The SEAL’s Surprise Baby: Hartsville’s SEAL Heroes Book Two

by North, Leslie

The time in her bed suggested he was still attracted to her, but she didn’t know what that meant beyond physical pleasure. Could he give her more than that? She didn’t let herself imagine what shape that might take, because the temptation to believe they could be a normal, happy family was too great.

  “He’s been good to me, too,” she admitted after a pause long enough for her mom to raise a questioning eyebrow. “Very good.”

  After they talked a bit more, she disconnected. Her mom’s presence, even digitally, was always soothing. She was a practical, loving woman who had done her best by Violet. Violet knew she could follow her mom’s example and raise Nate on her own, but she wondered if that was her only option. Anderson might…

  She stopped her thoughts there, since she couldn’t predict what he would do. Nevertheless, she felt good about the possibilities.

  By eight that evening, any sense of harmony Violet possessed was shattered. Nate had been fine after his nap, but later in the afternoon, he turned fussy. At times, his cries became shrieks. He blew through diapers and outfits. She and Anderson took turns pacing the floor with him, skipping dinner altogether, while one of them took the baby and the other ran laundry and cleaned up the mess.

  Violet called her pediatrician, who assured her that all babies have bad days, and it was probably teething or something mild, since Nate didn’t have a fever. The pediatrician promised to check in again in the morning. That was only marginally comforting, considering Nate’s obvious distress.

  Finally too exhausted to cry any more, Nate rested his head against Violet’s shoulder and dropped into a sound sleep. From there, she managed to put him in his crib without waking him. She and Anderson waited, watching, until they were sure he was out, and then they retreated to the master bedroom. After flipping on the baby monitor, Violet sprawled on the bed in exhaustion, but Anderson paced the room.

  “That was awful,” he said.

  “But he’s okay, and it’s over.” She didn’t add that there would be other nights like this. That was the nature of parenting at times.

  “I’m not cut out for it.” Anderson’s voice was low but emphatic.

  “Cut out for what?” she asked, but she already knew the answer.

  Anderson gave her a bewildered look. “Taking care of a kid, being a dad.”

  “You did fine,” she argued, sitting up. Her senses told her that this conversation was critical for him—for all of them.

  “You don’t know.” He stopped pacing and faced her. “You don’t know how close I came to walking out the door tonight.” His face was pained, anger vibrating off him. She controlled her reaction to his mood, knowing that his anger was self-directed. It had nothing to do with her or Nate.

  “I think that’s a natural response to a crisis,” she said carefully. “Fight or flight. Since there was no one to fight, wanting to get away was normal.” She’d had those moments, too. Not this time, but a few months ago when Nate had been colicky and she’d been so tired.

  “I’m trained to think differently,” Anderson said. “I know when to fight and when to retreat, and I’ve never gotten that wrong. I had no idea what to do in this situation. If you hadn’t been here, I…” His lips pressed into a straight line as if trying to hold in his emotions. “Look, I come from a long line of shitty fathers. Tonight proved to me that I’m no better than they were.”

  She had to be very cautious about what she said next, so she took a minute. He seemed so lost, not at all what she was used to with him. He faced danger and difficulty with courage. She’d seen him do it. Fatherhood shouldn’t have the power to trip him up.

  She held out her hand to him and waited as he exhaled a long breath before coming to her. When he sat next to her, she twisted her body to face him.

  “I spent a lot of time analyzing what kind of dad you’d be, and I sold you short. I’ve watched you these past days with Nate. You’re good. You care for Nate, make him happy, and accept your part of the responsibility. Those are all fatherly qualities.”

  He shook his head and averted his eyes. She needed to do more to convince him, because he was so capable of being a dad. She’d seen the evidence with her own eyes.

  “Okay, take a look at it from a different angle. You’re cognizant of your failings, willing to admit that you were overwhelmed. Only people who are invested and dedicated to improving do that, because they know they aren’t perfect. But they want to be.” She hoped her argument made sense to him.

  “You have your mom to show you what a mother should be, but—”

  “You had no one,” she interrupted. He swung his gaze back to her. “You think I didn’t research you before we worked together in Moscow? Oh, I know about your family. Their dysfunction and how you pulled yourself out of that. You defied what some might have thought was your destiny. Our families, our genes don’t determine what we do or who we are. We do.” She tapped his chest. “You know that better than most. So it’s up to you whether you’ll be a good father or not.”

  He focused on where their hands were still joined, and she let the silence play out, even though she desperately wanted to say more. This was up to him.

  “I don’t know if I can be,” he said after several minutes.

  She wanted to reiterate her confidence in him. She didn’t think he’d be able to hear it right then, so, she changed tactics. “Okay, can you keep helping me, at least? Doing what you’ve been doing?” That would be a start toward him taking a role in Nate’s life and, maybe, hers.

  He nodded. “I’m trying to make things easier for you.”

  “You’ve done that.” She smiled at him. “We already knew we made a good team.”

  “We were successful,” he said, giving her a grin, “but it wasn’t always easy.”

  She laughed, thinking of their conflicts in Russia. “Partly because we’re both bossy, and we wanted to rip each other’s clothes off.”

  “That did create some tension.”

  “It created Nate, too,” she said softly. Her darling boy wouldn’t be with them if the attraction between her and Anderson hadn’t been so great.

  He didn’t respond in words but pulled her down on the bed and covered her body with his, starting a slow kiss. She relaxed as he kissed her lips and framed her face with his hands. His thumbs stroked over her cheeks.

  “I should be too tired…” she whispered against his lips.

  “Are you?” he asked, lifting his head.

  “Not at all.” She lightly ran her fingers up his back. They didn’t bother to talk after that as they slowly shed their clothing and moved together. Loving and kissing were all-important right then, which made this different from their other encounters. There was no hurry, no need to prove anything, nothing but a building desire that brought them together in mind, heart, and body.

  When he finally entered her, only pleasing each other mattered. They came together in an orgasm so joyful it brought tears to her eyes. While their bodies were still calming, he kissed her cheeks where the tears had run and she smiled at him, not having to explain that the tears didn’t come from sadness. He seemed to understand, and she’d never felt closer to anyone.

  Afterward, they spooned together with his arms wrapped around her. With his body tight to hers, she dropped into a deep, contented sleep.

  11

  Anderson rolled over and reached for his phone on the nightstand. The buzz of an incoming text had brought him out of a dreamless sleep. His need to rest wasn’t a surprise after last evening. Nate’s illness had been frustrating and exhausting, and the conversation with Violet afterward was one of the most blunt and emotional ones of his life. He didn’t know what to think of it. Making love to her, though, had been the highlight of the night, possibly the year. He didn’t want to admit there was something between them, but it was becoming increasingly difficult to pretend otherwise. She made him feel… whole, somehow. No one had ever had that effect on him. He hadn’t allowed them to, and he shouldn’t now. But Violet…

&nbs
p; He gave himself a shake and glanced at the text from Allen Zimmerman, one of Rogers’s men.

  New developments. Use Wiffy.

  Anderson got out of bed, for the first time realizing that he was alone. He listened for a second and heard Violet singing softly in Nate’s room. All seemed peaceful, so he went to the living room where he’d left Wiffy, the encrypted phone Rogers’s security company had placed in the house for them. A request to communicate via Wiffy was probably not a good sign.

  He hit the only number programmed in the phone and waited for it to ping off multiple cell towers, making it more difficult to trace or listen in to conversations. After a minute, Allen answered.

  “Thanks for checking in.” Allen got down to business quickly. “Our night-shift monitoring guys picked up some intel that set off alarms. We’re going to need you to move, but we don’t have a house available yet.”

  Allen went on to explain how Russian mob communication in the area, though usually low, had suddenly increased. Rogers’s team was looking into it. By itself that might not mean much, but the team had also followed some of the leads Violet uncovered regarding the data breach and had new concerns for their safety.

  “So what’s next?” Anderson asked. While listening to Allen, he’d prowled around the house, checking the defenses.

  “We need to get you packets of intel for Violet to analyze—and new IDs. I can’t risk dropping the material off directly to your location, because one of our techs found a worm in our system. He killed it fast, but it might be an indication that someone knows we’re working with you. I don’t want to lead the bad guys to your doorstep. You’re going to have to go on a little scavenger hunt and retrieve the items yourselves.”

  “Is that safer?” They would be out and exposed. Anderson wasn’t sure he liked that.

  Anderson heard the man sigh. “We think it’s the safest way, but you’ll have to watch your back.”

  “Seems a little cloak-and-dagger,” Anderson commented. “Is Rogers okay with this?” The method didn’t seem in keeping with the former SEAL’s usual caution.

  “His order,” Allen said. “Look, I know it’s… unusual, but it’s been a lifesaver in the past.”

  “All right,” Anderson agreed, since he probably didn’t have a choice. “Where am I headed?”

  “Wiffy contains a secure app. We’ll feed GPS coordinates and instructions to it one at a time. Once you retrieve one item, we’ll make the next available.”

  “Got it,” Anderson said.

  “Good luck—and be careful,” Allen said before hanging up.

  Anderson found the app on the phone and went to check on Nate who—thankfully—seemed fine, then told Violet the plan. She too questioned the unusual method, but it had started to have some appeal for Anderson. They’d get out of the house and be taking action, which was better than biding their time being sitting ducks.

  Half an hour later, they put Nate in the car and made their way to the first set of coordinates. Anderson took the elevator to the third floor of an office building in downtown Nashville. An office at the end of the hall had a mailbox attached to the door. What looked like an interoffice envelope was sticking from the box. Anderson retrieved it and retraced his steps to where Nate and Violet waited in the car. He hadn’t liked leaving them, even for a few minutes, but a single man entering the building would gather less attention than a couple with a baby.

  He handed the envelope to Violet as he climbed in. She undid the tie and pulled out a sheaf of papers while he checked the app and found a new message with the next coordinates.

  “I’ll read. You drive,” she said and began flipping through pages.

  “You’re enjoying this,” he commented as he wound his way out of downtown and made for the suburbs on the west side of the city.

  “You know I love assessing new information,” she said, not looking up.

  “Anything good?” Anderson asked.

  “It’s definitely Volkhov’s organization,” she said, “but the question is who’s calling the shots.”

  “Could be the Wolf himself, from prison.” That wasn’t unheard of in Russia, where the network of prisons was connected to the heart of the mob community.

  “True, but someone must be directing the activity here.” She flipped over a page and continued reading. “I like working with Rogers’s team. They know how to get the goods. I’ve got descriptions and all known info for Volkhov’s associates.”

  “Anybody ring a bell?” During their time in Moscow, they’d crossed paths with plenty of possible mobsters.

  “I’m looking.” She continued to sort through papers until they reached their next destination. There she’d have to participate, since the packet had been left in a fabric store.

  “I have no idea how to locate this,” he said, showing her the information on the encrypted phone. “McCall’s M7718. Whatever the hell that means.”

  She didn’t hesitate. “McCall’s is the company name, and M7718 is the pattern number. Patterns are all stored in drawers, organized in numeric order.”

  He gave her a confused look. “You sew?”

  “Me? No way, but I did help a friend pick out a pattern for a dress once.” She put her hand on the door handle. “I’ll be back in five.”

  She slipped from the car, and Anderson took a minute to scan their surroundings in the strip mall parking lot. Nothing seemed out of place, so he leaned over the seat to take a look at Nate. He was playing with his toes and looking around.

  “Why couldn’t you have been so calm last night, kid?” Anderson asked. Nate gave him a sloppy grin in response. “Never a dull moment with you, huh?”

  Violet returned to the car a few minutes later and pulled a white packet from a bag. The outside was printed with the image of a model wearing a fancy dress. Again, she emptied the packet into her lap and began reading as he checked the phone and started driving.

  “Our next stop is south of the city, at a house they’re thinking of moving us to,” he said. “They’ve stashed new IDs for us in a planter in front.”

  “Why aren’t we moving there now?” she asked without looking up.

  “I guess it’s occupied.” The message had said they were working on it. Rogers’s team had steered them right so far, so he had to trust their judgment again.

  Anderson kept his eyes on the road as they left the city and headed to a smaller town. He turned down a main street that looked like something out of an old movie, with its ornate façades and decorative light posts. Not a bad place to live. He turned off Main onto Pleasant Street and drove, keeping a lookout for number 343. He came to a stop sign and checked to his right. A black SUV sat at the curb.

  He tensed. Anyone could own one of those, of course, but he didn’t like coincidences. He turned left, his action catching Violet’s attention.

  “I thought the house was straight ahead,” she said.

  “It was. We might have company.” He kept his eye on the SUV, but it didn’t move. Probably nothing, but it was a good reminder that he needed to keep his guard up. Gathering clues in this way felt like a game, but it wasn’t one. He took a loop around the block and came at number 343 from the opposite direction. He pulled to a stop three houses down and waited. No sign of the SUV or any other issues. He didn’t like the location, though. The old neighborhood was beautiful but full of mature trees and tall hedges that blocked visibility.

  “Stay here,” he said to Violet. “I’m going to grab the IDs and be right back.” He got out and headed up the street. Number 343 was a blue bungalow that sat back from the road under the canopy of a huge maple tree. As he reached its front walk, he felt his phone vibrate in his pocket. He thought of ignoring it, but something made him reach for it.

  “The SUV just came around the corner,” Violet said as soon as he answered. “Look right.”

  He swung his gaze in that direction and saw the black vehicle approaching at high speed. It slid to a stop thirty feet from him. Anderson felt torn. His trai
ning and instinct made him want to confront the bad guy, but he knew it was important to complete the mission: get the IDs they’d come for.

  The SUV’s door flew open, and a man in black tactical dress jumped out. Down the street, Violet was honking the horn, trying to create a distraction, but his opponent never took his eyes off Anderson.

  A showdown. Bring it on, Anderson thought. And then he remembered the two people he’d pledged to protect. He hated backing down, but confronting this guy might put them at risk.

  With a dip of his chin at the enemy, Anderson turned and sprinted to the car. By now, Violet was in the driver’s seat and already had the vehicle rolling. He leaped in and they took off.

  “Evasive driving,” he said. “Take that corner.” He pointed ahead. “We need to get out of this little town.”

  Violet wasted no time getting back to a highway. All the while, Anderson watched out behind them. He caught a glimpse of the black SUV once, but they lost it easily.

  A little too easily, he worried. Did that mean the enemy didn’t need to chase them because he knew where they were going?

  It was a thought that made Anderson pledge to double down on security.

  12

  Anderson waved to Jeff next door as they approached the driveway of the safe house. He’d had Violet circle their current street in loops, checking for the black SUV, before he determined it was safe to return.

  “Out for a drive?” Jeff called when they got out of the car. “Beautiful day for it.”

  Anderson had been so focused on their mission that he’d hardly noticed the sun had come out after a cloudy morning.

  “The baby had a doctor’s appointment,” Violet said, “and then we enjoyed some time at the park.” She gave Jeff an easy smile. No one who heard or saw her would believe her words were false. She was a good operative.

  “Is he okay?” Jeff’s face held legitimate concern.

  “Oh, yes,” Violet responded. “He had a fussy night, and I was a little worried. New parents, you know how it is.”