My closest examples of the way a family life should be are my parents and my brothers. Ten minutes after you agreed to go out with me, I suddenly wanted the whole Brady Bunch—lots of kids, happy family thing, with you. Just like all my brothers. It was all I knew. Never felt the way I do about you with anyone before, and I was smart enough to know I never would.”

  “Not even with Candy?” she asked quietly under her breath, smiling.

  “Especially not Candy. She was the last in a long line of wrong women for me. Until I met you, and the ride started. The first loop of the ride sent me right over on to my ear and took me off guard, when I realized you couldn’t participate in my many-children-included sitcom fantasy.

  “Once I thought about it for five seconds, I came to terms with it pretty quickly because up until I met you, I didn’t think I’d ever find anyone to marry anyway. I was ready to get an affidavit from my family that you didn’t have to produce any kids. It could just be you and me and if we were able to adopt, fine. If not, we could be the cool aunt and uncle to all the kids already running around the family. I only knew that you were the one for me and I needed to be with you.

  “I thought the ride was over and I could get back on the safe train that loops around in a boring circle with no surprises, but no, I barely catch my breath before the next crisis. I come to a call and find out that you are in a building all alone, defusing a bomb. Then there was this wicked explosion behind me. I thought for a moment or two that I’d lost you. Thought the ride might be over. I was mistaken. The roller coaster didn’t stop. It went straight up out of the park. I was still in the denial stage, by the way, when Hennessy had to drag me away from the scene. I told them I wouldn’t believe you were gone until they produced your smoking body and verified the DNA.