“Well. He did have the children here. I got what I came for. Please alert the FBI that we have him and we’re heading to the airport now.”
Molly pauses. “How’s Horse?” I smile. She knows of his harsh tendencies, too.
I snicker. “Having a blast!” I hear greaseball wailing down the hall. I cover the mouthpiece of the phone. “I said alive!” I bark out.
Horse laughs, the sound maniacal. “I said I won’t kill him!” I shrug and take him for his word. I recap the events and the timeline so Molly can take notes in case anyone has questions, which they rarely do, and have her ready arrangements for when we arrive back in Virginia Beach. I have to turn away when Van and a few other guys usher the children from the back room. Their wounded eyes are too much for me to bear. It’s easier for me to stare down a serial killer, a felon, a monster than it is to look a child in their eyes knowing that all innocence is gone. Why didn’t I find them sooner? Why can’t I save them all? Why are fuckers so, so horrible? I’ll say it one more time. I love my job.
Molly repeats the information back to me and then adds, “Oh, and Shoots like a Star called. She said she’ll be in Virginia Beach this weekend. She wanted to get together.” I cringe because I know what face Molly is making right now. Lainey and I have been in contact with each other since our meeting in NYC. Phone conversations have been polite and platonic. It’s been new and a distraction from my work. I turn around too soon and see the last of the children exit the room. A little boy who can’t be more than two years old turns and meets my eyes. I swallow and it sticks there. His face is dirty and his feet are bare and he clutches a rag like his life depends on it. I smile and wave, but his gaze faces forward as he continues his freedom walk. I want to tell him that I can empathize, that he’s safe now, but to him those are just words. I radio for Van to get the kids out of here first and as quickly as humanly possible. I can’t look at the little boy again until the vacancy in his eyes is replaced by something…anything else. It’s too familiar.
“Thanks, Molly,” I mutter, ending the call. I’ll need a lot of distraction as soon as possible. Lainey wants to get together. With me. I wipe the blade of my knife on a cloth and head for the exit. I don’t smell the sweat, the iron tang of blood, or even the stale cigarettes anymore. I smell her.
_______________
I hate the beach and seawater. Lainey knows it. The years of having a profession that requires early mornings dunked in cold water blossomed the hatred. She wants to get together at the beach. I know her game. She thinks if she invites me to the beach, I’ll be the old miserable, complaining stodge from the past. The thing about having years of your life stolen by captivity is that once you’re free, you don’t take a millisecond for granted. I live every one of them. Even the ones that coat me with a fine sheen of gritty sand.
Of course I see her before she catches sight of me and, oh my, what a sight she is. Her tight black shorts do everything for her. As does the form-fitted tank top. All her perfect curves are hugged, tight, and exactly where I left them. While I scrutinize every nuance that is Lainey, I can’t forget that all of her perfection isn’t mine anymore even if every ounce of testosterone in my body says otherwise.
Lainey smiles a cheek-splitting grin when she sees me waiting for her with a hot pink yoga mat tucked under my arm. Oh, yes, this woman knows exactly how to play the game.
She whacks me with her rolled up mat. “Mornin’!” Lainey looks me directly in the eye like she’s trying to convey so much more than a greeting.
I take in a deep breath. “Good morning. Man, do I love the ocean air. It’s so…fresh.” She narrows her eyes as she very obviously appraises me from head to toe.
“You hate the beach.”
“Do I?” I ask, raising one brow. Lifting the bottom of my black T-shirt, I pull it over my head. She ogles. I look away.
I hear her shift uncomfortably next to me. “Thanks for coming. I figured we could both use a little Zen in our lives.” Lainey clears her throat. I let my gaze wander to hers. Enough time has passed that I’m sure she’s looked her fill.
“How can I possibly tell you no?” I ask. Her clear, blue eyes grow wide. I’ve said what we both know as truth. I can’t, nor will she tell me no, either. “Shall we?” I extend my arm toward the water and the deserted beach.
Walking toward the ocean and the firmer sand, I unroll my mat and look at her. “You lead?” She tucks a wayward strand of her blonde hair behind her ear. She has these graceful fingers, long and feminine. When we were together she never had them polished. Each time I’ve seen her recently they’ve been a different shade of pink. After she rights her hair, she moves her hands down her body self-consciously.
Lainey swallows, smiles crookedly, and nods. She’s nervous. “Sure, I’ll lead,” she says.
“We’ve done yoga together a thousand times. It’s no big deal. We’re two friends hanging out. Don’t worry, I’m going to stay on my hot pink slice of beach and you’re going to stay on yours. No hanky panky.” I actually do need a good stretching after all the time in the gym I spend lifting weights. Every muscle in my body is stiff. Lainey bends over to adjust the corners of her mat and I realize now everything is stiff. Her fucking glorious ass might as well be naked and saluting me. It’s an odd sensation, wanting her like I do. It’s familiar, but it seems so taboo at the same time.
“Your man didn’t want to join? Let me guess. He hates the beach?” I sit down to stretch, reaching for one foot, and wince, and then the other. She looks over at me and the smile fades from her face.
“No,” she starts, but then pauses. “I mean, yes, Dax hates the beach, but I didn’t invite him. I guess I’m confusing him lately.” She lies on her mat, flat on her back, with her arms stretched over her head. Turning just her head, she looks at me. “I guess I’m confusing myself, Cody.” The doubt is there and there’s no running away from it.
I realize I haven’t taken a breath, so I exhale. It’s noisy. Even audible over the sound of the waves lapping the shore nearby. Before I can reply, Lainey switches poses and I follow suit, trying to decide what the fuck is going on inside her mind while bumbling with my big muscles. It’s a challenge I accept. I let her have this silence, planning to attack her with the question the second we’re finished. I can’t focus on yoga or releasing my ego or any of the other bullshit that is expected. I can’t be in the moment because of her proximity and she’s confused and fuck, is this my in? Do I throw caution to the wind and just kiss her senseless right here and really set the record straight? She won’t be confused after that; I know it for a fact. I go through the motions, pretending to zone out for the rest of the practice. “Down Dog,” Lainey says, her voice a hoarse whisper. Long blonde waves cascade on her mat as she lowers her head.
“How do you know I’m up?” I whisper. I am, because how can I not be when her ass has been in my face for the past twenty minutes. I haven’t been this close to her in so long that there’s no controlling my reactions.
A puzzled look crosses her face. “Huh?” She didn’t hear me. I snicker. She’s usually the one with all of the jokes. With a sigh, she falls back against her mat. I stay upright, mostly to be able to see her, and also because I want a good view of our surroundings. You can never be too careful, or too watchful. Paranoia set in the second I found out V is on the prowl. Ever so delicately, she lays her hand off of her mat, palm up in the sand in between us.
I take her hand and she squeezes it. “What do you want?” she asks quietly, her fingers stroking mine. Isn’t it obvious?
“What I want is quite simple and quite complicated at the same time. I want what I’ve always wanted.” Lainey sits up, keeping her fingers intertwined with mine.
“This,” she says, as she looks down at our hands, “was always an impossibility. I want you, Cody. And there’s no way for that to happen unless someone gets hurt.” You know that saying that ‘all’s fair in love and war’? It’s just not true because nothing about our situation is f
air. It’s fucked up. Lainey goes on. “Seeing you just makes me want to see you more and more, and how in the hell is that healthy for my relationship? I mean, Charlie Christmas, I’m getting married and all I can think of is the next time I get to see you and talk to you and you guessed it, be with you. This is why I didn’t want to see you. Deep down I knew this would happen. I’m so messed up in the head I couldn’t even work yesterday.”
Every bone in my body is shuddering in protest. I grab her other hand, so I have them both. “We should go, Lane. You should get back to him.” Can’t hurt him now, can we? I wonder if her parents like him as much as they loved me. Do they take family vacations together? Does she tell him about our time together like it was ancient history? Does he know how easily she could be mine? “I promised no hanky panky and I’m not sure how much longer my dog will stay down.”
Tears form in her eyes, but she smiles. “Namaste right here,” she quips. Shaking my head, I laugh. “For right now.” We talk for a while like that, hand in hand. She asks me about my aunt and my job, and if she can decorate my apartment, and if I have girlfriends. Lainey rapid fires the questions one after the other and I answer her honestly. She doesn’t bring up my years away. I can see when her mind veers there, but she shuts it down immediately. We start commenting on old ladies power walking on the beach and mundane stuff that couples always talk about. It’s time.
I ask the question that burns a hole in my mind. “Does he know?” Everyone has secrets. Lainey’s are paramount. Briefly, she glances at me and then away, her lips a drawn tight line. I can’t stay away from her any longer. Crouching in front of her, I force her down onto her back, my hands on each side of her head. Her breath hitches, and my own heart stammers. In the push-up position over her, I bend my elbows so I can get closer—to smell her, to feel her body heat against mine. Her lips part. She wants me to kiss her. I ask her again, “Did you tell him?”
Without hesitation, she simply says, “No.” When her beautiful eyes find mine again, I lean my forehead against hers and breathe her intoxicating scent into my body. It’s a moment I’ll always remember. Similar to the others that are vividly stored in my memory bank. Our first kiss and what happened directly following the kiss, the marriage proposal, the tearful goodbye before I left for the life-changing deployment. It was like she knew, but how could she? And now this: her reply of no means everything. More importantly, it changes everything.
It’s the moment I know without a shadow of doubt that, after all this time, she’s still mine.
He doesn’t know.
CHAPTER SIX
Lainey
I DIDN’T INTENTIONALLY keep the yoga date from Dax, but I didn’t tell him either. Of course I knew he’d be upset. I’m fucking everything up and at the moment I can’t find it in me to care as much as I logically know I should. Being with Cody gives me a feeling that I don’t get anywhere else. It’s strange. It’s electric. The absence of it makes me want it that much more. You know how some people have secrets hidden so well that they can convince themselves they don’t exist? I’m the owner of one of those. I think all of the small lies that aren’t really lies trickle into the blank space where the one we don’t speak of resides. Cody is the only one who knows. This just complicates everything now when I’m dealing with Dax.
I repeat myself one more time just to drive the point home. “I’m sorry, Dax. I am.” He’s shirtless, his tan muscles rippling every time he paces my bedroom. His blond hair is wet from a shower and the grit at the bottom of the shower is why I was caught. Yoga at the beach wasn’t enough of an explanation. He then asked with whom, and I would never lie outright. I told him the truth and he damn near blew a gasket.
From my perch at the end of my bed he is an angry mess. He stops in front of me, just far enough away that I can’t touch him. “You didn’t even plan on telling me. How sneaky is that, Lainey? What am I supposed to think? I’ll ask once more. Are you fucking him?” Ouch.
I look down at the floor. Not because I’m lying, but because I wish I was fucking him and I feel like a disgraceful asshole. “No. I would never cheat on you, Dax. Not even with him.”
“You say that like he’s a goddamn deity. Not even with him. I mean, fuck, what am I supposed to do?” he growls, bringing a big hand through his hair and pacing in front of me a few more times. He’s making me agitated. I’m not in a position to ask him to stop. He drops to a squatting position, his forearms against his thighs with his head down.
I don’t dare make a move to approach him. When he’s angry he likes space. Wide open space. “I love you, Dax. He’s just a friend. At the very least I owe him my friendship. I owe him.” More than Dax can ever know.
“Bullshit. If you thought of him as just a friend we wouldn’t be having this conversation right now. A smart man would walk away from this fucked up situation. I’m not wise when it comes to you. I’m merely a lovesick fool with hopes and dreams of a future with you. I’ve spent every waking moment for years trying to convince you of my feelings and then you of yours just to have them stripped away in a freak of nature occurrence. So just tell me now. Put me out of my fucking misery.” He looks up at me. Scooting off the bed, I kneel in front of him. It’s safe now. I can see his eyes soften. “You still love him?”
I put two hands on each side of his face. Honesty. This is it. This cut will be the deepest. I take one huge breath and another just for good measure. “I’ve never stopped loving him. How could you think I would be able to stop? That’s not fair. This whole situation isn’t fair! I can’t reconcile my future when my past morphs into the present. Dax, he was my future,” I explain quietly, my eyes imploring him to understand. How can he, though? Cody isn’t supposed to be here. I said yes to Dax. A knife blade twists inside my stomach. I said yes. I didn’t wait long enough. It’s my fault. I should have waited longer. I owed Cody that.
Dax looks away, pulling out of my grasp. “What now then? What do you want now? Let’s heap a little more unfairness onto this situation. Where do we go now?” His eyes rove over my body. He thinks he may never see me again. I lay my hand on his forearm. Dax’s eyes dart down to my touch as he gently pulls away.
Defeated, I say, “I don’t know.” It’s honest, at least. “There’s no manual on how to proceed when the dead love of my life comes back to life to meet the new love of my life.”
He arches a brow. I see the wheels spinning. “So, it’s a fair playing field?” No.
“You know I love you.” Not a lie. A tortured expression passes over Dax’s face. He sits back in a more comfortable position. I scoot closer to him, feeling every bit of pain that there is no way I can fix. I put it there. After everything he’s done for me, I’m causing him pain.
Quickly he takes my hands in his. “I can’t believe I’m going to say this.” He looks up at the ceiling and then his blue eyes meet mine again. He’s tortured and a jolt of unfamiliar uneasiness hits me. I actually have no idea what he’s going to say next. “Figure it out. However you need to do it. I’ll wait. It’s an even split. Fifty-fifty. What kind of person would I be otherwise? I won’t give you ultimatums, Lainey. I can’t live without you. Be with him if you want to, but pick me in the end,” Dax professes. His eyes shine; his bottom lip trembles the tiniest of fragments and I think that’s it. I can’t hurt his man any more than I already have. I have to live my life like Cody is still dead. That’s what a good woman would do. Me? I’m plain awful—a miserable combination of selfish and mean, nasty bitch.
“You’re serious? You would let me…” I can’t even say it. Sex. Fuck. Bang. Bump uglies.
Full lips in a firm line, he asks, “Fuck him? That’s what you want. First you want to see him and then befriend him. Fucking him is the next logical step. An easy step as you’ve probably already fucked him a thousand times before.” My hands are trembling as his words pierce my heart. Dax knew from the beginning that this is how it would go down and yet he accepted my decision to see Cody without question.
&
nbsp; I drop his hands. “Dax, please! I don’t want to hurt you. How can you even consider this? More importantly, what does that say about me?”
He shakes his head and looks past me. “The hurting has already commenced. This is just an easy way for you to figure out what you want. I’ll be as graceful as my patience and God will allow me to be, but I can’t make any promises. Do what you need to do and I’ll be here for you.” Roughly, Dax grabs my shoulders and pulls me to him. Without stopping to let me respond, he kisses me—his hands in my hair and his heart pounding against my chest. He’s here for me. He’s always been here for me. His tongue tastes sweet and his face smells like his soap and I’m immediately turned on. It doesn’t take long for my mind to fix things, though. My eyes flutter closed and Dax’s hands turn into Cody’s and the smell of soap is Cody’s cologne, and the way Dax kisses isn’t the way Cody kisses. Dax doesn’t bite my lip or tilt my head just so.
I pull away, breathless. “I’m messed up. I’m so messed up over this.”
He doesn’t make any moves to continue the kiss. He merely says, “I know.”
“I love you, Dax. I’m so sorry.”
“Why does that sound more like goodbye? I’ve taken every ounce of my testosterone and manhood and placed it into your hands. Don’t make this more difficult. I love you, too. You need to get your head on straight and unfortunately I think there’s only one way to do it. Spend time with him; whatever that means to you.” With that, he stands up and heads to the closet and begins riffling around and tossing things onto the bed. After years of being around Dax, I know exactly how upset he is right now just by the manner in which he tosses a T-shirt.
Why can’t I tell him to stop? That I want him to stay? That it’s him? Why can’t I tell him that he’s my everything?
Because he’s not. Not anymore. “I don’t deserve you,” I say, wiping tears from my face. “Please don’t hate me. You mean so much to me.”
The Crazy Good SEAL Series: Books 1-3 Page 62