Mia watched him hurry off. She’d never seen him so euphoric about a game before, which made her wonder if there was more to his happiness than met the eye.
A rush of suspicion suddenly coursed through her veins.
Had their mom somehow made contact with Danny?
Was that why he was in such a good mood?
She prayed that wasn’t the case, but she wouldn’t put anything past her mother. For some reason Brenda was determined to reunite with her children, particularly her son, and she was manipulative enough to use Danny’s teenage naiveté to wrangle her way back into their lives.
The notion was maddening, and it stayed with Mia all afternoon, bothering her so much that it was the first thing she brought up when Jackson arrived at the apartment later that evening.
“Do you think Danny has seen our mother?”
Shrugging out of his black Windbreaker, Jackson wrinkled his forehead, his whiskey eyes reflecting bewilderment. “I don’t think so. Why do you ask?”
Mia chewed on the inside of her cheek, barely returning the soft kiss he gave her as he joined her on the sofa. Not even his handsome face or the ripped arms poking out of his wifebeater could distract her from her troubling thoughts.
“She was here this morning,” Mia confessed.
“Seriously?”
“Yep,” she said flatly. “She just showed up on my door and demanded to be let in. Apparently she went to LA to visit a friend, and, I guess as an afterthought, decided to come see her kids. Oh, and she’s divorced again.”
“From the man she ran off with two years ago?”
“Nope, a different guy. Marriage and divorce number ten.”
“Whoa.” Jackson dragged his hand over his jaw, which boasted a five-o’clock shadow that normally would’ve made Mia’s heart pound. “So what does she want from y’all? Just to catch up?”
“I have no fucking idea what she wants. She claims she misses us, but that’s total bull. She’s been AWOL for two years, not a goddamn word from her. So why now? What could she possibly want?”
He reached out and took her hand. “Maybe she wants to reconnect with her children.”
Mia snorted.
“Maybe she woke up one morning and realized how badly she screwed up, and now she wants to make amends.”
“Well, if that’s what it is, then she’s a little too late.” Her teeth sank into her bottom lip. “I’m scared she might have made contact with Danny. He was super happy when he got home today—I half expected him to burst into song or something. I’ve never seen him smile so hard.”
Jackson’s hand stilled for a second before resuming its stroking of her knuckles.
“He’s always made excuses for her,” Mia went on. “Even after she deserted him, he refused to admit what a horrible person she is. What if he met up with her behind my back? What if—”
“He didn’t.”
She glanced at him in surprise. “How can you be certain of that?”
“Because I’m pretty sure I know why your brother is smiling like a fool and walkin’ around like the big man on campus.”
Wariness circled her spine, especially when she noticed the sheepish look on Jackson’s face. “What’s going on?”
He hesitated.
“Tell me.”
His broad chest rose as he inhaled deeply. “Okay, promise not to freak out—”
Her lips puckered in a frown. Any conversation that started with ‘promise not to freak out’ was bound to end poorly.
“—but I’m ninety-nine percent sure your brother lost his virginity this weekend.”
She gasped. “What? Are you kidding me? How do you know?”
The guilty flicker in his eyes was all the answer she needed.
“He told you?”
“Not after the fact. But he asked for my advice beforehand,” Jackson admitted.
Her jaw dropped, then slammed shut as her lips tightened in a thin line. It was a few seconds before she could speak again, and when she did, it came as an explosion of accusation.
“And you didn’t talk him out of it? You just gave him the go-ahead to have sex?” Her chest clenched with resentment. “He’s sixteen years old! He’s too young to be having sex! Why didn’t you try to stop him?”
Jackson answered in a calm, even tone, unfazed by the indictment. “There was no way to stop him, short of tying him up, sugar. Trust me, I was a teenage boy once. All those lectures about abstinence went in one ear and out the other.”
“Did you at least try to talk him out of it?”
“No.”
Mia stumbled to her feet. “I can’t believe you encouraged my little brother to have sex!”
“I didn’t encourage a thing. He’d already decided to do it before he spoke to me, and nothin’ I could’ve said was gonna change his mind.”
She spoke through gritted teeth. “But you didn’t even try. You say you’re my boyfriend, right? Well, my boyfriend would have tried to stop my brother from making the biggest mistake of his life.”
Jackson had the nerve to smile. “Believe me, Mia, having sex for the first time won’t be the biggest mistake of his life. And as I recall, didn’t you lose your virginity at sixteen too?”
“Yes,” she grumbled, “but I was very mature for my age.”
“Bullshit. You were a horny kid, just like Danny.” Jackson’s features hardened. “And I find it mighty insulting that you’re laying the blame for this at my door.”
He was right. Rationally, she knew it wasn’t his fault—Danny’s hormones were to blame—but she couldn’t seem to stop herself from lashing out at Jackson. She was still on edge from the encounter with her mother, but Brenda wasn’t here, and neither was Danny, and Mia’s anger and frustration needed a target.
Unfortunately, that target was Jackson.
“I think you should go.”
His mouth fell open. “Are you kidding me?”
“I’m not in the mood to hang out tonight,” she said tersely. “I need to be alone right now.”
“Mia. For fuck’s sake. Look, I’m sorry I didn’t hogtie your brother and throw him in the back of my pickup to stop him from gettin’ busy, okay? But you’ve gotta face the facts—Danny is growing up. He’s not the fourteen-year-old kid who got dropped off at your door anymore. He’s becoming a man, and sorry to break it to you, sugar, but sex is a part of that.”
She was stunned to feel tears pricking her eyelids. God, she never cried, and now she was crying twice in one day.
“Please, just go, Jackson,” she mumbled. “I really need to calm down and clear my head, and I can’t do it while you’re here.”
The frustration burning in his eyes was unmistakable, but Jackson was a gentleman to the core, and so he didn’t push her the way other men might’ve done.
Instead, he nodded curtly and stalked out of the apartment without another word.
14
“Seriously? This is the wild bunch we’ve heard so much about?” Duke smirked and started pointing to each SEAL, starting with Seth and ending with Ryan Evans. “Mr. Married with twins over here, McCoy with the serious girlfriend, LT with the pregnant wife, and Mr. I’m-getting-married-next-weekend. Pansies.”
It was Team Eight’s last night in San Diego, and the four party dudes of the bunch had finally convinced their Team Fifteen counterparts to join them for a night out. Jackson had initially turned down the invite because he was supposed to have dinner with Mia, but a major hole had opened up in his schedule after she’d pretty much kicked him out.
The last thing he’d felt like doing was going home to an empty house, where he knew he’d end up drowning his sorrows in a bottle of whiskey and stewing over their ridiculous fight. So he’d come to the Hot Zone instead, a nightclub in downtown San Diego, in the hopes that if he was surrounded by his buddies, he wouldn’t be tempted to drink himself stupid and show up at the base tomorrow with a massive hangover.
Except the second he’d joined the others by the second
-floor railing that overlooked the dance floor, he’d discovered that most of his friends were already calling it a night.
Carson set his beer bottle on the wide iron railing and shrugged in the face of Duke’s taunts. “Hey, just ’cuz my wife is pregnant doesn’t mean we don’t have wild and crazy sex every night. With that said…” He flashed a smug grin, his eyes gleaming in the shadows bathing the club’s upper loft space. “It’s time for me to go home and do some of that.”
Cash, Seth and Ryan followed suit, polishing off their beers in a rush.
“Yeah, I’m outtie too,” Seth announced. “My wife is a million times more interesting than you dumbasses.”
The foursome bumped fists with everyone and said their goodbyes, then headed for the wrought-iron spiral staircase that led to the main floor.
Jackson and Dylan were the only Team Fifteen members left, though Dylan’s presence was unexpected. The guy had barely left the house since Claire and Aidan’s return, so Jackson hadn’t expected to see him tonight.
Heck, he hadn’t expected to be here himself. All he’d wanted to do tonight was spend time with Mia, but the infuriating woman had sent him away.
And he was real ticked off about it, too. He understood why she felt the need to shelter her kid brother, but she was being naive about the entire situation. Danny was a teenage boy with a serious girlfriend—the two of them would’ve slept together sooner or later. At least Jackson had managed to drill the importance of safe sex into the kid’s head before he went out to do what he’d already been dead-set on doing.
No way was Jackson taking the blame for Danny’s decision, and he refused to beg and plead for Mia’s forgiveness. As far as he was concerned, she was the one who needed to apologize to him.
“So you’re the last two remaining bachelors, huh? Must suck losing your posse.”
Team Eight’s Max had to raise his voice to be heard over the loud house track pounding out of the speaker system. The flashes of strobe light illuminated his face and revealed the wry look in his blue eyes.
Jackson leaned against one of the floor-to-ceiling beams in the large, open-concept space and brought his beer to his lips. “Actually, Dylan’s taken,” he said.
“Very taken,” Dylan confirmed.
“So that leaves one,” Hunter remarked, glancing at Jackson. “You’re carrying the torch alone, huh?”
He shrugged. “Not really. I’m kinda seeing someone too.”
Or at least he had been, up until an hour ago.
“And he was never much fun even when he was single,” Dylan piped up. “No threesomes or fourgies for Texas. He’s a total prude.”
As the other guys cracked up, Jackson didn’t miss the sly grin Dylan shot him. Thankfully, the other man chose not to bring up the voyeur role he’d played in Jackson’s living room, proving that he was smarter than he looked.
“So where are your girls tonight?” Lancelot asked.
“Claire’s around here somewhere,” Dylan responded.
“She is?” Jackson said in surprise. “I didn’t see her when I came in.”
“She made a beeline for the dance floor the second we got here.” Dylan grinned. “You know I don’t dance unless I’ve had at least four beers in me, so she gave me permission to come up here and get loaded first. But I’m sure she’ll track me down soon to drag me out there.”
Lancelot glanced at Jackson. “What about your lady?”
He slugged back some more beer, hoping the alcohol might lift his spirits. It didn’t.
“She’s at home,” he admitted. “Actually, we got into an argument right before I got here.”
“Yeah? What’d you fight about?” Duke asked curiously.
With a deep exhale, Jackson quickly filled them in on everything that had gone down earlier. When he’d finished, he expected the Eighters to laugh and make light of the situation, but they surprised him by taking it very seriously.
“That’s bullshit,” Duke declared. “What the hell were you supposed to do, chain the kid up and forcibly keep him away from his girlfriend?”
“That’s what I said,” Jackson blurted out. “But she thinks I should’ve tried harder to talk him outta it.”
“Bullshit,” Max echoed. “You’re not the kid’s father. Not your responsibility.”
“Besides, you can’t stop a sixteen-year-old horndog from not acting on all that horniness.” Hunter’s dark eyes took on a rueful glimmer. “Dude, I’ve got a thirteen-year-old sister and I’m already dreading the day when some young punk tries to weasel his way into her panties. I’m prepared to shoot him down like a rabid dog.”
The resounding laughter was broken by a high-pitched whistle from Duke, whose gaze had focused on the dance floor below them.
“Sweet Jesus, check out that redhead. Dibs,” he said immediately.
Every pair of eyes followed Duke’s gaze, and when Jackson glimpsed the source of the SEAL’s admiration, he choked on a laugh.
It was Claire McKinley. And he had to admit, she looked hot tonight. A skimpy cornflower-blue dress hugged her X-rated curves and barely covered her thighs, and the strappy black heels she wore added several inches to her petite frame. With her reddish-brown hair loose and cascading down her shoulders, and her face flushed from the heat of the bodies filling the dance floor, Claire was hands-down one of the hottest women in the club.
“Sorry, bro, but she’s mine.” Dylan casually sipped his beer.
“Sure about that?” Duke countered. “Because Mr. Dimples seems to be staking a claim.”
Sure enough, Aidan Rhodes had come up behind Claire and was grinding against her ass, his hands taking more than a few liberties as they moved up and down her curvy body. The strobe lights flashed, revealing Aidan’s handsome face as he leaned in to whisper something in Claire’s ear. She responded with a laugh, then spun around and kissed him.
The Eighters burst out laughing again, but Dylan remained unfazed.
“Oh, don’t worry about him,” he said with the wave of his hand. “He’s mine, too.”
Four sets of eyebrows shot up.
“Huh?” Max said blankly.
With a faint smile, Dylan polished off his beer and slammed the bottle on the railing. “Gotta go, boys. I’ve got two drunk lovers to grind up against.”
As the blond soldier headed for the spiral staircase, Jackson noticed the expressions on the other men’s faces, and couldn’t help but snort.
“He’s joking, right?” Hunter said warily.
The question was answered when they all saw Dylan enter the throng of dancers and yank Claire in the middle of a Dylan-and-Aidan sandwich. Her delighted laughter rose over the pounding bass line and drifted up toward them. A moment later, Claire spun around and kissed Dylan with the same degree of passion she’d given Aidan.
“Son of a bitch,” Duke muttered.
“So he’s doing both of them?” Max demanded, looking impressed.
Jackson nodded. “The three of them are together.”
“For fucking purposes?” Lancelot drawled.
“For relationship purposes,” he corrected. “It’s unconventional, but they seem to make it work.”
There was a beat of silence.
Followed by Duke’s deep sigh of resignation. “Fine. I take it back. You Fifteeners are the wilder bunch.”
* * *
Mia’s heart raced nervously when a pair of headlights appeared on the road. She rose from the bottom step of Jackson’s porch and peered at the approaching vehicle. The hum of an engine cut through the darkness as his pickup slid into the driveway. Her pulse grew even more erratic
He was home. Finally. She’d worried she might have to wait out here all night.
The engine died abruptly, and then Jackson was striding toward her, his chiseled features creased with unease.
“What are you doing here, sugar?”
She swallowed a lump of guilt. “I came to apologize.”
His eyes softened. “How long have you been
sitting out on the porch?”
“Three hours.” She shot him a sheepish look. “I was on my way over pretty much ten minutes after you left.”
“For chrissake. Why didn’t you call and lemme know you were here?”
“I did. You didn’t answer your phone.” She bit her lip. “I figured you were avoiding my calls.”
He pulled his phone out of his pocket, checked the screen and cursed. “It’s dead. I didn’t even notice.” He sighed. “I’m sorry. I wouldn’t have stayed out this late if I’d known you were waiting for me.”
“Don’t you dare apologize,” she ordered. “And I’m demanding you retract your earlier apology, too.”
His lips twitched. “Oh really?”
“I’m the one who should be saying sorry. I was a total dick to you before.”
“Nah, you were just upset. I know you didn’t mean to be a dick.”
“I didn’t, but that’s no excuse.”
She climbed onto the top step so she could look at him without having to tilt her entire head. When she met his gaze, she hoped he could see the genuine remorse in her eyes.
The wave of shame and guilt had hit her literally two minutes after he’d left her apartment earlier. She hadn’t been kidding—she’d driven to his house almost immediately, and the frustration she’d experienced when she’d realized he wasn’t there had been twisting up her insides for three very long hours.
“I overreacted,” she said quietly. “I was pissed off about my mom showing up, and I took it out on you. I’m so sorry for yelling and for accusing you of encouraging Danny. It was never your place or responsibility to talk him out of anything, and I’m sorry for saying what I did.”
“Apology accepted, darlin’.” His smile was infinitely gentle. “And I’m sorry if I overstepped when I told you how to handle the situation.”
“No, you were right. I can’t stop him from having sex. All I can do is make sure he’s smart and safe about it.”
“Which he is,” Jackson assured her.
“Then I’m not interfering. And by the way, I’m not going to tell him that you broke his confidence. He doesn’t know that I know about him and Angie, and I’m not going to tell him.” She felt awkward as she added, “I really do appreciate your being there for him, Jackson. Aside from his coach, he doesn’t have any male role models. I know he likes you, and I think you’re a good influence on him, I really do.”
Out of Uniform Box Set: Books 4-6 plus 2 Bonus Novellas Page 75