Long moments later, once the swing had come to rest, he pressed a kiss to her damp hairline. “Come on, we’ve got to move.”
Limp, she slumped against him. “Unh-unh. Stay like this.”
“It’s not safe, sweetheart. The condom could slip.” He was surprised at how much, right that minute, he wished he didn’t care if it did. He wished this moment of joy, this sense of completion shared, could result in a baby. He jiggled her gently. “Lock your legs around me. I’m going to stand up.”
Using the old schoolyard trick of walking the swing back until his legs were straight, balancing her weight while getting his feet under him was easy; however, when Pickett’s feet touched the ground she lurched and wobbled against him. Jax dealt with the condom with one hand while steadying her with the other.
“Whoa!” she gasped with a shaky laugh. “Knee failure! I’m not sure I can walk.”
“Are you all right? Do you want me to carry you?” Not waiting for an answer he swept her up into his arms. Surprised, she clutched at his shoulders.
“Can you? Carry me, I mean? All the way to the house?”
He thought about the thirty yards or so to the door, her one hundred ten pounds. “Yes, ma’am,” he said with wry understatement. “I, a Navy SEAL, can do this.”
“Merciful heavens!” Jax bit the inside of his cheek at Pickett’s idea of a swear word. She dropped her arms and let her head fall back in a mock faint. “This is sooo romantic!”
A laugh rang out in the night. Rich, full-throated, masculine, deep.
He was still chuckling as he carried her, all soft and warm and sleepy, into the bedroom.
TWENTY-FIVE
A week later, when Jax pulled the Cherokee into the parking spot near the back door, his heart gave a little kick of gladness. It was good to be home.
Oh man. He almost physically recoiled. He’d better think over what was going down here. This wasn’t home, not his home anyway. Getting attached to somebody else’s home was the stupidest thing he could do. He knew. He’d done that before and paid the price.
Corey’s home, not the house Jax’s father owned, was the first home he’d ever known. When Corey was gone, it was too.
And the little house he’d shared with Danielle. Danielle had put so much of herself into it, fixing it up for the baby, it really seemed to be hers. Her home that he’d shared.
“Are we going to stay here tonight, Daddy?” Jax had Tyler unbuckled, and now he scooped him up to swing him to the ground. Since it made Tyler squeal with glee, Jax added a much larger swing than strictly necessary, then pulled the giggling child close for a hug. He nuzzled the little boy-scented neck and added a kiss.
Jax smiled to himself. He could hear Pickett saying, “Did you kiss him? You don’t want him to grow up thinking men don’t kiss men, do you?” Goodness me, no, he thought with soft sarcasm. Wouldn’t want that. But it turned out kissing Tyler was its own reward.
Pickett was always pointing out what he was teaching Tyler by his actions, but it seemed to him that Tyler was doing most of the teaching. For instance how much he liked hugging and kissing the little kid.
He was going to miss this. His heart contracted at the bleak knowledge that somebody else was going to get Tyler’s hugs and kisses. There was no use dwelling on that.
“Huh? Daddy? Are we going to stay here tonight?”
“Yes.” Jax would have thought it was obvious, but Tyler seemed to have a lot of questions about what was going to happen. The thought of how much Tyler was at the mercy or the whim or the careful consideration of the adults around him struck Jax with such force that he halted in mid-stride.
Did Tyler want to live with his grandmother? What would Jax do if Tyler said he didn’t?
“Do we live at Pickett’s house now?” Tyler’s question was an eerie echo of his own thoughts. “I like living at Pickett’s house. Can we stay here forever?”
“Don’t you want to live with your grandmother?”
“No.” With that single word it was as if a switch had been thrown and the Tyler of two weeks ago appeared. He stiffened, then wiggled to be let down.
Jax set Tyler down, but his arms felt … bereft. Tyler walked away without a backward glance. In a minute Jax heard him at the screen door calling for Pickett and Lucy.
Hobo Joe came racing around the house as fast as a three-legged dog could, his tongue lolling in a pink doggy-smile. The old reprobate looked glad to see them. Glad to see Tyler anyway. Hobo Joe had accepted Tyler right off, but still kept his distance from Jax.
Jax started for the door himself, but more slowly. Hobo Joe moved to stand in his way. The big old dog must be getting used to him. He never came this close. True, he was still outside arm’s reach, but closer than ever before.
“Hello, Hobo Joe. How’re you doing, fella?” The absurdity of asking a dog how he felt almost didn’t register. Pickett did stuff like that all the time, but he didn’t.
Being around Pickett was changing him. Changes he wasn’t sure he wanted to make. Like asking a dog a question. Like worrying about what he was teaching Tyler by his actions. Some of what Pickett said seemed pretty silly to him, men kissing men for example, but still he found himself thinking about it.
Hobo Joe took a step closer, yellow eyes fixed on Jax’s face. It felt like the dog wanted something. Hobo took another step, almost within arm’s reach now.
“What do you want, old boy?” He was doing it again, talking to the dog, but it felt right. “You want to come to me, but you’re scared?”
Moving slowly, Jax knelt in front of the dog and stretched out a hand, palm up. The same way Pickett said he should approach Tyler. “You look huge to him. You’ll be easier to come to if you make yourself smaller.” It worked with Tyler. Maybe it would work with the dog.
Hobo took another hesitant step, backed up, then came forward again.
“You want to, don’t you? But it’s pretty scary to even let yourself want it, isn’t it?” Jax continued to kneel, talking softly to the dog. “Everybody gets hugs and kisses and petting but you. You get plenty of food and a place to sleep. And it’s not enough anymore, is it? You let Pickett pet you but you never ask for petting. Is that what you’re asking for now? Well, come on. You can trust me.”
Jax knelt in the sandy driveway, hand outstretched with the absolute command of stillness. Though he didn’t do it consciously, he talked in the slow, almost uninflected rumble that gave his men confidence in tight situations. His senses took on the same heightened alertness. He was aware of the coolness of the breeze that barely touched his cheek, the whir of a late cicada, the salty, muddy smell of marsh, and the smell of the dog’s rough coat.
And he was aware of an odd resonance to his words, as if he were talking to something more than the dog. As if he were talking about something more than how the dog felt.
“Come on, old fellow. You can do it. One step at a time. You can do it.”
You can do it. There was another voice speaking to him in his head, saying the same thing he was saying to the dog.
Corey. It had happened so many times that Jax no longer questioned how or why he sometimes heard his dead friend talking to him. Though he knew if he told anyone they would question his sanity, he had learned when the voice spoke to pay attention. Usually it was just a word, or a short sentence: Stop. Look behind you. The meaning was usually crystal clear in context. But what did Corey mean now?
Do what? What can I do?
Keep Tyler with you.
I can’t keep Tyler. I don’t have any way to care for him. He has to go to his grandmother.
You can do it.
He wanted to. God knows, he wanted to. From the very beginning he had dreaded the moment of turning Tyler over to Lauren, even before he knew she drank, but until now he hadn’t acknowledged how troubled he was. Until he came to North Carolina, no, until he came to Pickett’s house, the distance between him and Tyler had seemed, not desirable, but somehow normal.
The log
istics would be a nightmare to work out, what with his erratic schedule and frequent absences, but to have Tyler right there to kiss good-night, to teach to swim and play baseball—hell yeah, he wanted it. Jax dragged air past the constriction in his throat. The kid needed a lot of work on his catch.
But Tyler was so little. He needed somebody twenty-four/seven. Maybe when he was older … uh-uh. Tyler didn’t want to live with Lauren.
You can do it.
The big black-and-tan animal was almost within the reach of Jax’s fingers now. With aching caution, yellow eyes never leaving Jax, he slid his gray muzzle under Jax’s outstretched fingers. Keeping all his movements slow and smooth, Jax stroked Hobo Joe’s head, fondled his ears, and as he crept closer, ran a hand across his back and down his flank. At last, he settled onto his haunches, laid his head on Jax’s knee, and heaved a huge sigh.
Pickett finished entering her case notes, and hit Save, just as the screen door banged. She heard the quick spat of Tyler’s sneakers on the heart pine of the entry, accompanied by the dogs’ clicking toenails. She just had time to swivel the desk chair before a compact little body flung itself against her lap.
“Pickett, Pickett, Pickett!”
“What, what, what?” Pickett helped him scramble onto her lap, straddling her knees. She gazed into the shining gray eyes and felt the connection zoom straight into her heart. She had an affectionate nature. She loved all the children she worked with, but not like this. The love she felt for this child filled her entire chest with warm, soft pressure, then overflowed into her throat and filled her eyes. Despite all the ways she had filled it up her life had been empty at the core before he came along. She would keep him forever if she could.
“We’re going to the fireworks!”
“Not today. Not for a couple of days.”
“Tomorrow?” They’d had this conversation every day since Jax bought tickets to watch the fireworks from the pier. Tyler anticipated the fireworks display with excitement usually reserved for Christmas. Pickett had even made him a little calendar so he could mark off the days. Yesterday, today, and tomorrow were the only time constructs he could really grasp, though.
“No, sweetie, not tomorrow either. But when the day comes, we will go.”
“Promise?” He bounced on her knees for emphasis.
She kissed the top of his head. “I promise, promise, promise!”
With the lightning shift of attention only children are capable of, he pushed himself off her lap in a sort of backwards leapfrog. “Gotta go!” He stuck the landing as well as any gymnast and raced for the bathroom.
Pickett missed his weight across her thighs even as she admired his superb coordination. Daily swimming lessons were paying off in physical confidence. It was like watching the real child emerge from a brittle shell.
He’d never talked about his mother again since that first morning, however. She’d waited for him to bring the subject up, but he never had. He didn’t act like a troubled child, but Pickett knew he still had feelings that would have to be dealt with someday. Pickett heard Jax’s footsteps on the porch and went into the hall to greet him, resolved to ask if Tyler ever talked about his mother to him.
Through the screen she saw Jax bend down to give Hobo Joe a slap of rough affection. Hobo Joe gave a long-tongued doggy-laugh and looked at Jax with shining eyes. So, the two roamers had found each other, had they?
A wise little smile played around Pickett’s lips when Jax, carrying a hot-pink Victoria’s Secret bag, opened the screen door, Hobo Joe at his heels.
“Looks like you’ve acquired both some lingerie and a dog.”
“The lingerie’s for you.” Jax handed her the bag while pressing a kiss to the top of her head. “I can’t have a dog, though. I haven’t figured out how I’m going to care for my kid.”
The smile took on a hint of sadness, but Pickett only raised her eyebrows in reply.
“Anyway,” Jax went on, “he wants to come in the house. Can he come in?”
“Sure. He’s always been allowed to come in the house. He just never wanted to before.”
“Are you saying he only wants to come in because I’m in?”
Pickett’s slender shoulders moved as if to say “what do you think?”
Jax scrubbed his fists across his hairline. “Damn. Come on, you big doofus. I’ve got to make a phone call.”
TWENTY-SIX
Jax flipped his cell phone open, closed it, and flipped it open again. He frowned at Hobo Joe stretched at his feet, closed the phone and returned to the kitchen, Hobo at his heels.
Pickett was rinsing snow peas for a stir fry with rice noodles, a dish that compromised between her dietary restrictions, a four-year-old’s whims, and an active man’s appetite. Though her kitchen was a far cry from the elegant waterfront restaurant Jax had taken her to in Wilmington, she was just as glad to be at home tonight. Talking about the fireworks with Tyler had reminded her he and Jax would both be gone all too soon.
She shook the excess water from the colander and dumped the green pods onto a paper towel. Selecting a red bell pepper and a paring knife, she cored the vegetable, lifted out the little white seeds, then began to cut it into strips.
“Pickett, can Tyler and I stay here?”
Stay here? He was talking about staying? Pickett’s mind scrambled to contain the hope that wanted to burst free within her heart.
“I’m not sure what you’re asking,” she said cautiously. “You and Tyler are staying here.”
“Just until I take him back to his grandmother’s. But that’s the thing, he doesn’t want to go to his grandmother’s and I don’t want him to go. So I’m asking, can we stay here until I figure out something?”
Pickett sneaked a look at Jax under her lashes. “Has something happened to change your mind?”
“Not one thing—a lot of things. I used to think anybody would do a better job with Tyler than me. When Danielle was alive and he was a baby, maybe that was true. I’m not so sure now. I’ve tried to deny it, but since her drunken phone call, I’ve gotta tell you, Lauren’s drinking has me worried.” Jax snagged a stool and dragged it to where Pickett was working.
“And I’m not willing,” he went on, “to see him once every few months at best. I let Danielle set the terms for how much I would see Tyler. She couldn’t handle it that I would make plans to come and have to break them, but call out of the blue and say I had free time.” He leaned more than sat on a kitchen stool, legs stretched straight. “Now that I know all I’ve missed, I don’t want to miss any more than I have to.”
Pickett’s hands stopped in mid-slice. Her mind ran ahead of what he was saying. “You mean you’re going to leave the SEALs?” Her hope, so long denied, was almost painful. “You’ll look for another job?”
“No.” Jax waved an impatient hand. “Being a SEAL is who I am. It’s what I do. But there’s got to be a way to have Tyler with me when I’m in the country.”
Disappointment, bitter and black, cold as day-old coffee, filled her mouth. If she could, she would shake herself.
She had known, from the start, anything they had would be temporary, and any love, one-sided. She had known she’d probably fall in love with him anyway, and God help her, she had. But she had always known how it was going to turn out.
Nevertheless, just for a moment there, she had allowed herself to believe he might decide to leave the Navy. To hope he wanted to stay. Forever.
“You don’t approve?” Jax cut into her thoughts.
“What makes you think that?”
Jax smiled crookedly. “You have a face that telegraphs every thought that goes through your busy, busy mind.”
Pickett focused on making absolutely perfect slices of pepper while she schooled her features into what she hoped was a neutral expression. “I don’t have a right to approve or disapprove.”
“That never stopped you from having an opinion before,” Jax drawled dryly.
Pickett laughed ruefully, and hoped the la
ugh didn’t sound as forced as it felt. “It’s true I have an opinion about practically everything. But I’m not the one who will have to live with the results of whatever you decide.”
“So what do you think?”
Pickett didn’t have one iota of objectivity to bring to this discussion, but Jax would keep on until he got an answer. She carved two more slices before she answered. “I think it will be very hard to provide Tyler with any sort of stability.”
“So you think he should go to Lauren’s?” He seemed determined to pin her down.
“I didn’t say that.” Pickett pushed a curl out of her eyes with the back of her hand, then leveled a look at Jax. “I can’t say what you should do.”
Jax took a step closer, crowding her toward the counter. “Are you being a therapist, now? Is this some of that nondirective bullshit?”
Pickett met his eyes with a don’t-mess-with-me glare. “I can’t separate who I am from what I do any better than you can.” She took a calming breath, made her shoulders relax. “But no, I can’t say what you should do, because I honestly don’t know.”
Jax took a turn about the room, looking out the window, hefting a knife, testing its balance. He pointed with the knife to Pickett’s cutting board.
“Tyler’s not going to eat the red pepper, you know. He’s not eating red food today. I had to take the tomato off his burger at lunch.”
Pickett shrugged. “More for me.”
“See, that’s what I like about you. Lauren … harangues Tyler for things like that, and a week ago I would have tried to make him eat it. You never fuss.”
Jax looked at the floor then turned worried eyes back to Pickett. “And I’ll tell you what else: Lauren seems to ignore Tyler, almost forgets about him, until he does something she doesn’t like. But it’s like you’re paying attention to him all the time. I’ll bet you know where he is and what he’s doing right this minute.”
Mary Margret Daughtridge SEALed Bundle Page 22