One Tough Marine

by Paula Graves

  Jim smiled. “Luke here is family. And if you’re under his protection, that makes you family, too.”

  The urge to cry hit her like a physical blow. The handful of people she still considered her family seemed so far away right now, farther than just the few hundred miles between here and her hometown of Texarkana. She struggled against tears, concentrating instead on the solid feel of Stevie’s sleeping body tucked against her chest. His breath warmed the side of her neck, a potent reminder of what was at stake.

  She would endure anything to protect her son. He was her family now. Maybe all the family she’d ever have again.

  Jim had been right; the warm, fragrant scent of baking bread filled the air inside the house when they entered. A tall, rawboned woman emerged from the back of the house, smiling her welcome. She was in her early sixties, with an unruly thatch of rusty-red hair only moderately sprinkled with gray. She wore a pair of well-worn jeans paired incongruously with a bright green ruffled blouse.

  The adoring gaze Jim Patterson sent her way made Abby’s chest ache. “Told you we’d find her cookin’,” he said with an affectionate grin. “I swear, woman, you’re tryin’ to kill me off for my fortune.”

  Rita’s laugh was as bold and big as she was. “Hush up, old man, before you scare off the company. I’m Rita.” Her warm, welcoming gaze settled on Stevie, and her green eyes softened, along with her voice. “What a little sweetie!”

  “This is Stevie,” Abby replied.

  “I made up a bed for the two of you right in here. Let’s get him settled down, how about it?” Rita led Abby into a short hallway and opened the first door on the right. “We just turned this room into a nursery for our new grandson,” she said with a beaming grin.

  The nursery was small, painted with blue and white stripes, and furnished with a crib and a twin-size bed. Abby laid Stevie in the crib under a small blue-and-white patchwork quilt. He was restless for a second, then settled down to sleep again.

  “Luke’s sister is married to our son Riley, you know,” Rita whispered, picking up a photograph sitting on the night-stand by the bed. “They just had a little boy. Cody James Patterson.”

  Abby took the photo Rita handed her. It was a candid snapshot of a woman with shoulder-length brown hair and bright green eyes, her face pale and tired but her smile so bright it seemed to light up the entire photo. She lay in a hospital bed, a tiny, red-faced baby tucked against her shoulder, screaming his newborn fury at being pulled from the warm, quiet cocoon that had kept him safe for nine long months.

  At the woman’s side, gazing not at the camera but at his wife, sat a rangy, ruggedly handsome man with sun-bronzed skin and rust-brown hair. The adoration in his eyes brought stinging tears to Abby’s eyes.

  She’d given birth to Stevie alone, with a nurse and her obstetrician to witness his entry into the world. Matt was dead and Luke somewhere across the globe, neither the nominal father nor the biological one there to share the precious moment of Stevie’s first wailing breath.

  Had Luke known about his son, had he not been on active duty halfway across the world, would he have been there with her for Stevie’s birth?

  She had a sinking feeling she already knew the answer.

  “They’re a beautiful family,” she said aloud to Rita.

  Rita’s green eyes were warm with sympathy. “I take it you’re not with Stevie’s father anymore?”

  “My husband died in a car accident before Stevie was born.”

  “I’m sorry. That must have made your pregnancy such a difficult time.”

  “In some ways,” she agreed, not wanting to talk about Matt or the past. “Mrs. Patterson, thank you so much for taking us in. I don’t know how much you know about what’s happening—”

  “Only what Luke told Jim over the phone. You have no idea what these people are looking for?”

  Abby shook her head. “Matt didn’t tell me much about his work. I guess he couldn’t, legally.”

  “I think Luke’s idea to come here was sound, but I don’t know if you should stay here very long. If these people are as ruthless as Luke seems to think, they’ll eventually figure out he made a call to a man whose folks live right here in Yuma. We’d better figure out a way to get you safely out of Arizona and headed wherever it is you’re going.”

  “That’s just what I was telling Jim,” Luke said from the bedroom doorway.

  Abby locked gazes with him, alarmed by how eagerly her heart leaped at the sight of him. He’d been out of her sight for a matter of a few minutes, and she felt as excited as if he’d just returned from a long tour of duty.

  Don’t do this, Abby. Don’t fall back into this trap. It won’t end well. It can’t.

  Luke nodded his head toward the hallway, silently suggesting they take the conversation elsewhere. Abby gave the quilt around Stevie one more tug and a pat, then followed Rita out of the bedroom.

  They ended up in the cozy living room, settled around a coffee table where Jim had set a tray of sticky buns and a large pot of coffee. Luke poured a cup for Abby, adding a teaspoon of sugar and a splash of creamer, just the way she liked it.

  Their fingers touched as he passed the mug to her, making her hand tremble so much that she almost spilled the coffee. She set the mug down on a coaster quickly, dragging her gaze from Luke’s before her out-of-control emotions betrayed her further.

  “They don’t have another tracker on us anywhere,” Luke said. “I checked with the scanner as soon as we were out of the alley. It’s not likely they’ll figure out where we’ve gone for the next little while. But they’ll learn I made a phone call from the public phone at the motel, and if we’re right about how connected these people are, they’ll trace the call I made to Riley.”

  “If they do any snooping into Riley’s background, they’ll find us,” Jim Patterson added. He looked at his wife, his bright blue eyes apologetic. “Rita, hon, we might be gettin’ a visit sooner or later.”

  Abby’s heart sank. “Oh, my God. They will come here, won’t they? They’ll want to know if you have any idea where we went.”

  Rita reached across to pat Abby’s hand. “Jim and I figured out pretty quick what we were getting ourselves into, as soon as Luke called us. We’re not afraid of a little trouble.”

  Abby didn’t think Rita had any idea what kind of trouble might come calling. She turned to Luke. “We need to get out of here. Now. Before they connect us to the Pattersons.”

  “We don’t have a car anymore,” Luke pointed out. She could see from the worry in his eyes that he wasn’t blind to the difficulties they were bringing down on Jim and Rita Patterson, but the grim set of his jaw suggested that he’d made peace with the consequences, at least for the moment.

  How did he do it? Was it something the Marine Corps had taught him, how to live with the imperfect outcomes inherent in the sort of lives they led?

  Abby couldn’t be quite so sanguine. The thought of those two black-clad thugs making a visit to Jim and Rita because of something Abby had done— “There has to be a way to keep those creeps from finding out the Pattersons helped us.”

  “It’s too late for that, hon,” Rita said. “What’s done is done.”

  Abby turned desperately to Luke. “What if they get rough with them? You saw those men.”

  “They’re pros, Abs. And pros don’t start breaking fingers when a little deceit will do.”

  “If they come to question us, they’ll pretend to be law enforcement. FBI or something like that,” Jim said.

  “That does make sense,” Rita agreed.

  “It’ll make it much easier for them to believe us when we tell them where the two of you were headed when you left here,” Jim added with a grin. “We’re law-abiding folks. We wouldn’t dream of gettin’ crossways with the law. Hell, I might even draw ’em a map.”

  Abby slanted a look at Luke. “A map to where?”

  “They’re going to tell whoever asks that they sent us up to Wyoming to stay with some friends of the
irs up there. The Garrisons—Joe Garrison is a cop up there. Riley used to work with him.”

  “But since we’re not going to Wyoming—”

  “They won’t find us. But if anyone asks the Pattersons where we went, that’s what they’ll say.”

  “I’m going to call Joe first thing in the morning to let him know he might be hearing from some folks claiming to be from the government,” Jim added. “And that if he’s asked, you folks were supposed to come for a visit but never showed up.”

  Rita looked admiringly at her husband. “You’re a clever old fox, aren’t you?”

  Abby was overwhelmed by the eagerness of these two complete strangers to put themselves on the line to help her and Stevie.

  “Meanwhile,” Jim added, “I’d say we could all use a little shut-eye.”

  “Abby, I figured you’d want to stay in the room with Stevie. Luke, you can take the other guest room.”

  “Actually, I think I’d like to set up out here on the sofa, if that’s okay,” Luke suggested, glancing at Abby.

  He intended to play security guard all night, Abby realized. Out here in the living room, he’d have a better shot at defending the main entrances, just in case they didn’t shake their pursuers as easily as they’d thought.

  Rita and Jim exchanged a look. Rita got up from her chair. “I’ll get you a blanket and some pillows.”

  Luke thanked her and rose himself. “Jim, I really don’t know how to thank you.”

  “Your sister’s put me in your whole family’s debt,” Jim answered, his usually cheerful expression going deadly serious. “When Riley’s first wife died, it felt like we lost our boy with her. Hannah’s given him back to us. We love her like our own, and as far as I’m concerned, all you Coopers are family, too. So no thanks are necessary.” Jim held out his hand.

  Luke shook it firmly, his expression equally sober. But Abby could see the pain lining his eyes and wondered, yet again, just why he’d exiled himself so completely from the family he so clearly loved.

  She had the opportunity to broach the subject a little later, when Luke followed her into the nursery to make sure she had everything she needed for the night.

  “The Pattersons are good people,” she murmured as he bent briefly over the crib to check on Stevie.

  He turned his head to look at her. “Yeah.”

  “They sure love your sister.”

  “She’s easy to love.” Though he smiled, Abby heard a bleak note in his voice.

  “Why haven’t you been home in ten years?” she asked, deciding bluntness was the best approach.

  Luke remained silent so long that Abby began to wonder if he planned to respond at all. When he finally spoke, it was the same nonanswer he’d given her before. “I told you, it’s complicated.”

  She was inclined to press him for a better answer, but before she could speak, he asked a question of his own. “Did you stay in San Diego when you left base housing? Or did you return later?”

  She wasn’t sure why he was asking that question. Did he want her to admit that she’d stuck around San Diego the whole time, waiting for his return? She had stayed, but not out of any expectations where Luke was concerned. Matt had already taught her that pinning her hopes and dreams on an intelligence officer was a gamble she didn’t have the heart for any longer. Luke hadn’t even promised, in the letter he’d left on her pillow, to be in touch. It hadn’t taken her long to realize she couldn’t expect to hear from him again.

  With a tiny life growing inside her, she had no longer allowed herself the luxury of false hope.

  “I stayed in San Diego. My friends were there. My job prospects.”

  “Your doctor.”

  She nodded, her gaze sliding past him to look at her sleeping son. “That was also a consideration.”

  “I know I’d have been hard to track down, if you’d tried. But I wonder—” He stopped, his mouth pressing to a thin line. “I guess I don’t really have to wonder, do I?”

  She saw guilt in his eyes, darkening them to loamy gray-green. He regretted the bad goodbye, clearly. Despite her own sense of betrayal, the hurt she’d nursed through the past three years without him, she somehow didn’t doubt his remorse.

  She just wasn’t sure remorse was enough to heal the rift between them.

  “We were friends, Abby. No matter what else happened, that was real. Wasn’t it?” The intensity of his gaze sucke punched her. For a second, the gulf between them seemed to narrow to nothing, and she felt herself drawn to him, magnet to steel.

  She even took a couple of steps toward him, needing to feel his arms around her once again. It wasn’t even sexual, not this time, just a burning need deep in her gut for the security and comfort she used to feel when Luke was around.

  There had been a time when she’d felt as if Luke Cooper was her only real friend, the one person in the world who knew exactly who she was and what she needed.

  But as he took a couple of answering steps toward her, she stopped herself short, dragging her gaze from his. “We were friends,” she admitted grudgingly. “But so much has changed. I don’t think we can depend on being friends like that again.”

  Luke stopped a few inches away from her. “I guess not.”

  She made herself smile. “At least we get the chance for a proper goodbye this time, huh?”

  He stood there silently, not returning the smile.

  She let hers fade, too. “We should get some sleep.”

  With a nod, Luke headed past her to the bedroom door. “Yeah. Early morning.”

  “How exactly are we getting out of here, anyway?” she asked, the safer subject giving her the courage to meet his gaze again. “You never said.”

  He smiled, his earlier tension seeping from his features. “You’ll see in the morning.”

  She took a step closer to him, despite her earlier determination to keep her distance. The sudden light in his eyes sparked her curiosity. “Not even a hint?”

  He walked back toward her, with each step seeming to fill more and more of the small bedroom until he was all she could see. He stood closer than before, close enough so that, had she reached out her hand, she could have laid it flat against the hard muscles of his chest. She clenched her fists at her side to keep them still.

  He lowered his head toward her until his mouth was only an inch or two from her face. He took a slow, deep breath and whispered, “Not even a hint.”

  Then, brushing his lips lightly against her forehead, he turned around and left the room without another word.

  Abby groped her way to the small single bed near the crib and sank heavily onto the mattress, her heart pounding. When she lifted her hand to her mouth, it was shaking.

  How on earth would she be able to get through the next few days of 24/7 Luke Cooper?

  Chapter Six

  Luke woke near daybreak and found the Pattersons up already, moving about the kitchen in near silence, apparently trying not to wake him. He sat up and stretched, surprised by how soundly he’d slept, and said good morning.

  “Did we wake you?” Rita asked.

  He assured her that they hadn’t. “Please don’t go to any trouble,” he added, noticing that Rita was apparently about to cook breakfast. “We’ll do fine with cereal or something—”

  “She believes in a hearty breakfast. Once a Texan, always a Texan,” Jim said, as if Rita’s birthplace explained everything about her. Maybe it did. Abby was from Texas as well, her hardy practicality one of the things that had drawn him to her in the first place.

  When his friend Matt had swept Abby off her feet and married her within weeks, Luke had understood. A girl like Abby wouldn’t stay single long, and her sturdy sensibility made her an ideal Marine’s wife.

  He’d often wondered, especially these past three years, what would have happened had he met Abby first. Would he have been her husband instead of Matt?

  The Marine Intel lifestyle made relationships difficult—constant travel from conflict zone to conflic
t zone, or base to base, wherever his investigative skills had been needed. And now, with Cordero’s threat hanging over him like the sword of Damocles, he could never test the theory, even if they both wanted to.

  “Have you told Abby how you’re traveling yet?” Jim’s eyes twinkled as he handed Luke a mug of strong, hot coffee.

  “I thought I’d surprise her,” Luke answered.

  Jim winked and smiled. “I can think of worse companions to be cooped up with for the next few days.”

  Being cooped up with Abby and Stevie wouldn’t be nearly as enjoyable as Jim thought. Maybe Jim sensed the familiarity between him and Abby, the result of several years of closeness before everything had gone to hell. Time hadn’t erased the connection he felt to her. The second he’d discovered she needed him, there’d been no thought of saying no.

  But when it was over, he’d walk away from her again to keep her safe. There was no other option. Not as long as Eladio Cordero was alive and in control of one of South America’s biggest and most dangerous drug cartels.

  “Go see if Abby’s up,” Rita called from the kitchen, where the smell of cooking biscuits was making Luke’s stomach rumble with hunger. “She’ll want these biscuits while they’re hot.”

  Luke set the coffee mug on a coaster on the coffee table and headed down the hall to the nursery room. Pausing at the door, he listened for any sounds of stirring within. He caught the faint sound of happy babbling.

  His lips curving with a smile, he eased the door open and softly called Abby’s name. There was no answer.

  He slipped inside. Abby was still asleep on the single bed, curled into a knot under the blanket. Stevie was awake, standing in his crib. He gave Luke a lopsided grin that made Luke’s heart turn a flip.

  He crossed to the crib. “Hey there, Little Bit.”

  Stevie held out his arms. “Down!” he demanded.

  Luke picked him up and tucked him close, breathing in the soft baby smell with a helpless grin. “Good grief, son, that diaper weighs a ton. What were you doing all night?”