She quietly put Daniella in her crib, then went to corral the boys into their bedtime routine. Not until after three hours of chasing them; bathing the twins in the roman bath, bubbles and bath toys abandoned on the floor; a half hour of Sid jumping on the bed; dealing with Zachary’s new fascination with flashlights and Morse code; reading books to them all; Boy’s homework finally done; Dexter and Daniel’s sudden and desperate thirst and need of water; and Zachary’s rolling under his bed to sleep incognito — something he’d insisted on doing lately and had convinced Sid to do the same — did she fall into her own bed, too exhausted to undress. Though she must have dragged herself up to change because when she became conscious again, she was immediately aware of a few strange things. First of all, it was pitch black in her room so hours must have passed. She was in her nightgown — the one she’d left at the foot of the bed — and Daniella was sound asleep beside her, tucked below her chin. Jacob’s big body was firmly wrapped around her from behind; his heavy forearm lay diagonal and intimately between her breasts, his fingers on her shoulder, his elbow near her hip.
“It’s okay, honey, don’t move.” His gravelly drawl was right against her ear. “I brought her to you about a half hour ago. She started fussin’ and wantin’ her mama. Soon as I laid her down with you she settled and went back to sleep.”
Danika ran her hand over her baby’s fine hair.
“Figured it’d also make it easier for you to nurse her tonight.”
Danika smiled. “You never did mind the family bed.”
“No. I like my family right by me where I can see and protect them.” His fingers flexed on her bare shoulder. Her nipples tightened in response. Then they started to leak.
Daniella shifted and started to fuss, most likely because she smelled the milk.
Jacob ran his hand over her breast and circled her wet nipple. She could feel the smile in his voice when he spoke. “She’s hungry now. Has a nose for her dinner.”
Danika stroked Daniella’s head as the baby fussed louder. “That she certainly does.”
Jacob lifted onto his elbow, and gently pulled down the strap of her nightgown, she shifted and pulled Daniella to her exposed breast. Jacob put a hand on her hip and rolled them both so they faced him, the baby tucked between their bodies as she reattached on and suckled Danika’s breast.
Jacob stayed on his elbow, looking down at them both. He stroked Daniella’s hair, his eyes on Danika’s through the dark. Every few minutes he’d look down her body, then use his leg to pull her closer. “You have no fucking idea how much I’ve missed this. You. The boys. Now her. My family.”
Danika looked at the hardness and wonder that mixed in his eyes. “Jacob, I need to explain —”
“No. Not now.” He leaned down to her mouth and rubbed his lips over hers. “Tomorrow. We’ll figure it out tomorrow. For now, don’t talk.” He settled back and lay his head down, sharing the pillow that Danika used, Daniella still nursing, his hand back to stroking her small head. “So fucking beautiful,” he murmured over and over, kissing Danika’s lips and staring into her eyes before stroking his daughter’s hair. “Tell me you never stopped being my wife.”
She looked at him across the pillow. “No, I never stopped.”
“Promise me you won’t ever. No matter what shit’s happened. That doesn’t change. This doesn’t change.”
“Jacob.” How on earth could she promise that? So many things had changed over the past few months.
“Promise me, Nika. Give me your word again, right now.”
“There are things that have changed, Jacob.”
“This doesn’t change. I am your husband. You are my wife. We have six kids. We work through the rest but this right here does not change.” He locked eyes with her so she couldn’t look away.
“Okay. Jacob —”
“You aren’t wearing your rings.”
“They don’t fit anymore after Daniella. She changed my entire body.”
He shifted forward on the pillow and touched his forehead to hers. “Do not fucking leave me.”
*****
She’s gone. Jacob was already awake and had assessed his surroundings long before opening his eyes. He hadn’t wanted to, but he’d let Danika carefully untwine herself from his body and put Daniella in the bassinet in the corner of the bedroom. He listened as she’d gentled and quieted the baby but she hadn’t come back to bed. Back to him. Instead, she’d crept quietly, impressively so, around the room getting dressed before she’d pulled the door closed with an imperceptible click.
She thought she was getting away from dealing with him this morning, but she wasn’t. Only delaying the inevitable. They would get to the bottom of it and work through this cluster fuck of a past year if he had to bind and gag her and toss her into his truck. She wasn’t getting away from this running away anymore.
Guess we both have a cluster fuck to deal with back home. Geoffrey’s comment from back at the end of their mission made so much more sense now. At the time Jacob had barely listened to his brother’s ramblings about their women and wives at home. He and Danika were separated so he didn’t need reminding that his situation back home was fucked.
Jacob opened his eyes and stared at the ceiling. He needed to get a handle on exactly what this fucked-up situation was now, so he could unfuck it, and like any good spec ops soldier knew, he had recon to do.
Jacob opened his eyes and continued listening to the sounds of the house. Nothing from the bassinet, so his daughter was still asleep. His daughter. His heart raced with the knowledge. He had a daughter. A little girl. And though he should be furious that Danika had kept this from him, he couldn’t bring himself to be. What he wanted was to understand why, how? How the fuck did they end up in a place where he got her pregnant and not only did not know, she didn’t tell him.
He blinked at the ceiling, memories of his last operation skittering across his mind and twisting the relaxed state of stomach. His team had been called out on a strike that should have been simple. Target a piece-of-shit dictator who was wreaking havoc and had taken control over oil lines that were not his. Take him out and go home. But when they got there, they found things anything but simple. An unreported group of little girls were being kept in cages in the basement. Blowing the dictator’s compound was immediately out of the question, but the charges had already been set. Saving the girls became desperate. Within minutes, his team was in a life-or-death fire fight with caged little girls in the middle. His team had to pull out or die. He and his brothers had to stand by and watch as sixty little souls perished in a ball of fire. Sixty little girls. Gone. Their piece-of-shit captor having escaped.
For weeks his team tracked him. Weeks that turned into months. Months where Jacob was steadily tracking justice for the girls, but was equally losing track of his own family. His own little girl born without him.
How the hell had he let that happen? Let him and Danika get so far apart. Him so out of touch that his baby girl came into this world without him being there to catch her. All of his boys had been born into his hands. All of them. Now his daughter, his precious little girl, had come without knowing him, his hands, his touch, as one of her first sensations in life.
A shrill scream cracked toward him. Sid. Jacob shook his head. Fuck that kid was emotional. Completely like his mother.
“All right boys, reign it in.” Max’s voice came next.
Jacob’s stomach tightened at the sound. He rolled out of the bed and dropped to the floor doing his first hundred push-ups, breathing in and out, holding his anger in check, pushing out the tension that gripped his body at the sound of the other man’s voice.
Nanny. Housekeeper. Bullshit. The guy looked at Danika with a protectiveness that was out of bounds. Nobody stepped into the role of protector with his wife or boys without one hell of a fight. That role was his and his alone, and if Max wanted that right, then he’d better be prepared to earn it through one hell of a fucking battle and a shit ton of bloodshed, no
t a simple job offer.
Jacob pushed his body harder, starting another rep. He listened to the boys, now in full swing down a hall somewhere, their feet pounding as they hollered orders at each other better than any Navy drill sergeant. They’d grown so much. It seemed like just yesterday that Boy especially would cling to him for days after he got home, the others following suit, trailing behind him like he was Johnny Appleseed for at least a week before they got used to him being around.
When did that stop?
Daniella fussed in her bassinet. Jacob sprang to the balls of his feet and went to her. He picked her up and she quieted as he talked softly to her. She was such a trusting little thing, so confident that anyone who held her meant goodness, warmth, and reassurance. A world away from those little girls who perished. She turned her head against his chest, and tried to root against his nipple.
He chuckled. “Sorry, darlin’ I’m not your mama. You ain’t gonna get nothin’ out of these.” She pursed her little bow lips and stared up at him, wide brown eyes unblinking as he left the master suite.
The head. Jacob shook his head at the children’s lettering, clearly Boy’s writing, on the piece of neatly cut construction paper on the first door he came upon. “Boys?” He pushed open the door to what was definitely the children’s bathroom, strategically set on the landing between four bedrooms. One look into each room told Jacob whose bedroom was whose. Boy’s room was perfect. Spic and span, ship shape and Navy regulation bare. A desk. Nothing on it. A bookshelf. Everything arranged in a straight line. Bed made with hospital corners. Pyjamas, though only a peek could be seen, were folded and beneath his pillow. Closet door closed. Nothing on the floor.
Zachary’s room was … trying. Same furniture as Boy’s but the desk surface hadn’t seen sunshine in weeks, if ever. Clothes, presumably dirty, lay scattered and abandoned on the floor. The bed was made but told a tale of pulling one side only to have the other wrinkle or slide to the floor. The pillow was under the bed. The closet door was wide open, pushed that way from the various things falling out. Jacob closed the door. Sid didn’t even try to maintain his chaotic bedroom save for the neat line of gadgets and toys on his desk. Those were evenly spaced and labelled. Everything else looked like it had suffered an hour of mortar fire. And the twins, well someone else had started maintenance but had given up trying. Stuff was piled everywhere, most of which had fallen over, the items strewn from one wall to the door and out into the hall.
Does the Navy think I have all day to clean this place? It’s like shoveling the walk in the snowstorm. Danika’s words from — how long ago was that — came back to him.
Jacob closed the doors and padded barefoot to the kitchen. He looked at another piece of neatly cut construction paper stuck to, this time, the wall. Mess Hall.
He smiled then flattened his mouth at the sight of Max, wearing a chef’s apron around his jean clad hips as he piled food from the frying pan onto nearby plates. The boys were off doing some shit in the backyard, the dog barking happily as the twins ran circles around her.
Jacob looked back to the other man in the room. “How long you been working for my wife, Max?” Daniella tensed and fussed as Jacob pulled out a chair and sat down.
Max shrugged and kept serving the food onto the plates. “About six months. Same time my husband left me to go overseas — to become one of you.” He tossed the spatula in his hand into the sink.
Jacob blinked. “Your … husband?”
Max shrugged and took down a set of cups from the shelf. “Raymond joined the Marines after our unofficial wedding. Dumped me as soon as Hell Week was over. Said our relationship wasn’t fitting.” He turned and looked pointedly at Jacob. “You know.”
Jacob could only stare at the other man. Husband? A marine? What the fuck? Did he really want to know more?
“We have a son. Tomas. He was in Boy’s swim class. When Miss Danika mentioned she needed a nanny, I needed a distraction. She also likes my cooking.”
“You’re gay?” Jacob said carefully.
Max smiled. “Miss Danika said the boys’ father was clever.”
Jacob grit his teeth. “Where’s your son now?”
“School.” Max laid out the plates of food on the table, setting the one with the extra high pile before Jacob. “And I have heard plenty about you boys on the teams, and I am not interested in your wife.” He raised an eyebrow. “But you?” He looked Jacob over from head to toe.
Jacob pushed back from the table, Daniella startling in his arms. Max broke out in a huge smile. “She told me not to tease you but —” He breathed the words through chuckles. “I could not resist.”
Daniella started to cry at Jacob’s sudden movement. “I’m sorry darlin’,” Jacob rocked her, scowling at Max. “Very fuckin funny.”
Max held up a hand in surrender. “Just wanted you to know there is no competition.” He pushed the plate of food at Jacob. “Food is the best peace offering.”
Jacob looked at the food. He couldn’t deny the smell was beyond tempting. How long had it been since he’d had a home-cooked meal? Although he much preferred Nika’s cooking. He looked down at Daniella, still rocking and trying to quiet her. “You have something for her to eat?” He picked up a nearby fork. “Seeing as her mother is not here.”
“No. She left for —”
“No! Three times!” Zachary dragged Sid into the kitchen. “Daddy, tell him it’s three times on. Off. On. On. On.” He held two flashlights, flicking one on and off as he spoke.
“Give me mine back! It’s mine!” Sid shrieked at his brother.
“No! Not until you do it right!” Zachary held one flashlight over his head. Sid jumped up to reach it. When his brother went on tiptoes, putting the flashlight further out of reach, Sid crashed into his brother’s chest, the two of them falling to ground.
“Whoa, boys.” Jacob started to stand as Max grabbed Sid off Zachary’s body. The little boy was determined though, and held onto the flashlights with both hands.
Max pulled out a chair and directed the boys to sit. “They do this every day. All the time with the flashlights. On. Off. On. Off. Makes me loco.” He slid plates of food to each of the boys before setting the last one at the remaining empty place across from Jacob. “Eat. Bus will be here in ten minutes.” He opened the fridge and took out Daniella’s bottle.
“Daddy, check me out.” Zachary slid under the table and started flashing the flashlight on and off toward Jacob. “What’d I say?”
Jacob leaned beneath the table and pulled out his son. “Stop tormenting your brother Morse code style.” He examined the flashlight, then flashed it on and off in his son’s direction. “What’d I say?”
Zachary frowned and sat in his chair. “No fair.” He scowled at his food then at his brother.
Jacob looked between his boys. “So you’ve been practising.”
Zachary perked up. “I’ve been teaching Sid!”
“They’re total geeks.” Boy wandered into the kitchen and saluted his father before he got into the chair at the other end of the table. He stuffed food into his mouth. “Mama’s told them a million times not to— Ow!” He grabbed his leg under the table then reached over and tried to stab Zachary with his fork. “Freak!”
“So where is your mama this morning, Boy?” Jacob asked.
Boy turned his attention back to his father. “Work,” he replied around a mouthful of food.
“At her underwear job!” Zachary and Sid both piped in.
“Geeks!” Boy scowled at his brothers.
Jacob looked at Max, as he put Daniella’s bottle down in front of his plate. “Underwear job?”
Max held up his hands. “I … just work here.”
***
Jacob pulled his truck into the beach parking lot and got out. He looked at the blue and white striped cabana then at the nearby sign: Slightly Here and Bare Lingerie and Swim Shop. He scanned the shoreline, looking past the six surfers coming in, the three men and eight women walking o
n the sand, and the woman with three children piling out of a van, until he found what he was looking for near the pier.
He pulled out his mini field glasses and focused on the group of people obviously filming or photographing something as they gathered around his ... wife? When some of them shifted, a man going down onto one knee revealed Danika, prancing around in the middle of them, wearing what had to be the smallest, barely-there bikini. Everywhere he looked was his wife’s curvy body and dark bare skin, all but naked, on display.
Jacob’s mouth fell open as his dick became instantly hard. He lowered the glasses and stared. “What the fuck?” His wife had kept her knees together in absolute shyness right up to their wedding night. He was not only her first lover but the first man to see her naked. He liked it that way.
He put the glasses to his eyes again. There were four of them out there: two women holding equipment, one struggling with a white sheet panel, another positioning an umbrella. The one watched his wife intently and directed as she wiggled, stretched, lounged and rolled in the sand, the cameraman — the fucker — was on his knees capturing it all on film.
Jacob zeroed in on the photographer: some guy probably in his early thirties and dressed like a hipster, as he handed Danika a sheer white scarf. His wife held it up over her head and let it fly out behind her while she moved her hips and arms from side to side before she wrapped it around herself, then pulled it suggestively over her stomach, between her legs and around her thigh.
“Holy fuck.” Jacob’s dick pushed against the zipper of his cargo shorts.
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