by Nicole Helm
“We’re not a thing, Jack,” she forced herself to say.
“We’re not not,” he said so much more firmly than anything she’d said. “Regardless of anything that results from last night, I do care about you, Rose. I like you. And maybe I’m not the best judge of return feelings, but I do think you feel something back.”
She hated seeing a waver in his self-confidence. Last night he’d been so sure that they were destined for this, and now he doubted her feelings. She even knew why—Madison and his dick of a brother had planted the little seed that he might not be able to properly suss out when someone loved him or not. She should pounce on that. Exploit it. Make him think he’d read this all wrong. She could do it. If she cared at all about him, truly and selflessly, she would. But selfless had never been her style.
“I do feel something, but, Jack—”
“We’re in this together. Whatever happens. So if you want to…well, we could go to a doctor and talk about options.”
“No. No.” A doctor. Options. Firstly, it wasn’t possible. She was not going to be pregnant, and if there was that possibility… She thought about Summer trying and not getting pregnant, and yeah, life was about that unfair. Options seemed so wrong in the face of that.
“Rose, I’m on your team. Whatever this is. You have to know I’d be there for you and…” He swallowed. “You know me better than to think I’d walk away from you or anyone else.”
She looked up at Jack, so determined and sure. So certain. “You’d want…” She couldn’t bring herself to say it. She just couldn’t. She had to believe it wasn’t possible.
He took her other hand in his and pulled her closer to him. “A baby doesn’t scare me, Rose. I mean, it does, but not in the grand, big scheme of things. I always figured I’d have kids. I always wanted to eventually.”
Not like this. Not with me. She couldn’t make herself say that, because this was all so premature. She wasn’t going to be pregnant. It wasn’t going to come to this.
“Look, I have to get back to my family. I left them at Georgia’s, and you have work to do. I’ll meet you at your house after the bar closes, and we can talk more about it.”
“Jack.”
He leaned forward and pressed a firm, certain kiss to her lips.
“Meet me,” he said, and then he was opening her door and striding out of it.
She could chase after him and tell him no. Just no. She could not show up tonight. There were a million things she could do, but all she wanted was another night with Jack. What would be the harm with just one more?
You know the answer to that.
But she didn’t want to, so she pretended she didn’t.
Chapter 19
Jack had never in his life considered himself anything close to romantic. He was pragmatic, loyal to a fault, and stoic. But he thought Rose could use a little romance. A little finesse. Rose could use a lot of things, and for the first time in his life, he wanted to give someone those softer things.
It had felt good to tell his sister he loved her and was proud of her. It had felt good to tell Madison he would always be hurt by what she’d done. Cathartic.
The fact of the matter was, his family might not be the demonstrative, I love you type, but he’d always known they did love him and support him. They hadn’t been thrilled about his plan to join the navy and devote ten years of his life to military service before coming home to the farm, but they had supported him. They had never, ever spoken a word against his choices.
Rose’s father had beaten her when he’d lost a poker game. He’d beaten her and her sisters, period. Clearly, her childhood hadn’t been idyllic. She had her sisters, and they were some piece of her source of strength, but he wanted to give her more. He wanted to stamp all that wariness out of her eyes, and if it took candlelight and flowers and nice blankets, he’d do it ten million times over. If it took more, he’d do his best to find it.
First, though, she had to get here. It was already thirty minutes after the bar closed. For some reason, he couldn’t accept that she might stand him up. They were starting something here.
Maybe even a family.
He shoved that thought away. It was pointless to think about that until they knew for sure. Pointless to imagine, to let himself want things he probably wasn’t really ready to want. God knew Rose wasn’t, but he liked to think there was some possibility. He liked to believe they were inching toward digging out a space where a foundation could be poured.
It wasn’t like what he’d felt with Madison years ago. That had been a concrete foundation of his life. An accepted tenant. He loved Madison and would marry her.
Rose wasn’t concrete—she was all question marks and quicksand. He cared about her, but there were so many contributing factors, so many things that could twist and turn to make it all evaporate. He couldn’t take anything with her for granted, including her arrival tonight.
He hated that uncertainty. His life had somehow become an exercise in never knowing, in never being certain what the next step should be when he’d always been so sure.
Somehow, if he had Rose as a partner in that uncertainty, he didn’t hate the idea. Or even mistrust it. He’d follow it and her and these things that gave him hope wherever they led.
“If past Jack could see me now,” he muttered into the flickering candlelight.
He heard the faint mechanical rumble of what he hoped to God would be Rose’s car, because if he was hallucinating, then maybe he wasn’t quite as close to moving forward as he thought he was. Then there were footsteps on the stairs, a door creaking open, and Rose’s voice echoing through the crumbling hall.
“Jack?”
“In the bedroom,” he returned, swallowing down the odd flutter of nerves jumping into his throat.
She stepped into the doorway and froze, her eyes darting around the room. He’d set up the candles in various containers he’d been able to cobble together from the ranch and what Felicity sold at the general store. He’d bought three bunches of flowers as well and some vases, and Vivian had enthusiastically put them together in something that resembled artistry. Along with all that, he’d brought over a quilt his mother had made him after he’d joined the navy and some softer sheets from the ranch, and he’d spread them all out on the bed.
“What’s all this?” Wariness edged her voice, her gaze, her posture. As if she didn’t know how to trust a gesture or anything good. Maybe she didn’t, when it came to that. He’d seen civilians in war-torn countries have that same kind of look. When he’d been young and naive, he’d wondered what was wrong with them that they couldn’t see they were being helped.
Then he’d seen the gray moral complexities of real war. He’d learned that horrible things could happen, no matter how good or upstanding or brave you were.
He thought maybe now, in the shadow of all that, he could understand how Rose would only see a shoe waiting to drop. A grenade ready to explode.
The problem was, of course, he didn’t know how to fix it.
“Jack?” She still hadn’t entered past the doorframe.
“Sorry. Right, all this. Well.” He made an ineffectual gesture at the surroundings, watching the light flickering against her face, reflecting in those dark eyes. “Felicity’s had more candles than camping lamps, and I figured more light couldn’t hurt.”
“What about the flowers?”
He shrugged. “Thought the room could use some sprucing up.”
“The blankets?”
“I was cold last night.” He forced himself to smile past the nerves, because she never managed to keep up that closed-off facade when he smiled at her.
She stepped into the room. “Well, that’s a lot of work for a roll in the hay.”
“Then it’s a good thing I didn’t do any of this for a roll in the hay,” he replied, some irritation creeping into his voice. His inst
inct was to smooth the irritation away and ignore it. That’s what he’d always done with Madison, with his family—suffocate any irritation. But he hadn’t been doing much hiding of his negative emotions over the past two years, and he’d grown out of practice.
Maybe that wasn’t such a bad thing, as long as he started letting out the good too. Like telling Vivian he loved her and telling Madison how badly he’d been hurt. Maybe they were two balancing sides of the coin. Both necessary.
He stepped toward her, never letting his gaze waver from those wary, dark eyes. “I don’t like it when you diminish this,” he said, letting that feeling seep into his voice, his expression.
She raised her chin, defiant, even as he thought he saw a shimmer of tears in her eyes. “Maybe I don’t like it when you exaggerate it,” she retorted.
He reached out and cupped her face with his palms. Soft and warm, even as she aimed that sharp chin at him like a dagger. “Like it? Maybe not.” He swept his thumbs up and down her cheekbones. “But you feel it.”
Her lips trembled for only a second before she firmed them. In that wariness, he saw fear. True fear. His heart squeezed painfully, because he wanted to wipe it all out, take away all her hurts and fears, and he knew he couldn’t.
“If this is all because you think you accidentally knocked me up—”
“It’s not,” he said firmly.
“I don’t know how to believe that,” she said, and he didn’t know if it was an honest admission or a way to fight him off, but either way, he wasn’t cowed.
“Then don’t. Don’t believe it. Question it till the last, but I’m not going anywhere. I care about you, Rose. Knocked up or not knocked up. Whatever happens, I’m riding this out, seeing where it takes us.”
She closed her eyes, and a tear trickled over and down her cheek.
He lowered his mouth to it, kissing it away. “Why are you crying?”
She didn’t answer him. She stood stock-still, her eyes closed, and if he had to guess, he’d say she was willing away all those tears. So he kept his hands on her face and waited, watched and waited and willed for her to give. Just a little.
When she finally opened her eyes, they were free of tears, but she didn’t say anything. She rose to her tiptoes and pressed her mouth to his, sliding her arm around his neck and pulling him closer. She kissed him soft and sweet. Slow. It felt like she was giving him more than a kiss—herself or her heart.
“You win, Jack,” she murmured against his mouth as she met his gaze. “For tonight, you win.”
He didn’t have a clue what he’d won, but she kissed him again, that honeyed sweetness feeling new and hopeful, full of limitless possibility. So he lost himself in that, in her, and in claiming whatever it was he’d won.
* * *
Rose dozed curled up with Jack, in her crappy bed, in her falling-down house. Funny how the blankets Jack had brought over made it feel very close to cozy, even with most of the candles burnt out.
Funny how so very many things felt different with Jack around.
Okay, not funny. Downright petrifying.
Yet she didn’t wriggle out of his grasp or bolt from the bed. She was naked, warm, and far too happy for any kind of good.
This was a fantasy, a break with reality. Dawn—and real life—would be here soon enough. But she’d made a decision the night before. She’d take what she could from Jack, and when she was sure she wasn’t actually pregnant, she’d cut it off.
She’d be hard and cruel and certain. If she was lucky, Jack would see the truth of her soul before she had to do it. Even if he somehow missed it, she’d be strong enough to walk away. She’d always been selfish—why not embrace it? As long as it was temporary, Jack wouldn’t be collateral damage. He’d walk away with the chance to find someone better.
And if it turned out she was, by some horrible twist of fate, pregnant after one foolish night, well, she had a plan for that too.
One she wasn’t too interested in contemplating here in bed with him, where thoughts might turn to realities.
She hadn’t thought he was awake, but his fingertips had begun to trace the tattoo between her breasts. His scarred hands traveled gently over each card that had won her freedom. Given her power. And now he was a threat to both. Her freedom. Her power. Your heart.
She wasn’t going to worry about that. She would enjoy the moment, then start a new phase of her life without him. Maybe she’d even sell this place. Rip him out of her life completely.
She swallowed at the heavy lump in her throat. It’d give her a reason to hate him, anyway, having to give up this sanctuary because she’d let him into it.
“The bar isn’t your heart, you know,” he murmured into her ear, his eyes still closed, everything about him sleepy and relaxed.
The comment rankled, that easy way he declared things about her to be true. “You seem to be under the very false assumption that you know me, Jack,” she replied as haughtily as she could manage.
“I do know you. Not everything, no, but plenty.”
Which was the biggest problem with Jack. His certainty. The way he embraced the truths whether she wanted him to or not.
“If the bar was your heart, you wouldn’t need this place.” He opened his eyes, that cool blue so familiar to her now. It didn’t matter how often she lost herself in the depths of that pure, breathtaking color, everything inside her shivered to verdant, sparkling life each time.
She forgot, whenever she was away from him, that she didn’t seem to have control of much of anything when she was in his orbit. How had she ever thought she could handle him? How did she keep fooling herself into thinking she could do this and then walk away?
Because you are Rose Rogers, and you are stronger than this. There’d been some mantra Delia had chanted to herself when they were little girls. Something about a heart of steel. Rose had memorized it, whispered it to herself when she was alone and had something hard to face, but in the pull of Jack’s gaze, she couldn’t remember a word.
“Are you ever going to tell me what the feather tattoo means?”
She was actually glad he’d asked that, because it snapped the spell. “No,” she replied with a conviction even he couldn’t break. That was her reminder, her mark, and no one, not one other human being, would understand it.
He made a considering noise, but he didn’t let her wiggle away. He wrapped his arms around her instead and held her close. He didn’t cop a feel, didn’t even rub himself against her, though the stiff length of his erection was evident against her thigh.
No man had ever held her close like this. Like you just held a person because you woke up together. And okay, maybe she’d never really spent the night with a guy. The few times she’d allowed herself to be charmed into sex, she’d always vamoosed either once the act was done or once the guy dozed off.
She didn’t stay. She didn’t do it again. And she did not, God forbid, cuddle. Someone holding her was supposed to be stifling. It was supposed to feel awkward. She was supposed to want to make fun of an act as soft and pointless as this.
Mostly she wanted to cry again and stay here forever. What was this man doing to her? And why him? Was it the scars—internal and external? The sob story? Or just those eyes?
“Do you have nightmares?” he asked out of nowhere.
She shifted in his arms. “Why would I have nightmares?”
He kissed her bare shoulder. “PTSD.”
“Hate to break it to you, sailor, but I never went to war.”
“You survived your own hell,” he said so matter-of-factly, she couldn’t even think up a response. “War isn’t the only thing that stamps itself on you, and death isn’t either. You know, when I was in the rehabilitation center, someone told me foster kids suffer from PTSD at a higher rate than military veterans.”
“What asshole said that to you while you were in
a rehabilitation center?”
He shrugged. “Mike.”
“I’d like to wring that little fucker’s neck.”
Jack’s mouth curved into a smile. “I’d rather you didn’t. My mother likes you, but she wouldn’t approve of that.”
“Your sister likes me too.” Which she shouldn’t have said or even thought. What did it matter what his family thought? It was a fake like, for a fake her…but she liked them in return.
Except Dick Bag Mike.
“My sister worships you and might not care if you wring Mike’s neck.”
She laughed. Oh, damn him for having half a charming family. Vivian was adorable, and his parents were…
Well, she didn’t want to think about how lovely they were.
“You had your own trauma, Rose. I just wondered if it still bothered you. Nightmares. Panic attacks. I’ve done it all, so…”
Trauma. As though she were a victim. She had been, in a sense, but not like her sisters. They’d all looked after each other. They had put each other first at great risk to themselves. Only Rose had ever taken their father’s teachings to heart.
Always look out for number one.
“Just tell me the truth,” he said, and it was all gentle and impossible to fight him off.
The truth. She didn’t want to acknowledge the truth, but lying to Jack seemed so impossible. “S-sometimes. I’ve had nightmares. Rarely, but sometimes.”
“Mine have gotten fewer ever since I started talking. I told my sister I loved her last night.” He paused, rubbing his lightly stubbled chin against her temple. “I don’t think I’ve ever done that. And it was something. Telling Madison how much she hurt me changed something. I’ve still got scars, Geiger is still dead, Madison is still married to my brother, but…”
“But what?”
“See, that’s the thing. There didn’t used to be a but. It was a list of horrible, dark things, and it ended there. Everything was awful. Now? I still feel beat down by those things, by those hurts and scars, but…there’s a but. There’s more.”
She wanted to cry. For him. Because of him. She knew what it was like to have a but. Her sisters had always been that. It was so strange to realize that, over the past year as her sisters had been building their lives, she’d lost that but for herself.