“Honey. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have—”
“The boy’s mother came to see us. She wanted us to know what my father’s heroism had meant to her.”
A muscle bunched in his jaw.
“Even though she’d lost her child.”
“Yes. Like those policemen and firemen who lost their lives on 9/11. They died heroes.”
She was right. Of course they had. Heroes did the right thing. It was the determination to do that right thing that mattered.
But if a man wanted to do the right thing and didn’t do it, nothing else he’d done could possibly make him a hero.
“Everything was different after that. My mother— my mother couldn’t deal with his loss. Things went downhill. We lost our house and she—she changed.” She gave him a small, obviously painful smile. “He was a hero but I wish he’d come home to us, you know?”
He knew.
He knew, absolutely.
Heroism was in the eye of the beholder.
Coming home …
Coming home was everything. He’d known that from the beginning—but what if you couldn’t bring all your men home …?
“Breakfast,” Angie announced, and slapped two huge platters of food on the table in front of them.
Addison looked at hers. Two eggs, over easy. Bacon. Sausages. Biscuits.
Grits.
“Fry cook said he don’t know how to poach eggs,” Angie said cheerfully. “And turns out we’re all out of wheat bread.” She put her hands on her ample hips. “But I left off the home fries. Figured you was one of them health-food nuts, or somethin’.”
“Or something,” Addison said, still staring at the food.
“You try those grits, girl. They’ll put meat on your bones. Texas men like their ladies with somethin’ they can grab hold of. Right, Jake?”
Jake tried not to laugh.
“Absolutely,” he said.
Addison narrowed her eyes at him as Angie walked away.
He was the very picture of innocence.
And he was waiting.
Okay.
What were a couple of pounds compared to the challenge in her lover’s eyes?
She looked at the grits, picked up her fork and dug it into the cooked, coarsely ground corn.
“I’ll get you for this, Jacob Wilde,” she said, trying to sound stern as she brought the fork to her mouth.
Jake waggled his eyebrows. “God, I hope so.”
She glared at him. Then her lips curved and she burst into laughter.
“Me, too,” she said—and that was the moment when Jake realized that against all odds, despite the ugly reality of his life, his smart, sexy, sophisticated-but-trailer-park-tough Adoré was starting to mean something to him.
Something that scared the hell out of him even to contemplate.
They drove home with the windows down and the radio on, singing along with Willie and then Waylon.
Well, no, Addison thought, as Jake switched stations so he could harmonize with Johnny Cash. He was singing. She only hummed.
She’d never listened to country music before tonight.
Turned out, she liked it.
The lyrics were honest and real.
Like her Jacob.
He was a man who’d grown up with wealth, and yet there was no pretension to him. He was a warrior, and yet he could be tender.
But there was a darkness in him that had to do with the war.
Travis and Caleb hadn’t told her much, only that he wasn’t comfortable in the role of hero.
She could understand modesty, especially now that she knew him, but there was more to it than that….
“Addison?”
She swung toward her lover.
She’d been so deep in thought that she hadn’t even realized they’d reached the ranch and were parked in the driveway.
Her heart swelled at the way he was looking at her.
“My Adoré,” he said softly, and she stopped thinking and went into his waiting arms.
The first faint light of dawn, touching the bedroom with crimson and gold streamers, woke him.
Addison was curled against him, sound asleep.
Jake looked at her, drinking in her beauty, her honesty, her essence.
He had never known a woman like her.
No pretense. No girlish gushing. No treating him with breathless wonder because he was rich or because he was a so-called hero. No averting her eyes from his damaged face or displays of cloying sympathy,
He just made her happy.
God knew, she did the same for him.
He was happy. And he’d never expected to feel that way again.
Gently, he kissed her bare shoulder.
Then he rose from the bed as carefully as possible, so he wouldn’t wake her.
He pulled on his jeans, made a face when he realized that though they’d showered a couple of times, he hadn’t changed them in—hell, in however many days he’d been here.
He’d lost track of time.
Was it Sunday? Monday? It was important to know. Addison had told him she was leaving at the end of the week.
He didn’t want to think about that now.
He’d also lost track of the fact that his family might be wondering what had happened to him.
He stepped out on the porch, took his cell phone from his pocket and hit the speed-dial button for El Sueño. It was early, but he was counting on the fact that Lissa had always been an early riser.
She answered on the second ring.
“Hi,” he said, “it’s me. Just figured I’d let you guys know I’m still alive.”
“We came to that conclusion on our own, otherwise, we’d have had a call from the hospital or the police.”
“Liss. I’m sorry—”
“It’s okay. You’re a big boy, Jake. We didn’t expect you to check in.”
He rubbed his cheek. The scar under his eye was throbbing. It had a nasty habit of doing that when he did something stupid.
“You’re also an idiot.”
“Yeah. You’d be amazed how many people have told me that lately.”
She laughed. “Wanna bet?” Her tone softened. “You okay?”
“I’m fine.”
“But not fine enough to put down roots here, where you belong.”
So much for a softening of tone.
“Travis around? Or Caleb?”
Her sigh echoed through the phone.
“Trav drove to Dallas. Caleb had an appointment in Austin. Em and Jaimie are gone, too. They both flew back to New York. And I’m out of here in about half an hour.”
Jake ran a hand through his hair.
“Nobody waited for me? I mean—”
“I know what you mean. The thing is, we’ve been waiting almost two years. We love you like crazy but—”
“Yeah. I get it.”
“Do you?”
Silence. Then Lissa cleared her throat. “The General called. He said he wished he could have gotten home to see you.”
“I’ve heard the speech before.”
“Haven’t we all?” His sister sighed. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say he really meant it this time.”
“Yes,” Jake said flatly. “But you do know better. So do I.”
“So, what’s next? You’re still leaving town?”
Jake hesitated. He thought of Addison, asleep in the bedroom….
“Jake?”
“I—I’m not sure what my plans are right now.”
“Well, keep in touch, okay? And, Jake … even though we both know you’re a jerk, of all my brothers, I love you the most.”
He knew she’d meant to make him laugh, and he obliged.
“You know, kid, we figured out that routine years ago. It’s what you tell each of us.”
“Yes.” She laughed, too. “But at the moment I say it, I mean it.” She hesitated. “Come visit me in California, okay?”
“My sister, the chef to the stars.”
Lissa blew a raspberry into the phone.
“Your sister, the dork who gets to clean up the mess made by the chef to the stars.”
They both laughed, she made kissy sounds, Jake said he loved her and put his phone in his pocket.
He hadn’t asked Lissa what was going to happen to El Sueño.
If he didn’t run it, who would? Ranching was never simple but running The Dream was the equivalent of running a privately held, exceedingly successful corporation.
Horses. Crops. Mineral rights. Oil. And a seemingly endless list of businesses in which the ranch was invested.
The Dream had always been well-managed but there’d been a time Jake had been filled with ideas on how to do even bigger and better things with it.
Taking over as CEO would be his chance.
It would also be a reason to stay on in Wilde’s Crossing, take the time to see where this thing, whatever it was, with Addison was going.
Which was nuts.
It wasn’t going anywhere.
How could it?
There was no place in his life for her. Even he knew his head was totally screwed up.
Yeah, but maybe it wasn’t quite as screwed up anymore.
After all, here he was, thinking about staying. No guarantees, but—
But what?
What would he say to her?
Jake got to his feet.
Stay here. Don’t go back to New York. I don’t know what I’m offering you, I don’t know what tomorrow will bring, I only know I don’t want you to leave me….
Right.
That certainly summed it up.
He didn’t know this, he didn’t know that. The truth was, he didn’t know anything. He didn’t even know himself anymore, and neither did she.
Nobody did.
He hadn’t had the nightmare since he and Addison had been together, but what did that mean?
The dream would come back.
It always did.
The Blackhawk. The pass through the mountains. The flames. The explosion. The smoke and the screams and the sight of men being blown apart, and all because he hadn’t been where he knew, goddammit, he knew he should have been …
A pair of arms wrapped around him from the rear.
Jake spun around, hands fisted, lips drawn back in a snarl … and saw Addison, her face gone white.
“I’m sorry, Jacob. I didn’t mean to startle you….”
“No. I’m the one who’s sorry. I don’t know why—”
But he did. He knew why, that the nightmares, the trigger-sharp reactions, the need to keep moving before everything caught up and took him by the throat …
All of it had become part of him.
Walk away now, Jake told himself. His Adoré deserved a man who was whole.
Instead, he held out his arms. She went into them. He drew her close and buried his face in her hair. And when she lifted her face to his, he bent to her and kissed her and kissed her until nothing mattered but them.
The morning’s darkness faded away.
They drove into town.
At first, Addison was uneasy.
People recognized Jake’s Thunderbird.
They stared. And stood stock-still, taking it all in when Jake parked in the supermarket lot, took Addison in his arms and waltzed her to the door as music poured from the store’s loudspeaker.
“Jacob,” she blurted, “people will talk!”
“Let ‘em,” he replied, and he dipped her back over his arm when they reached the door, brought her upright and dropped a kiss on the tip of her nose.
Somebody cheered.
Addison blushed.
And then, without warning, she thought, He’s right. Let them talk. Let everybody talk. I don’t care.
Amazing.
That she didn’t care.
She always had, before.
A girl whose mother tipped over the edge of reason with breathtaking swiftness, who went from being a grieving widow to being the town joke in the pink trailer down by the railroad tracks, was a girl who grew up wanting to avoid being looked at by anybody and everybody.
She’d only gone home once after she left for college, and that had been to attend her mother’s funeral.
Nobody had recognized her. Or talked about her. Why would they? She’d learned to blend in.
Anonymity was her armor, until Charlie.
But she’d endured the talk and pointed fingers because she’d loved him.
Charlie, who’d been her friend.
Now, they would talk about her because of Jacob.
Jacob, who was her lover …
A tremor swept through her.
“What is it, honey?”
“Nothing,” she said, and she busied herself choosing a head of leaf lettuce as if the future of the world depended on it, because she couldn’t trust herself to say another word.
After all, what could you say when you’d just faced facts?
Jacob wasn’t only her lover.
He was her love.
They bought steaks and salad stuff, bread and cheese and wine. Then they drove a block to the Western Ware Shop, where Jake bought jeans and shirts so he’d have a change of clothes.
And though Addison protested, he bought her boots.
“There’s a law in Texas,” he told her solemnly. “It says, if you own a ranch, you have to own boots.”
The owner, who turned out to be the buxom blonde with the Dolly Parton hair and a nice person after all, chuckled and agreed.
By the time they headed back to the ranch, it was midafternoon. Just enough time, Jake said, to take a serious look around the place.
Unless she wanted him to saddle horses and take a ride—if she knew how to ride.
“Certainly, I can ride,” she told him.
Not really.
They went out to the paddock, where the kid who worked the ranch part-time had left the few horses the old man had owned.
Jake watched Addison eye the animals from all angles.
“You sure you can ride?” he said, not even trying to mask his skepticism.
“Didn’t I tell you I could?”
“When’s the last time you were on a horse?”
She sucked her bottom lip between her teeth. The sight almost made him forget all about horses.
“It’s been a while.”
Jake folded his arms. “Adoré. Answer the question.”
She shrugged. “A couple of years.”
“How many is a couple?”
She lifted her head, eyed him with defiance.
“There was a fair in town one summer. And there were pony rides….”
Okay. She couldn’t ride. Jake smiled and promised to teach her one day.
She smiled, too. It was his first mention of a shared future.
Old man Chambers had owned a decrepit truck. Jake filled it with gasoline, fiddled with the engine, started it up.
They spent a couple of hours, driving and looking around.
Addison glowed.
She loved the view of the distant blue hills. The antelopes that watched them, ears and tails twitching. The blush of early spring wildflowers. The creek that tumbled over a pile of copper-colored rocks.
Jake took mental note of all that needed doing. Fences required repair. Roads needed grading. Acreage where crops should have been growing needed tilling.
But if he shut his eyes, he could see what could be done here.
The land had all kinds of promise.
If a man knew what he was doing …
A man like him …
It was a foolish thought. He wasn’t staying in Wilde’s Crossing. It just—hell, it just felt so right, being here, being with his Adoré….
Jake stopped the old truck, made a U-turn and headed for the house.
“We’re going back so soon?” Addison said.
He nodded.
“I need you,” he said simply, and her heart seemed to dance because she needed him, too.
F
orever.
They made love.
And showered.
Addison dried her hair. When she came back to the bedroom, Jake was dressed in his new jeans and one of his new shirts.
“Ta da,” he said, turning toward her….
He’d left off his eye patch.
He had not been without it, even once. Not in bed or in the shower or while she slept in his arms.
It was so much a part of him that she’d forgotten it existed.
Evidently, so had he—until that moment, when he caught a glimpse of himself in the dresser mirror.
“Crap,” he said, and he clapped his hand over the empty socket.
Addison flew across the room, grabbed his wrist with a strength that shocked him.
“Don’t … you … dare,” she said through her teeth. “Do you hear me, Jacob? Don’t you dare apologize or cover your eye or do anything other than look at me and listen when I say it doesn’t matter. Your eye. Your wounds.” She dragged his hand from his face, kissed it, then held it tightly in both of hers. “Nothing matters but you. That you lived. That you came home. That I—that I—”
She was weeping. It took Jake a little while to realize that he was weeping, too.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
ADDISON MADE coffee, and they took it out to the enclosed back porch.
She sat in an old wicker chair. He stretched out on an equally old wicker sofa. They talked about the ranch, the sunset, and then Jake cleared his throat.
“Adoré.” A muscle knotted in his jaw. “I need to talk to you.”
Her heart skipped a beat.
“You can talk to me about anything, Jacob,” she said quietly.
He sat up and held out his hand. “Come and sit with me.”
She went to him and he tugged her down next to him.
“We have to get things straight,” he said, after a minute. “The hero thing, I mean.” His voice was low. “See, I’m not any kind of hero.”
What he’d said might have been modesty or humility, but Addison knew it was more. She bit her lip, determined to keep quiet until he’d finished.
“I told you that I flew Blackhawks.”
She nodded. She could feel the tension radiating through him.
“Blackhawks are big. Tough. They can handle mostly anything you ask of them. My men were the same. They were a remarkable bunch of guys.”
The Dangerous Jacob Wilde Page 11