Jax had experienced Lauren’s harangues in which she made it clear that she found him beneath contempt. They disgusted him, but he’d had no idea that Lauren’s hostility extended to Tyler.
“You hate the things she says to you?”
“No. I don’t really listen. I just p’etend.” Jax thought he detected a note of wily self-satisfaction in his son’s voice. “But she won’t let me play with my toys while she talks. That’s what I hate.”
Jax pulled into a service station and punched the automatic dial on the cell phone. Maybe Pickett could help him sort out what he had just learned from his son. A recording said the phone was temporarily out of order. He was thinking about driving to Wilmington where they could find a hotel when Tyler spoke up again.
“I want to go to Pickett’s house. I think she likes little boys.”
Jax started to explain why they shouldn’t take advantage of Pickett’s hospitality, then stopped himself. What the hell. He wanted to go to Pickett’s house too.
Pickett’s hands were protected by work gloves, and she was dressed in worn jeans and an over-sized shirt while picking up fallen branches from the yard. She looked lost in thought when the big, green SUV pulled into the drive. She heard the tires on the gravel, and waved one work-gloved hand. She dropped her load onto the pile she’d already made, and crossed quickly to the drive when Jax brought the car to a stop.
Jax slid open the window. “Hey.”
“Hey.” Pickett smiled. She looked glad to see them. Jax felt something in his diaphragm relax.
“The beach is closed,” he told her. “Nobody but property owners can go on the island.”
“I heard on the radio. I didn’t think the storm was that severe.”
“There was a wash-over in a couple of places. The highway patrolman said the biggest problem was sand blocking the road.” Now that he was here, he couldn’t think of how to ask her. “I tried to call you.”
“Yes. The electricity came back on, but now the phone is out.” Pickett moved her slender shoulders in one of her humorous shrugs. With him sitting in the high-off-the-ground SUV and her standing, their height difference was cancelled and their eyes were for once completely level. Her eyes were sunny-sky blue right now. “So what are you going to do? Are you going back to Raleigh?”
“No!” Tyler spoke up from the backseat. “We’re going to stay here!”
Pickett’s eyes flew wide with surprise, and sought Jax’s. When their eyes met, he felt a kind of ripple go through him, as if her surprise had transferred to him. Jax felt his cheeks grow warm. “I was going to think of a nice way to ask you.”
Her smile cooled. It was as if the sun had gone behind the clouds in her eyes. “Jax, I don’t know …”
Damn. That cloudy, wary look was back in her eyes. Even last night in the bathroom when he had rushed her, she hadn’t looked like that. He hated that he had put it there. But he wanted to stay here, and it wasn’t just that he dreaded the thought of trying to keep a four-year-old amused in a hotel. A hotel would have a pool and they’d be okay. Only, there was something about being here that was right.
No amount of training and planning could cover every contingency. SEALs looked for leaders who had good instincts. Oddly, just for an instant Jax felt like that was what he was doing: taking his team in a new direction because it was right.
“Pickett, don’t say no. I know we’ve already imposed on you enough. We’ll try not to get in your way, and we’ll figure out the sleeping arrangements for me and Tyler so you don’t have to give up your bed.”
“I know!” piped Tyler. “I can sleep in my room upstairs and you can sleep in Pickett’s bed with Pickett.”
The sensual image of that innocent statement jolted through Jax, compelling in its hunger and also confirming the sense of rightness. Jax struggled not to let the blast of sensual heat show in his face.
Jax shook his head ruefully. “You never know at what moment he’s going to start listening. But seriously, we’ll come up with arrangements you’ll be happy with.”
“I can’t say yes right this minute. I need to think it over, and we need to talk away from—” Pickett nodded toward the backseat.
“Daddy! Get me out of here. I need to go find Patterson and Lucy and Hobo Joe.”
Jax was out of the driver’s seat and reaching for his son in one smooth motion. As he worked the straps, he met Pickett’s eyes. “I’m not going to pressure you. We’ll talk. But I want you to know that that’s the first time he’s called me Daddy since his mother died.”
Drat and blast that man anyway! Pickett pulled the wet sheets from the washer with uncharacteristic, unnecessary force. When he left this morning she thought they had things on some kind of reasonable footing. He was interested, she was interested, he would call her. They would try things out sans child.
Now what was she supposed to do? How was she supposed to act? She hadn’t missed that hot look in his eyes when Tyler suggested—okay, innocently—they share a bed. Even now her stomach got on a fast elevator when she imagined lying on her bed, his dark face intent with sensual promise above her.
Pickett had never regretted her nerdy teenage years or the cum laude on her diploma more. All those years reading and studying, but she didn’t know what she needed to know right now. Every woman in her group at the base was better equipped to handle a situation like this than she was.
Suppose they went to bed together and it was a disaster? She would have to face him all the next day, and act normal around Tyler.
Pickett stuffed a towel in the dryer. It had smelled like him when she got it from the bathroom. So had the sheets.
He said he wouldn’t pressure her, and she believed him, but that wasn’t the problem. Actually it was the problem. Because if he didn’t come on to her again, how would she know if he was still interested?
What would happen if she made a move? This morning Pickett had faced the truth that her sexless state hadn’t been caused by disinterest. There had been guys, and a couple of professors, who had looked past her being overweight, or maybe liked a bit of cushion. And she had several male friends. The truth was she put out strong do-not-touch vibes any time a man showed more than friendly interest.
She was attracted to him in a way that she hadn’t allowed herself to feel in years, maybe ever. The trouble was she had no experience with flirty looks and come-hither glances. A bush-league player trying to start out in the major leagues.
Some part of Pickett was aghast at herself. Was she really thinking that the complication of a man staying at her house was whether or more precisely, how, to go about seducing him? A man she had only known for four days? She, who always told clients to go slow, get to know the person? A long-term, meaningful relationship couldn’t be jumped into.
Two factors were different here. One: she probably knew more about Jax in four days than if they had dated once a week for four weeks. Two: she wasn’t looking for a long-term relationship. Not with a man who was a SEAL. Every day she counseled families in crisis. In truth, many of the problems they came to her with, they’d probably have had in any circumstances. But every problem was made worse by the corroding effects of stress, long separations, rootlessness. That was the crux of it. Military families faced all the challenges ordinary families faced, but they lived under conditions that made the challenges harder.
Looking at her situation logically, though, although she certainly wouldn’t marry a SEAL, she would like to marry the right man and have children. For all her knowledge about relationships, however, she lacked experience. She needed a couple of practice relationships, before she tried to make so serious a choice.
Pickett didn’t like to think of herself as a user but Jax was perfect to practice on, really. The big reason he wanted to stay here was that he wanted her help with his child, and if he got a little sex on the side, that would be okay. He wasn’t likely to get his heart broken.
She felt better now that she’d put the decision on a ration
al footing.
“Pickett.” Jax stood silhouetted in the doorway. “What are you doing?” With his features obscured, the sense of his physical presence loomed even stronger. It wasn’t that he was larger than most men; it was that he was so very there.
Pickett gave an involuntary gasp. “I’m loading the dryer.”
“It looked like you were in a wrestling match without a referee. Take it easy on those sheets and towels.”
Pickett blinked at the accuracy of Jax’s observation. She had been wrestling with her thoughts and taking it out on the laundry. The sheets and towels, all twisted and tangled, were a pretty good metaphor for the state of her feelings.
“They’re all tangled.”
“Let me.” Jax reached in the washer and lifted the heavy, wet mass with ease, separating sheets and towels. Pickett placed them in the dryer as he handed them to her. “What’s the matter?”
“Louie asks me what’s the matter,” Jan had said in Group the other day. “Why does he ask? He ought to know. I just thought to myself, if you don’t already know, there’s no point in me telling you.”
“Hon,” Faye, the earth mother, spoke up, “the thing you gotta understand about men is that they are clueless most of the time. Even the good ones. Isn’t that so, Pickett?”
Pickett nodded to Faye while keeping her eyes on Jan. “Men and women think very differently. It is hard for a man to guess what a woman is thinking, and why.”
“Yeah.” Kim, who rarely spoke up, shifted in her corner chair. “The problem is they’ve got two heads, and half the time they’re trying to think with the one that doesn’t have any brains.”
Wild, raucous laughter greeted the dryly expressed witticism. Pickett thought it was time to redirect the discussion.
“Jan, what do you tell Louie when he asks what’s the matter?”
“I said ‘nothing.’”
“Was that the truth? Was nothing the matter?”
“I was mad, and it made me even madder that he had to ask. That’s why I said ‘nothing.’”
“Every woman in this room understands, but it’s the kind of thing that just makes a man crazy. Because he didn’t know what was going on, but he could tell it wasn’t the truth.
“So, he was clueless before, but now he’s clueless and confused.” Pickett moved to a different point of view. “Let me ask you this: did you get anything you wanted by saying ‘nothing’ when there really was something?”
“No, he just picked up the remote.” As one, every woman in the room sighed. “So you think I shoulda told him?”
“Relationships that grow despite lies and misunderstandings only work inside the covers of romance novels. In real life it’s like trying to make a chocolate cake by substituting coffee grounds for chocolate. It won’t matter if you do everything else right. It will still taste terrible.”
“Pickett?” Jax’s voice pulled her back. “Where did you go? I asked you what was the matter.”
“I was thinking about something that was said in an all-women therapy group the other day. We were talking about what to say when a man asks you ‘what’s the matter.’”
“You mean you had to discuss that? Women make everything so complicated sometimes.”
“Yes, and I guess that was what I was doing. Making everything complicated.”
“Let’s start over. I say what’s the matter and you just tell me.”
Pickett was having a hard time squeezing any air past the thundering of her heart. Suddenly the underlying reason for all her wrestling with her thoughts was clear. She was scared.
“Okay. The matter is: this morning everything was clear. You had your life, I had mine. We were attracted to each other. We would try seeing one another to see if we wanted to go any further.” Pickett closed the dryer and set the controls. “Now, we’re all mixed up together again. We’re living together. Except not. We skipped over all the steps. And I don’t know how to deal with it.”
“You’re attracted to me, hmm?” Trust a man to hear that part out of all she had said.
“You know I am. The problem is I won’t know whether you’re really attracted to me or if I’m just a convenience.”
“And you want ‘steps’? What steps do you want?”
“I want you to take me to dinner. Or dancing. Or both. And I want you to ask me.”
“Okay. I already did ask you to dinner this morning but I will again. Will you have dinner with me, Ms. Sessoms? If I can find a sitter?”
“Yes. And we’ll ask the White’s oldest girl, Virginia, to baby-sit.”
“You already had that part figured out, didn’t you?”
“Yes.” Pickett caught a glimpse of the clock. “Oops! My client will be here in twenty minutes. I’d better get moving. I still have to change clothes.”
Quickly, she gave Jax directions for using the front door when she was with a client. She was grateful for his ready comprehension of her client’s privacy needs. Fortunately, the arrangement of the rooms made keeping the therapy suite and living quarters separate easy.
“I think I’ll take Tyler and go into Hampstead. If he’s going to sleep upstairs, he’ll need an air mattress and a sleeping bag.”
Pickett nodded in agreement. “That probably would be best. I’ve had my eye on an antique bed for that room. Unfortunately, right now, I’m not ready to buy it.” Her eyes strayed to the clock again. Eighteen minutes.
“When will you be finished with your clients?”
“I have a private client now, then I have to go to Camp Lejeune. I work with a group for young mothers there. I’ll be back around four.”
“We’ll be back then.” Jax placed one finger under her chin and tilted her face toward him. He searched her face for a minute as if looking for something. He gave a tiny nod and dropped a kiss, light and quick, on her lips. Then he was gone.
Pickett stood in the mudroom, the dryer rumbling and thumping behind her, touching the lips he had kissed. What did a kiss like that mean? It hadn’t felt sensual, exactly, though the sensual promise was never far away. But, on the other hand, it wasn’t friendly, exactly.
For what probably wouldn’t be the last time, she wished she were more experienced, not so far out of her league. She stood there until the timer in the kitchen gave the fifteen-minute warning.
He could have told her what the kiss meant, Jax thought as he drove the Cherokee south on Highway 17, Tyler strapped in the backseat. It was sheer masculine possessiveness. Territoriality. Jax’s brow creased in consternation. Pickett constantly surprised him. She was such a perpetually shifting mix of cool, intellectual precision, and warm, humorous caring. Undeniably sensual yet unawakened. But what gave him pause was that around her, he constantly surprised himself.
He wanted her, sure. That was one sweet package she had put together. She wasn’t unusually pretty, but watching thoughts chase themselves across her intelligent face, and humor sparkle in her ocean eyes made looking at her face something he just liked to do.
Jax liked women. He liked their soft bodies, and the way they smelled. After a day around men, he liked women’s lighter, softer voices, and the way they laughed. And Pickett was all woman, pure feminine essence from her tumbling curls to her soft, round, pink toes. It was no surprise she turned him on.
But being a SEAL had been his life. Women were a convenience for him, a truth that hadn’t changed even when he was married to Danielle. He had never been physically unfaithful to her in their brief twelve months together, but neither had she ever been more than punctuation in the meaning of his life. He had learned his lesson and he made sure he picked women for whom he was equally a convenience. Someone to see and enjoy occasionally without wanting or expecting him to be part of their lives. So the surge of sheer masculine possessiveness had come out of the blue, surprising him so much that he had acted on his feeling without thinking, something he showed an alarming tendency to do around Pickett.
It was that focus thing. She had a way of focusing on what
you were saying, or just focusing on the fact you were there, and you knew you had her complete attention. Most people, even when they were really engaged, had part of their mind on other things, what they were going to have for dinner, a report that needed to be written, whether their wife would find out where they had been the night before. Others were busily trying to figure out how they could use whatever you were saying, what it meant to them or about them. Pickett’s attention was so simple and pure, so uncomplicated, it had the spaciousness of a Zen temple. At the same time it was so focused that it could hit you like a force.
When she was with you, Pickett gave one hundred percent. He couldn’t help but wonder what making love would be like with someone who had that intensity of awareness. How would she kiss him, what would he feel when she took him in her hands? His body tightened at the thought of those soft hands, touching and exploring. Then, when she had looked at the clock and said she had a client coming, the focus had disappeared. And he wanted it back! The kiss was about making sure she didn’t lose her awareness of him. Of making sure she knew, no matter who she was with, that her attention was his.
“Where are we going?” Tyler’s voice piped from the backseat. Okay. He had his own focusing to do. This was not about getting something started with Pickett. It was about living up to his responsibility to his son.
“We’re going to buy you a sleeping bag and an air mattress.”
“Why are we going to do that?”
“So you can sleep upstairs like you want to.”
“Why are we going to buy an air mattress?”
“I just told you.” Jax hoped this wouldn’t be one of those ‘why’ sessions. Learning that they were typical behavior for a child Tyler’s age had helped his patience, but he still found them exhausting.
“No. I mean why do I need an air mattress?”
Mary Margret Daughtridge SEALed Bundle Page 13