Protecting His Pregnant Lover: Southern Soldiers of Fortune Book One

by North, Leslie

  Annoyed at the repetitive direction his thoughts were taking, Levon withdrew his cell and raised it to his ear to review the most recent message from his team. He preferred voicemail to text, something the SSoF was perfectly willing to accommodate.

  Asher, we just got a last-minute tip that some sort of deal or meeting is about to go down at the football field. Head out and find a place to observe. I repeat: observe. No charging in without my go-ahead.

  “Yeah, yeah.” Levon pocketed his phone and sauntered to the edge of the parking lot. He took cover behind the brick corner of the cafeteria, then peered out at the field. It was Thursday, just past 1800 hours. The day was damp, the grey sky overcast as afternoon shaded into dusk, but it was still humid as hell. Visibility wasn’t exceptional, considering the fog that hung in the air like a stubborn haze.

  He didn’t see anyone. Yet. That didn’t mean he could just stroll around in the open until he found a good hiding spot. He had his eye on one particular location, and he stole through the shadows now to get to it.

  The old equipment shed had been the primo make-out spot on the school grounds back in his day, thanks in no small part to the fact that the lock on the door was broken. Something in Levon told him that even now, years later, that issue still wouldn’t be remedied... and his instincts were proven right.

  By the time he arrived at the shed, he had noticed two shadowy figures detach themselves from underneath the football bleachers in the distance, and a third on its way from the student parking lot. It’s starting. He needed to hide. And fast.

  Levon twitched the shed door open, careful not to creak so much as a floorboard as he slipped inside.

  What he didn’t expect to find was another person waiting for him on the other side of the door.

  His instincts took over. Levon thrust his palm up to smother the other individual’s mouth even as he backed them both soundlessly to the wall; he only managed to narrowly avoid colliding with a hanging net of basketballs, which could have been a catastrophic giveaway of his location. Their location. It was pitch black inside the shed so he had no idea who this person was, or what their intentions could possibly be hiding in the equipment shed—all that he knew in that moment was that the other person was alone, adult-sized, and possibly armed. Nothing more needed to register to prompt him to go for his gun.

  Then the fragrance hit him—or more accurately, the perfume. He was so close that even the conservative dabbing of it was enough to overwhelm his senses: she smelled like fresh flowers, spring rain, and a dark, rich hint of something like coffee or cinnamon (or both).

  Yeah. She.

  “Olive?” Levon croaked in disbelief.

  * * *

  “Levon?” Olive’s own whisper was less guttural, but no less harsh or demanding as he withdrew his hand. “What the hell are you doing here?”

  The equipment shed back behind the high school was the last place she had ever expected to encounter Levon Asher, yet here the man was: coiled to spring, big enough to fill the tiny structure with his formidable presence alone. She heard a tiny click and the rustle of clothes and a cold chill ran down her spine as she realized he was putting the safety back on his gun and tucking it away. That meant that before that moment, she’d had a gun pointed right at…well. Right at the part of her that he noticed at the same moment, as his hand accidentally brushed her recently swollen belly.

  “You’re…” His palm settled heavily on the baby bump, as if confirming, and then he staggered back as if struck. His right shoulder collided with the net of basketballs beside them, and Olive leapt forward to stabilize them before they got loose and cascaded to the floor.

  “Yeah. Surprise,” Olive said weakly.

  She was seven months pregnant.

  She was seven months pregnant with his child, to be precise.

  But she had questions of her own. “You didn’t answer me,” she pointed out. “What are you doing back in town, Levon? What are you doing out here?”

  “I could ask you the same.” His hand brushed against her stomach again, tentative and quick, as if he thought he could sneak it in without her noticing. She guessed he needed the extra proof. Not that Olive could blame him. It still took her by surprise sometimes when she caught her own reflection in the mirror.

  “You could,” she agreed. “But I asked first.”

  “I’m here undercover. I took that job in Arlington, and this is my first assignment. I’m staking out a gang here in town.”

  “Undercover? A ‘gang’? What?” Olive shook her head in disbelief. This was all too extraordinary… but then again…

  Occam’s Razor. The simplest solution was most likely the correct one. And in this instance, under these circumstances, Levon Asher had already supplied the solution for her. In the heat of their night together all those months ago, she recalled he’d mentioned interviewing for a job with some sort of security firm. If he was on assignment, that would explain why he was here. But gang activity? At her high school? There must have been some mistake.

  “It’s a long story.” Levon peered past her toward the door, but he had shut it effectively behind him. “But the short version is we’ve teamed up with local law enforcement to investigate some gang-related activity reported in the area. We think that activity is tied to a group calling themselves the Reapers.”

  “Well, I’m staking out this shed because I was out on a walk,” Olive said. “Minding my own business. But I saw some people heading out here, looking like they were going to make trouble. I…I thought graffiti, or maybe vandalism, so I figured I would provide an adult presence—just in case—”

  “I think graffiti is the least of your concerns here, Liv.” Levon steered her toward the front of the shed, pitching his voice low. “What’s more likely to happen now is a drug deal, or plans for a future drug deal.”

  Olive wanted to protest. No way that was possible, not in her town. Yes, she knew it was Levon’s town too, but he hadn’t lived here for years. He wasn’t a teacher at the school they had both attended, interacting with the students every day. He didn’t understand that there was no way something that big would just slip below the radar—especially not her radar—

  But as they listened to the muffled voices from their position at the doorway, Olive felt her heart drop into her all-too-noticeably pregnant belly. She didn’t exactly follow the slang being used, but it definitely sounded like the boys collected out on the foggy football field were planning an illicit drop of some kind. “Drugs? Really?” she whispered in true astonishment this time.

  “Shhh.” Levon pressed a finger to his lips and craned away from her. He posted himself up on the opposite side of the crack so he could get a better view. Still, Olive had no doubt they were both perfectly concealed in their shared hiding space. No way a former Navy SEAL wasn’t an expert at this sort of thing. “Can you make out what they’re saying?” he surprised her by asking. But then, he knew her hearing had always been especially sharp. He used to tease her about it—good-naturedly, as opposed to the other teasing she got—back when they were in high school together. She had often wondered if he was just using it as an excuse to catch up with her after class and double-check their assignments… but she had filed that away with all her other wistful fantasies about Levon and his intentions towards her.

  “Not really,” she admitted. “Bits and pieces here and there. They’re almost too far away, they’re using slang I can’t really follow, and I… this might be above my pay grade, honestly, if it is what you say it is.”

  “I can make out enough of it,” Levon replied. “May need you to corroborate what I’m seeing later.”

  Seeing? Was it possible he was actually reading their lips as they spoke?

  “Levon, I—”

  Then Olive heard a list of names spoken by the distant goons. And one particular name that hit her like a live wire. She started forward, fitting herself beneath Levon like the lowest rung of a totem pole; he had no choice but to move out of the way to ac
commodate her as she listened.

  “Olive—”

  “Shhh.” Now it was her turn to request a silence. “I need to try and hear what they’re saying!”

  “They’re discussing recruiting students,” Levon intoned. “Your students.”

  “Right. I need to know which students. I swear if they have plans to come anywhere near Franklin Monroe—”

  “Do you recognize any of those boys?” Levon asked as she squinted through the crack. Before she could respond in the negative—she was having a hard time making out their faces in the deepening darkness, and while the voices were vaguely familiar, they didn’t bring out the immediate recognition of students she heard every day in the halls or in her classroom—a blaze of light blinded her. Levon pulled her back behind him, shielding her with his body in preparation for an attack.

  But it wasn’t some passing person shining a light on them and discovering their hiding spot. Something, or someone, must have tripped the football field’s floodlights. Olive heard a shout, and edged her way around Levon and back to the crack in the wall just in time to see the figures scatter. “Shit!” She caught the curse between her teeth and let it die before it became more than a whisper. “We almost had them!”

  “Olive, I didn’t come all the way out here to ride in all by myself, guns blazing, tonight.” Levon sounded amused; more than that, he sounded patronizing. Olive whirled, but anything more she had to say in that second fled from her completely when she realized Levon was directly behind her. In fact, spinning around had planted her right against his chest, his face only inches from her own.

  “So… what now?” she asked him after a moment’s careful silence passed between them. Levon seemed oblivious to their proximity as he craned around her to get another look out at the field.

  “Looks like we’re alone, but I can’t be sure. We’ll wait it out,” he said.

  “And then what?” Olive prompted him. She wanted in on organizing a plan of attack. If those goons were actual gang members targeting her most vulnerable students, then she needed all the research information she could gather on that front.

  “Let’s keep focusing on the now,” Levon suggested. “Now you’re going to tell me what you’re doing here, sparing no detail.”

  Olive huffed. “Look, I didn’t know they were gang members, okay? I thought I was dealing with something a little simpler.”

  “You said a name earlier,” Levon prompted. “Who’s Franklin?”

  “Franklin Monroe is one of my students,” she replied. “I’ve known him for years. He’s been acting different recently—more skittish, I guess. And since those guys said his name just now, it has me worried that they might be targeting him for some reason.”

  “Olive.” The floodlights on the football field were bright enough to throw some light through the cracks in the shed. Enough that even in the claustrophobic shadows, she could see the intense blue of his eyes as he gazed at her. She knew what was coming, but there was no diverting the conversation away from it… not when it was physically wedged between them like a small planet. “Whose baby is it?”

  She didn’t want to have this conversation. Especially not in the field house, the place of countless pregnancy scares when they were growing up. Somehow, this felt like bringing a prophecy full circle—a prophecy she, a self-appointed nerd, had never expected to have a hand in.

  “It’s yours,” she blurted. “Honestly, Levon, it is. I haven’t been with anyone else since the class reunion, and there wasn’t anyone else for a while before, either. We can take a test if you—”

  “I believe you.” His voice took her aback almost more than his words; it shook, actually shook. He ran a hand through his unkempt locks, and she knew he was doing his best to process this new factor in his life. Believe me, big guy, I’ve been there. Olive wasn’t without sympathy for how he must be feeling. It wasn’t like he decided to knock up his old lab partner on purpose.

  “I meant to tell you,” she stressed. “Really.” She was still between his legs; she turned around fully, now, and grasped for his arm in the dark. “I tried getting into contact, but…”

  She trailed off, waiting for him to continue.

  But he just stared at her, wordless, and his silence made her more and more self-conscious by degrees. She had probably made a huge social gaffe by delivering her news here, now. The least she could have done was postpone it until they were out to dinner or something! But not as a date, God no. Not that she would say no to an actual date with Levon Asher…

  Now even her thoughts were spiraling into incoherent babble. Olive pulled her hand back from him, the same way she would if she had just senselessly placed it on a hot stove.

  “I… should go.” She had no idea what she was saying anymore. She probably sounded like an idiot, something she definitely wasn’t—but Levon Asher had a way of reducing her to a babbling fool. She turned to the door, pulling it open. She was desperate to look back, but she suppressed the urge. He would call her if he wanted to discuss this more.

  Wouldn’t he?

  Only ringing silence answered her private plea, and Olive took that as her cue to leave. Obviously Levon would at least say something if it wasn’t safe for her to walk away yet. She bowed her head, unable to fully conceal just how disappointed she was, and slipped outside.

  The floodlights had clicked off for now, but she knew this campus like the back of her hand. It was only a short walk back to the main street and, from there, to her house. She should be able to find her way easily in the dark. She pulled the collar of her coat up, and…

  A pair of hands seized her in the darkness.

  4

  Levon heard Olive’s stifled shriek, and it was exactly the wake-up call he needed to snap him back to reality.

  This was not the time to focus on surprise pregnancies, sudden fatherhood, and the swirl of emotions that threatened to storm him like he was the enemy beach and not the SEAL. It was time to bottle it all up and thrust it aside—he’d unpack her news later, along with the guilt at having allowed Olive to walk out of the shed alone in the first place.

  It took every particle of self-control he had in him not to kick the door down and burst out into the open after her; but his SEAL training took hold, and Levon listened. The instincts he had worked hard to hone had yet to steer him wrong, and had saved plenty of lives before this moment.

  Levon twitched the door to the equipment shed open slowly, steadily, using two fingers to ease the crack wide enough for him to slip through without making a sound. He tucked himself into the deeper shadows around the side of the structure and listened. He could pick up the muffled sounds of a struggle coming from nearby.

  What surprised him most was how they became less muffled in the next instant.

  “Listen, I… I don’t know who you are, and you’ve done a good job of concealing your identity.” Olive must have slipped at least partially free of her aggressor’s hands; she kept her mouth moving now, her voice gathering strength as that big brain of hers went into overdrive. “But I was just out for a walk alone. That’s… that’s all I’m doing. Just me and the baby.”

  The moon cast enough ambient light that Levon could see her captor’s posture go rigid. Evidently the man had kept his grip around her shoulders and mouth and hadn’t noticed the women he held was pregnant. Amateur. Levon allowed himself a moment’s distaste as he crept along. How do you not notice the woman you’re holding hostage is seven months along?

  “No, seriously,” she continued. “It might be hard to believe, but walking is good for your baby. Great, even. Even at seven months—which I’m at, by the way, not that you asked—I mean, I’m available to answer any questions if you have them. It’s just stunning, you know? It’s no wonder they write books and books about it. I’m not so much into the parenting books—not yet, anyway—but I’ve kind of been obsessing over the science behind it all. For instance, did you know introducing exercise while you’re pregnant helps protect against gestat
ional diabetes? I didn’t even know that was a thing. So once I read that, I had to step back a bit, and learn what gestational diabetes actually was—”

  Olive’s monologue seemed to be having the same winding effect on her attacker as a physical blow. Levon identified the man’s loosening grip, the awkwardness in the way he was standing—still holding onto Olive but almost gently now, carefully. Whether the other regretted coming after Olive because of her pregnancy, or whether he was just confused because of her motor mouth, Levon didn’t care to discover. But this did change his own tactic.

  Levon melted out of the shadows. He allowed his approach to be seen, only for an instant—they could do this one of two ways, but the outcome would be the same. Olive would be released. If the guy fought, Levon would take him down. If he ran—Levon would let him. All that mattered was Olive’s, and her child’s, safety; this concern overrode everything else, even a possible apprehension. Olive’s attacker saw him in that split-second; the man dropped his arms from around her and bolted, giving Olive a rough shove in the process. She stumbled, her small cry cutting off her Web MD-style lecture. Levon wrapped her in his own arms the next moment.

  “Shhh.” He cupped a massive hand to the back of skull and pulled her in. He could feel her quaking all over. If he hadn’t had it in him to kill before, he definitely did now—whoever was responsible for her scare was going to pay that fear back tenfold. “It’s me. I’ve got you now, Liv. You’re safe.”

  “Did you see him?” Olive craned her head around to look, but her attacker was long gone, vanished back into the surrounding treeline.

  “Not clearly. I’ll check the school security cameras later.” Though instinct told Levon the cameras wouldn’t have caught much in the dim light. If they were lucky, the cameras might have caught someone before it got dark out, but with the haze, it seemed like a long shot. “Are you hurt?”